Ruby Rose and Jaune Arc maintained a brisk pace on their way to the Beacon Gymnasium. They bickered back and forth with one another as they approached the apparent haunt of their friends Nora Valkyrie and Yang Xiao-Long. The temple of iron was as nondescript as any of the other service and recreation buildings in Beacon, the only identifying feature being the large exterior lettering illuminated and advertising its purpose. Sliding glass doors gave way easily to allow the two to enter.
As Ruby and Jaune passed through the doors, they were assaulted with the warm, humid air unique to gym environments. There was a lingering scent in the air of exertion and sweat that only strengthened as they made their way to the weight racks. A cacophony of shifting metal and flesh made for an impromptu orchestra that welcomed them into the bulging, rippling arms of steel that so many enjoyed.
"Come on! Light weight!" shouted a familiar voice from far away in the corner by the power racks.
"L-lift big to get big!" answered another with no small amount of exertion.
As Ruby and Jaune rounded the last of the Smith machines, the figures of Nora and Yang came into full view. Nora was in a deep squat, her entire form braced and tense as she balanced an overloaded barbell across her back. Yang stood just behind her, squatting with her to maintain proper spotting position and remaining ready to step in and assist Nora should she falter with her load. Both girls were wearing their typical gym attire: simple, matching tank tops and shorts in their preferred coloration.
"Let's go! Leave humanity behind!" shouted Yang in encouragement as Nora reached the apex of her descent, her ass hitting the proverbial grass, shoulders back and upright to prevent the bowed barbell touching the ground.
"H-Hip Drive!" grunted Nora as she slowly began to rise, grunting in exertion as she activated her full posterior chain to overcome the antagonistic force of nature that was Gravity. With a triumphant roar, Nora rose and rose until she at last reached her starting position, locking out and shifting the 6 plates on either end of the barbell with an intimidating clunk of steel.
"One more rep! You're a sick cunt, a sick cunt!" Yang shouted encouragingly as Nora huffed and puffed to recover her blown-out CNS. Nora exhaled sharply through her nose, not unlike a bull, as she allowed herself to be goaded by Yang into further and stronger performance. In but a moment, Nora began to fall once again, grunting once more as she continued her exercise.
It was that moment when Ruby and Jaune walked around the two, standing between them and the massive wall-mounted mirror as Nora and Yang worked out. The two women didn't even seem to notice them amid their feedback loop until Ruby at last cleared her throat.
"A-hem! Er, hey guys!" Ruby chirped. Nora's grunting and Yang's encouragement stopped as they both glanced up, at the bottom of Nora's squat, to finally notice Ruby and Jaune.
"Oh! Hey Ruby, hey Jaune!" greeted Yang with a grin as she held her position perfectly.
"Hey guys!" cried Nora, as if she wasn't being crushed under almost 600 pounds of weight, "Oh, hang on!"
Nora shifted her attention away from the two once more in order to draw power from within. With a flare of her soul she activated her aura, and all the fatigue seemed to vanish from her at once. Yang scrambled back as Nora stood up as if completely unburdened, dragging the incredibly heavy barbell with her. She casually lifted it straight up over her head before dropping the bar to her chest and sliding it onto the safety pegs of the power rack. Her weight racked, Nora dropped her aura and immediately sagged and began to shake from the exertion of her workout.
Yang came up behind Nora then, dragging a bench with her and sliding it under the power rack for Nora to sit and rest, her breathing heavy as Yang stood beside her. Yang draped a towel over Nora's shoulders and handed her a water bottle, who immediately took both gratefully and wiped the sweat from her brow. Yang grabbed her own towel hanging from the power rack as she looked to Ruby and Jaune, who had watched the entire display with an overawed gape.
"…What?" Yang asked, raising a brow.
"Y-you lifted that," Jaune began with a stunned gasp, pointing at the sagging barbell on the rack, "without Aura!?"
Ruby mutely nodded her disbelief from beside him, eyes wide.
