In a Land Far, Far Away

A/N: Well, well, well, what do we have here? Could it be an update!? Oh my! Yes, that is indeed what this is. Keep in mind, after not having written in a long while, I'm no doubt very rusty. As such, this drabble is a bit rough around the edges. Even so, I hope you enjoy it!

Just to clarify, this is a continuation of drabble # 19, 'Not a Fairytale: The Reluctant Princess'.

A shoutout to Madgamer2k7 on deviantart. They did a wonderful picture of Blake x Pyrrha years ago which fits perfectly with this mini drabble set. You can find it here: www dot deviantart dot com forwardslash madgamer2k7 forwardslash art forwardslash Pussy-Magnet-Iphone-6-Background-506736070

Disclaimer: The characters and the worlds I write in do not belong to me. The stories that I write are intended for entertainment purposes. I do not make any money from them.

Summary: The real world wasn't a fairy tale. Pyrrha Nikos knew that all too well, Mistral's star athlete having experienced her fair share of life's discrepancies. Then Blake came along and changed everything. Blake x Pyrrha. Romance/Friendship. AU.

*** ~ Not a Fairytale: The Humble Knight ~ ***

There were no such things as fairy tales.

The boom of a rifle. The shattering of wood.

Fairy tales were fake, made up stories, of good against evil, of knights versus dragons. They were stories meant to shield children against the terrors in the world, to make them believe in such things as hope and goodness.

But they were not real.

A frustrated growl.

The real world was not like the worlds found in fairy tales. Pyrrha Nikos knew that all too well, Mistral's star athlete having experienced her fair share of life's discrepancies. Even here at Beacon Academy, a school known for its equality and unbiased view of all peoples, she was not ignorant to the cruelty which lurked beneath the surface.

"Uh... The answer..." Jaune stuttered, clearly having not a clue what the answer could possibly be.

Taking pity on her team mate and leader, Pyrrha gestured to her eyes out of sight from Professor Oobleck, the green haired man's gaze currently on the youngest Arc.

"The advantage of the faunus..." Jaune continued, the blonde now noticing Pyrrha over the professor's shoulder. "... had over that guy's stuff..."

Ignoring the look Blake gave her as she sat next to her, Pyrrha curled her fingers and again motioned to her eyes. She smiled when Jaune's eyes lit up.

"Uh... Binoculars!" Jaune said with a triumphant smile on his face.

Pyrrha face palmed as the entire lecture hall burst into laughter.

"Very funny, Mr. Arc," Professor Oobleck said, now standing behind his desk. Scanning the room, he turned to the loudest source of laughter.

"Cardin," Professor Oobleck said. "Perhaps you would like to share your thoughts on the subject?"

With his feet propped up on his desk, his hands behind his head, Cardin smirked.

"Well," the other boy said in an all knowing voice. "I know it's a lot easier to train an animal than a soldier."

Blake bristled beside her. Pyrrha's right hand curled into a shaking fist on her desk.

"You're not the most open minded of individuals, are you Cardin?" she said, barely keeping her voice even, her eyes narrowed at the other boy slightly.

"What?" Cardin rebuked, turning his glare on Pyrrha. "You got a problem?"

Only her status as 'human' allowed Pyrrha to bypass the worst of the deep seated racism faced by her faunus peers. Yet while she was given a free pass against such things, she was not ignorant of them. She just didn't know what she could do about it, any of it, to change things for the better. So she did what she could, that being becoming the best role model she could be for everyone, even if it meant being the mascot for Pumpkin Pete's cereal.

But it was just so tiring. All of it.

Holstering her javelin rifle Milo, Pyrrha wiped the sweat from her brow before leaving the shooting range in favor of the locker room. After depositing her weapons and changing back into her uniform, Pyrrha made a beeline for Beacon Academy's library, a small detour from her original target, that being her dorm room. She really needed to take a shower right about now, but as the library was closer to the locker room, she opted to go there first.

While many students nowadays preferred electronic copies over written text, Pyrrha was an old style kind of girl, her preference having always been hard copy books over anything digital. Slowly perusing the many aisles of books on the main floor, the 'P' of Team JNPR turned down the tenth aisle on the left towards the back of the library, Pyrrha having already located the book she needed for her school assignment on a prior trip. Much to her disappointment however, the book was not there when she arrived at the correct location.

Pyrrha rubbed her eyes tiredly as she hung her head in defeat. Electronic copy it was then. Maybe it was for the better.

