New World Order

by JKrlin

Ruby Rose and Negan have a lot in common. Both are enrolling in Beacon Academy. Both share a love in cool-looking and over-the-top weapons. Both want to be a hero, someone who fought for what was right and protected people who couldn't protect themselves. Both want to save the world. The only difference is that they have some very divergent ideas on how the world should be saved.

4. Passing School Days - Part 1

"That's dumb."

"Coming from the Huntress in a freakin' skirt."

"A combat skirt! It's called a combat skirt, Russel! A combat skirt is not dumb, but not naming your weapon definitely is!"

"They're just a pair of daggers, Rose. What do you want me to call them? Mister and Missus McTwoKnives? Because that's what they are, a pair of fancy kitchen knives."

"But they're not everyday kitchen knives! They're like twice the size, and they've got those revolving chambers for Dust like Weiss has for her weapon. Those things help make your daggers unique, and special. They need a good name for them."

"Why don't you come up with the name, Rose, since you keep bringing it up?"

"I only bring it up because –"

"Because you're a weapon freak that uses a giant freaking scythe as a weapon, that's why."

Ruby's hands grasped the sides of her head. She pulled at her hair in vexation. "Why do you always complain about Crescent Rose? Why do you always have to complain about Crescent Rose?"

"Everyone at Signal knows that Professor Branwen played favorites with you and your sister. He's the only reason your crazy weapon works."

"That's not – Okay, maybe Uncle Qrow did help me out a lot, but I still worked really hard on my baby by myself. It was me who put together the scope, the magnifying glass in the scope, the custom magazine for the rifle, and I did the math for how much it should weigh for me to handle the recoil, and… and…"

"You mean it was Carl who did the math for you," Russel corrected with a knowing sneer. "He was an even bigger nerd than you were, that's for sure."

"D-Don't make me bring out Crescent Rose again! I'll – I'll cut you with it!"

"You're still not very good at making threats, Rose. You should have made the time you had with Carl last. Kid knew what to say to make you think twice, even for a nerd."

Ruby did bring out Crescent Rose, but unlike the previous times when she had held it threateningly over Russel, he didn't look at all worried now.

Whitley's lax, amused cackles filled the misty air. "I think Weiss's misanthropic tendencies are rubbing off on you, Ruby." He raised himself from his kneeling position. His jar was completely full of the pinkish-purplish sap he was harvesting from a tree. Whitley set the jar down in the nearby wheelbarrow along with the other jars of sap they had gathered. "I believe that is the last one. Now, where did Merle wander off to? He should have returned by now."

Between the drifting cherry-colored leaves and the dense line of trees that were signature to the Forever Fall forest, a small Ursa Grimm burst out and landed into the small clearing the Beacon students were residing in. The Ursa fell onto its back, and Merle was climbing on top of it. He was beating the Grimm viciously and repeatedly with the mallet attachment on his Hook Blade. Two or three larger Ursa charging after them were lagging not too far behind.

"Ah, there he is," Whitley greeted with a smile, undeterred by Merle's battle cries or the Grimm's dying croaks. "I was beginning to suspect something was wrong. It does not take that long for one to privately relieve him or herself."

All Merle had to say back was half-desperate and half-irritated shout of, "A little help would be nice!" The incoming Grimm came close enough to lunge. Without further prompting, Whitley, Ruby, and Russel sprang into action.

As Ruby took out her frustrations on the raging, soulless Grimm, she couldn't help but wish she had gotten better teammates for this field trip. Whitley was okay – great, actually, since he did most of the sap harvesting, but Russel was Russel, and Merle kept trying to get out of the work they were supposed to be doing. Add the fact that Ruby had only just truly accepted that she was, will, and had to be a good, proactive leader for Team RWBY, and wasn't quite confident to be the leader for a whole other team entirely, it all spelled for a less than ideal crew to put together.

The field trip itself was a nice change of pace in the monotony of Beacon's regular classes. Sure, it was Beacon Academy, the weapons and dueling classes were awesome, and a lot of the new friends Ruby has made are pretty cool, but at the end of the day, it was still school. That meant quizzes and tests you had to stay up studying late at night for, the homework that you think will take five minutes but actually takes five hours, the pages and pages and pages and pages of textbook material you had to read…

Ruby took solace in the fact that the light at the end of this tunnel was becoming an official, certified, awe-inspiring, and – in Negan's words – badass Huntress. Plus, some of the classes were actually really, really cool!

Teachers like Professor Peach and Professor Eastman helped keep things interesting at Beacon. Professor Peach taught one of the science classes, so they were regularly doing labs and plenty of hands-on type of work with Dust and stuff. The sap they were collecting was meant for another experiment regarding animalistic Grimms' attraction toward the the sap.

Professor Eastman decided to come along on the field trip to supervise another Team Dynamics exercise. Each team leader was given new teammates for the day. It was to teach "versatility and trust with your fellow Huntsmen," or something like that. Ruby hadn't really been paying attention when the Professor explained it. She was too busy being dismayed that she wasn't with Team RWBY and had to work with Russel at the time.

Once all of the Grimm were dead, Team RMWR (or Team Roamer, as Ruby suggested after twenty attempts of figuring out a good acronym for their temporary team) was cleaning the blood off their weapons. Standing by the wheelbarrow, Whitley was poking at one of his fancy revolvers with a screwdriver-looking tool. Merle sat at the base of a tree, wiping a rag along his Hook Blade. Russel leaned against the side of another tree, watching the Ursa corpses disperse into nothingness. Ruby sat across from him, and she was doing her darnedest not to glare at him.

"You like what you see, Rose?" Russel said to her without looking away from the Grimm.

