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Despite what she might’ve told you if you asked, Nora Valkyrie was not a night owl.
At a certain point as it got later, she would start to get tired, and before long, she would just clock out.
Nora liked the idea of staying up until all hours of the night, but that just wasn’t how she functioned.
She got exhausted at night, and was still tired in the morning, always hating to get up early. It seemed she just needed her beauty sleep in order to function right.
Ren, for one, was very protective of her sleep schedule, always wanting to make sure she got to bed at a reasonable time.
It was because he cared about her, yes, and he wanted her to be able to function at her best, but maybe also because he just didn’t want to have to deal with her when she was running on low sleep. She would be extra grumpy in the morning, and groggy in the day. It wasn’t good for anyone.
Regardless, these times seldom occurred, because most of the time, Nora’s sleep schedule just worked itself out. She would (at Ren’s insistence) drag herself out of bed with the alarm in the morning, and at night?
Well, let’s just say that one moment she would be energetic as ever, and the next…
Crash!
Nora could fall asleep anywhere. She was up one moment and down the next. This happened especially when she was at home in the dorm, but not just there.
Sometimes, at the end of a long day, Ren would find himself carrying her back to the dorm. Honestly though, he didn’t really mind. Her little form wasn’t very hard to carry, and he could always feel her warmth, the beat of her heart.
He would keep her safe.
~
“Ren!”
A freshly energetic Nora burst forth from the dorm’s little bathroom, clad in her pjs and smiling. She jumped into Ren’s lap, making him give a little grunt of surprise at the impact.
Her hair whipped across his cheek, still damp and steaming from her recent shower.
Even though she had hit him pretty hard when she’d jumped on him, he couldn’t be upset at her. Her teal eyes sparkled, holding a smile in their brightness, only showing how genuinely happy she was to see him. They had only been apart the twenty minutes she had been in the shower, but regardless.
He gave her a soft smile, pulling her closer so he could rest his chin on her head, her messy locks damp and warm on his face, giving off the soft scent of shampoo and soap.
He, for one, would’ve been content to just sit there and enjoy a nice moment of peace, but Nora was Nora, always moving and talking and looking for the next thing she could get into.
She was very different from him, and he didn’t always understand her haphazard ways, but she was his Nora. Her ways were beautiful to him, even if it meant they sometimes broke up nice little moments like that one.
“Ren!” she said again, hopping back out of his lap and turning to face him.
He sat criss-cross-applesauce on the carpet, his back resting on the end of his bed, and she sat right in front of him, still smiling brightly.
“Ren, I wanna eat a snack before bed! Ooh, let’s do something, what’re we gonna do?”
Ren just shrugged, shaking his head.
“Nora, did you brush your teeth?”
She stared at him for a beat, as if trying to gauge what answer he was looking for.
“…no?”
“Why do you say that like a question? And if you haven’t, you should brush them.”
“But I wanna eat something!”
“You know eating late makes your stomach hurt, so be careful. But if you wanna eat, I’m not going to stop you.”
Nora puffed out her cheeks and refused to look at him, as if pouting. Finally she blew out a breath and whined.
“Rennn! Why do you always have to be the voice of reason?”
“I.. don’t know,” he said, “Nora?”
“Yes Ren?” she responded defeatedly.
“You brushed them, didn’t you?”
She sighed.
“Yes. I thought that if I said I hadn’t, I could eat something.”
“Y’know, I think you know I’m not going to force you to do anything, and really it’s your own reason that tells you to make good choices. You try to say it’s me, but…”
“Shut uuup!” she whined, “That’s not true! I have no reasonable-ness!”
He just rolled his eyes.
“That’s not exactly a good thing,” he said, chuckling.
She just cast a dark look at him.
“Meanie.”
“Yeah. Sure.”
“Anywayyyy! What’re we gonna do? I wanna do something!”
“Go to bed?”
“No! That’s not fun! I mean something exciting!”
He crossed his arms, rubbing his foot back and forth across the hard carpet.
“I don’t know what exciting thing there is to do,” he said matter-of-factly.