"Pyrrha?"

At the sound of her name, Pyrrha paused, blinking a few times as she tried to locate the speaker.

"Blake?" she said, walking out of the aisle to the far side of the library where multiple tables lined the wall near the windows.

At one such table sat the 'B' of Team RWBY, Blake the only student from her team there, a stack of books already on the table in front of her. And there was Pyrrha's book, in the other girl's hand, Blake already halfway through it.

"Fancy meeting you here," the faunus said with a small smile, one which Pyrrha returned instantly.

"Most certainly," Pyrrha said, her smile widening unconsciously. "I'm glad to see you up and about. You look much better. How are you?"

The day Pyrrha walked into one of Beacon's many training rooms to find her friend prone and utterly helpless had been the most terrifying day of her life. Without even thinking, she jumped into action, Pyrrha easily dispatching the rogue android, immediately after rushing to her friend's aid. She visited Blake in the infirmary many times after that, at least once a day usually, at times Pyrrha foregoing events with her teammates in favor of visiting her friend.

"I'm much better now, thank you," Blake said, momentarily resting her book down on the table. "I still can't participate in any mock battles for another week or so, but as long as I don't do anything strenuous in the next couple of days, I should be cleared by the head nurse."

"You don't know how relieved I am to hear that," Pyrrha said, only now noticing the tenseness in her shoulders as it drained out of them at that news.

The very image of Blake lying helpless on the floor, a rampaging android ready to kill standing over her had haunted Pyrrha's dreams every day this week. Perhaps that's why she felt so utterly tired and miserable lately. Sleep had been quite evasive, the only thing making her feel better being her visits to check in on a certain faunas of Team RWBY next door.

"You and a lot of people," Blake said, pulling Pyrrha from her thoughts. "And me too of course. I can't thank you enough, Pyrrha. Really."

"Please Blake," Pyrrha said with another smile. "You don't need to thank me. I was just doing what was right."

Even though she said those words, deep down, Pyrrha knew she really didn't mean them. Well, she did mean them, but not in the way they sounded. While it was true she'd help out some in need, just like how she helped out Jaune initially during initiation, something about Blake was different. Pyrrha wasn't quite sure what that meant yet, but she knew she'd go above and beyond for the other girl, even if she didn't understand why yet.

A twitch of a bow.

"Oh!" Blake said, Pyrrha not missing the minute movement atop the other girl's head. "I'm sorry. How rude of me. Did you want to have a seat?"

Only when her companion said that did Pyrrha realize she had set her hand down on the table to prop herself up in her exhaustion. Silently berating herself for pushing herself to hard, Pyrrha made a mental note to take a nap later. After her shower that is. She would need it if she was going to stay awake for the rest of the day to finish her other various projects coming due soon.

"That would be grand," Pyrhha said, tucking a loose lock of hair around her ear to hide her embarrassment. Just about to move to the seat on the opposite side of the table from Blake, Pyrrha froze when the faunas moved the stack of books on the table in her direction, freeing up the space directly next to her.

"Please, have a seat," Blake said, pulling out the chair to her right.

Eyes widening slightly, Pyrrha nodded, a grateful smile on her lips as she made her way around the table to sit at her friend's side.

"Thank you," she said, sighing softly the moment she sat down. The relief was instantaneous. Pyrrha revelled in the quiet contentment of merely sitting. Gods, she was really tired.

Noticing movement in her peripherals, Pyrrha turned to her left just as Blake dipped her head, somewhat bashfully Pyrrha noticed, Pyrrha's smile widening at the sight. The other girl was just so cute when she was like this! Meeting a golden gaze, Pyrrha quickly averted her eyes to the books on the table, hoping she hadn't been staring for too long.

As of late, Pyrrha found it harder and harder not to stare at the faunas whenever she saw her, but not in a bad way. So far no one had caught her staring yet, but still, Pyrrha didn't want to give off the wrong impression. What Blake thought of her held a lot of weight for some reason, and the last thing Pyrrha wanted to do was creep out the other girl or worse.

"I'm guessing you were also here looking for this?" Blake said, gesturing to the book in front of her on the table.

Staring blankly at the said book, it took Pyrrha a moment to remember why she had come to the library in the first place. So caught up in this unexpected though pleasant meeting with Team RWBY's faunas, Pyrrha had completely forgotten her initial reason for coming here. Thankfully Blake didn't seem to notice, or at least the other girl decided not to say anything about it for which Pyrrha was most appreciative.

