A/N: Better late than never, that's what I always said!

Beta-reader & security consultant: Jiu-Jitsu Dude

Chapter Two

"Just look at this mess! We totally wrecked this place, didn't we?" A tall blonde girl asked her opponent while gesturing at a slightly demolished sparring arena, amusement clear in her voice.

Her opponent sighed.

"I believe it was mostly you, Yang."

"Well, maybe." The blonde grinned devilishly. "Maybe I did get carried away a bit, but only because of that hair-grab you've pulled, missy!" She pointed an accusing finger at the other girl. "My, my, who would've guessed that such a nice girl could fight so dirty?"

"I'm sor…"

"And I loved it!" Yang's excited exclamation cut the apology short. "Well, not the hair-grab part, but everything else. Gotta admit, you surprised me, Pyrrha! Then again, I probably should've guessed that you had some tricks up your sleeve," she winked at her, "with you being the invincible champ and all, but still!"

"Thank you?" Pyrrha offered, unsure. Knowing Yang, some sort of barb was coming next.

"You're welcome, girl! Sparring with you is always fun, but today was on a whole new level!"

"Any second now…"

"But the surprise was the best part! Honestly, I never took you for the type of girl who would fight like a mean bitch when pressed, but I did push you pretty hard, didn't I?"

"…aaand here's the barb. Still, she's not entirely wrong, I might've gone a bit too far this time."

Because they both were ranked amongst the top fighters of their year, Pyrrha often found herself pitted against Yang in sparring matches during Professor Goodwitch's Advanced Combat Theory class – the blonde girl affectionately called it "Big Miss G's Fight Club". Pyrrha was able to win the first couple of matches with relative ease, but with each spar they had, Yang adapted and was getting increasingly harder to defeat.

Pyrrha had to admit that today's match went a bit closer than she would've liked to the ridiculous name that Yang had given to this class.

She smiled at the blonde apologetically.

"Yes, Yang, you had me on the ropes and I really didn't like it, so I guess I got carried away too. I'm sorry."

"Don't be! If anything, I should thank you for going all out on me!" Yang emphasized her words by pressing her hands to the chest before grinning again. "And besides, I know why you were so feisty this time."

Pyrrha steeled herself for another quip with the practiced ease of a celebrity used to dealing with both public and press. After all, jokes and witty banter were Yang's meat and drink, so one could either learn to take them in stride – or just kill the blonde imp, because there was no changing her, and Pyrrha Nikos would never get that angry over some good-natured teasing!

"You couldn't just lose in front of your man, now could you?" Yang finished, elbowing Pyrrha in the side.

And just like that, all her composure was shattered and Pyrrha found herself staring blankly at the grinning blonde. Apparently, her experience was not nearly enough to prepare her for the phenomena of Yang Xiao-Long.

Yang moved a bit closer, throwing her arm around the redhead's shoulders.

"What's up with the dumb look? Are you trying to feign innocence or did you really believe that you were subtle about your… advances on our resident Ladykiller overthe past couple of weeks?" Yang waggled her eyebrows at the word.

"Actually, I did. Damn!"

During the last two weeks, she'd taken every opportunity to spend time with her frustratingly oblivious team leader and made various attempts to give him a hint about how she felt about him. And up until this moment, she was sure that she'd been discreet about her actions.

"Gotta hand it to you, girl, you have guts! Clearly, you're not very good at this business…

"Thanks, Yang…"

"… but you tried your best to get through his thick skull… well, in your own adorable, innocent way." Yang flashed another smile at Pyrrha.

Pyrrha felt the urge to shake her head to clear her vision, because for a moment she almost saw a certain devious brunette in Yang's place.

"If those two ever met, I'm done for. 'Invincible Girl' my butt, they'd roast me alive!"

Yang's expression became a little more serious. "You're a real champ, you know that? We're all rooting for you, even the Ice Queen said something about wishing you the best of luck if that would mean getting Jaune out of her hair." For a moment, she appeared to be considering something. "Well, she used her rich-girl talk, but I'm pretty sure that's what she meant."