Nora, still panting, could only grin savagely, raising an arm and flexing her muscle. Her previously nondescript limb surged into a defined mass of muscle and vein, her arm a network of vascularity that would've made any pre-workout-enjoyer blush. Yang, too, wore a wide, proud smile, chuckling at the disbelief of her sister and Jaune.
"Uh, duh?" Yang asked, amused, as if the answer was obvious, "You can only get stronger under exertion! You'd have to lift a bus or something if you wanted to strength-train with aura! Didn't you pay attention in phys ed at Signal, Ruby?"
Ruby flustered mightily as she shook her head in the negative, then looked down at her hands, turning them over as she wondered aloud, "…Is that why I never seem to get any stronger?"
"Yeah, sounds like!" Nora chimed in, her breathing normalizing as she continued to wipe away sweat, "Aura will help you recover faster and easier and supercharge your growth rate and potential, but you still gotta drop it and lift big if you wanna get big! Oh, not to mention eat big if you wanna build mass! You can't get around the laws of thermodynamics if you wanna be a mutant! 4 scoops, c'mon!"
"O-oh," acknowledged Jaune, eyes still wide, "Man, I thought I was strong after I got my aura unlocked in Initiation – "
"You what?!" Yang cried out, stunned.
"Pyrrha fixed it," both Ruby and Nora answered, which seemed to mollify whatever concern Yang possessed.
"Oh. That makes sense."
"…but I guess I've got an even longer way to go than I thought," groused Jaune as he looked between the 3 girls, incensed with their interruption and his own carelessness.
"Oh yeah you do, fearless leader!" sang Nora cheerfully, much to Jaune's chagrin, "Pyrrha's got you on the cardio and technical side and Ren's been sneaking in protein and vitamin supplements to your food, but I've really had to play up the wacky shenanigans to get you to carry things everywhere! You're lucky you've got hips for days or we'd all be calling you noodle-boy instead of vomit-boy!"
Jaune paled more than he thought possible as he considered just how much worse his social life at Beacon could've been if that name had caught on. Nora merely grinned at him while Ruby still seemed catatonic at realizing she had missed something so simple for so long. Yang was already cracking up at Jaune's expense and he just knew he was going to be hearing noodle puns for weeks after this. A part of him despaired at how much help he needed from his team – and how they felt the need to go behind his back to help him – but a larger part resolved to start working even harder and to pay them back for all their support. He stepped forward towards the power rack.
"Alright!" Jaune announced, suddenly motivated, "Let's do this, show me what I've got to do to get stronger!"
That announcement seemed to jerk Ruby out of her thoughts, and she lurched forward to cut Jaune off as matching feral grins appeared on Nora's and Yang's faces.
"Up-up-up! No! Nope! Not today!" Ruby protested, standing between an unwitting Jaune and his certain doom. He immediately began to argue with her, but it devolved into the usual rote bickering almost immediately.
Both Yang's and Nora's expression fell sharply as Ruby saved her friend from an imminent lecture about "SL 5x5" and "GOMAD," but the pressing question of what Ruby actually wanted kept them from speaking on it. The two girls looked to one another and spoke in that way only two fellow gym-goers could.
'Yo, what's she want?' asked Nora with a roll of her shoulder.
'I dunno, why would I know?' replied Yang in a helpless shrug and wide eyes.
'You're her sister!' reminded Nora with a sharp glare and a pout of her lips.
'Oh, just ask her yourself,' huffed Yang as she rolled her eyes and planted her hands on her hips.
Nora rolled her eyes and acquiesced.
"Ruby!" barked Nora, interrupting her argument with Jaune and drawing two pairs of eyes to her in an instant.
"Uh, yeah, Nora?" Ruby asked sheepishly.
"Why did you interrupt my set? I kinda have to do a rest period now for like 10 minutes and I don't wanna have to do it again if you spend the whole time arguing!" Nora griped lightly before she attacked her water bottle, drinking its blessed contents down in great gulps.
