𝐈𝐧 𝐘𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐖𝐢𝐥𝐝𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐃𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐦𝐬 (English)

Chapter 84

For all that Jaune went to bed with a lot of worry over what was happening between Ruby and Yang, and whether Blake and the rest of Team RWBY would ever truly forgive or trust him again, it wasn't a big surprise that he ended up in Cinder's dream that night. His new daughter's dream. The fallout of her discovering her old self and going on a rampage inside Beacon was so great that he couldn't focus on anyone but her.

The dream was fuzzy and indistinct, with the walls of the unfamiliar house he appeared in blurring like static on an old television set. There was little furniture to be seen, no pictures on the vibrating walls or flowers in the corners of the room, nor even places to sit. It looked like a newly bought home that no one had transported furniture to yet.

It also looked very fragile, like the walls might collapse in on themselves if he touched them. Jaune took a step and stumbled when his right foot pressed down into the floor and through, sinking into the ground. His left remained stable, but he could see the floor around it rippling like a disturbed pond. Nothing about this house – this dream, this memory – was stable.

Everything was on the brink of falling apart.

This must be the home I imagined up for Cinder to grow up in, he thought. No wonder it isn't stable when she only experienced it in a dream within a dream. None of this was ever real or ever existed.

Focusing, Jaune expanded his aura and imagined a more solid floor. Suddenly, his feet were back on the surface of it. Hard wooden planks interlocked beneath him. He expanded those to the edge of the room and then looked to the walls. They were still blurred like static. Concentrating, he forced plaster and paint up them – a vibrant shade of purple on one wall, and then white for the other three, and white for the ceiling as well. Interior decorating had never been his thing, but bold colours had to look better than the flickering static from before.

A soft and shaggy purple rug flopped out onto the floor, followed by lighter purple seating – a large three-person sofa and a smaller armchair for one. A pine coffee table clanked down atop the rug. Two flowerpots shimmered into life in the corner of the room, and several picture frames stamped onto the walls with sounds of nails driven into wood. Pictures of him and Cinder, but also of the others from both his team and Team RWBY. Younger versions of themselves, all of which he'd seen in one dream or another.

It took only a few minutes but Jaune felt noticeably tired after. Not exhausted on aura, but it'd definitely taken a hit to set this all up. He estimated as much as a quarter of his aura had been used to reinforce the memory. Not a moment too soon either, as the door handle clicked down and the door swung open.

A fully grown, adult Cinder stepped in.

Jaune almost panicked. "W—Welcome home," he stammered. "How was school?"

"School was... school..." Cinder frowned, her eyes glancing down. "Where... Where do I go to school again...?"

"Sanctum." Pyrrha's last school. It was the only one he could think of. Luckily, he had an excuse for her memory issues. The coma that Ozpin had suggested be faked for her. "Are you okay, sweetie? You're not experiencing any unusual headaches again, are you?"

"Headaches...?"

"You've been having some memory issues."

"Oh..." Cinder shrank a little. It wasn't much, maybe an inch or so, but it came with a shrink in other proportions. Her arms had less length, and she lost a little around the waist and some thickness in her legs. Her hair grew a little shorter. "Oh, I... I guess my head has been feeling a little stranger, Jaune—"

"Dad."

Cinder blushed. "Dad," she amended, looking a little pleased by the word.

Again, she dipped another inch. It looked to him like she was subconsciously altering her dream persona in reaction to what he said and how he acted – or, more likely, how she felt about what he said. There were two sets of subconscious memories at war; the old Cinder who saw herself as a vicious adult, and the new Cinder who saw herself as a child. Jaune knew which he would be fighting for.