Chapter Eleven

I moaned as soft, supple hands worked hardened flesh.

"Holy Shit, Pyrrha," I groaned. "We're doing this again."

The girl who could beat me bloody if she so desired paused, as she straddled me, before going back to gripping me tightly.

"It can't feel that good," Yang disagreed, trying, and failing, to study, while Blake tried to read a book, staring over the top of it at us.

"I can do you next," Pyrrha offered, cheerfully, with a hint of teasing in her tone. "Or Jaune could do it."

"I do need the practice," I agreed looking over to my fellow blonde, "But it'd probably be better if Pyrrha helped. She has more experience, but maybe I could later." Yang opened her mouth to respond, before she blushed and muttered something as she went back to her reading of Professor Port's autobiography.

The door, which we hadn't locked, practically flew open, and Ruby, who had very obviously been listening in, fell to the floor. "Um, hi?" the small girl asked, eyes wide as she looked over. "Oh, you're. . ." she trailed off.

"Getting a massage? Yeah," I agreed, biting back another moan of pleasure as Pyrrha worked loose knots I didn't even know I had, straddling my butt as she worked on my back with oils, a towel spread out to catch any stray drips. "Want one?"

"She's too young!" Yang objected, looking up.

"I'm fifteen!" Ruby disagreed, shooting a glare at her sister before she went back to staring at me. "That's old enough for. . . massages."

I blinked, having been actually offering a massage, and wondering how that'd ended up as innuendo to the young girl. Pyrrha paused, and I bucked my hips a little, prodding her to "Keep going, please," and soon enough she was back at it. If this was the way they wanted to play it, I was game. "Have you ever had a. . . massage before?" I asked with a grin, perfectly willing to tease the ever loving shit out of both sisters.

"I. . . no, no I haven't!" Ruby squeaked, turning as red as the tips of her hair.

"Good!" Yang agreed, getting another glare from her sister.

I shook my head, "No, it's really something you should experience. Ah, that's good,"

The blonde shot me a betrayed look. "Jaune! You said-"

"That's why Pyrrha should do it," I continued.

I could practically feel the girl on me nod, even though I couldn't see her. "Not now, of course, but I see no reason not to," she agreed, guilelessly.

"Oh, but. . ." Yang trailed off looking at me in confusion.

"What, me? I don't know what I'm doing, at least when it comes to massages," I said with a grin. "I might go too hard, and you wouldn't want her first time to hurt, would you?" I asked, my grin so innocent that butter wouldn't melt in my mouth.

That was enough for Yang's brain to effectively reboot, and realize I was teasing her just as much as I was teasing her sister. She smiled back, commenting, "Most guys wouldn't admit about being inexperienced."

I shrugged, causing Pyrrha to poke my back to get me to lie still. "I'm honest about my skillsets. On the massage table, I'm a rank amateur. Now in the bedroom-" I started, only for Yang to bolt to her feet, slapping her hands over Ruby's ears, and force her out the room, over the madly blushing girl's objections.

The gladiatrix that was riding me paused, before asking with forced nonchalance, "And what are your skills there, Jaune?"

I shrugged, "No idea, no experience there either, but if it's anything like fighting I'll likely be a quick study."

Pyrrha shook with laughter, slapping my back. "Oh Jaune, you are terrible!"

"Oh, I hope not," I replied with mock concern. "But I'm sure I'll improve!"

She laughed more, going back to giving me one of the best massages I'd ever had. "I'm almost done," the redhead informed me. "Could you. . . do me next?" she asked, once again with forced calm.

"It's the least I could do," I agreed solemnly, laughing as Blake suddenly stood up and left as well. "Those girls have such dirty minds," I bemoaned.

"Oh, um, yes, them. They certainly do," Pyrrha agreed carefully, and I had to repress another laugh, looking forward to returning the favor. God knows the girl on top of me deserved it, even if she was thirstier than a camel.

