Heart to Heart
Chapter 2: Girl Talk
Yang and Jaune walked back to the dorm rooms their teams currently were living in. There was a comfortable silence between the two of them was they made their way down the halls. The school was finally quiet although with the headmaster gone if the academy was going to open on time was still up in the air.
They knew that Mistral was going to have to find a new headmaster and who knew how long that would take. Well as long as they weren't kicked out before they were ready to go on the next leg of their adventure then everything would be okay. They walked into the main living area, which unlike Beacon this school was set up differently.
While Beacon had team rooms linked to a hallway, Mistral seemed to set theirs up with larger rooms. The ground floor held a common room in the center with an open kitchen and dining room, there was the smaller dining room off to the side where you had to sit on the floor at the table.
Yang noticed how quiet it was.
"Guess everyone is in their rooms." She said.
"Must be," Jaune agreed as they headed to the stairs to the upper level were the rooms were located. There were four rooms meaning that this place was supposed to have four full teams. At the moment Team RWBY was in one, his team was across from them although Sun had moved in to take the empty bed.
The last two were used by Qrow and Oscar/Ozpin took another bed and the previously empty room was being used by Blake's parents and that Faunus girl Ilia that came with Blake. Jaune didn't know much about them but they seemed okay. Although Blake's dad was massive, it was somewhat intimidating. He really didn't envy Sun trying to get on that man's good side.
"Hey Jaune?"
His attention was now back to Yang, "Yes Yang?"
"Thanks," she said honestly. "For both listening and for opening up to me."
"I should thank you as well for that," He told her. "I felt better to get some of that off my chest."
"Well if you ever need another talk my office is always open," she joked.
He gave her a small smile, "Deal and I'm a pretty good listener myself."
She nodded her head and said goodnight to him before opening the door. The room had four beds all facing towards the center of the room. It felt strange, she was used to their old setup at Beacon and it just felt a bit strange to her.
"There you are!" Ruby her energetic little sister and team leader was sitting on her bed in her PJs pointing an accusing finger at her. "We've been calling your scroll for the past fifteen minutes."
Yang blinked and took out the small white device and opened it up, she had three missed messages.
"Oh sorry about that, I guess it was on silence mode." She shrugged putting it away. "Honestly Ruby I just went to the training area to burn off some energy. I'm not going to disappear on you."
"Sorry," Ruby calmed down a bit as she looked down at her feet. "I just got worried, we are all back together for the first time since Beacon and…well I just didn't want to lose that again."
Yang gave her a warm smile, "I'm not going anywhere sis."
"I don't know how you have any energy left after today," That was Weiss who was sitting in a chair looking in a mirror as she brushed her long white hair. She was currently in a pair of sweat pants and t-shirt. It was the only spare thing they could find since Weiss lost her luggage when her ship crashed and then the whole kidnapping thing didn't help.
"I feel totally exhausted," she sighed.
Yang noticed her dress on the dresser next to the bed she had gotten. "Cleaned up your clothing from earlier?"
"I got the…blood out," Weiss had been shown the laundry room and had put her clothing in there. She didn't want it stained with her own blood after all but it was still hard to think about. She looked over at the blue dress. "The hole in it, well that's another story."
"We'll fix it up like new Weiss," Ruby offered. "Plus we could always get a new one."
Weiss knew that her partner was just trying to help but that dress was worth more than what some people made in a month. Also the face that she didn't have any access to her accounts thanks to her father would also be an issue later on. She mentally shrugged, they would deal with that in the morning.
Blake was being silent, which was somewhat normal, but the dark haired Faunus was most likely still feeling a bit guilty about leaving without a word last time. Yang would have to tell her that all was forgiven later if only to make her partner feel a bit more at ease.
"That reminds me," Yang looked to Weiss, "Ran into Jaune training too, I hope you thanked him for saving your life."
"I planned on doing that tomorrow," the heiress said. "I was going to do it tonight but he vanished on me, looks like he went off to train."
"Yep, good old Jaune has been kicking up his training," Yang grinned. "Took me nearly five minutes to get him down."
"He got that better?" Blake finally spoke up.
"Oh yeah you should have seen some of the things he's done lately," Ruby said all excited for her friend.
Yang gave a small laugh, "You fill Blake in, I need to shower and change."
