The night had always been my favorite part of the day.
It wasn't just the silence. It was the feeling that the world had finally gone still, that everything outside my room had gone blind and soft while I stayed awake, alert, and in control. Behind closed doors, I kept my own secrets. In my room, I kept the most precious one of all.
I sat cross-legged on the plush carpet of my private rented room, tucked away in one of the upper-classmen dorms far from the standard first year area where Team JNPR officially lived.
This was not where I slept. I still kept a bed in the team room, of course. That had been necessary. I had to keep up appearances, smile at the right times, nod along, and play the role of the supportive partner, the loyal Huntress-in-training, the polite Champion of Mistral.
But this room was different.
This room was mine.
It was the place where I kept the things I could never risk leaving near my team. Especially not near her. Not near that clingy, needy twin sister of his who thought she had some kind of claim.
True possession isn't loud, I thought, my lips curving into a soft smile. It's quiet. It's knowing every breath he takes without him ever realizing I'm listening.
I was dressed for midnight and comfort. I had just finished a punishing workout to burn off the frustration from the day's classes, and all I wore now was a pair of tight black athletic shorts, a dark crimson sports bra, and a loose gray jacket draped over my shoulders.
My skin still held a little sweat, and the cold air from the room's conditioner felt lovely against it.
I leaned back against the edge of a velvet loveseat, let out a long breath, and reached for the two things sitting on the coffee table beside me: my highly customized, heavily encrypted private Scroll, and a large cup of strawberry frozen yogurt.
After a good workout, it's time for what I love the most, I mused happily, plunging the plastic spoon into the sweet treat.
I took a bite, savored the tart sweetness, then tapped open my Scroll. The biometric scanner read my thumbprint at once and unlocked the hidden folder buried deep inside the device.
What opened was my collection.
Thousands of files, all organized by date, all labeled with care. Photos. Audio clips. Videos.
Every single one of them belonged to one person.
"Good evening, everyone," I thought with a playful mental bow to no one at all, scrolling through the gallery. "This is Pyrrha Nikos. At the moment, I am completing my daily routine."
I took another bite of yogurt.
"I am currently arranging and backing up the contents of my Jonah collection."
My finger paused over a high-resolution photo I had taken the day before. Jonah sat in the library, lit by weak, ugly light that left deep shadows across his face. He looked exhausted. His eyes were flat, his shoulders slumped, his entire posture worn down into something tired and sharp.
To anyone else, it would have looked like a miserable boy trying to disappear.
To me, it was perfect.
Now then, I thought, my smile widening. I opened the folder marked for the current date. Tonight's Love♡Jonah folder had been filling up fast.
I hummed softly while the new photos loaded. There was a perfect shot of his scowling face as he left class. There was a blurred little video of him trying to dodge my embrace before I finally dragged him into an empty classroom for lunch.
I lingered on that one for a while, replaying the exact moment his careful, apathetic mask cracked when I whispered about his morning kiss with his sister.
The look of panic in his eyes still made my chest flutter. I practically shivered in delight, crossing my legs tight.
But still images had limits. They never lasted long enough.
Which is why I simply can't neglect my live observations! I thought, slipping out a quiet giggle. "Ufufufu..."
I closed the gallery and opened the surveillance program I had written myself and installed on the Scroll.
The screen flickered, buffered, and then split into a grid of live feeds.
Every corner of the Team JNPR dorm room appeared on my display.
I had cameras hidden in the vents, lenses tucked into the spines of books, and audio bugs hidden in light fixtures. Nothing in that room was out of view. Nothing in that room was ever truly private.
Getting it all set up had taken far more effort than it should have.
My mind drifted back eight months, to the time after initiation, when we had become Team JNPR and moved into that cramped dorm together.
My first attempts had been a disaster. I would sneak in while the others were in class, use Polarity to work the wiring, and attach my equipment to the walls.
Then Jonah would find it and strip the whole thing apart within a day.
It became a quiet war between us.
