A/N: Eew, plot.


The concept of certainty wasn't one that generally found itself a home in Blake's psyche.

Of course, that hadn't always been the case. The certainty that the world would be a made a better place had followed her throughout her childhood, immersing itself in her passion with every picket sign she created and chant she rallied. It had been false, martyred and bloodied by her attempts to merely stay alive, to keep her head above the waves as black as night that had rushed outwards to claim her once precious, peaceful organisation.

Adam had been another certainty, another reassurance to slowly lose itself to the darkening tides of their society. Leaving the White Fang behind in search of a better way had found itself her newest certainty, one accompanied by the drive to focus, to not waste her time on others and to be the best she could possibly be. That resolve too, had begun to crumble away, leaving in its place a dilemma that spanned her past and what could very well be the entirety of her future.

Perhaps a school wasn't the best place for her, considering her seeming inability to learn.

Doctor Oobleck's lecture, once holding every ounce of attention and intrigue, had long since faded to a piece of uninteresting background music. If the teacher had noticed her lack of attention, he hadn't commented on it, leaving Blake with nothing to do but attempt to re-rail her attention and, when that inevitably failed, ponder silently to herself whether she had been a stupid child or was a cowardly teenager.

She didn't question why her mind was then suddenly telling her to cut a circle out of a spare piece of paper, colour it silver, and hang it over Pyrrha's head in under five seconds, but she did anyway. Maybe it was just another Faunus thing, like the uprising of an insatiable urge to kill every time she saw a bird. That had ruined more than its fair share of pet stores.

In the end, it was the pages of her notebook fluttering up against the tip of her nose that startled her back to reality. It was the melancholic tone that spoke of wisdom and power that Doctor Oobleck had taken that she listened to, and it was the realisation that she would never get anywhere while thinking this over on her own that spurred her into action. Luckily enough for her, the ringing of a bell sounded in that moment, and Blake made her way down the stairs with every other student, waving her team onwards as she stopped in front of the only single desk in the room.

"Uh, Doctor Oobleck?" Blake would have winced if she weren't staring right into the face of the green haired Huntsman. Her voice sounded weak even to her own ears, pathetically coherent with that of a child desperately seeking guidance. All too fitting, had she not given up her childhood when she decided to take part in her first peaceful protest. "Can I discuss something with you? It's… it's important."

She could change the White Fang for the better. She could steer her beloved mentor back towards the light. She would attend Beacon and become a bridge between Faunus and human. She wouldn't grow close to anyone; she couldn't. She would remain a secret until she was ready.

Somewhere along the line, she really should have learned to stop making promises to herself. Granted, there had been a chance of her keeping that last one, until she was chucked onto a team with two of the most lovable sisters in the entire school… and Weiss, but even then that chance would never have been a good one.

She had seen good humans and bad humans. Just as she had seen good Faunus and bad Faunus. She had lived up and down that spectrum, laid witness to acts of hatred and kindness alike; it would be years until she would think to admit it to even herself, but she would never be ready.

And the rest of Team RWBY deserved more than that. In only a few short weeks, they were some of the best friends she could have ever asked for… and Weiss. A secret as big as her past would eat her alive, would tear apart the bonds they all shared like wet tissue paper. Maybe it was selfish of her to want after the atrocities she had once committed; living seventeen years embroiled in a war that nobody around her seemed to give a damn about stopped her from caring too much about that little aspect.

Repentance could be worked towards in her own time, but that wasn't fair to them. They needed to know, but as good as she was at reading them, Blake just didn't have any practice with using words. She needed help.

And who better than the only human she'd come across in her time at Beacon that actively protected the Faunus from discrimination? Who better than someone else who knew what it felt like to fight a war that had no end in feasible sight beyond extinction?

Oobleck took a sip from his mug (that had a pretty blue flower on the front), glancing at her over the rim; more specifically, at her bow. The last of her classmates had trickled out of the room, all with various lacking degrees of enthusiasm, a mug (that had a pretty blue flower on the front), causing one student who'd been attempting to re-enter the room to give a loud shriek or pure terror and immediately flee in the opposite direction. With a slight incline of his head, Oobleck leant against his desk, gesturing for Blake to continue with a vague wave of his hand.

Blake took a breath, letting it out slowly as she contemplated just what she would say. Ousting herself as a former terrorist would see her into a prison cell faster than even Oobleck could move, which she really didn't want, regardless of the fact that behind bars was probably where she should have been. But that was the entire point of the conversation, so what did that honestly leave her? Running for the door with her proverbial tail between her legs?

