"Young lady, what in the world could you have in the bag that is so importa-"

Ruby knew by the sudden silence, the rustling behind and the stares from her friends what had precisely just happened.

"Get back in the bag." Ruby whispered at Zwei, hoping he'd take the hint and get back into the backpack. Her words went unheeded as he barked. Crapbaskets.

"We are here, to investigate an abandoned urban jungle… and you brought a dog?"

"I… uh-"

"Genius!"

That was the only word Ruby was able to pick out of Doctor Oobleck's fast string of words. Well… that turned out okay? "Did you hear that? I'm a genius!"

Despite the resulting face-palms, Ruby could tell that at least Weiss was happy, and even Yang. However, Blake didn't even so much as glance at her, turning back to the professor. "So what are your orders, Doctor?"

Ruby's almost smug smile wavered. Blake sounds… disappointed, that's no-. Ruby's smile returned in full force as Grimm rounded the corner. No matter, our first mission is going to be a great success!

A few hordes worth of dead Grimm later, Ruby was not quite so sure.

Not about the mission, no, they were carving through Grimm like a hot knife through butter for a few hours now, having gone into pairs to go through them faster, Weiss and Yang sticking together. Rather, about Blake. Since they landed, Ruby had been getting the feeling that her girlfriend was avoiding her.

Blake always seemed to be as far as away as possible from her, nearly out of Ruby's sight. Whenever the younger teen tried to get closer, the distance never seemed to change by much, made all the more eerie by the abandoned and decrepit buildings. Is she avoiding me? Did I do something wrong?

The worry built up in Ruby, as the dead Grimm continued to pile up in heaps, or would have, had they not disintegrated upon death. Should I talk to her, or would that make this worse?

"Ruby." Surprisingly, it was Blake that approached her. "Why did you bring it?"

It took Ruby a moment to realize what 'it' was. "Zwei?" Blake gave a quick nod. "Because I didn't want to leave him alone at the dorms…?" That wasn't quite the whole truth, however.

Ruby wasn't blind.

Blake hadn't had the chance warm up to Zwei, quite yet, unlike Weiss. Ruby wanted to give that chance to Blake. "…and maybe so you could get a chance to play with him?"

The Faunus took a deep breath in before mumbling something that Ruby couldn't quite understand. "Um, I couldn't hear you…"

"…dogs scare me…" Amber eyes shied away, as her arms crossed.

"O-oh." Ruby felt horrible. "I-I didn't mean to, um, I'm sorry." Yet, that made sense; I forgot, Blake met him before during the semester break… she didn't like him much then, did she? "If it's okay to ask…" Blake nodded. "Uh, why?"

Black hair swayed as Blake shook her head and gave helpless shrug. "I don't know, it's just always been that way." Blake's arms hugged tightly around herself. "I guess that's the point of fear, isn't it? If you knew what was scary about it, you wouldn't be afraid anymore." Blake let out a long sigh. "As racist as it sounds, it could be because of these." Her bow twitched. "I just don't know."

I really screwed up. Ruby looked back at Zwei, the corgi staring up, panting, and looking adorable as ever. Yet in Blake's eyes, that wasn't the case. When Zwei looked at her, Ruby could see her girlfriend flinch. I don't want this.

The course of action was clear to Ruby; "I'll take him over to Weiss." Ruby quickly scooped the dog up into her arms before looking for her partner. "I know she wouldn't mind watching hi-"

She was stopped by a feeble tug on her sleeve. "Blake?"

"I did promise you I wasn't going to run away anymore." Blake's voice was unsteady, as she was trying to keep calm. "I guess that applies even here."

"Are you sure?" Silver eyes studied amber ones. "If you don't like him, we could always find another way." Blake shook her head. "Do... do you want to hold him then?" Ruby held out the corgi towards her.

Blake took a tentative step, her eyes refusing to look at Zwei. Slowly but surely, the corgi transferred hands into Blake's shaky arms, her breathing hitching for a moment. "You are doing good!" Ruby said encouragingly, and for a moment, it seemed true. Blake was holding Zwei with no problems.

Then he licked her face.

Blake went stiff as a board, the colour leaving from her face. That's not good… "P-please take him away."

Ruby quickly pulled the corgi away, before he jumped down to the ground. The moment he touched the ground, a very shaken Blake latched onto Ruby.

Baby steps Blake, baby steps.

AU: This chapter difficult for me for one singular reason.

Besides doing a rather dark thing of "THE HUMAN RACISTS USED DOGS ON ME", I was struggling for reasons for why Blake doesn't like dogs. This was the best I could come up with. To be fair, it's a bit more extreme then what we've seen in canon for sure, sorry D:

Dunno when I'll get the next Dilation chapter out, my schedule for the next week is currently in flux to say the least. Sorry about that... real life continues to pick up in time commits for some stupid reason D: Stupid real life. I do know Spoon Equality will have another chapter on Saturday, but that's about it for the moment.

Thank you for reading and I hope everyone has a wonderful day!:D