“Is he…. Okay?” Ruby hesitantly asked as she sat down for lunch.

Team RWBY found themselves joining team JNPR at a table once more, but the sight of their blond haired leader pressing his face into the tabletop instead of eating or arguing with Second Thoughts was a bit strange.

Her sister rolled her eyes. “I know Ms. G is a bit of a hard a-”

Weiss slapped a hand over the blonde’s mouth with a glare. “Ms. Goodwitch may be a bit of a… disciplinarian, but it cannot be so bad as to leave you like this, Arc.” Figures that Weiss would downplay just how horrible detention with Ms. Goodwitch must be. Had she ever even been in detention? Not that Ruby had ever been the sort of student to suffer through it either, but she’d had to go with her dad to pick Yang up from detention before, and that was bad enough!

Jaune had been tight-lipped about the reason for his detentions, but apparently it had something to do with him slipping out of team JNPR’s room late at night and was somehow related to the revocation of the resident criminals’ “free roaming privileges”. Nobody was exactly upset about that last part, with Yang even offering their friend a fist bump in congratulations, but it would be odd for his current mood to be over a pair of thieves he barely knew.

It seemed Jaune was still not in a talkative mood though, as he simply groaned, not even bothering to look at them.

“Our fearless leader is just exhausted from sneaking out in the middle of the night to clear the Emerald forest of grimm again!” Nora exclaimed. “You should have seen him getting back to the dorm, he was covered in blood and guts and he had a crazed look in his eyes, like he was ready to slaughter them for even longer but had run out of prey!”

Ren sighed. “Nora, none of that happened. He stayed in our dorm with a haunted look on his face until he fell asleep. Besides, grimm don’t leave blood and guts behind when you kill them.”

His comments went ignored by Nora as she stuffed her lunch down her throat.

Pyrrha cleared her throat to draw their attention. Poor girl. It must be tough being the only sane one on the team. At least Ruby could be happy that her team was…

Was…

Hmm. Her team wasn’t sane either, were they? Maybe she and Pyrrha could do some bonding over having teams full of crazy people!

“Jaune is just… a bit concerned about a certain aspect of the punishment he’s receiving.” The grimace on her face showed that she was worried about it too.

“Is it not just the detentions?” Blake asked between bites.

“Well, it seems that she has decided to… inform his father.” She looked at her partner with pity clear on her face.

“And?” Yang looked between the two of them. “My dad got called about my ‘lack of discipline’,” she rolled her eyes and added air quotes, “all the time. It was never that bad.”

“Yang, I don’t think most people have the benefit of their uncle working for the school and being the one to call their parents.” Ruby reminded her sister. She’d gotten teased in the past over that. How she must be getting special treatment from Uncle Qrow. Shows what they know though, the only ‘special treatment’ that she and Yang got was Uncle Qrow embarrassing them all the time…

It seemed like there might be more to the situation, but Pyrrha looked hesitant to share any more with them. Luckily, that was when Second Thoughts appeared with a flash of light.

The blue semblance glared at Jaune. “Why do I have to explain this? This is completely unrelated to me!”

She couldn’t make out the groans that Jaune replied with, but apparently Second could.

“I mean yeah it’s my fault you’re in detention, but you’re worried about the consequences for your actions taken before I even manifested!”

Jaune made a rude gesture that her dad and Yang told her not to repeat.

Second rolled his eyes and accepted that he was the spokesman. But he hesitated, a hint of fright clear on even his face.

Just what could have them so worked up about Jaune’s dad coming?!

“You see…” Second began, “The problem with Mr. Arc being informed of the detention, is that he probably doesn’t know that Jaune is attending this school.”

The rest of the group, excepting Pyrrha, didn’t know what to make of that if the look they shared was any indication. Though Blake was mysteriously pale…

“What do you mean by that? Surely any parent would want to know what school their children are attending.” Weiss frowned.

Blake got paler.

“Well, I don’t imagine your father was very keen on you coming here Weiss, but he would have had some idea that you were going to pursue this path before you came here, right? You had to pay for your tutors, and set aside time for those lessons…”

Weiss frowned at the mention of her dad. Apparently he had cut off her cards, which was why they’d declined during the Vytal festival. Ruby had been doing her best to be supportive, but Weiss kept insisting that she could handle it herself, keeping details to a minimum…

“That would be correct. However, it doesn’t answer my question.”

Second nodded. “The point I’m getting at is that you spent some time preparing. The circumstances for each of you coming to Beacon are different, but it’s not exactly odd for you to be here. Well, most of you anyway.”

Blake’s face was as white as Weiss’ hair now. Did she need to see the nurse?

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“Jaune, on the other hand,” Second continued, “notably did not spend his time preparing. One might say that he was very much the opposite of prepared for life at Beacon. I think just about anyone other than him would conclude that stealing the family heirloom weapon, running off to Vale with no training at all, getting forged transcripts, and taking the entrance exam without any aura would be suicidal at best.”

The table was silent for a moment.

With Jaune still face down on the table, they all slowly turned to Pyrrha.

The champion fighter gave them an awkward grin. “I unlocked his aura and he’s been training really hard?”

She probably meant for that to be reassuring, but it came out as more of a question of whether or not that would make up for the many problems with what they’d just learned.

Ren sighed. “Honestly, that explains a lot.”

“You went into initiation without any-” Nora started off with a scream, but luckily Ren managed to silence her before she went revealing Jaune’s secrets to the whole cafeteria. She quickly pulled her partner’s hand off of her mouth before continuing. “Only our fearless leader could do something like that!”