"Oh, heh-heh, well, it's a funny story, -"
"Ruby thinks you two are like mirror images of one another except for the way you two were raised. Basically, it's like nature vs nurture, but she says your nature is the same while your nurture was different," Jaune interrupted, rattling off an explanation as Ruby panicked beside him. He had a smug look on his face – he had gotten back at her for her interrupting him with Weiss and Pyrrha! See how she likes it!
"Jaune!" shouted Ruby, furious, she didn't like it at all!
"We're both the same except for how we were raised?" asked Yang in a contemplative tone from besides Nora. Nora looked up at her workout-buddy to see her wearing an exaggerated expression. Seeing an opportunity, Nora mimicked her and turned her attention back to the team leaders, leaning in and rubbing her chin thoughtfully, as if stroking a beard.
"Mmhmm, mmhmm. That appears to be so, Yang!" Nora nodded along, trying to give Yang a hook as Ruby and Jaune both stared at them mutely.
"Well," started Yang in a faux-genuine tone, "We do have the biggest guns at Beacon!"
"Yeah!" Nora agreed with a snicker, "And we have the highest caliber firearms, too!" Nora turned to level a look at Ruby, who seemed about to protest. "Don't think I didn't notice your necked-down cartridges for Crescent Rose! Yang and I have caliber-maxxing on lock!"
"Aw yeah, straight-walled cartridges all the way, baby!" laughed Yang, and Nora high-fived her as they continued to dunk on Ruby's theory by playing into it.
"Oh-oh-oh, I bet they think we're so similar because we're super awesome and have positive self-images!" continued Nora with a wide grin as her amusement and excitement both grew.
"Haha, oh yeah, we don't rely on anyone else to define our worth at all!" added Yang with suspicious specificity.
"Yeah, and we hit real hard!" Nora contributed, trying to bring things back on track.
"And we're totally laid back and know how to have fun!"
"Oh man, they must be right! We must really be the exact same!" Nora emphasized, drawing out the syllables of her words to try and get Yang to get on with it already. Surely, she'd have thought of something by now.
"I think you're right, Nora! There's just one thing…" Yang trailed off. Finally! She was getting to the punch line!
"What's that, Yang?" Nora played into the pause, adopting the most obviously affected yet genuine curiosity she could manage.
"Well, I mean, it's just a little, teeny, itsy-bitsy thing that probably separates us completely," Yang was slow with her words and syllables, really milking the tension there! Ruby and Jaune were looking aggrieved, Jaune folding his arms and pouting while Ruby tapped her fingers together as she watched the display.
"What's that, my long-lost twinsie?" asked Nora earnestly, her grin widening in anticipation of whatever obvious difference Yang was about to drop.
"You never had to deal with all the boys looking at you like a piece of meat and only caring about your assets!" Yang called out triumphantly.
Nora boggled at her, her grin vanished as if wiped away. There was no jovial tone to her voice, there was no easy dismissal of Ruby's silly theory – she had totally botched the setup!
"Uh – Yang, are you serious?" asked Nora when Yang didn't continue for a few moments, "Do you not pay attention? I am a shortstack. Yes, they look at me like that!"
"I – wait, they do?" Yang looked genuinely surprised, and Nora's head tilted in imitation of her Leader's as Yang's eyes darted around, confused, "I mean, that sucks, but how didn't I notice?"
"Heck, I dunno? Anyway, bad example, try again!" urged Nora, trying to get things back in order. Yeah, the punchline was pretty much shot, now, but they still had to finish it! If Yang couldn't come up with some basic, fundamental difference between them, then she was going to have to!
"Oh uh – well uh, youuuu…" Yang looked uncharacteristically nervous, her head rolling with her jaw as she elongated her syllables. She brought her fists up under her chin, her index finger raised on each as if to point at the thing that separated them. Her expression brightened, and those fingers dropped to point right at Nora, "Didn't have to take care of your younger sibling from a young age and keep her safe due to unavailable parental figures!"