“Nooo, there’s always something!”
“Okay then.”
As it turned out, that ‘something’ became Nora turning and dancing around the little dorm, loudly announcing about how bored she was, to which Pyrrha just put on her headphones and faced the wall, and Jaune looked up every now and then, looking a little concerned.
Ren just watched her from his spot at the floor, knowing that at some point she would tire herself out.
That time soon came.
“Ren!” came her call again, as she sank into his lap once more.
“Yes Nora?”
“What’re…” She paused to yawn. “What’re we gonna do…?”
“I don’t know Nora,” he said, brushing his fingers through her short hair as she clung to his chest softly, and he noticed her eyelids beginning to flutter.
“Nora, are you sleepy?” he asked gently, but he received no response.
Upon looking down, he saw that Nora was fast asleep, her eyes peacefully closed. She had fallen asleep right there, still curled up in his lap, and mid-conversation, too.
He wasn’t even surprised. She crashed like this almost every night, without fail. One minute she was up and energized, the next she just simply clocked out.
Smiling softly, he shifted her into a more secure position in his arms before attempting to stand (which was a little tougher with his arms full) scooping her up with him.
Nora remained sound asleep, and upon looking around at his teammates, Ren realized that he was actually the only one left awake.
Gently, he placed Nora in her bed, pulling the covers up snug around her so she wouldn’t get cold.
As he moved to walk away, he felt a hand clutch his shirt, holding onto the hem with a surprisingly insistent grip, especially seeing as Nora was still asleep.
The little gesture tugged at something in Ren’s heart, and he felt his chest go warm as he stared lovingly down at the sleeping girl on the bed.
And so he took her hand gently, pressing a soft kiss to the back before setting it down atop her covers, and leaving for his own bed.
Still, the warmth lingered.
~
“And then, the old woman took the man down to the old rotting cottage, and she ate him!! Rahhhhh!!!!”
Nora roared loudly, jumping at Ruby and making the silver eyed girl fall backwards, nearly yanking the thick blanket off of them all.
Nora began to laugh, while Ruby just shifted over onto her side, setting her head in Weiss’s lap.
Neither of the girls really had the heart to tell Nora that her scary stories weren’t very scary.
Blake and Yang had long since escaped the confines of the stuffy blanket covering the other three’s heads, and were now just watching, chuckling at the other girls’ antics as they passed a box of crackers back and forth.
“Weiss,” Ruby complained, “You haven’t told a single story yet! I’ve exhausted all mine!”
Weiss was silent for a moment, before finally caving.
“Alright, alright, I’ll tell you a story.”
“Yay!” Nora squealed, pulling the blanket down so as not to let the light in, “Tell us, tell us!”
A couple minutes later, both Ruby and Nora really, really regretted asking for this.
“That was so scaryyy!” Nora cried, “Do you think the spirits are coming for us in our sleep?”
“Not so loud!” Ruby hissed, “They’ll hear you!”
“Oh for god’s sake,” Weiss said, rolling her eyes and ripping the blanket off of the little huddle, making the other girls shriek and jump on her.
Even Yang and Blake, who had been listening in, looked a little spooked. They sat side by side on Yang’s bed, a blanket wrapped tightly around their shoulders.
“It’s just a story,” Weiss said, rolling her eyes again, “It’s not like I actually almost got spirited away when I was little. Or, I mean, probably not.”
This elicited screams from the other two girls, making Weiss wince, since they were screaming right in her ears.
“Weisss, you’re so meaaan!” Ruby whined, clinging onto Weiss for dear life.
“Okay, okay, why don’t we all just chill out and play some video games or something,” Yang interjected, “What’s a sleepover without some brutal competition between friends! And maybe it’ll take our minds off of Weiss almost getting… spirited away.”
The blonde visibly shivered at the words as she hopped off the bed, moving to grab out the game controllers.
The only games they had were for only two people at a time, but the girls were content to take turns, mostly just enjoying watching Nora beat Ruby repeatedly as the silver eyed girl moaned at her defeat.