No, not this time. Beacon was her one and only chance; if and when everything about her came to light, there was no chance that it wasn't at least going to be on her own terms.

It was in that moment that Blake could truly appreciate a favourite adage from an old White Fang colleague of hers', the exact same moment that she found the end of her ribbon and pulled it free.

'Fuck everything'.

XxX

Jaune wasn't entirely sure how to proceed in the situation he'd found himself in.

In his experience, when somebody asked another person if they could talk about something important, that topic was generally one which should be kept as far out of the public spotlight as possible. So when Blake's voice echoed through the now mostly empty room and reached his ears, he found himself stuck between a rock and a hard place.

Figuratively speaking, of course. He was still underneath his desk so he could gather the last of his supplies, so really, he was more stuck between a desk and another desk that were probably about the same molecular density. But that wasn't the point.

He didn't want to be here right now. Most other people probably relished in the chance to discover another person's secrets; Jaune could think of two off the top of his head. He didn't include himself on that list for two very good reasons; he was very bad at keeping said secrets, and after sharing a house with seven siblings of the opposite gender, he was all too well versed in the types of volatile emotions that would accompany a secret when it inevitably came out. Only a natural born sucker wouldn't bet that those volatile emotions would follow closely him accidentally divulging said secret for all to hear.

So what could he do? He still had another class to get to; as much as he wished History had been the last so the day could finish on a high note, Dust Theory was fairly important too. Even if he didn't actually use the stuff, there was always the possibility that Jaune would cave and draw up some schematics that would allow Crocea Mors to some cartridges of ammo. As much as he appreciated the antiquity, range would be far more important in his line of work than tradition. And it wasn't as if he would install any modifications without Ruby's supervision, that was more than liable to end up as suicide.

So he didn't want to be here, he had somewhere else to be, and he had no reason to stay…

If there had been a camera hidden within his field of vision, Jaune would have turned to it with a blank expression. Making his way out from underneath the desk wasn't too hard, even though he would end up having to say goodbye to that pencil that he just couldn't seem to find. Oh well, it wasn't like they didn't sell for a couple of lien a pack at basically every single business that sold stuff.

Pushing himself to his feet, happened to glance out over the room, catching Doctor Oobleck's eye as he went. The Huntsman gave him no visual cues as to what he may have been thinking, and Jaune took a single step towards the stairs- only for his eyes to land on Blake a second before he hit the ground with what he hoped was not too conspicuous a thud.

"I don't really know where to start with what I need to say, but I guess I need advice?"

Crumbs, shivers, frick, and all other manner of words he had taken to using as substitutes while around Ruby. Never had Jaune really wondered what Blake would look like without her bow, never now would he have to. He had a front row seat, to the least coveted event in all four of the Kingdoms, at least in his eyes.

This… was a big secret. A very big secret, one which he wasn't sure he'd be able to keep.

"You wish to know how you may break the news to your team that you used to be a member of the White Fang."

Aaaaand it just got a whole lot bigger. If it wouldn't have resulted in a sound that would be impossible to hide, Jaune would have slammed his head into the desk in front of his face. Why wasn't Oobleck calling him out? Why hadn't he just left the classroom with everyone else? Why did this sort of thing always happen to him?

'Your belongings are now all over the room, have fun with that. Oh, yeah, Blake used to be a terrorist operative; those must have been some crazy times. Mum's the word.' Thanks, universe, you dingus.

"Wha- how did you…?"

Jaune would have rolled his eyes, but given how dry they felt, he was too worried that they would crackle and give away his position. Had Oobleck been hiding under a desk the last time Blake had taken off her bow? Did everyone know the secret and he was just worrying about nothing?

And where on Dust's tortured Remnant was his freaking pencil?

"There is very little Beacon does not know about its students, Miss Belladonna. We are a school for the best of the best, there are more groups targeting this establishment than you may think. Nothing has managed to get past those defenses yet, your past included."

Jaune's spine straightened out in alarm, which had the unfortunate side effect of sending the top of his skull directly into the bottom of the desk that he was sitting under. The only silver lining in this situation was the fact that his Aura had activated on instinct upon the shock entering his system, so he could at least escape without bruises or a concussion.