The response of "Your hair looks stupid!" came out before Ruby could stop it. In her defense, she really thought that the Mohawk looked stupid. She should know. She wasn't Yang's trusted little sister for nothing.

"Hey. Hey!" Merle yelled, raising his arms up. "Can you two pipe down for just one second? Can't damn hear myself think with y'all shouting so much." As if giving up, Merle exasperatedly threw his arms toward the Rs of Team RMWR. He rose and sauntered a few feet away, though still within the team's line of sight.

"Russel started it!" Ruby pointed her index finger at the bully.

"It does not matter who started it," Whitley said. He set his screwdriver back into the camouflaged duffle bag he constantly carried around with him. Most of his guns and hunting gear were stored in it, the camouflage look often clashed with his white and blue attire. "What matters is who finishes it, Ruby, and neither of you seem willing to finish it."

"I'm trying!" Ruby defended herself. "I'm really, really trying, but Russel isn't trying at all!"

Russel chuckled. "Blaming everyone except yourself for your own problems? Isn't that the Ice Queen's shtick, Rose?"

"Don't bring Weiss into this!"

"Russel isn't wrong," Whitley said under his breath.

"Even she's trying, though! She helped Jaune and Cardin study for Professor –"

"Doctor," Whitley corrected.

"Doctor Oobleck's test last week. Cardin's trying, too. He apologized to Velvet, Jaune, and everyone else he was bullying. Russel hasn't apologized to anyone!"

Whitley laughed softly again, zipping up his duffle and putting the sling over his shoulder. "Have you apologized to Russel for your own crass behavior toward him yet?"

Admittedly, Ruby hasn't. "He should say sorry first! He – He started it…" Ruby lost some of her energy near the end. Whitley and Russel were smirking at her. They looked like they just won an argument, and Ruby felt like she just lost one.

Stupid Russel. First he was friends with Philip, and now he's suddenly friends with Whitley. Today was just not Ruby's day.

When Ruby plopped down to hug her legs against her chest, she could hear Merle take a few steps toward her. "Hey, why so down, Red?" he asked not unkindly. "What happened to all that fire ya had in ya? This is the closest thing to an actual hunt that we've had since the school year started. I thought you'd be more excited, considerin' that you always talk about bein' a Huntress an' all."

"It's not the field trip that's the problem," Ruby muttered, refusing to look at anyone in the eye.

"So, it's the new team that's bothering you, is it?" Merle laughed softly, too, but unlike Whitley's that was goodhearted teasing on Ruby's behalf, Merle's sounded like he really was entertained by Ruby's attitude. "What, is your big pal Merle not your first choice as a team member?"

"Not really," Ruby answered, still downcast. "No offense, but… yeah, not really." Despite his friendliness, Merle was a pretty open racist at times.

"Shouldn't be surprised, I guess. You got your eyes on Slick. Rather partner up with his pansy ass than Uncle Merle." Merle laughed lightly again. "Too bad for you that he's putting the wood in our local mute, huh?" Merle licked his lips and wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.

Ruby's frown became more pronounced. "Pansy ass?" she repeated. She wouldn't call Negan something like that. Slick was a good name, but pansy ass?

"Yeah. Slick likes to act like he's a badass. The jacket makes him look big, but take off that coat, strip him down bare, I'm betting he'll look as skinny as my little brother."

Ruby didn't know Merle had a brother, let alone a little one. Maybe he lived in Vale instead of Patch. Yang has mentioned before that the Merle's parents are supposed to be divorced like Carl's parents. "What makes you say that?" Ruby asked Merle.

"Slick likes to talk a lot, and a man doesn't talk about his dick so much unless he's got issues with it, or something to hide."

"If Negan has something to hide with his boy-thing, then why would he joke about it so much?"

"Hiding in plain sight." Merle turned his head to Whitley. "You're living with Slick, ain't ya Fancy Pants? Ya know if he has any muscle under all those layers?"

Whitley wasn't paying attention to Merle's query. He was staring toward the line of trees from where the Grimm that were chasing Merle had originally come from. Ruby followed his gaze and saw something in the distance. Between the woodwork and the floating leaves, there was a tiny black blurb. The blurb was steadily growing in size. The white protruding bones and red glowing eyes of another Ursa could eventually be seen, and as it got closer, something else could be discerned sitting on the back of the Grimm.

"Come on, Nigel," Nora declared, kicking her Ursa's side with her leg. "Faster! We can't let Negan and your evil twin win!"

As Nora and her Ursa ran past Team RMWR, another Ursa with another rider followed. "Like fuck you're gonna beat us, Valkyrie! Mine's bigger!"

"That means it's slo-wer!" Nora shouted back in a sing-song voice.

"That's just means we're gonna have a good fucking night all night long when we catch up!"

Three or four more Ursa followed after Nora and Negan. The Grimm completely ignored RMWR. They were more focused on trying to catch up with the student Hunters that had commandeered two of their own.

"It appears Negan's strength is at least comparable to Nora's," Whitley said after a shared moment of silence, "to be capable of taming and riding an Ursa of that size, so perhaps that answers your question, Merle."

"Could've been his Semblance," Merle suggested.

"Perhaps, perhaps…"

"Does his Sembalnce have anything to do with controlling Grimm?"

Russel sighed to himself. "Either way, they're fucking psychos, the both of them."

"They're not psychos!" Ruby screamed at him. "They're just, uh, excitable!"

"Excitable fucking freaks you mean. Kind of like you, right?"

Ruby wanted to pull at her hair again, or try to seriously trash Russel with Crescent Rose again, but the last time she got too physically violent with Russel, Negan deducted a hundred points from her. She didn't want to lose any points, arbitrary or otherwise, from the friends she's already made, so since then, she's been trying to restrain herself around Russel. She's had… mixed success with that.

