Chapter 2: The Next Morning

When Yang returned to the land of the living the next morning, or was it noon? She could never tell, not that it really mattered, she wished so desperately that she could stay where she was lying for a bit longer. It was so soft and warm, a far cry from the rickety beds or the ravaged couch that she usually fell into after a long night of fetching and bandit hunting.

Wait… that meant that this wasn't any of the beds or the couch, which meant….

She opened her eyes to the sight of Blake, who just started to open hers as well, leading Yang to the realization that she was on top of Blake. Okay, Yang had briefly entertained fantasies similar to this, but she was never serious about it, especially not with Blake. Not that she didn't want to, Yang thought Blake could use a cuddle given her rough upbringing, but Blake was just as likely to pull out some hidden sharp thing and stab Yang out of reflex as she was to scream out of surprise, getting abducted from your home to be raised as an assassin for Atlas kind of does that to you.

Thankfully Blake didn't stab her, but she did scream and pull out a knife.

"WAITWAITWAIT! BLAKE STOP IT'S ME! YANG!" Yang shouted out in haste while clumsily getting herself off of Blake and backing into the wall.

"…Yang? Oh. Uhhhh, sorry. That was just… reflex" Blake murmured sheepishly before sheathing the knife. "Just… reflex", she said again under her breath, more for herself than for Yang.

The air was tense for a moment. Yang knew Blake didn't want to be reminded of her past, but things like this, which no one had control over, still opened old wounds for the ex-assassin. The moment was short lived however, as a voice that would normally be shrill and grating if it weren't drowsily slurring half its words cut in.

"Yang Xiao Long what on Pandora is so important that you had to scream while I was sleeping AGAIN?!" Weiss inquired, now livid at the blonde lummox having interrupted her slumber twice within twenty four hours.

"Blake startled me, but it's fine now. She said it was just reflex", Yang replied evenly, hoping to defuse the situation

"Reflex? What do you…. oh." Weiss and Yang now both looked at Blake, who was deflated in shame, her eyes downcast. This wasn't the first time something like this had happened, and Blake predicted it would be far from the last.

"I didn't mean…." was all Blake could get out before Weiss and Yang sat on either side of her, arms around her and both of them shushing her

"We know you didn't. It's no big deal. Besides, you're gonna need more than that dinky thing if you wanna take me down! Yang replied, first tenderly as she was comforting Blake, then proudly as she boasted about her apparent durability

"What Yang said, you've more than shown that you want this to be behind you. There's no sense in faulting you for this." Weiss added, much more softly than she had been speaking before"

"Thanks, you two. I don't know where I would be without you." Blake replied, smiling softly.

"Oh pfff, it's nothing, that's what friends do-" Yang started her reply, and was promptly cut off by a red and black boot kicking open the door to the bedroom followed by its owner who dashed into the room.

"GOOOOOD MORNING TEAM RWBY!" Ruby yelled out loud enough to wake up the other three a little more. With her exuberant yell, the heavy feelings of the moment before were swiftly shot down and left in a ditch to rot, a similar fate to the one the bandits they confronted last night faced. "As leader of the team I have compiled a list of wonderful activities for us today!", she said cheerfully as she hefted a binder up and onto the table of the room with some text on the cover scratched out and replaced with a red, hastily scrawled "BEST DAY EVER".

"Is that my binder?" Weiss asked suspiciously

"Uhhh ye-no, no it's not" Ruby answered hastily.

"Okay, what's first on that list?" Weiss asked again, deciding not to bother calling out Ruby's disregard for private property.

"A visit to the gun show!" Ruby said excitedly, pointing to the scribbles next to the written number one on the inside of the binder

"Ohhh no, none of us are awake enough to drive, and besides. We got one right here", Yang replied as she flexed her arms ostentatiously. "Eh? Ehhhh?" she urged, hoping for a smile or a giggle. Instead all she got was a collective groan and Ruby, of all people, slapping a palm to her face in annoyance. "Ugh, everyone's a critic" Yang spat, pretending to be offended.

"I think she means the one just outside town", Blake chimed in helpfully, also diverting the topic from Yang's awful attempt at bragging about her muscles.

"Well what're waiting for let's go!" With that, Ruby tried to dash out of the room before Weiss yanked her back into the room by her cape.

"Not so fast, we still need a bite to eat, and I am not going out looking like this" Weiss ranted. As if to illustrate her point, Blake's stomach growled like an overgrown stalker, and Ruby got a look at Weiss's normally prim and proper stark white hair in a frazzled mess.

"Uh, oh, yeah, uh… right! I'll be waiting in the workshop then." Ruby stammered sheepishly and dashed out of the room, leaving no evidence of her presence save for a few rose petals.

"How can you be so sure that you two are sisters?" Blake asked

"Easily" Yang replied nonchalantly, "Well, half-sisters, she takes after her mom a lot more if I were to guess".

END OF CHAPTER 2

A/N: All the teenaged characters of RWBY are in about their early 20's, because… REASONS!, and faunus exist here because I'm too lazy to think up the equivalent of that in the borderlands universe.