Yang picked up her own sleepwear and went into the small bathroom as she could hear Ruby talk about their trip here and everything that had happened. Yang closed the door as she started to strip off her clothing. She finished by detaching the mechanical arm, although it could in theory get wet she didn't want to risk it. Plus it wasn't like she wasn't used to doing things with one arm anyway with the months she spent before she got the new arm.
The warm water felt nice on her skin and hair, it took her a little longer to get herself clean with just the one arm but she had come up with a system for it. After she was down and drying herself off she put on her clothing and gathered up her usual attire and her arm in one hand and opened the door.
"And then Jaune unlocked his semblance," Ruby's voice was heard as soon as Yang opened up the door.
"It looks like Jaune has come a long way," Blake was sitting cross-legged on her bed now listening to the story.
"I have to admit the Jaune isn't like how he was." Weiss had since finished with her hair and was getting into her bed.
"Yep, old Vomit Boy is growing up fast," Yang grinned placing her clothing by her bed along with her arm.
"You don't sleep with your arm on?" Blake wondered aloud.
"Nope," Yang told her sitting on her bed with a shrug. "It's because the cold of the metal again my skin sometimes wakes me up plus there is a gun in that thing. I really don't want to wake up to find that in my sleep the barrel came out and pointing at my face or something."
What she didn't tell anyone was that the last time she had slept with the thing on and had one of her nightmares she had accidentally fired it off. It scared the hell out of her that night, not to mention having to help dad fix her wall that morning.
"You could just disarm it." Weiss told her.
There was a silence as Yang raised an eyebrow at her friend before Weiss suddenly realized what she had said.
"I didn't mean to make a pun!" she shouted at Yang falling back onto her bed and quickly taking her pillow and putting on her embarrassed face. "I blame your influence for this Yang!"
"Too late," Yang laughed, "It was a good one too, I've been trying to work that one into conversation for awhile now. Anyways, I know I could but if I ever forgot it would be too much of a risk. Plus this helps to save on power anyway."
The dust powering the arm could last for two months in all honesty but Yang still didn't want to sleep with the thing on after that night. She had been lucky she hadn't shot herself or dad or something else.
"Yang," Blake looked uneasy. "I know I haven't said it yet but I'm sorry. I'm sorry for leaving when I did."
Yang sighed and was quiet a moment, "I know."
The blonde went up to her friend and Blake looked at her with a little trepidation before Yang pulled her into a one arm hug. She hugged back hard squeezing her eyes shut, Blake hated running away again. She had just felt so guilty about everything, everyone close to her seemed to suffer around her sometimes.
Yang pulled back and then poked her with a slight glare. "But don't you dare do this again! This is your second strike on running away you know."
Blake's ears flattened remembering the first time before her friends found out she had been a Faunus and had been part of the White Fang. "I know."
"So you better promise me that you will never, ever do this again."
Blake looked into Yang's eyes and nodded her head. "I've run away too many times, I promise I won't."
Yang's expression softened, "Good, because if you get strike three I will hunt you down and kick your ass. And since Sun has this uncanny ability to find you, I'll employ him as my blood hound to help me do it."
Now it was Blake's turn to give a small glare at her friend. "You would wouldn't you."
Yang smiled, "Yep."
The blonde then paused as something she had been thinking about for awhile now. "So what's going on between you two anyway?"
"What do you mean?" Blake tried to play dumb but the slight blush was telling the others more than what she wanted them to know.
Yang saw it and grinned. "Oh? You take a boy home to meet your parents and it doesn't mean anything?"
"I didn't take him home, he followed me home," Blake defended herself. This only set Yang off laughing as Blake had to ask what was so funny.
"When you said that I just got this image in my head of you showing up to your parents with Sun and going 'Mom he followed me home, can I keep him' like he was a lost puppy." Yang nearly laughed again. Ruby could be heard snorting as she tried to keep her laughter in check. Weiss had come out from behind her pillow and had on a smirk on her face.
Yang found a pillow suddenly slamming into her face from Blake. It wasn't hard but it had just enough force to let the blonde know her dark haired teammate was annoyed.
"And now I have two pillows," Yang sang picking it up and walking to her bed.
Blake huffed out in annoyance before crossing her arms. "Looks Sun is just…a friend okay."