Blake landing from the red bushel of leaves atop a tree helped provide a good distraction from Ruby's aggravation. "Hey Blake!" Ruby greeted her sister's partner.

"Hey," Blake replied. Her yellow eyes landed on Whitley, Russel, and Merle, slowly and in that order, before falling onto Ruby. "Did you see Negan and Nora riding on top of a couple of Ursa come by this way?"

"Yup." Ruby pointed in the direction the pair was racing towards. "They've got some spare Ursa chasing after them, too."

"Of course they do," Blake muttered. "Thanks, Ruby."

"No problem. And good luck finding them."

"Finding them isn't the hard part," Blake said as she was leaving. "Getting them to finally settle down is another."

Once Blake was out of sight, Russel spoke up. "You aren't going to go with her, Rose? She's chasing a pack of freaks. Aren't you going to go help them out?"

God, why did Russel always have to egg her on? Why? Why? Why did he want to be such a horrible bully all the time? What did she ever do to him? It's not like Ruby ever did anything to Russel before he became a full-time bully. She was pretty sure of that. Just what exactly was his deal?

Ruby was about to embark on another rant on Russel. However, a hissing growl sounding off right next to her ear stopped her. She was still glaring at Russel, and Whitley and Merle were still in her field of vision, so whatever was grumbling at Ruby was behind her.

The growling suddenly became a large snarl. Ruby hopped to her feet, spun around, and unleashed her scythe on the prowler. The growling snarl shifted to a pained shriek. Ruby blinked. She saw herself with Crescent Rose stabbing into the spine of yet another Ursa, only this one looked… It looked different.

The Grimm was much larger than the ones Team RMWR previously encountered. It was an Ursa Major with bigger bones, a bigger body, and a bigger bite. It lay on its stomach with its limbs stretched out. There was a bullet hole on the side of its neck, but there were many more wounds across its entire form. They were mostly splotches of red with flesh and fur meshing with the muscly bits underneath the skin. It almost reminded Ruby of a lab she had to do at Signal, where she and Carl did an autopsy of a dead pig, except that the Grimm before Ruby looked a lot more… gory than anything Ruby recalls ever seeing.

Ruby was standing on the Grimm's back, her and her weapon avoiding the bone spikes protruding out of creature. A trail of blood, much darker and more noticeable than the red of Forever Fall's wildlife, led from the Ursa Major to deeper into the woods. A small puddle of blood was slowly brewing underneath the Grimm, too.

"Gross," Ruby murmured. She cocked her rifle and readied herself to finish off the Grimm, but Merle started waving his hands up in the air to stop her.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! Hold your horses, Rosey!" Merle stepped directly in front of Ruby. He placed his good hand on Ruby's arm and placed his Hook Blade hand on top of the Grimm's head. "Don't ya see what this Grimm here is? It's an Ursa Major."

"Yeah, I know," Ruby confirmed. "I'm killing it."

"I said hold on, Rosey," Merle insisted. "Hold off on killing the nasty sucker for a few minutes." His eyes scanned the Grimm's masked face. "Ya know how we've got to do presentations on specific type of Grimm for the Mad King next week?"

Mad King was Merle's nickname for Professor Port. Ruby wasn't sure why, though. "Yes," Ruby said with a hint of uncertainty.

"Well, my team's supposed to do one about Ursa." Merle rapped his weapon against the mask of the Grimm. "And the Governor was thinking, instead of just reading about 'em in a book or the Internet… why not study 'em up close and personal?"

"Governor?"

"Yeah, Governor. That's what we call Philip."

Ah, "we" must mean Yang's group of friends from Signal who had gotten into Beacon. That group would include Yang, Team PMPR, and a couple of other first-year teams Ruby hasn't really met yet. "So Philip suggested that your team find an Ursa out in the wild to poke and prod?"

"Yeah, he did."

"That's sounds a bit… wild, for Philip."

Merle pulled out one of his spare blades and stabbed it through one of the paws of the Ursa. The Grimm groaned but barely twitched. "We were supposed to find one this weekend, but hey, we've got a big'un served up for us right here." With one paw relatively secure, Merle moved to stab another blade in the other paw. He took out two more knives, probably for the feet.

"Wait, Merle," Ruby beseeched in an attempt to stop him, "is this really the time to do this?" Ruby checked her scroll. "It's half past noon. We need to start heading back to the base camp soon."

"Come on, Rose," Russel said. As Merle finished locking down the Ursa, Russel pulled out his scroll. The small blinking light on the side of it indicated that it was recording video. "How often do you get to see a Grimm like this face-to-face when they aren't trying to kill you?"

"In Atlas, quite regularly," Whitley said as he approached the unusual scene before him. Hands folded behind his back, he kept a reasonable distance away from the blood of the Grimm. "At least for the many scientists working for the SDC. Live Grimm are often captured and examined in designated facilities. I have visited a few in the past, and though Merle's method of restraining our given test subject is…"

The pool of blood was getting a little wider. Fighting the sensations of her queasy stomach, Ruby had to wonder how much blood a Grimm had in it. Did Grimm even have veins and arteries or a beating heart like a real person, or was the blood just stored inside the body?

"… less than hygienic, Philip's plan of personally studying the enemy we are sworn to fight is a perfectly reasonable one." Whitley set down his duffle bag, zipped it open, and began to search through it. "This is an opportunity that should not go to waste. So long as you continue to keep your scythe pinning the Major down for us, Ruby, I believe there is plenty of information we can extract from the Grimm."