DR

Bad news, Sticky Fingers didn't help with sports massage, good news, it seemed that one of my other talentsdid. Likely Martial, if I had to guess. That meant while I wasn't instantly amazing, I did learn a good bit from Pyrrha working on me, and, able to practice on her, I learned very quickly.

Pyrrha had given out an ill-repressed moan of pleasure as I finally worked out a knot under one shoulder-blade, figuring out the sweet-zone between too light and too hard, only for the door to open, Yang to poke her head in, and then for her to immediately retreat, Ruby's "They're still at it!" quickly muffled.

By the time I was done she wasn't a puddle of pleasure, but she was very relaxed, and I was very proud of myself. Leaning over her, I quietly suggested "A good start, but I think I need more practice."

I laughed as she thought about it, then just lazily nodded into my bed.

DR

Next morning, I could practically feel Blake half-leaning on my bed, and cracked a single eye open to look at her, creepily staring at me. I reached up, quickly, like a striking snake, and as she was reeling back I patted her on the head.

She almost hissed as she pulled away, knocking my hand off her. "What was that?" she demanded quietly.

"Act like a cat, get pet like a cat," I yawned. "Seriously, I'm not that attractive." I paused, "Am I?"

"You're not," she informed me, with a bit too much vehemence. "You're. . . wrong."

I sat up, giving her a raised eyebrow look. "Care to explain that, or just gonna leave that hanging."

"Don't think I don't know what you're doing," she insisted instead.

Rolling my eyes, I proclaimed, "Ah, yes, my great master plan has been foiled by the masterful investigations of Blake Belladonna. Curses, curses I say! Care to explain what they are to the class? Or are we gonna go ahead with vague declarations of malfeasance?"

"You're abusing your position, to seduce Pyrrha," she angrily informed me. "You're practically flaunting it."

"Ah-huh," I replied, looking over as the woman in question stepped out of the bathroom, fresh from her shower. "Hey, Pyrrha, am I abusing my position as team-lead to seduce you?"

Blake went still, likely not expecting me to call her accusations out. Pyrrha just looked confused. "What?" the redhead asked. "How are you seducing me, Jaune? Not. . . not that I'd necessarily be adverse to such a thing," she quickly added, blushing.

"I believe it was the massage," I pointed out, amused at her reaction. "Blake was concerned."

Pyrrha blinked, "But, that was merely. . . oh. Oh!" she exclaimed in understanding. "I apologize," she said, turning to her teammate. "I'm so used to the tournament culture, that I sometimes forget how other people view things. Did you think that, when I suggested. . ." she trailed off, glancing my way.

I shook my head, and she looked simultaneously relieved and disappointed. "No, I assumed it was a sports massage. Was it supposed to be-"

"No!" she cut me off, blushing even more. "No, it was merely. . . two fighters assisting each other. I assure you Blake," she said, turning to the other girl. "Nothing untoward or unwanted was happening. I'm the one who suggested it, after all."

However, the ex-White Fang operative wouldn't be deterred. "But he's in charge of you. You might not've thought anything was happening but he shouldn't've been doing anything with you in the first place!"

Pyrrha's expression cooled a little, as she frowned, stating slowly, "But I just said there was nothing happening, Blake. He is our team leader, but that does not mean he can command me to do what I wouldn't want to do. That does not mean he could do what you are implying. Or do you believe that I would be so weak as to be abused in such a manner?"

For a moment, nice, cheerful, happy-to-be-here Pyrrha fell away and there was an instant where the cold, focused, Invincible Girl stared back. I'd only known her for a few days, and hadn't upset her, so I hadn't seen this side of her, as she stared down the Faunus with a hard, unbreakable intensity.

I had to say, it was surprisingly hot.

"I, you, that's how it starts!" the dark-haired girl shot back, glaring at me. "You think everything's fine, and they make you feel special, and. . . and. . ."

