Well, my first shipping story, so don't be too surprised if it turns out to be horrible. This on is based on the Non-Date fanart made by deviantart's amazing Exvinr. You can find it on his profile. It's a pretty old one, so it may take a little bit to find it. Please enjoy!
I do not by any means own RWBY or the cover page. Those belong to Monty Oum & Roosterteeth and Exvinr respectively.
Jaune Arc was never one to wake up early on weekends. This one, for whatever reason, was an exception. Jaune's blue eyes scanned the dorm room to find Pyrrha and Ren still asleep and Nora standing above her childhood friend. Jaune was mildly curious but knew Nora always did this all the time anyways, so nothing to fear. Nora turned around to see her team leader and greeted him with her huge smile, "Hey Jaune!" she greeted in a loud whisper. Jaune smiled back and returned, "Morning, Nora." Jaune now thought about how to pass time and wait for his other two teammates to wake. Jaune already knew that getting Nora to leave Ren's sleeping figure would be an impossible, not to mention borderline suicidal, feat, and Ren loved to get his sleep, so it would take some time. An idea formed inside Jaune's head and he headed for the door. "Where are ya going?" His only conscious teammate asked. Jaune turned and replied, "Just out." "Okay!" Nora saw this as an acceptable answer and immediately returned back to her task at hand. Jaune then left JNPR's room and headed straight to the kitchen.
Unbeknownst to most of the Beacon population, Jaune had a secret talent of cooking. His mother taught him at a young age how to, repeatedly exclaiming, 'No son of mine will rely on their wives for proper meals.' Granted, he was the only son, the only child for that matter, Mrs. Arc still put Jaune through cooking for eleven years of his life, which, at age seventeen, made him very skilled in the cooking department. Although he never outright said it to anyone, Jaune actually enjoyed cooking very much. He found it challenging and, quite frankly, it was one of the few things he could do very well without assistance of any kind. The thing was, he was far too embarrassed to tell anyone. He had always heard that cooking was supposed to be a 'woman's job', and, not wanting to be considered a woman, he hid it from people outside of his household. Now, Jaune figured that since he was alone, and would be alone for a while, he would revisit some old talents. Today, he was in a mood for making sweets. Cookies, brownies, cupcakes, the liking. Jaune put on his apron and went to work. He figured he could quickly make half a dozen of each treat and, whatever he didn't eat, he would hide it in the refrigerator and deny any knowledge of how it got there. It was the perfect plan, except for one red cloaked, scythe wielding variable. Ruby Rose.
Ruby had not been expecting Jaune to be standing there in the kitchen, pans of treats stacked all around him. When she had woken up, Weiss and Yang were still sound asleep and Blake had gone, no doubt in the library. So, she had gotten up and headed to the kitchen for breakfast. When she got there, Jaune had several pans of different snacks surrounding him. He was too absorbed in cooking to notice her, so she quietly snuck in too try a cupcake from the pan closest to her. She figured it couldn't be too bad, plus it looked pretty good. When she bit into it, she realized she had been absolutely wrong about how delicious it was.
It tasted god like. Like the angles had taken form into food and begged to be eaten.
Ruby had tried to remain quiet and not get noticed by Jaune. She really did. But then again, she had never eaten Jaune Arc's cupcakes before. So she let out a loud sigh of delight, and Jaune immediately turned towards her in surprise. "Wha- Ge- Ruby!" He blushed furiously at being caught. "What are you doing?!"
"Trying out your food. Why didn't you ever say that you could cook?"
"I-It's not ready yet! Don't…"
"Jaune," Ruby interrupted the rambling boy, "It's delicious. It's one of the best things I've ever eaten."
Jaune continued to blush more at the compliment. "R-Really?"
"Yeah. It's extremely good." Jaune smiled nervously with a blush still on his face, "Thank-Thank you." Ruby returned the smiled back and looked at the rest of the pans. "You've been at work for a while now, huh?"
"Yeah." Jaune rubbed the back of his neck.
"Could I…be your taste tester?"
"Sure." Jaune's blush finally faded and he looked out the window to the clear blue sky and shining sun. "It's a nice day for a walk. Wanna go on a walk and taste my food?"
"That sounds good." A walk with Jaune while eating his food actually sounded like a good way to spend her Saturday.
Jaune seemed to agree as he smiled. "Great! I'll finish this last batch and put everything in bags, and then we'll go."
"I'll go get us some real breakfast." Ruby said as she went to the pantry.
"Real breakfast sounds nice."
Moments later Ruby returned with some cereal bars to Jaune who had multiple small paper sacks in his hands.
"Alright! Jaune Arc, master chef, and his trusty taste tester, Ruby, are off!" Ruby exclaimed.
