22

"This is a very bad idea." Ren whispered into his scroll. It was two in the morning and he was hiding in the corner of the dark hallway in front of the main elevators. He was certain that his teammates were overreacting when it came to their team name.

"I'm done." Came Ilia's reply to the group call.

"They won't know what hit 'em!" Nora whisper-shouted.

"You are enjoying this too much." Ren tried to chastise his childhood friend.

"Ren is right," came their leader's voice, "this is not just some joke for the fun of it. This is retribution!"

Ren could only sight. He was fairly satisfied with his team. Nora was Nora, Ilia was nice but clearly needed more time to settle in and Blake was trying her hardest to make sure everyone got along, at least to an extent. Compared to the shouting contest that their neighboring team had every few hours, this was heaven.

Now if only they wouldn't waste so much money on pink paint…

-BBW-

It was a very long evening. Not only did she have to deal with all the paperwork that came with the start of a new school year, she also had to participate in the intelligence meeting with Oz and his other allies.

And of course they had nothing to show for all their efforts… Amber's attackers were nowhere to be found, James blew off Atlas' military budget to brothers know what places and Qrow kept dropping his scroll every few minutes due to his drinking. Thankfully it was over and she could go take a power-nap.

While Glynda and Ozpin rode the elevator down she decided to give him a piece of her mind, the one that she had kept under out of politeness.

"Don't-"

"I can't believe you are letting James bring a third of their fleet here! What part of that is subtle?!" She let the message settle before releasing an angry huff.

"If it helps, I don't intend for soldiers to be in the city, only keeping eyes on the outside."

The elevator finally reached the ground level and the two of them walked out.

As soon as they did, the motion detector was triggered and the entire hallway was filled with a pink cloud.

Thinking it an attack, both activated their auras, Glynda cast a barrier in front of her and Ozpin was standing in a green, eggshaped shell. His barrier did provide some defense against the paint but as soon as he let it down, a few droplets still fell down on his suit.

As for Glynda… She cast her barrier only in front, which did absolutely nothing to stop the paint coming from above.

-BBW-

"Nikos and Amarilla." Professor Goodwitch barked out and the two girls went to the arena. Ruby didn't know what was happening but their instructor seemed to be in a very bad mood. First, their class started by a surprise run through an obstacle course. She was fine with that, but she heard a lot of her classmates complain under their breaths. Then she made an error by asking why she chose pink over purple for her hair. Blake snickered on the side which earned both of their teams an extra run through the course after classes.

Aaand it's over. Pyrrha's 'fight' lasted a whooping fifteen seconds, in which the girl kept running at her in desperate attempts to get a hit in.

"Amitola and Thrush." They barely left the arena and Goodwitch was already calling the next fighters.

"Hey Yang?" She whispered to her sister. Yang raised one eyebrow, so Ruby knew she was listening. "Do you think I can skip this class? I don't want to fight."

Yang signed tiredly. "Rubes, it's a spar, if you run away from it, they will get hurt when they run into grimm. We sparred back at Signal, everything will be fine. You've got it."

Ruby gave her sister a thankful smile and refocused on the match. Ilia was winning but it wasn't as one-sided as Pyrrha's. Then she managed to hit the boy with her whip square on the back and electrify him, ending the match.

"Rose and Lan."

Ruby was ready in under a minute and was already waiting in the ring when her opponent showed up. She looked somewhat familiar, maybe she was also from Signal. And why was she looking so worried? Was there something on the seats?

While Ruby was getting ready for the match, Weiss, Pyrrha and team BLAN were slowly inching away from Yang, who was giving Ruby's opponent a red-eyed death glare.

"Begin!" Goodwitch commanded. Yet neither of them moved, one frozen in fear, the other unsure of how to fight. After a few seconds of awkward standing they approached each other and soon enough the 'spar' became a pitiful slugfest in slowmotion. Even Yang, who was feeling very protective of her sister in the beginning, was cringing at the display. Those who overheard their little chat understood what was going on, most people simply didn't care or were sharing barbs at their expense while Weiss and Goodwitch were getting dangerously close to having an aneurysm.