Ruby might have said no if it was only Merle and Russel – especially Russel – who asked, but Whitley was a smart guy. He was Weiss's brother, he was Negan's partner, and he was not-at-all a bully. He was a friend, and a smart friend, so Ruby nodded in reluctant acquiescence, turned on the safety for her weapon, and kept Crescent Rose steady. "Fine, but don't take too long. Okay? Please?"

"Of course, Ruby."

From his duffle bag, Whitley put on a pair of white plastic gloves and tied a white bandana around the lower half of his face. He also took out this small, compact box. It had the texture of a white birch wood. Opening the box revealed a collection of Dust vials, not unlike the vast collection Weiss had kept in her luggage.

Whitley also took out a bowl and a spoon. He poured some Dust mixtures into the bowl and started mixing. "Russel, may you please make some cuts along the Ursa Major's sides with your knives? Make them only as deep as a quarter the length of your blades."

"Whatever you say, Schnee." Russel did as he was asked while also continuing to record with his scroll. The Grimm barely moaned as the cuts were made. Even more blood dripped and added to the growing puddle. "Mind telling me what these are for?"

Merle replaced the attachment on his Hook Blade with something that resembled a skeletal prosthetic hand. He put a small notepad on it. After pulling out a pen and putting the cap in his mouth, he started jotting down notes. "Never took you as one of them sickos who liked trying to make Grimm scream, Fancy Pants. You look too clean for that sort of thing."

"You are mistaken, Merle," Whitley said. With the spoon, he spattered the now purple-looking Dust blend along the Grimm's new cuts and the old ones. The low growls of the beast drifted into silence. It was still awake, but it wasn't making any more panting sounds. Did Grimm even have proper lungs like a real animal to breathe and pant with? "This is merely a… sedative. While not recommended for human consumption, it does wonders for keeping wildlife and Grimm docile for a short time."

"Sick," Russel commented with a crooked grin. "How many points is it gonna cost me to get the recipe off you?"

"Of course you would ask for it," Ruby grumbled at him.

"Hey, who's more sick? The guy asking for the recipe, or the guy who made it?"

"It is all a matter of perspective," Whitley remarked. He set down his Dust-stained bowl and spoon. After taking out a plastic zipper bag out of his back pocket, Whitley filched Russel's other dagger from its sheath. Whitley cut off a lock of fur from the Grimm. Snippets of black smoke spewed out. Before Whitley could place the hairs inside the bag, the strands in Whitley's hand dissipated completely into the air.

Ruby found herself oddly intrigued by this. Obviously, Grimm bodies disappeared when you killed them, but she can't remember personally seeing dismembered parts of a Grimm disappear before the original Grimm dies. They probably do, though. Ruby does recall cutting off limbs in the heat of a fight, and there weren't any Grimm remains after the fight. Ruby just never consciously looked and thought about it.

Whitley seemed to be savoring in the looking and thinking, what with his wide eyes and absorbed leer. He cut off a few more strands off and watched them fade away from his hands. "I have actually encountered few Grimm before my arrival to this school," he confessed as he grabbed another handful of fur, trying to find a decent sample of Grimm hairs to bring home.

"Really?" Russel snorted in disbelief. "Kid like you gets into Beacon, you're either smarter than most of the teachers or had to be wrestling Grimm when you were still a baby."

"It was the former in my case, no. The first time I killed a Grimm was actually during initiation."

Ruby's jaw dropped before she could stop it. "Wait, s-seriously? You enroll at Beacon at thirteen, and you haven't even fought a Grimm until a couple of months ago? B-But, but, how? What junior academy did you go to? Who trained you? H-How, how did you… Are you really just that smart?"

"There were two particular tutors that were instrumental in my training, yes, and they are decades smarter than I am." Whitley poked at one of the spikes sticking out of the Ursa Major's back. "Do you believe there is enough time for us to extract some of these bones off our test subject?" Whitley began to prick slightly deeper into the skin around the spike.

"Are–Are you serious? No! God no!" The contents of Ruby's brunch rumbled uncomfortably inside her stomach. "Why would you want to cut off the bones of a Grimm? That's like, I don't know, cutting the tail off a dog, or maybe tearing the shell off a turtle."

"Don't be so childish, Ruby." Whitley spun the knife between his fingers. He raised it up high and brought it down to the Grimm. Ruby shot out her free hand and grabbed his wrist before the blade could hit its mark.

"One: You're two years younger than me and at least two centimeters shorter than me," Ruby countered as pointedly as she could. "You can't call me a child. Two: I'm not being childish! I just have a healthy respect for –" The Ursa Major suddenly shuddered and gave a high-pitched yelp. Ruby nearly fell off. Fortunately, her grip on her scythe held true. "Whoa. Uh, what was that?"

Merle popped up like a gopher from the other side of the Ursa. He was smirking like a smug fox. "Now, look at what I got here?" He held up what looked like a worn, petrified piece of wood. It had a faded eggshell white color and was about the size of two tissue boxes stacked on top of each other. The end of the object was shaped to a point.

Slowly, Ruby stood herself on her tippy toes to look over pass the Ursa's spikey back. She could see the front right paw of the Grimm. Of its five individual claws extending form each finger, the Grimm was missing the one that was supposed to be on its ring finger.

Ruby looked back to the object twirling between Merle's fingers and connected the dots to what that object actually was.

"Wait a minute," Ruby slowly said as she narrowed her eyes at the detached claw. "Why isn't it turning into smoke like when Whitley was cutting off fur?"

"Wow. Good point, Rose," Russel admitted as set the bony shape in the frame of his recording. "Freaky. Grimm bones inside and out are supposed to become smoke along with the rest of the body, right? What's your take, Schnee?"