“Are you insane?” Blake asked, disbelief clear on her face.

“Woah there, I don’t think you have much room to talk,” Second frowned. “His brand of insanity is just a bit different from yours.”

“I didn’t rush into a grimm filled forest with no aura!” Blake scowled, pushing on the point.

“You didn’t, but I have a feeling that if your parents were getting called, you might feel about the same as he does right now.”

Blake froze, the color draining from her face once more.

Ruby wanted to ask what that was about, but Weiss slammed her hands down on the table, demanding attention. “You used forged transcripts to get into an institution as prestigious as this?” Part of Ruby was worried about where her partner was going with that line of thought… “Once the staff finds out they could have you expelled, especially if they’re already this mad at you!”

Ruby let out a sigh of relief. Weiss had really come a long way since the start of the school year…

Second rolled his eyes. “Do you really think they don’t know the transcripts were forged? If they didn’t know as soon as they looked at them, they definitely know now. No way they wouldn’t have looked into his past once he unlocked me.”

“And they just accepted that?” Yang asked, not upset but definitely surprised.

Ruby flushed as Second pointed at her. “Look at your team leader and tell me that they care about how things are supposed to be done. I can’t say I’ve read the rulebook, but I’m pretty sure a 15 year old being admitted isn’t standard.”

Ruby found herself laughing nervously. “I guess I’m just that amazing…?”

Nora nodded with the utmost confidence. “You definitely are, but Jauney is even more amazing! You at least had training before you got accepted!”

“I’ve been making sure he gets caught up!” Pyrrha defended her partner.

But if he’d gone from no training at all to a bit below Ms. Goodwitch’s standards in such a short time, Pyrrha must be a really good teacher… Maybe she should get in on that…

“Though the path Jaune has taken to reach this point is… concerning and ill advised, he has made it here all the same,” Ren spoke up. “He has been doing well so far, and if the staff settled with detention and calling his father, then I doubt they’ll do anything more drastic. I’m afraid I’m lost as to why his father coming is causing such a…” he looked at his team leader’s rather pathetic state, “...adverse reaction. He’ll likely be upset about the stolen weapon and what I assume to be running away from home without no contact for months, but shouldn’t we be expecting relief when he finds out that Jaune is fine?”

“Well, I think most parents in that sort of situation would definitely be relieved to find out their kid is still alive and well,” Second pointedly looked at Blake for some reason, “but Jaune comes from a long line of huntsmen. Crocea Mors belonged to some ancestor of his and has been passed down through the generations. They have a family crest they still use. And yet Jaune, who clearly has the desire to be a huntsman, came to Beacon with forged transcripts, no training, and basically no knowledge of aura. Why would that be?”

Pyrrha’s eyes widened. Guess even his partner didn’t know about this part…

“Are you saying that his father didn’t want him to become a huntsman?” The redhead asked.

“I can’t say that for sure, but it’s been true in other timelines, and I think it lines up with the evidence in this one. Well Jaune?” He prompted, poking at the blond.

For the first time since she sat down, Jaune finally pulled his head up.

He looked… well, not terrible, but… she could tell he hadn’t slept well.

“That’s about right. Dad… didn’t exactly approve of my plan to become a huntsman.”

Ruby couldn’t even imagine it. All of her life she had wanted to become a huntress, and even after her mom had died her dad and Uncle Qrow had been super supportive of her dream! She didn’t know what she would have done if they’d told her no and she’d been forced to figure it all out on her own…

But beyond that… she didn’t really know what to say. Obviously Jaune was worried about how his dad was going to react to the news. Would he give in and be supportive now that Jaune had actually made some progress? Would he demand that Jaune come home with him, wherever home was for them? That would split team JNPR apart! Jaune could just say no, refuse to listen to his dad, but…

As someone who was down a parent, could she really suggest such a thing? There wasn’t a day that went by where she didn’t think about her mom. Yeah, there was a big difference between a big argument causing a rift and what had happened to Summer Rose, but… family was just as important as a team. Ruby’s team basically was her family. Literally in Yang’s case, and a bit of a dysfunctional mess with Weiss and Blake, but she loved them all the same.

She couldn’t imagine a scenario where her dad told her it was him or team RWBY, but with the way Second had laid things out… Jaune might have to make an impossible choice.

“We’re not gonna let that happen!” She declared.

The rest of the group stared at her, Seconds mouth open and his eyes annoyed.

Had she interrupted him? She had sort of gotten lost in her thoughts. Oops…

A blush crept up her face, but she forced her way forward. “If your dad has a problem with you being a huntsman, then we’ll just have to change his mind!”

Jaune gave a half-hearted grin. “Relax, Ruby. Who knows? Maybe he’s relaxed a bit since I last saw him. I’m sure he’ll come to scold me for getting detention, and for stealing Crocea Mors, and for getting forged transcripts…” the further he went on listing things, the more the hope in his eyes faded. His grin looked forced. “Anyway, I’m sure it’ll all work out.” He awkwardly laughed.

She wasn’t convinced though. Turning towards Jaune’s partner, she made sure to give Pyrrha a determined look.

Pyrrha looked confused, but her fellow normal person definitely understood what she was trying to say without words!

They were going to make Mr. Arc accept Jaune as a huntsman, whether he liked it or… well, they’d make him like it!

Probably.

She hoped…