With an hour left to lose before he skips down to Pyrrha's, Jaune organizes his room. He hangs his single set of combat clothes on the single coat hanger in his walk-in closet; the armor guards go in an uneven pile underneath. It'll definitely be weird not having the protection of those around his torso and limbs, especially since the form-fitting material of his uniform makes him feel like he's wearing next to nothing underneath his blazer jacket.

He manages not to scream when he steps out of the closet to the sight of Penny straightening some new covers on his bed. He prides himself on sounding completely normal when he greets, "Hello, Penny."

"Salutations, Jaune," the orange-haired girl replies cheerfully, fluffing up a second pillow. Where did that one come from? "To better ease your transition into this place of residence, I have acquired supplementary resting materials!"

"Oh. Uh. Thanks. But how…" He takes a glance at the closed door. Yup, still locked. {Light this girl is scary…} "Did you slip in when Pyrrha left?"

Penny only smiles mysteriously. "I am always glad to assist you, Jaune."

Fortunately, Penny doesn't seem to have a bad bone in her body, so Jaune chooses to take this as an acceptable answer. Maybe a selfish one, seeing as she vanishes into thin air whenever other people show up. Then again, maybe she's just super shy.

{Or maybe she's another imaginary friend.}

There's something a bit different about her this time that he can't place—at least, not until she turns around to place the extra pillow at the head of his bed and he gets a full view of her new hairdo. "Hey, erm, nice hair ribbon."

Penny touches the pink bow tie carefully. "Do you like it?"

"It's… nice," Jaune says lamely.

He should have come to expect that it really doesn't matter what he says, because her eyes widen in ecstatic joy anyways. "Fantastic! The Cat informed me about its visual appeal when I questioned her about the necessity of her accessory, and bequeathed one unto me as an additional sign of our friendship."

"You know Blake?" Whew, Penny isn't just a figment of his imagination. "How long have you two been friends?"

The girl contemplates this for a moment. "In a way, we have known each other for at least a decade."

Oh. Wow. That's… a long while. He's finding it a bit difficult to imagine Blake and Penny being friends for so long, especially since they're on opposites sides of the personality spectrum. Really, he can't even begin to picture Blake possessing a pink ribbon, much less tying up her raven hair with it.

"So, in order to further establish our friendship," crows Penny proudly, "I bring you gifts as well!"

"Is that… nail polish?"

"That's what friends do, is it not?" she beams enthusiastically, eagerly displaying her three different kinds of sparkling multicolored nail polish. "We can paint our nails and try out clothes and talk about cute boys!"

"Um… I think Blake would appreciate that more." Not that he can picture Blake with glittery hot pink nails.

Penny shakes her head resolutely. "No, Blake specifically stated that you would appreciate the intricacies of discussion concerning tall, blonde, and abs."

{Nonononono. Not you too, Blake.}

"Nope. Not happening. I'm not going to—"

Ten minutes later

"'…is required for every class.' Oh, by the way, do you want the background of your pinkie to be hot pink or lime green?"

"Whatever you want, Penny. I'm sure you'll work wonders with whatever you choose to do."

"Your trust is well-founded. Anyways: 'Do not forget to bring your scroll, as it is used to register your attendance in the class as well as pick up any assignments, if applicable. Now, you may already know that your physical bioactivity is monitored through your scrolls; I stress that this is for your own safety, as well as the safety of the entire capital of Zodiac. This is a battle school, not a battlefield, and we must…'"

He should know that he shouldn't be surprised by everything that Penny is capable of… but when he'd casually asked her what he'd missed over the past week, she immediately went on to describe the major duels of initiation week, including tribe, age, and stats of each contestant, the duration of each fight, and a running commentary of battle techniques and arcane artes.

And that was even before Penny started working on his nails.

It's been ten minutes since she began her massive multitasking. In that time, she's painted a sapphire dragon snaking through a rainbow coral reef on his thumb, a black tortoise and a snake dancing a tango, a golden dragon circling around the world, and a nearly-invisible tiger hurtling through a bamboo forest on his ring finger—with the color combinations of three bottles of nail polish.

