She couldn't help but flinch and squeeze her eyes shut as the terrible symphony of blaster fire echoed through the room, and braced herself for the inevitable fate that awaited her, but found herself puzzled when she felt nothing, not even the heat emanating off from a near miss. Instead, she heard a pair of screams, neither her own or Raven's, accompanied by the sound of bodies slumping against the floor, immediately followed by more blaster fire. Slowly, as if unsure she wanted to know what had happened, she opened her eyes to reveal the two doctors' bodies lying still against the floor, the Hoots Troopers deciding, what she assumed was out of spite, to unload their entire magazines into the Doctors who had ordered her execution.

After about a minute, passed, the soldiers ceased fire, and approached Raven and her new, self-adopted daughter. Immediately, they stood at attention in front of Raven, addressing the older woman with crisp salutes. For a moment, Raven stood there, more shocked than not, before remembering, and feeling like an idiot for not realizing it sooner, that she had trained these clones personally, the realization allowing her features to ease into a cheeky smile. She reclined back in her chair with her hands folded back behind her head as she gave a hearty and jovial, yet relieved laugh.

"Didn't think we were actually gonna take orders from that слабая сука, did you, Comrade?" The closest to her questioned, adopting a more lax stance, resting her XA-22A2, a modified version of the Army's standard blaster rifle, on her shoulder nonchalantly.

"Heat of the moment, don't take it personally, Gaz." Raven quickly explained, the trooper taking off her helmet to reveal features that directly mirrored the now-late Summer Rose's, save for the tattoo of a single tear under her left eye. The Hoots Trooper, like the rest of them, wore double-sided pauldrons, a ballistic waist-cape, and an advanced combat utility pack on her back to signify their status, as well as a rangefinder on their helmets and dark-colored extra plating over her shins, wrists, torso, and her helmet's front was further reinforced. She, like all Hoots Troopers, had personalized her armor, with three symmetrical stripes going vertically down the front and back of her helmet, down her arms and on the side of her legs, as well as diagonally down her waist-cape going down from her rear. The waist-cape itself was a dark grey, like her pauldrons, except on the pauldron's right side the armored plating was colored red. Over her chest, she had three ammunition pouches over her right breast, and a sort of red, 3-pronged leaf with three symmetrical, horizontal lines taken out around the bottom, left hollow. The rest of her armor, like the rest of the army's, was the stark white, as per design.

"So... Captain now, eh? When'd you get the promotion?" Raven asked, remembering that the girl's armor, like everyone else in the room, used to have blue markings, signifying her as a lieutenant.

"General Ironwood oversaw a training exercise, and I just did as I always do. Apparently I stood out to the General... not that I'm complaining, Comrade Raven." She stated, giving the older lady a cheeky wink, before immediately redirecting her attention to the much younger girl, in the room, despite said girl technically being older than she herself was. "Sorry about the scare, sis. Wanted to cut them down in the hallway, but that would've been too conspicuous... not that I think Lara would actually care."

Ruby only nodded, quickly wiping her eyes before returning with a small laugh. She felt somewhat foolish, thinking that these girls would take orders from the doctors. The clones hated them, though wouldn't say such in front of them for fear of being deemed "defective," and being terminated, the one exception to the general rule being in the facility's director, Lara Sue.

"And before you start worrying about us getting terminated, Lara has already promised to turn a blind eye to us killing them... but for now, we need to smuggle you out of Astra. Jacques Schnee has already extended to us that you can take shelter in his family as long as you need... convenient, seeing as we're being dispatched to the Schnee Manor to act as guardians."

"Plan on smuggling her out with you?" Raven inquired, looking down at Ruby. After taking a moment to take in the small girl's appearance, she just smiled and motioned with her free hand for the small girl to go to the troopers. Excited at the prospect of seeing Weiss again, she rushed over to the troopers, giving Gaz as strong a hug as she could muster, eliciting a small giggle from her more developed younger sister.

"Не беспокойся, товарищ. She'll be safe." Gaz assured, ruffling the smaller girl's, much less protocol, locks of hair.

"So... when are you headed out, then?" Raven questioned, smiling fondly at her little soldiers a last time before they'd depart to do their duty.

"Two hours, at 2330. We have to head to the medical bay to get cured of our quickened aging, first." Gaz explained, getting a somewhat Inquisitive look from the older lady. Deciding to elaborate, she continued. "New orders from General Ironwood. He wants all clones to be cured of their accelerated aging at age 9, and put into cryo-stasis pods once they've finished their training unless otherwise needed, at least until war finally calls."

"Ah, I see... so, that means that you might live more than fifty years at most, then?" Raven inquired, receiving a hearty, somewhat morbid laughter from all clones in the room.

"Comrade, it'll be a cold day in Hell before a clone lives any more than twenty!" Gaz replied with morbid guffaws accompanying her claim. "Ruby most likely being the obvious exception." Lowering down to a knee, she took her hand off her blaster and extended it to Ruby, whom eagerly accepted the offer to leave, though not before turning back around to give a last look to Raven.

