Ruby Rose was fast.

Perhaps it was a byproduct of her semblance, or perhaps she was just inherently quick at thinking. Whatever the case may be the panic that flashed onto Blake's face, as the door opened made something very clear to the young girl.

Blake wasn't quite ready for others to know her secret. Or at the very least not be found out by accident.

The horrified look on Blake's face as she tried to tie the bow on her head was telling enough to Ruby.

Ruby knew what she needed to do.

Blake's vision was covered by a stream of red cloth, a new silky weight rested over her head. It took her a minute to realize what was obscuring her vision.

It was Ruby's cloak.

The amount of gratitude she felt for the girl was huge. It wouldn't be good for Blake's emotionally drained mind to have another person find out without her control. At least twice in the same day. As Blake's fingers fumbled with her bow, the loud voice of the duo's saviour rang out.

"HOW LONG HAVE YOU BEEN IN THERE?! HAS IT BEEN DAYS?! WEEKS?!"

Blake's mouth opened and closed as she tried to find words, her fingers robotically tying the bow on her head as her mind's distress was no longer mucking with her coordination. Pulling off the cloak from her now concealed ears revealed… Nora?

What.

The more verbose of the pair came out of surprise first, "Nora… you saw us like… an hour ago." Ruby pointed out as Blake handed back the girl's cloak, "…wait how'd you find us?" That is a good question; why would she even be looking for us in the first place?

"Oh!" Nora nodded her head rapidly as she took a step out of the closet to yell at something hidden from both Ruby and Blake's view, "I FOUND THEM!" before turning back to the two. "Ren and I bumped into Weiss who was trying to find you, and then Ren mentioned I was really good at finding things, and Weiss said she'd pay me thirty pancakes if I found you in ten minutes."

"Rea-"

"OF COURSE I ACCEPTED FOR THE CHALLENGE!" Nora's volume level skyrocketed as the yelling startled everyone on that half of Beacon as she shook a fist. A triumphant gleam entered Nora's eyes, "and I found you two~"

Having finally recovered from well… Nora, Blake quietly spoke, "That you did."

"Yuuuup!" Nora took a brief glance out into the hall before looking at Ruby, "Could you pleaseeeee tell Weiss I expect my pancakes by dinner?" Ruby slowly nodded, "Alrighty seeya two later!" With that, a smiling Nora skipped off down the hall.

Ruby and Blake looked at each other before that Ruby spoke up, "Well… that was a thing." The black hair girl nodded. "I hope Yang isn't too… angry stil-"

"I'm still positively yangry."

A new voice, not belonging to Ruby, Blake, Nora or even Weiss. A red eyed Yang loomed over the two, blocking their exit from the closet, casting a slight shadow over the duo from the hallway lights, even with the single small light bulb in the closet on. If Blake's ears weren't covered by her black bow, she'd be certain they would be flattening right now.

Ruby scrambled off Blake, her mind already plotting Blake's escape from the confines of the room… but before she could act, Yang held out a…a… a pair of scissors?

"An eye for an eye" Yang's tone was dead serious, and if her gleaming red eyes were any indicator she was being serious, her usual teasing smirk replaced by a frown.

Blake raised an eyebrow as she took the pair of scissors and cut off a small strand of hair. Still bigger then what she thought had cut off of Yang's. "Better?"

Immediately Yang's eyes returned to their normal lilac colour, the smirk returning to her face, "Yup." A brief second later, Yang's eyes seemed to dilate, "Soooo what were you two lovebirds up to in here?"

Blake felt her face turn red as Ruby started to sputter, "Wha- whaaaa no no no, ew! We were hiding from you not…um... not kissing or anything!"

Yang's smirk turned into a Cheshire cat smile, "Who said anything about kissing lil sis?"

"We were talking." Blake looked her partner straight in the eyes, "In other news Weiss is in Nora's debt now." Blake could only compare her partner's face as a starving person set in front of banquet, unable to decide which plate to pounce first.

"Speaking of Weiss…" Ruby spoke up, not allowing Yang to start teasing the two again, "where is she?"

"YANG XIAO LONG YOU LOCKED ME ON THE ROOF!" A shrill voice rang out as an angry Weiss stormed at the blond haired girl, Myrtenaster drawn, the dust chamber already spinning.

"I…heh…" Yang sheepishly backed away from the smaller girl as the heiress stalked towards the towering blond, "I may have wanted to find you two firs-THAT'S COLD OW OW OW!"

Even as Blake watched her partner get pelted by ice shards, she couldn't help feel relief. Someone finally knows my secret. Better yet, that someone hadn't reacted with disgust. Quite the opposite in fact, as Blake blushed at her ears being called cute.

AU: Welp. That was a bit of a odd ride wasn't it? I mean, the fact that I did a series of fairly linear chapters instead of just drabbles, the usual format of Dilation. Moreover actual things happened in this, instead of just fairly pointless fluff. I remember way back around the second or third chapter I said something to the extent of "I might be turning this into an actual story." Well, this is the result. My current plan is I have a half dozen actual story chapters to do in the future, similar to this mini-story arc. However, they will not happen for a while, rather, I will be returning Dilation to its usual chapter format, albeit with a bit more character building.

I have to apologize for this particular chapter. My intention was to have this chapter be part of the previous chapter. When I went to write chapter 14 however, I essentially ran out of time and came to the realization that either I was going to downplay it or make it, its own chapter. In the end I decided to go the separate chapter route as you can see. For that reason it caused a cliffhanger that was rather... unnecessary in my own opinion, and for that I have to apologize.

If you didn't know, Dilation is sort of an experiment for me. I write it when I am feeling writer's block, with the criteria being I finish each chapter in less then an hour. The average chapter takes only about thirty to forty minutes. If I'm not feeling the flow, the chapter gets trashed and I restart with a new idea, although that wasn't possible in the past for chapters, although that particular issue never came up.

So now this is the part where I have to ask the question that I've been wondering; how successful or interesting was this change up in format? Was it entertaining? Was the last chapter a bit too...er... well, campy? I know I slightly overdid Blake's reaction. Okay a lot. She was being a complete drama kitty and more then a little of character by my own admission. As always feedback is greatly appreciated!

Thank you for putting up with the cliffhangers!