I planted a bug under his desk. He removed it. I replaced it. He removed that too. For weeks, we kept at it in complete silence, each of us refusing to give the other the satisfaction of a confrontation.
He never shouted. He never even accused me. He just dismantled my network and left the crushed remains on my bed like a warning.
At the time, it had been infuriating.
Still, in those first weeks, I had not done it because of him. I had done it because of habit.
As a celebrity, I was used to people invading my privacy, so I monitored my own space to stay safe.
I hadn't fallen for my cynical team leader yet. That realization had come later, after our little war of bug and counter-bug had settled into a kind of respect.
He was so clever for catching those first bugs, I thought fondly. But I had patience. And I had money.
These days, my equipment usually stayed hidden for weeks at a time. Sometimes Jonah finally got annoyed enough to do a full sweep of the room and rip the bugs out all at once, but that only happened every few months.
And even then, it barely mattered. By the next day, while he was busy dealing with Jeanne's moods or whatever other disaster had found him, I had already replaced everything with smaller, better devices in the same blind spots.
He thought he was clearing his room, I thought, smiling at the feed. He had no idea the walls were made of my eyes.
I opened one of the camera feeds to full screen. It showed Jonah's bed, dark and empty under the moonlight. It had recently been destroyed by that needy sister of his.
Of course, I didn't limit my tracking to just the dorm room, I made sure to watch every place where he might go to, I thought proudly, sipping more yogurt.
There was his seat in Professor Port's lecture hall. His spot in the cafeteria. His bag. His shoe locker by the training arena. Every place he went on a normal day, every hallway he passed through, every route he liked to take without thinking about it—
All completely covered!~♡
The tiny trackers I slipped into his jacket pockets and the receivers I fastened to his belt kept me from ever losing him for long. I always knew where he was. I knew his pace, his heartbeat, even the rhythm of his breathing.
Perfect~♡
I tilted my head back and looked at the ceiling, warm satisfaction spreading through me. Knowing another person so fully, so constantly, had a strange kind of power to it. It was intoxicating.
Perhaps... I thought, twirling a strand of red hair around my finger. Am I actually just a severe perfectionist when it comes to love?
Then I laughed softly and dismissed the idea. Who cares about the clinical terminology? It was just her dedication.
But enough about my surveillance habits, I reprimanded myself playfully. Let's get back to the truly important subject: Jonah.
I glanced at the spoon in my hand. It was ordinary, cheap, taken from the academy cafeteria.
Then my eyes drifted to the folded gray towel on the back of the chair.
Then to the oversized jacket around my shoulders.
Aaaall of them came directly from Jonah! I practically squealed in delight, hugging the oversized jacket tightly against my chest, burying my nose into the collar and inhaling deeply. It smelled faintly of him.
I'm not stealing, of course! I told myself. I'm merely 'borrowing' them... just for a little bit. To use them. To feel them. Before I carefully return them exactly to where I found them, so he never notices they were gone!
I took another generous spoonful of yogurt and put the spoon in my mouth, closing my eyes.
The taste was sweet. Not just the tartness of the strawberry yogurt, but the imagined taste of his lips on the very same metal. I licked the spoon clean with slow strokes of my tongue, my breathing hitching slightly in my chest as a familiar, hot thrill spiked through my veins.
So delicious ♡
Not only that, I thought, my mind racing with ecstasy as I slowly licked my lips. I also diligently collect Jonah's regular athletic jerseys and unwashed gym clothing directly from his laundry basket!
I felt a massive, rushing wave of heat flood my face, turning my cheeks bright red. My breathing turned shallow. I dropped the spoon back into the yogurt cup and wrapped my arms tightly around my own body, hugging myself.
And I do incredibly naughty things to his clothes in this private room, I confessed to my imaginary audience, my heart pounding a frantically against my ribs.
Mainly rolling around in my bed while burying my face into his sweaty shirts, desperately imagining him wrapping his large, strong hands all over me! Taking me right then and there!
