Author's Note: And we're back!

I feel just as bad about leaving you in a cliffhanger and you do for being left in one.

"Let me through!" Yang growled at the police officer trying to block her way.

"Sorry ma'am." The officer apologized in an insincere monotone. "I can't let you through."

"I live here!" The blonde insisted, her voice level barely quieter than a shout.

"This is a crime scene." He intoned, ignoring the emotional outburst. "You're going to have to stay ba-."

"Hey!" A yell interrupted the police officer. A man in a standard police issue windbreaker exited her apartment wearing a badge that hung from his neck. "You said you live here, right?"

"Yes! As I was trying-" She attempted to answer.

"Your name is Yang Xiao Long then?"

"Yes! Can I g-"

"Got any ID to prove it?"

"One second…" Yang muttered as she started to dig through her purse with adrenaline fueled hands. She managed to find her ID and presented it to the man. "Here."

He took only a cursory glance before handing it back. "My name's detective Quartz. If you could follow me."

Glaring at the police officer who slowly ambled out of her way, Yang followed the detective towards the door to her apartment. The first scene she saw as she approached the door horrified her. Scattered on the ground were pieces of ceramic and glass. The mess also included the cord and metal frame of the table lamp they came from. Her eyes narrowed in as she saw something else; blood. There was a small pool staining the carpet and droplets in a splatter pattern on the wall that covered a sizeable area.

"Apparently there was an altercation between some faunus." The investigator started to explain, carefully eying the frantic girl as her hand jumped to her mouth. "We don't know exactly what happened yet."

"No…" Yang whimpered.

"When I got here the paramedics were already moving an unidentified redheaded faunus onto their stretcher." The investigator continued his monologue.

"No… no… no…" Yang began to visibly shake.

"The brunette girl claims to live here with you, but we couldn't find her name on file." "We tried to get her to come to the station for questioning, but we ran into some problems."

"Blake! Oh, is she ok? What's wrong? Please tell me she didn't do anything..." Yang snapped making desperate eye contact with the man and grabbing his arm before whimpering again. "...to Neon."

"Neon, huh?" The investigators gave a small eye roll accompanied by a slight sneer. "That must be the other faunus' name, the one causing the problems."

"What did you say?" Yang tightened her grip on the man's arm. "But how is she causing problems? You just said she was removed on a stretcher!"

The man tooka small step back as the grip she had on his arm started to cause pain. The anger that flashed in her eyes warned him to stop beating around the bush.

"Look, it's be better if I show you. If you could be so kind as to take your hand off of me." Yang complied and the man lead the way to the hallways and headed towards the bedrooms. "The faunus in question that was removed was a taller male with horns. I was trying to gauge your reactions to see if you were going to try to conceal information about him, but it's apparent you don't know who he is. These faunus cause enough problems for the police department, I don't need someone trying to cover for them."

"Gee." Yang snarled at him. "I wonder why they won't talk to you. And if you want my cooperation you'd better show them some respect."

"That is obstruction of justice." He barked back.

"No." Her voice cut back with a hard edge. "Lying is obstruction of justice. Not talking to you is well within my rights."

The investigator looked as though he was going to utter a retort, opening his mouth slightly. He then closed it as if he reconsidered his actions. Stopping in front of the doorway, he gestured his arms to the room.

"They're in here with my partner, Ember." He stated. "She's trying to get them to cooperate and let the paramedics take a look at them."

Pushing past the man, Yang entered the master bedroom. Another investigator and a paramedic were crouched in the middle of the room facing the back corner. Huddled in the corner were the two girls she was so desperate to see.

The paramedic attempted to get close to the girls again, but a low-pitched guttural sound hit Yang's ear. The sound grew in intensity as the medical technician got closer and the man slowly stopped and backed up. It was then that Yang realized what the sound was, Neon was growling at the two professionals. She yearned to run to comfort the small faunus.

"Go away, Quartz." Ember ordered, not looking away from the girls in front of her. "You've already done enough damage."

"I'm their friend, this is my apartment." Yang announced her presence. "Let me talk to them."

"Yang." She heard a soft voice carry through the room as Blake's eyes connected with her own.

The investigator moved aside and allowed Yang to thread her way through the room and kneel in front of the two girls, both of which collapsed into her embrace, clutching her clothing with vigor.

"It's ok." She tried to soothe them, gathering them up into a hug and rubbing small circles on their back. "It's going to be fine."

"I'm sorry I broke your lamp." Neon gasped hysterically into Yang's shoulder, causing the taller girl to release a nervous chuckle.

