Disclaimer: RWBY and all affiliated characters/titles belong to Rooster Teeth, those wonderful geniuses.

The soft crunch of leaves and wings flapping from above were the only noises that were heard as the two Huntresses in training crept silently through the undergrowth of the Emerald Forest.

Yang tried to be quiet, but the blonde brawler was having trouble focusing, see, today Teams JNPR and RWBY were working together to complete a mission.

It was a special request from Ozpin, as the headmaster knew of the closeness between the two teams, and he wanted to see how the group of eight cooperated on a mission without a guide. Yang wondered just how close he knew the teams really were, especially two specific females.

Her relationship with the red haired Mystralian hadn't progressed that far just yet, and they had never been on a mission together. Yang desperately didn't want to make a fool out of herself in front of Pyrrha.

After all, her job on the team was usually just to deal damage and keep the Grimm at bay. But today wasn't a search and destroy mission, their objective today was recon. Ozpin's thought was that they use the increased size of their group to search a wider area more efficiently.

He also wanted them to pair off into groups with one member from each team, and while Ruby was with Jaune, Blake's partner was Nora, and Weiss was with Ren, of course Yang had been placed with Pyrrha. That was how she found herself creeping through the undergrowth behind the gorgeous redhead, trying desperately not to be overly obvious about watching her backside.

She wasn't doing very well at that though, and more than once, Yang had wondered if she should be the one in front. At least that way they would both be totally focused on the mission, because if Yang had learned anything about Pyrrha over the last week or two it's that she was incredibly hard to distract. Once that girl set her mind to something, she went for it, no diversions.

That didn't stop Yang from trying all the same. She wanted to find the one thing that would tear her focus off of something, and was determined to find it.

If only Yang herself wasn't so distracted, she would've realized Pyrrha stopped moving at the top of a small ridge. As it was, Yang was so lost in thought that she slammed right into Pyrrha, nearly bowling her over in the process. Yang quickly jumped back and realized her mistake. But in turn, she tripped backwards over an unearthed root and with frantic waving of her arms, tumbled over the edge. Her scream was quickly cut off as she hit the forest floor below.

Pyrrha stumbled slightly as Yang collided with her but was able to maintain her balance on the edge of the rocks. She spun around just in time to see Yang tumble about in a circle, flail her arms in desperation and plummet off the side of the ledge. She heard Yang's scream and fear gripped her heart. Had she not signalled her stop? How could she have messed up this badly? Now Yang was going to be injured and it was all her fault.

Pyrrha crouched and prepared to hop off the cliff edge to come to Yang's aid but stopped when she saw a dark shape lumbering through the woods towards Yang's prone body.

"Ursa!" Pyrrha screamed, hoping Yang would hear her in time to get up and defend herself. She was so far away.

Yang tumbled backwards over her head, desperately trying to use her shoulders to turn right side up. Unfortunately, the power in her shoulders lifted her too hard, and she fell on her stomach and chin, knocking the wind out of her.

This time, she heard Pyrrha's voice. No words, just a scream that sounded fearful. Pawsteps lumbered on the ground, she could feel it vibrating through her body. Quickly, she hefted herself up with her hands under her chest, and stood upright, finding herself looking directly into the eyes of a massive Ursa charging straight at her.

There was no one word to describe how Yang was feeling: nervous by working with her girlfriend, embarrassed by her massive blunder, frustrated that she landed so poorly, and now there was an Ursa. This Ursa was doomed.

Yang needed something to take out her emotions on, and it looked like someone just offered to be her punching bag. Yang finished pushing the rest of the way to her feet and struck a fighting stance, preparing to meet the beast's charge.

With a roar that scattered birds for miles the Ursa closed the remaining distance between itself and Yang in three powerful strides. Yang cocked her arm back and planted her fist directly between the Grimm's eyes. She heard it's skull plate crack as it's momentum was arrested at the end of her strike.

The Ursa staggered back several paces and Yang took the

opportunity to engage her

gauntlets. As the golden weapons shimmered and snaked around her wrists, the Ursa reared back on its hind legs and bellowed once more, issuing a challenge to its clearly inferior opponent. Yang smirked and dashed at the exposed midsection. Two jabs and a cross backed up by Ember Celica's dust chambers had the Ursa slumped against a tree and fading into oblivion.

Pyrrha finished descending the cliff, javelin and shield in hand, ready to assist Yang but saw that it was far from necessary. Pyrrha had been waiting for an opportunity to go out in the wild and really prove herself to Yang. Sure she was a Tournament Champion and no one could best her in the ring, but Yang was a completely different kind of fighter.