"My goooosh~~~♡!" I moaned aloud, unable to contain myself.
My legs rubbed together tightly. The sheer intensity of the imagined scenario—his dead, apathetic eyes suddenly blazing with raw, animalistic desire as he forcefully pushed me down onto the mattress—was almost too much to handle.
Of course, I quickly composed myself, wiping a bead of sweat from my forehead. I never actually steal anything! I am a proper, dignified woman, after all. Not a common thief.
If it was something of his that I desperately wanted to keep permanently for my collection... I simply use my personal funds to buy the exact same, identical copy from the store, rough it up carefully to look worn like the original and secretly swap them out while he's sleeping!
"KYAAA~♡" I squeaked, hiding my face behind both hands and peeking through my fingers at his face on the Scroll.
"Oh my~~! Geez~!" I whined, my body trembling slightly. "Jonah, why are you so incredibly you! Your apathy, your dark eyes... I literally can't stop drooling for you! I need you so badly!"
Then a sharp crack of feedback burst through the earpiece in my ear.
The sound cut through my daze at once.
My expression changed from flustered and dreamy to alert and focused in a single breath.
I sat up straight, grabbed the Scroll, and brought up the audio feed linked to the dorm room bugs.
Wait. I hear movement... I thought, pressing a finger against the earpiece. Jonah might be saying something?
I raised the gain on the mic hidden near his bed.
Static cleared.
Then I heard it: the sound of someone cleaning up a mess, along with sighs and the scrape of movement against the floor.
And then... I heard it. A sound so incredibly rare, so incredibly precious, that it practically brought tears to my eyes.
Jonah was humming.
He was humming softly to himself while he knelt on the floor, cleaning up the wreckage Jeanne had left behind earlier that night.
All your happiness and sadness, give it all to the sky~" Jonah mumbled the lyrics softly under his breath, his voice slightly off-key but utterly mesmerizing.
So incredibly cute, I swooned internally, a soft smile spreading across my lips. Even after everything that crazy sister of his puts him through, he's humming while he works.
"That which I've forgotten~ hmm~ hmhm~ Hmm~ hm~" Jonah continued, the words devolving into an unrecognizable, mumbled melody as he clearly forgot the rest of the song.
"Pffft...!" I couldn't help myself. I burst into genuine laughter.
"Jonah!" I whispered lovingly to the live feed. "You idiot! You don't even remember the lyrics!!~♡"
There was something almost unbearable about it. The boy everyone saw as cold and sharp was sitting in a wrecked bedroom, humming to himself while he cleaned.
Gosh, he is just so incredibly cute, so overwhelmingly cute!!!
My heart thudded hard enough to hurt. I gripped the jacket so tightly my knuckles went pale. The love I felt for him was so thick and consuming that it crowded out everything else.
Geez~ Jonah, my poor heart almost physically can't take it with how ridiculously adorable you are! I chanted in my mind, rocking back and forth on the carpet in pure bliss.
I love everything about you!
Everything.
Everything!
Everything!
The word echoed in my mind, growing louder and more frantic with every repetition until it was the only coherent thought remaining in my head. It drowned out all reason. It drowned out all logic. It was just a burning, undeniable truth.
All of Jonah's Everything.
EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING!
"I LOVE ABSOLUTELY EVERYTHING ABOUT YOU!~♡" I declared passionately, throwing my arms wide open to the empty room, as if trying to embrace the very concept of his existence.
...Thum.
...Creak.
A sharp sound crackled through the earpiece and snapped me out of it.
My eyes flew back to the live feed.
The front door of the dorm room was opening.
Jonah, already dressed in his street clothes, slipped quietly into the hallway and pulled the door shut behind him.
Ah!~ My breath hitched in alarm. Jonah is going out on his random late-night walk again!
Panic surged through me at once. He was leaving the room. Leaving my surveillance. Leaving the safety of the place I knew.
Oh, no.
