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Grounded Lightning

Summary:

The second semester was in full swing and life at Beacon was going great. Team RWBY had successfully put Torchwick in jail and helped to fight off the Grimm attack on the city. Now the only things they had to worry about were classes, the upcoming Vytal Festival Tournament… and the fact that they were all starting to fall in love with each other.

Notes:

takes place after volume 2. cinder and co don't exist. what does this mean for the plot you ask? heck if i know lmao !!

just kidding. there will be some plot but this will mostly be fluff. probably. anyways, i hope you enjoy :p

 

(also now there is new cover art by the amazing spicybon!!)

Chapter Text

Somewhere along the walk back from the library, Blake had somehow come into possession of both hers and Ruby’s textbooks. Ruby herself was busy complaining about their workload beside her.

“I don’t get it,” she said, groaning in frustration. “History is stupid. And really hard. There’s so many names and dates you have to remember.”

“Well, it’s just a part of Huntress training,” said Blake.

“It’s dumb is what it is,” Ruby retorted with a pout. “I don’t get why I need to know that some random dude from some random town in Mistral tried to start some random revolution a hundred years ago. What does that have to do with me being able to kill Grimm effectively?”

“I dunno,” said Blake, more to humor Ruby and let her know she was still listening rather than actually arguing the point. “What would you rather be doing, then?”

“More hands-on activities. I wanna go on more missions! That’s where all the real Huntress stuff happens.”

“We just got back from our first one like a week ago.”

“I know, but still,” Ruby whined. “That’s what I’ve wanted to do since coming here. It felt like we actually made a difference. And…” She trailed off for a few moments. Blake glanced over at her, curious. “Even then, I still can’t stop thinking about how we could have done better. I’m glad we helped put the Torchwick guy in jail, and we’re really lucky no one in town died in the Grimm attack, but… the same can’t be said for those White Fang members on the train. How many of them lost their lives, and all because Torchwick was only using them to further his own plans? If they hated humans before, I don’t want to think about how they must feel now.”

Ruby was practically vibrating with worry at that point, her hands clenched into fists, brought close to her chest. Blake nudged her gently with her elbow to snap her out of it. “Hey,” she said. “There’s a lot of mysteries left to solve and problems to smooth out, but don’t forget that you’ve got a team. We’ll work through this together.”

Ruby’s frown slowly turned back into a smile. “You’re right. I'm getting carried away. Thanks, Blake.”

By then, they’d reached their dorm. Ruby opened the door and held it open for Blake, since she was still carrying all of their books. They entered to find Weiss writing an essay at her desk and Yang rummaging through Blake’s closet.

“Um,” said Blake.

Yang poked her head out, saw Blake and Ruby standing there looking confused, and grinned. She was wearing nothing except a towel. “Hey, Blake,” she said casually, and then went back to digging around in her clothes. “Did you guys have a good study session?”

“Kind of. What are you doing in my closet?”

“Uh. I forgot to set aside a clean set of clothes before I did my laundry. And then I took a shower.”

“She’s an idiot,” Weiss pitched in from across the room.

Yang just shrugged like she agreed. She pulled out a dark purple hoodie. “Can I have this?”

“Sure,” Blake found herself saying.

“Awesome. Thanks.” Yang smiled, grabbed a few more articles of clothing from the closet and then ran off to the bathroom to change.

“I’m going to go back to studying,” Ruby said half-heartedly, pulling her books off the top of the pile in Blake’s hands and heading for her bed. “Stupid random villager in Mistral.”

A short while later, Yang reappeared wearing Blake’s hoodie and shorts, the towel now slung over her shoulder. Blake couldn’t help but look her up and down, trying to stop herself from smiling. “Why my stuff?” she asked. “Why not steal clothes from Weiss, or, you know, your own sister?”

Yang snorted. “Have you seen how short they are?”

