Blake couldn't quite place what feeling was pervading her for the past hour day.

It was not something quite as simple as a burning emotion, like anger or one that cut deeply into one's being, like sadness. Neither was it one that gave a person energy and joy, like happiness. In fact Blake would probably place happiness as far as away from that as possible.

However, that would imply that what she was feeling was something akin to the opposite of happiness, i.e. sadness. Yet the sense that filled her was much less in intensity than anything quite as grandiose as being sad. It was a much more vague emotion; one that was barely felt yet was distinctly not a positive one.

Trying to backtrack her day to pinpoint the cause was not exactly helping either.

I woke up, next to Ruby - the thought brought a slight heat to the back of her neck, a distinctly happy emotion, so clearly not the cause. At breakfast they had even served Blake's preferred meal of choice, rice and fish, much to Nora's horror; that can't be it either.

Classes had been next, with the much feared day, at least in Weiss' opinion, not that Blake would've ever agreed out loud, when they got their grades on last week's test. Yet Blake could tell that was not the source of it either, as she had, along with her team had passed with flying colours.

The day had passed rather uneventfully after that, despite an excruciating dull lecture by Professor Port. It was at this point that the highlight of Blake's day had come, namely the arrival of a package for her in the mail. Not just any package mind you, but that of newest in The Man With Two Souls series. A distinctly happy event in the day.

The occasion was so happy in fact, that she hadn't been bothered the missing presence of her girlfriend, as Ruby had to attend a leadership class that she had once a week for the next few hours.

All of which led to the present.

Blake was sitting in her favourite chair, with a book that she was sure she was going to love…

…so why do I feel like something is missing?

As great as the book was, which was by all accounts living up to everything that Blake hoped for from this series, her mind just refused to stick to it. Her attention drifted about, as if a plastic bag in the wind. On some level, that was more frustrating than whatever was causing her to feel this, since even in the worst in Blake's life, books had always been her best way of escaping reality.

It was like a certain kind of lethargy that wouldn't let up, that no amount of getting up and taking a walk around would break, nor any amount of tea either. It wasn't the tired kind of lethargy either, as Blake was quite wide awake.

Rather, it was more akin to apathy more so than lethargy, just a complete lack of will to do anything- not a lack of energy. It's almost like I'm one of those ninjas in Ninjas of Love, the really gloomy and edgy one…

The faunus had a sudden realization what exactly that emotion was.

Melancholy.

A gloomy state of mind or a general sense of dejection. But why-

Yet before she could brood on it any further, a blur of red landed in her lamp.

"I'm baaaaaack! Didya miss me?"

Looking at Ruby's cheeky grin, a feeling euphoria emanated throughout Blake, as the feeling was gone.

"Yes."

AU: The ninja is Sasuke because of course he is.

Yes, you didn't misread this I actually did update. Pardon the sloppy writing, it's been a while.

Now to answer a few questions;

Yes, I am actually alive.

Yes, I will continue to write my stories. Just… slowly.

Why haven't I answered reviews? Real life has been kicking my butt hard and it's not easy to sit down and start to respond when I finally remember to do so like… a month or three later… shame on me I know…

Now as to what's going on and why it took a legit year and two weeks to do something new…

I started to slowly realize that a certain story of mine was beginning to affect my writing process and how I wrote characters, to such a degree that I was having trouble getting into their heads to write how they would react outside of, like, tropes. So I decided to extend my break a bit as you can tell. I have set an arbitrary thing IRL as for when I will start once more on Acceptance and possibly Spoon Equality.

So why, if I haven't achieved that arbitrary thing am I suddenly posting now, might one reasonably ask?

…I got my eyes Dilated today and thought it would be fitting…

Literally that's it.

However, that's taught me that over the last year I've gotten extremely rusty and I definitely need to keep up writing, at least occasionally to keep myself reasonably skilled.

That being said, Dilation is no longer on hiatus, though there is NO set posting schedule so, uh, expect randomness. It might also have some more serious chapters ahead, as this one attempted to be (poorly I might add).

I'd like to thank everyone who was worried that something had happened or was concerned (I got a fair number of messages and reviews as such)… it was really heartwarming to me :D

I hope everyone has a wonderful day and enjoyed the chapter! :D