"That's what you're worried about?" Yang cradled the diminutive girl harder. "I am just glad you two are ok."

"I'm sorry…" Neon gave a small choking sob and shifted to latch onto Blake. "I shouldn't be the one in this state."

"It's ok." Blake attempted reassure her despite her own shaky voice. "You were brave when I needed you, it's ok to not be now."

"But I'm not brave." She clutched the other faunus harder. "I was so scared. Scared of what he might do, scared not being able to see Yang again, scared of losing you."

"Me?" Blake gave a surprised smile.

"You were the first person to stand up for me. Back at the coffee shop earlier today, no one's ever done anything like that for me before. I act confident and proudly show my heritage." Neon wiped her eyes with her sleeve. "But it's so hard to look at people's disapproving faces, or ignore their teasing. That wasn't the first time someone has tried to pull on my tail. I always wished that I could hide like you do, but it's so painful to hide a tail. It's one of the reasons I couldn't stand you when we met, you could hide so easily."

"Hey, now." Blake responded and pulled back from the redhead.

Yang was certain that Neon had offended Blake, the last argument they had bubbling to her mind. To their surprise, Blake did something unexpected. She reached up and pulled on the black bow that was in her hair, undoing the knot and freeing her ears underneath.

"This bow is my favorite." Blake explained while Yang inspected the ribbon that she had removed from her hair.

It was the same bow that Blake was wearing when Yang first met her. Blake straightened the fabric before grabbing Neon's wrist. She then tied the ribbon into a bow on the other girl's wrist.

"What are you doing?" Neon inquired

"I want you to have it. As a reminder to stay strong." Blake sighed forlornly. "To be honest, I was jealous of you too. To show your heritage proudly was so infuriating to me because it was something I could never do. I was too much of a… well, you were correct. I was always a coward and tried to hide myself. I was unfair to you and to Yang. I can't, no, I refuse to hide myself anymore. That bow is a symbol of my cowardice, I want it to be a symbol of my support for you now."

"I promise to be there for you too!" Neon lurched forward, hugging the taller faunus.

"Oh! I'm so proud of you both!." Yang piled on top of them, wrapping both of them in her arms.

The moment of catharsis was uplifting, and after a few minutes of embracing, all three girls wore genuine smiles. A gentle cough behind her reminded Yang that Ember and the the paramedic were still in the room.

"Can the medic check you guys out now?" Yang inquired, eliciting a nod from both of the girls.

She waived professional forward and sat back while he asked them a series of questions and checked their eyes for signs of shock or a concussion.

"I still need a statement." Ember stated to the blonde as she watched the affair.

"You'll get one." Yang retorted. "Just, let me ask them about it. What did your partner do?"

"I am not sure." The detective shrugged. "But I will find out. All I know is, I walked in and the redhead was growling and him with her fists pulled back as if she was going to strike him. He has had… incidences before with being accused of biasness against faunus. I am going to make sure that whatever he did will go into his file, and have a discussion with the chief of police as well."

The two women looked over as they sensed a presence move towards them.

"I'm all done." The paramedic grunted as he walked past. "Other than some minor scrapes and bruises, they are both fine."

With him gone, Yang moved back to where the girls were seated.

"So, what happened?" Yang's eyes darted back and forth between the two girls. "And what was up with Investigator Quartz?"

Blake sighed and pulled her knees up to her chest, hugging them in the process.

"Remember that guy I told you I used to be friends with?" She asked with a low voice.

"His name was Adam, right?"

"Yeah. I told you how he would bother me at home and work. When I moved here I didn't tell him where I was going, or that I was even leaving. Apparently he saw me at the coffee shop with Neon when we came to talk to you and decided to follow me home. We had gotten back and Neon went to your room to get something and wasn't there when he knocked. I shouldn't have opened the door, but I thought it was just going to be another time where I was just going to have to tell him to leave.

"When I opened the door he pushed his way inside. He started yelling about me betraying him and running off with some whore. I started yelling back when he tried to choke me me. We fell to the floor and he kept shouting about how I belonged to him. I think that is when Neon came running back from your room. Somehow she managed to get him off of me. My mind when blank, I was more scared than I have ever been. Next thing I remember, Adam was bleeding on the floor and Neon had me on my feet and was pulling me back here."

Blake's eyes flitted to Neon as Yang shifted her gaze as well.

"What did you do?" Yang probed.

Neon looked down at her hands, balling them into fists.

