Team RWVBY
Chapter 14
Beacon's training room was a safe place to hone their skills in their free time. Right now, Blake Belladonna and Jaune Arc were sparring against each other to improve Jaune's reaction speed.
Blake ran in close and becoming a blur of afterimages as she slashed both her blade a Jaune's shield. Jaune buckled behind it tanking the hits and holding his ground. Sliding around, Blake used her shadow clones and threw them at Jaune, forcing him to shift and turn and face them. Each clone faded as they collided with Jaune's shield, but as the last one came, Jaune parried with his shield and stabbed with his sword. With the clone gone, Jaune couldn't see Blake but he heard her, the shuffling of feet. With a wild turn he swung Crocea Mors to his right.
"Hyahh!" Jaune yelled as Crocea Mors met Gambol Shroud.
BZZZT, a buzzer had gone off and the two parted.
"It's been an hour already?" Jaune asked as he transformed his shield back to a sheath.
"Time flies." He watched Blake holster Gambol Shroud on her back. "You're getting faster Jaune, that was a good block at the end there." She complimented him.
"Thanks." Jaune said sheathing Crocea Mors.
"You should think about channeling aura through your sword like you did with your shield back at the docks." She pointed out.
"Wait I did." Jaune hadn't even noticed to Blake's slight amusement.
"Yes Jaune; when Torchwick fired the shot at me and you stepped in your aura went straight to your shield. It's why the shot ricocheted off it instead of exploding immediately. If you were to do the same with your sword, you'd be able to put a bit more power into your swings, maybe even fire off a small range wave." Blake explained.
"Huh." Jaune looked at his sheathed sword pondering the information.
"Unless you wanna look into getting a fire arm to add to your arsenal." Jaune instantly winced at her words.
"No, no, I uh… tried that with Pyrrha's rifle and heh… let's just say it… it didn't end well." Jaune was scratching the back of his head looking away, clearly embarrassed by what ever happened.
"I'll take your word for it then. I'm going back to my dorm; I'll see you later Jaune. Good job today Jaune." Blake said.
"Thanks again, see ya later Blake."
…
With Beacon running on a limited cafeteria schedule, when it came time to eat, everyone who remained in Beacon made sure to be there.
"Then there's Sage; he's a bit of quiet guy but he's our team's powerhouse." Jaune listened in as Sun was going on about his team back at Haven. To his right saw next to him were Ren and Nora, while Cassian and Blake sat next to Sun.
As Sun continued talking, Jaune's thoughts drifted off to more personal matters. He wanted to improve, not just for himself, but for his team, and his friends. They supported him so much, he just wanted to be a leader they could be proud of. Even though the rest of his team had told him how much they liked him as leader and told him of the good job he was doing, he couldn't help but worry, about what ifs.
His downward turning thoughts were halted a tugging at his hoodies sleeve.
"Jaune Jaune, look." Nora nudged him again. He followed her pointing finger to the other side of the cafeteria. Walking towards an empty table was team CRDL.
"Hey I heard about those guys, isn't the team that was stealing from others?" Sun asked the table to a nodded response. "Well, looks like they got no friends here anymore." Their team was met with intense and solid glares as they walked around.
"Good!" Nora felt no sympathy for them.
While most of team CRDL sat down taking the glares in stride, Jaune watched as Cardin Winchester himself kept walking. He was walking towards them.
"What do you want?" Blake hissed as he approached their table.
"I ain't here to ta-" Cardin spoke aggressively before forcing himself to stop. He shifted his whole body towards Cassian and chose to ignore Blake.
"The headmaster told me about wh-"
"Don't" Cassian said cutting him off.
"What?" Cardin asked.
"You don't have to apologize; you don't have to even pretend to like me, just don't fuck up." Cardin was silent. "Cause if you do, I'll be there to kick your ass."
Cardin grunted before shuffling away back to his team.
"What was that about?" Nora asked.
"Nothing to worry about." Cassian waved it off. "You all doing anything?" He asked.