She had plenty of experience out in the world, fighting real opponents with the intent to kill, fighting Grimm. Pyrrha couldn't hope to compare in those regards. So, she was hoping that today's mission would give her that opportunity. Apparently she had been wrong. Yang was still just so indomitably strong.

Panting with slow burning rage, Yang ran her hand through her fluffy mane of hair, before putting her hands on her hips to stare at the place the Ursa lay as it slowly dissolved away.

"Yang, are you okay?" Pyrrha ran forward, spinning her weapons to their spots on her back and grabbed the hand Yang had punched the Ursa with bare knuckle to check it for any sign of injury.

"Ah...yeah." Yang turned around, anger dissipated, replaced with nervousness once again. "Though I'm pretty sure my shoulder hurts more from...you know...stupidly falling down a cliff…" Yang reached her other hand behind her neck in a nervous reaction, but the first hand tightened its grip on Pyrrha's.

Yang knew her fall down the hill was far from elegant, her sore chin reminding her of her failed landing. Pyrrha probably thought she was an idiot, her inner mission to impress her had already failed and they'd barely been out here a few hours.

"Well, fall or no fall. You certainly handled that Ursa quite handily." Pyrrha stopped examining Yang's hand and resigned to simply holding it.

"I'm sure you would've done better, more graceful too…" Yang winced at the still burning image in her mind of the fall. Pyrrha was the one who was run into, and she regained her balance easily! Yang made a mental note to herself to work on her balance the next time she was training, and save the usual strength training for later.

Pyrrha glanced over Yang's body again to double check her for any sign of injury. She was both impressed and relieved to see that Yang was completely free of any visible scrapes or lacerations even after that huge tumble. She petted her free hand down Yang's arm and felt the firm muscle ripple beneath her touch. She leaned over, craning her neck to place a light kiss on Yang's cheek without pressing their bodies against each other.

"I'm just glad you're okay." Pyrrha sighed and lingered near Yang's face for just a moment before returning to even footing.

"Y-yeah…" Only grand pun master Yang Xiao Long could be rendered speechless by a simple kiss by none other than the Invincible Girl, Pyrrha Nikos. It was enough for the blonde to completely forget her embarrassment just before, and allow herself some time to let her eyes rake up and down Pyrrha's body. She never ceased to be impressed or amazed at just how gorgeous this girl- no, her girlfriend was.

"Come on, we're a little behind on our time." Pyrrha looked up and checked the sun's location to gauge the time. "We're gonna need to hurry if we want to make it to the rendezvous in time."

"Pssshht." As if on queue, Nora's voice rang out over their shortwave radios, snapping Yang out of her fixation. Reception was too shotty out here to rely on scrolls so they had to carry an alternate form of communication for extended missions. "Come in everyone! Can you hear me?" Nora called out after having made the static noise to begin with.

"Yes Nora. We can hear you." Ren's calm response came like soothing water after the sharp pitch of Nora's words.

"So Blake and I got a little lost. It was totally definitely not my fault." Nora sounded like she was definitely the one at fault.

"I'm not sure if I believe you…" Jaune's hesitant voice broke in.

"She wanted me to track a sloth," Blake's monotone speech cut across like a knife. "There was no sloth to track."

"Of course." Weiss' exasperated voice now sounded off. "Well while you guys were chasing make believe animals, Ren and I are very close to where Ozpin instructed us to go."

Yang gently took the radio from Pyrrha, finally letting her small team be heard. "Ruby? Where did you and Jaune make it to?"

"Uhhh, I'm not sure really." Ruby's voice was nervous, worried almost." Jaune got chased pretty far by a Boarbatusk and I had to run after him. We got a little turned around. I think we're further away than where we started."

"Why don't we all make as much progress as possible, then camp for the night and gather at the rendezvous point in the morning?" Pyrrha offered a shred of civility to the quickly deteriorating conversation.

"Well. I see Ren and I will have a lot of time on our hands then, now won't we?" Weiss snapped over the radio. Her voice so sharp that it did cause a second or so of feedback.

"Alright Ice Queen, chill out." Yang chuckled quietly and shared a quick smirk with Pyrrha. "Pyrrha has a good plan. You and Ren just relax, do your nails, whatever. We'll meet you there tomorrow."

"You insufferable-" Weiss' voice was cut off by static from Ren taking the radio and his voice cut in.

"That sounds agreeable. We will see you all here tomorrow, please be careful."

"Weiss," Nora sounded...mad. "Don't you lay a hand on him. You hear me? I will ride a herd of Ursai in there if you so much as touch him. Do you hear me? Do you hear me Weiss?" Yang thought she could hear Nora's shouts even without the radio, and couldn't resist the opportunity to tease Weiss even more.