Penny's just begun her latest work of art on his pinkie, plus she's moved on from initiation battles and is now reciting the headmistress' welcoming speech to the freshmen, word-for-word. Like, she's even lowered her pitch ever so slightly while using certain inflections and tones—it almost sounds like a recording of Headmistress Goodwitch's voice, if it wasn't for the occasional and characteristic stilted pause in Penny's speech.

Secretly, he's relieved that he found her. Or she found him. Well, simply that they're friends in the first place, and she's able to tell him everything he missed while stuck in the middle of a gigantic ice cube. Still, he has to quickly interject her perfect monologue with an urgent question: "Hold on a sec—you said that the school admin keeps track of our, what was it, bioactivity? Isn't that an invasion of privacy?" He's fine with biological monitoring during exercise. But, um, those midnight sessions with him and his endorphins? He'd like to keep those moments to himself.

Penny interrupts herself as if abruptly switching modes, with no lag in which she collects her thoughts. It's a lot like switching songs on an mp3 player—one second, reciting a list of rules in the voice of the headmistress; the next, knowledgeably responding, "The monitoring is meant to keep track of Familiar releases. Colloquially, this is known as 'letting out one's inner Grimm.'"

"Aren't faunus mostly human? Half-human and half-Grimm, but for the most part…" He gestures to his body. "…At least, they… erm, we look human."

Penny takes a moment to look up from her nail polish art and smile graciously. "It's the human soul that gives the faunus their aura and semblance," she confirms. "But their spirit belongs to Grimm."

"So… that's why Ruby can shrink into a Mouse? And Yang can transform into a Dragoness? But Weiss… she didn't change. Something entirely different came out of her instead. That's…"

"Her Inner Grimm, also known as a Familiar," Penny immediately supplies. "Weiss Schnee is quite the protégé, being able to simultaneously direct both her physical body and a spiritual Familiar in battle. Faunus of lower power tiers will find that control is best executed by molding the Familiar's form over their own body, hence the apparent transformation."

"But didn't Weiss lose—"

"The heiress Schnee maintained absolute control over her Grimm Familiar," disagrees Penny firmly. "Her semblance held firm as well, which is a true testament to Schnee's strength. But not even complete control over one's own spiritual and physical capabilities can hold back the sheer natural energy of Dust, a reaction that was catalyzed by you."

"Hey," Jaune begins defensively, though Penny immediately shakes her head.

"It was quite possibly the one way you could have defeated her," she states solemnly. "You had to do it."

He had to do it. Yeah, it cost him a week of his life, but… in the end, he got into the Academy, right? At the sacrifice of Weiss, sure, but it's not like the ice princess didn't deserve it. She'd slapped labels of pervert all over him before school even started, requested the death match against him, and practically declared war on him in front of the entire school during said match. All because of a minor misunderstanding. Somebody had needed to knock her down a peg; it was only right if the person to do it was the guy she abused the most, right?

Still… bringing Weiss down didn't feel right. "Hey Penny… What's… how much do you know about Weiss' personal history?"

Penny takes a break from her intricate nail-painting work to give him a funny look. "Her father—"

"Was a major faunus general who turned around the result of the revolution, I know," he sighs. "But Weiss herself. What do we know about the daughter of the general?"

Penny tilts her head. "Not much. Why? Do you fancy her?"

"No! Where did that idea come from?"

"I sensed a spike of norepinephrine earlier when I mentioned the words tall, blonde, and abs. I have studied neurochemical physiology enough to know that the pheromones you produced at that moment pertained to either a fear or arousal response. Further prompting led me to conclude that you do not hold an attraction toward Sun Wukong, and thusly I have moved onto gauging other potential faunus of positive interest. Is Weiss Schnee not of interest to you?"

"I… I just…" He takes a proud stance, speaking to the heavens boldly as a spotlight shines down upon his noble form. "I should know where she's coming from before I judge her, y'know? It'd be easy to label Weiss Schnee as a psychotic bitch and treat her like that for the rest of my time here. Except if I did that, I'd only be doing what she's already done to me. If I gave her a taste of her own medicine, I'd deserve to be labeled a pervert." He finishes his honorable speech with sparkling manly tears of empathy cascading down his cheeks. "So I have to know! I have to understand who or what made Weiss the way she is!"

"So… you're not a pervert?"

The spotlight snaps off as Jaune's tears of empathy turn to tears of rage. "Did you not hear anything else I said?"

