The (Mis)Adventures of Team JPTR

by GenericUsername3846

You know when you have a really bad idea that seems better the more you think about it? This is one of those. Jaune Arc, Peter Parker, Ben Tennyson, and Rex Salazar together in the RWBY universe to form team J.P.T.R. And they said Infinity War was the most ambitious crossover in history. Updates will come fairly regularly if my schedule allows for it.

11. Let's Start Over

Oof, we're finally here. Where is "here", you ask? A very important place. I feel like I've been saying (or at least thinking) this a lot lately, but I'm very excited to write this chapter. It's got a lot of stuff I've wanted to do for a while now, so I'm very happy to finally get to bust out some of the ideas I've been holding down until the right time.

It's also one of the rare few times I don't feel like complaining about my writing. I know, GASP, I'm not opening the chapter with "By the way, this whole thing is shit, my writing ability is shit, and this entire chapter is straight cheeks". It's not perfect, obviously, but I'd like to think it's actually pretty good. Dare I say it, I think I cooked with this one. I give it an 8/10.

I do not own RWBY, Spider-Man, any version of Ben 10, or Generator Rex.

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"Do you think one of you will finally get to fight today? You've been stuck on the bench this whole time."

It was Wednesday, the fifth day of Beacon's first term. Many of the first-year students had fallen into their own personal rhythms to help ease into their new living situation. Most filled their spare time by training with their teammates, or passed the day in the library completing homework assignments. Others ignored their responsibilities and goofed off all day, playing video games or aimlessly watching TV on their Scrolls.

"Maybe..."

Whatever they did in their free time, the majority of the first-years had enough common sense to at least remain attentive during classroom hours. With so much material to cover and the threat of tests already looming over their heads, very few were willing to risk being caught unprepared, lest their grades slip into a pit too deep to climb out of.

"I hope I get to fight one of you. Should be fun to get a decent challenge for once."

"... Looking forward to it."

Of course, some tried harder than others. Many were content with simply paying attention in class and drew the line there, believing their memories would serve them well. Others took things a step further and prepared outside of class by studying textbooks and lecture notes. Others still went into overdrive, devoting every waking second to being the best students they could be, though they were few and far between among the largely relaxed first-years.

"Hey, are you guys okay? You've been kind of quiet lately."

"... Just feeling tired."

It was 9:50 in the morning. Third period, the final class before the lunch bell rang, would begin in ten minutes. For this particular batch of students, it was known as combat class, held in one of the largest classrooms in Beacon.

Really, calling it a classroom was a massive understatement, an outright fallacy even. Instead of desks, students sat in raised stands set beside a massive, arena-like space, as though they were bleachers lining a football field. Every day, for a little over an hour, pairs of students were chosen by the professor of the class to spar with each other until one of their auras dropped too low for the fight to continue.

The basic idea was to give the students opportunities to directly test their abilities against each other, as well as to study their own weaknesses and work to correct them so they could improve their performance in the future. For a school of Hunters-in-training, it was arguably the single most important class they had.

"Tired? You'd better wake up before the bell rings, or Ms. Goodwitch will definitely let you have it."

"... Got it."

It was only natural for the most important class to be taught by the strictest professor. Even the most disobedient students had learned she was not to be toyed with. If she gave a command, it was to be followed, if she spoke, they were to respond, and gods help anybody foolish enough to show up late. The number one unofficial rule of combat class was simple; whatever you do, do not piss off the teacher.

"Honestly, what is your leader doing? I don't know if I should commend his bravery or find fault in his stupidity, daring to not be in his seat by now." Weiss checked the door to the classroom for what had to be the hundredth time in the past five minutes. Her team was nestled right in the center of the stands, Team PVRL occupying the row directly in front of them while Team JPTR was one row behind, minus one member.

With so little time before class began, the only student who had failed to be present was Jaune Arc.

She did not receive an answer to her question.

"'Tired' might be an exaggeration. These three are practically dead."

With their leader gone, it was like Team JPTR had lost their soul. Whenever he was around, they were fairly normal. They made conversation, they wore smiles, and seemed perfectly happy. Without him, it was an entirely different story.

All they did was... wait. They sat quietly in their seats, fiddling with their Scrolls or staring at the wall. In the row in front of her, Weiss could see Kevin was behaving similarly, completely ignoring all of Nora's grating attempts to speak with him. Facing away from his hyperactive teammate, all he did was cross his arms and stare at the wall on the other side of the classroom with a neutral expression, unbothered by her behavior, but not acknowledging it either. It was remarkably similar to how Ren usually acted, but, coming from Kevin, it gave off a very different feeling.

Frankly, it was worrying. Though Weiss had not known them for very long, the boys she met on Initiation day and the classmates she shared the room with were very different people, and the massive shift in attitude made her genuinely worried. She brushed it off two days ago, paid a little more attention yesterday, and was now beginning to think there actually was a problem.

As she opened her mouth to ask her question a second time, the door to the classroom slammed open. Instantly, every single student shut their mouths and fixed their posture, only to relax shortly after. The one to walk through the door was not their terrifyingly strict professor, but a lanky blonde boy proudly striding in without a care in the world. From the way he carried himself into the room full of fighters, he seemed confident enough to happily fight the world.

"Finally made it, Lady Killer? I didn't think you'd be the type to cut it close like this." Beside Weiss, Yang was leaning back in her seat and using her crossed arms as a pillow. Her tone was as casual as her posture, giving her the presence of somebody who couldn't be bothered by the world around them.

"I was getting worried, Jaune. You usually always come to class with us." Ruby, on the other hand, was rocking back and forth in her seat, like she couldn't wait for some excitement to brighten up her boring morning.

"My bad, guys." Jaune climbed the stairs beside the raised stands and took a seat next to his team. "Got caught in one of Professor Port's stories when I tried to give him my homework. It took a while to get him to let me go."

Nobody questioned the story, or even batted an eye. Weiss shut her eyes and muttered something about inadequate staff, Yang laughed loudly, Ruby groaned miserably, and Blake's bow twitched a tiny bit. By now, everybody was familiar with the aging professor's tendency to go off on long tangents every time somebody set him off. It was truly unfortunate for any poor soul who garnered his attention, especially if they had somewhere to be.

That was exactly why Jaune selected the incredibly believable excuse. What actually happened was that he made the mistake of leaving his homework on his bed before leaving that morning and had to make a mad dash to his room and back to submit the assignment before he forgot about it again. Of course, he wasn't going to tell anybody that.

Turns out, pretending to be confident and capable was surprisingly easy. All you had to do was own everything you did and said, pretend any mistakes made were done on purpose, and crack a joke or two every now and then to give off the air of somebody who had no reason to be worried about anything. His act had held up these past few days. As far as he knew, there wasn't a single soul in Beacon that questioned his Honors Student status.

"Well, now that you're here, perhaps you should have a word with your team. Lately, they've seemed rather-"

Weiss gestured to the three boys who practically refused to say anything ever since they were separated from their captain, only to freeze up upon seeing all of them were now smiling. The moment their leader returned, new life was breathed into all of them. It was an unnervingly sudden change.

"'Sup, jefe?" Rex paused the game he was playing on his Scroll and raised a hand in greeting for his leader.

"Good to see you, captain." Instead of waving, Ben chose to nod his head.

"Didn't think you'd be the type to cut it close like this." Peter joked.

"... I just said that." Yang stared blankly at the one who so casually stole her lines…

And received an equally blank stare in return. "You did?"

"..." All she could do was blink slowly. It was impossible to tell if Peter was being serious or not.

Jaune chuckled lightly at the humorous scene.

"What were you saying, Weiss?" He asked politely.

With his attention now on her, the heiress stumbled with her words momentarily. "... N-nothing. Perhaps it was… just my imagination." Weiss turned away from the now complete team and shook her head. Whatever just happened, she didn't want to waste too much time thinking about it right before class began.

"Well… alright then. Here's hoping my good luck continues."

Shrugging his shoulders at the beautiful girl's dismissal of the topic, Jaune prepared himself for another stress-inducing period. The number one source of his anxiety was this hellish class. After several sleepless nights in the library, he was beginning to make progress on his studies to the point he could actually follow along with classes. Sure, he was constantly exhausted and lines were beginning to appear under his eyes, but he filed those minor details under small annoyances rather than major issues. Any physical changes were minor enough that nobody had noticed them yet, as such, they were currently irrelevant.

He chose to focus on the fact he was at least able to understand what his professors were saying… while ignoring the sad truth that he had spent more time seated at a desk than he had in his own bed since arriving at Beacon.

Combat Class was another issue entirely. In all Jaune's life, he had never fought another person. His attitude, he could fake. His grades were between him and the professors, and he was already making progress with his studies. Putting on a show for his entire class to see… that was impossible to fake. When he was inevitably chosen to fight, he would need to improvise or hope his opponent suddenly came down with a debilitating fever right as the match began, otherwise the image he had meticulously built up of a cool, confident, capable Honors Student would come crashing down once everybody saw how easily he was defeated.

Until today, he had managed to get through every class without once being chosen to fight in a match, but that couldn't continue forever. Sooner or later, his luck would run out.

"... By the way, you think maybe one of you will get to fight today?" He addressed his teammates. Now that he thought about it, he wasn't the only one. Nobody on his team had been chosen to fight yet. Neither had Kevin or even Pyrrha from Team PVRL. Considering some other students had already performed two or even three times, it was hard not to notice that they alone had been passed up.

Ruby turned around in her seat to face Jaune. "I was just asking that earlier! I've wanted to see you guys fight ever since Initiation, but Professor Goodwitch won't choose any of you."

Peter nervously itched his cheek with a finger. "Really? I didn't even notice. Maybe I'll finally get a chance today." His answer was filled with more dread than enthusiasm. "Not... that I'm excited to beat up my classmates. No hard feelings if we get matched up, right?"

Despite his alleged combat skills, Peter very transparently did not relish the idea of being forced to fight the same people he attended school with. Under the poor cover of half-hearted jokes, it almost seemed like he outright despised it.

"Still, he's much more talkative now that his leader's turned up." Blake had been silently reading a book this entire time, but she was sitting close enough to the others for it to be impossible to not listen in on their conversation. Peter's answer may not have been terribly long, but it was a tremendous improvement from the empty, one-word answers he and his teammates had been giving earlier.

On the subject of fighting, she had her own theories regarding their long stay on the sidelines. Considering all of Team JPTR, along with Kevin, were supposed to be the "top-tiers" of their year, Professor Goodwitch was likely saving them for whenever she needed to prove a point. The best in their year were unlikely to benefit very much from fighting their classmates, and fighting each other wouldn't provide much new experience either, considering they all seemed to know each other already before the term even began.