"It's okay Nora! Weiss will be too busy missing Ruby to focus on Ren!" Yang's cheery tease jumped in before Weiss could reply.

Embarrassed sputtering sounded from Ruby's end of the line, and Pyrrha held her hand over her mouth to hold back the laugh that threatened to spill out.

"Alright guys good work." Jaune stepped in since Ruby was apparently unable to form coherent thoughts at the moment, and Weiss was heard screaming high pitched threats against Yang from the background, Ren surely keeping the mouth piece a safe distance from the white haired heiress.

"Yeah, go team!" Nora shouted. The radio fell silent and Yang slid it back into the pouch at her hip.

"Well, that was certainly exciting." Pyrrha smiled wanly and glanced back up at the sun, dipping just behind a nearby ridge.

"I love our teams sometimes. Hey, think we should keep going a bit, or find some shelter?" Yang queried, following Pyrrha's gaze.

"Perhaps we should just crest the next hill. So we can start the next morning heading downhill." Pyrrha gestured to the top of a hill in the general direction they were headed. It was pushed up against a steep cliff face and promised to offer some type of shelter.

"Sounds good to me. I can even get us a fire going with a little Yang magic!" Yang smiled excitedly. This would be her chance to really show off for Pyrrha. What was better as a survival skill than the ability to make fires anywhere you needed them?

"That will be wonderful. It's really much colder than I thought it would be." Pyrrha shuddered just slightly and wrapped her arms around her bare shoulders, rubbing to try and heat the exposed skin up even slightly.

The pair made their way up the hill and glanced out over the forest floor now spread out before them. Just off in the distance, much further than would be reasonable to travel tonight, but closer than either had thought, was the clearing and the monitoring station they were to use as a rendezvous point.

"Lovely, so we just have to Yang out here, then trek down to the clearing in the morning." Yang nudged Pyrrha lightly with her elbow and her amazing joke pulled a small laugh from her even more amazing girlfriend.

"Oh Yang," Pyrrha sighed a little and waved a dismissive hand through the air, trying to dispel her own laughter. "Come, we have to find shelter or I might freeze to death. Even with a magical Yang fire."

Together they made their way slowly along the edge of the cliff where it met the ground. The quickly dimming light made searching a little difficult but together they were able to find a small cave entrance. It wasn't a gaping hole in the rock, but a small dugout they could push through one at a time. Inside the space opened up enough for them to stand and move around a little.

"Well, this is...cozy." Pyrrha looked around the small space.

"I mean, it's not huge but it's just for one night." Yang shoved a rather large rock off to one side to clear a bigger space for them to lay. "Plus, it's still better than being out there right?" Yang jerked a thumb over her shoulder at the small opening.

"We can't exactly light a fire in here though. The smoke will kill us before anything else." Pyrrha muttered and looked around the cave, trying to find some place they could lay down.

"Oh." Yang's face drooped, and she looked out of the little cave to the rapidly setting sun. All she wanted was to impress her girlfriend who had impressed her so many times before. Was that really too much to ask?

Pyrrha reached out and gently rubbed Yang's shoulder sympathetically.

"Another time Yang," she murmured. "Then perhaps you'll be able to show off your magic."

"We're still gonna be cold. It's not like we brought camping gear or anything." Yang chuckled under her breath and rubbed her head abashedly, "We were supposed to sleep at the monitoring station and all."

"Yes well, I suppose it won't be too cold in here." Pyrrha looked at the small opening and the sturdy rock walls. "We are protected from any possible rain at least."

"Yeah, we can rough it though. We're pretty strong, and if another Ursa comes, I'll take care of em'." Yang stood in a makeshift defensive stance, chest puffed proudly.

"Oh, my hero." Pyrrha stroked a single hand down Yang's arm and chuckled lightly. "Thank you, I feel much better about using rocks as pillows now."

"Well…" Yang stretched the word out. "You can always use me as a pillow." She stood back up straight, but kept her puffed out chest the same, and smiled cheekily.

"Yang." Pyrrha blushed and turned away slightly, holding her hand to her mouth.

"What!" Yang pretend to take offense. "I'm comfy! And my semblance will keep you warm! You did say you were getting cold earlier, right?"

"That is true," Pyrrha gave in a little, easily convinced. It's not that she was opposed to the idea. "Isn't that somewhat...inappropriate though? Even if we are dating."

"Depends on how you take it." Yang released her previous position and shrugged. "But suit yourself. Let's lay back over here."

Yang walked the smallest distance in their cave which was more of a fifteen foot deep hole in the side of a cliff. She eased down against one wall and stretched out as much as she could given the space provided. Once she was as comfortable as she was going to get, she beckoned Pyrrha over with a wave of her hand.