Penny puts the finishing touches on her fifth work of art—a brilliant crimson rooster rising from flickering flames—and then moves to tick numbers off her fingers. "Panty peek #1: at the heiress Schnee's underwear, before we even entered within the gates of campus."

"That was a complete accident, I swear!"

"Questionable encounter #1: with Blake of Cat in a dark alley."

"How did—"

"Your profile was thoroughly investigated during your week in ice; some particularly chatty witnesses reported this sighting five days ago at 14:54. Questionable encounter #2: a public kiss with Sun of Monkey."

"I didn't agree to that!"

"Tell that to the gossipers running rampant around campus. Questionable encounter #3: longer-than-necessary time spent suffocating within the Dragoness' abundant cleavage."

"That wasn't my ch—"

"Panty peek #2: at that of an underage Ruby of Mouse in the heat of battle."

"No… it wasn't like that…"

"Panty peek #3: a longing stare at Lie Ren's—"

"AHHH LALALALALALALA!" Jaune plugs his ears and screams at the top of his lungs.

When he's sure that Penny isn't speaking any longer, he hesitantly pulls his fingers out of his ears. Penny instantly continues, "—whitey tidies."

"No… Penny… I swear I'm not a pervert…"

Penny holds up the five fingers she currently has. "Jaune… as your ever-helpful assistant and friend, I will take your word as truth. However, I regret to inform you that it is instances such as these five that have convinced the general student population of the depths of your perviness. If you wish, I can continue with the full report…?"

Jaune draws his face out of his hands wearily. "How many more examples are there?"

"Eleven."

"I was only on campus for three days! How were they able to scrounge up sixteen examples of me being pervy?"

"The mind will see what it wants to see," Penny offers knowingly. "For instance, the most recent scandalous word says that you are hot after Adam of Ox, having already established steamy connections among the other three Directors. I am glad to report, however, that as the Director of North, Adam has built up enough mental defenses to be quite immune to such flimsy speculations, and will mostly likely not kill you on sight should you two ever happen to pass within ten feet of each other. Nevertheless, I would caution that any closer might be pushing it, so be careful."

"Penny, that doesn't make me feel better at all."

"Oh. Then maybe I shouldn't report on the nasty rumors that you are in sexual relations with both—"

"AAAAHHHHHH LALALALALALALALA PLEASE SHUT UP, PENNY." Hurriedly searching his mind for distractions, he quickly leaps upon his previous topic. "Tell me about Weiss, Penny. Tell me what you know about her."

Penny switches conversation topics as instantaneously as switching mp3 tracks. "Again, I regrettably must inform you that I know little of the heiress Schnee, other than the fact that she currently bears the entire weight of the family business alone. Give me your other hand. Pink or baby blue?"

Jaune startles at this. This is new news. "Um, okay. Whatever color you want. So Weiss runs Rooster Teeth all by herself? What about her dad?"

"Her father is in prison," Penny states plainly, returning her concentration to his ring finger. "This is information known to every faunus, Jaune."

"Oh. Right. It… slipped my mind." He fakes putting a hand to his head in pain. "Ohhhh… my memory isn't so hot. Maybe it has to do with been frozen for a week. Remind me… why is her awesome general dad in jail?"

Penny seems to accept this fragile excuse without a doubt. Whew. Good thing she's so out-of-it all the time. "The deeds he did to turn around the war are still up for debate: do they qualify as war crimes?" she supplies. "Either way, most agreed that the deeds were dishonorable, so General Schnee committed himself to a lifelong sentence and appointed his only child as the heiress to the company Rooster Teeth."

Okay. So Weiss is running a Dust company from the safety of a school. At least, he can probably assume that. During her intimidation speech, she'd let drop that she wasn't coming to the Academy to learn. And she'd hired two Directors—Adam and Lie Ren—as guards. For protection, then? "Anything else you can tell me?"

"Not off the top of my data banks. If you would like, I can consult the Cat for more information."

"Blake? Right, they're friends, aren't they?"

"The word is that they're in lesbians with each other, yes," confirms Penny. "But the word also says that you're handing out flyers for the Dark Side—"

"Okay you can stop now." So it'd seem that going to Blake-the-Mysterious-Cat now is out of the question, since she's currently in cahoots with Weiss-the-Angrily-Misunderstood. Which… isn't all too bad of a situation, if it means he gets Penny-the-Cheerful-Helper-Friend in exchange. What if Blake was the one to send Penny to him? That is her ribbon in Penny's hair, after all. Therefore… "Since you and Blake are friends, do you think you can ask her about Weiss?"

