Co-Author: ToxicExotic

So I will keep this part brief and leave a little bit of a longer note in the end note; but for now, I hope you enjoy this new work from me and ToxicExotic.

Disclaimer: All characters belong to Rooster Teeth Productions.

One would think that being in a well lit training room with no obstacles or hiding places would make it easier to see a single girl; but that was so far from the truth that Ruby believed she would be entirely justified calling someone a liar had they told her it did. While she had easily gained the upper hand when the fight had started with the dance-like movements of her precious scythe being too much for Blake to keep up using her weapons combined form. However, after almost a minute of Ruby successfully keeping the agile girl at a distance and landing some solid blows, Blake had removed the katana from its sheath at the perfect moment to parry a strike and throw her off her balance. Ever since that moment, Ruby had been unable to rebuild her momentum due to the relentless attacks the girl was throwing at her.

This is... ridiculous, Ruby thought to herself as she gave her darling Crescent Rose a quick spin the deflect a pair of strikes from Blake, who had suddenly appeared in front of her. Taking the opportunity of the girl being in sight for once, Ruby halted the spin with the blade hovering above her teammate and tore it backwards, only for Blake's form to shimmer from existence. As it had the past four attacks, her strike had hit nothing but Blake's shadow and the all-too-familiar feeling of a blade sliding along her back. Upon feeling it, she let the downwards momentum of her previous swing to position Crescent Rose's barrel behind her and fired off a shot, the force of it sending her tumbling forward; but not before she heard a distinct hmph that told her the bullet had hit it's mark.

Dropping into a shoulder roll to carry her momentum, Ruby pivoted her body as she stood and swung her scythe out in a wide horizontal arc, cutting through yet another shadow clone that Blake had used to propel herself upwards. Unfortunately, Blake had also thrown out the sickle form of her sword during the jump and the ribbon wrapped itself tightly around the Crescent Rose's shaft. Unable to loosen the grip, Ruby felt a slight tug on her scythe and watched helplessly as Blake pulled herself back down with straightened legs; the girl's two feet slamming hard into her chest and pushing Ruby further back as her weapon slipped from her hand.

As her butt slide finally came to a halt, Ruby witnessed Blake land gracefully out of a backflip and point her gun straight at her. Just as she heard the gun go off, Ruby activated her own semblance out of pure desperation and the familiar feeling of loss overcame her as she burst into rose petals. But that didn't matter, all that mattered was getting to her weapon. Fortunately, she managed to get there and immediately upon reforming she seized it and swung in an upwards diagonal arc to cover as much of an area as possible. However as her eyes looked up to see if she had succeeded, Blake's form once again faded from existence and she heard a distinct click behind her before something small slammed forcefully into the back of her head and knocked her onto her face.

BZZZT!

"Uuugh," Ruby groaned as the buzzer signalled the end of their fight, lights flashing before her eyes as she attempted to stand up. Despite her aura still being up and holding out against the hit, Blake had shot from so close that the pain of the impact had rushed through her nonetheless and had turned her legs to jelly.

"Well done, Miss Belladonna," she faintly heard Professor Goodwitch say at her side. "You adapted to your opponent well. Maybe you should take the time to learn from your teammates, Miss Rose; instead of raiding the dormitory kitchen for baked goods every night."

"Got it," she sighed, giving up on standing and simply flopping over onto her back to rest for a second.

Closing her eyes until the flashing stopped, Ruby couldn't help but feel a little frustrated. While she certainly wasn't near the bottom of the first year sparring rankings, she had yet to be able to beat any member of her team in the six months she had been there. The person she struggled the most against however, was Blake. Despite have a semblance that give her exceptional speed, she constantly found herself falling behind the ninja to the point where she would hit nothing but her shadows. The shadows seemed to taunt her with every missed strike and even laying there after the fight with her eyes closed, she could see the pale light that broke through her eyelid darken as a shadow passed over her vision.

"Ruby?" She heard Blake's concerned voice say from above her and opened her eyes to see the girl stood over her. Almost immediately, Ruby's eyes connected with the girl's shining amber ones and she felt a wave of heat rise up to her cheeks. "Are you okay?"

"Y-Yeah," Ruby stuttered as sudden nerves caused her to flush a little. Giving Blake the closest thing to a smile she could and moving her gaze away from her eyes, she gratefully accepted the hand that was held out and used it to lift herself to her feet. "J-Just a little dizzy, is all."

"Sorry," Blake replied genuinely and tighten her arm as she helped Ruby up. "You started to move so I had to take the shot I had."

"It's cool," she replied with a shake of her head, inwardly thanking whatever gods may exist that her legs didn't collapse again. "Guess I do need to train harder though."

"You did quite well actually," she replied with a small smile and Ruby felt her stomach do a small flip in response. "But we should go change into our uniform before Grimm studies."