"Yeah! Let us go on grand adventures, my apprentice!"
Then the two team leaders set off to the courtyards.
"Where ARE they?!" Yang asked to no one in particular.
She and the rest of RWBY and JNPR were here meeting in front of the main building on campus while on the search for their team leaders, and so far, they were unsuccessful.
"Nora, are you sure Jaune didn't say where he was going?" Pyrrha asked frantically.
"Yep! He just said 'Just out' and left."
"Well where does 'Just out' mean!"
"Calm down Pyrrha." Blake told her. She and Ren had been relatively calm throughout the whole ordeal. "I'm sure that he's fine. He and Ruby are probably together."
Nora then gasped. "You mean like on a date?!"
Ren had anticipated such a random thought from his childhood friend, "No, Nora, I don't think-"
"My sister is on a date and I didn't know about it!"
"Yang, they probably-"
"Oh my god, that idiot better not do something stupid to my partner."
"Weiss," Blake tried to intercede, "I don't think tha-"
"Jaune would never do something like that!"
"Pyrrha…" Ren and Blake were trying to bring reason into this situation. No such luck.
"Oh my god! There they are!"
Nora was pointing at what was indeed Jaune and Ruby walking on the courtyards a several yards away. They could see the two leaders walking side by side, obviously enjoying each other's company.
To this Yang firmly stated to Ren and Blake, "You were saying?"
"Hold on," Blake desperately tried to convince Yang otherwise, "How do we know that this is a date?"
"How do we know that it isn't?" Yang counteracted.
"We should follow them!" Nora exclaimed.
"That's stalking, Nora." Ren stated.
"No! It's making sure that they don't do something bad!"
"Yeah," Yang defended Nora. "And, as my job as an older sister, I need to tease Ruby as much as I can."
"I'm pretty sure that's not the point of being an older sister." Ren tried to reason.
"Shut up, Ren. You don't know what anything about being an older sister."
"…But I'm male. I can't be an older sister."
"Exactly! Which is why you don't know anything!"
Ren couldn't argue with that logic.
"Ok then, it's settled. We're gonna supervise their date to make sure nothing bad happens, and to tease them with anything we can get."
"Let's go!" Nora exclaimed as she, Yang, Weiss, and Pyrrha headed off, leaving Ren and Blake in defeat.
"We should probably go with to make sure that those four don't do something drastic." Blake stated to the boy.
"Yeah. That sounds like a good idea." Ren returned.
"Oh god. These are amazing." Ruby said as she munched down on a cookie that was brought with them. Jaune smiled nervously. "Yeah, thanks."
"Seriously, since when could you cook?"
"I was taught since I was little. My mother didn't want her son to freeload all his meals from women, so she wanted me to learn."
"Well, why didn't you ever say anything?"
Jaune then rubbed the back of his neck nervously, "Well, since cooking is considered a 'woman's job', and I just got Cardin off my back, I didn't want any more teasing. Besides, I didn't want to steal Ren's thunder."
Ruby had just finished her cookie. "Well, consider his thunder stolen. Because these are so good!"
"Thanks." Jaune said with genuine gratitude in his voice.
"Speaking of Cardin, I'm proud of how you handled him."
"Y-You are?"
Ruby turned to him with a smile. "Yeah. I mean, he was a jerk to you for so long, and yet you still saved him. And you didn't punch him or anything. I'm not sure if I could do that."
"No, I'm sure you would."
"I doubt it. Every time he picked on you, I wanted to hurt him so bad." Her voice was carrying a darker note. "I was mad every time he hurt anybody, but you, it made me even angrier."
Jaune looked at the girl genuine surprise. "Really?"
"Yeah. You're a good friend, Jaune. My best guy friend, as a matter of fact."
Again, genuine surprise came to the blonde. "I-I am? Honestly?"
Ruby nodded her head.
"W-Well…" Jaune was so awestruck that he was stammering his words. "Y-You're one of my best friends, i-if it means anything."
"It does." Ruby smiled, and it was the truth. The two went into brief silence.
"Jaune can cook?" Yang was pretty shocked at seeing the boy hand a bag of cookies to her sister that were obviously recently baked.
Weiss was surprised to learn of this as well. "I'm impressed. I used to believe that if that dolt was placed in a kitchen, he would either burn it down or kill himself. Possibly both."
Pyrrha frowned in disapproval at the heiress's comments while Nora quietly squealed. "That's so cute! Cooking for his girlfriend."
"We're still not sure if Ruby really is Jaune's girlfrien-"
"Less talking, more hearing, Belladonna." Yang cut Blake off. Due to her super hearing courtesy of her faunus heritage, she had been asked to 'pick up' the 'couple's' conversations.
