"Holy-" Winter gasped as she reentered her dorm room.
"What is it?" Ruby asked as she peeked around the older Schnee to find her girlfriend sitting on a chair between two stacks of paper.
"Even I haven't read that much of it." Winter spoke as she shook herself and reentered the room.
"It's nothing special. Most of this is boiler-plate template." Weiss said as she quickly scanned a page before flipping it over and placing it neatly on the opposite stack and reaching for the next one. "As of yet, I haven't found anything too special except section six-eff-bee-eight point three, subsection bravo-delta-nine."
"Right, that's the fix to company boiler plate that happened in early October." Winter replied. "There's also a few others that appear in every section between see-four-two-two point one sub alpha-bravo-oh, and eff-six-one-nine point bee sub delta-alpha-oh."
"Right, I'll skip those once I come to them then." Weiss fell silent again as she continued to scan the file one page at a time, slowly picking up speed as she came to sections that her sister had mentioned.
"Can you explain what just happened?" Ruby asked in a whisper to Blake.
Winter overheard the question and turned to invite everyone inside the room. "Every contract is broken down into sections and subsections. This contract is specifically difficult as it has an additional decimal place to the section numbers. As is Schnee standard practice, all sections and subsections are numbered in a base sixteen instead of base ten in order to shorten the length of the headings."
"So what do we do?" Ruby asked cluelessly as she watched Weiss move the papers from one pile to the other.
"Weiss, what are the first five problem sections?" Winter asked over her shoulder.
"Three-alpha point two through seven, not four." Weiss responded irritatedly.
"There we go then." Winter clapped and spun to pick up the stack Weiss was filling. She removed it and Weiss started piling the papers on the ground again. Winter flipped the stack and started leafing through the paper until she pulled a handful of pages from the middle. "Alright, just take notes on possible outcomes or exits while you go through the piece and strike them out when you find something that closes the hole."
"I know there should be a joke in there somewhere, but I'm not quite sure Weiss would appreciate it." Blake smiled.
"Looks like Yang's started to rub off on you too." Ren sighed as he took the first bunch of papers Winter was offering.
"Okay, let's do this!" Jaune said as he took his papers and the rest followed his example. Ruby was last in line and Winter held onto the papers and leaned closer to make sure nobody else would overhear her whisper.
"Ruby, I've never seen Weiss this serious before. She looks like she might just snap under the stress she's feeling." Winter spoke, her lips barely moving. "If anyone can get her to take a deep breath, I'll put my money on it being you. Please?"
"Uh… sure!" Ruby agreed, not exactly grasping the implication Winter had made, but deciding to give it a shot regardless.
Ruby sat down on the bed in front of Weiss, she looked around the room to find the others in various positions on the couch, the opposite beds and the window ledge.
"Hey, Weiss…" Ruby whispered, leaning into Weiss's personal space.
"What is it Ruby? I'm busy." Weiss asked, a frown marring her features.
"I need you to look up for a second." Ruby said, ignoring the tone of voice Weiss had. She'd dealt with worse before and she knew the frustration wasn't aimed at her.
"What is it?" Weiss asked again and then looked up. Ruby cut off any other words with a kiss to her lips that surprised her and after a moment, when Ruby felt Weiss's resistance crumble, she pulled away.
"Relax, you've got all of us to help." Ruby said quietly so as not to disturb anyone. "We'll find a solution, but you need to let us help you."
Weiss nodded and took a long calming breath.
"Alright… start on that section then." Weiss said as she pointed to the papers in Ruby's hand. She quickly turned to the room at large. "When you're done with one section, let me know and I'll give you another. If we can, let's get through the first hundred tonight."
"Just leave it to us." Jaune replied for the group.
Weiss turned back to Ruby. Once again, she reminded herself of that one important idea she accidentally kept pushing aside. "I love you Ruby."
"I love you too Weiss, now let's crack this thing!" Ruby smiled and pulled out Weiss's notebook from her pocket. She clicked her pen into action and flashed Weiss one last smile before she set to work on the contract. Her tongue stuck out the corner of her mouth as she concentrated and scribbled the odd note, and Weiss felt an overwhelming sense of relief. With everyone helping her, they were sure to work something out.