"Y-Yeah," Ruby stuttered again and took a step back as she realised just how close they were. "You uhh… You go ahead. I wanna uhh… Talk to Professor Goodwitch."

"Alright…" Blake nodded and turned to leave, the swaying of her hips making Ruby turn around in embarrassment.

Dammit, Ruby sighed, disappointed in herself at having lied to her teammate. Though it was a far better option to her than turning bright red at seeing Blake undress, as she had only a week prior.

Fighting against Blake had not been the only issue Ruby had been having with the faunus, there was also the fact that she had been unable to look her in the eye for nearly a month. Ruby didn't know exactly when it had started, but certainly knew when she had noticed what her developing crush was. She had entered the room one morning after returning from her run and Blake had been sat on her bed reading a book, though it wasn't the usual novels the studious girl tended to lean towards but one of Ruby's own manga named Nablueto. However, instead of the usual blank stare that was usually painted the girl's face as she enjoyed her quiet time, there was a small smile that made her eyes glow slightly as they flitted from side to side taking in the artwork.

Though Ruby generally didn't like people touching her manga, as Yang would always make them sticky as a kid, she wasn't the type of person to ask for it back when Blake's rare smile clearly indicated she was enjoying it. Instead she simply climbed onto her bed and read her another one of her books while she waited for Blake to finish, or at least tried too. As she waited, her eyes were constantly drawn to the faunus and after a while she simply gave up on reading and watched her teammate from over the top of her book. Even though Ruby generally read through them rather quickly herself, she saw Blake reread each page a couple of times before moving on to the next one. Intrigued by the sight, she watching each little twitch of the raven-haired girl's lips and with each blink she felt saddened that the golden amber of her iris' were no longer visible.

She had been so transfixed by the sight that she had stopped bothering to look at where Blake was in the book and was therefore surprised when she closed it and turned to look in her direction. It also surprised her that for some reason she had felt incredibly hot for some reason and upon Blake's eyes meeting hers, she quickly ducked her head back below her book as she suddenly became incredibly nervous. Listening intently and worried Blake could hear her heart beating like she was still running, Ruby was glad when she felt the girl place the book back on her bed before uttering a small thank you and leaving the room.

It was certainly not the first time she had found herself looking at Blake but she normally just told herself it was the normal occasional glance people often did when they considered someone attractive; however after that moment, it was hard to deny to herself that the attraction may have at some point developed into something more.

She had panicked at first of course. Blake was two years older, a member of the team she led, and her sister's newest best friend; so not wanting to be subjected to the tormenting of her sister, Ruby went to Weiss for help. Not that it had helped much. While Weiss was no longer as stuck up as she used to be, the heiress was still not the best person to turn to when in need of romantic advice. The only thing Weiss had told her was to just tell Blake and see what happens, though admittedly Ruby was interrupting the girl's studying at the time, so it was likely she was rather annoyed and was trying to get rid of her.

Having received no advice that she found helpful, as telling Blake was certainly out of the question, Ruby had simply tried her best to continue as though she was not crushing on her friend. A tactic that, if she was honest with herself, was not going very well. Every time she was alone with Blake she either stuttered or just left the room, and she was beginning to worry that the rather attentive girl may begin to notice.

"Miss Rose?"

"Huh?" she squeaked as Professor Goodwitch's voice issue from right behind her and made her jump.

"You told Miss Belladonna you wished to ask me something?" she explained and crossed her arms impatiently.

"Oh…I uhh..." Ruby flustered, trying her best to think of a lie that would get past the strict teacher. Racking her brain as fast as she could, she chose the simplelist, most believable thing she could. "I was… I was wondering if I could book the sparring room for team training on Wednesday."

"Hmm," Glynda scowled at her briefly before looking down at her Scroll and pressing the screen a few times. "I have scheduled your team in at three. Now go and change before you are late for your next class."

"Right," she said with a quick nod, a small amount of sadness that she would have to plan a training exercise and give up her Wednesday afternoon.

However, even though she was bummed at that idea, the only real thought that permeated her mind as she turned and walked to the changing rooms was the hope that Blake had already left for their next class.

A/N

Hello there. I am Raalm, some of you may know me from my other works, if so then hello again, but many of you a likely new so welcome. So this story has been worked on for nearly a month now and is a Ladybug ship, a ship that both me and Toxic (I am sure you will hear from him soon) really like. Working on it together has been quite a lot of fun, and now we are finally ready to start publishing.

So a little about the story I guess, just for understanding the setting. It takes place shortly after the Volume 3 tournament and is an AU, meaning there was no attack on Beacon. Honestly this is the easiest way as the attack doesn't really fit into our story or with the characters we wanted to write, but I know a lot of people like these small AU divergences, so we really hope you enjoy.

Unfortunately we are unsure as to what the update schedule for the story will be as I do have another story that pulls a lot of my time and focus, but we will be sure to not keep you are waiting too long.

P.S: Please let me us know how the combat scene was. It is something we are a little nervous about.