Chapter 13

"Faster Jaune!"

Weiss barked the order as she tried to hold the ice wall in place under the barrage of attacks. Ruby was blitzing around, firing off shots as quickly as possible before repositioning, but her attempts to draw away Weiss' attacker just weren't enough.

"Jaune! Hurry up!"

The blonde-haired man was running as fast as he could to catch up, having previously been hurled away without a problem. He came in swinging at his opponent, wild and reckless attacks that deterred nothing, and Weiss' ice wall fell apart moments later.

When Pyrrha came flying through, her fist struck Weiss with enough force to knock her clean off her feet, flying end over end into a rumpled mess. Ruby's attempt to strike failed just as spectacularly as Weiss' defence, Crescent Rose halted mid-swing under Pyrrha's semblance before Ruby received a roundhouse kick to the chest that knocked her away. With her weapon taken from her, all she could do is meagrely raise her fists in defence before a flurry of blows bludgeoned her aura into the red and she was down for the count.

Two down, Pyrrha turned to face Jaune, the last one left.

"Haaaah!" He raised his sword and swung with all his force. Pyrrha sidestepped it easily, and then gave Jaune a nudge on the side.

"You're dropping your shield again."

He panted with exhaustion but raised his shield before swinging again.

"Don't overswing, you leave yourself open after." Pyrrha's reprimand followed Jaune almost knocking himself off his feet with his own swipe. He wasn't normally this bad, but he was so tired by this point he was losing any semblance of form he'd once had. His next attack bounced weakly off Pyrrha's shield. "Not too weak either. Remember, you're cutting through your enemy, but don't do it at the expense of your stance. Check your feet."

She gave him a weak shove as a reminder, only for Jaune to fumble over his shoes and drop to the floor. He landed on his ass, struggling to rise before completely flopping onto the floor. The heavy rise of his chest visible even beneath the metal breastplate.

"Okay, take five."

"Pyrrha… you're a monster…" Ruby gasped. As the adrenaline was fading, so was her ability to stand, and she sat propped against a pillar. "How are you… how do you…" She gave up speaking and made a general waving motion.

Pyrrha chuckled though, taking her own seat. Her breathing was more controlled, less laboured than the others, but despite what it seemed Pyrrha wasn't without limits. More than one bead of sweat was dripping from her forehead. Though admittedly, part of that was due to the much heavier and more covering armour she now wore. There would still be changes she needed to make, the plates weren't fitted exactly right and would rub at inopportune times.

"A lot of training Ruby. Like this, but for a long time."

"Even Yang never trained like this…" Ruby may have had more agility than her older sister, but on account of being two years younger she'd never been pushed as hard as Yang. Their father was also able to identify a lot more with his eldest' fighting style, whereas Ruby had always been taught more effectively by her uncle.

Though Uncle Qrow was always far softer with her anyway, a fact that she often took advantage of to get what she wanted.

"You'll get there in time Ruby." Pyrrha promised. "It'll take a lot of hard work, but you can get there."

A weakly raised thumbs up was all the response Pyrrha got. Instead, Weiss began to rise as she checked the time.

"Well, training is finished for now anyway. Pyrrha can torture us another time. Time now for homework."

The new schedule they had agreed on was being put into practice, and Pyrrha was keeping her reservations to herself. She didn't object truly to the balancing of their different responsibilities, and truly did trust in her teams' opinions. But the itch was always there. Scratching at the back of her mind, telling her it wasn't enough.

She pushed the thought deep down as she moved to grab her belongings. One quick shower later and they returned to their dorm room to start completing the homework that had been piling up with so much of their time spent training instead. Even so, Pyrrha finished it all quickly, and moved onto her next item, the next iteration of her armour.

Refining a few of the joints was at the top of her list, but next would be trying to take it to the next level. Her pen idly sketched the designs of a helmet. Simple, but practical, she would build the first prototype and then iterate after some testing, but that was not all. Her armour was becoming full body, but currently only the plates did so. She would need a chain or scale mail skin to cover the gaps and avoid any vulnerabilities. The extra coverage would also better allow her to use her polarity on herself.

"What's that?" Ruby asked, leaning over out of boredom from her homework.

Pyrrha saw Weiss' frown, but figured she would allow the girl a small break and sate her curiosity. "I'm upgrading my armour to give myself better coverage. There are a few points at the moment where I'm chafing because of tight joints, I need to fix that."

"You kicked our butts in armour that didn't move right…?" Ruby shook her head, pushing away the embarrassment of their loss and focusing instead on the chance to geek out. "But what about Miló? Aren't you going to do anything with your weapon?"

