We're picking up steam!
Oh Weiss, you are so difficult to get right. She's not too cold, but she's not too warm. She's pragmatic but has a flair for drama. To be fair, I do think most of her bad impressions of Ruby in the beginning was all due to the dust explosion.
Chapter 4: Picnic
A few days have passed since Ruby's outburst at Cardin and Yang couldn't have been prouder. The young girl was so bright and optimistic, lighting up any room she entered and never failed to put a smile on Yang's face.
For his part, Cardin seemingly eased up on taunting other students… well except Jaune. At least he wasn't bullying many of the Faunus students anymore. Ruby's tenacity dogged at team CRDL whenever they were in the cafeteria. Despite the cold brush off on their first meeting, Ruby cheerfully greeted them everyday. When asked why…
"If we're all friends, then they won't bully anyone anymore right?"
Had this been any other student, team CRDL would have arranged for a rather unpleasant meeting after class. However, Ruby is rarely ever alone, almost always with someone from her own or another team. Her bubbly personality had won over a large majority of the students, not surprisingly a lot of them Faunus.
Yang dropped the grocery bags she brought from the city in the middle of the dorm room. She got back before everyone else, so she was alone for now. Rubbing her hands together, she started on her plan.
Blake and Weiss were able to spend time alone with Ruby, and Yang was starting to feel a bit left out. Granted, they looked like they had really important issues at the time, so she left them be. Now though? It was her turn to spend some quality time with Ruby.
She heard the door creak behind her and quickly shoved everything into the closet.
Ruby entered looking a bit dejected.
"'Sup Ruby? Why the long face?"
"Hey Yang," she answered with a slight frown.
"Want to talk about it?"
Ruby hesitated, but eventually nodded. "Cardin's still messing with Jaune. And I can't do anything about it. Jaune even said it's fine… but…"
Yang scratched her head. She was no stranger to dealing with bullies. But her methods were far more brutal than required. One reason why she didn't want to deal with Cardin, as much as it shamed her, was because the result would be one or both parties in body-casts for a good month. Risking suspension and potential backlash against the victims were more than enough reasons for her not to get involved.
Ruby was trying to help by 'killing them with kindness' however, and Yang has no experience with this whatsoever.
"Well… err… what did Jaune say?"
"…" Ruby looked thoughtful for a moment. "… I don't know if I should say. It's his problem."
"Look at it this way then," Yang patted Ruby's shoulder. "If you can't help by dealing with Cardin, maybe you can help by dealing with Jaune."
"… … Jaune's… afraid… that he might not be a good enough leader," Ruby spoke slowly, cautiously revealing what she and Jaune had talked about moments prior. "I told him that as leaders, we have to be good enough. Whether we are or aren't, whether we want to or not."
Ruby looked to Yang with tears in her eyes. "But I've never been a leader before, so I don't even know if what I'm saying is right."
"Ruby!" Yang said sharply, stopping the girl from crying. Yang took a deep breath and collected her thoughts. "How did Jaune look after you told him that?"
"How'd he look?"
"Like…" Yang gestured in the air trying to find words. "Did he look better? Less depressed?"
"…" Ruby scrunched her eyes trying to remember. "He… sort of looked like he understood?"
"And do you believe what you said?"
"Y-yeah… I guess."
Yang clapped Ruby on the back. "There you go! You can't live life always worrying about stuff like that." She looked at the younger girl straight in the eyes and willed confidence to her. "Just do what you think is right. That's all you can ever do."
For a while, Ruby stayed silent. Slowly, she nodded in understanding.
"Go take a shower and get some rest," Yang suggested. Ruby nodded and left for the bathroom, but Yang's voice stopped her at the door.
"Hey, cheer up and look forward to tomorrow, okay?" Yang flashed her a smile and Ruby weakly managed one in return.
"Ruby! Slow down before you hurt yourself!" Weiss yelled after the blur of red in front of her.
"Aww, lay off Weiss," Yang said good-naturedly. "She's just excited. Let her have a bit of fun."
