The next day was a Saturday, so the students at Beacon Academy were free to do what they liked, within reason, and so the eight of them, unlike most other days, were not all in the same place.
Rain and Hemlock had gone into Vale first thing in the morning for one reason or another, they had been very vague on the details, and would probably be gone all day, so the rest of them had to occupy their time until they returned. The remaining six were sat in the dining hall during breakfast discussing what to do over plates of bacon sandwiches and pastries.
"So," Buck said as he swallowed what must have been his third Full English, "What do we do whilst 'The Great Green Grinch' is out?"
"I don't know about you guys but I was thinking of going to the Faunus club that Professor Oobleck has today."
"Oh yeah I forgot about that, I'll come with you if you want buddy?"
Before Rao could answer that question however, Wynter had an idea and cut into the conversation. "Actually, I think Navi should go with you, she's interested in Faunus history." The boy blushed and stared intently at his plate.
"Y-yeah, well if she wants to of course I mean she doesn't have to it's not like-OW!" He stopped rambling and growled at Buck, the boy shrugged and spoke calmly.
"Dude you're mumbling," He stood and pulled Rao up from his seat as Navi stood from hers, then gave him a shove that sent him stumbling forward towards the door, the boy sent him a glare, but continued to walk with Navi anyway, and soon they had left the building. Buck sat down again and continued to eat, "I'd call that a success."
"Yeah if we don't find you dead tomorrow." Cherry laughed so hard she almost fell off the bench, and Teal had to pull her back up before she actually did. When the girl composed herself she cleared her throat and spoke.
"Well I have an idea, but I'll need all your help." The three students nodded, intrigued about this plan of hers, "Good now, we need bread, cans, a couple of turkeys and whatever else you can find laying around in here, get as much as you can and meet me in the training halls in ten."
"Anything else cap'n?" She rolled her eyes and leaned closer, the rest of them doing the same so they sat huddled like they were having some sort of secret meeting.
"Watermelons. Lots of them."
***
"Ah yes yes welcome Faunus students of Beacon! Please help yourself to refreshments and get comfortable! This classroom belongs to you now! Well not literally because even I don't own this classroom but you know what I mean yes? Good! Mmm? Yes you're correct..." Once Oobleck finally stopped spouting greetings Navi and Rao took their seats in the corner of the classroom and proceeded to sit in awkward silence.
"So I'm going to grab a drink, you want anything?" Navi shook her head, but did her best to smile at the boy politely, to her surprise he turned away without returning the gesture, did she do something wrong? She didn't think so. If only Navi had seen the colour of the boy's face before he had turned away.
He returned with a plastic cup and a bone shaped biscuit in hand, and sat beside her again, crunching another biscuit. "Sorry if you were forced to come, I would have come alone but like I didn't really know what to expect and it's always good to have a friend am I right?" She didn't say anything, she just nodded, and the boy sighed. "Am I talking too much? I get told by Buck that I tend to ramble a bit and then I just get caught up with whatever I was trying to say in the first place and-"
He felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up to see Navi looking at him with her soft eyes, he exhaled and smiled at her, then she spoke very quietly, "I don't mind."
"Oh phew, I thought I was being annoying, you don't talk much do you?" She shook her head and her hair swayed from side to side.
"I think it's to balance you out." He chuckled at that, then her eyes widened and she removed her hand from his shoulder, "No, no! I, didn't mean it like that, sorry."
"Hey that's okay, I understood what you meant." She gave him a shy smile and his ear twitched, why did she have to be so cute? "Man I am starving, how many of those biscuits do you think they'll let me have?"
She giggled and told him to stay put as she stood and made her way over to the table set out at the front of the classroom, she had just got there when the entire room was sent into darkness.
***
"Cherry?" Buck, Wynter and Teal had just arrived in the training hall, their arms piled high with leftover food, and the pink haired girl wasn't here.
Suddenly the whole arena changed into a large stone courtyard, with one wooden structure at each side, and a familiar voice yelled from the tower at the far end. "Ladies and gentlemen, hold on to your hats because today we have a doozy!" Cherry stood on the parapet of one tower and continued to announce to the imaginary audience. "It's the match of the century, the fight to end all fights, two titan teams battling it out until we have a champion!"
"What the hell is she doing?" Wynter looked at Teal and the girl just shrugged, then Buck laughed, confusing both of them.
"It's tower defence, she wants us to play tower defence, with food." They all looked at Cherry, the girl was grinning as she continued to talk like a boxing announcer.
"In the north corner we have the dynamic duo, the dynamite gals, Blue Bloom! Aaaand in the south corner we have the loudmouth and the lady, the fool and the flower, Teeeeeeeam Reindeer! It's going to be an interesting fight folks."
"Reindeer?!" Teal dropped half of her haul as she laughed at the pair's reaction. "How are we team reindeer?!"
"How am I a flower?"
"To be honest Buck I think I'm more the flower."
"You don't get it?" Teal said as she wiped tears from her eyes, "A Buck is a deer, and what happens in winter? CHRISTMAS!" She completely lost it and fell to the floor giggling. The other two just looked at her, a mixture of worry and confusion on their faces.
