Why is it so hard to tell her?

Ruby sighed as she slouched in her chair, sliding down so silver eyes were barely above the table's edge.

It'd been nearly a week since Ruby had talked with Weiss about her problem. The advice her partner had given was sound, yet Ruby hadn't worked up the courage to actually take it. I should just tell her up front and that's it! That makes sense! But why is it so hard?

Ruby had tried to tell Blake about her little screw up. The problem was that whenever she so much as thought about telling her teammate, her voice just sort of… died. It was like words wouldn't come out as everything that might screw up in their friendship went through Ruby's head at light speed. Thoughts about Blake being angry, or hurt at the betrayal of trust rocketed through her mind, freezing Ruby in place.

"How am I even supposed to bring it up?" Ruby despondently muttered into her collar. "Sorry Blake for outing your closest secret that you trusted me with…" Worse yet, the longer that Ruby agonized over how to say it, the more hurt Blake would get that'd she waited this long to tell her. Just thinking like this was starting to depress Ruby.

Well, maybe I could just never tell Blake?

If nobody told her, perhaps Ruby's screw up would shift to the wayside. Weiss isn't going to tell on me, I think? And Yang doesn't know at all! Team JNPR had promised to keep it secret, so it sounded like a sound plan to Ruby.

Except for the vast amounts of shame she was feeling from it. Or the fact that it was becoming very uncomfortable to so much as talk to her. Ruby was rapidly becoming a jittery mess around Blake, scared that some little thing she might do or say would let the Faunus know she had messed up. I think it's been two days since we hung out, outside of classes n'stuff…

Usually the two would spend a few hours just chatting every day outside the rest of their team, on the school grounds, the most popular spot was the library. Suddenly Ruby was finding excuses to not go to their little meet ups, homework was taking too long with Weiss, or she wasn't feeling good.

So other than eroding Ruby's friendship with Blake, the plan was working flawlessly. Except the point was to not lose that friendship. Kinda failing on that point…

"Maybe I should tell Blake?"

"Tell me what?" The sudden appearance of Blake's voice from behind caused Ruby to nearly jump out of her seat. "Are you okay?"

"Y-y-yeah, I'm fi-i-ine!" Anxiety started to set in with the realization that Ruby was alone with Blake in their dorm room. "100% ok-k-kay!"

A single eyebrow rose in clear disbelief while amber eyes focused in on Ruby as the teen fidgeted in her chair. "Ruby, you've been acting… strange."

"Strange? Pfft!" The younger girl weakly waved away the suggestion. "E-e-everything has been normal!"

Blake stared at Ruby, her eyes honed in on the girl.

And stared.

Could she know something? Ruby was freaking out internally, rooted to the flimsy chair, cold sweat forming as her instincts were screaming at her to run. Run away from the problem and not look back. Run until the problem wasn't causing her hands to shake.

Ruby was half way to the door, a trail of rose petals following her before Blake spoke up. "Do you remember our promise, Ruby?"

The girl in question barely stopped herself from being flung out of the room in time to hear the question. Promise? "Uh…"

"I promised you that I wouldn't run away again." Blake simply stated after a moment. "I've spent more of my life running then I honestly should have, but I still made that promise because you asked me to." Ruby felt the soft weight of Blake's hand on her shoulder as she stood rock still, listening to her teammate. "I know what it's like to run from problems. And as someone who knows what it's like to run away, I can tell you, it doesn't solve anything."

There was a long pause as Ruby debated between continuing to flee or to turn around at Blake before she continued. "I probably shouldn't be the one giving this sort of advice, given that I, well, that I do it." The Faunus sighed loudly as she let go of Ruby's shoulder. "Forget I said anything."

The team leader turned around finally, watching the retreating form of Blake as she went to sit down at her own desk. "…You're right." Ruby barely squeaked out the words, which nevertheless grabbed the teen's attention. "Blake, I, uh, have something to t-t-tell you."

Blake simply nodded, giving Ruby her undivided attention. Ruby, for her own part, shuffled lamely towards one of the beds before plopping down. Trying to open her mouth was hard, and Ruby couldn't even attempt to look at Blake, the younger teen's eyes drawn to her hands in her lap as they tightly held onto the hem of her sleeves. It felt like hours were going by as Ruby tried to will herself to speak up when it was probably only seconds. When she finally spoke, it wasn't the words Ruby meant to say at all: "You're gonna hate me."

"Why would you think that?" Ruby's eyes were involuntarily drawn towards the source, finding concerned amber eyes focused on her, and a slightly upturned mouth stitched across the Faunus' face – as if the notion was beyond the realms of possibility. "You're my closest friend, I don't think there is anything you can do to change that." Blake's voice sounded about as warm as Yang's did, Ruby couldn't help but feel a little better. "I'm all ears." If I wasn't so freaked out that'd be funny since she has an extra set n'stuff.

"…I-I-I told-d-d te-e-eam JN-N-NPR that you're, you're a-a-a Faunus…" Ruby's eyes darted from Blake to her knees, as they touched the bottom of her chin, her arms wrapped around them. The young team leader's hands clenched as she expected some kind of disappointment. Tears were already welling up in her eyes-

"Is that it?" Blake's very confused voice penetrated into Ruby's head. "Pyrrha, Jaune, Ren and Nora know I'm a Faunus?" Ruby numbly nodded. "Okay."

"Okay…?" Tears were forgotten as Ruby stared, gob-smacked at the teen. "Y-y-you're okay with it?"

The Faunus merely nodded. "I was going to have to tell them sooner or later." Blake shrugged. "I suppose I won't have to worry about it anymore." It took Ruby a moment to realize that Blake was actually not angry. Or sad. In fact, she seemed to be taking it rather well. I guess that this isn't so bad. As Ruby tried to collect her thoughts, Blake continued. "Anything else?"

Ruby dumbly nodded, only for Blake to let out a huge sigh. "I was really worried that I had done something…"

"Done something?" Ruby parroted back. "OH!" It dawned on Ruby that avoiding Blake for a week could probably give the wrong impression. "No-no-no!" Tears were forgotten as Ruby hugged Blake tightly. "I really didn't mean to hurt you! Please forgive meee!"

It was almost instantaneous, Blake's arms wrapped around Ruby bringing her into a snug embrace. "I forgive you, promise to tell me next time? I didn't like losing my friend for a week."

"I promise!"

AU: Like an inexplicable Godzilla sequel/reboot/remake, I'm back.

I'm hoping that this was a good idea. As opposed to my normal route, this specific subplot had a lack of real drama. In fact, it was fairly drama-less in that Blake was more or less okay with it.

Honestly, I've felt like the quality of Dilation has fallen considerably in the past ten chapters and more than once in the past few weeks I've considered stopping the fic altogether. I'm hoping this chapter is back up to my old level of writing, though it's not quite as light hearted and funny. I really need to get back to that. Tell me what you guys and gals think, please!

As some of you avid Ladybug fans out there know, there is technically another chapter 54 out there. Or at least, there was. In fact I know about it because I had quite a number of PMs in under an hour begging me very specifically to not do what had been done in that chapter. The author in question wanted me to go a certain direction with Dilation that I was very uncomfortable with. While I'm glad he enjoys my story as much as he does, as you can see, I did not follow his suggestion.

Thank you all for reading, have a great day!