Pyrrha felt her cheeks heating up from embarrassment at being so transparent. It stung a little to basically have her crush sublet to her by his crush, but the support was nice regardless.

"The problem is, our Vomit Boy is dense as a rock, so I can tell you: he didn't pick up on any of the hints you've thrown at him."

"Oh, that's just wonderful! So everyone got the hint except for the only person I meant to!"

The screech of metal being bent with extreme force interrupted her miserable thoughts. She wiped her head to the source of the sound just in time to see the faint purple glow of Professor Goodwitch's Semblance dissipating around one of the protective field emitters.

They'd really done a number on the sparring arena during their match.

The Professor adjusted her glasses and said quietly, "That should do it," before tapping a few quick commands on her Scroll and turning to the audience, who were chatting animatedly amongst themselves.

"Attention, class." She said evenly.

The hum of voices and sounds of laughter died out immediately. It wasn't like a full auditorium of trained fighters were afraid of their teacher, terrifying as she was…. well, on second thought, it was at least partly the reason for such obedience. She waited for a moment after everyone settled down before speaking.

"While the system's resetting for a new spar, let's review our latest match. I hope you all have paid attention to it, because it illustrates several important points. First off, Miss Nikos, Miss Xiao-Long – excellent performance, both of you." She gave a short nod to the two girls standing at the edge of the arena. Pyrrha nodded back politely, while Yang grinned and pumped her fist in the air. "Now, let's break it down and see what we have learned from it." She tapped another command on her Scroll and the big screen that was showing combatants' Aura levels and timer during the match now started to show a replay of their spar. "Miss Xiao-Long, I commend your ability to find a solution against the range advantage that Miss Nikos's arsenal gives her. Using the recoil of your weapon to cross the distance to your opponent and then attempting to disarm them is a rather straightforward, yet effective tactic."

"Straightforward, yet effective? You don't say!" Pyrrha thought with unusual sarcasm and winced slightly, the image of Yang closing in at pretty much muzzle velocity all too fresh in her mind. No matter how many times you saw it, it was always terrifying.

"By knocking Miss Nikos's weapon out of her hands and pushing inside of her guard you've created an excellent opportunity for yourself to force hand-to-hand combat on your opponent and have taken full advantage of it." The combat instructor continued, her eyes scanning the audience to make sure that everyone was paying attention.

"Oh, she took advantage of it, alright!"

Pyrrha fought back the urge to scowl. Naturally, she shielded her head when she saw a fist flying directly into her face, and honestly, who could blame her for falling for that feint? As the old saying went: "Aura or not, a solid kick to the head will make 'em flinch", and a face punch from Yang Xiao-Long would've most certainly made her "flinch". But the freight train she was expecting to ram her shield apparently had another destination, because it hit her right arm instead, sending Milo clattering on the floor – and that was just the beginning of her troubles.

Meanwhile, the screen started to show the next segment of footage. Pyrrha looked up and winced.

"Here it comes…"

"Now, class, I want to take this opportunity to point out the importance of hand-to-hand combat for you. Everyone of you will eventually find yourself in a situation when you'll be forced to fight unarmed, and mastery over at least the basics of hand-to-hand combat might spell difference between life and death for you." There was some awkward shuffling in the audience caused by Professor Goodwitch gravely serious tone. "It's a common trend amongst Hunters-in-training to become overly reliant on their weapons, but rest assured…" she gave the students sitting in the amphitheater a clipped smile, "… I'll put every effort into breaking this bad habit."

Pyrrha heard a giggle beside her and glanced at Yang who muttered: "Poor Rubes…" At first, she didn't understand, but then she looked up the rows and saw team RWBY's leader cradling her scythe as if trying to console a baby, and smiled despite her mood: Ruby Rose and her affection towards weapons, especially her scythe, was becoming one of the Academy's legends already. Poor Ruby indeed.