The 'battle' ended when Ruby slammed her opponent with the flat of the blade and batted her out of bounds.

"What were you trying to do, Rose?" She sternly asked the 'winner'.

Ruby collapsed her weapon and put it away before shyly addressing her teacher. "I'm sorry, I'm not used to fighting people… I worried I might hurt her toomuchandgetexpeledandIwon'tbeableto-" She almost immediately descended into a torrent of excuses.

"Enough!" Goodwitch cut her off, she remembered those bablestorms and refused to decipher it again. "You clearly know how to deal with people! I saw it for myself so what was the problem now?"

"But those were criminals! And I still had to be careful! And you were scolding me anyway!"

"So you can defend against thugs but become a messy child when you need to fight another student?"

"I can't exactly get practice on my own, can I?! Or we can go to Emerald Forest? Pretty please!"

"Out of the question." She couldn't just let a bunch of greenhorns run around in there. The forest was always cleared before initiation, otherwise it was only for third years and above. "But I can give you access to one of the training arenas, just make sure to have a proper schedule. You are not the only one who uses them." After a few taps on her scroll she Gave Ruby the permission. "First floor, third room. The key is coded to your scroll."

Ruby gave her an enthusiastic nod before running off to her team.

After one more match the class has ended. Ruby couldn't wait to take a look at her new training arena and have some fun with Yang.

But before that…

"Where do you think you are going?" Professor Goodwitch raised all of them into the air and moved to the start of her tortuous obstacle course.

-BBW-

Blake wasn't sure if she would be able to make her visit to the library today. All of her body was sore, sticky from all the sweating and she was just so tired. The rest of her team didn't fare much better, except Nora but she wasn't sure if the girl even understood the concept of exhaustion.

Team RWPY on the other hand… Pyrrha was also soaked but was soldiering through while Ruby and Yang looked like they only finished the warm up. Weiss was slumped on Yang's shoulder as she carried her back to their dorm. She tried to protest but it was short-lived and soon enough she was limp in Yang's arms while alternating between cursing Ruby and Goodwitch.

"Nice fight, Ilia." She decided that a small talk might make them focus less on the soreness.

Ilia huffed, before replying. "Not as good as Pyrrha's…"

Blake could only agree. She was sure that she would be able to hold her own against the girl but would ultimately lose. Her reputation and what little she saw from her real skills made her certain of it.

"Still better than Ruby's." She jokingly added. There was a pitiful whimper from the girl in question but no rebuttal followed. "Wanna do a group dinner later on?" She might not have been thrilled about spending time with the Schnee but it would be unfair to alienate the entire team because of one person.

"I wouldn't mind." Everpolite Pyrrha agreed.

Weiss muttered something but nobody understood her. Frankly they weren't even sure if she would be moving today.

"I don't know… I wouldn't want to make you wait for us." Ruby answered. "Professor Goodwitch gave me access to an arena and I wanted to check it out."

In the end it was only Blake and Pyrrha who went down to the cafeteria. Weiss and Ilia were too tired to go, Ren and Nora cooked for themselves and the sisters were probably ruining a training room.

"So how has the leadership been treating you?" Pyrrha asked when they sat down at the table.

"It's okay I guess. I expected it to be much worse, to be honest, but Ren and Nora were easy to get along with and I've known Ilia for a few years." Except for Nora's occasional snores and sleep talk that is. "Are you regretting not getting on my team?" She said with a teasing smile. "I'm sure we can adopt you, at least unofficially."

Pyrrha rolled her eyes. "I'm fine but thank you for the offer."

"I'm serious, you know, if there are any problems then I will try to help."

"Nothing like that, Blake. I admit that there may be some tensions but we didn't even spend a week here." She gave it a second thought before continuing. "I think you have it easier than we do."

Blake raised an eyebrow but waited for Pyrrha to elaborate further.