Yang glanced at her and was about to let it go before she flashed back to what she learned earlier with Jaune. Her face fell slightly as she thought about how if Pyrrha had just gotten the nerve to talk to Jaune earlier things could have been different between them. They could all tell that there was something going on between Blake and Sun but she was either too stubborn or scared to admit it.
She didn't want to see Blake one day regretting not having the courage to face this.
Yang calmly walked back to Blake and handed her the pillow back. "Blake can I tell you something? Something as your partner, teammate and as your friend?"
Blake blinked at the seriously in Yang it was a sudden turn but she nodded her head. Yang only got serious a few times but when she did it was usually a good idea to listen.
Yang took a breath before saying it. "Get over yourself."
Weiss's jaw dropped as Ruby got a worried look that a fight might break out. Blake looked like she had just been slapped in the face.
"Excuse me!?" Blake narrowed her eyes.
"I don't know why you have this complex about being happy." Yang continued on lightly touching Blake's shoulder and giving her a pleading look. "You always seem to feel like you deserve to be punished or that you don't deserve to be happy but you do. I just don't want to see another set of my friends one day being in pain because they couldn't face their fears and admit their feelings."
"What are you talking about?" Blake asked.
Yang sighed as she closed her eyes, she didn't know if Jaune wanted it a secret. She should have asked but if that tragedy could help out their friends she got the feeling Jaune might be okay with it. "Did you know that Pyrrha loved Jaune and I mean more than just a friend."
Blake's eyes widened. "I…I knew she cared for him but you mean she was in love with him?"
Yang nodded her head. "She confessed to him before pushing him into that locker and sending him away that night."
Well she knew that she hadn't confessed in the traditional sense but it was pretty much what happened. She could see Blake processing things, Ruby had her knees drawn up but didn't look that surprised. Had she known or found out?
Weiss's eyes shifted back and forth remembering that night that Beacon fell. She remembered how Jaune sounded when he had called her and Ruby on that scroll. He had sounded so desperate and hearing this it put that memory into a new light. Her heart reached out to the two of them at what had happened.
"That's why Blake," Yang looked at her partner in the eyes. "I don't know if confessing would have changed anything but can you honestly say that the happiness they could have had would have meant anything less?"
"I just…" Blake hugged the pillow to her chest. She didn't know what to say about that, it just that every time something seemed to be working out life would come along and take it away.
"We're going into dangerous situations," Blake finally said. "We're going to go up against someone who has been the greatest enemy our entire world has known and kept herself secret all this time. From what you told me she can control all the Grimm and we're going to have targets on our backs now that we got that artifact."
"Blake," Weiss spoke up. "If you're waiting for the world to be a safe place you'll die of old age long before that happens. The world has always been dangerous and even if by some miracle we defeat Salem, all her Grimm and whatever else we'll face. New threats will most likely show up to take their place."
"She's right," Yang nodded her head. "There will always be danger Blake, that's why I think it's important to take every single moment of happiness we can get. We shouldn't live with regrets and yes there will be pain in the future but we've already been through that too."
"You have a right to be happy Blake," Ruby told her. "Yang lost an arm, Weiss nearly died today, we've lost friends but we're still here. We're still alive and we shouldn't have to be afraid to be alive. We're here for you no matter what."
"Guys…" Blake felt a stinging in her eyes trying to blink it away.
"Look I'm not saying just jump the guy or something," Yang shrugged. "All I'm asking is that you really think about your feelings here. If Sun makes you happy then you should go after it, hold onto it tight and never let go. If he doesn't then maybe you should tell him because it's painfully clear how he feels about you."
"He did travel half the world to make sure you were okay," Ruby grinned with a shrug.
"I suppose you could do worse than him," Weiss shrugged.
Blake's face soured at that as she sighed. "I have…guys one of the reasons I never thought about it was because of how my last relationship ended."
That got the girls interests as Yang jumped onto her bed grinning. "Ohhhh, I smell a story. So what's this ex-boyfriend's name and what happened?"
"I never told you guys but I dated…Adam," Blake winced knowing what was going to come. The silence was so thick you could hear a pin drop at that point.
The pure silence was shattered as Yang's eyes flashed red for a moment before she exploded. "You dated that psycho!?"