Blake's best guess was that Goodwitch was waiting until her students began feeling a little too full of themselves, only to sic the Honors Students on them to destroy their overconfidence. Or maybe she was giving them a chance to build up their confidence. If the Honors Students easily crushed them right at the start of the year, there was a chance they would begin to doubt their abilities, which could be a death sentence at a demanding school like Beacon.

As for Pyrrha… well, there wasn't much mystery there. Everybody knew the world famous champion. She was likely in the same boat as the Honors Students, a trump card for their teacher to use to bring any overconfident students back down to Remnant.

Though, these were only theories. There was no way for Blake to actually know if she was right. Perhaps their teacher had another plan in mind.

"Don't get too upset if we end up fighting, ladies. I'll apologize in advance for embarrassing you." Rex confidently declared war with a smile on his face. He did not even look up from his video game while looking for a fight.

Naturally, the majority of Team RWBY did not take such blatant disrespect lying down and immediately began protesting the outrageous statement. Again, Jaune found himself chuckling at the humorous scene.

It made him happy seeing his team get along with the others, but he couldn't help but feel something was off. Weiss was definitely about to tell him something about their behavior, only to change her mind. He had not missed her sudden decision to back out of the conversation.

Before class began in the next minute or two, he tried to take a closer look. Rex was focusing only on his game and not minding Ruby and Yang's protests to his bold declaration. Ben was fiddling around with his watch, pressing buttons and rotating the dial with no apparent effect on its functions beyond producing a few beeping noises. Peter was just staring at the clock on the wall with his hands in his pockets, waiting patiently and quietly for class to begin.

None of them looked off in any way. They looked relaxed. They looked calm. They looked…

Impatient?

Underneath the relaxed attitudes, the boys almost seemed to be waiting for something. Not just waiting for class to start or for something interesting to happen. There was a sort of feeling to them that said they were just blankly passing time, waiting for some particular thing to happen. Rex was playing his game so absent-mindedly, he was barely even paying attention. Ben was just pressing random buttons that did nothing more than make noise. Peter's eyes kept darting around the classroom, looking for nothing in particular, only to return to the clock sooner or later and start the cycle over again.

The closer Jaune looked, the more he felt there was something strange about his teammates. The more he thought about it, the stranger it felt. He couldn't think of any time in recent memory when he was around them where they weren't exactly as they were now. Relaxed, calm, and smiling. He would like to think it was because his presence put them at ease, but…

"Well, now that you're here, perhaps you should have a word with your team. Lately, they've seemed rather-"

"..."

Truthfully, Jaune had been rather disconnected lately. He'd spent so much time in the library studying, he failed to pay close attention to his team, let alone his other classmates. Maybe he would have to take some time to remedy that mistake. If something was bothering the boys, it was his job as the leader of their team to check up and make sure they were alright.

From what he could tell, they were largely the same as ever, wearing perpetual smiles and cracking jokes. But, by the sound of it, Weiss was seeing something different. Could it be that they were unwilling to show weakness to their leader?

No, that was ridiculous, stupid, even. Why wouldn't they tell him if something was wrong? Surely they would ask him for help if something was bothering them.

But... Weiss didn't exactly seem like the type to make up something like this for fun. And... it did look like they were a little off, now that he took a closer look.

"... I'll be busy during lunch period and dinner, but I can talk with them for a while before I head to the library tonight."

Nodding to himself, Jaune confirmed his plan. Bettering himself was important, but he couldn't just ignore his teammates, especially if there was something causing them pain. No matter what, he would take the time to check up with all of them before slipping away for the nightly stay in the library. Maybe he was overthinking this whole thing, but sparing a couple minutes to check in wouldn't kill him.

Just then, at long last, the bell rang. The precise moment the harsh ringing assaulted Jaune's eardrums, the entire class fell silent, like a switch had been flipped. The previously noisy students did not dare make a single peep. This was no longer a time of joy and relaxation.

This was her time now.

The door to the classroom swung open, and a blonde woman walked in carrying a large, custom-made Scroll. She was all business, robotically marching straight into the room and stopping precisely in the center with a stern look on her face. Feet pressed together and back straight, her posture was flawless.

"Good morning everyone."

"Good morning Professor Goodwitch." Nobody dared remain silent. By now, everybody knew the serious teacher could smell disobedient students. Whenever she called, there was not a single person brave enough to refrain from responding. They did not need a reminder of what happened to anybody who could not be bothered to greet her back.

Number one unofficial rule of combat class; whatever you do, do not piss off the professor.

"You have all performed well thus far, though there is always room for improvement." As Professor Goodwitch began her lesson, the large TV screen fixed to the wall behind her flickered on. There were two blank square boxes on opposite sides of the screen, and two large, empty bars were right beside them. It brought to mind a video game, if you ignored the empty character frames and the prematurely depleted "health bars".

"The best way to improve yourself is to practice. Over and over, until you have learned to identify and correct your weaknesses. I intend to assist each of you in learning how to better yourselves, until there are no mistakes left to fix. Now then, let us begin."

The stone-faced professor began tapping away on her Scroll. Some became excited while others tried to disappear into their seats. It was time for the battles to begin.

Cafeteria:

"Seriously!? Again!? Come on, I wanna fight you guys already!" Yang dramatically threw herself down on the lunch table, resting her face between her outstretched arms. As she feared, it was more of the same in combat class. All of the Honors Students plus Pyrrha were benched the entire period, with no signs they would be fighting anytime soon.

She was a little happy that she herself got to fight somebody today, but it was just Russel Thrush, the skinny little weasel from Team CRDL. He talked a big game, but the fight only lasted a few seconds. One good punch to the face and his aura disappeared along with his dignity. Yang wanted a real challenge, the kind an Honors Student could provide.

"It is becoming rather noticeable that Professor Goodwitch is actively avoiding choosing any of you." Weiss sighed. "At this rate, half the year will pass before you get a chance to participate in class."

"..."

"..."

"..."

"Of course." Weiss scowled at the Honors Students before her.

Jaune did not join them for lunch. He hurriedly informed all of them that he had somewhere he needed to be and dashed out of the cafeteria after grabbing some food for himself. Without their leader around, the remaining members of Team JPTR behaved exactly as Weiss expected them to. As soon as Jaune was out of the room, they shut down, shut up, and shut out the world around them.

"Honestly, what are they putting on this show for? Why bother putting on smiles whenever their leader joins us? Why not give any of us those same smiles? The least they could do is respond."

Truth be told, she was getting extremely sick of this behavior. The concern she felt before was rapidly dissipating into full-blown annoyance. It was getting more and more difficult to bear being around the boys when all she got from them at best were one-word responses and small nods.

"Ahem!" She cleared her throat loudly, succeeding in at least getting them to raise their heads. "Peter, have you considered my request since the last time I asked?"

"... What?" He responded blankly, like he had no idea what she was talking about.

Weiss groaned through closed lips. "Yesterday, I requested for the nth time you show me the battery you claim to be able to build. If you have some free time today, I can meet you in one of the workshops.

"... Mmm. Maybe." Peter gave an empty, non-committal answer. Weiss did not appreciate the lack of emotion in his voice, but decided to back out of this aggravating "conversation" while she at least had a "maybe" and not a straight refusal.

"Ooh, that reminds me! Ben, you said you would show me more of what your watch can do today! Please, please, please can you show me after classes end?" Ruby leaned over the table and gently prodded Ben's cheek to get his attention. He flinched away, like she had woken him up from a nap. After blinking a few times, her words seemed to finally register in his mind.

"Oh, uh… yeah, later's fine." He said in a tired voice, then went back to eating his lunch. Ruby internally fist-pumped. He agreed to no such thing, but if he was willing to go along with it, then that was a win for her. She had wanted to see more of the awesome watch he wore ever since Initiation ended, but, with Goodwitch permanently benching him, there hadn't been any opportunities.

"... Is everything okay?" Pyrrha leaned over and whispered in Blake's ear. "It's not just my imagination, is it?" The Spartan girl was far from an expert on emotions, especially those of people outside herself, but even she wasn't so oblivious as to not notice the oddities playing out before her.

"Nope. They're definitely acting weird." Blake boredly responded, then turned to look over the redhead's shoulder. "Looks like you've got the same issue."

She was referring to Kevin, of course. Nora had spent all morning bugging him, but he refused to say a word. Or rather, he looked too distracted by something to even notice he was being spoken to. The immensely fascinating walls and floors of Beacon had his attention in a death grip these past few days.

Pyrrha sighed pitifully. "I do. I've tried making conversation so many times, but I haven't had much success."

Blake frowned. She noticed the four boys began behaving strangely ever since they returned from the Vale trip. No, maybe even a little before that. Something about their behavior was just... wrong, beyond the obvious. It wasn't even that they were being so uncharacteristically distant. If she had to choose a word, it was as if they were distracted.

Whenever she paid attention to them, they always looked like they were waiting for something to happen. Ben had made a habit of constantly tapping his foot on the ground impatiently, something he was doing even now, and Rex rarely ever put down his Scroll, choosing instead to pass the time playing random video games that barely captured his attention. It was especially noticeable with Peter. She could count on her fingers the number of times she had seen him not looking at a clock, timer, or calendar. All of this left her with only one question.

What could they possibly be waiting for?

She was not a prying person by nature, but this was far too strange to just leave alone. So, she decided to go for the one thing she knew for sure made any difference in their behavior.

"... By the way, do any of you know where Jaune is right now?" She inquired casually, putting extra emphasis on their leader's name.

The results were as she expected. As soon as she said that name, all of JPTR's members snapped to attention and put on casual smiles. Out of the corner of her eye, Blake noticed Kevin also slightly adjusted his posture, though not nearly to the same degree as the other boys. In the span of a single second, they went from looking deeply depressed to warmly happy. Once they realized he was not actually there, they returned to normal.

"He's… uh…" Peter trailed off lamely.

"At… the dorm?" Ben obviously had no idea and was just guessing.

"... Overtime with Professor Peach?" Rex shrugged cluelessly.

Kevin stayed quiet. His shift in demeanor began and ended with sitting up a tad straighter.

Blake narrowed her eyes in suspicion. "... None of you know where your leader is?"

Of course, she got no response.

Blake closed her eyes and slowly rubbed her temples. "Your turn, Yang." It was time for her to tap out. The self-proclaimed "PR Manager" of Team RWBY could handle this.

"Hm?" The brawler paused with her fork in her mouth and an adorably clueless look on her face. Blake tiredly gestured to the boys, earning a slow blink and a small noise of understanding. Yang swallowed her food and cleared her throat. "So, what's new boys?" she asked in her friendliest voice.

"... Not much." Peter replied.

"Watch is all good." Ben continued fiddling with the device in between bites of his lunch.

