Boop

Summary: Sequel to Loveless. Ren and Nora discuss love. Platonic Team Sloth. Contains background Arkos.

Ren poked his head into Team JNPR's dorm room, but found no sign of his quarry. "Heard any sloths around here?"

Jaune Arc jumped, the most recent X-Ray and Vav comic dropping from nerveless fingers, apparently not having sensed Ren's approach or even heard the door opening. Odd for a Huntsman-in-Training, but not unexpected for his team leader. Pyrrha Nikos, Jaune's partner and their team's ace, looked up calmly from where she sat beside him, studying a tome on Aura theory.

Ren wondered, not for the first time, just how oblivious Jaune was. Pyrrha seemed to be everything the bumbling blond wasn't—graceful, clever, skilled, talented; also, Ren found it in himself to admit, she was quite good-looking. She was also plainly head-over-heels for the boy, and while Ren couldn't quite understand why, he was also coming to accept that he didn't quite understand romance at all.

Pyrrha shook her head. "Try the courtyard," she said, sounding amused. Ren nodded, and withdrew his head, hearing as he did so, Pyrrha drawing Jaune's attention to some detail in the textbook.

Ren shook his head, amused. Pyrrha had been the one to personally unlock Jaune's aura for the first time. She was tutoring him in swordplay, going out of her way to teach him all the things he was supposed to already know. (Jaune had confessed to faking his transcripts after the incident in the Forest of Forever Fall—well, he had confessed to his own team, at least. Ren wasn't sure if Team RWBY had been informed, yet. Or if they would be.) She was the first to leap to his defense when Winchester started in on him, or to comfort him afterward. She studied with him, coached him, and did her best to inspire him. Even now, she was doing research that was plainly for his benefit, as she sat beside him on the bed to study, their shoulders rubbing comfortably. Bizarrely, in Ren's opinion, she even gave Jaune some occasional romantic advice, watching him chase his own tail when it came to the blonde's unrequited crush on Weiss Schnee, incomprehensible as that, too, was to Ren.

Lost in thought, Ren blinked and found that he was already in the nearby courtyard that Pyrrha had recommended. Nora, sure enough, was "studying" in the shade of a tree…meaning that her books lay abandoned as she practiced balancing her weapon, Magnhild, on the tip of her nose, arms flailing for balance as she wriggled, trying to keep the massive hammer centered above her.

Ren felt a faint smile tugging at his lips. Nora always seemed to bring one out. She was facing away from him, and was progressively losing her balance as Ren crossed the grass toward her. In the end, Magnhild itself—himself, Nora would have insisted—overbalanced just as Ren reached Nora. He wasted no time in catching her bridal style and shifting so that the hammer's head impacted the ground beside them, rather than her face or his foot.

"Ren!" she exclaimed, promptly hugging him around the neck. He let her legs drop, but Nora did not release him, forcing him to bend at the waist as she dragged him down eight inches or so to her own height.

"Hello, Nora." Some people might have wondered how two such different people could be such close friends, but Ren rather thought that those questions somewhat missed the point. The vivacious redhead was his constant counterpoint, and he hers.

"Where've you been all day? I haven't seen you since breakfast and you left all sudden-like!" Nora exclaimed. She left out how plainly he had wanted to be alone—not that he had needed to explain such to her, after all these years—or how she had plainly not been searching for him, trusting him to pop back up when he was ready. Ren found himself smiling fondly again as Nora pulled him all the way down to the ground, his head resting in her lap as she sat back against the tree, jabbering away about all the nothing that had happened while they were apart.

"I was in the library," he supplied, when Nora took a breath. "I met Velvet. Interesting discussion." His characteristic summary done, he glanced up. Magenta eyes met sparkling turquoise as she looked back at him.
"Do you think she was named Velvet 'cause of how soft her ears are?" Nora wondered aloud.

"Perhaps, but that's not what we talked about," Ren chuckled.

"Then what did you talk about?" Nora asked, head tilted as though she couldn't conceive any other possible topic the two of them could have covered.