"Miss Nikos's performance illustrates my point perfectly. When she was disarmed by her opponent, she didn't lost her composure and managed to launch effective, if a bit unorthodox, counterattack."

"I honestly don't know if she's being sarcastic right now or if she genuinely believes that I had everything under control."

The screen dutifully showed another segment of the footage. "Close and personal" was Yang's domain, and the stone-faced Pyrrha on the screen was having a hard time withstanding the flurry of punches and kicks, but she wasn't about to give up, and their fight quickly became a furious brawl. Knees, elbows, headbutts - everything was permitted as long as the Aura was above the "red" level, and so she used it all.

She felt an elbow digging into her side, not-so-friendly this time, and winced. She didn't need to look at the screen to know what was being displayed right now.

The hair-grab part.

Pyrrha shuddered inwardly. Despite her desperate efforts, she was losing and getting angry. With a gleaming mane occupying a good half of her field of vision, the idea of using Yang's pride and joy against her looked very appealing, so she snatched - literally - the opportunity to turn the tables.

It took her approximately point five seconds to remember why exactly she never tried this before. And then Yang exploded into her face and sent her flying back first into the nearest defense field emitter.

Those eighteen seconds while she was hunkering down behind Akuo and slowly backing up before the flaming juggernaut were the longest in her life. She didn't recall how she managed to pick up Milo again, nor how she deployed it into its spear form. She probably used her Semblance to do it, but if so, she couldn't care less about the fact of using it so openly, she needed that stop-gap. All she could remember was the desperate struggle to keep the monster at bay.

And then suddenly flames died out, and Yang stumbled, out of balance for a moment. A quick spear thrust was enough to push her Aura into the "red", thus ending the match.

"Now, Miss Nikos, I have no suggestions for you." Pyrrha nodded at the older woman. "Miss Xiao-Long, I'd suggest you to practice at controlling your Semblance. Powerful as it is, it puts you at a disadvantage when you fight against the opponents who can outlast you. That said, I believe that you did your best given the circumstances. Maximum points, both of you."

"Gotcha, Miss G!" Yang gave a thumbs up to the Professor and flashed her a smile. "Gotta admit, I'm surprised you didn't chewed us for messing up the place, but, hey, no complaints from me!"

"Why should I, Miss Xiao-Long? These facilities were constructed for that specific purpose, so you could go all out here - and only here! - and test the limits of your abilities." The Professor returned the smile, but something about it was off and the younger blonde's smile faltered. "However, I do not approve of such familiarity, Miss Xiao-Long. Maybe writing a thousand word essay on the ancient Mistralian warrior culture and traditional greetings might help you learn something about good manners?"

"Oh, come on, Prof!"

With an effort, Pyrrha restrained herself from giggling. Learning lessons the hard way was Yang's way.

"Oh, my, did I say 'a thousand'? I'm sorry, I meant 'two thousands'. Two thousands words essay by the end of next week." No, there was no hint of an apology in the Professor's "I'm sorry".

Yang opened and closed her mouth a couple of times, then her shoulders sagged and she nodded.

"Yes, ma'am."

"See? You're learning already. Now, take your places."

"That. Was. AWESOME!"

Pyrrha winced slightly at the shout, but wasn't really surprised by it. Team JNPR's own juggernaut and powerhouse, the one and only Nora Valkyrie, was a very excitable person, and outbursts like that weren't unusual for her. The rest of their respective teammates offered their congratulations in a more reserved manner (or, in case of Ruby Rose, started to emit strange noises and make hand gestures that apparently were supposed to resemble some sort of martial art), but all seemed to share the same excitement.

All except for her team leader, that is, who just nodded absentmindedly, but otherwise appeared to be engrossed in his Scroll.

"In all fairness, this shouldn't hurt so much," she mused. "Do I even have the right to feel hurt?"

It still hurt, regardless.

"He doesn't owe me a thing. I should be better than this. I AM better than this!"

Being better than this didn't help much, though.

"Sooo, Ladykiller, did you like the show we put on? We aimed to provide the best entertainment for our loving audience, y'know!" Yang drawled as she took her seat behind Jaune and put her hands on his shoulders.