“Yayyy! Victory is mine!” Nora cried for the seventh time that night, thrusting her controller up in the air, while Ruby flopped back onto the rug with a groan.
“It’s getting pretty late,” Yang said, just as Blake flopped against her shoulder, wrapping her arms around the blonde girl’s waist, “And while I’m perfectly content to stay up all night watching Nora beat Ruby at video games, I think some of us are getting sleepy, and might crash soon.”
Yang flicked her lavender eyes towards Blake, who looked to be half asleep already.
There was that word. Crash. Ren often used it to describe the manner of which Nora fell asleep at night.
But she didn’t crash!
Did she?
“Yeah, you’re probably right. We want to be able to open our eyes tomorrow, and that won’t happen if we don’t sleep. Especially for this one,” Weiss agreed with Yang, gesturing to Ruby, who still laid sprawled out on the rug.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Ruby replied.
“That you need your sleep more than any of us, otherwise you’ll be the one who can’t function tomorrow!”
“Please, no one gets any sleep at sleepovers, right?” Nora asked, but no one seemed to hear her.
Her face fell a bit. She didn’t want to go to sleep yet…
“I’m sleeping with you!” Ruby said loudly, latching herself onto Weiss and refusing to let go, “There’s no way I’m sleeping by myself after that creepy story you told us!”
“That’s fine, but just this once, seeing as we need somewhere for Nora to sleep too. You don’t mind sleeping in Ruby’s bed, do you?” she asked.
“Wait, no, you sleep in my bed with me! Nora can take your bed!” Ruby cut in.
“There’s no way I’m sleeping in the hanging bed!”
“Guys, guys, the hanging bed is cool!” Nora cut in, “I’ll sleep there!”
She was eager to try out the hanging bed. Maybe going to sleep here would be fun! Maybe.
“Okay, it’s settled,” Weiss said, prying Ruby out of her lap and sitting down on her bed.
All five girls were already clad in their pajamas, so they just hopped straight into their beds, Nora clambering up onto Ruby’s hanging bunk and pulling the covers up to her chin.
“Alright, lights out!” Weiss chimed.
“Wait!”
All eyes turned to the ginger haired girl on the hanging bunk.
“We haven’t brushed our teeth!” Nora said intently, expecting everyone to hop up and get to it, but they didn’t.
“Ugh, I’ll do it tomorrow,” Yang groaned, burying her face in Blake’s dark hair as the Faunus girl nodded her agreement. (The two were sharing a bed, it seemed, because they wanted to, not because anyone else needed the other one)
“Nora’s right guys, we should brush them,” Weiss agreed, trying to pull Ruby out of her bed.
“Yeah, we should,” Nora stated, hopping down off Ruby’s bunk and grabbing the toothbrush pouch out of the little sleepover bag she’d brought.
“Yang, Blake!” Weiss scolded, glaring at the two girls who were still trying to avoid the small task.
Nora wasn’t quite sure why she’d been so insistent on it. Maybe it was because that was what she’d always done. Brushing her teeth was just a required part of life. Ren often asked her if she had done it before she went to bed at night. He had asked her that for years and years.
Could it be that he was the reason she was always on top of it?
But then his words seemed to return to her, the ones he had said not long ago.
’Y’know, I think you know I’m not going to force you to do anything, and really it’s your own reason that tells you to make good choices.’
Her own sense of reason?
Whatever the matter, Nora was glad she had been insistent upon this. It was actually quite nice like this, brushing her teeth as she stood in a line with the other girls, all in front of the mirror. Yang swayed her hips to the happy tune Ruby was humming as they brushed, making everyone smile.
Once they were finished, they finally made it to bed for real, and Weiss made quick work of switching off the lamp.
Alright, it was time to go to sleep!
But Nora found that the task at hand was going to be much harder than she’d anticipated.
While RWBY’s dorm was almost identical to JNPR’s, it was not the same.
