A/N:

Welcome back dear readers! I know it has been a while, but better late than never right? On a serious note, homework had been kicking my ass and I had events to plan (like my birthday).

On a brighter note there are a lot of things to celebrate! Like the fact that I have been writing just over a year now! The fact that I have turned 17 two weeks ago! AND THE FACT THAT EPISODE OF RWBY VOLUME 3 JUST RELEASED AND IT WAS AWESOME!

But, how could I overlook the best news of all: MCSE REACHED OVER 100 FOLLOWERS! WOOOOOOOOO!

Seriously though, thank you so much for helping me get this milestone. The one shot I promised will be written next, but there is still time to vote. The current stand is:

Tiny Yang / Blake: 2 votes.

Tiny Weiss / Ruby: 1 vote.

Now that we got that out of the way, enjoy reading!

May contain side effects

Chapter 12:

Wilting

"Goodbye."

Blake woke up with a start, gasping as her heart ran at a million miles per second. Her hair and clothes were soaked with sweat, the cold fluid sending shivers up her spine. All of the fatigue in her mind had vanished.

She looked at the bed on the other side of the room and sighed; Yang still hadn't returned. It had been three days since their argument. Three days since she had last seen her partner.

Blake let herself sink back onto the pillow Ruby and she shared.

This was all her fault. Yes, Yang had started it, and yes, Yang had been unreasonable, but Blake was the one who had crossed a line. She should have handled the situation more carefully. Why hadn't she realised being aggressive towards Yang wouldn't solve anything? That was the last time she would let her emotions cloud her judgement, or at least she hoped so .

The soft click of their door closing echoed through the room. The sound was loud enough to make the two massive silver eyes beside her open slowly. Ruby was awake.

The giant lazily rubbed the sleep out of her eyes and let them focus on Blake.

"Has Weiss already left?" Her team leader's voice sounded tired.

"Yes, we just missed her. I feel guilty, us sleeping in and her …"

The scythe wielder groaned before slowly getting up, careful enough not to squash Blake.

"Ruby, you shouldn't worry so much about her. You said it yourself three days ago."

Ruby knew she wasn't talking about Weiss.

"I know Blake, but I also said that I would make sure she's fine. How am I supposed to do that if I don't see her, nor am able to talk to her?" Ruby pushed her hand through her hair in exasperation. "Is she deliberately avoiding us? If so, why?"

Why? She had asked herself this many times now. She got up and tapped one the fingers that were as big as she was. "I don't know either Ruby, I'm sorry."

The giantess shook her head. "Pondering over it isn't going to get us anywhere. Time to get the day started."

Blake relaxed as the girl's fingers closed around her and lifted her off the softness of the cushion. Weird as it may sound, Blake had been craving for the physical contact. The fingers around her made her feel safe, they shielded her from the cold and the nightmares from the outside world.

"Now where did Weiss put those notes?"

Monday had come way too fast after Yang had left them. Unfortunately for them their free time couldn't last forever. The problem was that they needed to go to class, and like Professor Ozpin had instructed, all of them.

Blake, being her size, was in no shape or form to follow the lessons independently. They had yet to think of a way to sneak her safe and unnoticed through school. They had agreed that it was too dangerous for her to be carried in a bag or a purse the whole day. That meant that someone was going to have to hold her on her person, which was almost impossible without raising suspicion. Should a student catch a glimpse of her all hell would break loose and Blake would be in mortal danger.

They had decided to play it safe and to confront Professor Ozpin. Ruby had been a bit reluctant at first as she didn't want others to know that Yang had run away, of course they would have to admit to that too. Blake had argued that transparency was key if they wanted to keep her as safe as possible.

The headmaster had frowned upon the situation and had to think for a while. Eventually he had given Ruby and Blake permission to stay in their dorm as long as Yang was gone or until they found a better solution. Weiss had volunteered to go to class and take notes for the rest of them.

The second before they had left Blake had caught a glimpse of concern in her headmaster's brown eyes. She didn't know why, but she had the strange feeling that he knew more than they thought he knew.

"I don't know, Ruby, maybe she put them inside one of the desks?" Her team leader started to open and close drawers in search of the papers.

When she opened one of Weiss', she found a strange little book. The book was completely white and the Schnee family crest was engraved on the cover. Whatever this was, it was not a school book.

"Isn't this the book Weiss always writes in when she is done doing her homework?" Ruby's eyes narrowed in mischief. "Do you think it's a diary?"

"As much as I would like to know, we shouldn't look through Weiss's stuff without her permission, Ruby." Blake felt a smile form on her face as Ruby pouted and whined, but it vanished as soon as it had formed.

"I guess you're right- Aha! These are the notes from yesterday!" Ruby grabbed a stack of papers and put the little book back in the drawer.

Blake was put down on her favorite spot, the window-sill. Not only had she chosen the spot because the view was nice, but also because she hoped deep down that she would be the first to see Yang come strolling over the field outside.

Ruby left some of the notes near her before climbing onto her bed. Their daily study session had begun. That's how most of their days had gone by, needless to say Blake was bored out of her mind.