"Yang, what the heck?" griped Nora, annoyed and frustrated, all sense of fun gone from her expression as she fixed Yang with a frustrated glare, "Yes, I did! I told you about how Ren and I met, didn't I? He's not a girl or sibling but we were taking care of each other for years! Try again!"
"Oh, shoot, sorry, that's weird – I've never had that happen before, I swear," Yang was sweating now – and not just from the workout they were undergoing. She was really struggling, and it was really annoying Nora! "Um. You're not… Actually way more sensitive than you let on and cover it up with a mask of bubbly attitude to try and avoid vulnerability?"
"Yang! You're doing this on purpose! Stop saying things that apply to me, too!" groaned Nora. She buried her face in the towel – ew, gross, sweat – then pulled it away and heaved a deep sigh. Finally, she just threw out the first thing she could think of to finish this bad joke, "Next, you're going to say you were abandoned by your mother, too!"
Yang just stood there, her eyes slowly widening as she parsed what Nora had just said. She swayed with her breathing but otherwise stilled. She didn't know what to say, couldn't find the words. Ruby, for her part, was also staring at Nora with eyes wide as saucers, while Jaune's jaw dropped at Nora's admission.
Nora realized something was wrong only after a few moments' silence. She looked up and between Ruby and Jaune, then to Yang when she failed to speak. She saw the expressions of disbelief, vulnerability, and even fear cross Yang's face in a way she never even knew Yang could do! The air between them all was tense and awkward and Nora didn't know what to say as she watched them all grapple with whatever this revelation could mean, slowly growing more and more nervous.
"…I uh, I was," Yang admitted finally, her voice small and weak. Her typically bold, aggressive demeanor was withdrawn and fragile, and Nora could see lines of worry and stress etched across Yang's expression.
"Oh my gods," gasped Nora, finally hearing Yang's words and realizing what her reluctance to speak meant. "You too? I'm so – so sorry, I didn't – "
"Oh my God, we really are the same," Yang breathed, gaping at Nora like a fish out of water.
"Huh?"
"W-when did she leave you?" asked Yang suddenly, pursing her lips and leaning into Nora's personal space.
"When I – I dunno, it was like a year or two before I met Ren," Nora started, even as she leaned away from Yang. Her features scrunched up as she recalled those memories, pain writ on her face as she spoke in a halting cadence, "And there were Grimm chasing us, and she just dropped me and ran away."
"M-mine just walked out on me – on us – one day and never came back," Yang revealed, her shoulders dropping as if a weight had just left them. She spoke in a low monotone as she continued, "I got a new mom, and then she had Ruby, so I got a sister, but then Mom never came back, too."
"I never…" Nora trailed off as she considered herself in Yang's place, to imagine gaining a new mother to replace the one that left her, and then to lose that one, too. It would've destroyed her, just as it would've destroyed her to lose Ren. Her eyes filled with treacherous tears at the very thought. "I never got a sister, or a new mom, all I ever had was Ren."
"W-well not anymore!" declared Yang with a sudden energy. She drew herself up to her full height again, the fire in her eyes returning. She took Nora by her shoulder, hauling her to her feet, "Come on!" and wrapped her arms about her, pulling the shorter girl into a tight, bone-crushing hug, "C'mere, sister!"
Nora was stunned into silence, though only for a moment, as she wrapped her arms about her in turn. She returned the hug with all the force Yang put into it, clinging to her like a lifeline she had no idea she had. Both girls were suddenly crying, Yang sobbing into Nora's hair while Nora tucked her head into Yang's shoulder. Their bodies shook with one another as they shared in the other's plight, and a new kinship, deeper than blood, was realized.
Ruby and Jaune watched it all, their expressions shifting from surprise to shock to bewildered regard as it went on. Jaune, being a family man, couldn't help but shed a tear of his own as he watched Nora and Yang solidify their new relationship as found family. He raised a hand to his cheek, wiping away a single tear as he smiled happily at the sight.