Pyrrha sighed. "I did think about it, but I can't come up with anything special to make it better. I guess using more elemental dust based ammo?"

"Well… maybe I could take a look sometime?" Ruby tapped her fingers together nervously. "I'm sure you know your weapon best, but I could be a second pair of eyes…?"

Pyrrha had never seen Ruby looking more adorable than at that moment, as she was unable to look Pyrrha in the eyes with her request. She smiled, rustling the girls hair and making her squawk with embarrassment. "I think I'd like that Ruby."

"Ok! Ok! Thank you!" She shoved away Pyrrha's hand before crossing her arms and huffing. "I thought with Yang on a different team it would mean my hair could be left alone, but noooo."

"We can't help it." Jaune joked as he scootched closer, putting his own hand out to tussle her hair in unison. "You're too adorable."

"Agh! NO! Let go of me! I'm not adorable! Honest!" Ruby complained, adorably.

At her desk, Weiss grumbled.

_/\_TIG_/\_

"Who can tell me the equation for estimating Grimm density around a settlement of 100 people?"

Doctor Oobleck looked around the class. A small number of hands went up, the usual suspects. Weiss raised her hand with pride, eagerly shooting up as she tried to shift into his view any time he turned his head. She was a smart student to be sure. But Oobleck didn't want to choose people that were always correct, engagement from all student kept them from falling behind.

Pyrrha had been the second to raise her hand. Her enthusiasm for the class was surprisingly little compared to how often right she was. In the first class he'd had with her, Oobleck had noted how disinterested and distracted she had been, as Glynda had asked him to watch for. But since she'd had a discussion with the girl, her attitude had turned around.

Somewhat.

Pyrrha was still clearly an advanced student, and was often unchallenged by the questions he raised. Occasionally, he would slip in more advanced questions to make her struggle and actively participate in the class, but usually she would casually raise her hand and just as casually give a textbook answer when called upon. He passed over her.

There was some potential elsewhere. Ruby Rose was a struggling student, having advanced two years on her combat prowess and missing out on a great deal of academic development, but she did do her best to try and follow along with what she could. Her elder sister, for all of her rebellious persona, was a dutiful student, no doubt as a result of having one teacher as a parent and another as an uncle.

Team CRDL as a whole were very typical teenaged students. Sometimes they did their homework, though clearly begrudgingly, and sat comfortably towards the lowest end of the class scores. But not the bottom, that spot was reserved for…

"Jaune Arc!"

The man panicked, just as he did every time Oobleck called on him. Ruby Rose was lacking in two years of education, but still held some solid fundamentals. Jaune Arc was woefully under educated in Grimm specific topics.

"If you could give the equation please?"

"Um, yeah it's, uh…" He looked around for guidance, something Oobleck pretended not to notice. "…A2B2=C?"

Laughter rose up in the classroom, and Oobleck stifled his groan. "Mr Arc, that would be the equation for the sides of a right-angled triangle, and also wrong. It is C squared." The laughs grew louder. "Everybody settle down. And Mr Arc, please try to keep up to date with your studies, the equation is on page 42 of your text book."

_/\_TIG_/\_

Night came quickly, though as it was nearing the weekend not all were asleep. Team PWJR had split up for their own purposes in their designated free time. Ruby was with her sister, Pyrrha was in Beacons workshop modifying her armour, and Jaune was… reading comics in his bedroom.

Weiss left the bathroom, a towel wrapped around her hair to see him obliviously lost in his own world. She scowled. She was scowling a lot more these days, and certainly a lot more than she had expected to.

"What are you doing?"

Both the words and the venom snapped Jaune from his trance. He looked at her sheepishly, pulling the comic away with embarrassment. "Um, uh… just, reading."

"Reading… a comic book? What are you, eight?"

He flinched and put the comic away. "Sorry. Um, what did you want?"

"What do I want?" Her eyes narrowed, and a deep rage built inside of her. "What I want is to go back in time to have a different partner. What I want is to have someone who doesn't act like just as much of a child as the literal child. I want someone who is actually able to defend themselves and won't be a liability for me, someone who won't get me killed by Grimm because I have to put my neck on the line to save them instead. Someone who can answer a question correctly in class, any question. Who does their study like they're supposed to. I want a partner who meets the standards this school expects of them, but no. I've got you!"

Weiss was panting, the fury inside of her was far greater than she'd ever realised, and Jaune's hurt face reflected it. The rage inside Weiss still burned, but it felt redirected at herself. She'd lost control of her emotions and she hated herself for it.