"Fun?" Weiss cocked and eyebrow. "We're here on an assignment. We're not here for fun."
Yang shook her head, knowing she would never get through to the ever serious and studious girl. She was right that they were on an assignment to gather Red Sap from the Forever Fall forest by Professor Peach, but that didn't mean they couldn't enjoy the day.
"Hey guys! Hey guys! Guess where I am?" Ruby's voice echoed around them. With every leaf a shade of red, Ruby had blended in perfectly with her surroundings.
"Come on Ruby," Blake called out to her. "The sooner we get this done, the sooner we can get back."
"Aww… but this is fun."
Blake sighed. "Fine, the sooner we get done, the sooner you can play."
"Okay!" Ruby shouted right behind Weiss, causing her to jump and scream.
Collecting sap was not hard, just tedious. One had to drill a hole into the bark, attach a spout, and let the sap drip into the jar.
"Come on Ren! Let's get that sap!" Nora shouted as she ran ahead.
Team JNPR and team CRDL had also been assigned but Jaune had left with Cardin's group. Pyrrha looked disappointed, but there wasn't anything anyone could do, aside from completing the mission.
While they all picked a tree and got to work, Yang looked up to see Ruby's fingernails grown long and sharp.
"Uh… Ruby? What are you doing?"
Ruby did not answer. Instead, she raked her claws down the tree while walking around it, leaving five deep gashes spiraling down the bark.
"Whoa! Hold on Ruby! If you release that much sap, the smell's going to bring all sorts of critters here," Yang warned. Many animals and Grimm enjoy the sap, almost as much as Nora.
A faint buzz drew everyone's attention and they readied their weapons. Rapier Wasps. They love sweet nectars and saps and they never fly alone.
A small swarm made a beeline for the tree next to Ruby and everyone tensed, ready to strike.
Ruby just calmly walked to another tree and proceeded to do the same thing.
The Rapier Wasps buzzed around the first tree, greedily drinking the sap but leaving everyone alone.
"I get it," Ren muttered. "They're drawn to the sap, so just give them what they want and they won't bother you." He casted a look around, "And there's plenty of sap for everyone."
With five grooves running down the tree, collecting the sap was much easier. The only reason this technique was rarely used was because of dangers of drawing unwanted attention.
"How'd you know to do that?" Weiss asked as she finished her jar.
"I saw a couple of bears and an Ursa do it once," Ruby answered. She had filled her jar as well, and started licking at the grooves for excess sap.
"Oooh," Nora's eyes sparkled. "I want to do that too!"
Yang chuckled at the scene in front of her. "Well, if you guys are that hungry…"
"Surprise!" She fished out a yellow wicker picnic basket out of nowhere.
"Where did you even get that?" Weiss asked.
"Hehe," Yang grinned proudly. "I stayed up all night packing a picnic for all of us."
"Oh? That's very thoughtful of you," Pyrrha smiled.
On a classic checkered pattern blanket were an assortment of sandwiches, tea, lemonade, water, salads, cookies, scones and various other foods.
"I must say, I'm impressed," Weiss admitted as she ate a scone. With the excess sap, the lightly buttered pastry went wonderfully with the tea.
"Catch Ruby!" Yang shouted as she tossed a cookie into the air.
Ruby leapt up and snatched it using only her mouth.
"Ugh, manners you two," Weiss chided.
"That's not all though," Yang said as she drew a round object from behind her. "Since we finished early… how about a game of discus?"
"Oh boy! A game?" Ruby shouted excitedly, spraying crumbs everywhere.
"Yep, we take turns throwing this to each other. You have to catch it before it hits the ground, or else you're out."
"Pass," Blake and Weiss stated simultaneously.
Yang shrugged. "Your loss." She turned her attention to the rest of the players. "Alright Ruby," she torqued back.
"FETCH!"
She let loose the disc and Ruby immediately took off after it like a shot.
"YANG!" Most of the group shouted at her.
"What?" Yang rubbed the back of her head. "I didn't think she'd actually go after it."