"Downloaded a new game today." Rex responded without looking up.

It was Yang's turn to frown. Unlike the others, who seemed to think this was an abrupt change, she had noticed a decline in the boys' behavior. She had seen them slowly close themselves off ever since Initiation until they reached a point where they wouldn't even smile unless Jaune was around. It wasn't out of nowhere, they just stopped trying so hard to hide whatever this was.

Apparently, the only one they cared about putting on a show for by now was Jaune. The rest of them simply weren't worth getting dressed up for.

"Cool, cool. And, you guys are doing okay?"

"Yup."

"Totally."

"For sure."

All three replies had about as much life in them as Yang expected them to.

The other girls might have been willing to dance around the issue, but Yang was not. Several times she had asked directly and indirectly if everything was okay, and several times she was either ignored or given an empty nod. The blatantly untrue responses to her most recent attempt were actually an improvement over the results of the past. Something was obviously bothering the boys, something they didn't want to talk about, not with her. If anybody was going to fix this issue, it wasn't going to be her. Not because she didn't want to, but because she already knew anything she said was unlikely to have any effects.

Well, not any positive effects.

Taking a resigned breath, Yang grabbed her tray and stood up.

"Yang?" Ruby looked at her sister with confusion in her eyes.

"I'm out. I've got enough self-awareness to know when I'm not wanted." She turned her attention to the silent boys, a small scowl on her face. "I hope you all get over whatever's bothering you. In the meantime, don't let me bring you down even more with all my questions."

Done speaking, the annoyed girl walked to another table. Whatever people thought of her, she really was good at picking up social cues, she just chose to ignore them most of the time. This was absolutely not something to be ignored, and her presence wasn't going to help at all. If it were Ruby, or Blake, or even Weiss, maybe she could do something, but, plainly speaking, Yang just didn't know enough about the JPTR boys to truly help them.

There was somebody else better suited to that task, wherever he was.

"Y-yang? Hold on, wait!" Ruby grabbed her own tray and followed her sister. "Where are you going?"

Weiss thought for a moment, then grabbed her own tray. "When you're feeling better, I'll be happy to speak with you again."

Blake was already walking away by the time Weiss stood up.

"E-everyone?!" Pyrrha called after the RWBY girls, but she was ignored. "U-um…" Looking between Team RWBY and the JPTR boys, she too began leaving. "I-I'll be right back. I'll try talking to them."

The table was almost empty now. The only ones still sitting with the off-worlders were Ren and Nora. Even the hyperactive girl looked unsure of herself by this point. Meanwhile, the ones responsible for the mass-evacuation hadn't even noticed anything.

"... Hm?" Reaching out to grab his cup of water, Rex briefly looked up from his game and stopped. He was confused by the distinct lack of people at their table. It was full just a moment ago, wasn't it? Or did he imagine that?

Looking to his left, he saw Peter was also looking around with confusion etched on his face.

"They left." Ren calmly explained. The two boys looked over to see him slowly eating his lunch with a neutral expression. "I believe Yang was frustrated and the others chose to follow her."

The explanation only furthered Peter's confusion.

"Frustrated? Why? Weren't we just talking about…"

"..."

Unknowingly, Rex was continuing the same thought as his teammate.

"What… were we talking about?"

There was something about Jaune… didn't somebody ask where he was?

No, hold on, that was Blake. Why was Yang so frustrated? Was their answer to her question unsatisfactory?

Her question… which… was…?

Peter blinked. He couldn't remember what she had asked them. Thinking maybe it was something from before, he tried thinking further back, and found he couldn't clearly remember a single conversation they'd had since going their separate ways in Vale four days ago.

... Something was wrong.

There was a strange sensation in his right leg. Looking down, he realized he was tapping his foot down so furiously, it was starting to wear down the sole of his shoe. He was in detective mode, looking around for anything to help him figure out what happened while he was spacing out. The only other clue he found was gripped loosely in his left hand. His personal Scroll was turned on, displaying a calendar and a clock.

"Hold on... that can't be right. It can't have already been... four days?"

Rex set down his own Scroll. He had stopped paying attention to the game he was playing long enough to lose his final life and had nothing to look at but a Game Over screen.

"This game… haven't I beaten it a bunch of times already?"

"Hey, Ben, do you know what-" Rex turned to his partner, who was still fiddling with his watch. He hadn't even noticed that their table was now half-empty.

"Oye, Ben!" At last, the verdant hero reacted after Rex snapped his fingers in front of his face a few times.

"Yeah, what's u-... where'd everybody go?" Ben parroted his teammates and looked around a few times.

So, he didn't know either. That wasn't very helpful.

"Are you guys… okay?" Nora's energy dropped just enough for her to carefully prod the boys for information.

"... Y-yeah?" Peter replied cautiously. He did not sound very confident in his answer. The poor liar spoke as if he wanted somebody else to answer the question for him.

Ren frowned at the response. "If I may, perhaps you should speak with Jaune. He knows you better than us, so I'm sure he could offer more appropriate-" He quietly trailed off. He watched as the three boys straightened up and smiled, only to look at themselves with shock on their faces, like even they could not explain the reflexive action. "... advice. ... Sooner rather than later may be best."

"What… was that?" Peter hadn't even tried to move, his body just reacted on its own once he heard Jaune's name. Ben and Rex were equally lost, unable to understand their own behavior.

Pausing his own thoughts, temporarily, Peter looked at his no-longer-tapping foot, then at the calendar on his Scroll. Ben stared fixedly at his watch, and Rex lifted his Scroll closer to his face. One by one they slowly put away the things that evidently captured their attention not long ago. While Peter and Rex pocketed their mobile devices, Ben tugged down his left jacket sleeve and put his arm behind his back for good measure.

Peter wasn't entirely certain what was going on, but he was starting to put the pieces together. All of them were spaced out, all of them were unusually unaware of their surroundings, and they all reacted anytime somebody mentioned…

"Crap."

He looked to Ben and Rex. Their expressions made it clear they had reached the same conclusion as him. Closing his eyes, Peter breathed deeply and came to a decision.

"This won't get us anywhere. We need to take care of this before it turns into a serious problem."

It was Peter's turn to push away from the table. "Guys, we need to talk. You too, Kevin."

"Go away, Parker." Nora's eyes widened. After hours of prodding from her, all it took for her teammate to open his mouth were a few words from Peter. "I ain't goin' anywhere until I finish my- HEY!"

This was too important. Peter was not taking no for an answer. Grabbing Kevin by the shoulder, he pulled him up and away from the table, leaving the last of his lunch uneaten.

"Sorry, can't wait."

Dragging the much larger young man around by the shoulder, Peter led the way out of the cafeteria. Ben and Rex did not need any convincing to follow after him.

Ren blinked slowly as they left. "That was interesting."

"It was supposed to be me!" Nora was immensely disappointed her game of trying to get Kevin to speak had been won by a last-second entrant.

J.P.T.R.'s Dorm:

"Jaune, you in here?" Peter pushed open the door to his team's room. Unsurprisingly, it was empty, but he was not disappointed by this fact.

"The hell are you doin', Parker!?" Kevin had been struggling ever since the cafeteria, but he had not made any progress breaking Peter's grip on his shoulder. He had yet to succeed at even lifting a single one of his fingers.

"Come on, all of you get inside." Pushing the man he blatantly kidnapped into the room, Peter gestured for Ben and Rex to step inside as well. Once everybody had chosen a spot, he shut and locked the door.

"You better have a good reason for cuttin' my lunch short." Kevin pointed accusingly at the monster who ended his mealtime early.

"Calm down, Kev. This is important." Ben leaned against the wall next to the window and crossed his arms.

Rex sat on his bed with his hands in his pockets, trying to get ahead of the curve and piece together what he could. He knew something was wrong with them, but for some reason, he couldn't think of what it was. What were they doing?

Peter sat down at the desk next to the door and sighed. He dragged his squad of dimension-hoppers here on a whim without really thinking it through. Even though most of them agreed they needed to talk, he wasn't quite sure what he wanted to talk about.

No, that wasn't true. He was pretty sure he knew exactly why he felt so uncomfortable, and the others probably felt the same way, even Kevin. What Peter didn't know was how to start the conversation.

"Guys… what are we doing?" The meaningless question was the best he could manage to start with. It didn't exactly shock him when all he got in response were confused looks he was sure matched his own. "I mean, what are we trying to do here? What are we hoping to accomplish?"

"... Aren't we supposed to save the world?" Ben put forth the only answer he could think of. Again, Peter sighed.

"Well, yeah, but what are we doing now? What are we doing with our time? What… God, what am I even trying to say here?" Peter held his head in his hands. Even he didn't know what point he was trying to make. Hoping a visual aid would help get his thoughts across, he pulled out his Scroll and showed off the calendar he was apparently staring at earlier. "... What is this?"

Again, none of the boys knew how to answer the strange question.

"I don't…" Rex tried to give an answer, but didn't know what he was supposed to say. He was just like Peter. He knew exactly what was bothering him, but had no idea how to explain it.

Peter decided there was no hope of getting the others - or he, himself - to understand his point just yet, so he switched gears. "... We all know this world is in danger, right? That much is obvious. There are giant monsters running around outside the big cities, destroying villages and killing people. Even if they don't plan on saving the world, isn't everybody else here working hard to do something?"

He paused to take a breath and collect his thoughts. The point he was trying to make was important, but it was difficult to find the right way to bring it up.

"What… what happened to us?"

The question hung in the air. Just by throwing it out, it felt like a weight settled on every one of their shoulders. Nobody looked Peter in the eyes, and even if they did, he probably would have looked away himself.

"... This sucks. Everything about this sucks. Of course I want to help these people, but I don't want to just disappear for two whole years. I can't even imagine being away from home that long, and I'm guessing none of you can either. But we're here now, and we can't go back." Peter forced himself to raise his head. Even if the others wouldn't look at him, he would at least show enough courage to keep his own head up. "We can't just not talk about it. We can't just do nothing. For four days, all we've done is try to waste time as fast as possible. We've barely talked to anyone, we've barely done anything… but we're still pretending. We're acting like everything is fine, and for who? For Jaune?"

Peter stood up. He knew he was ranting. He knew he was barely making sense. But he couldn't stop now that he had started.

"Paradox said he's part of the team. He's supposed to be our ally. He's supposed to be my partner, and none of us know anything about him. Blake made that pretty clear, didn't she?" Peter turned and looked straight at Rex. "Rex, where was Jaune last night?"

The dark-haired teen obviously wasn't expecting to suddenly be called out. He looked to Ben for support, but received none. "... I-in bed?"

"Nope. I woke up around five in the morning, and saw Jaune sneaking into his bed. He probably wasn't even in the room with us until then." Peter next looked at Ben. "Ben, what was Jaune doing yesterday?"