"I have… some ideas," Whitley answered. While Ruby and Russel had decently healthy looks of curiosity fixated on the glorified finger nail, Whitley looked positively mesmerized by what he saw. "Grimm are killers first and foremost. The outward bone-like attachments of Grimm are the primary instruments for killing. The Grimm dies, then the weapons die, and if Doctor Eugene Porter's theory of Forced Grimm Evolution has any merit…"

Whitley spieled on and on about scientific laws and natural selection and other stuff Ruby had no clue about. It reminded Ruby of how she got carried away with weapons, so she let Whitley have his moment of incomprehensible chatter, even if Ruby was getting more and more lost by the second.

"You can keep theorizing all you want, egghead," Merle spoke as he admired the bone claw. "All I know is that I've got a new present for Lil' Merle." He put his notebook away try to jury rig the claw onto his Hook Blade.

Russel gave a snicker. "Don't hog all of the fun, Dixon." Russel put one foot on the Ursa Major's mutilated paw. He stomped his other foot down a few times, eventually causing another claw to pop out. Russel snatched it up and held it close to his camera. "Look at these things. Looks more real than anything Professor Port's got hanging in his classroom, doesn't it?"

"As if you'd know," Ruby retorted, albeit a little more pettily this time around. "You always flunked on Grimm physiology tests."

"Who cares about tests, Rose? Look at these things! We could make necklaces out of them, maybe make some cash out of this."

"We're not out here to make money!" Ruby objected fiercely. "We are out here to collect tree sap and to do team-building exercises! We're not here to torture some poor, dying Grimm."

Ruby stopped herself short. Never did she expect she would take pity on such a large and an otherwise terrifying Grimm. Her time in Beacon has been leading her to do a lot of things she never thought she would end up doing.

"Hell, can you even torture a Grimm?" Merle asked offhandedly. "Grimm only live to kill and murder. Bet they'd get a kick out of torture if anything."

"No!" Ruby shouted. "No, no, no-no-no, we are not talking about torturing anything or anyone! We are going to stop playing around, kill this Grimm, and head back to the base camp, right now!" Ruby set off the safety on Crescent Rose. With the blade lodged firmly inside the spine of the Ursa, the barrel of the rifle was lined up almost perfectly with the Grimm's head. She could fire and blow the Grimm's brains into oblivion, but Whitley was kneeling right in front of the Grimm. "Whitley, can you move a little? I don't want you to get splattered by blood or black smoke or anything."

The Schnee ignored her. He was staring intently at the Ursa's face. It looked like he was having a staring contest with it. Ruby peered her head around another back spike and saw the Ursa's crimson eyeballs leering back into Whitley's.

"Whitley," Ruby repeated. "Can you move now, please?"

"It's looking at me," Whitley said, refusing to break his gaze with the Grimm.

"I, uh, can see that. Yeah. Why are you just staring at it?"

"It's not that I'm looking at it. It's only looking at me."

"Okay. Uh, then why is the Ursa Major looking at you?"

Whitley placed a hand on the Ursa's bone mask. The Ursa didn't react. Its red eyes only continued to glow and glower at Whitley. "In the SDC labs, the actual tranquilizers used on Grimm are never one hundred percent effective. Grimm always remained at least partially awake, at least partially conscious, just enough to gently growl at the scientists and researchers observing and testing them. Even at their weakest, during their last hours, the Grimm could not help but express their hatred and bloodlust for humanity."

"Really?" Russel said, obviously intrigued. Merle succeeded in securing the Ursa claw on his Hook Blade and was eyeing Whitley with a similar level of interest. "You'd think the dumb bastards would just give up and die at that point. They can't escape an SDC lab, can they?"

"Of course not, and no, Grimm would never waver from their mission of humanity's extinction, but this Grimm in particular," Whitley held the Ursa Major by its chin and raised it, "even with my crude Dust mixtures, it should still be demonstrating its innate anger and hatred. Purring a low-hanging hiss, showing its barred teeth, glaring hatefully at its tormentors…"

An epiphany hit Ruby. "But it's not doing any of that, right? The Ursa's just sitting here and doing nothing."

Memories of school field trips with Huntsmen teachers flashed before Ruby's eyes. When they were in areas on Patch where Beowolves were known to wander, one or two teachers had always stayed with the class as they all watched from a distance another Huntsman teacher kill the Grimm.

One of the things that really struck Ruby was how focused the Grimm where. She remembers seeing their noses constantly sniffing the air, their eyes darting between the Hunters and the unarmed students, and how when the Beowolves were lying on their sides as their bodies became smoke, they were doing their hardest to drag themselves toward the nearest person alive. Uncle Qrow tends to kill the wolves before they got too close, but they were usually just close enough for Ruby to see them choke out their last, nasty croaks.

But this large Grimm, who had to have lived for a good while to get so big, wasn't croaking or moaning or – It wasn't doing anything, really, other than tiredly staring into Whitley's eyes. The red glow was losing its light, though, and it looked like it was ready to fall asleep.

"Correct, Ruby," Whitley said, his eyelids falling a bit. "This Grimm… It lives to kill, but now it is dying. I believe it has accepted its fate and merely wishes to wait out its final hours without unnecessarily overexerting itself." Whitley pulled out his own notepad out of his duffle and started scribbling. "Yes, Doctor Porter's theories may actually have some merit to them. Why my father doesn't indulge his research propositions more often eludes my understanding."

"Hey, Whitley," Ruby spoke up, her own intrigue now waning and being replaced by a faint dizziness. The smell of soiled Grimm blood mixed with Dust must be getting to her now. "Can we talk about these 'theories' another time? I need to kill the Ursa still, and we really need to start heading back now."