Still, did that mean Beacon knew? Surely they did, there was no way he could put more effort into hiding the origin of his transcripts than Blake would put into hiding her affiliations. They had to know… so why was he even still here?

"So… so the teachers know? That I'm a criminal, that I used to be a terrorist? They know, and yet they still let me in?"

It had to be because of his teammates. He had really lucked out in that regard, despite almost certainly having burned down a field of four-leaf clovers in a past life. Three prodigies all managing to get onto the same team, with the kid that was kept around to pad out numbers. But that would imply his transcripts had even worked in the first place, and he was under no illusions that his performance during initiation managed to convince anyone to his legitimacy.

But… why would Ozpin even send him into initiation in the first place? His forgeries must have been discovered early; the amount of negative karma he had somehow managed to garner together held approximately enough mass to develop into a black hole… great, now he was even more confused.

"I won't pretend that I entirely understand Headmaster Ozpin's decision making process, but I do have complete faith in it. He has placed his trust in you by allowing you entry, and from what I have seen so far, there is no reason for me to do otherwise."

Hmm, seems his small blunt force trauma had managed to fly under the radar. Joy of joys, now this horrendously bad situation could spiral even further out of control.

What would he even do after this, he was forced to wonder. Sure, he could pretend that he hadn't heard anything, he could take this secret to what was very likely to be an early grave, he could wait for the explosion to engulf him and the rest of his friend group while straining to hold up the weight of the web of lies he himself had spun around him and his perceived abilities. Yes, his body could have been made of steel and his innate negativity still would have repulsed any magnet in the Kingdom of Vale, why do you ask?

"I… I don't know what to do. I want to tell my team. Maybe Team JNPR too, we've been getting closer to them recently, but I just don't know what I'm supposed to say. How would I even bring something like this up? 'Hey guys, just thought I'd let you know that I used to be a terrorist operative, those were some seriously crazy times. Mum's the word!'"

Jaune tilted his head to the side. Hmm, why did that sentence sound so familiar?

"There has never been a time in my life when I have found myself in a situation similar to yours, Miss Belladonna. Perhaps you should start at the beginning? Tell me how you became affiliated and why you decided to leave."

"…Alright. I guess I'll start by saying I was a member of the White Fang since as long as I can remember."

Since as long as she could remember? Jaune furrowed his eyebrows, still images flooding his mind as he attempted to call forth the earliest memory he was still in possession of. Nothing rushed to the forefront to claim the position, too bogged down by the recollection of all the times he had sat in heard news of a White Fang protest turning sour, the body count slowly rising as the years began to pass. It had never seemed like that big a deal when he was still too young to really think for himself; he couldn't actually recall ever giving a second though to that single rally he had once watched from the safety of his mother's arms, to the words that were thrown and the dishevelled state of those who had been marching.

"That was back when they were still peaceful, still trying to project a message that wasn't violence. I was always there, holding a sign and crying out for the rights of my people. But as I grew older, things started to change."

The biggest misgivings he had ever had about his own life was the mild frustrations of his parents refusing to train him, or the constant struggle of having to share two bathrooms with seven sisters. Compared to some of the things he'd come across since arriving at Beacon, his life before now had been remarkably… cushy. The school was of course a place of comfort, it had the budget to cater to every student's whim and desire, none of which changed the fact that it was an institute geared towards teaching teenagers how to kill things. His formative years had been spent stumbling about and trying to figure out how to use a sword without accidentally chopping his own leg off; he couldn't even begin to imagine a life of protest and consequence.

"The leaders stepped down, and when new Faunus took the position everything started to change. Things… got worse. I was recruited for some of the more… covert missions when I discovered my Semblance."

Covert missions. There was no need to read between the lines, and even less of a desire to do so. It wasn't Jaune's place to do so, his own situation left him without a leg to stand on the moment morality became a topic of discussion. There was nothing he wouldn't do for his own family; he didn't need the added pressure of a civil war to make that decision.

"There… there was just too much blood. There wasn't ever supposed to be any, I told myself there wouldn't be any when I was a little girl, every time I picked up a sign. It got to be too much, more than I could delude myself into dealing with. So… I left. Cut all ties and applied for Beacon. Now here I am, running and hiding from the cause I had been prepared to die for less than a year ago."