Before I could say anything, not sure what I could say that wouldn't be twisted against me, Pyrrha replied, tone no longer cold, but soft, and understanding. "And that happened to you before?"

"No! Maybe!" Blake bit out, and I tried to figure out a way to exit this conversation, not ready for it, and not sure what to do. "And we're not even a team for two days and he had you. . ."

I sighed, getting up. "I'm gonna take a shower, and make breakfast. We've only known each other for, what, three days? We're still figuring each other out, so maybe I'm not what I'm coming across as. I mean I think Weiss is a spoiled princess, and don't really care for her personality, but maybe there's something else there." I shrugged, as she glared, "And maybe I'm still saying the wrong thing still. I'm gonna shower, and make breakfast, and then we have class, and I'll try to leave you alone."

Heading to the door, I could hear Blake quietly ask Pyrrha, "You know what's in those shakes, right?"

The Gladiatrix responded calmly, "Of course. As I said, my coaches would occasionally mix some cattle blood into the smoothies they would give me to help replenish key minerals. Or did you think I didn't notice?"

Closing the door, I reminded myself that, for all that she came off as clueless, Pyrrha was not an idiot. I wasn't planning on tricking her, maliciously tricking her, I specified, but this would be a very clear warning if I was.

Showered, I walked through to the kitchen, Pyrrha and Blake's conversation pausing as I moved through the common/bedroom, Yang still passed out. With several gallons of my blood to work with, it was easy enough to make the smoothies up, and with the extra time I poked around the extra-dimensional mansion, looking over the lab to find that I did have several devices stamped with Atlas' symbol, one of them likely the 'plasma sculptor' that Ruby had been so excited about.

Returning to Remnant, Blake was in the bathroom, and I paused, putting the tray down and offering Pyrrha a shake while we sat down on our beds, facing each other. "So, she thinks I'm the same as her mentor? The one who taught her how to fight anyone but him?"

The redhead didn't reply right away, parsing her response. "Yes. She was. . . involved with him, and he was the type to give. . . commands. Jaune, when you tell me to do something, you do know that I can say no, correct?"

"Um, yes?" I replied, confused, before I thought about it from the position of someone who served under Adam Taurus. Again, I'd never seen the part that included him, only hearing second-hand about the character, but what I'd heard. . . wasn't good. "Oh. Let me guess, he wasn't?" Pyrrha nodded sadly, and I sighed. "And he was a manipulative sonofabitch?" She nodded again.

"I've dealt with those types of people, and those they latch on to," the Gladiatrix told me. "Very rarely at the top, but. . . Jaune," she said, looking straight at me. "If you were that type of person, I would request a transfer."

"And you'd be right to," I replied instantly, thinking of that kind of toxic environment, having grown up in that kind of environment, to some extent. "I think. . ." I said, considering it. "I think that if Blake were on a different team, one with a female leader, it wouldn't be an issue. You know more about this than I do, and probably more about her situation than I could guess, so what do you think I should do?"

She considered it, finally stating, "Nothing. You do nothing." I raised an eyebrow. "Give her time, Jaune. It's a. . . recent wound, and it needs to heal. You've done nothing wrong, but she does not always see you when she sees you. I'd. . . also suggest you not try anything with her," she suggested, teasing, but also serious.

I laughed bitterly, "Sorry, I don't have a secret fetish for girls that think I'm scum." Shaking my head, I added, "Okay, I'll do that. I'd want to help, to talk to her, but. . . the injury metaphor works. I'm gonna go say hi to the others, should. . . should we talk to Yang about this?"

Pyrrha hesitated, before shaking her head no. I nodded, dropping the blonde's shake off on her nightstand and shaking her slightly to wake her up. Leaving and heading across the hall, everyone but Weiss was up and dressed, the heiress in the bathroom.

"Break-" was as far as I got before Ruby and Nora had both grabbed their drinks, Ren swiftly, but unhurriedly, claiming his own. Setting the tray down, making a note to grab all three when I left, I jerked my head to the door. "Maybe tell her I'm here, so she doesn't get surprised?"