She knew that this would likely be the last time, at least for a long time, that she'd see her, the woman who'd personally overseen so much of her own training as well as that of the troopers behind her. With a smile on her face, she sped directly up to Raven, giving the older lady one last, big hug, one met in kind...

"I don't wanna go... not without you..." Ruby pleaded, only receiving some small chuckled from the older woman.

"I know, believe me, I know... but it's no longer safe for you here. If anyone other than another clone or Lara learns of your survival, they'll come for your head... I can't have that." She reasoned, spacing herself and the little rose apart. "Besides, your destiny lies outside these walls, outside this army. Your mother lives on in you now, and I know you'll do her proud."

Ruby noted that the older woman was being more tender than she usually was, but she brushed it aside as once more being heat of the moment. Nodding furiously, she then cartwheeled backwards, landing feet-first right beside Gaz. With a last, warm smile, Ruby made her way out the room, followed closely by sixteen Hoots Troopers, leaving Gaz and her own team behind with Raven for a few last moments...

"We'll continue her training, Comrade. Count on it!" Gaz declared, bringing a fist to her heart, before darting out the room with her sisters to rejoin the main group, leaving Raven alone in the dark room. She smiled fondly after them as they took their leave, remembering the years of training these soldiers saw, and sighed. Both proud and worried as they made their way out the door, finally being called to serve as they were born to be.

A few moments passed as she turned her attention to the pair of corpses that so lovingly graced her floor. She cringed as the stench of burnt flesh finally reached her nostrils, opting immediately to breathe through her mouth as she dragged the bodies towards the large glass windows behind her. The nice thing about blasters, she thought, was that they didn't leave any blood to clean up, and made dumping the bodies that much easier. Quickly tying rope around each one's ankles, she then tied a cinder block to each one, and threw then out the window she'd opened. She giggled lightly as one of the corpses splattered against a rock before gravity continued to work it's magic and dragged the corpse down into the water.

Sighing, she looked outwards toward the landing pad, and watched as the troopers quietly stowed Ruby in the back of the gunship...

"Well, it's all up to you now, Ruby. Make it count."

An hour passed, and Ruby idly waited for her sisters to return, quietly mourning the news of her mother's death, as she hadn't a proper chance beforehand. It was truly disheartening news to the young girl, but tried not to let it shake her. The deaths of those she'd met was no new concept to the young girl but this wasn't just some random person she might've said "hi" to once or twice, this was her mother, the most important person in her life.

To say she was shaken from this information would be a complete understatement, and she silently cried in the back of the gunship, simply wanting the day to end, to curl up under some sheets and forget the day ever happened... but alas, she could not risk dozing off, not yet. If someone were to come out to inspect the gunship, someone who wasn't a clone, she'd have to kill them. Gaz had given her a XA-25A blaster pistol, just in case anyone were to inspect the gunship and find her without it being a clone. While she wasn't opposed to the idea, she didn't want to kill anyone... not yet, at least. She wasn't like her sisters who could unquestioningly kill another living being, but she knew she could do it if it meant staying alive... or at least she hoped she could...

Another thirty or so minutes passed before she heard some loud footfalls against the steel platform lightly coated in a thin layer of rain water. She immediately stiffened up, the blaster shaking in her hands as she tried to make herself small in the corner behind a crate. She silently counted down in her head as the footsteps grew louder and closer, all the way up until she heard them step inside the gunship. A flashlight swept around the area, just going over her head, the crate barely stopping her from being spotted. She wanted to sigh in relief, but the footsteps started creeping closer once more, weaving through the crates and checking behind each and every one of them.

Gulping almost inaudibly, she readied herself to use her blaster, turning it off the safety as she silently waited, coiled and ready to strike. After a few tense seconds, the holder of the flashlight came around the box, and ruby rolled back to put some distance between herself and this person, swiftly leveling their sights and preparing to fire, when...

It was a clone, who looked shocked-er, as shocked as one could look behind a face-covering helmet. Breathing a sigh of relief, Ruby slumped back and lowered the gun. The clone in question only stood silently for a few seconds, before nodding her head in understanding, and reaching into one of the crates.

It was a cup. The clone held it out to the rain and filled it up, dumping out the first bit to clean the cup of any dust it may have gathered, before refilling it and handing it back to Ruby.

"Here. You need to stay hydrated. If they ask me what took me, I'll just say there was a rat to throw off the platform." She said, rising back up and heading back out the gunship and back towards the city. Ruby smiled brightly at the soldier, before greedily guzzling down the water in the cup. It was cool, soothing, and she couldn't say why, but it made being alone that much more bearable...

Another thirty minutes passed, this time with the 20 Hoots Troopers filing into the gunship. Ruby stood up and smiled towards her sisters. A few of them waved back, but most of them simply nodded and went about taking their spots, Gaz included.

With a wave of her hand outside the gunship, she pulled herself back in as the gunship began to lift itself off the ground, it's twin engines roaring to life. A few seconds later, the large doors on each side of the gunship snapped shut, and the gunship blasted off into the dark, stormy night, allowing Ruby just barely fifteen seconds to look back at the city, her home for most of her life, before the dark clouds around them had completely drowned it out, leaving her in darkness...