"Weapons are like the extensions of one self, and every Huntsmen learn to live and fight with it as one. It is not only an item, but also a companion, and a friend."

*Note: the italic words are the characters' inner thought.


"Ruby!"

"Urghhhh…." Ruby rolled over, buried her head deeper into the blanket to block out Yang's annoying voice.

"Ruby Rose! Do you know what time is it? Don't you remember what is our assignment for today?"

This time, Ruby was surprised hearing Weiss' voice, but she refused to let go.

"Ruby, you wake up for me right now!" With a forceful tug, Ruby shivered at the cold morning air as her warm blanket flew away, and before she realized anything, a whole body came crashing down on her.

"YANG!" Ruby screamed in annoyance as Yang squished her like a bug, struggling to crawl out of the mountain weighing on her body.

"Rise and shine sleepyhead." Yang said cheerfully, but got up anyway and forcefully pulled Ruby up straight in a sitting position, despite her non-stop whining.

"What is it?" Ruby said sleepily, her eyes were still half-closed, looking at the blurring white, black and yellow figures before her. Her brain wasn't functioning well enough to processed why all of her teammates were in her house.

"Ruby, you know we have a mission with professor Oobleck today, right?" Blake spoke, her cool demeanor seemed to be a bit anxious as well, yet it didn't bother Ruby one bit.

"Uh huh…"

"And you know this mission takes up 20% of our grades in Beacon right?"

"Uh huh…"

"Which means… we need this grade to pass… And he told us specifically not to be late, otherwise the result will be invalidated." Blake glanced at her team's leader whose battle clothes were put on, More like forced on, by Yang, and hesitatingly added in, "You know we're going to fail if we're late right?"

"Uh huh…"

At this point, Weiss couldn't take it anymore, "We were supposed to meet him at the Emerald Forest at 8:30, and it's 8:20 already!" She screamed at Ruby's ears, shoving Ruby's boots in her legs to finish dressing her up with Yang, and pulled Ruby by the arm outside with the speed of light.

"The ship is here," Blake's sensitive ears caught up with the roaring sound of wind and motor from the airship outside the house, and the three girls immediately sped up, dragging Ruby alongside with them.

By this time, Ruby had a vague sense of what's going on as her adrenaline started to rush, her warrior heritage calling out as she shouted, "My weapon!"

She broke free from Weiss and Yang's grasp, speeding ahead to the front porch, yet find herself spinning a few rounds before making a full stop as she had no control whatsoever of her semblance while being half-asleep. With her head pounding with dizziness and sleepiness, she grabbed her weapon and made a run towards the aircraft, while Weiss used her semblance to help herself, Blake and Yang to get into the ship in time.

As the ship lifted off, Ruby let out a sigh of relief, her head finally caught up with what was happening as she looked at her teammates with an apologetic, goofy smile.

"Sorry, guys…"

"Sorry? Sorry? Is that the best you can say you dolt? How many times have we called you last night to remind you NOT to oversleep on the most important day in our academic life. As Huntresses, it is our duty to…" Weiss started scolding Ruby for the rest of the way, while she looked at the ground, trying to endure Weiss' lecture on the responsibility of a Huntress for the ten thousand times.

"Well… You want some tea Blake?" Yang looked away innocently, leaving her sister with pleading eyes behind who was suffering in the merciless voice of Weiss Schnee.

As a matter of fact, she overslept as well and was barely finished with putting on her clothes and readied her weapons as Weiss and Blake stormed in. But of course, Yang was not dumb enough to go and take the blame. All three of them had tasted Weiss' lecturing skill at least once, with Blake being the one who endured the least, and Yang was not ready to put up with the ice queen's wrath.

"Sorry sis," she mouthed quietly, to which Blake picked up on and smiled a bit."

"Tea would be nice." Blake nodded, and they went as far from Ruby and Weiss as the ship allowed them to, having a nice cup of tea and enjoying the view of Vale from above.

"I think I'm going to be deaf," Ruby whined with Yang, covering both of her ears after the twenty-minute ride to Emerald Forest with Weiss breathing constantly on her neck of how "un-leader-like" she was.

"Well, it could have been worse," Yang said sympathetically, and Ruby just sighed in discontent, knowing that she was right. The trip to Emerald Forest usually took longer, but due to Yang and Blake's rushing, the speed increased tremendously and by the time she knew it, they were already started landing.