"She'll be fine," Nora said, waving away the suggestion, and I looked over to Ruby, who nodded to me, knocking on the bathroom door.

"Jaune's here," she announced.

Weiss's "Tell him to leave!" was expected.

Ruby frowned, before she smiled evilly. "Okay, but he'll be taking your breakfast shake with him."

". . . Tell him to stay by the door," Weiss amended, and I rolled my eyes.

"Eh, it's progress," the team lead shrugged, and I had to laugh.

DR

Professor Oobleck's class was. . . different. If Professor Port teaching was ambling down the path of knowledge, stopping to stare at something unrelated for long moments, and getting there eventually, Oobleck's was riding a rocket sled made of declarative statements and logical connections.

I loved it.

The history was never abstract, never 'these people did this on that year for no particular reason, which resulted in these things, for seemingly no reason, and if you get enough lessons in everything might eventually connect', like I'd had before. No, they were 'Cause A led to action B which coincided with action D because of Cause C that resulted in E, F, and G, which then aggravated nation H because of I, which came about because of J and K, caused by L, and interacted with F and G to start conflict M, which spilled into the neighboring land of N, and they sided with O because of action D, which meant that Cause A stopped being a thing, but as E and F trailed off, G became self sustaining, which shifted things enough for Nation P to mass forces and retaliate against Nation Q in war R, which, because of G and the aftereffects of conflict M allowed them to win, but winning didn't fix G, despite being the point War R, and BAM! WHITE FANG!'

His board looked like a conspiracy theorist's back-room, but it was a causal map and I had to wonder how the hell had Jaune ever done poorly in this class! Oh, right, I knew because some part of him was still in the back of my head, separate but still there, even if heavily muted. He didn't do well in this class because he didn't want to do the homework because he thought it was 'boring'. Ignoring his presence, because it didn't matter, Oobleck wrapped up the class, and, glancing at the HW, it was pretty much a review of everything he just went over, likely in case someone missed something from his energetic lecture.

"That was great!" I smiled as we walked out, only then noticing the shell-shocked looks on my teammates faces. "What?"

"You. . . followed that?" Yang asked incredulously.

"Yes?" I had to ask.

The blonde blinked, "You aren't human." I smiled, and tapped my horn, causing her to roll her eyes, "You know what I mean!"

I laughed, not offended in the slightest. "He moved. . . quickly," I admitted, "but it made sense."

"But did he have to move around like that?" Ruby complained, "I was getting dizzy watching him run around the room!"

We collectively stopped and looked at her.

"Oh, right. I do that," the speedster realized. "But I'm not that bad, right? Right?"

"He was using the movement to denote the links between points of interest, I think," I explained as we started walking again, ignoring Ruby's pleas. "Or he was hyper and his coffee is drugged. Honestly, it could go either way."

"So you got what he was saying?" Yang asked leadingly.

I nodded, "Yeah, and from what I can tell the homework is just what he went over in class."

The blonde nodded, "Good, so you can tell us what it is so we don't need to do it!"

My good humor dimmed. "Ah. No."

"But-" Yang started to argue, only for Weiss of all people to come to my defense.

"Just because he can, doesn't mean he should," she primly lectured my teammate. "You should be doing the work yourself, not expecting others to carry you!"

"If you do the reading and still don't get it, sure," I added, tempering my refusal. "But reading the history books is part of the lesson, in addition to learning the history in the books."

"Wah?" Ruby asked, confused. Weiss and Blake both nodded, though the second scowled when she noticed that fact, and the others looked skeptical.

"It's more obvious an issue in a literature based class," I hedged, as that had been my area of teaching expertise, "but if you don't do the work, either getting summaries or having someone tell you, not only do you miss the minor, but important, details, but you also don't learn how to pull the meaning of things out of the material yourself."