"Well, what do hear?" Weiss surprisingly asked. Blake held up a hand to silence her. A few moments went by before she was asked again by the blond brawler, "Well? Anything?"
"They're… talking about how …," Blake paused. "How they mean a lot to each other, and they consider each other good friends-"
"Oh, that's perfect!" Yang exclaimed. "They're so cute, aren't they?" Before anyone could reply, Yang walked up to behind a tree several feet behind the two in question. She motioned the others to follow. Weiss, Pyrrha, and Nora were quick to follow them. Blake and Ren both looked at each other in despair, before following.
"So, it's a series about two teams fighting over a flag?" Ruby asked while brushing brownie crumbs off from her mouth.
"Not exactly." Jaune replied after finishing his own brownie. "It gets a lot more serious and complicated later on. But at first, yeah. "
"What's so serious and complicated about two teams of idiots fighting over flags?"
"A lot, actually. They add in a whole bunch of other stuff into the plot later on."
"Ok. How long has it been running?"
"Eleven seasons."
Ruby's eyes went wide. "Eleven seasons?"
"Yep, eleven seasons. It's a pretty big show."
"I can't believe it's that big of a show."
"But it's awesome!"
"I guess I'll take your word for it."
"You're also taking like a million other people's words for it."
"Jeez, you must like this show a lot."
"Like it? I love it!"
"Are they… talking about a web-series?" Pyrrha asked in confusion.
"What kind if date has a conversation about a web series?" Weiss asked in an annoyed tone. "Are they both this childish?"
Ren sighed; all attempts at logical reasoning had completely failed. Blake, on the other hand asked the snow haired girl, "Why are you even here?"
"To make sure that clumsy, blond dolt doesn't do something to my partner that he'll regret later."
"Jaune wouldn't do such a thing!" Pyrrha exclaimed, blushing at the thought.
"It doesn't matter if I think he will or not, Schnees still protect their own."
"Since when di-" Blake asked before stopping at the absence of the team leaders. "Where did they go?"
They then saw then sitting at a bench several yards away, apparently taking a break from walking. The group of six then stalked their over to the bushes and shrubbery behind the bench, and tried to stay as quiet as they could.
"What kind of music do you like?"
Ruby was turned towards her friend with a quizzical look in her silver eyes, as she had not been expecting the question.
"Huh?"
"In all the time I've known you, I never figured out what kind of music you like. So what's your favorite song?"
Ruby went into thought for a moment as she took a cinnamon bun from the bag that sat between them. "Either Red like Roses or This Will be the Day. It's too difficult to decide. What about you? What's your favorite song?"
"I'm more of an I May Fall kind of guy."
"That is a good song. Yang hates it though. She really likes I Burn, especially the remix version."
"The original's a whole lot better than the remix."
"That's what I keep telling her! But she says it's more 'upbeat'."
Jaune snorted. "Because that's probably listens to all the time at clubs." It was no secret that Ruby's elder sister enjoyed clubbing very much.
"What do your teammates listen to? Do you know?"
"Nora loves Red like Roses Part II, Pyrrha likes Gold, and Ren doesn't really listen to music. How about your team?" Jaune answered as he ate the last cinnamon bun from the now empty bag.
"Weiss claims to love Mirror Mirror , but I know that she secretly loves Red like Roses. And I've heard Blake listen to From Shadows more than once."
"Doesn't Weiss sing Mirror Mirror?" Jaune asked.
Ruby lightly chuckled in response. "She does. That's why she claims to love it so much."
"She doesn't like admitting to having a heart, does she?" Jaune said amused.
"Nope. But that's why we love her."
Jaune then stood up and tossed the empty bags into a nearby trash bin, leaving one full one remaining.
"Whelp, we're down to the last one." He stated as he sat back down.
He then offered the bag to the red and black haired girl beside him. "Here, take it."
Ruby looked into the contents of the bag and her eyes went wide and shone brightly and her faced was painted with a large, gleeful smile that threatened to cut her face in two.
Inside the bags were strawberry shortcakes.
"Arethesestrawberryshortcakes?!"
She had asked so quickly that the blond boy next her almost missed the question. "Um, yeah? Why?"
He got his answer almost immediately as Ruby quickly shoved one into her mouth. "I luv stwabewy showtcakes. Nd these are so good." She said with her mouth completely full. After she swallowed the first one she continued to shove another one into her mouth. Jaune, with a look of surprise on his face, tensely reached his hand over to enter the bag, only for it to be declined by the current occupant.
"Hey!" Jaune cried, "I want one!"
"Nope."
"Nope?"
"Nope. This art, and you're the artist, Jaune. And art's supposed to be shared."