"I suppose it is for comfort and survival's sake." Pyrrha rubbed at her arm with her hand nervously, weighing the options in her mind. She walked slowly over to Yang's side and eased herself down onto the ground with her knees tucked up against her chest, sitting near Yang but not cuddling up against her. "You are pretty warm."

"You won't want to come near me in the summer," Yang laughed, her hands placed behind her head with her elbows sticking out. "I stop being warm, and just become really hot." She also turned her head to wink at Pyrrha, just for a second, before she went back to gaze at the stars that were just coming into view through the small opening.

"I'll keep that in mind." Pyrrha said softly and scooted a little bit closer. "I'm rather enjoying it right now though."

"You're the only person who I want to enjoy it." She murmured tenderly, leaving the flirting behind, and attempting to relax as much as she could, but inside, her heart was beating so fast that she was sure the Mystralian beside her could hear it.

"I'm not usually the jealous type but…" Pyrrha hesitated and scooted just a little closer to Yang, closing the gap between them, "I really appreciate that Yang." Pyrrha released her knees and curled up against Yang, resting her head against the blonde's shoulder.

Yang breathed out contentedly and leaned forward to press a kiss against Pyrrha's forehead and lingered for a moment before relaxing her head back in her original position on top of her hands. Now Yang was sure she could really hear her rapid heartbeat.

No one said anything anymore, they just listened to the sounds of nature they could hear from outside. Crickets chirping, pebbles tumbling down the side of the cliff they were temporarily residing in, and, of course, the wind.

It didn't bother Yang at all, she felt decently comfortable, and her semblance pulsed heavily through her body. In fact, the chill of the wind combined with the warmth of her body was a lovely combination for Yang.

Her heartbeat started to slow down, and her eyes began to slowly close as she gazed at the stars. Memories of adventures with her dad and little sister dancing through her head.

She wasn't sure how long they laid there, with her eyes closed and her mouth pulled into a small, pleased smile. She knew what pulled her out of her dreams though.

A small quiver shook her body, but it wasn't her own. She lifted her head just a little and noticed the red haired fighter next to her was sleeping on her side, facing away from Yang, shivering. It wasn't violent quaking, but clearly her girlfriend was not sleeping comfortably.

"Pyrrha?" Yang whispered concernedly, removing her hands from behind her head and sitting up carefully in the blackness.

Pyrrha jumped slightly in surprise, just enough to be noticed in the dark with the slight light from the moon and stars.

"Y-yes?" Her voice shook clearly, confirming Yang's thoughts, but she decided to ask anyways.

"Are you cold?" Silence answered Yang's question until she felt Pyrrha shiver again.

Yang followed her maternal instincts without hesitation and quietly crawled over to Pyrrha's body, comfortably resting her chest against Pyrrha's back. She wrapped her arm around Pyrrha's waist and used the other to prop her head up.

"Is...is this okay?" Yang suddenly found herself asking, wanting Pyrrha to be comfortable. She was uncertain, never having needed to ask before. But Yang was acutely aware of the fact that she was Pyrrha's first relationship and needed to take special precautions against doing anything that might make her uncomfortable.

An embarrassed, yet drowsy voice echoed in the darkness, and at the same time vibrated in Yang's chest from being so close to her. "Yes. Thank you."

The blonde let out a breath she didn't realize she had been holding in, and relief flooded her senses. Pulling Pyrrha just slightly closer to her, Yang slid the arm that was propping her up under Pyrrha's head, and rested her chin momentarily on the red haired girl's shoulder.

"I'll keep you warm." Yang breathed quietly, lightly lifting her head off of Pyrrha's shoulder, and resting it gently against Pyrrha's back, pushing her forehead into Pyrrha's hair and inhaling the scent of her shampoo mixed with the smells of the forest.

Despite being in a cramped cave, in the middle of the forest, Yang felt much more comfortable and at ease than she had in a long time. Pyrrha just had that effect on Yang's mind and soul, that she hoped, would last for a long, long time. Little did she know, the feeling was mutual, and Pyrrha fell asleep within seconds of both Yang's arms and her warmth surrounding her.

It was safe to say, that even after they woke up, reunited with their teams and finished the mission that feeling would remain. It wasn't the last time they slept in such close proximity to each other, with gratefulness and comfort on both sides.

A/N - Ooh boy second chapter done and out there. We almost didn't make the deadline on this one….

Like we said, life. Working for me, and conventions for Zach. We were pretty good with this one though, at least in my opinion. If you notice anything wrong, it's because we had plans come up, but I hope it doesn't feel rushed.

Please let us know what you think too! We can't just write in a vacuum or it'll just be our crazy ideas bouncing off each other and who knows what that'll make.

Thanks for reading!

-Zach

~Anastasia