"Liked it? Are you kidding me?! I loved it! In fact, I've just finished downloading the replay!" The Ladykiller in question punctuated his exclamation with a wave of his Scroll and flashed Pyrrha a megawatt-strong smile while slapping Yang's gauntlet with his free hand enthusiastically. "You both were amazing out there!"

Let it be known that never before Pyrrha Nikos considered herself a dog person. But looking at this huge grin and these beaming blue eyes adorned by a messy blond hair, she felt something melting inside of her soul and realized one important thing: golden retrievers were adorable. At that moment, she vowed to herself that her future house would have at least two of them.

"Ah, to be young and in love!" That ironic thought felt very out of place in her inner monologue and had stopped her impromptu journey to the dreamland quite unceremoniously. It took a moment before understanding hit her: "I've been hanging around Cinder too much..."

Meanwhile, Yang wasn't about to let go of her new favorite plaything.

"Loved it? Oh, be still my racing heart!" She pretended to fan herself with her left hand. "You certainly know how to make a gal blush!" Then she leaned close to Jaune's ear and almost purred: "And what part of our performance you loved the most?" while winking at Pyrrha lazily.

"Your wrestling, of course! It was so intense!" Jaune's voice trembled with pure and innocent passion of a scientist, eager to share the results of his breakthrough research with the world. "No offense, Pyrrha, but when Yang was on top of you I thought that you're gonna lose this one for sure, but you've managed to fight back, and against Yang, no less! You really are invincible!"

Surprisingly enough, being called "invincible" by Jaune didn't rub Pyrrha the wrong way like it did with everyone else.

"I don't think that I was all that good, but thank you, Jaune, it means a lot!"

And she meant it.

"How smooth of you: complimenting both of us within a single line. You have a way with words, Ladykiller." No, Yang clearly wasn't done with her prey. "So, you loved our intense action out there, did you?" She intoned. "That makes me feel all warm and fuzzy inside!" She hugged Jaune from behind, thus pressing the back of his head to her considerable chest - smiling brightly at Pyrrha all the while, who suddenly felt very warm and fuzzy inside too, but for a very different reason.

Even Jaune wasn't that dense.

"Um, Yang? Wh…" his voice broke and he coughed. "Wh-what are you doing?" He asked in high-pitched voice.

"Why, I'm expressing my gratitude for such a praise, of course!"

Trust Yang to be helpful.

An irritated sigh prevented any future exchange.

"Yang Xiao-Long, stop this indecency!" The tone of that demand was curt, but there was a subtle note of amusement in it too. Then the speaker, none other than Weiss Schnee, turned her attention to Pyrrha: "And I know that I'm asking for a lot, but could you please refrain from murdering this blonde oaf? She may be an imbecile, but she's still our teammate."

"Aw, thanks Weiss! I knew you cared!" Yang let go of Jaune and kicked back in her seat.

"If it comes down to that, I'd much rather skewer her myself." Weiss finished with a perfect deadpan.

Weiss' dry humor defused the situation and everyone laughed, a little nervously in case of Yang and a little embarrassed in case of Pyrrha, who took the place next to her partner.

As the fatigue started to take hold of her, Pyrrha relaxed in her seat and enjoyed the warm feeling inside. Maybe it wasn't exactly what she wanted, but with her friends around she couldn't help but feel content: it wasn't perfect, but it was good enough.

"For now."

And there you have it!

I'd like to point out that certain aspects of the combat segment were intentional nods to Jiu-Jitsu Dude's "Fighting Mean" and Coeur Al'Aran's "From Beyond" stories, so if you felt that the match between Pyrrha & Yang felt somewhat familiar - that's why. If you haven't read those stories, than I recommend you to check them out, I'm sure you won't be disappointed.

Oh, and Cindy was totally phoning it in during this chapter. Not very nice of her, I know! But don't worry, I have reliable inside info that she will make her appearance in the next chapter.