"Me and Nora are going to the store to get some baking supplies. You want to come Jaune?" Ren asked turning towards him.
"Nah, I think I'll pass this time, thanks though." Ren nodded before he and Nora got up and left. Jaune turned to the others at the table.
"I'm going to the library for a bit." Blake said standing up.
"I might actually join you, still haven't finished that book from Tukson's." Jaune said.
Blake smiled and said, "I'll be at my usual spot." Jaune watched as left the cafeteria. Sun reached over the table and nudged Jaune in the shoulder and said,
"Dude, nice." Wait what?
"Huh?" Jaune asked confused. Did he miss something.?
"I'm gonna head out myself, still quite a lot to do on my Vale bucket list." Sun stood up ignoring Jaune's question. "See you tomorrow for the jog squad." Sun blasted his finger guns at them as he walked away.
'That was weird' Jaune thought. Now it was just him and Cassian. He knew a bit about him; from the short version of his life that he told him and his team, they had fought loosely together in Vale, but the most important thing was that Ruby vouched for him and Ruby was a great judge of character.
"What are you going to do Cassian?" Jaune asked.
"Not sure yet, maybe head back to my room, maybe train. I'll figure it out." Cassian said nonchalantly as he too stood up.
"Hey, can I ask you-"
"I don't think it'd be a good idea if I trained with you." Cassian cut him off. Jaune was silent, was it that obvious what he was going to ask.
"It's just a knife is a far cry from a sword and shield; and my style is different. Unless you're ready to pull someone's hair, stomp an opponent's privates, throw dirt in eyes, shit talk someone into anger, basically anything and everything to get an edge." Cassian spoke bluntly.
'Yea that didn't sound like him at all.' Jaune thought.
"What I thought but don't worry, just keep at what you're doing and you'll improve. I didn't start out amazing either, and you're technically at a better starting position than I did."
"Really?" Jaune asked.
"You have both of your arms, so yea." Cassian said half joking. "Just be confident, be yourself." He added.
What was it with people and sayings of confidence. Jaune didn't get it.
"Good luck noodle boy," Cassian said walking away.
"Wait… Noodle boy?" Jaune asked. Where did that come from.
"Blame Yang," Cassian added and then he was gone.
'Well might as well go to the library.' Jaune thought.
Jaune wasn't feeling the stairs today and decided to take the elevator. Stepping in he saw Ajax Libel and one of his teammates. Jaune tried to remember his name, was it Kevin, Keith, something like that.
"Hey, you thought about who you're going to ask to the dance?" Jaune unintentionally listened in.
'Wait dance? What Dance'
"Nah, not yet. I was thinking of asking Xiao Long though." Ajax answered.
"Bro, she's a babe, you think she's gonna say yes to someone like you." Kevin or whatever his name was laughing.
Okay now, Jaune had to find out what this was about.
"Hey sorry, I didn't mean to eavesdrop, but what's this about a dance?" Jaune asked.
"Dude, each year Beacon has a school dance, next semester will be the next one. Team CFVY is planning it this year." Ajax answered him before turning back to his teammate.
"I guess it's a good thing the Vytal Festival is here, with all the visiting students, more options." Ajax said as he and his teammate got out of the elevator a floor below the library. The next floor came and as Jaune stepped out the elevator next, he started thinking.
'A dance huh.' His mind wandered to who he could ask. At first his thoughts traveled to Weiss, but pushed that away quickly. He hasn't asked Weiss in a while now and the thought to do so again just hadn't interested him. Maybe it was just a quick crush after all.
Jaune was in the library now; his thoughts turned to Ruby. Maybe the two of them would just stand on the sidelines drinking punch, like the socially awkward friends they were.
He spotted Blake sitting in her usual spot, the far back corner of the library where little could disturb here, when a new thought came to Jaune's mind.
'There's no way though.'
'Right?'
Author's Notes: Wanted to get a Jaune chapter in there. One last chapter to go before heading into Vol. 2
Hope you Enjoy!