Now, it could never be said that Jaune Arc could be held up as a paragon of horseshoes and the number seven. With that in mind, which was usually the case for young Mr. Arc for sixteen hours out of the regular twenty-four, even he was not aware that the sliding scale could find a setting that went beyond that week following the time he tripped over a black cat, rolled under a ladder, and ended up breaking thirteen mirrors with the umbrella he had just opened indoors.

He wasn't sure what he should have been feeling as he sighed and set his head back against wall that effectively made up the bottom structure of every desk in the row. Pity would be an insult, sadness even more so when he lacked the understanding. Truly, even with a family as vast as his, emotions would likely never be his strong suit.

When the wall inevitably gave way and sent him tumbling down onto the floor before Blake and Oobleck, however, he knew exactly how he was feeling. A form of annoyance, so tempered by experience and years upon years of building exasperation that it smashed through all barriers in its path until it was set to the simmering, boiling heat of unadulterated and pure rage against the universe and all that resided in it.

His youngest sister has once coined the term as being Arcgry, usually seen in brief flashes whenever a bird decided his head would be a good place to empty its bowels. Somehow busting through a solid wood surface at literally the worst time with nothing but the lightest brush of his hair against it also seemed able to trigger it, amazingly enough.

Jaune really wanted to scream. At the desk, at the universe, at his pencil (wherever that little fuck had managed to get to). His lungs were already inflated to start, all that hot air leaving him in a very unattractive snort upon glancing up and catching sight of Blake's upside down expression of pure terror. That, and her feline ears, which looked so soft from this angle that he could say with complete certainty he'd never wanted to feel a girl's body part in his hands more than those ears in that very second.

…Wait.

When it became obvious that nobody else was going to try to continue the conversation, Jaune opened his mouth, intent of letting loose a sentence that in all honesty probably would have made things worse for him, considering he hadn't bothered trying to think it through. It would all be for naught, however, as Blake broke her stare and disappeared in a blur of black and white, the screeching of her shoes against the floor telling him all he needed to know.

"Forgive the inelegance of this solution, Miss Belladonna, but in my expert opinion I believe that any confidence borne for this admission would be an illusory practice." With speed that trumped even the young kunoichi's, Doctor Oobleck had beaten her to the door, leaning against its frame with his arms crossed. His stance probably would have been one that screamed how entirely cool his life in general was, had he not had one long leg spanning the doorway to effectively bar entry and exit, the tip of his shoe resting at about the same height as his waist. "Take this as my advice as I throw you to the metaphorical sharks; occasionally there will come a time in life where you are left with no other choice than to proceed, because forward is the only direction with land beneath your feet. That being said, please don't try to run away, I fear that may just exacerbate the situation."

The door swung open seemingly on its own volition to allow the good Doctor through, a coffee mug (that had a pretty blue flower on the front) coming to rest in his hands as he kicked the door shut behind him.

"Ain't my problem anymore," Jaune heard him mutter from the other side of the door. Huh, seems he had decided to take that post so Blake couldn't get away. Smart man, and for that Jaune immediately hated him.

With slow, deliberate movement, Blake's body rotated until she was once again facing Jaune, her expression a strange mix of that which was worn by a person about to be dragged to the gallows, and that which was worn by a person who was about to drag another person to the gallows.

Jaune stared back from the floor, having neglected to climb back to his feet. Semblances' were a reflection of one's soul, right? Maybe if he lay really still and wanted it a whole lot, the ground would open up beneath him and swallow him up. From there it could just spit him out somewhere else or maybe just keep him, either would have been good.

How long had they been staring at each other now? A few seconds? The rest of perceived time? Why hadn't the floor opened up yet; did he just not want it hard enough? Why did Doctor Oobleck choose to leave him here?

Damn it, he was not prepared for this situation. He had no idea what to do; what would his father tell him to do in this situation?


Little Jaune glanced up from the cup he was busy filling with tea, setting the teapot down next to his little sister's prized rabbit plush doll and undoing the knot of his apron. Four of his siblings sat around the small table amidst their toys, each enjoying one of the cupcakes he had just pulled out from his Funbake Furnace. His father, having beckoned him over, smiled down at his only son as Little Jaune climbed onto his lap, his blue eyes large and inquisitive.

"Son, you're six years old now." The man, who was so similar to Jaune in every conceivable was that the only possible explanations were divine laziness or asexual reproduction by fragmentation, pulled the pipe out from between his lips, setting his newspaper to the side and running a hand through his moustache. With the cup of coffee he was currently nursing in his free hand, he fit the appearance of someone who'd had a hand in spawning eight children all too well. "That, of course, means you're finally ready to begin your training."