"We're already late, so I suggest everybody should be ready to fight and make a run for it as soon as we get down," Weiss ordered, clearly still pissed off at Ruby for dragging the team's time.

All three were in battle mode, but Ruby was still looking around to find her Crescent Rose. She moved to the back quietly, searching frantically as she could have sworn she took it with her in a pinch.

"A ha," Ruby smiled happily as she rushed toward the piece of metal near the window glinting under the sunlight.

But to her surprised, Crescent Rose wasn't there, but instead it was a long sword with a clockwork mechanical at the hilt and a red handle that she was so familiar with.

"Qrow's scythe?" She gasped in disbelief, staring at the bladed weapon lying at her feet with wide eyes. Holding up his weapon, she felt like hitting herself in the head for making such a stupid mistake.

Their team was going to go on the most important mission of the school year, which would determine their fate as Huntresses, and yet she grabbed the weapon that she had never fought with on this life-or-death test.

"I'm doomed, I'm officially dead…" Ruby mumbled in despair, and she found herself shrinking under the thought of Weiss and Blake's deadly stares, as well as Yang's crushing power.

"Ruby! We're about to land, where are you?" Weiss' voice frightened Ruby out of her wits, and she could only try to respond as naturally as she could, "Coming!"

With a heavy heart, she retracted the blade and stored it at her waist where Crescent Rose was usually placed at. Ruby ran to her team, and luckily since they were so fixated on the opening compartment of the ship that they didn't notice she wasn't holding Crescent Rose like she normally would.

Before the ship could land safely, Weiss, Blake and Yang all jumped down in perfect synchronize, leaving Ruby stranded on the ship, unable to make the jump as she didn't know how to function Qrow's weapon as well as she did with Crescent Rose. But still, Ruby jumped down with nothing to hold her back from gravity and the ground that was closing up on her.

"Ruby!" Luckily, Blake spotted her and used Gambol Shroud to slow her down, and Weiss coordinated with Blake using Glyphs to break her fall.

"Ruby, what were you thinking? We don't have time for jokes…" But before Weiss could finish scolding Ruby and her recklessness, professor Oobleck approached them with a displeased manner. Blake and Yang also closed their distance with Ruby and Weiss, wondering why she didn't used her scythe to land like usually.

"There you are girls. Do you have any idea what time is it? And to think that your team would be late in such an important day as this. I'm so disappointed in you." Professor Oobleck looked straight at Ruby, while all four girls lowered their heads in shame, especially Ruby for pulling her team down like this.

"Professor Oobleck, this is all my fault, it has nothing to do with them…" Ruby started to plead as he cut her off immediately.

"No excuses," he looked at them sternly, "But since you have done your job excellently on the previous missions, I will let this slip for once."

The girls' faces brighten with relief, but turned serious as he assigned them their mission, "Your team will head out to the West side to collect venom of the White Fanged Hydra. It lives in a cave deep in the forest, and its venom is toxic enough to kill a Goliath, so be extremely careful girls. Eliminate anything that stands in your way and make it back here with two jars of the venom. Good luck girls."

Professor Oobleck gave Weiss and Yang two small tubes which could be tucked away in their pouch but could also be expanded to the size of a jar to collect the hydra's venom. He then stepped back and looked at them as team RWBY set out into the deep forest.

As he disappeared between the bushes and trees, Yang turned at Ruby and asked worriedly, "Are you okay Ruby, why didn't you use your weapon to stop yourself from falling to death?"

"I… I…" Ruby stuttered, laughing nervously at all pairs of eyes were fixated on her, demanding for an explanation.

"Well?" Weiss pushed.

"You know you can tell us anything Ruby," Blake added with sincerity.

But before they could press on the subject further, Ruby left out a warning shout, "Grimm!"

The four girls leaped away quick enough to avoid a deadly slash of paws pounding down on them and quickly raised their guards up as they engaged in battle.

This time, Ruby wasn't able to hide it any longer. She took out Qrow's weapon and transformed it into a scythe, then charged at the Grimms while praying she would be able to stand her ground with his weapon.

Weiss, Blake and Yang were temporarily distracted as the clock-like mechanism start to turn, forming a silver scythe, completely different from Ruby's red Crescent Rose.

"What the…" Yang made a surprise sound, but quickly snapped away from a million questions in her head as to why Ruby had uncle Qrow's weapon and focused on the matter at hand.

