It was a beautiful day at Beacon, the sun burning high and bright in the cerulean sky. Unfortunately, none of the students in class could tell. It was Professor Peter Port's time to teach. Though physically present, few of the young minds of his students remained in the classroom. Professor Port had only succeeded in engrossing himself in one of his long, rather bombastic stories. Up in their seats, Team KRME sat in silence, each individual member passing the time in their own way. Azure laid back in his spot, coolly listening to the teacher's story with one ear. Rember and Gayle had their binders open, but while the lizard faunus scrawled notes, the fox girl doodled. Jad, in typical Jad fashion, was on the verge of falling asleep, his hat tipped over his eyes.
"So there I was, my back against the face of the mountain, staring down the eyes of my prey!" Port declared, his round figure bouncing around as he vigorously shared his tale. "And with one lightning fast motion I..."
Azure tried to follow what the professor was saying, but all he could hear was 'blah blah blah'. Sighing softly to clear his head, Azure glanced around nonchalantly. Eyes roving over his teammates, he observed something...off about the youngest member of his team. Usually, Gayle would be furiously writing down all of what Port said in great detail. But today, she didn't even seem to be paying much attention, only half heartedly jotting down her notes, few pages filled compared to her usual novels.
Leaning over carefully, so as to not draw attention, Azure whispered to his teammate "You alright?"
Gayle flinched, startled by the unexpected voice. Upon recognising it was only her leader, she sighed.
"I don't know, it's just...a lazy day, I guess." She half heartedly shrugged off the question, pencil still traveling across the page at a sluggish pace.
Azure's eyes narrowed a fraction, trying to read Gayle's body language. She seemed okay, but something just didn't sit right. It had only been a month since they met, and he only knew so much about the girl.
"Alright," he replied reluctantly, focusing back on the 'lesson'.
Not a moment later, Rember nudged his arm. "Hey Azure," she whispered.
The boy shifted his attention to his partner, curious. She slid the page she had been drawing on in front of him, smirking proudly at her work. Azure cracked a smile when he saw an impressive picture of a mountain forest, complete with a waterfall in the background.
"Nice," Azure complimented, sliding it back to her.
The remainder of class went by just as dull as before, everyone on the verge of comatose from the excessive droning of their teacher. Thankfully, the bell for lunch eventually rang, snapping the students out of their trance.
Port however, wasn't even close to finishing his tale. "AND THEN-Ah! Oh...out of time again," he mumbled, disappointed. "Well, I hope you've all learned a lot today! And remember, you have a test next week, so study hard!"
Gayle trailed alongside the team as they ventured through the halls, humming distractedly and nearly tripping on several occasions. Jad and Rember were engulfed in an intense discussion about the vital role of bacon in a proper morning diet, determined to coerce their leader into cooking it for them every morning for the foreseeable future.
Several moments of heated breakfast debate later, the four of them arrived in the cafeteria. Even Gayle perked up at the enticing aroma wafting from within, and they all simultaneously quickened their pace.
"What's on the menu for today?" Rember asked eagerly, ears swiveling forward in anticipation.
"I don't even care, man, whatever it is I'll take it! I am STARVING!" Jad exclaimed dramatically.
"I agree. Food would be nice..." Azure nodded, scoping out an empty spot for them.
Gayle halted abruptly. The other team members glanced back, confused by the stop, to find their youngest teammate staring straight ahead with wide eyes.
"Oh no…" the faunus girl whispered, before remembering her team's presence and looking up at their concerned glances, "Uhm, I-I think I left something back in the classroom!" she stuttered hurriedly, dashing back out of the cafeteria.
Azure and Jad exchanged a puzzled glance, and Rember observed the direction Gayle had fled with a frown. None of them noticed the satisfied smirk of another student across the room, nor the laughter of his team at the lizard girl's swift exit.
"Uh...What was that about?" Jad asked, looking back where his partner had scampered off.
Azure shrugged. "Not sure. She's been acting weird recently."
"Huh." You could almost see the gears turning in Jad's brain. "Gayle doesn't just do things for no reason. You guys notice anything off of late?"
"Don't know. If something is up, she'll tell us," Azure stated, leading the other two members towards the food. After stocking up, they all found an empty spot for the three of them, getting down to work.
By late evening Jad was starting to worry about his partner and headed to the library in hopes of finding her there. The library door pushed open slowly, and Jad hesitantly stuck his head inside. The warmly lit room was empty as far as he could tell. Classes had been over for a while, and his partner had hastily made her exit the moment the bell rang, so he hoped she would be in here somewhere.
"Gayle?" he whispered, voice fading as he truly caught sight of the vast room before him.
Tentatively, he pushed the door open further and stepped inside. With no small measure of caution, he warily delved deeper into the great hall of knowledge, staring in wonder at the impressive height of the multi-story shelves. He shook himself, pushing down the unease growing inside him. His partner had been acting strangely, and he was determined to get to the bottom of it.
"Woah…" he breathed, awestruck. Libraries this big were intimidating to begin with, but the emptiness and silence made it outright eerie.
Far above him, Jad heard a small giggle. He whirled around, searching for the source of the laughter, only to have his face acquainted with a gently descending paper flower that must have fallen from the upper level.
