Earplugs

Disclaimer: RWBY is the intellectual property of Monty Oum and Rooster Teeth. I claim no ownership.

Ren didn't really care for most things. That's not to say he was cold or cynical. He just viewed most things with a passing interest at most. Because of this, few things ever really bothered him. Everyone he knew always told him that he was the most mellow person they had ever met. So the fact that two of his teammates were dating each other didn't even register as a remotely bad thing.

A giggle floated through the room, followed by a hushed voice.

"J-Jaune, that tickles!"

Until he remembered that they all shared the same room.

The violet-eyed boy buried his face in his pillow, trying to ignore the giggling and rustling of sheets coming from the beyond the makeshift curtain that divided Team JNPR's room. It was the same thing with them, every night. And every night, Ren would have to lay in his bed, praying for sleep to take him before they got started.

He had originally thought it wasn't a bad idea to change the sleeping arrangements. Jaune and Pyrrha on one side; Nora and him on the other. It would give the new couple time to bond and Nora was delighted to have her best friend sleeping right next to her. Win-win. At least, it was, until Jaune and Pyrrha started getting more intimate.

Outside of their room, it was simple stuff. Holding hands, kissing, sitting so close to one another that they might as well fuse into a single human being.

However, once they were inside the room and behind the curtain, they got more...handsy.

"Jaune...we're going to wake them up if you conti-NUE!"

"They're already asleep," Jaune's voice - husky with lust but spoken at casual, almost conversational pace - responded, not sounding as though he had just heard - 'More like "caused",' Ren thought in the safety of his own mind - Pyrrha's voice shoot up two octaves. "Just relax, Pyrrha..."

There was a moment of silence before a quiet, breathy moan made its way through the curtains and into Ren's ears.

Ren curled his pillow around his head, desperately wishing he would just fall asleep already so he didn't have to hear their 'bonding time' anymore. Ever since Pyrrha had let Jaune cop a feel of her derriere (they thought they were subtle. Ren wished they were subtle), the blonde leader had become surprisingly aggressive in his affections; to Pyrrha's delight and Ren's lament.

There wasn't anything wrong with being intimate. It's just that Jaune wasn't a subtle guy. Jaune on a hormone high was even less so.

A gasp of pleasure made Ren shove his face deeper into his pillow, hoping he could smother himself to sleep. No such luck, unfortunately.

How in the depths of the Darkness was Nora able to sleep peacefully through this? His friend was energy incarnate, but she had always been faster to fall asleep than him; and she hadn't shown even the slightest hint of being roused by the sounds from the other side of the room.

A masculine groan from the other side of the curtain made Ren tense up. He really, really, really did not want to hear that. It sounded like he was in for the long haul. With a sigh, Ren flipped his pillow around to sit on his head, and resigned himself to a sleepless night.

Suddenly, his pillow was ripped off his head and, for the first time in his life, he felt the beginnings of frustration bubble up in his chest. Ren took in a deep, calming breath before it could grow into actual frustration and turned around in his bed to see who had decided to ruin his futile attempt to relax.

Unsurprisingly, he was met with Nora's wide, blue eyes and her wide, shining smile. All traces of negative emotions were wiped from Ren's being upon meeting her expressive eyes. He could never be mad at Nora. It just wasn't in him. He opened up his mouth to ask her what was wrong when a shuddering moan cut him off.

His blood froze.

Had their noises finally woken Nora? That wasn't good. That wasn't even remotely acceptable. He could handle a bit of sleep deprivation, but there was no way he was letting them ruin Nora's sleep. If Jaune and Pyrrha's 'bonding time' was keeping the entire team up late into the night, then it had to be stopped. Now.

Ren sat up to verbally put a stop to their intimacy when Nora's fist flew into his field of vision and made him stop dead.

He looked at her, confused, but Nora just kept smiling at him and nodded back at her fist. Ren turned to look at her hand, which had opened up to reveal-

'Earplugs...?'

For a long moment, Ren just stared at the two pieces of malleable foam sitting in the palm of Nora's hand. Then he turned to look at her, almost as if asking if those were what he thought they were. Nora pointed at her ear, where her own earplug was nestled comfortably. Then she placed her hand at the side of her mouth and whispered to him.

"I meant to give these to you! But I kept forgetting!"

Of course, whispering for her was the equivalent of hushed shouting for everyone else.

Immediately, all noises from the other side of the curtain ceased, and a tense awkwardness seemed to emanate from that side of the room. Ren could swear he saw it physically seep through the curtain. Nora, however, seemed completely unaware as to what she had just done and continued smiling obliviously at him.

Ren wanted to laugh. He really did. But he didn't want to make the next morning more awkward than it already would be. So, it was with a grateful smile that Ren took the earplugs from Nora's hand and placed them in his ears. Nora, still all smiles, straightened up and skipped back to her own bed; dropping back into it with the grace of a rhino. The sound of her bedsprings' creaking rang through the silent room like a cannon, all but assuring that Jaune and Pyrrha were aware they had an audience.

Relieved that the noises were done for the night (and perhaps the next several nights), Ren picked his pillow up off the floor and laid his head onto it. A content smile was plastered onto his face as the day finally caught up to him and slowly dragged him into the abyss of sleep.

Ren finally sunk into a pleasant sleep, dreaming of a quiet place and the company of a hammer-wielding valkyrie.

A/N: *Sigh* My muse has taken over my schedule for me. I'mma be honest, I have no clue when the next chapter for Greatness Inherited is going to be out. I had all of the next three chapters for it planned out but every time I put thought onto document, it hits a roadblock and I feel like I'm going about it the wrong way. Then I sit there for an hour wondering what the Hell I should do and I end up just leaving it for a day or so before coming back and doing the same thing all over again.

But enough about my terrible work ethic. The beginning of this one-shot drifted into my head a few days ago and I finally wrote it up to remove it from my head. So, most of this is me winging it.

Is anyone else sick to death of the numerous OC-centered stories in this section? It kind of actually disgusts me a little.

Questions? Comments? Critique? Review!

KineticKaiser, out.