"... A homework assignment?"

"For who?"

"..."

"... Yeah, that's what I thought. Kevin, wha-"

"Will you give it a rest already?" Kevin glowered at Peter. He was getting sick of this pointless lecture. "If you're such a great guy, why don't you answer some of these questions? What was Arc doin' last-"

"I don't know! That's the whole point!" Peter's sudden shouting caught all of them off guard. "I don't know anything, and neither do any of you! We don't know anything about Jaune, about this world, about anything! We haven't talked about Paradox, we haven't talked about our plans, we haven't talked about Jaune, we haven't talked to Jaune!"

Peter ran out of breath and needed to take a seat. Stumbling back over to the desk, he fell into the chair he occupied previously. He searched for the right words to use next, but failed to find them. He opened his mouth and raised a hand to gesture at nothing, and dropped it soon after.

The question of what they had done since the term began could be answered with one word; nothing. Absolutely nothing. They had tried so hard to ignore their reality, and, in the end, they succeeded. Between the four of them, they possessed next to no memories at all of their most recent days on Remnant. It was as if they hadn't even happened at all, like their meeting with Paradox had only happened yesterday. The fact that they truly could not call to mind a single conversation, lecture, or sparring match was proof of how successful they were at running away.

"... We're just… tapping out of reality." Peter was saved from having to continue by Ben. He picked up where his fellow hero trailed off. "It hurts. It's lonely. But we can't just quit. Everybody else here is working hard just to help. We're supposed to save the entire world, and we're afraid to have a conversation. We're afraid to make plans. We're afraid to get closer to the guy who's supposed to help us, because as soon as we start talking about any of it, we have to accept that we're trapped here. All we've done is shut down. … We can't… just tap out."

It was uncomfortable. The last thing any of them wanted was to be the one making trouble, the one giving their friends even more reasons to be upset, but it needed to be said. Everyone in that room knew they all felt the same way. There was so much they could be doing, and instead they chose to do nothing. They abandoned training, they gave up on studying, and, worst of all, they acted like everything was fine whenever Jaune was around. They were so afraid of facing reality, they unconsciously acted perfectly okay whenever he was nearby, because if he were to ever ask if something was bothering them…

They would have to talk.

About everything.

Everything they needed to talk about.

"... We're supposed to be heroes." Rex continued the thought. "Big, strong heroes, who fight for peace, who keep everybody safe. And we're afraid to have a conversation."

"..."

"..."

"..."

Even Kevin did not argue. He covered up his own emotions with silence and anger, but he felt the same.

Lost.

None of them had anything to say. Their collective thought was completely right. About everything. Ever since Paradox gave them the bad news, they gave up. They gave up on working, they gave up on getting to know their allies, they gave up on all of it. The only thing they bothered focusing on anymore was his comment about something important that was meant to happen "soon".

Why focus on anything else? All they had to do was kill time until that "something" happened, then they could lose themselves in saving the world. Why do anything else? Why bother doing anything for a school they didn't care about?

What did it matter if they couldn't remember a single lecture or sparring match between their classmates?

What did it matter if they didn't know anything about the hometowns, families, or hobbies of the people nearby?

Why bother paying attention to the world around them when none of it was "important"?

Since when did any of them start thinking like that, like hardened, cold soldiers?

Was their collective case of pre-emptive homesickness really that powerful?!

"I don't know anything about this place."

Ben, Kevin, and Rex broached the thought they shared with Peter, but more than that, they realized how much they were missing. It wasn't just about Jaune.

How much did they actually know about their classmates?

Did they have any tests coming up? Was something like that mentioned while they were spacing out during lectures?

Even if they couldn't save the world just yet, how much had they done to help anybody?

"..."

"..."

They were trapped. There was no denying that. Whether they faced reality or not, Paradox wouldn't just change his mind and send them home early. No matter how hard they ignored their surroundings and willed time to pass faster, they were still stuck in Remnant for the next two years. Like it or not, this was their home, and they had no idea how they were meant to even live in it.

They knew absolutely nothing, because for the past few days, they had chosen to hide.

"A… conversation…"

"... Salem ain't our only problem." Four lowered heads raised up and turned to Kevin, the first to begin speaking again. "Paradox said we're stuck here because he had to sneak us into this universe, to keep somethin' from noticin' us. That's the whole reason we're stuck here in the first place."

He thought back to that time, four days ago, digging up every little detail he could remember. Maybe this wasn't the right time or place, but he felt the need to do something, to stop trying to avoid anything of actual importance. He wasn't going to make excuses anymore.

"It's kinda like the Sotobro Effect. Whatever Paradox did to get us here, that thing... or... things, I don't know... they can sense it. Salem was strong and all, but I doubt that old lady's got the kind of power to detect fluctuations in dimensional energy. Far as we know, all she's got is control over some ugly monsters and flashy lightning powers. Doesn't seem like enough to scare Paradox out of lettin' us leave.

Ben glanced at the Omnitrix for a moment, then popped open the scroll wheel. He cycled through until he reached the Grimm icons he had collected so far. Given how depleted his once bountiful collection was, it did not take long.

"... He said something about 'powerful beings' who aren't around right now. Whatever the ripple he was talking about could attract, he made it sound like we're all screwed if they show up before we deal with Salem. But..." Ben paused. The more he talked, the clearer a certain thought became in his mind.

"Our problems don't end with Salem." Rex closed his eyes and clenched his teeth. "The way Paradox was talking... he wants those things to show up, but not until after we take out the witch. But... why? How are they connected? And why can't we just take care of both at the same time?"

The five heroes all took a moment to think on their own. This was the first time they seriously considered anything Paradox had told them that night. There wasn't technically any new information, but pondering old details did help to come to a logical conclusion.

It wasn't a very pleasant one.

"That's… something." Peter breathed out. "We still don't have a plan for exactly how we're supposed to save the world, and maybe we don't need to, not yet. Paradox said something big was coming, that certain events have to play out. I think, even if we try to plan ahead, we'll still end up having to just deal with certain things as they happen, things we can't predict with the information we have now. So, instead of world-saving plans… what do we do now?"

"You're askin' us?" Kevin raised an eyebrow at Peter's bold suggestion. "All that talk about makin' plans, and you don't have any ideas of your own?"

Talking was progress, but it didn't help matters all that much. It wasn't as if any of them actually felt any better about their predicament. Talking was a solution to the wrong problem. For the most part, they still felt like shutting down and letting the unfamiliar world pass them by. For the time being, the most important thing was finding a way to feel less... lost.

"Maybe we should just find something to focus on. Something more than stupid ways to pass the time." Rex thought aloud. He thought for a bit longer, then faced the group and saw that all eyes were on him.

"Care to elaborate?" Ben urged.

"I mean, if all we can do is wait, then why not just do what Peter said on our first day and find something we can do, like, I don't know…" Rex itched his scalp with one hand and tried to come up with ideas. "Ugh, I don't know man, come up with it yourself! … Look, it's like Peter said, we aren't doing anything at all. Why not just… start small? I'll put away the video games and try to think of something… more to do with my time."

The whole reason they'd had this conversation in the first place was because they finally realized they were doing absolutely nothing, literally, in Kevin's case, and ignoring everything in the process. The halls of Beacon may as well have still been a maze. They did not know its layout, they only walked the same path to the same places every day. Most of the other students were still unfamiliar faces, their only distinctions being simple labels such as "the loud one", or "the blonde one".

In spite of himself, Rex managed to grin slightly as he looked over to Peter. "What was it you said earlier? 'What happened to us'?" Rex put his arms behind him, loosely wrapping his fingers around the back of his head. "Great question. Rex Salazar never was the kind of guy to hide away and cry about how unfair his life is. He'd get over himself and go find new ways to have some fun. No way does the universe get to think it pulled one over on me and kicked me into a corner. Soy demasiado asombrosa para rendirme."

Ben found himself agreeing with the idle thought. He also found himself beginning to smile. "Fair enough. Hundred-time universe-saver Ben Tennyson doesn't give up either. For now... well, if we're supposed to be tapping back into reality, why don't we start with trying to get to know everybody, not just Jaune?"

"Why? We know 'em plenty, don't we?" Kevin wasn't too excited by the idea of socializing with the other students of Beacon. Even without cruel reality looming over his head, he wasn't interested in playing the part of a socialite.

"Just a thought I had. I think... that's the most important thing here. We might be Paradox's heroes, but we aren't the only ones that exist." Ben explained. "They're not just NPCs existing in the background, here for us to interact with whenever we feel like it. They're real people, and this is their world. It's not like we have to get to know every single student, just the ones around us. What about Ruby, or Yang, or Nora? All of them seem to like hanging around us, they care about being our friends, but we've barely paid any attention to them. I don't think I even know any of their last names."

Kevin still did not look convinced. Ben just gave him a smile.

"Okay, how about this. Can you think of anything specific about any of our classmates, Kev?"

"... Book girl is quiet. Hammer girl is loud. Scythe girl is awkward."

"Anything more... specific? Actually, better yet, what's 'Scythe girl's' name?" Ben already knew he had won, but kept pushing anyway.

Kevin thought carefully before answering. "... Rory."

"See? Even I know that's wrong, come on Kev! We met Ruby before we even got to Beacon! Look, this is my point. They've all tried so hard to be friendly with us, and we barely even know anything about them."

All this time spent in close proximity, and the off-worlders could hardly recall anything beyond the most basic personality traits and habits of their acquaintances. They may as well have spent all that time interacting with shadows, nothing more than hollow caricatures of real people.

"You're... not wrong. The way we've been acting, I'm surprised they're still willing to even try talking to us. ... It's a good start." Peter said. "I think… we need to try and be more present. No more zoning out. No more ignoring reality. And, next time I get a good chance to catch up with Jaune, I'll try talking to him again. I've given him enough time to think by himself. If he really is meant to help us, then we need to tell him what we know, and who we are. Can we all agree to that?"

One by one, the others nodded. Rex was the first, even throwing in a smile with his nod. Ben pushed away from the wall he was leaning on and rested a hand on Kevin's shoulder, giving him an encouraging look. Kevin scoffed, but still nodded in the end.

"Great. And… just in case anybody still wants to ignore our situation…" Peter inhaled deeply before continuing. "We are trapped here. This is our home for the next two years. We can't go back to our worlds until we save this one. Like it or not, we live on Remnant… and that's okay. It's missing a few things, it doesn't have our favorite people, but we can still make a home here. We can still try to enjoy ourselves. We just need to look at the positives, and we can all find ways to get by. This place won't feel like home if we choose to treat it like a prison... so we won't. Agreed?"

The boys closed their eyes. Hearing the truth out loud wasn't fun, but they needed to hear it. Running forever was not an option, no matter how much they wished it was. Again, they nodded one by one.