"You mean you'll teach me how to use a sword?" Little Jaune's face lit up, his body almost vibrating with excitement. "You'll teach me how to stab those mean Grimm thingies and keep everyone safe like a hero should so I don't have to do something like fake transcripts to get into a school later in life because the world is infested and if I do that without the proper training I might die or end up getting my partner killed because I didn't have what it took to keep them sa-"

"Whoa there, Jaune! Not so fast!" Father Arc pushed a finger against Little Jaune's lips, the smile widening to include a few teeth. "That'll come later. Or never, preferably never. No, what you'll be learning is an ancient art that has been passed down from Arc father to Arc son for generations!"

Little Jaune leaned forward, small stars in his eyes. Generations? He didn't exactly know what that word meant, but it sure sounded cool!

"You will begin training…" Father Arc paused, tapping out his own drumroll on the table beside him. "…In the sacred art of Sed'Arction!"

"…Was that a dad joke?"

"Confidence, my son. All woman look for confidence in a man." Father Arc clapped a hand down on his confused son's shoulders. "And with this final lesson, you have completed your training. I'm so proud of you!"

Little Jaune tilted his head to the side, not grateful for receiving this sacred training because he was a child and children are entitled little bastards who didn't know how the world worked. "What about good looks?"

"…Huh?"

"Wouldn't woman also want good looks? And a guy who'll listen to them? And someone smart enough to talk to them properly?" Little Jaune began ticking off fingers. "And manners? And money? And a big-"

"All an Arc should have to have is confidence!" Father Arc waved a fist emphatically through the air. Not Father Arc probably would have ended up face first on the ground when Father Arc jumped to his feet, had he not had the foresight to vacate his seat a few seconds beforehand. "That is how it has been for generations upon generations, and if it ain't broke, you don't fix it!"

"…'Kay." Little Jaune began making his way to the exit of the room, never quite turning away from his father. "I'm gonna go now, I promised Emily I'd style her hair, and after that I'm going to be help Chloe fix her make-up for her date tonight, so…"

"CONFIDENCE!" Father Arc cried as his son finally turned the corner.


Jaune shook his head as neurons that had long since considered themselves dead kicked into high gear. He knew how to style hair and do a girl's make-up? Wait, of course he did, he'd been doing so on a regular basis since his fifth sister had been born! He was interested in cooking? Well, he had been until he had been informed that Arc men didn't belong in the kitchen.

Cooking wasn't manly, according to Father Arc. Tearing through flesh with a serrated chunk of metal, igniting blistering heat to gain nutrients from that which was bested for the express purpose of maintaining the strength of the human race, that wasn't manly. Blending together your surrounding environment, besting nature constantly for reasons that could stretch from survival to simple enjoyment, that wasn't something a man should hold any interest in doing.

Not for the first time, Jaune cursed the fact that his father had such a compelling voice. Of course the only information about the fairer sex, no matter how useless, that wouldn't end up repressed had to come from Father Arc. His grandparents literally giving his dad the name Father really should have been his first clue, come to think of it.

Great. Now his back was sore from lying on the hard ground for so long, the silence was reaching for the ten minute mark, and he all of a sudden really wanted to try his hand at making a soufflé.

Today sucked.

XxX

I do ship KnightShade (Jaune x Blake), but beyond the platonic interactions, this story will not be a KnightShade fic. There probably won't be any ship sailing for the foreseeable future, this is primarily a comedy. Even though this chapter probably wasn't as funny, but sometimes you need plot related chapters too. Next chapter should finish off the Jaundice storyline, and then it's on to Forever Fall and beyond.

Am I doing these characters right? I still don't know.

I was honestly expecting two more scenes for this chapter, and for all four to add up to maybe ~3k words. Shows how much I know.

It's a personal headcanon of mine that Jaune definitely knows how to fix make-up and hair. I'm going off personal experience, having two sisters myself, so I can only imagine what three and a half times that number would entail.

Little Jaune was going to say house. I promise. For a six year old, it's not a bad guess. Certainly better than 'nothing but confidence'.

Somehow, this story got recommended on TV Tropes. Hello, fellow Tropers (yeah that's right) who have found this story through there! I guess now I should start towards earning myself an actual page. Should be fun.

'Till next chapter!

X