The thought of him walking alone, vulnerable to the other absolute lunatics roaming this city, was utterly unacceptable. It physically hurt my chest.
Oh, no!
I didn't hesitate for a single second.
I scrambled to my feet, abandoned the yogurt, grabbed my trench coat, and threw it on over my sports bra and shorts. Then I shoved my feet into my boots and did not even bother tying them properly.
"Wait for me, Jonah," I whispered as I burst out of the room and sprinted down the hallway. "I'm coming."
"Hmph..."
I stood on a quiet street corner in Vale's commercial district, my trench coat pulled tight around me against the midnight cold. A frustrated breath left me, and a small cloud of white fog drifted into the air.
I had been searching the surrounding area for fifteen minutes, following his usual routes, and I still had not found him.
It was intensely frustrating. The boy was an enigma.
Jonah, I thought bitterly, grinding my teeth together as I scanned an empty alleyway. Whenever he's outside my searched areas... he really can just completely disappear into thin air like smoke.
He knew how to disappear into shadows. He knew how to leave no trace. It was an incredibly irritating skill of his.
Hmm... I tapped my chin in thought, my green eyes scanning the dark horizon. Which way did he likely go? Considering the temperature tonight... maybe today he'll head over toward the library? The stone buildings would have held warmth better than the open streets.
With that thought in mind, I started walking at a brisk pace toward the part of the city where I hoped he had gone.
Jonah had always belonged to the night. That had been true for as long as I had known him.
When the dorm felt too suffocating, or when his mind kept him from sleeping, he slipped out and wandered alone through the city. He moved through empty streets until the early hours, avoiding everyone and everything.
I loved the silence too.
It meant we were alone out here.
Me and him.
If I could just find him.
A dark, filthy, blood-soaked alleyway completely hidden from the main streets.
Nora Valkyrie stood at the center of it, grinning wildly as she drove a knife over and over into the chest of a fresh, human corpse lying dead in the garbage.
Blood splashed the wall. Blood stained her face. She laughed like she had lost her mind.
----
High above the city, on a locked dorm rooftop, Coco Adel leaned against an air conditioning unit and tore off her coat. She dropped it to the floor and revealed that she was wearing nothing beneath it but her lingerie's.
Her breath came hard in the cold night air. She held her Scroll inches from her face, staring at a recording she had made of one of her humiliating sessions with Jonah.
A deep flush colored her skin as she pressed a hand between her legs, gasping in absolute bliss in the cold night air.
...Sorry about that brief interruption.
My apologies. You definitely just saw something incredibly strange and disturbing just now, didn't you?
Please, do your best to just quickly ignore the vile, pathetic habits of those filthy things. Let us return our focus entirely to what is truly important in this world.
Me and Jonah.
After wandering aimlessly around the library for what felt like far too long, checking corners, benches, and alleys, I still had not found him.
Sigh...
I stopped under the pale, flickering yellow light of a broken streetlamp. The chill of the night was beginning to seep through my clothes.
"Jonah," I whispered aloud to the empty street, a note of genuine, pathetic desperation creeping into my voice. "Where are you?"
I tilted my head back, letting my red hair fall loose as I looked straight up into the vast, starless sky hanging above the city. The clouds obscured the shattered moon. The sky looked exactly like his eyes. Dark. Dead. Yet impossibly deep.
Without Jonah present here as my radiant sun and my guiding moon, I thought, a sense of total emptiness washing over my soul. What point is there in anything else existing in this universe?
He was my gravity. Without him, I was just drifting through my own life
If Jonah ever truly chose to vanish into the dark and leave all of us behind, there would be no easy way to find him again.
He was incredibly smart. If he wanted to vanish, he would vanish.
The thought brought a sudden, sharp ache to my chest.
Jonah.
He was special. The only person in this broken world worth watching.
Where are you? I sighed again, looking longingly at the vast, uncaring night skies.
Ahh...
Where exactly is he right now?
Where on earth are you hiding, Jonah?
I squeezed my eyes shut, clutching the edge of my coat.