"I heard the shouting. So ran into the living room as fast as possible. I couldn't make sense of what he was saying, but he was on top of Blake. So I kicked him in the ribs as hard as a I could. I think I heard something snap, but he managed to get up anyways and pulled a knife out of his coat." Neon paused and trembled slightly. "He tried to stab me! I didn't want to hurt him but he came after me! I grabbed the lamp next to me and hit him with it. I just wanted him to stop. I didn't even check to see if he would get back up, I grabbed Blake and helped her follow me in here, locked the bedroom door, and called for the police"

Both Blake and Yang moved in to give her another hug.

"You're safe now." Blake crooned. "I'm safe thanks to you."

"So why did you refuse help from the police and medics?" Yang tried to press forward so they could be done with this mess as soon as possible.

"He said we needed to go with him to the station to give a statement." Blake explained as Neon remained quiet. "He said had no record of me living here and he said he would cuff us and force us to go if we didn't comply. I think Neon scared him with her growls. Thankfully, his partner came in. But we weren't quite in the right frame of mind to trust them."

"Thank you for your statements." A voice called over Yang's shoulder and she turned around to see Ember leaving. "If we need anything else, we'll contact you."

As she left she bumped into a uniformed officer who whispered something to her. She turned around and gave a smile.

"Sounds like they are done with the crime scene and the cleaners have already removed the biohazard." Her face softened. "Please try to take care of yourselves tonight. This looks like a fairly cut and dry case of self-defense, so don't worry, he won't be back to bother you."

Silence fell on the bedroom as the three girls looked at each other expectantly. Yang's mind raced to think of a way to help her friends feel better. Getting an idea, she walked over to her dresser and pulled out extra sets of pajamas. Tossing a set to each girl she smirked.

"Put those on." She ordered. "I am going to run out to the kitchen and make some popcorn and hot chocolate. When I get back we are going to have a slumber party and watch movies."

She promptly left the room to get what she needed from the kitchen. Satisfied to see that the apartment was now empty, and the area where the debris and blood had been was clean, she locked the door and moved back to the kitchen to start boiling the water. Tossing a bag of popcorn in the microwave she dug through the cabinets for anything else she could find. She found a few bags of unopened candy and a box of chocolate wedged behind the tea. It was probably Blake's stash, but she promised herself that she would replace it next time she went to the store. Mixing the water with the hot chocolate mix she filled three thermos cups and put lids on them before pouring the popcorn into a bowl. Gathering everything up, she managed to carry all of in one trip to the bedroom.

When she got back, both the faunus were dressed in the oversized pajamas. Their eyes lit up as she walked in and they both jumped up to help her with the goodies. Ordering each of them to pick out a few movies, she made her way to the bathroom to change into her own pajamas. Finally when all that was done, the three of the settled down on Yang's bed. Neon curled up on side of her while Blake rested her head on Yang's other shoulder. The blonde reached for the remote and pressed play so the three of them could enjoy their night.

Yang smiled as the sound of pattering resounded through the room. Flicking her wrist, she pointed the device in her hand across the room. Small footsteps were heard again as the determined feline chased a little red dot to its new destination. She let out a small giggle as Neon, in her cat form, pounced on the speck of light. The last few days had been going well for her. Neon and Blake were finally getting along and spending time together, even at times where Yang wasn't present.

Today was one of the rare days where none of them had anything to do. She assumed that Blake was still asleep, but couldn't tell because her bedroom door was closed. Yang got woken up relatively early because a little orange cat decided to pounce on her and wanted to play. Dragging herself out of bed, she grabbed an energy drink while she mischievously shone the laser pointer around the room. Neon was more than happy to play with her; pouncing on, scampering after, and stalking the dot.

Tracing the laser across the wall, slightly too high for Neon to reach, she giggled again. Neon instead sat on the floor, staring at the dot and issuing a high-pitch chattering sound. Yang was so enthralled in the game that she didn't notice the other presence in the room.

"Don't be mean." Blake spoke as she scooped Neon up off the floor, her eyes darting to track the laser.

The cat gave an idle swipe in the direction of the red dot as she was lifted past it. Once it was out of sight she snuggled into Blake's arms and started purring. Blake reacted with a small look of apprehension before she started to pet the orange cat.

"This goes against so many habits, but she is too cute to resist." Blake sighed as the teal eyes looked up at her innocently. "Don't look at me like that, you know what you are doing."

Yang sniggered as she realized that Blake's eyes kept snapping back and forth as she tried to focus on Neon and track the laser simultaneously. Moving the dot in a circle on the wall just on the edge of Blake's vision, Yang tried to entice the eared faunus to try to catch it with her hand.