Getting her wits about her, Pyrrha nodded.

"I thought I'd get a head start on Professor Peach's project before things got too busy with midterms," she said shrugging. "Rumour has it Professor Port is about to drop a large group project on us soon, and I'd rather not let anything fall to the wayside."

"Ah yes," Blake said. "That rumour. Weiss was talking about that just the other day. Yang thinks it's a bunch of garbage, but Weiss was very adamant about getting a head start on it too. You know how she is."

Pyrrha chuckled.

"I do know," she said. "I'm guessing she's somewhere else in the library working on it as we speak?"

Blake shook her head. "She's actually gone to the Vale CCT Tower with Ruby to see if she could get some more reading materials. Something about Beacon's Library being rather limited."

"With Ruby?" Pyrrha said, her eyebrows raised in surprise.

While Ruby was no slouch when it came to school, the younger girl didn't seem the overly studios type to Pyrrha. (Not unless it had something to do with weapons). That was more Weiss' thing.

Blake chuckled at her reaction.

"There's an ice cream shop near the CCT Tower that Ruby's been wanting to try for the longest time," the faunas said. "And with Weiss having already promised to be the best teammate Ruby could possibly ever have..."

"They could kill two birds with one stone," Pyrrha finished for her library companion. "Research and a treat."

Blake nodded.

Pyrrha looked out the window as the pair in question came to mind. That certainly made more sense.

"On that note," Blake continued, causing Pyrrha to turn back to her. "I never quite thought of you as the books type."

At that comment, Pyrrha laughed.

"A lot of people don't," she said, Pyrrha turning her gaze back to the stack of books on the table. "But there just something about feeling the actual book in your hands. The weight of it. The smell of ink on the pages..."

Picking up one of the books on the table in front of her, Pyrrha ran a finger down its cover, feeling everything from the small scratches in the glossy binding to the embossed letters of the title on the front of it.

"It's not quite the same without it," Blake said after a moment.

Pyrrha looked up at Blake in surprise before smiling.

"Exactly."

It had been a long time since Pyrrha felt this way, this connection with another, someone that understood her, without all the explanations. Sure, there were plenty of times she got along with her teammates, her friends and even her classmates (most of them at least), but it wasn't often she felt like she really connected with someone. Like with Blake right now.

Perhaps they were both just old souls, kindred spirits from an age lost long ago. Or perhaps it was something else. Whatever it was, Pyrrha truly relished it, knowing all too well how fleeting such moments were. Her own childhood, or lack there of, was a testament to that after all.

"It's nice," Blake said, causing Pyrrha to look at her curiously.

"It's not often I find someone who likes books as much as I do," Blake clarified, Pyrrha smiling as she said so. "It's... nice."

"It is," Pyrrha said in agreement, her gaze soft.

"Maybe we could meet up again after the project is done to... talk about books?" the faunas asked hesitantly.

Pyrrha didn't even have to think about her reply.

"That would be just grand," she said almost immediately, only catching herself at the last moment to avoid sounding too eager. "I look forward to it."

"Me too," Blake said softly, in that shy kind of way. The faunas looked down at the books in front of her fondly.

Pyrrha swore her heart skipped a beat.

"I just need to take a few more notes, then this book is all yours," Blake said looking up again, bringing the conversation back to its original topic. "Is that okay?"

Having once again forgotten her original intention of being here, Pyrrha shook her head and waved the other girl off.

"Take your time Blake," she said. "I'm in no rush. There's still plenty of time before the project is due, so please, don't feel pressured on my account."

Blake smiled, nodding her head slightly.

"Even so," Blake said. "I promise not to take too much longer."

Not wanting to pressure her companion any further, Pyrrha acquiesced with a nod before busying herself with a random book she picked up from the table. Smiling to herself as she started flipping through the pages, Pyrrha couldn't but think about one thing.

This was nice.

"Pyrrha."

A sound escaped her throat, but her eyes remained closed otherwise.

A soft chuckle.

"Pyrrha," the voice from before said again, this time followed by a soft hand on her shoulder, shaking her gently.

Her brows furling from the interruption, Pyrrha pursed her lips before her eyes fluttered open tiredly, her emerald gaze trying to locate the source of her annoyance.

"Sorry," Blake said with a small smile when Pyrrha's gaze landed on her. "I know you must be very tired, but the library will be closing soon and I thought you'd rather me wake you up than the librarian."

"Closing... soon...?" Pyrrha mumbled to herself.