The window, for one, faced the courtyard outside, and little slices of light from the lamps came through the blinds, lighting up the room and casting strange shadows on the walls. Plus, without Pyrrha’s little sound machine that was always on at night, the space was eerily quiet, making it so Nora could hear all the strange sounds outside and the creaking of the building settling, startling her from any feeling of peace she had been able to find.
She rolled over and faced the wall, clutching the blankets tightly to her chest as she tried to force herself asleep. Snippets of Weiss’s spirit story drifted about in her head, twisting themselves into scary images only amplified by the darkness.
Nora pulled the blanket closer, burying her face in the lumpy pillow, but the bed didn’t seem to bring much comfort. Ruby’s bed smelled like… well, Ruby, and not Nora, or Ren.
Ren.
A knot of uneasiness twisted itself in her stomach. Ren was right across the hall, and yet somehow he felt very, almost too, far away.
The clock only ticked later, and yet Nora’s mind was wide awake. Nothing seemed to make her sleepy, no rest could find her weary mind. The bed was a bed, but it wasn’t comfy or relaxing like hers was.
She rolled over onto her back, staring at the folds of the white canopy hanging over Ruby’s bed.
How had everyone just fallen asleep so easily?
The answer was simple. This was their dorm, not hers. They were comfortable here, just as she was in her own dorm. She always slept easy in JNPR’s dorm, with her teammates, with Ren.
Setting her mind on what she wanted to do, Nora tried to steel herself, before slowly and carefully hopping down from the bed.
-
Ren found it strange to go to sleep when Nora wasn’t there.
She was just… always there.
She was only across the hallway, and yet something about her not being in the bed next to his when it came time for lights out gave him a weird feeling.
If she was having a sleepover, he would never bother her. He wanted her to have fun with team RWBY, to spend time with her friends outside of their team. And yet it was just different without her here.
Without her voice, her energy, her little form under the covers after she had just had her crash.
She seemed to fall asleep anywhere in the blink of an eye, even outside the dorm and her bed. He remembered all the times he had to carry her home.
So he had no reason to worry. Nora would have a good time with team RWBY.
“Lights out Ren,” came Pyrrha’s soft voice, to which Ren just nodded blankly, staring briefly at the empty spot where Nora would have been before everything went dark.
Surely it was about time for her to crash right now.
Apparently, he had been wrong.
Contrary to Nora’s quick crashes, it always took Ren a while to fall asleep. He would often lay there for some time, just staring into the dark and basking in calm, getting lost in his thoughts. Sleep would take him eventually.
Now, it seemed he was so lost in his mind that he didn’t hear the door open. Didn’t hear soft footsteps pad across the floor to his side.
He did feel it however, when a little form climbed onto the bed beside him.
“Ahh!” he gasped, before quickly realizing what had happened, “Nora?”
There came no response, only the feeling of someone sinking down to the bed beside him, pushing their head under his arm, huddling in close. Ren felt his hand meet familiar messy hair.
“Nora,” he said softly.
She buried her face in his chest, still saying nothing, and so he stopped questioning, hugging her close and relishing the feeling of finally feeling whole again. Within minutes he felt her breathing even out, her body relaxing in his embrace. He stroked her hair gently, relishing in her warmth.
It didn’t take much for Ren to put the pieces together of what happened, but why, he wondered, had she been unable to sleep at RWBY’s? This was Nora. She could crash anywhere!
He recalled all of the times he had carried her home. He was always there to carry her home.
He was always there.
It was then that something seemed to click inside him.
He hugged her close, thoughts drifting into ideas.
She had come to find him.
Here, she could finally crash.
Could it be because of him?
But he pushed the thoughts aside, instead just letting himself feel the contentment slowly spreading from Nora’s presence. She was here. Everything would always be okay as long as they had each other.
His mind continued to wander as he drifted off to sleep.
He had been right.
Nora could crash anywhere, yes, but she knew Ren would always be there to carry her home.
Maybe she didn’t realize it in the moment, but she always fell asleep easy as long as she knew that he would watch over her. With him, she felt safe.
That night, it was only once he was there beside her that at last, that she could finally crash into a dreamless sleep.