"Ren and Nora might have already come to school as partners, same with you and Ilia. Our team on the other hand is a bit socially stunted." She admitted.

"Hmm, I think I can see some of it but it doesn't seem too bad."

"That's because you don't spend that much time with them. I… don't have much experience with socializing and I think Weiss has it similar. Ruby is a sweetheart but she is somehow combining being too shy and too excited at the same time. Yang… I'm pretty sure that I haven't seen Yang start a conversation with anyone except Ruby. Sometimes, it's like she ignores the world around."

"I mostly meant if there wasn't anything really bad… like a faunus being on a team with a Schnee heiress." Blake awkwardly steered the conversation back to the initial goal. Although it was a bit heartwarming that Pyrrha was okay with letting out some of her frustration in front of her.

"Oh, no, nothing like that. Well, I haven't asked per se but I'm pretty sure that we are all humans. The arguing between Ruby and Weiss is mostly because they are both high-demand perfectionists but can't agree on what is more important." She said with a small laugh.

-BBW-

Target practice, extra-durable mannequins for testing… Ruby was quickly going over all of the arena's functions while Yang was finishing with stretching. She did screw up during combat class so she wanted to make it up by having an actual spar.

And who better than her awesome big sister!

A few quick taps and their aura was displayed on the large holographic screen above the ring. A moment later additional blast shields rose up from the floor.

"You ready to go sis?" Yang called out as she took a boxing stance.

"Let's go!" Ruby let out Crescent Rose into its full form and aimed at Yang.

The preset timer rang out a second later and the match was on.

-BBW-

Their first Friday at Beacon came. Which meant a small quiz from half of their classes. Their team did reasonably well. Weiss and Pyrrha both got straight As but not except Weiss' dust theory none of it was a full mark test. Yang did her usual 'comfortably above average' routine she has been doing at Signal for several years. On the other hand, Ruby's marks were a complete mess. Full marks from grimm studies, decent marks from history, abysmal rating from Goodwitch despite Ruby being in top ten when it came to winrate and dust theory that made everyone rub their heads in confusion. On one hand she had perfect understanding on several types of dust and its every possible combat application. On the other hand, she barely knew what earth dust was.

Weiss called their results unacceptable, something that Yang ignored but Ruby actually promised to take a better look at it before the next test.

As per usual, both teams sat down together for lunch and after a brief greeting started comparing their results.

"Please stop!" Came a pitiful whimper from a nearby table.

Whenthey turned, they saw team CRDL bullying a rabbit girl. Yang watched on with bored expression, most of them scowled and Ruby was ready to go.

Only for Yang to grab her arm. "Don't." She boredly intoned.

Ruby gave her a disbelieving look. "They are bullying her! I'm going to help!"

Yang breathed out a sign. "Look at the girl and tell me if you recognise her."

Ruby did so. "I don't. So what? It's not like I only help people I know!"

"You don't recognise her because she doesn't have classes with us, meaning she is a senior student. If she wanted to, she would deal with the mongrels on her own." Yang continued to eat her lunch at a sedate pace, ignoring both the ruckus on the side and the looks she was getting from her teammates and acquaintances.

"So what?! Maybe she doesn't like to fight! I'm going to give them a piece of my mind." Ruby stormed off.

"Ehm Yang, I doubt it's appropriate to advocate for violence." Weiss carefully started. She may have been a victim of faunus terrorism but as a huntress she couldn't allow it to cloud her decisions. "I think Ruby is being very mature in trying to solve it peacefully."

Yang looked her into the eyes and slowly started counting.

"Three"

"Two"

"On-"

CRASH

Team CRDL, some plates and a piece of table were thrown out of the cafeteria via a torrent of bright red petals. With a small satisfied smirk Yang went back to her lunch.

"Hey guys! This is Velvet Scarlatina! I thought that she could have lunch with us seeing that… There was a small accident with her table." Ruby strolled back to their table with the older girl in tow, already having a new lunch that Ruby paid for because it was technically her fault.