I took out my scroll, and brought up the textbook, flipping over to the homework. "So, we've got an accounting of what happened, but it's, well, it's kind of dry and boring. You'd know from the lecture how tensions arose from the conglomeration of Vale's towns into a unified body with a unified military under the rule of king Ozlan." And how no one doesn't see that pattern is beyond me, I added mentally, which wasn't exactly fair. The Oz* naming scheme seemed common enough that it would be more akin to having a lot of famous people named Alexander, then assuming that Alexander Hamilton was the reincarnation of the first, Great one of that name.

Returning to my point once we'd grabbed our food, I continued, "So because of his lecture you should see the knock-on effects of the history easier than if you weren't paying attention at all, but if you read the homework, you can see it alludes to it here and here." I pointed out the phrasing of 'provoked discontent among its national peers' from the text. "We're huntsmen, but I'm learning that is way less Grimm slaying than I thought it'd be, so being able to figure out the Lancer-nest you're stepping into when you show up somewhere just from reading the records is looking more and more useful."

"Oooooor," Nora chimed in, "We could have our glorious leader do all the book-readin, while we do all the knee-smashin'!"

Ruby looked to me for help, and I shrugged. "Your team, your call, but I'm going to insist that my team does their work."

Pyrrha nodded in agreement of my decision, Yang pouted, while Blake looked up from the hardcover book she'd started when she'd waited for us all to gather with our lunch. "I have to read?" the cat faunus asked, deadpan. "Oh nooooo."

While I did appreciate the fact that she was no longer treating me like I was Satan, aka, like I was Adam Taurus, I could do with a little less sass. But, hey, progress.

"Ugh," my blonde teammate grunted in displeasure, "I didn't come here to read, I came here to be a kick-ass huntress! I thought I'd be using my fists, not my head!"

"But Yang," Ruby told her sister. "You're exercising your most important muscle! Your Brain!"

The sheer cheesiness of the phrase made me laugh, it was like an inspirational poster. Actually, one of those kitten 'hang in there' with Ruby would be adorable, and something I needed to make happen.

Not able to top that, we finished up lunch and headed to our other class of the day, Dust Basics.

DR

We'd been waiting in class for several minutes, and I was starting to get annoyed. Was the teacher running late? Were we in the wrong classroom? I even got up and double checked the door number, but it was correct, and asking the other students, some of whom it turned out had just followed us here, they all had the same room number in their schedules.

Team CRDL meandered in, late, but the teacher wasn't here so I guess it didn-

The lights turned off, though, with my Draconic eyesight I could still see just fine, and explosions of fire surrounded Cardin and his flunkies, hemming them in, before I saw a flicker of movement along the ceiling of all things, and lightning wreathed a figure, who seemed to be standing, upside down, on the top of the room, in casual defiance of gravity.

"Who's that?" one of my fellow students asked.

"There are some who call me. . . TIM!" the figure boomed, dropping to the ground before team CRDL, hitting with a blinding flash, the lights back on as I blinked my eyes clear. A cloak of fire wreathed the man's form, "But you may call me. . . Professor!"

Then, as if a switch was flipped, the fire, the lightning, everything? It disappeared, as if it was never there to begin with, revealing a nondescript brown haired man in a black business suit, the only piece of ornamentation a glowing, prismatic tie. "And I call you late. Detention, boys, timing is everything," he noted conversationally. Unlike his previous booming tones, he sounded. . . small, gentle, almost meek, and smiled genially. "Now have a seat, so we can get started, if you will."

Staring at the calm, average looking man, it was hard to square the enraged, eldritch-looking entity he'd appeared to be moments before. I wasn't the only one struggling with the sudden change either, by the way that team CRDL hesitantly made their way to their seats in the front row.

My first thought was that he had some kind of illusion Semblance, though my Mind Defense should've protected me from that. I sat, staring as the mundane looking man turned to look at the rest of us. "Welcome to Dust Basics, class, where, if you so wish, you will learn how to use magic."