"I didn't know he was when things started up!" Blake defended herself but then flopped back onto her bed looking up at the ceiling. "When I joined the White Fang I was a kid and it was back when we did rallies and demonstrations but I felt it wasn't doing anything."
"Adam actually recruited me into his faction that was supposed to be more 'proactive' in the fight for our rights."
Weiss wanted to make a comment on how acts of violence and terrorism were 'proactive' but kept her mouth shut on that point. They had been down this road once before and she knew that Blake wouldn't have done anything horrendous.
"I thought he was this great figure fighting for our rights, I thought he was passionate about our cause and he seemed interested in me. Then I started to slowly see how he really was, he was a person that was full of spite. He wasn't passionate just angry and wanted to hurt the world. So in our last operation together I left both him and the White Fang."
Blake sat up and looked at Yang, "That's also why he hurt you Yang because he wants me to suffer for what I did. Because I hurt him, he feels that he had to hurt me anyway possible. Including hurting everyone I'm close to or care about."
"Wow…he really is a psycho-ex," Yang felt like she had a bigger picture now of why Blake ran off that night.
"Yeah he is," Blake balled her fists. "I've been afraid of what he would do to those I care about after that night, that is until when we got here. I refuse to let Adam keep me afraid and I refuse to run away from him anymore."
"And we'll be here to help you beat the crap out of him if he ever shows up again," Ruby raised a fist to the air.
"Damn right," Yang flexed her robotic fist. "I got some personal payback coming his way."
"Well I have to say given that, Sun is a very large improvement over Adam." Weiss commented.
"Yeah, he is," Blake smiled a bit at the thought of him. Sun was the total opposite of Adam in every way she could think of.
Weiss yawned suddenly, "sorry. It's been a long day and I really need to sleep."
The others started to agree as they got into their beds. As the lights were turned off they lied there in their beds thinking their own thoughts. The quiet of the night was broken by Ruby that had to say the oddest of things.
"I miss the bunk beds." Their leader sighed.
Weiss smiled, "I kind of do too."
"It would feel more natural if we had them," Blake said next.
"Maybe we can set it up in the morning," Yang yawned. "I have no energy to go hunting for tools and rope."
"That reminds me," Weiss asked them. "Which one of you brought rope to school? You know the ones we used to help make the bunk beds? I never figured that out and I kept forgetting to ask."
"I actually found that in the closest," Blake supplied.
"Wait, it was just there in the closet?" Ruby asked her. "Like, someone just left it there in the room?"
"Maybe it was from the previous group that had been living in that dorm before us?" Yang shrugged although now she was thinking why they would have rope let alone just leave it in the closet of all places?
There was another moment of silence before Weiss let out a disgruntled groan.
"Now I'm going to be tossing and turning for the next hour thinking about that. I hate mysteries especially when there isn't an answer for it." She grumbled.
"Want me to tell you a story?" Roby offered. "My dad always did that to help me sleep."
"No." Weiss simply said.
Yang only smiled closing her eyes, it felt good to have everyone back again. She felt whole for some reason. When everyone had split up she hadn't noticed at first how it had left a hole in her life. Now though they were back together and she wanted to make sure they stayed together for a long time.
Suddenly she frowned thinking about Jaune and how he and his team still had a hole in their lives. She doubted nothing could help them with the loss of Pyrrha. She felt a bit guilty feeling better with her team together when JNPR would never be together again. Nora and Ren seemed to handle it better, maybe it was because they were partners and were so close that they could lean on each other for support.
If that was the case then who did Jaune have to lean on?
Back when she was recovering in the winter, Yang had never felt more alone. Her dad and sister tried to help but even then, they couldn't understand what she had been going through. Even with them in the house, she had felt so isolated and like she was alone in the world with her pain.
Could that be what Jaune felt sometimes? She hoped not, she wouldn't wish that feeling on anyone. That had been the darkest moment of her life, but slowly she had come out of it.
She stared at the ceiling thinking about it. She finally came to a resolution, if he did feel like that or if he did feel alone then she would help him out. She could be that friend he needed to lean on, their talk not too long ago might have been proof of that. At any rate she was going to wait until morning to see about that. First she was just mentally and emotionally exhausted and needed to sleep.
TBC…