Penny sits up proudly. "I sure can! I can also conduct additional research for you on the personal history of Weiss Schnee, utilizing unnamed but certainly reliable resources."

"Yeah. That'd… that'd be nice. A-a-and not as blackmail material, I swear!" he backs up abruptly. "Whatever your resources are, I swear this isn't to dig up dirt on Weiss. I just… this is to help me get what angle she's approaching me from, okay? So I know how to best approach her in return. Got it?"

Though most of her concentration seems to be focused in on painting a technicolor rave party on his second thumb, Jaune doesn't doubt her comprehension when Penny nods vehemently. "Duly noted."

As a precaution, he hesitantly adds, "You're not adding into the gossip, are you, Penny?"

"It is my job to help you, Jaune. Not hurt you."

"Yeah, thanks. Sorry."

Okay. Investigation on Weiss Schnee, start. Possible reconciliation? …Nah, that's just hopeful dreaming. But maybe he can at least get rid of this pervert label. Yeah, that'd be nice.

Also probably wishful thinking.

It all comes down to Weiss in the end anyways, so he's just approaching the root of the problem. One of many of his problems.

Problem #2: his deficiency in physical combat.

Solution #2: sparring seshs with Pyrrha. Score!

A hop and a skip down the hall brings him to what he hopes is Pyrrha's room. Hesitantly, he knocks on the door—

Only for it to immediately swing wide open, having never been closed fully in the first place, and—

"Kyah! Pervert!"

He gets a half-second glimpse of tanned skin, light green hair, and neon green panties before a boot imprints itself upon his face. The door slams closed before Jaune's butt hits the floor.

The next door over swings open as a small redhead enveloped within a gigantic black trench coat pokes her head out. "Are… are you Jaune?" she questions uncertainly.

{Those leeeeegs...}

Jaune smacks away the pervy thoughts concerning the second-long peek of leg he'd caught. Still, now with his brain in Pervert Mode, he judges that, just from the size and sleekness of that leg alone, the girl must have an extremely lithe and fit figure. Still a bit small side, which probably means that she's younger than him, still in her maturing teenage years and thus probably has not completely... developed, perhaps, into the full-grown woman she will be. Maybe that's why she's hiding her body within the formless void of that black trench coat. "You're Pyrrha's roommate, right?"

An innocent smile breaks its way onto the girl's face as she steps out into the hallways and offers a hand. "I'm Kairi. Pyrrha told me to expect you… And when I heard the commotion, I thought…" She apparently realizes the awkward path her conversation is headed down, blushes, and quickly amends, "Pyrrha sent a message to me a couple minutes ago saying her errands are taking a bit longer than expected, and that she won't be available for another hour. Sorry."

"Oh." Jaune rubs the back of his neck awkwardly. "Well… then…"

An awkward silence ensues until Kairi quietly pipes up, "I like your nails."

Jaune immediately stuffs his offending hands into his pockets. "A friend wanted to experiment on them. So I let her."

Kairi chuckles softly. "Okay. Hey Jaune… I know we've just met, but could you do me a favor?"

He immediately snaps to attention. "Um… sure?"

"I need some more battle gear. I'd like to go to the local mall, but I don't have anybody to go with. Will you go with me?"

Sure. Why not? It's not like he has other plans. Or friends, for that matter. "When do we head out?"

Kairi shuts the dorm room behind her, takes a step forward, and promptly trips on the hem of her trailing black trench coat. Jaune grabs her arm to prevent her from falling flat on her face, which only means she faceplants into his chest—just as a guy with a light green Mohawk steps out from his room.

"This isn't what it looks like!" Jaune shouts as Green Mohawk stops and gapes.

Kairi's hands paw his torso as she attempts to pull herself back onto her feet, but the leather trench coat is longer than she is tall and entangles itself around her legs. "I… oh, I am… so…" she gasps, a flush rising to her cheeks. Green Mohawk chokes a little. Probably in indignation.