"Like hell we do," Merle objected. His good hand reached into his back pocket. The jiggling of keys could be heard. "All this talk about theories and experimenting with Grimm just gave me an idea." Merle pulled out a small zipper bag. Inside were little orange-colored bottles with white caps, the kind that Ruby's dad sometimes got from the pharmacy.

"Christ, Dixon," Russel chuckled to himself. "You've been holding out on us."

Whitley rotated his head almost robotically to look at the bag of bottled pills. "Are those prescription medications?" he asked.

"What do you think, egghead?" Merle goaded sarcastically. "You're a smart guy. Ya think we can get a Grimm high on some good stuff?" Merle tossed his little zipper bag to Whitley, who caught it easily and began to read the labels on the bottles.

"It is certainly a possibility," Whitley admitted, and Ruby finally caught on to what Merle was suggesting.

"Oh, no," Ruby said. She pulled her scythe out of the Ursa Major. Hopping over its spiked back, she sliced through the Ursa's neck. She landed beside Whitley, falling to her knees briefly before standing tall and pointing fingers at the rest of her impromptu team. "I've heard the stories! I've seen the documentaries! My dad and Carl's dad told us all about how bad it is use to illegal drugs, and I will not be caught as an accessory to a crime!"

"Come on, Rosey," Merle beseeched her with a grin. "Your dad might be cool, but the Grimes Sherriff was a pussy. A lil' kick every now and then never hurt no one."

"That's what the drug dealers say, but then 'every now and then' becomes every single day of your life!"

Russel rolled his eyes. "Oh, so you don't care about your uncle's drinking problem, but you don't want anything to do with recreational drugs? Yeah, fuck that." He moved to swipe the bag of drugs from Whitley, but Ruby grabbed it first.

"Ruby," Whitley said politely, "may I have that bag back please?"

"This. Is. Filth!" Ruby declared. "If Weiss finds out I let you guys, especially you Whitley, take some of these drugs, then she is going to kill me!" That's not to mention the legal consequences, too.

"Oh, so that's what this is about," Russel deadpanned. "It's not about getting caught by the teachers. It's about your crush on the Schnee heiress."

"No, it is not! There isn't even any crush I have to begin with!" Ruby threw the bag of illegal pharmaceuticals to the ground. She prepped her rifle for another shot and took aim. "Executive decision as team leader! I am destroying this!"

"Hey, hold on!" Merle, losing his playful attitude, protested with a shout. "That's my stash! It ain't yours to destroy or nothing!"

"I agree, Ruby," Whitley said. He took a subtle step toward her and outstretched his hand to push away Crescent Rose. "Please, listen to reason."

"Don't care. I'm pulling the trigger." And so Ruby kept her word and fired.

She did not anticipate a multicolored explosion to be set off, or for Ruby to feel her body to get sent flying into the air. The flight was not unlike when she was launched off a platform during Beacon's initiation, but the detonation was all too reminiscent of when she sneezed an explosion with Weiss's Dust supply on her first day at Beacon.

Ruby blinked. The vague wailing outlines of Russel and Merle were flying toward the horizon away from where Ruby's body was heading. Whitley was soaring alongside Ruby. For the most part, the younger Huntsmen students let the force of the explosion carry them over the forest without much resistance.

"What just happened?" Ruby numbly asked to Whitley. Whitley's bandana was untied and no longer covering the lower half of his face. He held it in his hand and was coughing into the cloth.

"Some drugs, illegal or otherwise, are synthesized with Dust," Whitley managed to get out as he cleared his throat. He spat into the white cloth and tossed it away. He gave Ruby a stern look. "I was trying to inform you, Ruby, that if you wanted to dispose those substances, you should not fire a custom Dust-charged sniper rifle bullet at them."

Embarrassed, Ruby avoided Whitley's fixed stare. "I didn't know that. I'm sorry," she said in a muffled voice.

Whitley sighed in the same way Weiss sighed whenever she was absolutely done with Ruby's supposed childish antics, except Whitley sounded more resigned rather than frustrated or disappointed. He faced the cloudy blue sky above them and rested the back of his head against the palms of his hands.

"I am more than well-aware of the negative aspects of misusing non-prescribed drugs," Whitley stated plainly. "I was merely considering taking simple and small samples, nothing more and nothing less."

"Wait, you actually were thinking about trying some of those pills?" Ruby whipped her head around so fast that her hood smacked against her face. She pulled it out of the way so Whitley could see her incredulous expression. "Why?"

"I was curious."

"But they're bad for you. Like, really, really bad."

"So we are told by certified doctors and professionals, but we cannot always take things at face-value. I always enjoy learning about new things firsthand rather than only being told about them, and feeling the effects of non-prescribed medications on the body at least once would do more than satisfy my curiosity on the topic."

Ruby frowned and tilted her head at Whitley. "You're smart, though. Shouldn't you know better than to try out drugs like that?"

"There is a difference between knowing information about a given topic and truly understanding it. All I ever intended to earn out of this experience is understanding. That is all, Ruby."

Negan's talk about Whitley and Weiss's reasons for attending Beacon Academy sprang to mind. Ruby supposed she couldn't blame Whitley for wanting to try out new things in a new environment. He sure was a lot more open-minded than Ruby gave him credit for, especially since Weiss was his sister.

"Besides," Whitley added as an afterthought, "what I do in my personal life shouldn't affect Weiss's. She has no need to know whether or not I decide to look further into Merle's connections in the drug trade."

That was something Ruby would have to take a stance against. Sibling bonds shouldn't be taken for granted, even if Whitley had some sort of complex or whatever with his sister.