"Yang." Her voice was stern. "If you don't knock that off I will walk over there and bite your hand until you drop that infernal device."

"If I stop will you come over here anyways?" Yang teased her roommate.

"Yes."

The simple answer was all she needed. Putting the laser pointed away, she scooted over to give Blake room to sit. She watched the masters student saunter over still carrying Neon. She wanted a closer look at Blake's ears. She hadn't covered them since the incident with Adam, but Yang hadn't had a chance to look at them all that closely. As the faunus sat next to her she got her chance. They were an endearing feature that fit their owner's personality quite appropriately. They looked soft too, if only she could touch them.

"Please don't." Blake warned, placing her hand on Yang's.

Yang hadn't realized that she had moved her hand towards Blake's ears. Sitting back she tried to control her blush of embarrassment.

"Sorry." The engineer muttered.

"It's fine." Blake traced her fingernails over the back of the previously captive hand. "It's just, I am really protective of them. They are delicate."

"I'm still sorry."

"I know you are." Blake smiled before turning her attention back to the cat purring in her lap, giving Neon a soft poke. "Change back. We need to have that conversation with Yang."

Neon stood up in Blake's lap before stretching. Jumping off, the was a blur of motion and Yang closed her eyes and looked away.

"Neon! Innocent eyes here." She exclaimed.

"Oh, just relax and turn around." Neon pouted back. "I am not indecent."

Yang turn back around and saw that Neon was in fact wearing clothing. She was dressed in gym shorts and a tank with her hair in her customary high twintails.

"Wait. You can transform with clothing?" Yang looked at Blake. "Why didn't you do that last time?"

"Because I was stressed." Blake shrugged. "The more clothing you wear the more energy and focus it takes to turn into your animal form. Most of the time something like spandex is hardly noticeable, but bigger looser clothing can take several minutes of focus and it's pretty tiring."

"Ah…" Yang fell silent for a moment. "Oh, you said that you have to transform occasionally. Why is it a necessity?"

"I don't know why, at least not scientifically." Blake explained. "But if we don't transform into our respective animal forms we begin to feel a bit tired or stressed. With the rate that you drink coffee and energy drinks I am sure you know what caffeine burn out feels likes. It feels like that, but keeps getting worse as time goes by. It won't be fatal, but it definitely makes it hard to function."

"Yup." Neon chirped, stretching again. "Spending time as a kitty then switching back to a person feels like taking a really good nap. It's a shame you can't experience it."

"Nah, but I get to pick you up and cuddle you." Yang teased. "So I call it a wash."

"Pfft. I benefit from that too." Neon smirked. "Being pet feels soooo good. Especially being scratched behind the ears. Blake, you want to trade me for my tail?"

Blake merely rolled her eyes and patted the couch next to her.

"Come on, we're supposed to be talking to Yang."

"Right." The redhead groaned. "Talk about awkward."

"What's awkward?" Yang cocked her head to the side. "What's this about?"

"This conversation might be awkward." Neon looked at her feet. "This is something we need to talk about. It's about you and me and, well, her."

"I don't generally like conversations that start like this." Yang looked suspicious, this was starting to sound like a conversation she had heard before.

"No no no." Neon tried to assure her. "It's not like that I wouldn't break up with you or anything like that there is just some things that we need to talk about and everything would ultimately be up to you and anyways more of this is about me and Blake and previous actions that you may not have thought about."

"Ok, Neon. No need to be nervous" Yang sought to stop her ramble from continuing. "You just took me by surprise."

"Look." Neon made eye contact with her girlfriend. "I know you have probably wondered why I was taking our relationship so slow. I couldn't talk to you about it without giving the whole 'shapeshifting' thing away. From your point of view you had a girlfriend and a pet cat. From my point of view you were being unintentionally affectionate to another person. The thing is, she was here first, and you liked her first. I had hoped that she would go away, then Blake became your roommate. I still hoped that she would give up her pursuit of you and I would still be there for you.

"But then, she turned out to be this really cool person. It was obvious that she still had feelings for you. I never knew for certain, but I am certain that you have feelings for her."

"But I like you too, Neon." Yang interrupted.

"I know." She smiled back. "I never doubted that, I would still fight to hold onto you. In the last few days, Blake and I have hung out a few times and got around to talking, and, uh, we had an idea."

Neon paused as a shade of red dusted her cheeks.

"And that would be?" Yang prompted the younger faunus.

She shook her head and refused to speak.