It was settled then. The meeting adjourned just before the bell for the next class rang. It wasn't exactly a fun conversation, but now that it was over, the off-worlders truly felt better, like a burden had been lifted. For the first time since Paradox spoke with them, they felt motivated to make progress in this world, even if they wouldn't be doing anything "important".

The heroes needed to get back to their old selves, and they were quick to devise a short, simple checklist to aid their recovery:

Goal 1: Learn to enjoy Remnant for what it was.

Goal 2: Try to interact more with their peers.

Goal 3: Find something to keep them occupied between Paradox's "events".

Goal 4: Bring Jaune fully onboard.

"Well… it's cool that we've got a plan and all, but… what do we do, like, right now?" Rex asked nobody in particular.

Ben, already having a plan in mind, gave him one of his signature grins. "Now, we've got to go to class. But after school, I'll try to find Ruby." He walked over to the door and stepped out into the hall. "We're supposed to connect with the world, yeah? If I remember right, I owe her a demonstration of the Omnitrix. That sounds like a pretty good place to start to me."

Peter thought back to what little he could remember of the one-sided conversation during the lunch period and threw on a smile of his own. His idea was something small, but it was something he enjoyed. In fact, it wasn't just a way to get closer to his classmates. After going so long without feeding his inventor's spirit, even making a simple device sounded like a lot of fun.

In fact… yeah. That would be a perfect start.

Temporary Goal 1: Act like themselves and do something they enjoyed.

"I think I'll find Weiss and get to one of the workshops. I have some minds to blow."

Workshop #9:

"Did... something happen?"

"He looks more… colorful."

"It's like he drank five gallons of coffee."

Weiss, Blake, and Yang were gathered in one of Beacon's many workshops. Originally, Weiss was going to be the only one going, but the dissimilar partners had nothing better to do and ended up tagging along to find out where she was going.

Reactions were… mixed.

"Okay, let's see, I've found a substitute for the zinc separator, I've got a shell, I've got a cap to act as the terminal… I still need a cathode!"

Weiss came for only one reason. After several days of pestering Peter about the comment he made after she returned from shopping, he finally agreed to prove he could build a battery. She was pleased that her request was at least considered during lunch, but had very low expectations of anything actually coming of it, given the… circumstances.

And yet, to her surprise, the inventor in question had approached her as soon as their last class ended, apologized profusely for his rude behavior, and asked her if she still wanted him to build the battery she had been asking about. It wasn't that the heiress was unhappy that her pleas were answered, it was just that everything about this situation was rather jarring.

Her most recent request was initially met with an almost lifeless response. The Peter she spent days pestering and the Peter who agreed to show her his skill were practically zombies. This Peter, the one currently getting to work, was like an entirely different person. It had only been four hours! What could have possibly happened in that time to cause such a 180?

N-now hold on, it wasn't that she was unhappy! If Peter really was feeling better then that was great! That wasn't the issue here, not even close. Surely, she could not be blamed for being more than a little perplexed by this abrupt shift in behavior.

"Okay… okay! I've got everything I need. You guys are gonna love this, I promise." After sifting through dozens of boxes of spare parts and scrap metal, Peter finally got to work assembling the mess of parts he had dumped onto an empty workbench. "Of course, I'll have to change the design a little to fit these kinds of electronics, but I'll make it work.

"He looks so excited. What happened to the bored jerk from lunch?" Weiss was more confused by her peer's behavior than she was with the strange device he was building. The very thing she had spent days begging for was relegated to being her second most pressing thought.

"Surely you don't think this is normal?" She turned to Blake and Yang, the only other witnesses to the bizarre display

"I mean, I guess it's a little weird that he changed so fast, but…" Yang found herself smiling a little as she watched Peter excitedly explain every step of his building process. "He seems happier, like he was before we got to Beacon." She wondered if Jaune had a word with him, as she'd hoped.

Despite not knowing him before Beacon, Blake recalled the emotion her classmate showed in the library, when she asked him about the Faunus. The Peter before her now was much more in line with the one from back then. Unlike her partner, though, she did not voice her thoughts.

Having also not met the boy until arriving at the academy, Weiss could not be sure if Yang was telling the truth or not. Deciding not to dwell on it anymore, she tore her focus away from Peter's inexplicable personality shift and focused on his work, the entire reason she was there.

The only item laying on the table other than the parts he intended to use was his personal Scroll, the charging port opened up and waiting.

"The hard part was finding something small that could act as a cathode in all these boxes, but once I tracked a stand-in down, I was able to find a carbon rod and even a zinc cap right after. I was afraid I'd have to replace those. It's doable, but it's way easier if you can stick to the classics, you know?" Peter continued happily over-explaining as he assembled his modified battery. If he was aware of the fact that most of what he was saying was going over the girls' heads, that did not stop him from explaining anyway.

Finding parts was not difficult. All of Beacon's workshops had several rows of shelving units filled with boxes of scrap for students to use as they wished. It made it easy to find replacement parts for broken weapons, but also served a purpose providing materials for science experiments, rare as those tended to be.

Weiss was far from a master of engineering, but as she carefully swept her eyes over the assortment of scrap metal, it did not take her long to identify a glaring issue in Peter's design.

"Is this everything you intend to use?"

"Hm? Yeah, this is all I need. I told you, batteries really aren't all that hard to make as long as you know how." Peter only briefly glanced up from his work to answer the short question.

Yang took a closer look at the table and found the same issue as Weiss. "Uh, Pete? You sure this is all you want to use?"

"Yeah, why?"

"Where's the Dust?" Blake asked plainly. "How can you make a Dust battery without any Dust?"

Peter's hands stopped moving and he fully faced the girls. Their inquiry was perfectly reasonable, so they didn't understand why they were being stared at like they had asked an unbelievably stupid question.

"Who said I was making a Dust battery?" He asked as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. The simple question made the girls' brains shut down.

"... Pardon me, I don't think I heard you correctly." Weiss rubbed her temples, already feeling this was a waste of time. "Do you mean to tell me you are going to create a battery without using Dust as a power source?"

"Yup."

"Bullshit." Yang replied instantly.

"Yang." Blake chided gently, like a mother reminding their child how to behave. "But she's right. What kind of battery doesn't require Dust to work?"

"The best kind." Peter responded. "The kind that doesn't cost three-hundred Lien."

Weiss heaved an exasperated sigh. "Let's say you're correct, and it is possible to create a battery without using Dust. Do you really expect me to believe you of all people know how to make one?"

"Sure, why not?" Peter's simple responses were beginning to grate on Weiss' nerves, almost as much as his apathetic ones.

"No, no Weiss, remain calm. There's a tiny, almost nonexistent, one in a million chance he's telling the truth. Stay calm, just for now."

"... For generations, Dust has been the only power source on Remnant. All other attempts to branch out into other forms of energy failed. Generators broke down almost instantly. Energy cells imploded. There's a reason all research into alternate power sources was abandoned long ago." She decided to try one final time to explain the reality to the delusional nutcase.

"Sounds like everybody got lazy." Peter countered. "Nobody wanted to bother trying to make anything else because they didn't have to. 'Oh, we've got Dust, no need for any other power source'. The spirit of invention died along with the necessity for alternate power sources. Maybe if that kind of research got reopened, you'd be surprised what people could discover. There, all done."

Twisting a cap down with his fingers, Peter set his battery on the workbench for the girls to look at. It was far from impressive, little more than a tiny cylinder cobbled together from loose parts with a small cable crudely fixed to the end.

"... Well, this is either gonna work and blow my mind, or fail and blow up the workshop. Either way, mama Yang is about to be entertained." The blonde shuffled a safe distance away from the workbench, just in case the latter happened. Blake and Weiss both joined her without hesitation.

"This is ridiculous." The heiress was disappointed with herself for taking time out of her day to entertain her foolish classmate's delusions. "I admit your speech was rather nice, but this invention is folly. Honestly, all this to avoid buying batteries."

Peter paid no mind to the criticism from the peanut gallery.

"We'll see what's 'folly' when I blow your minds." He winked at Yang, who smiled and shook her head. Picking up his Scroll and pinching the battery between two fingers, the brilliant inventor prepared to dazzle his adoring audience. "Ladies and Weiss, I am proud to present to you… the standard alkaline battery, Scroll charger edition."

The cable jammed into the end of the cylinder was slotted into the Scroll's charging port. The screen was dark for a couple seconds, then flickered to life. In the center of the screen was the telltale lightning bolt symbol that meant the device was charging.

Peter's battery had worked.

Weiss' jaw dropped down to her feet. She couldn't believe her eyes. The piece of junk fashioned out of spare parts fished from a box of scraps actually worked.

"The design is pretty rough, and shoving a cable into the connector isn't exactly my finest work, but I was in a rush so it'll do for now. Can't say I've ever plugged a battery into a pho- er, Scroll before, but as long as it works, it's all good." Seemingly unaware - or uncaring - of what he just accomplished, Peter calmly broke down his project. "I figured that since this kind of tech runs on electricity Dust anyway, it wouldn't be hard to configure the battery to match up with- Hrk!"

"WHAT HAVE YOU DONE!?" Weiss grabbed Peter's shirt with both hands and pulled him in close. "This… th-th-this isn't possible. HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE?!"

"I told you, simple mechanics." Unbothered by how close he was to Weiss' face, Peter unplugged the battery and handed it to her. "Not too complicated if you know how to make them."

Weiss numbly accepted the battery and turned it over in her hands.

"A-an alternate source… generations of scientists failed… it can't be."

The poor girl was so shellshocked, she completely forgot to watch where she was walking.

"Uh, Weiss, there's a wall there." Peter called from the workbench. "Weiss, there's still a wall there. Weiss, there's- aaand, she just walked into it."

Nursing her aching forehead, Weiss pushed open the door to the hallway and stumbled through it, still staring at the battery.

"... I'm not getting that battery back, am I?"

"Probably not. Gotta be honest, though, I didn't expect you to actually pull it off." Yang tried to play off how impressed she was, but awe leaked into her voice anyway. It was impossible to not be amazed by the incredible accomplishment. She quite literally just witnessed something important enough to end up in the history books. The only way she managed to not fully show her amazement was by repeatedly telling herself "It's just a battery, it's just a battery".

"I've heard some places still use steam power, but that's the only other power source I've ever heard of. Where did you learn how to make these kinds of batteries?" Blake asked with moderately more energy in her voice than usual. Evidently, not even she was unphased by Peter's logically impossible achievement.

"Eh, just a little something I picked up back home." A dull, thunking noise emanated through one of the open windows in the cramped workshop. Curious, Peter walked over and took a look outside.

"Hey guys, I think you should go take care of Weiss before she hurts herself."