Suddenly, a pencil hit her in the face. The force of the throw sent her stumbling back several feet. Blake caught the pencil before it hit the ground and walked over to return it to Weiss.

“Thank you,” she said pleasantly, and then went back to writing her essay in silence. Behind them, they could hear Ruby struggling not to laugh.

Blake set all but one of her textbooks down on her desk and took the last one to her bed, settling into the pillows before opening it up. Ruby was right in that the random Mistral revolution they were currently learning about was really dumb, but they needed to know all about it for the upcoming test. Blake sighed and began to read.

The dorm was peaceful and quiet for a period of time, mostly because Yang had eventually left to go retrieve her laundry. Soon enough Blake had managed to lose herself in the history textbook. Her concentration was only broken when she felt someone sit down at the edge of her bed.

It was Weiss.

“Hello,” said Blake.

“Hi,” said Weiss. “Having fun?”

Blake rolled her eyes. “As always. Finish your essay?”

“No. I’m taking a break.”

“Right,” said Blake, raising an eyebrow. “You’re… taking a break from doing your homework by watching me do mine.”

“My brain is currently fried and I thought I could use some company,” Weiss said defensively. She crossed her arms and brought her legs up onto the mattress, leaning on the opposite side from Blake so that they were facing each other.

Blake glanced up at the other end of the room. “Ruby’s over there, you know.”

“I’m aware, and while her bed has yet to fall on top of me and brutally murder me at night, I don’t trust its structural integrity to handle more than one person at a time.”

They both stared up at Ruby. She looked incredibly hurt and offended.

“Can you at least look over my essay outline for me?” she asked, fixing Weiss with her best puppy-dog pout.

Weiss just sighed and held out her hand. Ruby cheered. A few seconds later, a paper airplane sailed across the room, and Weiss caught it neatly out of the air. She unfolded it and began reading intently, her serious, concentrated mode activated. Blake figured that was why she didn’t realize that she’d ended up tangling their legs together.

Weiss had begun scribbling her own notes onto Ruby’s paper by the time Yang returned, basket of laundry in hand. “Sup,” she greeted all of them at once, dropping the basket onto the ground and lazily kicking it aside. “What are we doing?”

“Work,” Weiss told her pointedly.

“Sounds boring.” Yang gave Blake a split second to try and shift to the side before she plopped down right next to her, leaning back against the pillow and sighing contentedly.

“Shouldn’t you give me my clothes back now that you have your own again?” Blake asked her.

“Nah,” said Yang. When Blake turned her head to look at her she realized just how close the size of the bed forced them to get. She became momentarily distracted by Yang’s bright smile. “Your clothes smell like you.”

“Is that a good thing?”

“Maybe.” Yang glanced over Blake’s shoulder to look at her textbook. “Here, gimme that. I’ll quiz you on the chapter.”

“No fair,” Ruby cried from where she was still sitting all alone on her own bed. “I can’t believe you guys would try and have a cuddle party without inviting me.”

Yang glanced at the bed, then back up at Ruby. Then she shrugged. “There’s still a bit of space left if you want to join us.”

“I don’t remember agreeing to this,” said Blake.

But it was too late. In a flash, Ruby had rocketed across the room and directly on top of all of their legs, facing towards Yang and Blake. Weiss choked.

“Hi,” said Ruby, looking innocently up into Yang’s eyes.

Yang stared thoughtfully back at her sister. Then she propped Blake’s textbook onto Ruby’s face. Ruby, to her credit, only let out a disgruntled noise, but didn’t make an effort to move.

Weiss, meanwhile, was swatting at Ruby’s feet. “I’m the one helping you with your essay, you jerk, and this is what I get in return?”

“I’m sorry!” said Ruby, her voice muffled by the textbook.

And so they stayed that way for the rest of the afternoon. The only commotion that occured was when Ruby, with great effort and hardship, finally turned around to face Weiss so they could discuss her essay outline and also because Yang’s legs had fallen asleep under the weight of her sister. Besides that, though, the impromptu group study session actually went pretty well.