Weiss recognized the weapon as well, despite the fact she had only seen it once when Qrow fought with her sister Winter. Its unique design and the impulsiveness of the man wielding it had left a big impression on her, and it wasn't the most pleasant one. Only Blake remained clueless of the origin of Ruby's new scythe. Maybe she wielded two different scythes for backup? She thought innocently.

Despite struggling a bit with the oversize, heavier weapon than she used to, Ruby was still able to kill off most Grimms striking towards her. After all the Grimms were cleared out, Ruby heaved a sigh of relief, slightly surprised for how well she handled the situation with a brand new weapon.

Although Ruby has seen Qrow using his weapon smoothly so many times when he sparred with her for practice, she couldn't help but admire his amazing skills now that it was her turn to deal with the weapon. Not only did it slowed her down a bit with its weight, the scythe was too long for her limited height, making it hard for Ruby to swing it around, as well as its gun-mode that was completely foreign to her as she barely used up any ammo.

"Let's move out," Ruby signaled her team and they immediately sprinted ahead in full speed, away from the Grimms' ambush.

As they were on the move, Yang and Weiss questioned her non-stop, while Blake was still oblivious to what was happening with Ruby.

"Ruby, why do you have uncle Qrow's weapon?" Yang asked, her eyes glinted with curiosity and amusement, enough to dyed Ruby's cheeks pink.

"Ruby, is that your uncle's scythe? Where's your weapon?" Weiss was confused, unable to come up with any reasonable as to why would Ruby and her uncle exchange their weapons. Although they were both scythes, she knew the mechanism of each one and how they functioned were worlds apart.

Blake remained silent, but staring intently at Ruby, searching for some sort of explanation.

"Well…" Ruby hesitated, but spilled the beans at the end.

After she's done with her story, each of her teammate had a different reaction.

"Hey, can I try using his weapon next time? We can take turn," Yang winked playfully.

"You're a hopeless dolt," Weiss sighed impatiently.

"If you can work well with his weapon, then I guess it wouldn't be much of a problem," Blake commented in her usual monotonous voice.

Ruby smiled awkwardly at her teammates' remark, but was glad that they didn't blame her recklessness further. I have the best team ever!

Looking up at the shiny steel scythe blade, Ruby couldn't help but giggle a bit. She remembered the first time she saw Qrow using his weapon rescuing her and Yang from the Grimms. His strength, agility and power was mesmerizing, and she couldn't peel her eyes off of him ever since.

So Ruby followed his footstep and ideal, joining in Signal Academy and slowly guided herself towards the Huntress she has always wanted to be. She used to doubt whether she could do this, used to think about giving up, but Qrow was always there for her to lean on and pull Ruby back on her feet.

Ruby remembered Qrow's face when she told him she wanted a scythe as her weapon, and it was the most surprised she had ever seen him in. He warned her about its weight and the difficulties in wielding a scythe, but nothing could stop her when she made up her mind. Qrow knew it, and he agreed. After that, they spent months thinking up the design, piecing the weapon together and as fitting to Ruby's personality and ability as possible. Qrow was with her every step of the way, from her weapon's creation and into the endless nights, practicing until the necessary skills to wield a scythe were beaten into her skull.

As Ruby brought herself out of the endearing memories between her and Qrow, she thought that maybe taking his weapon by mistake wasn't so bad, because she knew very well he's going to rock her weapon like it was his own. Reminisced back to the battle she just fought, Ruby could feel herself getting stronger, as if Qrow was there himself, guiding and supporting her through thick and thin.

Similarly, her own scythe was irreplaceable to her as well. It spoke for her, and it didn't represent herself alone, but also the one who helped her build it. Crescent Rose was another presence of Ruby Rose – deadly beautiful, yet it was only "half" of her soul, as he held the other "half" to her "full" existence.

Just the thoughts of Qrow made her blush, and Ruby felt like she could do anything with his soul channeling within her through his scythe. Couldn't contain her embarrassment any longer, Ruby burst into a whirlwind of rose petals and dash ahead in full speed, taking her friends with her as well.

"Wait, what do you think you're doing?" Weiss scream was muffled by the gushing wind.

"Ruby, slow down," Blake said in a stern voice.

"Woo hoo!" Yang yelled gleefully.

And with that, team RWBY was on their way to complete the mission, fulfilling their roles as true Huntresses.