The moment those words actually registered, she blinked awake in an instant, bolting upright in her seat. Her neck and shoulders hurt like heck at that movement, making her grimace.

"What time is it?"

Bewildered, Pyrrha turned to the windows next to her to find only darkness outside.

"It's almost ten o'clock," Blake supplied for her, Pyrrha's eyes widening at that answer.

"Ten o'clock!?" Pyrrha gasped.

"Sorry," Blake said, making Pyrrha pause as she rubbed the back of her aching neck.

"Sorry for what?" Pyrrha asked in confusion. She'd have to remember not to fall asleep in these library chairs again. They were killer on the back.

"I said I'd be quick," the faunas clarified, her expression embarrassed. "But the reading took much longer than I thought it would."

Smiling at her companion to show no hard feelings, Pyrrha put a hand on the faunas' shoulder.

"That's alright, Blake," she said with a quick pat. "Some of those readings can be quite... dense at times, especially if they're not what you're used to. Don't fret."

A thought.

"Besides," Pyrrha continued, her smile widening. "It all worked out in the end. Apparently I was in great need of a nap and I got one!"

Blake looked at Pyrrha is surprise for a moment before laughing at that comment, Pyrrha quickly following suit. Not long after that, the two of them quickly collected their things, Pyrrha checked out the book she needed and the two of them made their way back to their dorm rooms. At this hour of the night, the hallways were practically empty, so it didn't take them long to reach their destination.

Standing in front of their respective dorm room doors, Pyrrha stood there facing Blake, feeling a bit awkward. She wasn't quite ready for this to end, yet at the same time, she couldn't for the life of her think of a reason for it to continue either. Or what to say for that matter. Thankfully Blake came to her rescue.

"Sorry again for taking so long," Blake said, causing Pyrrha to smile once more.

"It's fine, Blake," Pyrrha said. "Really. I don't blame you. At any time, I could have downloaded the digital version to my scroll. But I wanted this copy instead."

Pyrrha waved to the book in her hand.

"You are not to blame for my choices," Pyrrha continued, putting a hand on her friend's shoulder. "So please, enough apologizing."

"Okay."

Squeezing her friend's shoulder, Pyrrha raised the book in her hand in farewell.

"Thanks for the book and the company," she said with a smile and a nod. "And have a pleasant night."

"You too," Blake said, a smile also on her face. "I'll talk to you later?"

The smile on Pyrrha's face was brilliant. "Of course!"

Heading inside her dorm room with much reluctance, Pyrrha snuck one last glance over her shoulder to see Blake just slip into hers. Closing the door behind her, Pyrrha turned back to find Nora already in bed looking at something on her scroll, while Ren was working on something on his desk. Jaune was nowhere to be found.

Dropping the book on her bed, Pyrrha took one step towards the closet to get her clothes for a quick shower before she paused. Thinking back on her nap, she reckoned she could probably sneak a bit of reading in before bed. Sitting down on her bed for a moment, with all intents and purposes of bookmarking a spot to start with, Pyrrha opened the book only for her eyes to widen in surprise.

There, on the first page of the readings was a sticky note, Blake's gracefully prose written in black.

Sorry for taking so long with this. Maybe this could make up for it? - Blake

Written on another sticky note, stuck just underneath the first, were Blake's notes pointing out the important facts found on the page. Stunned at this revelation, Pyrrha quickly turned to the next page, and the next, and the next, finding each and every page of the readings marked in a similar fashion.

Closing the book and bringing it up to her chest, Pyrrha smiled as she looked in the direction of her dorm room door.

"That girl..." she said softly to herself.

Smiling to herself softly for a few more seconds, Pyrrha set the book down on the bed and made her way to the showers for a much needed bath. All the while, one thought played over and over again in her head.

The next time she saw the faunas of Team RWBY, she owed Blake a drink.

A/N: So continues part 2 of Pyrrha and Blake's little drabble saga!

For those of you who may have recognized the scene in italics, it was taken from Volume 1, Episode 16 – Janundice, Part 2.

The CCT Tower was originally introduced in Volume 2, Episode 3, "A Minor Hiccup". CCT stands for Cross Continental Transmit (System), which is the large communication system all kingdoms use to communicate and share information with each other. You can find out more information here: rwby dot fandom dot com/wiki/Cross_Continental_Transmit_System

I have no idea what time Beacon's Library closes. I totally made it up. But given that classes usually end around 6pm on a daily basis, I figured a 10pm closing time wasn't too out there.