Somehow, not only had the stupefied girl managed to make it all the way outside, she continued to smack into every wall, tree, and person in her way while her eyes remained glued to the battery.

Yang sighed.

"Yeah, got it. But you'd better teach me how to make those sometime. I don't like spending three-hundred Lien on batteries, either." Yang waved good-bye and pushed open the exit door.

"Bye Peter. See you in class." Blake followed her partner out, leaving the inventor by himself. The door reopened a moment later. "I also would rather not spend three-hundred Lien on batteries."

The door shut again. This time, it did not re-open.

"... How's that for interacting more?" He mumbled quietly. He was far from feeling as happy and care-free as before… but sharing something he enjoyed with people he enjoyed being around did feel pretty nice.

Left alone, he found himself blankly staring at the ceiling.

This wasn't perfect... yet he felt a sense of satisfaction that had eluded him for several days.

"... I'll see you in two years, May. Don't worry, I won't be lonely. I promise I'll make a lot of new friends while I'm here."

Training Room #4:

Beacon had many different kinds of training rooms. Some had obstacles, some had holographic projectors, and others, like room #4, were simply large, cube-shaped grey boxes designed for teams to hold direct mock battles without anything getting in their way. These kinds of rooms were the most numerous, and the most popular among first-year students.

"That's so cool!" Ruby's were shining as she gazed upon the glowing blob in front of her.

"Thank you, thank you. Upgrade doesn't get much love these days." Ben took a deep bow, grateful for the applause.

This was his own preferred method of taking back his usual passion for life. It had been a long, long time since he got to amaze somebody with the Omnitrix. No matter where he went back home, there was rarely ever somebody who didn't already know who he was and what he could do. The closest he got to the old days was when kids would ask him to transform into their favorite alien.

There was novelty in entertaining children, but he missed the feeling of showing off his watch to people who didn't know what was coming.

"Pft, that's nothing." Of course, no amount of success can ever be enjoyed without suffering the jeering of sad, lonely hecklers. From his seated position on the floor, Rex downplayed his friend's transformation.

Seeing as Kevin was unlikely to attempt to socialize with anybody beyond his team, and Peter already got the majority of Team RWBY to hang out with him, that really only left him the option of third-wheeling Ruby and Ben. As little as he knew about RWBY and PVRL, he knew even less about literally everybody else, and he didn't feel up to starting from scratch with somebody outside those two teams right now. He proposed starting small, and that was what he intended to do.

Ben crossed his arms and exaggeratedly tossed his blobby head to the side. "Oh please, and you've got something better?"

Still, it wasn't like he couldn't have fun while he was here. Ben wasn't the only one who missed the feeling of getting to show off his abilities to people who didn't know about them.

Rex didn't say anything. Slowly, he stood up, dusted himself off, then simply uncrossed one arm and pointed it to the ceiling. Said arm was criss-crossed with glowing blue lines before suddenly breaking into wires and metal plating, reforming itself into a sword several times the size of his body.

"Yes. Yes I do."

"Whoa!" Ruby was in heaven. When Ben approached her after their final class with a smile and an invitation to watch him show off more of his transforming ability, she was already excited enough. Add in another awesome display of power from his partner, and this was shaping up to be the best day of her life.

"That's so awesome! Oh my gosh, your weapon is literally an extension of yourself!" She wasted no time dashing over to Rex and grabbing hold of his long, hard sword. It wasn't just some illusion, it was real. Her hands ran up and down the shaft, feeling every inch of the steel-hard blade.

"This is so cool! Does it get even bigger?!"

"Sorry, but this is the best I can do."

"Aww. I was hoping it would grow some more." Ruby's eyes filled with disappointment, slightly diluting the rush of excitement she felt when the oversized blade was initially revealed. Yet, as soon as her joy ebbed, it returned tenfold. "Ooh, ooh, what about that thing you used during Initiation!? The big gun!"

"The Slam Cannon? Ooh, I don't know." Rex sent Ben a taunting side-eye and played around with an uncertain tone. "I don't think you're ready to handle something that powerful."

Ruby looked mortified. "NO! I can, I can! I'm ready, so please! Show me!"

It took every ounce of willpower Rex possessed to not bust out laughing. "Hm… if you're really sure…"

"I AM! PLEASE, I WANT TO SEE!" Ruby gripped the collar of his open jacket and shook him. She was one step away from falling to her knees and begging. Rex decided to stop teasing the poor girl and give her what she wanted.

Blue lines crossed his sword and the metal malformed. The blade collapsed in on itself and spread out into a rectangular shape. The Slam Cannon in all its majestic glory rested over Rex's shoulder, ready to be displayed to the world.

"If that's what the lady wants, who am I to say no?" Rex flourished with his regular hand as best he could, emphasizing his impressive cannon.

Now, the noises Ruby made after seeing the majestic weapon were so bizarrely unique, it would be impossible to accurately depict them in written text. Even if the sound were recorded, any person who heard it could not be blamed if they assumed it was a recording of some strange, unidentified animal crying out to the endless void of reality.

For the sake of preserving precious time that would otherwise be wasted describing the beautifully demonic noise, we shall simply let it be known as the "Ruby Squeal".

As Rex was recovering from the shock of the Ruby Squeal and questioning how it was possible for a human being to produce such a sound, he felt something tugging at his modified arm. Chunks of metal began splitting off from the Slam Cannon, pulled at by an invisible force until there was nothing left but his human arm.

"Oh, sorry, did I break your toy?" The stolen metal rapidly orbited around a tall, robotic creature. Its body was mostly yellow, with massive, spiky shoulders and pronged hands resembling tuning forks. The most noticeable feature was its fully metal head, which somehow floated freely above its body. "My bad. Didn't think it'd be so fragile."

Its voice was distorted and metallic, like it was run through an audio filter, but it was just human enough to have a recognizable tone.

A very smug, taunting tone.

Knowing it was Ben, Ruby was already on her way over to gush over the newest form. As far as she was concerned, this was just a very awesome day where two boys took turns showing off their amazing tech. Ben, with his super cool watch that combined with his Semblance to turn him into all kinds of monsters, and Rex, presumably also using a Semblance, with his amazing constructs.

For the boys, it was a war.

Ben's new form, Lodestar, had an unchanging face and emotionless eyes. And yet, when he and Rex locked gazes, the cheated teen just knew there was a challenge there.

There was a silent exchange going on between these two prideful heroes the outside world would never hear put to words.

"Looks like she likes mine better."

"Oh, it's on, cabrón."

"Ah, don't even worry about it, amigo." Rex swaggered over to the cocky robot with a smirk on his face. "I'll just make something a little tougher this time."

True to his word, both of Rex's hands morphed into two oversized gauntlets with blue orbs set in the center. Recognizing the unspoken challenge, Ben stretched his pronged hands out and tried to steal them away as he did with the Slam Cannon. But, as soon as circular energy shields were projected from the blue orbs in the center of the gauntlets, he found his inherent abilities had no effect. The special properties of the energy emitted completely nullified his invisible magnetic force.

In the background, Ruby continued making strangled noises, unable to form words anymore. This incredible display of tech was becoming too much for her to handle.

She had too many questions to keep them all straight in her head. Did the gauntlets produce their own energy, or did Rex have Dust stored in a hidden pocket or something? Could the shields be launched like discuses? If they were, in fact, powered by Dust, would different kinds produce different effects? There was so much she wanted to ask!

"Ah, ah, ah, Ben. Unless you've got an invitation, you're blocked from this party."

Grumbling in annoyance, Ben slapped the dial on his chest and transformed again. The metal floating around him dropped to the ground, almost crushing his diminutive new form in the process. He had gone from a tall robot to a tiny red devil dressed up in green and black clothing, complete with a matching goggled cap.

"Hah hah hah! Nice, nice, fix, fix, fix!" The little imp completely ignored the scrap around him, instead choosing to run straight for Rex. Scurrying up his legs, he began digging into the gauntlets with deceptively powerful claws and tore away the most important pieces. The glowing blue energy shields flickered a few times before shutting off completely as their inner components were stolen.

His prize secured, the wingless imp dashed back into the pile of metal and began rapidly assembling an invention of its own, endlessly laughing and repeating "fix" over and over again like it was some kind of mantra.

"Dude, not cool! Quit breaking my arms!" Rex complained loudly, but his smile remained. "You're taking this too seriously. With this kind of thing, you're supposed to have some fun!"

Rex's arms began morphing again. Massive cylindrical weights supported by extremely thick cables were his latest creation. It had been a while since he busted out the Funchucks, and he was going to enjoy every second of it.

Ben was almost done with his new invention, some kind of turret built by combining the parts from Rex's destroyed machines. But, just as he was about to turn it on, the construct was crushed under a giant weight. The stunned imp whipped around to identify the culprit and found Rex wearing a massive smirk.

"GRAAAAHH!" Though the little devil shouted in fury, he did not get the chance to do anything. Rex immediately dismantled his latest weapons and leaped into the air. His legs transformed into a sleek hoverboard supported by two glowing disks on the front and back end.

"Lo siento, pequeño diablo. The ground's a little too boring for me."

This was starting to become way too much fun. In the back of his mind, Rex was pretty sure they had come here for somebody else, but he was enjoying his game with Ben too much to pay them any mind.

Stomping a clawed foot on the ground in anger, Ben slapped his dial again. Before the green light died away, two jets of water sprayed out of the blinding flash. Rex was struck directly in the chest by both jets and fell out of the sky, soaking wet. Losing his focus, the hoverboard reformed into his regular, human legs.

"Better watch out, Rex. Wouldn't want you to fly into a water hazard." Once the flash faded, the figure that emerged was a figure covered head-to-toe in red, crab-like armor dotted with nozzles and valves. Two such valves set in the palms of its hands were dripping with water.

"Ugh, is that really the best you could come up with?" Rex wiped the water off his face and chose to make fun of the poor joke instead of getting angry. "Even my Block Party joke wasn't that bad."

"Oh? Then why don't you-"

"AKJ&^*&^%$EDKJN^%$#W!"

Ben and Rex covered their poor ears to protect them from the harsh sound threatening to deafen them. They knew that indescribable noise. It was a Ruby Squeal, the loudest one yet.

"So… AWESOME!" The short girl threw herself between the two boys, excitedly sweeping her gaze over Ben's new form. "It's like one of Atlas' security robots, but way cooler!"

Without warning, she whipped her body around and focused on Rex. "But all that stuff you made was super cool too! The big nunchucks looked like they could crush an Ursa, a-and the hoverboard, you were flying!"

Ruby continued to disrespect the laws of physics in ways that shouldn't have even been possible. She had so much to say to both of the boys but couldn't decide who she wanted to speak to first. At first, she constantly turned herself around, breaking up her praise and questions every few seconds.