"Hi, nice to meet you…" She meekly greeted them.

Ruby sat down, back into her spot between Yang and Pyrrha while Velvet took a place at the end of their group next to Weiss.

"Ehm, Velvet, you are not a first year student, correct?" Weiss asked.

"I'm in my second year." She said, still a bit awkward around the new people.

"Oh,so you wouldn't mind sharing some tips with us?"

This elicited a groan from the rest of the table although it was rather halfhearted considering that they wouldn't mind the tips either. Unfortunately Yang decided to ruin the moment.

"Keep your hands to yourself, snowflake. She's Ruby's so if anything, it's her tips."

There was a moment of silence,so her words could sink Ilia exploded.

"What do you mean 'she's Ruby's'?! She is not some pet to be passed around!"

Yang ignored the outburst and calmly started explaining."She protected her, fed her and took care of her. She is either a little child or a pet."

"Yang!" Ruby cried out.

"What? It's exactly what you did." Yang actually started to look a bit worried.

"But you did the same things to me!" She accused her sister.

"Because back then you were a little kid!" Yang quickly started doing some damage control.

"I can leave if I'm not welcome…" Velvet said with a small amount of sadness in her voice.

Ilia was about to continue her outrage while Weiss and Pyrrha were trying to deal with the two sisters bickering and preserve their team's reputation but Blake beat them to the punch.

"It's fine. I'm sure Yang actually means well, she just sounds like an ass." She really hoped she was right about that one.

-BBW-

The atmosphere was still rather awkward when they arrived at combat class. Ilia was really peeved about Yang's treatment of Velvet and Blake had to actively hold her back from asking Goodwitch to pair them up for a fight.

Meanwhile the class went on. Goodwitch said that starting next week, one quarter of the spars will be pair against pair, and if they still can't work together then it's time to learn.

Pyrrha was the first one to go, the match ended shortly after with her opponent clearly giving up even before the fight and then just going through the motions.

Weiss won against a small boy with a staff, although not before getting punched to the face.

"Xiao Long and Winchester." Professor Goodwitch called the last match for the day.

Yang went into the arena with the same neutral but rather bored expression while Cardin strode up like a peacock, waving his mace around to show off his strength.

"Hey blondie, guys told me that the little brat was your sister. I hope she won't start crying if I beat you."

Yang gave him a once over and only started to chuckle.

"Begin!" Goodwitch started the match and Cardin rushed at a still chuckling Yang with his mace above his head.

He brought it down in what seemed like a devastating strike, only for Yang to stop it mid-attack with one hand. She got the mace's head in an unbreakable grip and started to outright laugh.

"I thought you were just a mongrel but no! You are an insect! An annoying mosquito buzzing around when one is trying to relax! But seeing that you came to me and I don't have to chase you around-" she raised her free fist as her semblance set her hair ablaze, redirecting the energy from the impact into her next attack "-I'll be gentle." She finished with a wicked grin and in one punch Cardin received both a ring-out and aura break.

-BBW-

"Okay team!" Ruby cheerfully shouted. It was ten in the morning, saturday. And because it was their first weekend on Beacon they needed to have a small celebration! "We survived the initiation and the first week of classes! That calls for some fun and relax! We will go to Vale and have a Blast!"

"I don't mind, I haven't seen the city properly yet." Pyrrha said.

"But what about homework? Didn't you say you would study more?!" Weiss protested.

Yang was on board simply because it was Ruby's idea. She still wanted to show her that nice ice cream cafe.

"I'm done with my homework and I did study!" Ruby defended. Their largest piece of homework was a few papers on grimm native to Vale, Ruby did it the same day it was assigned.

"What?!" Weiss wasn't.

"I know! I will help you with grimm and you will give a rundown on dust!"

Weiss bottled up a rather insulting remark and decided to agree. It was clear that Ruby was a walking encyclopedia when it came to grimm.

"Very well. Where are we going in that case?"

The wide blinding smile on Ruby's face started to slowly become a bit scary.