"See? I told you!" quipped Ruby from beside him. That was enough to drag Jaune forcefully out of his reverie, and he shot a look to Ruby that silenced her immediately (not that she was still talking).
"That…" Jaune began as he really took in what just happened. His mind slowly processed it all, categorizing and filing away the information of what he just witnessed. When he did, his jaw set, and his expression hardened as he hissed to Ruby through grit teeth, "Is a load of bananas!"
"Bananas?" Ruby scoffed as she leaned away, not expecting such vitriol. Her serious expression warred with her amusement at Jaune's choice of words.
"I'm serious, Ruby!" Jaune spoke lowly, still not wanting to interrupt the moment between the two teams' respective brawlers, "That had nothing to do with nature or nurture or whatever – those two just happened to share, what, all the same struggles and half the same horrible traumas they endured through life?"
"I know!" agreed Ruby, excited as he seemed to suddenly see the truth of her belief. "It's ridiculous, right?!"
"What's next, do they both have a thing for –" Jaune stumbled as he tried to cook up some equally insane similarity as what he just witnessed, "Dark-haired, relatively slender partners with a heavy Mistralian aesthetic?!"
"Jaune?" Ruby questioned, then thought over his words, "Well, I mean, I guess Blake sort of fits that, too, but – "
"It's absurd, Ruby! People aren't the same! Everyone is unique and their circumstances unique to them! The idea that two people could be so similar as to be twins is just – it's insane, Ruby!" ranted Jaune, his volume slowly increasing, "And this plays perfectly into your theory! Did you plan this? Is this a prank? It's not funny, Ruby!"
"Jaune, I swear I didn't expect their nature and nurture to be the same! That was out of the scope of my theory!" Ruby defended herself from Jaune's accusations. She raised her hands to placate him.
"You're doing this on purpose, somehow! Or it's a conspiracy! A grand contrivance of fate! Something greater than us is mocking us, Ruby, and I do not appreciate it!" Jaune almost snarled, and he placed his hands on his hips, oblivious to the world around him as his mind raced.
"Jaune! Jaune, relax!" Ruby implored, reaching out to touch him, trying to ground him, but flinching back when he jerked away, "We can fix this!"
"What now?"
"Let's just go see Ren and Blake, okay? They'll be different! Then we can just call this a fluke!" Ruby tried to compromise with Jaune, placating his sudden nerves and trying to redirect him. She reached up to grab his sleeve and started pulling him towards the gym's entrance.
"I swear, Ruby, if this turns out to be some contrived junk about how they're both so similar and we just never knew for some reason, I'm going to scream!" Jaune warned, allowing Ruby to lead him away.
They both left the gym without another word, headed for the library and leaving Nora and Yang to their emotional embrace.
"Hey!" shouted Yang, suddenly perking up and coming back to life in the gym, even wrapped in Nora's grip as she was.
"Huh?" Nora asked, still a bit weak from all the emotional turmoil, looking up to her new sister.
"I know what'll cheer you up!" Yang declared, smiling widely down at Nora. Her slightly puffy eyes were the only evidence she had just been crying as she beamed at the smaller girl.
Nora tilted her head, silently urging her to speak. She clung limply to Yang's larger figure as Yang placed her hands on her hips, not impeding Nora's grip at all.
"Let's go find Ruby! If you're my sister, then that makes you her sister, too!" Yang said, and Nora's brain slowly lit up with firing neurons as she considered the implications of that sentence.
"Oh my gosh, not just her sister, her older sister!" Nora perked up as she understood, finally releasing Yang.
"Yup! And you know what that means, right?" Yang egged on, her grin turning feral.
"Uhh, well, no, I've never been an older sister before!" admitted Nora, but Yang's grin never faltered.
"It means you've gotta make up for years of missed little-sister-torment! Come on, let's wash up and go get her!" Yang decided, and without another word the two gym-rats headed for the locker rooms, occasionally trading devious, sadistic giggling fits.