However, she didn't have time to voice her concern. She and Whitley were now descending instead of flying upwards. They were about to land on a section of the elevated train bridge that traveled through Forever Fall. That Dust explosion must have been stronger than Ruby thought if it had sent them this far out and deep into the forest.

Ruby's and Whitley's Aura-infused legs hit the train tracks without trouble. As Whitley patted his pants down to remove residual Dust soot, Ruby stuck her pinky finger into her earlobe to hopefully erase that indistinct, echoing ringing that sometimes lingers when Ruby's too close to an explosion.

She and Yang had actually made a game out of that noise. When Yang had first started experimenting with explosive Dust rounds, the ringing had always persisted in their ears. Dad had bought them custom earplugs to help deal with the noise. Ruby would've worn them while Yang fired her harmless shots into the sky or at a target dummy. Ruby, with her semblance, had sneakily ran around Yang and fired the paintball gun Uncle Qrow had gotten the sisters for a special birthday at her. Yang had been trying to learn how to adapt to the temporary deafness caused by her shotgun gauntlets, and Ruby had gotten to splatter Yang's long, blonde mane with a myriad of colors.

It's been years since they played that game, what with how Yang started obsessing about her hair more and more as they got older, but now that they're on the same team and in the same grade year, Ruby hoped to host a training session where they practiced something similar.

Maybe Whitley can help set up something like that. The practice rounds Beacon supplied were concussive in nature, not paint-based, so maybe he can help spruce some bullets up that exploded into paint and packed the same punch as –

A whistling sound broke Ruby's train of thought. Removing her finger from her ear, she turned around to see a dark… train barreling along the tracks. It was practically roaring and screaming in front of her face. Out of panicked fright, she tackled Whitley so the two fell off the tracks and out of the way of the locomotive.

"Sorry!" Ruby cried out over the noise of the train. She and Whitley fell like a pair of bricks. They immediately landed in a set of red shrubs. A spread of pink leaves was flung up to float softly back to the ground.

Groaning, Ruby rubbed her forehead with a weak hand. She lifted her head up and realized she was lying on top of Whitley. His eyes were closed, and his forehead and cheeks had a flushed color to them, so Ruby's temple must have hit his when they hit the forest floor.

"Sorry about that," Ruby repeated. She shifted her legs so they weren't pressing against his. Whitley placed a hand against over his shut eyes, probably exasperated with Ruby's hasty actions thus far today, as Ruby tried to push herself off of him.

"Did you hear that?"

"The train?"

"No. It sounded like a scream."

At the sound of those two familiar voices, Ruby ducked her head back under the bushes surrounding her and Whitley. Her head slapped against Whitley's chest. He gave a half-hearted grunt, but Ruby stuck a hand to his mouth to keep him silent. "Shhh," Ruby whispered, inching her head slowly to look over the shrubbery. "Please be quiet for one second. Please."

Ruby was never more thankful for the reddish color in her hair than now. Without that hair color blending in with the red color of Forever Fall, Yang and Philip probably would have spotted her instantly.

They were near one of the supports for the train bridge. Their backpacks and jars of sap were sitting against the concrete column. Ruby glimpsed Yang's backside pacing down the farther side of the bridge. Philip was patrolling the side closer to where Ruby and Whitley were hiding. Fortunately, his eye-patched eye was facing Ruby, so when he turned his head around, she hid again before he caught her.

"I don't see anything, Yang," Ruby heard Philip say. "Probably just the train whistle that distracted you." Ruby could hear footsteps against the grassy turf walk away.

"I know the difference between a train whistle and an actual scream," was Yang's response.

"I don't know about that. Your hearing's never been the same since you and Ruby blew up half of Signal."

That wasn't their fault! If it was anyone's fault, it was Russel's for spilling Ruby's chocolate milk all over Yang's hair! If he didn't do that, then everything would have been fine!

"My hearing's fine," Yang defended herself. "What about your eye? I heard Weiss talking about these artificial robot eyeballs they're making at Atlas. Maybe you can, y'know –"

"I can live with one eye, Yang. We've been over this."

"Still leaves you with an obvious blind spot. It's also the reason I always beat you in dueling class."

"Who's to say that I just let you win when we get paired up?"

"Oh, I know you love me, Philip, but I know that you know that I know that if you didn't put up a good fight, I would have left you a long time ago."

"I like to choose my battles, Yang. Besides, I know better than to –" Philip never finished his sentence. He was cut off by that muffled moaning sound Ruby had begrudgingly and unwillingly gotten used to whenever Negan and Neo decided to randomly enter a smooching session. This muffled moaning sound, however, was obviously between Philip and Yang, and that made the whole thing so much worse.

Maybe Ruby shouldn't have hid and should have just made her and Whitley's presence known from the get-go. It may or may not have made the situation a little less uncomfortable. Still, when Ruby first popped her head over the bush, she could see that Philip and Yang were already in varying stages of undress. There was also a ruffled bedroll that was set by their gear and the bridge column, so Ruby had a pretty good guess on what those two were doing before the train whipped by, and Ruby did not want to interrupt another bout of her sister and her sister's boyfriend doing that unmentionable thing again. It was always just too awkward to be around them afterward.

Jeez, the moans were getting louder. It was already getting worse! As quickly and quietly as she could, Ruby slipped her hand into the satchel behind her back. She pulled out her pair of earplugs. She put them on but realized she was still lying atop Whitley with her hand over his mouth. His eyes were still shut. Ruby would have mistaken Whitley for sleeping if it weren't for the subtle rising and falling of his chest.

"I'm really sorry," Ruby whispered again. Whitley didn't have any mufflers for his ears, so Ruby just pressed her palms against them. Ruby repeated her apologies again and again as Yang's and Philip's voices undoubtedly grew louder. "I really don't want to walk in on them doing their thing, so please, just… stay quiet. I-I'll make it up to you, later… somehow."