A few hours later, with the occasional lunch break, they had finished studying. Blake stretched. She found herself staring out of the window. Her gaze glanced from the particularly cloudy sky to one of the trees to the patches of flowers a few hundred feet below. Under Ruby's command they had planted a variety of roses under their window. It had been a nice gesture, the girl had insisted on planting roses in each of their colors. How their leader had found black, yellow, and white roses in the blink of an eye was beyond her. Blake noticed that the yellow roses looked a little lifeless, some had already started to wilt. She knew that fate was laughing right in her face. Not able to look any longer, she focused her sight on her own reflection in the glass.

She was an absolute mess. Long, disheveled strands of raven hair obscured parts of her vision, she hadn't taken a shower since Yang had volunteered to help wash her hair. Dark circles had formed around her eyes. Her appearance surprised her, but at the same time she had expected it. After all, her mental state was much worse. Her nights had been restless. The memory of Yang leaving her without a single goodbye haunted her dreams. The hurt in those lilac eyes would be forever engraved in her mind.

Every door that opened, every sound that echoed through the room made her heart leap in her throat. She would jolt up only to have her hopes crushed. It wasn't Yang.

She needed Yang.

After she had left the White Fang, she had resolved that she wouldn't get close to anybody anymore. The pain of leaving Adam had been fresh on her mind and had been slowing her down. She had broken that resolution not even a full two days after she had entered Beacon Academy. There hadn't been a single moment that she regretted it. Meeting Yang and the others had been a delight, getting to know them was a wild, but entertaining ride.

As time had passed she had learned that she shouldn't judge people on their first appearance. She had learned that Weiss actually had a gentle and even scared soul under her ice cold mask - that Ruby wasn't as childish as her demeanor let on and that Yang was far from the brute Blake had thought she was.

The company of her teammates had evolved her from a lonely girl raised by violence and hate to someone who could care about others. Someone who would rather have friends around her than live in solitude. They made her feel safe and warm.

Now that one of her friends was missing, her own partner even, the temperature in their dorm had dropped several degrees. Weiss had been avoiding the rest of her team ever since she had come back from the library that fateful night. She hadn't been able to look Blake in the eyes for two days. Even Ruby wasn't her cheerful self, the disappearance of her big sister had more impact on her than Blake had thought. Without Yang's hearty laugh and the cheery rambles of her team leader, it was painfully silent in the room. The tension between them was suffocating.

They needed Yang.

It was crystal clear that their team couldn't function as long as Yang was gone. It seemed the composition of hunter teams had a much deeper meaning than they had originally thought. From what Blake understood, each team was a structure supported by four pillars. As long as these pillars stood, the structure would be nearly indestructible. But if one of the pillars would crack and fall, the rest of the structure would crumble with it.

With every day that passed her nerves multiplied. The longer Yang was gone, the more she feared something bad had happened to her. Or that she would never come back.

The door of the bathroom opened and closed. Blake didn't even bother to look, she knew who it was.

Weiss.

The girl was more than ever a mystery in Blake's eyes. They thought they had been able to break her mask of ice when she began to integrate in their group, but the longer Blake knew the heiress, the more she realised that the mask they wanted to break was actually an ice fortress. While they had been able to make cracks appear, they were still a long way from actually tearing it down. There were so many things about her shrouded in mystery. The fact that Blake was smaller than a finger proved that much.

Under her rigid surface, Weiss was a fragile person. Not in the way that Blake was fragile, no, Weiss had been scarred by something. And not just mentally, Blake realised. She had lived with the heiress for months now, and not once had she had the audacity to ask how Weiss got that scar of hers. What had happened to her in the past?

Whatever it was, they were going to have to be careful with her. Blake saw a vague reflection of herself in the white haired girl. Weiss had created her icy shell to protect herself from the outside world. If they were to shatter it too carelessly they risked breaking the girl behind it as well.

It had been Yang's right to interrogate the heiress. Although Blake was reluctant to acknowledge it, Weiss was at fault in some way. Yang and Blake shared the same vision, Weiss knew more about Blake's condition than she was letting on.

It pained her to think about her friend like that. Although she didn't blame Weiss for not opening up to the rest of them, she had cracked Blake's trust in her. When they had met, Blake had been willing to look past her family name. But now that it had become clear that Mr. Schnee himself was pulling some strings, she was growing wary of the heiress.

Why?

Why was Weiss being so secretive about everything? Back at the docks the heiress had made her swear that she would talk to her teammates whenever something big came up, so why couldn't she do the same?

Unfortunately Yang's approach had been too fast and too direct. She had lost her cool and had made the mistake of threatening the girl. Weiss had closed up and shut down, too distressed to give the answers they needed. If they wanted to get information out of their teammate, they were going to have to be discrete and not let their emotions cloud their minds.

Blake's thoughts went to her team leader.

It wasn't until she had noticed the changes in the girl's behavior that she realized how hard this must be for Ruby. This whole situation was probably weighing down on her more than it did on Blake. One of her best friends was merely the size of a doll, her partner was avoiding her and to top it off her sister had left her. Her team was slowly falling apart and she was unable to do anything about it.