"Blake?" Yang implored the other girl.

"Traitor." Blake chided the tailed faunus. "Look the day I met you, back in that park, you looked so sad. It looked like you had been rejected by society and you really looked like you could use a friend. I felt for you. That is why I followed you back. I just wanted to comfort you, but even just a small glimpse of you life and who you are just captured my heart. I found myself unable to leave you. When you started dating Neon I felt bad about hiding myself. Everything lined up when you decided to look for a roommate when I was trying to move out of my old place. I hoped that my presence would chase her off, but she turned out to be such a sweet, endearing girl."

Neon emitted a small squeak and her blush deepened. Blake patted her on the leg before continuing.

"Anyways, remember that day in the kitchen where you thought that Neon and I were fighting over a plate of tuna?"

"Yup." Yang popped the 'p'.

"Do you remember what you said to us?"

"Yeah." Yang looked thoughtful and rubbed the back of her head as she thought back. "I said, 'see you guys can sh-'... oh."

"Yeah." Blake was looking at her feet now. "Look, I know this is awkward and you should take some time, ok?"

"Yeah." Yang slowly nodded her head up and down. "I am going to go do some thinking."

Yang got up and made her way to the door. Her normal method of thinking was taking a ride on Bumblebee, but it was low on gas so she decided to make her way to her room instead. Before she could walk out of the living room she felt a tug on her shirt, causing her to halt, but she didn't turn around.

"Look." Neon spoke from behind her. "Since we got over the other stuff, Blake and I get along well. If it makes you feel better, you shouldn't worry about that."

"Alright." Yang responded before closing herself in her room.

Yang threw herself down on to her bed and lost herself in thought about what the two women had just said to her.

Eventually a buzzing noise ripped her from her musings. Grabbing her scroll she noticed that she had quite a few emails that she had received in the last few hours. Checking the time she realized that she had sequestered herself for most of the day, missing lunch, and it was almost dinner time. Opening up her messages she was pleasantly surprised at their contents.

While the first was a message from Fall Factories informing her that they were going with a different candidate, but the next message was from Ozpin R&D. She had interviewed with them over a month ago and hadn't heard anything from them, but the message contained a job offer. She reread it multiple times to make sure, definitely a job offer. If that didn't cause her heart to soar, the next message made her even happier. It was from Ruby! Sent through official channels. Her little sister would be back in Atlas soon, she would have to see if Neon and Blake...

Smiling slightly, she made up her mind. Sending a quick message to both girls, she headed to her shower.

Her good fortune seemed to keep its momentum. Her hair curled perfectly, she got her makeup on without smudging it, and there wasn't a wrinkle to be found on her dress. Checking the time on her scroll she waited by her bedroom door. She had told both girls to get ready and meet her in the living room at six. It was already a few minutes past six, but she wanted to give them a small buffer of time. Taking a deep breath and sorting her thoughts again, she started to count.

Upon reaching sixty, she unlocked her door and headed out to the living room. Neon and Blake were facing each other, clasping each other's hands, and conversing quietly. Letting go of each other's hands, they faced her. Neon and Blake were dressed stunningly. Attired in a skirt and blouse combination and sleek asymmetrical dress, respectively, both girls smiled at her. Yang was happy to see that Blake was still leaving her ears uncovered and was pleased to see that Neon was wearing Blake's bow on her wrist again. Slowly approaching the two of them, Yang leaned down and captured Neon's lips in a quick kiss. Pulling back she saw an expectant look in Neon's eyes. Smirking slightly Yang turned towards Blake. Taking a breath to calm the butterflies that she felt in her stomach, she caressed the taller faunus' cheek with her hand and brought her in for a kiss too.

"Alright, girls." She said as she slid one hand into Neon's hands and the other into Blake's hands. "Let's go have dinner, the right way this time."

There you go that's all! I need to go take a nap and write something really angtsy. So fluffed out.

No more for this story!

None!

Fine... Look, peer pressure is bad. But I guess I can give into it, this time. There will an epilogue, and not a half-assed one either. It won't be here for a bit though. I finished this in time to submit it for the Reddit Moncon, so I will be submitting it and can't edit it until August. You guys can wait that long right? In the meantime, go to the RWBY subreddit, and go read the stories and vote for you favorite!

As always, if you enjoyed this remember to Favorite and Follow, then go leave a review.

I know I enjoyed writing this. Alot more than I thought. This was supposed to be around 10k words, I was way off, hitting around 25k. But it was worth it and I will certainly be write either a sequel or some one-shots.