Around evening they heard a knock at the door. None of them moved to answer. They knew by now that most of the time it was someone from Team JNPR, who were all aware that they usually left the door unlocked and only knocked as a preemptive warning.

Sure enough, a few seconds later Pyrrha opened the door and poked her head in. Judging by her surprised expression, she’d clearly been expecting all of them to be dispersed evenly across the dorm. Instead, they were all dogpiled and crammed together on one bed. Pyrrha blinked.

“Hey,” she said, a bit sheepishly. “Nora is starting to approach worrying levels of hunger already, so we’re going to get dinner early. Want to join us?”

“Food!” said Ruby, trying and failing to pretend like she hadn’t just woken up from dozing off. Weiss fixed her with a glare.

“We’ll be there,” Yang called out to Pyrrha. “Just give us a few minutes to, uh, disentangle ourselves.”

“Ooh, big word,” said Weiss, impressed. Yang chucked the textbook at her face.

Pyrrha, not wanting to witness the chaos that was inevitably about to occur, flashed them a smile, closed the door, and went back to her own dorm.

 


 

The two teams met up in the mess hall a short while later. They grabbed their trays and sat down in their customary spots at the corner of the hall, across from each other. It was still fairly early in the evening, so apart from them, there were only a few other groups of students trickling in.

“So,” Nora began saying with her mouth full of food. Ren politely put his hand over the lower half of her face to block the view. “I heard from Coco that Professor Goodwitch is gonna make us fight in pairs in sparring class this week.”

“Like, against each other, or against other teams?” Pyrrha asked, interested.

“Against each other,” said Nora. “We’re apparently supposed to split up into partners and spar that way. Something about practicing for the tournament.”

Jaune groaned and planted his face into the table. “I know what that means.”

“Oh, shut up, Jaune. Your partner is literally Pyrrha Nikos!” said Nora. Somehow, she had already finished everything on her plate. “That’s like an automatic unfair advantage right there.”

“Yes,” said Jaune, without looking up. “Which means that she’s going to be spending all her time trying to keep me from getting ganged up on by you two.”

Ren and Nora looked at each other. Then Ren shrugged. “That does seem like something we’d try and do,” he said. Nora nodded in agreement before getting up to go get seconds.

Jaune groaned again. Pyrrha laughed nervously.

“Ooh. Tough break,” Yang said to Jaune, wincing in sympathy. Then she nudged Weiss sitting beside her and opened her mouth expectantly. Weiss rolled her eyes, but took a grape off of her cluster anyway and popped it into Yang’s mouth.

“Oh man,” said Ruby, turning to look at the rest of her team. “We have sparring class tomorrow afternoon.”

“I can’t wait,” said Yang, pumping her fists in excitement. “Winning against you two will be a piece of cake.”

“Hey!” Weiss protested. “Don’t be so cocky. I’ll have you know that Ruby and I have been practicing together on our own a lot. We’re a lot more in sync now than you think.”

“Is that so?” said Yang, leaning in uncomfortably close, with the biggest, most aggravating grin on her face. “How in sync are we talking, here?”

“Yang!” said Ruby, aghast.

Weiss planted her hand on Yang’s face and shoved her as far away as she could. “You are rude, invasive, and completely insufferable,” she said, fixing Yang with her most withering glare.

Meanwhile, Blake, who now had Yang all up in her personal space, leaned in and grinned. “We’re totally going to beat them up,” she said.

“Damn right we are,” Yang replied gleefully, with Weiss’s hand still on her face.

“No way!” Ruby said indignantly. “Don’t you underestimate me and Weiss. You guys are going down!”

“Please,” Yang scoffed. “You barely come up to my chin. What are you gonna do, punch me in the boobs?”