"But, as an artist, shouldn't I enjoy my own art?"
"Not if it's this deli-" Before Ruby could finish her sentence, Jaune quickly reached his hand in the bag and snagged a shortcake and placed it into his own mouth.
As he raised his fists in victory, Ruby retaliated by reaching her arms over and tickling his exposed sides. Jaune attempted to keep from falling on his back unsuccessfully. He was now laying on the seat of bench with a scythe-wielder tickling his sides like a madman. "R-Ruby… s-s-stop! P-Please!" He begged in between laughs with strawberry shortcake still his mouth. Suddenly he inhaled the not-fully chewed shortcake and started coughing furiously. Ruby then jumped off of him and helped him to the trashcan, where he vomited red and pink into it. "Are you ok?" Ruby asked with worry dancing among her words.
Jaune wiped residue from his lips and said, "I'm fine, Crater Face."
He had meant the nickname to be returned with 'Vomit Boy', but Ruby looked and the ground guilty and said timidly, "I'm really sorry, Jaune.", unable to look at him in the eyes.
Jaune raised Ruby's head to meet her eyes and said with a reassuring smile, "It's ok. Really. I know you didn't mean to." Then Ruby gave a small smile in return. Jaune the scrunched his nose as he tasted his breath. "I will hold you accountable for giving me this horrible breath."
To this, Ruby offered him the final strawberry shortcake. "Here."
Jaune took it and said thanked her as he finished it. The two then stood there and smiled at each other as the boy swallowed the last of their food.
Yang was officially aggravated, as was everyone else in the group, including Blake and Ren. Why haven't they kissed yet? It was a date after all! The way those two were looking at each other was so adorable yet they wouldn't kiss. What part of that made sense?! Then, without thinking, she stood up from the plants and yelled "OH MY GOD, YOU TWO! JUST KISS ALREADY!" She immediately cringed as the two snapped their heads towards her direction. Yang ducked back into the shrubs, but it was too late.
Their cover was blown.
"Yang?" Neither of them had expected for the blonde sister to appear out of nowhere and demand that the two kiss.
What they really didn't expect is for them to push back the shrubs from which Yang ducked into to find both of their whole teams hiding there with her,
"What are you guys doing here?" Jaune asked with a mass of confusion filling his voice.
"Supervising your date!" Nora quickly answered.
"Supervising our… what?!" Jaune parroted.
"Yeah! To make sure you didn't do something you would regret-" Weiss tried to add on, only to be cut off by Ruby.
"Wait, have you guys been following us thinking this was a date?"
"Well…" Weiss was not so quick to add, "…that's what this arrangement was, right?"
Everyone's attention lied on the team leaders. The two then looked upon their teammates, then looked at each other, and suddenly, to everyone's surprise, laughed in hysteria.
The six looked upon them in confusion as they cackled at their explanation. Ruby then took a break to ask, "You guys really thought this was a date?" before returning to laughing along with her 'date'.
The two finally stopped laughing and Jaune asked, "Even you two?" he motioned towards Ren and Blake. "I thought you two were the logical ones." Said 'logical ones' were both very embarrassed at being involved with the whole thing.
"In all seriousness, nothing's going on between us." Ruby motioned between herself and Jaune. "We were just hanging out."
Silence fell upon the two teams until Weiss finally spoke up. "So, we've been following you all this time thinking it was a date, when it was just you 'hanging out'?!"
"Pretty much, yeah." Jaune answered.
Four pairs of angry eyes fell upon Yang and Nora, who smiled sheepishly. "It was a … team bonding experience, at least." Yang offered. There came no replies. The four just stood up and walked away, Jaune and Ruby joining them, which left Yang and Nora to shrug at each other before catching up to them.
Later that night, while lying on his bed in his dorm room, Jaune was still getting a kick out of his and Ruby's whole team following them all day because they thought that they were on a date.
It was so ridiculous to Jaune. Why would he and Ruby date anyway? They were both far too socially awkward to date successfully yet. Then Jaune realized that was not true at all. Sure, they were awkward. But she was also sweet, and kind, and, while he would never say it in front on Yang, Ruby was actually really pretty too. And, on top of all that, he cared a lot about her, and she cared a lot about him. Maybe it could work out after all. He thought.
Great. Now his mind would indefinitely be plagued by these thoughts. And the next few days didn't look good either.
Little did he know that across the hall in Team RWBY's room, Ruby was thinking about the same thing.
There we go!
Added Headcannon: The music on the RWBY sound track exists in RWBY, and all of Team RWBY love their own theme song except for Weiss, who secretly loves Red like Roses more than Mirror Mirror, but is too embarrassed to tell anyone.
Well, that's probably it for me today. Farewell, my readers!