{Looks like this situation just turned into Questionable Encounter #17...}

Jaune gives up damage control with their voyeur and pushes Kairi back until she's standing upright again. "Why don't you just take off the jacket?" he suggests. "I wouldn't want you to go tripping all the way downtown."

Kairi glances away awkwardly, wrapping the coat around herself. "I…"

"You're wearing your uniform underneath the jacket, right?"

Kairi shakes her head in a negative. "The shirt that administration gave me was too big," she says in a small voice. "But smaller sizes are out of stock. They're supposed to come in tonight..."

"So... you are wearing clothes underneath that, right?"

"...Yes."

"Don't tell me you're wearing a slingshot bikini."

"No…"

"A qipao with a side slit all the way up to your armpit?"

"No…"

"School uniform that transforms into a stripperific outfit whenever you bleed into it?"

"What?"

"Never mind." He glances back down the hallway—yep, Green Mohawk is still staring. "What are you still looking at? Scram!" he snaps.

Green Mohawk snaps a quick salute. "Yessir!" he shouts as he disappears back into his room.

"I'm wearing clothes," says Kairi, shouldering open her trench coat to reveal a lithe figure {ha!} in a tiny pink minidress. Three vertical zippers run in parallel along its front. "It just… shrunk in the wash."

"You're perfect," says Jaune's mouth before his brain approves it as non-pervy. "Um! Uh! It's perfect! Your dress. It's fine!"

"It's not… too short?"

It is incredibly short. Or her legs are just that long. It is quite the view. "Well... um... I still think it's perfect. In a non-pervy way, of course. But if you're uncomfortable," he suggests, "We could look for bicycling shorts at the mall for you to wear underneath the dress. Still, in my humble and absolutely un-perverted opinion, I think you look great."

A tentative smile creeps its way onto Kairi's face. "That's what Sora said," she admits. "But he's been my best friend for life, and he always says nice, cheerful things, so I wasn't sure whether to trust him or not." She sheds the coat and tosses it back into her room. "The bicycle shorts though? That's a great idea. Let's go."

He almost makes it out of the dormitory front entrance with embarrassing himself in front of his newest maybe-friend.

He shouldn't have held his hopes up so high.

"Aiyaaaah!"

Jaune blinks. Ah. He's snuggling up against his good friend The Floor again. How did…?

"He's awake!" Nora crows, resting her Sledgehammer of Rude Awakenings upon the ground next to him. She's also wearing her school uniform; a small badge in the shape phoenix with its wings spread wide acts as the clasp for her shoestring tie. "And no bloody bits of brain everywhere, which means his aura is fully functioning! You've passed, Jaune."

Jaune scuttles backwards on a belated reflex. "Nora! If my aura wasn't—"

"If your aura wasn't functioning in full," Ruby butts in, "Then you'd still be in your coma."

"Huh?"

"So really," Kairi reasons, "It's because you're awake that your aura is fully functioning, and not the other way around."

"Basically, Nora just wanted a reason to use her sledgehammer," concludes Ruby.

Nora bops the tips of her fingers together in what would have been a sheepish gesture, if not for the giant shit-eating smile on her face. "Whoopsies."

Kairi offers a hand to Ruby. "I'm Kairi."

"Ruby of Mouse."

Somehow, Nora somehow manages to pop up between the two auburn-haired girls making introductions. "Nora! Of Dog. Pleased to meetcha!"

Jaune glances between Nora and Ruby. "Neither of you are in Eastern Dragon. What are you doing all the way on this side of campus?"

"We need your objective opinion as a man," explains Ruby.

Kairi nods vehemently at this statement. "He gives really good opinions!"

Nora grabs his hand and starts to pull him in the direction of the school exit—at least, until she notices his nails. "Oh my Light!" she shrieks. "These nails are magnificent! Did you do them?"

Ruby and Kairi pounce on Jaune's hand before he can pull it away. A chorus of ooh's and aah's rise up from the three girls as they inspect each of Penny's masterpieces.

"These are works of art," Kairi proclaims reverently. "Why would you want to hide them?"

Ruby looks up at Jaune with crocodile tears in her pleading, gigantic silver eyes. "Jaune, will you paint my nails? Pwetty pwease?"

"I've always wanted a Gay Best Friend!" Nora squeals.

"What—! Nora, I didn't—"

"It's decided," declares Nora pompously. "Com'on, loser. We're going shopping."