Okay do you have more on team MRNE cause??? omg i need more of that in my life
So far I’ve got this one that covers the basic set up of it, and this one that touches more one Merc and Ren’s side of things. So now I’m gonna take this opportunity to ramble about Nora and Emerald-
Nora obviously isn’t too happy with not being Ren’s partner, but she’s still on the same team so she’s fine with it. Em puts on her best ‘this is fine’ face and much like she does around RWBY in canon, pretends to be happy/excited
She knows her next meeting with Cinder is going to go poorly, because she was supposed to partner with Merc, and then try and team with ‘that Nikos girl’ so they could get they could see what she’s really all about. Luckily though, the three teams (RWBY, MRNE, and JP//) hang out a lot
Nora’s still her normal chattery self, so she’s always asking Em random questions or rambling on about herself. So it doesn’t really take long for them to realize how much they actually have in common.
Emerald realizes she’s actually starting to really enjoy Nora’s presence, and starts not liking that she has to lie to her about where her and Merc run off to sometimes. (Nora just assumes they’re ‘together-together’ and want some privacy. Em won’t tell her otherwise.)
By the time they figure out Pyrrha’s semblance, Emerald is severely doubting if she still wants to help Cinder. Not only does she care about Nora, and even Ren, but she’s grown fond of the rest of their friends too. She brings this up with Merc, and in true Merc fashion says that he’s just pretending to care. It’s just a job, and it’ll be done soon (he’s lying to himself and they both know it)
At some point during the semester, Nora notices that Em comes back from wherever she goes with Merc with some burn marks. She tries to chalk it up to just some training gone wrong even if her gut tells her otherwise. She tries bringing it up with Emerald a few times, but Em just shrugs it off so Nora doesn’t press her about it.
By the time of the dance, they’ve both got Pretty Obvious Crushes that they refuse to acknowledge, however Nora does ask Em to go with her. Ya know, as ‘friends’
They have a good time, and this is when Em really changes her mind about the upcoming tournament and what it means is going to happen
Merc and Yang still advance to finals for their rounds, but Em doesn’t use a hallucination on Yang to frame her. She does still try and use one of Pyrrha, and Nora notices that Em isn’t looking too good but it’s too little too late. By the time Nora gets Emerald to snap out of it, Penny’s already well... that doesn’t change.
Em just starts crying and pulls Nora aside to explain everything. She expects Nora to hate her, to push her away, to react violently, anything. Instead, Nora hugs her, and tells her it’s going to be okay. They’ll figure this out and get her out of Cinder’s grasp.
All hell starts breaking loose because of the panic, and the Fall pretty much goes the same. Beacon still gets destroyed, Pyrrha still dies, and Cinder still gets the full maiden powers. The only real difference is that Merc and Em aren’t at her side anymore, they stayed to fight. Alongside their friends. Their family.