"Don't treat her like a dog," Blake chided with narrowed eyes. Far too often humans have treated Faunus like animals, and even if someone like Yang meant it as a joke, it's often not seen as such.
Surprising everyone though, Ruby leapt up and again caught it with her mouth. Forgetting to throw to someone, she ran back to Yang and offered up the disc.
Yang just had the largest grin as she tugged on the disc. "You want to go again?" At Ruby's excited nod, she tried to pull the disc out of the girl's mouth. Ruby's bite was strong and it took more than a few tugs to get her to release.
When Ruby brought it back the second time, Yang rubbed her head and her tail flailed back and forth.
While mostly everyone giggled or smiled at the scene, Blake held her frown.
"Okay, who wants to toss it next?" Yang asked, all pretense of playing as a group foregone in exchange for playing with Ruby.
"Oh! Oh! Pick me!" Nora squealed. Yang tossed her the disc and she wound up for the pitch. "Ooookay Ruby…. FETCH!"
The disc soared, but Ruby stood stock-still. Her ears twitched rapidly and her head swiveled as she sniffed the air. Without warning, she took off.
"What's going on?" Yang asked as she looked around to everyone for help.
"After her before we lose her in the brush," Pyrrha shouted as she sprinted forward.
The group fanned out to find her more easily, but Weiss and Pyrrha were the ones who caught up to her first.
"What are you–" Weiss huffed, but gasped when she looked in the direction of Ruby's gaze.
An Ursa Major stared down Jaune, its chest had a deep cut and Jaune's sword dripping in its blood.
Ruby growled and Weiss moved to attack, but Pyrrha held out her hand and stopped them.
Jaune struggled to attack the Grimm, but the Ursa tossed him around like a rag-doll. Despite dodging and blocking as best he can, he felt his stamina drained with every movement.
In one last desperate attempt, he lunged at the bear. Time seemed to flow slowly as he felt a guiding force raise his shield. It blocked the oncoming blow, and he retaliated by decapitating the beast once and for all.
Once the Ursa was dead, Ruby stopped growling. The three watched in fascination as Jaune walked over to Cardin and helped him up.
"Don't ever mess with my team," Jaune glared at Cardin. "My friends, ever again."
When Jaune walked off, they followed him.
"Jaune!" Pyrrha called out, running up to him. "Are you alright?"
"Huh?" He glanced back to see them. "H-hey Pyrrha, what are you guys doing here?"
"We, well Ruby, heard something and ran off. We chased her and found you. What happened?" Pyrrha left out watching him fight and her involvement.
Ruby was about to speak, but Weiss elbowed her sharply in the ribs since she understood what Pyrrha was doing.
"Oh. Uh… We ran into an Ursa and… I killed it?" he stated, not believing it himself.
"An Ursa! Really where?!" Nora shouted, once again scaring Weiss.
"We ran into the rest of team CRDL and they were screaming 'Ursa'. Yang and Blake went back to inform Professor Goodwitch in case there were more," Ren explained as he caught up.
In the confusion, the jars of sap Jaune collected for team CRDL were smashed, thus they had to recollect. While they had more than enough jars for the assignment, Jaune refused, stating that it wouldn't be right if he didn't collect his own for the assignment.
Still, with Ruby's method, the process was quite swift and left ample time for all of them, this time Jaune included, to rejoin the picnic.
They spent the rest of the day laughing, eating, and playing with Ruby.
Extra:
"Hey Ruby?" Jaune asked as they walked back to the school.
"Hmm?" Ruby and Jaune lagged behind everyone else, partially because they played the hardest during the picnic.
"Thanks for umm… talking some sense into me yesterday," Jaune admitted. "I probably wouldn't have been able to do what I did if you didn't give me that push."
Ruby grinned at him, happy and relieved. She gave him a quick hug before running forward to catch up with the group.
Jaune looked at her retreating figure and smiled. Though he had his own issues and Beacon can be very trying at times, he hoped these happy days continue.
Artistic License - Biology. Any botanists reading this, please don't flay me.
We see a bit more of Ruby's wolfish traits and there's more to come.
Hope to see you next chapter as well.