"Psst! Up here!" a soft voice whispered. Jad brushed aside the origami flower and craned his head upwards to see the diminutive form of his partner on the higher level, leaning over the balcony. She stuck out her tongue at him and retreated from view.
Jad beckoned frantically for his partner to come back. "Gayle! It's kinda creepy in here. If I see two twins holding hands I might poop myself," he hissed.
Her head popped back into view over the balcony with a bemused expression
"Just come on up, bro. I can show you what I've been working on!" Without waiting for a response, the faunus girl extended an arm over the balcony and dropped another little paper flower.
Her partner smiled as he reached up to snatch it out of the air. Holding the intricately folded structure in his palm, he raised it to eye level to inspect it up close.
"It's so tiny!" he exclaimed gleefully, poking the miniscule petals.
Gayle grinned from her perch at the balcony. "I've got way more up here, come on!" she called down before disappearing again.
Seconds later, heavy boots landed with a thud on the carpet of the upper floor. Gayle jumped at the sudden noise, sending papers flying across her table.
"Hey kid." Jad greeted kindly.
"Jad! That was...surprisingly quick. I didn't realize you were so adept at navigating the library!" Gayle exclaimed, reordering the paper menagerie that was sprawled across the desk. "Quite honestly, I wasn't sure you even knew where the stairs were."
At this her partner wrinkled his nose then pulled up a chair. "Nah I just vaulted up the pillars. Those tapestries have pretty good grip!"
The faunus girl paused momentarily, hand hovering above a delicately folded paper dragon. She opened her mouth as if to comment, before shrugging it off and silently resuming her task.
"So..." Jad began after a moment of silence, "you saving up for a wish?"
"Hmm? Oh, the paper folding." Gayle smiled and settled into a chair, supplies reorganized to her liking. "Nah, it's just something I use to do as a kid. I was thinking back to, uhm, my hometown and remembered when...my friend and I used to make things like these all the time..."
She sighed, folding her arms across the table and resting her chin on top. "Besides, it's not actually possible to earn a wish, regardless of how many paper stars you fold."
"I don't know about that. Wishes are just goals for you and the people you care about." Jad picked up a minute paper butterfly, "But these are lovely," he said thoughtfully.
"Yeah...so hey, you've got muscles! Want to help me carry my books back?" Gayle straightened up in an instant, her usual bright demeanour returned. She stood up and started shuffling the crisply folded figures into a pile, tail tip twitching almost imperceptibly as it swayed along with her movements.
Jad wasn't blind. In the short time he'd known her, he had grown acquainted with his partner's attitudes. He had a particular eye for physical cues, and he could read the tension Gayle carried in every line of her body. She was trying at optimism, but something was weighing down on her.
Unsure of how to best broach the topic, he tried for an indirect route first.
"So hey, Foxy wants to go into town tomorrow, and Pasty's in too. You wanna tag along? We could all go for ice cream."
"Oh, uhm..." Gayle rubbed the back of her neck in an obvious show of discomfort, "I...I've already got plans for the weekend."
Now he knew something was up for sure. Not only was she avoiding eye contact, but the Gayle he knew would never turn down an opportunity to have fun with the team. Especially when sweets were involved.
"Oh, I see where this is going. Got a hot date lined up?" he joked, hoping to make her smile at least.
"Nah, just some, uh, personal studying." Gayle reached down beside the table and procured a huge stack of books. They were dropped onto the table with a thud, joined by several more a second later.
Jad's eyes popped at the tower of study material and he looked back to his partner. "Gayle, I get that Beacon is a study grind. And you are obviously better at hitting the books than I am, but as your partner … you know that I've got your back right?"
She nodded faintly, distracted.
"More importantly as your friend, whatever challenge you run up against, I'm with you. And if something is weighing you down, you gotta tell me so I can help pick you up. That's what friends are for. Heavy lifting. That's why I have muscles." Jad didn't expect her to open up but he needed her to hear it.
Gayle remained silent, seemingly focused on packing up her materials.
Not pushing the topic further, Jad acted like he hadn't noticed her evasiveness. "Aww, too bad. I was looking forward to meeting the guy," Jad joked but it weighed heavily on him that he couldn't reach his partner.
Nobody questioned Gayle's 'personal studying'. It was a common habit for the faunus girl. She could be found at every opportunity to have her nose buried in a textbook, or studiously taking notes. She'd frequently devote her weekends, after all schoolwork was complete of course, to her own personal studies into Dust, a favorite topic of hers. But the rest of KRME unanimously agreed that this was ridiculous. Ever since returning from the library with her arms full of books and her bag full of paper, Gayle had constructed a veritable fortress of tomes in her corner of the room and soon retreated inside her covered hammock-nest.
KRME had hardly seen their youngest teammate for over a day, excluding the long red braid and reptilian tail dangling from her nest. They did in fact go out to town for ice cream, sans lizard, and when they returned they found their dorm room littered with paper stars and other assorted origami creations.
A couple of half hearted jokes were made about the situation, but the only response from Gayle came in the form of several more folded creations being expelled onto the floor from her nest.