“Oh, shut up! You aren’t even that tall!” Ruby finally snapped and lunged across Weiss to try and grab her sister. The three of them ended up in a scuffle, with Blake looking on, amused. She took advantage of the distraction to swipe Yang’s smoothie for herself, content to watch her get mercilessly dunked on by both Weiss and Ruby at once.

Nora came back to the table with two more plates of food to find Ruby struggling to put Yang into a headlock. Weiss had a hand on both of the back of their necks, seemingly in an effort to move them farther away from her lap.

It was at that moment that they noticed that most of the people in the hall were staring at them.

“Why’s everyone looking at us like that?” said Ruby.

“Probably because they’re scared we’re about to start another food fight,” Blake suggested.

Their table fell silent. After a brief pause, Weiss huffed and dragged Yang and Ruby back up into a proper sitting position.

“I feel like I should be getting used to this by now,” Pyrrha said with a sigh.

“Tell me about it,” said Nora. “You four are total weirdos.”

Blake slurped loudly on her smoothie.

“I like your jacket,” Jaune said to Yang, trying to diffuse the situation.

“Thanks,” Yang replied brightly. “I stole it. Just like how someone stole my drink.” She jerked the glass out of Blake’s hands, leaving the straw hanging in her mouth. Blake pouted.

Somehow, the rest of dinner managed to pass by without any more commotion. Yang and Weiss were the first to leave the table, with Weiss saying something about wanting to finish up her essay, and then just dragging Yang along for the ride. Then Nora left with the rest of her team following shortly after, leaving Blake to watch as Ruby tried to cram as many last cookies as she could into her mouth.

She must have had a funny expression on her face, because Ruby paused, one cookie in her mouth and another in her hands. It was adorable.

“What?” said Blake.

“Stop judging me,” said Ruby around the cookie.

“I’m not judging you.”

“Yeah you are.”

“I’m not. I promise.” Blake became dimly aware of the fact that she was smiling. Something weird was happening in her chest. “Just hurry up. It’s starting to get really crowded in here.”

Ruby conceded reluctantly, and started piling all the empty plates onto her tray before standing up. She broke the cookie in her hands in half and offered a piece to Blake, who raised her eyebrow in response.

“It’s an apology for when Weiss and I inevitably kick your butt tomorrow in class,” Ruby told her.

Blake laughed. She took the piece of cookie and lightly bonked it on Ruby’s forehead. Ruby scrunched up her face in protest and tried to swat Blake’s hand away, but Blake could tell that she was enjoying herself.

They took their trays to the front of the mess hall before heading back to their dorm together.

 


 

Back in the dorm room, Yang was doing push-ups on the carpet. Weiss was perched on top of her back, sitting cross-legged while putting the final touches on her essay.

“How many have I done?” Yang asked.

Weiss thought for a few moments, not taking her eyes off the paper. “You just hit seventy-five.”

“Sweet.” Yang let out a shaky breath and did another push-up, doing her best not to jostle Weiss.

“Hey, guys!” Ruby called cheerfully as she burst into the room. “What are we doing?” Within the next five seconds she had somehow wormed her way into Weiss’s lap. Yang choked under the extra weight.

“Trying not to make Yang die,” Weiss said with a sigh. She tried to shove Ruby off. “I know you have no respect for my boundaries, but at least have some mercy on your poor sister.”

“Oh, fine,” said Ruby, rolling onto the floor and sprawling out next to them, staring up at the ceiling. “Why are you even doing push-ups right after dinner?”

“Because,” Yang said through gritted teeth, “I got curious how many I could do while waiting for you two slowpokes to come back.” She finally collapsed to the ground. “Alright, get off me, Weiss, I’m spent. And you’re really heavy.”

Weiss just scoffed and stood up, walking back to her desk without even looking up from her essay. None of them missed how hard she was trying to hide her smile.

Blake walked over to Yang and held out her hand. Yang smiled sheepishly and took it, letting Blake pull her back to her feet.

“Seventy-five push-ups, huh? Very impressive,” said Blake.