Blake admired how the girl was able to keep her cool, but she was also afraid. At the moment Ruby was able to mask her emotions, but they must slowly be cropping up. If Ruby would break under the pressure it could mean the end of team RWBY as she was the only one keeping the three of them together at the moment. Blake wanted to help her, she did, but she had no idea how. The girl had been talking little since their heart-to-heart-conversation that Sunday. In fact, the small talk they'd had this morning, had been all they had said to each other since days.

All Blake could do was watch the smile of her friend become smaller with every passing moment.

Useless.

That's how she felt. Fucking Useless.

She couldn't do anything. Not when Yang had almost crushed her. Not when she had almost been squished by her team leader. Not when she had been captured by that thief. Not when she had almost drowned in the canal. Not when her two teammates fought. She hadn't even been able to follow and stop her best friend as she had left her. Her body was vulnerable and feeble. No, not just her body, she felt weak all over.

She couldn't do anything without the help of at least one of her friends. For someone who had lived independently during all of her childhood, it was difficult to adapt.

A cynical smile protruded her crestfallen expression as she remembered that she used to be a huntress-in-training. She used to fight against the evils of Remnants and help the people of the kingdom. Even though it had only been a week, it felt as if her past was a different world. She tried to remember her time as a full-fledged member of Team RWBY, but she could only recount faint memories, all of which were involving Yang. It seemed the effects of the Dust was messing with her mind.

All of a sudden it felt like her heart split open as a huge spike of negative emotions pierced through it.

Suppressing her feelings of self-loathing had been much easier when she had been with Yang. Now that she was all alone, she couldn't hold it all in.

Her dam broke. Every single emotion of sadness and despair built since her transformation came crashing down on her. She desperately tried to stay afloat and hold onto her sanity, but it was a lost cause. She sank deeper and deeper into her mental prison.

"Blake?" A voice coming from somewhere in her vicinity echoed through her head, but it wasn't her. It wasn't Yang.

The first droplets of water began cascading down her cheeks. Soon droplets became rivers and rivers became waterfalls.

"Blake?" The sound of a bed creaking, she didn't pay heed to it.

Blake fell to her knees and shook violently. Something warm enwrapped her body, gently putting pressure on her as she was lifted off the ground. Black and Red engulfed her entire vision. It was Ruby, her slender fingers gently squeezing the little girl between them. She pushed Blake against her soft chest and began to stroke her back comfortingly. Blake grabbed the black cloth of her team leader tightly and buried her head into it as deep as possible and let her tears flow freely. The soothing voice of her friend filled her ears. "That's it, Blake, just let it all out."

And she did exactly that. She released months of unshed tears, staining Ruby's sleeping top. Thankfully the giantess was too busy caring about her to realize or even care about some clothes.

"You really miss her, don't you?" Ruby's voice was so warm and comforting. All Blake could do was nod.

Blake felt like she didn't deserve the attention she was getting. Especially because her friend could burst out in tears at any moment herself. And as the thought that, something big splashed down onto the fabric right next to her face. Blake was right, Ruby couldn't hold back a few tears herself. The two teammates stood in the middle of their dorm, hugging and basking themselves in each other's presence.

They were too distracted comforting each other to notice the yellow flash moving across the field outside their window.

A/N:

Well, this chapter didn't really turned like I had originally planned, but nonetheless I'm pleased with the result. Long monologues are always a hit or miss for me.

Thank you so much for all your reviews, favorites and follows! Like I said, this story has reached almost 70 favorites and over 100 followers!

Reviewing time:

To lindleya1:

You're too kind, my heart swelled up while reading your review! This story will never die, not until it's finished ;-). There will indeed be a chapter between Blake and Weiss, but I can't really tell when that will be.

To ReverseSlinky:

First I got your attention and now I have your interest? Thanks!

To dracohalo117:

Like always, I'm glad you like it.

To Tatya1999:

You won't have to anymore ;-)

To SilverCivic:

You're a person of my heart SilverCivic! I share the same vision, and that's exactly why I won't quit this story, no matter how long it takes to finish it. I do hope I'll be able to post next chapter sooner. BTW, Bumblebee is the best ship.

To Guest:

Thanks! She will be herd responsible in some way.

To Emma:

It's my pleasure writing this story for you! There will be more cute kitty Blake moments, don't worry, it just didn't fit this chapter.

Like always, If there is anything you would like to see, just ask! (no promises though)

Please review, follow and favorite or Yang may leave you too!

DragonSlayer out!

(Back by popular demand: my own)

Yang: Hey wake up.

Me *mumbles*: Five more minutes mom.

*Yang slaps me in the face*

Me: Alright, alright I'm up. What is all the fuzz?

Blake: It has been a month and a half since you last updated.

Me: What! Not again.

*I sulk against the wall*

Yang: And why did you make me leave Blake? I would never do that!

*Yang's eyes turn red*

Me: Please have mercy on my poor soul.

Blake: You're on your own, now.

*Ruby barges in the room*

Ruby: Hey friends, what's up? Ooh, what is this?

*Ruby begins reading computer screen*

Me: Not you too.

Yang: Ruby, you're too young and innocent for the internet!