I just want to see you right now. I don't care what it takes. No matter what it costs, I want to see you.
"Stab."
A familiar, flat voice suddenly whispered into my left ear.
At the same instant, I felt a dull, prickly sensation press hard against the dead center of my back, right between my shoulder blades, completely catching me off guard.
My heart leaped in my chest. A massive smile immediately broke across my face.
"And now..." Jonah's flat, utterly bored voice continued speaking right behind me. "...You've already been pierced."
I didn't panic I didn't activate my aura. The sheer, overwhelming surge of euphoric relief at simply hearing his cynical voice obliterated any instinct I possessed.
I slowly turned my head, my smile turning incredibly sweet and undeniably sultry.
"...Aha~" I cooed softly, leaning my back incredibly slightly against the object pressing into my spine. "You pierced me... with a lovely arrow directly to the heart, right?~♡"
I turned fully to face him.
Jonah was standing mere inches away from me, wrapped in his dark jacket. His face was devoid of emotion as usual. He just stared at my overly flirtatious expression with annoyance.
"Huh?" Jonah drawled out the word slowly, his eyes narrowing. "Stupid."
He didn't bother hiding his annoyance at seeing my face in the middle of his attempt to hide in the dark. It was incredibly clear he had been hoping to avoid me.
I ignored the insult and looked down at the thing in his right hand.
It was, indeed, a blade. Or, to be more accurate, a custom combat dagger. It was a completely black weapon. Definitely not the standard, mass-produced issue combat knife you could normally just casually buy at a civilian supply shop or requisition from the Beacon academy armory.
It was a solid obsidian blade, crafted and fitted with a rubber grip for the handle to prevent slipping. It was an incredibly expensive, specialized tool.
More importantly, it was a weapon entirely composed of non-magnetic materials. It was a blade that my Polarity Semblance fundamentally could not affect, control, or deflect. A weapon perfectly suited for fighting me.
Fortunately, the edge caught the light from the streetlamp, and I saw it was blunt. A training blade. A warning, not an attempt to kill.
"Whoa!" I said cheerfully, my eyes lighting up as I raised both of my hands up into the air in an exaggerated gesture of surrender. "Careful there! You're holding something incredibly dangerous out in the open!"
I flashed him my most teasing, playfully wicked smile, taking a small step closer to the tip of the blunt dagger.
"Tell me the truth, Jonah," I teased him softly, lowering my voice. "Perhaps... sneaking around in the dark... you've even brutally killed someone tonight? A serial killer in the making?"
It was a test. A way to read him. A jab meant to pull a reaction out of him and point me if he had met the far more unhinged girl living in our dorm.
Jonah's expression didn't change much. He just let out a tired breath, rolled his eyes to the heavens, and flicked the rubber handle of the heavy blade in his hand, spinning it backward so the blunt edge rested harmlessly against his forearm.
"Hmph," Jonah scoffed dryly. "You say I went out and actually killed someone with a knife? Are you even remotely sane?"
He shook his head, looking utterly disgusted by the accusation. "Uggh, geez. You women are incredibly quick to just leap to completely prejudiced, insane conclusions about my character at every turn. Even though you can clearly see this is just a blunt toy."
I just smiled, delighted that he engaged with my banter, even if it was just to call me insane. We were conversing. We were alone in the dark. It was perfect.
However, the universe, apparently deciding that it completely abhorred my happiness, chose that exact second to ruin the moment.
"Jonah-Sama," a sudden, cold voice said from the alley. "had, unfortunately, been in a rendezvous with that pervert of a senior student not long ago. I saw the encounter with my own eyes"
I whipped my head around, my perfect mood instantly souring.
Blake Belladonna silently walked out of the shadows of the nearby alleyway. She moved with silence, not a single footstep making a sound. Her cat eyes were literally shining a faint, reflective gold in the darkness of the city.
Jonah didn't look startled. He just sighed, turning to face her. He accepted the unwarranted assist from the stalker simply because it helped deflect my previous murder accusations.