Yang’s grin widened. “Aw, thanks, Blake,” she said. “I swear I can usually do more than that, though. When Weiss isn’t on top of me and breathing down my neck.”

Blake laughed.

“Well, now that everyone’s here,” Weiss said, pointedly ignoring Yang’s teasing, “what are we going to do for the rest of the night?”

“I have an idea for that!” Ruby called from where she was still lying on the ground. “Team JNPR said they wanted to have a movie night with us and Sun and Neptune later. So until then… you guys wanna play some board games?” She brandished her box of Remnant: The Game cards.

“I’m down,” said Yang. She sat down on the carpet and snatched the box out of Ruby’s hands. “I still need to get back at you for last time.”

“In your dreams, you mean!”

Blake shared a look with Weiss as the two sisters started bickering. Weiss gave her a shrug, having already resigned herself to her fate.

The four of them settled into a circle on the floor, the board and pieces scattered in between them. As usual, Ruby and Yang dominated most of the action. Weiss had gotten a lot better, though. Blake was still confused.

Eventually, Yang and Ruby teamed up to knock Blake out of the game first before turning on each other, which Blake found hard to take offense against. She was content with spending the rest of the match just watching the carnage, lying on her stomach and resting her head on her hands. Above her, she could feel Weiss stacking Grimm pieces on her back.

“Having fun?” Blake asked her, raising an eyebrow.

“Yeah. Quit moving,” said Weiss. She brushed aside some of Blake’s hair to make room for some baby Beowolf pieces.

A few minutes later, Blake noticed that Weiss was getting increasingly distracted. She kept spending all her turns doing nothing but fortifying her defenses while Yang and Ruby duked it out on the other side of the board.

“Hey,” said Blake, turning her head to look up at Weiss. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Weiss replied with a small frown. She was holding six cards in one hand and a single one in the other. Blake glanced at the card. The title of it read Faunus Militia. “Do you ever think about what they might be up to right now?”

Blake blinked. “Who? The White Fang?”

“Roman Torchwick used them,” Weiss said simply, absently twirling the card in her hand. “A human promised them justice and then not only failed to deliver on that, but also left them to die in a tunnel full of Grimm.”

The room fell silent. Yang and Ruby had stopped playing the game and were listening in now as well.

“They knew what they were getting into,” said Blake. She shifted uneasily. A few Grimm pieces fell off her back. “The White Fang… they like to preach about how sometimes it’s necessary to sacrifice your life for the cause. Sure, they’re a group of Faunus who have been discriminated against, but more importantly, they’re terrorists. And what they managed to achieve with that train crash—well, they hurt a lot of innocent humans in town. Maybe they took it as a win.”

“Maybe.” Weiss didn’t look convinced. Blake didn’t feel very convinced herself.

Across from them, Ruby let out a sigh. “Well, there’s nothing we can really do about it right now,” she said. “Unless Blake is willing to infiltrate another White Fang meeting again…”

Blake winced. “I’m gonna say pass on that one. For now. After the mess I started last time, they’ll probably have increased security all over the place.”

“We’ll figure something out, guys,” said Yang, nodding confidently. “We just have to lie low for the time being.”

“Yeah,” said Blake. Weiss and Ruby echoed her sentiment.

There was a moment of silence.

“Whose turn is it anyway?” asked Ruby.

“Mine,” said Yang. She threw down a card onto the board. Judging by Ruby’s sudden frustrated cry, it was something big and destructive.

Weiss still looked a little worried, but when Blake offered her a small smile, she seemed to loosen up a bit. She nodded, looking more determined than before, and turned her attention back to the game.

Yang ended up winning, to Ruby’s chagrin but no one’s surprise. They tried to start up another game and Blake was actually dominating somehow until Sun burst into their room halfway through. He was carrying a giant pile of snacks with both his arms and tail.

“Come on!” he said, bouncing up and down with barely contained excitement. “Team JNPR already set up the blanket fort in their room, now we just need you guys in it.”