"I'm leaving." She grabbed her scroll off the side and shut the door behind her with a slam. The slam wasn't intentional, but her mood was firing off so much she'd not been able to stop herself. Yet another failure on her part.

When she reached the library, she found a corner of peace and quiet for herself. Her hair was still damp and drying, but aside from a few strange looks nobody cared, the rest of her outfit being her usual white dress. Opening her scroll she swiped through to see the last few messages she had sent, mainly off to Winter. Updates about how school was going, asking how things were back in Atlas, and complaints about her partner. All responses were short, clipped, and that's if she ever got anything back.

Save for when she complained about Jaune.

It was one of the longest messages she had received from Winter in a long while, admonishing her for acting childish with her complaints instead of seeking corrective action. Weiss had felt ashamed when reading it but didn't agree with her. Why should it be Weiss' fault that Jaune didn't meet the standards of the school he attended? She held the scroll in her hand, her thumb hovering over the first letter of the message she had mentally prepared.

But she didn't. She didn't type even a word.

The messages from Winter sat before her like a wall before she closed the screen. For a brief moment, she considered who else she could message. Her brother? Hah, anything she told him would become a weapon against her. Her father would just use it to pressure her into returning home. He'd tell her about how she had failed, how the entire venture had been a waste of time. As for her mother? Weiss doubted she'd even see anything she said.

What did she even have to say to her mother? Open herself up in search of comfort? It was so pathetic she couldn't even laugh. No, her mother had long since closed herself off from any of them. Too lost in a drunken haze of guilt and self-pity.

The Scroll in her hand shook as her hand tightened. She flinched when she realised what she was doing, and put the scroll down on the floor. A long sigh escaped her lips as she let her head fall into her hands. The anger was fading away into just sheer tiredness…

_/\_TIG_/\_

Pyrrha watched as the printers finished their work. The metal was red hot before it was blasted with gas to rapid cool it. She kept an eye on the machine's temperature gauges as the machine did its thing, keeping all levels within acceptable parameters. This was a process that Pyrrha had first been taught in school, but had become quite adept at in her own spare time. A green light beeped, and she pulled the final piece from the machine.

She laid it out with the rest of the assembled sections, doing final checks to make sure everything aligned with each other. Mirrored pieces should have had no problem, but one could never be too sure.

The armour that laid before her looked nothing like she'd ever attempted before. The gauntlets around her fists and arms had been reinforced but lengthened to give full coverage up the rest of her arm, tying in with pauldrons over her shoulder. Around her chest she now had coverings up to a wide neck hole for mobility, a necessity for her fighting style and to not drop too much speed. The plates dipped down her torso until they became a metal skirt of loose flaps, her red sash sitting beneath it.

The skirt hung over her leg armour, now stretching from just below her hips all the way down to her toes. She was fully encased from head to toe, especially as she admired the final piece. The helmet was an old-fashioned design, traditional but functional. Full coverage around her neck with slits for her ears, and an open front face save for a metal bridge from brow to nose.

She rolled her neck, and tugged at the metal sleeve she wore over her body. A mixture of standard chain mail and something closer to a mesh fibre for flexibility. With a raise of her hands, she began to pull.

A shimmering black aura formed around the metal piece by piece as they began to lift. The shoes moved first, lifting from the bench and flying to Pyrrha's feet that she raised to meet them. They slipped on, fitting snugly and locking into place. Next came the ankles, the shins, the knees.

Up and up the pieces went, locking in around her body limb by limb. The chest went on as two pieces, locking in from the front and the back, her semblance moving to pull the metal buckles and snap them tight and in place. Shoulders, then arms, and finally hands. The metal gloves felt just right around her, the comforting protection of the metal skin on her body. The final piece remained.

She did not pull with her polarity for the helmet, instead she took strong and steady steps to the table where she had set it down. It looked back at her, calling. She plucked it, and with two hands raised it over her head. A slit through the top let her ponytail out, pulled through using metal clips in her hair.

The helmet fit perfectly, and at last the armour was assembled around her.

She took another step, flexing her hands and knees for a final inspection of mobility. Before she executed a roundhouse kick against a nearby pillar. It shattered, the black aura of her polarity shining beneath the concrete dust in the air. Another pull of her semblance flung her weapons to her. Miló and Akoúo̱ sat strong in her hands, and she shut her eyes as she relished the feeling.

For the first time, in a long time, she felt a brief semblance of safety.