Ren glanced across the courtyard. "We talked about romance, actually." Nora went very still for a moment. "About how it is possible not to experience romantic feelings at all."

"Oh, Ren," Nora sighed. He looked up at her again, only to get poked in the nose for his trouble. "Boop."

He squinted up at her, but she was looking off into the middle-distance. "Who does Velvet know that's like you? It's not herself," she added with certainty. Ren blinked. Nora had certainly jumped quickly, if correctly, to the conclusion that Ren was talking about himself.

"Coco Adel," he answered. "Hence the Iced Cocoa jokes you hear sometimes." Nora nodded, eyes still unfocused. "She indicated that it is uncommon, but not abnormal."

"You thought you were broken, didn't you?" Nora said, accusingly, chin dropping to glare at Ren. "You thought maybe there was something wrong with you."

"How could I not?" Ren muttered, not meeting her eye. "We've been friends for a decade. Everyone we knew at combat school either expected us to get together or thought we already were. Plenty of people here think the same; even our teammates. Every story and account I've heard has indicated that some sort of attraction should be at least expected." Finally, he glanced sideways up at her. She was staring at him, mouth a little open. "There's also an annoyingly persistent rumor that 'boop' secretly means 'I love you'."

Nora began to giggle uncontrollably, leaning back against the tree at last. Finally, with a rather undignified snort, she stopped. "Of course it does."

Ren stiffened in shock. "What?"

Nora looked down at him again, a hint of mischief in her eyes. "I didn't make a secret that I'd considered what it would be like, if we were together. I mean, 'together-together'. But I'm not about to drive away my best friend by expecting something you can't give me. If people think that 'boop' means 'I love you', they're not wrong, they're just not entirely right. You're not the only one I boop, and there's a reason."

Ren just blinked at her again. Nora was being…remarkably coherent today.

"You'll always get boops, 'cause you're my best friend," Nora went on, still giggling, and poking his nose again to make her point. "Other people will get them too, sometimes. I love you and everyone! And that's okay too." She narrowed her eyes, though to Ren's familiar gaze, he thought she still looked mischievous. "Or do you think there's something wrong with me because of that?"

Refusing to get worked up, Ren just shook his head. Nora began playing idly with his hair, isolating the pink strand that she had bleached and dyed one day to match his eyes.

"There's more to love than romance, Ren," she said, solemn for once.

Ren nodded this time.

"Lots of people place romance on a pedestal. They tend to—" Nora grinned "—romanticize the ideal of romantic love. But it's not everything."

Another nod.

"It's not even anything special. It's just a form of love. There are lots." She ruffled his hair, then poked his nose yet again. "Boop. Case in point."

Ren considered that for a long while. Nora was not aromantic, that much was clear. But she seemed to accept that he was, and was quick to remind him that there was still love to be found. Funny, how someone that most people saw as such a scatterbrain could hone right in on exactly what was bothering him and lay his concerns to rest without him ever bringing them up. Some called her shallow, but nobody else had ever taken the time to get to know her properly. The rest of Team JNPR and their sister squad Team RWBY were on their way, but Ren had a feeling that nobody would ever take his place. That was just as well. They were partners, after all.

"Nora," Ren said softly. Nora paused mid-word and glanced down at him, only to recoil in surprise when he gently poked her nose. "Boop," he said.

Nora's smile could have blinded the sun.

A/N: Ren's perspective, once again, is basically just mine.

Ren appears to be an unashamed Arkos fan himself, though as with most things about him, it's pretty understated. Nora is not nearly so restrained, being more of a shipper on deck, actively nudging the two toward each other—or rather, nudging Jaune toward Pyrrha and encouraging Pyrrha to step up.

This was unplanned, but it felt like a natural extension to Loveless. Which was not meant to be a "perfect" title, by the way. Obviously Ren is not loveless, as Nora points out. He just needed her to help him realize it; she's a counterweight that helps him stop overthinking things, just like he helps her from going overboard in her excesses and burning out. I don't see Ren and Nora in a romantic relationship (ever), but there is still love there. They are partners. Forever.