But, as those seconds crept by, she began moving faster. As the question of how best to say everything she wanted to say in as short a time as possible ran through the mind of Ruby Rose, her body created a solution all on its own. Where the mind failed, the flesh compensated.

The hyperactive girl could have put Nora to shame with the sheer amount of energy she recklessly abused. She continued turning back and forth, faster and faster, until the laws of physics simply gave up. She began to move so fast, it was as though she was not moving at all. Completely still, and yet infinitely fast, ever increasing in velocity without any perceivable changes to her appearance. The little reaper was unbothered as the theory of relativity collapsed around her.

In a universe different from her own, a certain German scientist was crying.

Ben changed back to his human form and locked eyes with Rex. Neither of them could even understand what Ruby was saying anymore. Their rapid use of alien transformations and mechamorph body-altering had sent her brain into overdrive.

"... Truce?" Ben suggested.

"Truce." Rex agreed.

Carefully, the two boys reached out and each grabbed one of Ruby's shoulders. She came to an awkward stop, finally realizing the cool monsters and machines were long gone.

"So, you liked it then?" Ben asked.

Ruby nodded her head up and down at borderline hyperspeed. "Yes! You guys have the coolest Semblances ever!"

"Yeah, we're pretty awesome, but there's still a question that needs to be answered." Rex released Ruby and walked over to Ben. Leaning over and resting an elbow on his friend's shoulder, he gestured between the two of them. "Who's got the cooler stuff?"

In a heartbeat, all of Ruby's excitement drained away along with the color in her face. The two older boys smiled evilly at her, knowing full well the moral conundrum they had just thrown at the kind-hearted girl.

"U-um, that's… Ben's monsters are super awesome… b-but your weapons were cool too, Rex! Th-the cooler one is… e-er…" Ruby desperately searched for an answer. She only became more frantic when the boys intentionally gave her the saddest, most dejected looks they possibly could. "I… I… Oh! I think I hear Weiss calling me! G-gottagobye!"

Ruby disappeared in a flurry of rose petals. The exit door was blown open by the storm of red petals, indicating she had fled the large arena.

"..."

"..."

Rex and Ben exchanged a look. They began another wordless exchange and agreed this was the perfect opportunity to lift their spirits even further.

Just outside the training room, Ruby was breathing heavily. She had narrowly escaped the awful situation she was forcefully thrown into, and was so relieved to have done so, she forgot one of the most basic rules of every horror scenario.

When given the option of resting beside a door frame or running, always choose to run.

She jumped in fright when the training room door was blown open with a loud bang. She began trembling, terrified beyond comprehension by the two demons slinking out of the training room.

""Oh Ruuuuuubyyyyyyy…""

"PLEASE DON'T MAKE ME CHOOSE!"

Another flurry of petals.

Ruby Rose ran and ran, not stopping until she escaped to the safety of her dorm room.

"I think she prefers the Omnitrix, but don't feel too bad. Second place isn't bad." Ben generously offered praise to his worthy opponent, who was still resting an elbow on his shoulder.

"Oh, Ben, I know it hurts to lose so badly, but the longer you lie to yourself, the worse it'll be later." Rex easily waved off the ridiculous idea that he had lost their odd competition.

Both of them stared down the hallway through which Ruby had fled with wide smiles. Acting like gremlins was probably the most enjoyable thing they had done since arriving in Remnant.

Ben shrugged off Rex's elbow and adopted a faintly guilty expression. "You think we should apologize?"

"Meh, I'll just show her a few more of my weapons and she'll get over it. A little follow-up show from her favorite should make her feel better."

Ben was not about to let that challenge slide. "You're so on."

PVRL's Dorm:

"Hello Kevin. Welcome back."

"Helloooooooo!"

Ren and Nora greeted their teammate as he came through the door. Classes had ended nearly an hour ago, but there was still plenty of time left in the day. Ren was right in the middle of his daily meditation while Nora was pestering him about making her pancakes. Pyrrha was not present at the moment. She always spent the short hours between the final period and dinner training. Her team was invited, but they had yet to take her up on any of her offers.

"..."

It did not hurt his feelings when Kevin said nothing to him. He had grown used to the thuggish young man remaining silent all the time. The emotionless boy was, ironically, rather adept at understanding the feelings of others, and could see his teammate had something weighing down on him. While he would have liked to help, something told him whatever the problem was would be best left to those who already knew him, namely the members of Team JPTR.

Kevin plopped down on his bed and began quietly reading a book about advanced Dust mechanics. Ren could tell at a glance it was the kind of book only a very experienced engineer would be able to make sense of.

Shutting his eyes, the quiet boy began the arduous task of getting back into a meditative state, a task made much more difficult than it should have been by his long-time companion.

"Come on Ren, pleeeaaase! The lunch ladies didn't make any pancakes this morning, they only made waffles! I can't eat those, it's heresy to the pancake gods!" Nora could not go a full day without consuming her favorite food, and when all else failed, she turned to the one person who would never let her down.

"No, Nora. Dinner is in two hours. You'll ruin your appetite if I make you pancakes now."

The pancake glutton was not worried by the denial of goods. She knew from experience Ren would break if she just kept pushing. There was, however, something completely inexcusable mixed in there.

"Ren…" Nora was completely serious now. Ren sensed he had made a mistake, but fought down the fear and remained silent. "You know I would never ruin my appetite so easily. If it's for pancakes, I can eat as many as I want and not get full, especially if you're the one making them! I could eat a hundred of your pancakes and be totally fine!"

Ren sighed and prepared himself to explain the many reasons that was both ridiculous and physically impossible, already knowing he would be fighting a losing battle.

"Rookie numbers."

Ren cracked one eye open. Had he heard that right? Did Kevin just…

"Excuse me?" Nora muttered darkly.

"Only a hundred pancakes? Those are kid numbers. Come talk to me when you can handle a real meal." Without looking away from his book, Kevin committed the grave sin of questioning Nora's appetite for pancakes.

In all his life, not once had he been defeated when it came to pancake-eating. Even when Ben used the Omnitrix to cheat, he could not even begin to approach Kevin's all-time record. Being proud of one-hundred pancakes? Truly adorable.

"... Oh-ho-ho, is that a challenge I hear?" A terrifying smile spread across Nora's face.

"Oh no." Ren began to sweat.

"What, you think you can take me on?" Kevin side-eyed Nora, refusing to fully look at the puny challenger.

"Gods, please have mercy." Ren felt a pit form in his stomach.

"You'll regret the day you dared challenge me. I saw you eating waffles this morning. A traitor like you could never defeat a true pancake enjoyer!" Nora stomped over to Kevin's bed and looked down her nose at him.

"Please do not bestow this fate upon me." Ren felt like crying.

At last, Kevin put down his book and stood up, glaring down at she who dared oppose him. "Big talk from the door destroyer. You can't even handle a hammer, what makes you think you can handle a buffet?"

The two opposing forces stared each other down, neither of them willing to back down. It made for quite the humorous image, given their immense height difference of nearly two feet.

This was to be a competition for the ages, where two beings of great power would stake their pride, their reputations, their very lives on the capacity of their stomachs.

They only required the assistance of a humble apostle to begin their legendary duel.

Even with his eyes closed, Ren could feel that he was being stared at expectantly.

"... The gods have abandoned me."

He had no lords left to pray to. All that remained were Kevin and Nora.

The bottomless, all-consuming pit of spite and pettiness and the queen of gluttony loved by syrup and flour.

It was time to give up. There was no escaping his fate.

Unable to remain an innocent bystander any longer, Ren could only sigh.

"Nora, get my flower apron."

Oh well. At least Kevin wasn't ignoring them anymore.

Dorm Building:

"You have no power over me, Dust lab! I'm your master now!"

Jaune was in a very good mood. After several grueling hours of studying, he was starting to get a clearer image in his mind of how different forms of Dust could be identified, manipulated, combined, utilized, and distilled. He had put off the complicated subject until now because he fully expected it to be the most difficult to learn, but it was actually kind of fun.

By no means was he an expert, and more likely than not, he wasn't even on the level of his classmates. Even still, he felt good. He was better, and that counted for something. He felt he was prepared for the first test of his labors in three day's time.

The professors had constantly informed the first-years that they would be conducting weekly tests every Saturday to make sure nobody was falling behind. They were not huge, important exams, only consisting of ten to twenty questions regarding the material covered that week, but they were still important enough that performing poorly could mean trouble.

It was the perfect way for Jaune to check just how far he had come since he began studying tirelessly. He was confident he could pass them, but that wasn't enough. He needed to get scores good enough to make him stand out, and that meant he needed to study even more.

Naturally, Jaune's day was not over. The lagging student lacked the time to afford luxuries such as taking extended breaks. The only reason he wasn't studying now was because of a promise he made to himself earlier that day.

"I really hope whatever they're going through isn't too complicated. I didn't have time to read a book on therapy." Laughing dully to himself, Jaune psyched himself up to offer emotional support.

There were a lot of unknowns here. Maybe something was wrong, maybe everything was fine. Maybe his teammates were in an even worse state than he was, and maybe they were just feeling a little anxious and needed time to decompress.

Maybe he would actually be able to help, and maybe he would make everything worse with his utter lack of experience with lending an ear to anybody other than his younger sisters.

"... Still, gotta try, right?"

Jaune did his best to not dwell on the more negative possibilities as he approached his team's dorm room. It didn't really matter if something was wrong or not. He had spent so much time improving himself, he forgot one of the most basic rules of being a leader.

As the one in charge, he needed to be there for the others. Maybe there really wasn't anything wrong, but that didn't mean he couldn't at least ask. Maybe he wouldn't know how to help if there was a problem, but he was still going to try, because that was his responsibility.

The determined knight allowed himself a small slot in his schedule to offer whatever support he could. There was still time before dinner began, not that it had much meaning for him anymore. He had realized early on that meals were untapped potential, massive thirty-minute chunks of time that could be utilized to study. Jaune had begun taking his notebooks along with him so he could review material while eating. Yang had more than a few choice words about his neurotic tendency to study constantly, but he was too busy studying to hear all of them.

That was to say nothing of his all-night sessions in the library which lasted until five in the morning. At that point, the exhausted boy would crawl into his bed and enjoy a couple hours of sleep before waking up for first period at seven.

He would be doing the same tonight, of course.

"Before I buckle down for the night, I'll talk to them." Jaune nodded to himself. There were ten minutes remaining before dinner started, leaving him plenty of time to play the part of a good leader.

He approached Team JPTR's dorm. Inhaling one last breath of air, he steeled his nerves and wrapped his fingers around the doorknob.

"You should have seen the look on Weiss' face when my Scroll started charging. I thought her brain was about to explode."