"See!?" Jonah yelled, gesturing aggressively toward Blake as a credible witness. "There's your proof! My innocence is confirmed by a third party!"
I narrowed my eyes at the Faunus, crossing my arms over my chest. I felt an intense wave of annoyance wash over me.
"Utter pervert...?" I repeated, then put the pieces together. "Oh. Right. You must mean Coco, our second-year upperclassman, right?"
Jonah suddenly paused. He ignored me and turned to face Blake, his eyebrows raised high in genuine, shocked curiosity. He looked incredibly concerned by the implication of her statement.
"Wait a damn second," Jonah demanded sharply. "You were there? Just now?"
He pointed a finger back toward the direction of the academy. "How the hell is that possible? We were literally standing in the middle of a completely open rooftop on the top floor! There was absolutely, literally nowhere to hide nearby besides hanging off the edge of a five-story drop!"
"Yes," Blake answered instantly, her voice of any hesitation. She stared at him with unwavering conviction. "I was there."
She said it with the sort of calm that made the whole thing even more insane. As if performing life-threatening acrobatics just to spy on him was the most obvious, perfectly natural decision in the whole world.
While Jonah and Blake began to bicker over the insanity of what she did, I tuned them out. I had other, much more pressing matters I wanted to address.
I caught Blake's eye and gave her a sharp wink.
My expression said everything.
Blake, I silently transmitted my fury through my glare. I explicitly asked you to contact me immediately if you managed to find Jonah first, right~?!
I glared harder.
What the hell is the meaning of this sudden betrayal, you lying, thieving street cat~~!?
Blake caught my signals. She stared at me for a split second.
And then, she deliberately, mockingly just turned her head away from me, ignoring my blatant demands. She practically stuck her nose in the air.
I felt a sudden, hot rush of furious humiliation burn across my cheeks. I blushed wildly in sheer anger at being so casually dismissed by her.
Th-This absolute, utter bitch! I seethed internally, my hands clenching into tight fists so hard my nails dug into my palms. After all the help and information I've secretly given her over the past months just to keep her loyal! She betrays the alliance the second she actually finds him alone!
Shit! I cursed in my mind. It's completely unfair! Only in her freakish, feline 'Jonah finding ability' am I no match for Blake's tracking skills yet!
She could track a scent. She could see perfectly in the dark. It was a racial advantage that I simply could not replicate with mere technology or skill.
Hmmm~ How utterly frustrating~ I thought, forcefully taking a slow, calming breath to reign in the urge to draw my spear and impale the girl where she stood.
I clamped down on my raging jealousy.
It's fine. Stay calm. Stay composed, I reassured myself, closing my eyes for a fraction of a second. I desperately wanted to be the very first one to be with Jonah's everything. I wanted this moment for myself. But... Oh well.
A determined smile slowly returned to my lips.
It doesn't matter if the cat found him first tonight. There will undoubtedly be countless more 'firsts' arriving in the inevitable future. He isn't going anywhere.
I used the thought to quickly cheer myself back up.
Jonah finally finished his argument with Blake regarding her insane lack of self-preservation. He stopped yelling and glanced back over his shoulder towards me. He noticed my slightly flushed face immediately.
"What the hell is wrong with you now?" Jonah asked dryly. "You've got a weird, incredibly unsettling look plastered on your face right now."
I relaxed my hands and uncrossed my arms. Looking up at my beloved leader standing before me in the dark. I looked at the dark emptiness in his eyes, the emptiness that called to my soul.
I gave him a small, bright smile. A smile completely devoid of my inner fury, radiating only pure love.
"...Nothing," I whispered back, my voice as sweet as honey. "Nothing. At. All. Darling~♡"
Jonah just groaned, rubbing his eyes again in annoyance.
And so, surrounded by a me, and a delusional stalker acting as his escort, Jonah gave up on his night walk. We turned around and began the long walk back towards Beacon Academy together.