Cherry hopped off her pedestal and ran over to them, "So you like your ship name?"
"Well she loves it." Buck gestured to Teal who was struggling to pick all the food back up. "Wait, ship name?!"
"Did I say ship name I meant team name anyway your tower is that one off you go." Before he could say anything else his sister had grabbed the rest of Teal's haul and the two of them were running as fast as they could to the tower Cherry was stood on earlier. He sighed and jogged to catch up with Wynter as she hurried to their tower.
"Ready?" She said to Teal, and the girl nodded, she made to yell to the others when Cherry stopped her, "Don't bother, they know." She was about to question how Cherry knew when a swordfish speared the beam above her head, she was so surprised she almost fell right off the tower.
They immediately retaliated, hurtling watermelon-bombs and baguette-spears across the courtyard, laughing maniacally whenever Buck was splattered with food.Each tower losing its structure over time as they were pelted with edible ammunition until both teams were balanced on the rickety wooden skeleton, doing their best to stay standing.
The fight went on until Buck had the brilliant idea of bringing a gun to a food fight, and sent a dust-charged watermelon straight past Cherry's tower and into the control panel stood in the seating area. There was a loud hum as the generator shut off and everything went dark.
***
Almost no-one in the classroom panicked, but then again a room full of people who can see in the dark won't really be fazed by a blackout. Rao did however, and he bolted straight for the table where he'd last seen the brunette, he found her and grabbed her hand, leading her out of the dark classroom, down several dark corridors and a flight of stairs before they were outside.
He stopped and turned to Navi, who looked shaken, "Are you okay? Sorry about that, I panicked." She nodded and looked like she was about to reply when Buck and the others rushed over, covered in food.
"Are you guys okay?"
"Why are you holding hands?" Rao realised he still had a hold of Navi's hand and quickly let go.
"B-because I panicked and wanted to help her get out of the building."
"Why would she need help?" The three members of team BRCH looked at Wynter while Navi looked at her shoes and Teal fished scraps of macaroni cheese out of her hair, she cleared her throat and Navi met her gaze, the expression in her eyes told Wynter what she needed, "Oh you guys don't know, right."
"Don't know what?"
"Navi's a uh, how to put this..."
"She has wings okay?" Teal had given up with her hair and the slow pace of the conversation and stepped in. "Navi is a winged Faunus and you probably didn't give her enough time to explain what she is so being the polite son of a gun we love her as she simply didn't tell you and let you carry on acting the gentleman, okay?" Immediately after she finished her rant she brought her left arm to her right shoulder and apologised, causing Wynter to frown.
Rao turned to Navi and took a hold of her shoulders, staring intently at her eyes, after a moment he stopped and shook his head, then asked, "So you can fly?"
"Not exactly."
"Well that's no good; we're going to work on that."
Eager to change the subject, Navi looked at Buck, then Cherry, Teal and Wynter, then spoke, "So what were you doing whilst we were at this club?"
Teal beamed and pointed to her tomato-stained clothes, "Tower defence, food edition!"
"Teal not so loud!" Wynter hissed as she looked around for Goodwitch.
"You didn't hear anything, but the blackout was Buck's fault."
"It was?!" Rao and Navi exclaimed simultaneously, Buck went to scratch the back of his neck, only to find it sticky with soup, and decided against the idea.
"Yeah, the idiot decided to fire a watermelon out of his gun, and it hit the generator in the arena; I didn't think it would cause this though." Cherry said as she looked up at the building which was still pitch black inside despite the many windows it had.
"Oh, right, makes total sense."
"You guys had a food fight without me?" The difference in their reactions made Wynter chuckle, then she looked down at her clothes, then her hair and arms, then to Teal, who looked just as bad if not worse, and made a noise of disgust.
"We really need a shower."
Cherry nodded in agreement, then her expression changed to one of horror and she slapped Buck across the back of his head, he whined and turned to her with an innocent look, but she just glared at him, "Sorry."
"You better be."
The others had very confused looks on their faces when the siblings stopped their internal conversation and turned back to the group. "What did you hit him for this time?"
"Oh nothing," she glared at him again but only quickly before her smile returned, "Let's get back to the dorms before anyone questions why we're covered in food." With that she marched off, leaving the group even more confused, but when they realised they weren't going to get any explanation they followed behind. And thanks to a certain brunet's excellent hearing they made it to the safety of their dorms without detection.
Her team filed into their room before her, but Navi stayed outside for a moment until it was just her and the dog eared brunet on the corridor, "Hey Rao?"
He turned to her and his ears twitched, "Yeah what's up?" She walked closer and brought a hand from behind her back, opening it out to reveal a bundle wrapped in kitchen roll, she gave it to him and smiled, then walked back to her dorm and closed the door.
He stood there for a moment gazing at the bundle, then finally decided to open it, there had to be at least ten of those bone shaped biscuits in his palm, he grinned and fist pumped the air before walking inside the room, giving a silent 'thank you' to the wavy haired brunette who he couldn't get out of his head.