"Hm?" Jaune paused. Was that Peter speaking on the other side of the door?

"Oh, you got a reaction like that too? Man, I should have shown Ruby my other transformations sooner. If I'd known she would lose her mind like that, I would have shown 'em off way sooner. Especially since she likes them more than Rex's dumb machines."

"Discúlpe?! My awesome nanites are way cooler than your grimy aliens. I'll take a giant sword over a sweaty little gremlin any day!"

"Ben? Rex?" His team was definitely gathered in there, but something was… different.

"... Nora's… got a good… stomach. Can't believe… she managed… a tie."

"Kevin too? What's he doing here?" The blunt young man sounded like he was in pain, but there was another emotion lurking underneath his groans of discomfort.

He, along with all the others, sounded happy. Not terribly so, yet much more so than they sounded in recent days, without any trace of exaggeration or falsehood, every one of them sounded truly joyous. Not that they didn't already seem happy whenever he saw them, of course. This was like... adding more water to an already half-full cup. But why?

"Did… something good happen?" Curious, Jaune tightened his grip again and pulled the door open. Inside, he was greeted with the sight of his team - plus Kevin - smiling brightly at each other and sharing stories of what they had gone through after classes ended.

They were spread around the center of the room, Peter and Kevin seated on the two innermost beds while Ben and Rex reclined on the floor between them. If you ignored the pair of ground goblins playfully shoving each other like children, it was a very peaceful scene straight out of a college brochure.

The first to notice his presence was Peter. The youngest in their group turned his head to see who had joined them, and, after realizing it was his leader, smiled even wider than before.

"Hey, Jaune." Peter hopped to his feet. He looked… way too happy.

"About time you showed up, jefe. You've gotta hear what this guy's been saying. He actually thinks his watch is cooler than my nan-... S-Semblance." Rex jerked a finger at his partner, who expertly harrumphed at the accusation.

"You can't deny the truth forever, Rex. Variable shapeshifting wins the cool competition every time."

"Both of you… shut it. I'm dyin' here." Kevin was sprawled out on Jaune's bed with his hands over his stomach. His body was making a concerning amount of gurgling noises that instilled a sense of fear in Jaune. He had been motion sick enough times to know what usually accompanied that sound, and on his bed no less…

"No, no, forget that! That's not why I'm here! I came to try and… help…"

Remembering his original mission, Jaune felt a wave of confusion wash over him.

He was not a genius, not by any means. However, the only Arc son was not forgetful, and he trusted his eyes. The boys he had seen only a few hours ago were definitely trying to hide their emotions underneath an act of normality. What he was looking at now did not match that at all.

Those smiles were real. Those calm attitudes were real. Everything was so real, Jaune almost questioned if he was mistaken before.

"... No, I know what I saw. All of you, I know you were hiding something. What… is this?"

"Kev, seriously, go to the bathroom." Ben looked over his shoulder at his bed-ridden friend. "I'm not helping you clean if you vomit pancakes everywhere."

"Why not? Don't have a transformation for that?" Rex smugly taunted.

"Oho, don't you start, you little-"

"Seriously, what's going on?"

Jaune's nerves tried to convince him he was being ridiculous and nothing had been bothering his team, but while he was still calm, he could say with certainty they were affected by something. What happened to that? What changed?

"Just… ignore them." Peter dismissed the others' pointless argument and tried to block them from sight with his body. "Where have you been, Jaune? We haven't seen you all day."

"... Just… studying in the library." Jaune responded blankly. His mind was refusing to catch up. Something about this situation was bugging him, creating an itch in his brain he couldn't scratch. "I… wanted to talk to you guys about something, but…"

No, no buts. There was nothing to contradict his intentions. The team leader had told himself before even entering the room that even if he didn't think something was wrong, he still had a responsibility to check up on his squad. And… Kevin, apparently, since he was also here, but that was besides the point.

So they looked happy, big deal. It wouldn't cost anything to check, just to be sure.

"Oh? What's up?" Peter stood at attention expectantly, as if he already knew what his leader wanted to ask. Still seated on the floor, Ben and Rex shifted to face Jaune, wearing the same expression as Peter. Even Kevin lifted his head a couple inches. Jaune had their full attention.

"... I just… wanted to ask how you're doing. You know, settling in at Beacon, and all that."

"Mm, pretty good. Rex and I hung out with Ruby earlier today, so that was pretty fun." Ben shrugged indifferently.

"I'm pretty sure Weiss is still rebooting after I made a battery for her. And, I might have to make more for Blake and Yang. Or maybe not. I couldn't tell if they were serious or not." Peter recalled his day, suddenly feeling worried.

"... Pancakes." Kevin practically growled out the word, but still found it in himself to smile fondly.

The boys were happy to recount their day. By the sound of it, they'd had a lot of fun with the girls from Team RWBY after class let out, along with… whatever Kevin did.

Happy…

Fun…

"..."

It was good news. If they managed to find a way to feel better and enjoy themselves, that was great. By all rights, it did not look like the young men were feeling the effects of whatever was troubling them earlier.

What a wonderful development.

"... They didn't… But, I was…"

Jaune forced a smile onto his face. He was… truly pleased his friends had supported each other in their shared time of need.

"A-awesome, that's amazing. I was worried you might be feeling nervous or stressed out, but I guess you guys are tougher than I thought."

Forget it. Seriously, there was nothing to worry about. If they were alright, then that was a wonderful thing. There wasn't any need to complain about a good end result.

"... Dyinnngggg. Tennyson... tell Cooper... he still owes me sixteen dollars." Kevin moaned pitifully.

Ben stood up and indifferently grabbed one of Kevin's arms, slowly pulling his groaning friend to his feet. "Come on, you're giving us too much credit. It's not that big a deal."

Rex grabbed Kevin's other arm, keeping him stabilized. "Yeah, what have we got to worry about, jefe? It's not like school is anything to freak out over."

Peter held open the bathroom door for his teammates. "The classes here aren't all that hard as long as you know the basics. I'm feeling pretty confident so far."

"... R-right. Sorry, I just felt like checking in." Jaune sheepishly averted his eyes. "I feel like I haven't been around all that much since the term started. Just… felt like I should make sure you guys are all doing alright. I'd feel bad if something was wrong and I didn't help you."

He had to be overthinking this. The itch in his brain was just that, an itch. It would disappear any second now, for sure.

Through the open bathroom door, he could see Ben and Rex sitting on plastic stools and patting Kevin's back while he held his face over the toilet bowl.

In between pats, Rex gave his leader a reassuring look. "It's all good, man. We just felt a little homesick, is all."

"You don't have to worry too much about us." Peter agreed. "We were able to sort out our problems ourselves, so don't feel obligated to look after us."

It was obviously meant with the best of intentions, a simple, kind-hearted "Don't worry about us, we're fine now".

But still, the itch grew stronger.

Jaune's smile slipped a couple centimeters down. "... Gotcha. I'll try not to worry so much from now on." With nothing better to do, he pulled out his Scroll and checked the time. "By the way, it's about time for dinner. Is, uh… is Kevin coming?"

A very unpleasant sound from the bathroom answered his question for him. Rex groaned in disgust, but did not get up from his stool.

Ben sighed and gave Jaune and Peter a thumbs up. "We'll meet you down there."

Jaune and Peter acknowledged their brave compatriot's kind offer to stay behind and exited the room. The pair quietly began their trek through the vacant halls to the cafeteria.

"You're… really okay?" Jaune decided to make one final attempt at talking. "I know I said I'd stop worrying, but… earlier today, you all looked pretty…"

Peter chuckled as Jaune trailed off. "I know what you mean. Like Rex said, we were just a little caught up thinking of home. We'll be alright. We talked it out amongst ourselves and figured everything out. We're better now, don't worry."

Jaune accepted the explanation with a hesitant nod. There was still an itch in his brain, but if the matter was truly settled, then he would leave it alone.

"... Although, there is something else I need to talk to you about." Peter's face darkened a few shades. "Not right now, but tomorrow, if we can. It's pretty important, so, you know… the sooner the better."

Jaune was caught off guard by the proposition. "Oh, yeah, of course! If there's something bugging you, I'll always be willing to listen. All you have to do is ask."

"I can't promise I'll actually be helpful, though."

He kept his inner thoughts to himself. His teammate was coming to him for assistance. Him, the reliable leader of Team JPTR. Whatever it was Peter wanted to talk about, he would do his best to be helpful.

That was his job.

He needed to be helpful.

He...

"... They talked it out themselves... they're all doing better now..."

He wanted to feel happy. He should have felt better. But something continued to bother him.

Peter all but confirmed his suspicions. They were "better". So, he was correct. There was something wrong before, they did need help while he was off studying. Jaune would have felt guilty for not being there were it not for the fact that they managed to get better in the end regardless.

On their own.

"I guess... they didn't need my help."

Jaune kept his thoughts to himself. They were far too self-centered and arrogant to be voiced, especially with Peter right next to him.

... His day was winding down anyway. If everything was taken care of, there wouldn't need to be any changes to his plans. After dinner, he would go straight to the library. Saturday was fast approaching and he needed to prepare while there was still time. On top of that, he still needed to find a good, secluded spot he could do some solo combat training in after hours. Luckily, forgoing sleep freed up lots of time for reviewing class material.

"... I'm so tired."

.

.

.

As usual, I've done a wonderful job displaying my glorious inability to make chapters that are either fully serious or fully goofy. Maybe I should just make them smaller, like 5-10K words per chapter instead of 15-20K.

Peter is on his Mumbo Jumbo arc, and the citizens of Remnant are people who can't use redstone.

If somebody told you I wrote that scene with Ruby grabbing Rex's sword the way that I did by accident, somebody lied. I actually went back after I was done and edited it to make it even more suggestive. I will not apologize for my actions.

Maybe it comes off as rushed to have this whole "Shut-Down" character arc start and end so soon, especially after I gave Monty shit for giving Jaune such a short character arc a few chapters back. I swear, I've got a legitimate reason for starting and then ending it so quickly, and no, it's not "I didn't want the story to drag" this time. I promise I'm cooking something good, just give me some more time in the kitchen and I'll prepare the finest steak.

That being said, it's a weird time for the story. I'm caught between the good times and the bad. If there was ever a time to keep things chill and happy, it's now, before the story starts picking up and the world's condition starts getting worse. On the other hand, we can't quite relax yet. A certain few people still need to work through some issues before they can start to properly enjoy themselves. Hopefully they do that soon.

... No, seriously, please let this end soon. I'm starting to realize I severely underestimated how hard it actually is to write mildly angsty content without crossing over the line and just coming across as edgy... damn.

I'm gonna need some more practice.

Thank you for reading and please consider leaving a review.

Aren signing off.