RWBY fanfic

Warming an Old Forge

Short story

Hank Wayland wiped the sweat off his brow as he pounded the heated metal with his worn hammer. The heat was intense, even though his thick gloves he could still feel his arm hair singing off.

"Mr. Wayland?"

Hank sighed deeply under his breath. The sign on his door had better had fallen off or someone was going to get the raw end of an iron bar. He was thankful he was at the end of a cycle, and quickly placed the iron bar into a nearby vat of heat-resistant oil for its final hardening.

"What do you want!" he called out, removing his apron and gloves. Whoever had chosen to bother him was meekly hiding behind the archway of his main office. A small head poked out from the behind the wall

"Uh s-sorry, didn't mean to interrupt."

A young girl in a red hood stepped out, she was fidgeting and looking everything in the room other than him.

"S-sorry," she repeated, "Professor Ozpin told me I can find what I need here."

"What you need?"

The girl pulled out her weapon in its compacted frame. She carefully held it out for him to see.

"My eyes aren't what they used to be girl," he stated, growing more irritable.

"It's Ruby," she said meekly, as she approached him, "And this is my problem."

Hank took the weapon from her, examining the part she was pointing to.

"How did you manage to break the locking hinge?"

"By… dragging a giant Nevermore up a cliff."

He gave her another look.

"Kids today," he said aloud, not bothering to lower his voice. "No respect for their tools."

Other than his office and forge room, he also had an area dedicated to extra supplies. They had a dedicated repair station, so why had Ozpin sent this girl here. He found the appropriate replacement and set the weapon on his personal repair station.

"Hmm," he muttered. No sign of rust anywhere. Not even a speck of leftover Grimm blood. The repair was relatively easy with the proper tools, and in a few minutes he was done. He unfolded the frame, the fully extended scythe barely fitting in the small room.

"Well I'll be…"

Everything, from the smallest mechanisms, had polished with a high quality maintainer. He picked up the broken hinge, and on closer inspection there was a bit of weakened metal that had caused the failure.

There was a clanging coming from the forge room, so Hank refolded the scythe and went back. He found Ruby kneeling on the ground, her desperately trying to lift his fallen weapon, a large hand hammer.

"You can't lift it," he said, causing Ruby to squeak and quickly move to the wall. Hank put her weapon on the workbench leaned over. Ruby had an excited look on her face as he lifted the hammer easily and set it back on its holder on the wall.

"Is that your weapon?" she asked, an enraptured look on her face. He could see her eyes jumping around the segmented pieces.

"Yes," he replied picking up Ruby's weapon and handing it to her. "And I'd rather you not touch my tools without my permission."

"Sorry," Ruby apologized. "I thought it wouldn't hurt. And I wanted to figure out how you could get the Maulnir into such a compact form."

"You recognize the Maulnir?"

"Well yeah, I mean it's the best example of folding frame technology, and with it right in front of me I couldn't help but-"

"Wait," Hank stopped her. "How did you recognize it? There a lots of hammers here and on the wall"

"I could just tell…" Ruby was beginning to grow nervous again. Hank paused, and walked back to his private storage room.

"Wha!" Ruby panicked. "I'm sorry! I didn't know I shouldn't have recognized it! Really! I'm sorry! Please don't throw Crescent Rose into the furnace!"

"Calm down kid," Hank said loudly, putting the Crescent Rose into Ruby's lap. She dried the tears that were beginning to form.

"And here."

He handed her a small bottle.

"It's' a different brand than what you're using, but it'll be better on the weapon's overall performance. A small dab on a cloth should do just fine."

Ruby stood up and gave him a large smile.

"Thanks a lot," she said, hugging her weapon close to her. "Um, do I ow-"

"Don't worry about compensation. I've got more parts than I know what to do with. Good luck out there."

Ruby thanked him again and turned to leave, almost skipping as she held her fixed weapon.

"Oh, and Ruby!" he called after her. She stopped and looked back at him.

"If you need any repairs done, or maybe just wanna talk about the latest stuff Atlas puts out, feel free to stop by."

"Ok!" she said cheerfully.

She left, leaving the door ajar. Hank went to close the door, and paused.

"Huh, I guess the sign did fall off."