Neptune popped up behind him, putting a hand on his shoulder in an attempt to get him to calm down. It didn’t work. He turned his attention to the room. “Hey, guys,” he said with a wave.

“Hi, Neptune,” Weiss responded, sounding unusually chipper.

“Come on,” said Sun, bumping Neptune with his shoulder as he headed back out the doorway. “Let’s go finish setting up. And you guys need to hurry up or we’re starting the movie without you!”

When they left, Yang turned her attention to Weiss, grinning. “Someone is still crushing hard on Mister Cool Boy, I see.”

Weiss opened her mouth to protest, but then she froze. Everyone stared at her, confused. “Wait a second—” she said, her eyes widening. She looked like she was having an existential crisis. “I don’t—I don’t like Neptune like that.” It didn’t sound like denial. The way she said it was very blunt, like she was simply stating a fact. Even Yang didn’t know how to respond to that.

“Um, right,” Ruby said awkwardly. “That’s… that’s cool, Weiss.”

No one said anything.

“Right!” Weiss blurted out suddenly. She grabbed Ruby and Blake by the arms and rushed towards the door. Yang scrambled to her feet and followed after them. “You heard Sun! It’s movie time!”

It was a pretty fun end to the day, all things considered. Piling ten people into a single dorm room probably hadn’t been the best idea, but they made it work. The movie itself wasn’t anything exciting, just some typical hero action flick that Jaune had picked out. They spent most of the time just talking, laughing, and throwing snacks at each other. Yang and Sun eventually roped them all into a game to see who could catch the most popcorn in their mouth. To everyone’s shock, Ren ended up winning.

Team RWBY stayed behind to help JNPR clean up their mess of a dorm afterwards, since Sun and Neptune had somehow mysteriously disappeared by then. By the time they got back to their own dorm, all four of them were exhausted. They didn’t talk much as they took turns getting showered and ready for bed.

Lights out was at midnight. By then, the four of them were already fast asleep.

 


 

Later that night Blake awoke to the faint sound of something metallic clicking rapidly. Confused, she sat up, looking up at the underside of the top bunk. The clicking sound paused for a few seconds, then started up again.

She grabbed onto the top of the bed and swung herself up, poking her head out to investigate what was going on above her.

Yang was sitting there with Ember Celica activated. She was absently spinning the rotating magazine, over and over again, while staring out the window.

“Yang?” Blake asked, concerned.

Yang jumped. She met Blake’s eyes and laughed sheepishly. “Sorry,” she said. “Was I making too much noise?”

“Not really.” Blake looked up and twitched her ears through the bow. Yang nodded in understanding. “What are you doing up so late?”

“Nothing much,” said Yang. She scooted aside as Blake pulled herself up over the side, climbing onto Yang’s bed to sit down next to her. “Just didn’t feel like sleeping.”

“Thinking about things?”

Blake followed Yang’s line of sight out the window. The view from up here really was nice. Yang sighed and turned to face Blake. “Not about anything in particular,” she said. “It just feels… weird, I guess. How we got here to this point.” She looked down at her gauntlet and started spinning the magazine again. “I knew for a long time that I wanted to become a Huntress, but I don’t think I ever realized what that actually entails. And now I’m sitting here, barely a week after stopping a massive orchestrated robbery and almost being stabbed to death by some tiny evil henchman on a train…”

Blake laughed a little. “In hindsight it does sound pretty crazy.”

“Yeah. Tell me about it.” Yang smiled softly. “I know that little girl got away. So did that… that woman, the one who saved me. I know I saw her… And I know we talked about it earlier, but I still can’t help but wonder what they’re doing right now. But I mean, it doesn’t feel like a super big deal, because we’re always getting into situations that are way over our heads. And, I dunno, now I’m just sitting here in a room with my team, with three amazing people, and I—”

Yang suddenly stopped talking. Blake looked up, confused, only to find Yang staring back at her, looking both a little intense and a little lost.