Whitley gave no response. Ruby wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing. Weiss always voiced her disapproval whenever she felt it, and any honest compliments she might give usually had to be prodded out of her. Ruby hasn't spent enough time with Whitley to figure out if that was something they had in common or another opposite personality trait between them.

Whitley was consistently politer than Weiss, and Ruby enjoyed that politeness, but the only times Ruby's really seen him irritated is during a disagreement with Weiss or when Negan does a weird thing. Ruby was doing a weird thing at the moment, so it was really a fifty-fifty chance whether Whitley was really bothered or not.

Thankfully, Ruby's internal struggle was interrupted by yet another loud noise. This one, like the others, made Ruby jolt a little, but unlike the others, this loud noise sounded much more… visceral. The drug-Dust explosion was just an explosion, the train whistle was a howling roar, and this new boom reminded Ruby of when Grimm were torn apart by a hail of bullets or crushed flat by a giant war hammer.

Ruby popped her head over the bush again. She saw what had to be the tenth Ursa she's seen today. Well, what Ruby actually saw was a mass of black Grimm limbs and bones piling on a large blood splatter. Ruby could tell that it was an Ursa Grimm from the masked head that was rolling away from the mound of animalistic body parts. The whole thing must have fallen from the sky to leave a spread of blood that wide.

A blood-stained, barbed wired bat rose up out of the mound. The rest of Negan's body followed suit, and he was equally as bloody as Lucille.

"And I fucking win!" he announced with outstretched arms.

Another person popped out of the Grimm carcass with a skip in her steps. "It's a boy!" a slightly less bloodied Nora cheered. She stepped behind Negan and patted his head. "What should we name you?"

Ruby watched as Negan turned his head to answer Nora. He stopped midway. He stared at Yang and Philip who were and yup! Yup! Ruby is not looking at them! Yup, she cannot see them doing whatever it is that they're doing! Not at all! Not at all! Yup!

"Well, excuse the fuck out of me and Valkyrie," Negan said, putting a hand over his eyes and shying away from the frozen forms of Yang and Philip. "We didn't mean to interrupt a good, private session of fucking. I guess we'll just –" Negan stopped midway again. His eyes landed on Ruby, and Ruby just stared back at him. It was better to keep her attention on him rather than look away and risk looking at that thing which Yang does with her boyfriend which will not be named until further notice.

Just when Ruby was starting to feel more mature about herself in life, she can't bring herself to even name the mature thing her sister does with her boyfriend. Maybe she should spend some more time with Negan. He knows how to move pass the awkwardness and just go at things with a confident swagger.

Whitley groaned again. He pressed his elbow against the ground to push his upper body off the grass. Ruby, now realizing that Yang and Philip could probably see the two younger Huntsmen students, rolled off of Whitley and sent a wave in Negan's and Nora's direction.

"What the fucking hell, guys?" Negan asked in an almost depressed tone. He had a downcast frown and everything. "You guys have a fucking hot, orgasmic orgy, and you don't invite me? What the fucking hell? Seriously, I gave you that idea in the first place, too."

"As if we'd invite you," Yang muttered darkly. Philip was scrambling to redress himself, but Yang was taking her sweet time.

"My dick's more than big enough, if that's the problem. Trust me on that."

"Merle has been asking about that, actually," Whitley spoke up absently. Now, everyone's eyes became solely focused on him and Ruby. The hood on Ruby's cloak might not actually hide her from the world around her, but it helped deliver the feeling of it, at least.

"Wait a second," Yang said, confusion filling her voice. "Ruby? What are you doing here… with… Whitley…" The confused voice drifted to the sound Yang's voice makes when she starts gritting her teeth.

"Ahhhh," Nora squealed as she tilted her head, clasped her hands, and held them against her cheek. "You guys look good together."

Negan now had the beginnings of a smile on his face, but he still had some of that downcast tone in him. "Whitley, my partner, my other, I'm happy that you took my advice to heart, but the two of you are still pretty young for this kind of fun, and I'm pretty sure Rubes has got the hots for your sister. Unless this is a no-strings attached kind of deal, I'm thinking this is going to cause a fuck storm of unnecessary drama."

"We weren't doing anything like that!" Ruby immediately objected. "And why does everyone think that I have a crush on Weiss? We're just partners and future best friends! That's it!"

"Says you," Negan countered, his smile growing larger. "Speaking of, mind if Nora and I join in on the fun?"

"Oh! Oh!" Nora hopped high into the air and landed with a swirl. She pulled out her scroll. "I'm inviting Ren!"

"Hey, while you're at it, call Jauny boy and Nikos, too. God knows that they need something to give them a push if they're ever going to be together-together at some point."

"Oh, great idea, Negan! I'm already on it!"

Nora eventually got the other members on Team JNPR on speaker phone. With Nora giving an exuberant sales pitch on joining an orgy, Yang bursting in a barely contained fiery rage, Negan trying to keep a good distance between himself and Yang, and a half-dressed Philip trying to calm Yang down, the surrounding area become filled with noise almost as loud as the train that flew by.

Ruby turned to Whitley who was scratching the back of his head and cracking the back of his neck. "Sorry again," she said, mostly because she didn't know what else to say or do now.

"Your multiple apologies are accepted," Whitley said with another crack. He paused mid-crack as he blinked his eyes. "I just realized something. What happened to our supply of sap?"

God, the sap was probably lost in the Dust explosion earlier. To top everything that's happened today off, Team RMWR probably has to go collect more tree sap for a passing grade.

Still, the excitement today was better than boring old studying. Ruby can take some solace in that.