“Yang? Are you okay?” said Blake.

Yang didn’t respond. Her eyes kept darting back and forth, as if she were trying to take in every feature of Blake’s face.

“I uh—I’m sorry. I was just thinking about—” She cut herself off again. Her hand was hovering in the air, as if she were uncertain of what to do with it. “Blake, you’re really great, you know that?”

Blake blinked, surprised by the sudden praise. “Um, thank you?”

“Yeah. You are.” Yang laughed. It sounded a little breathless.

Blake didn’t know what was happening anymore, but the longer she stared at Yang, sitting next to her up on her bed, the warmer she felt somewhere inside her chest. It was a nice feeling.

“You’re pretty cool yourself,” Blake told her.

Yang stared back at her blankly, a giant dumb smile on her face. She looked like her brain had short-circuited from the compliment, which only made Blake want to do it more.

“Well, um,” Yang began in an attempt to derail the conversation, “since I’ve kept you up for this long already, do you wanna discuss battle tactics for tomorrow’s sparring lesson?”

“Not really,” said Blake.

“Why not?”

“I’d rather not do it when the enemy is currently listening in on us.”

“Huh?” Yang looked over at the other side of the room, confused. “But they’re both asleep right now.”

“That’s what Weiss would like you to think,” Blake said with a grin.

The two of them scooted to the edge of Yang’s bed, peering through the darkness at Weiss’s motionless form. A few moments passed. Nothing happened.

Then Weiss let out a huff of frustration and opened her eyes.

“Are you two ever going to learn how to keep your voices down?” she complained, pushing herself up into a sitting position.

“Honestly? Probably not,” said Yang.

Weiss just sighed and got out of bed, rubbing her eyes as she made her way across the room to Yang’s bunk. They heard the sound of a glyph forming before Weiss neatly hopped her way onto the bed.

“I wonder how Ruby does it,” she said, settling down next to Blake. “I bet we could roll a rock band through here and she’d sleep right through it.”

“I mean, she did have to grow up with Yang,” Blake said reasonably.

Yang looked like she was ready to argue the point, but then shrugged, because they all knew Blake was right.

The three of them sat together in peaceful silence.

“You know,” Weiss began hesitantly, “I’ve been thinking.” Yang and Blake turned to face her, expectant. Weiss took a deep breath. “About earlier, when I said I didn’t like Neptune that way… I meant it. I know this probably doesn’t seem like a big deal to you guys, but I just—I never really thought about it until now. I didn’t even realize what I was doing until you explicitly pointed it out to me. I think I just saw him that first time and saw a boy that my f… that I was expected to go after.”

Blake didn’t say anything. Yang nodded in understanding. They both knew exactly who she had almost mentioned at the end.

“It’s cool,” said Yang, reaching across Blake to offer Weiss a fist bump. Weiss rolled her eyes but accepted, almost bashfully. “We’re all here for you, whatever choices you decide to make.”

“Thanks,” said Weiss. She was fixing Yang with a curious look. “It doesn’t feel the same, anyway.”

Yang paused to try and make sense of that statement. “Sorry, what?”

“Nothing,” said Weiss. She took a sudden interest in staring at her feet.

Blake looked back and forth between the two of them, bewildered. Tonight was apparently a night for people to act really weird and shifty. They lapsed into silence again, except now it was several times more awkward.

When it became clear that neither Weiss or Yang were going to speak up again because they were both stupid, Blake sighed and began pushing herself up from her sitting position. “I guess I should try and get back to sleep,” she said. “Good night, you two.”

“Yeah,” said Weiss, still looking dazed.

“Good night, Blake,” said Yang.

Blake jumped down and landed lightly on her feet before moving to crawl back under her covers. Above her, she could hear Weiss and Yang still saying absolutely nothing to each other. Yang started playing with Ember Celica again.

She sighed again and turned onto her side. Sleep came soon after.