A/N: Hey everybody, FalseRobot here to nervously tell you that I managed to beat my Job/Personal life induced writer's block an is trying to get back into the swing of things. So unfortunately, I can't make any promises that this won't happen again.
That being said, please let me know how this chapter turned out.
Chapter 10: Moving Forward
The next day...
Ilia nervously shifts in her seat, trying not to look suspicious as the airship she is on flies towards Beacon Academy. She once again checks the duffel bag and makes sure that all of the equipment she needs for the infiltration and the exfiltration is all in there and undamaged. Satisfied that everything is still and undamaged, she takes a deep breath to calm herself down then looks out the window to find that the airship is on its final approach to Beacon.
When the airship safely lands and allows its passengers to disembark, Ilia blends in with crowd as everyone makes their way away from the docks. Along the way towards the Administration building, Ilia finds an inconspicuous hiding spot and stashes the duffel bag there before rejoining the crowd. She finds herself walking with what appears to be a small group of eager parents and their very excited children. Entering the Administration building, Ilia immediately spots her destination that is clearly marked by a large sign that says: Beacon Academy Tours and heads towards it.
Somehow, Ilia makes it to the sign in desk before the rest of the group, getting the attention of the staff member manning the desk.
"Hello ma'am, are you here for a tour of Beacon Academy?" The staff member greets with a cheery smile.
"Yes I am." Ilia replies.
"Excellent. Just so you know the tour is 10 Lien." Ilia nods in response and hands the staff member the money required. "May have your name so I can get you signed in?"
"Rain Bowstein." Ilia replies, coming up with the first thing that popped into her head.
"Thank you Ms. Bowstein." The staff member as they hand Ilia a visitor's badge. "The tour will begin soon and your tour guide will be Dr. Oobleck instead of Prof. Port due to work related matters. So if you will please wait in the waiting area until he arrives and not wander off. That would be lovely." The staff member says with a smile, pointing to a clearly marked lounge.
Ilia nods and heads over to the lounge and sits down in one of the chairs as the rest of group begins to slowly sign in as well. She sits there anxiously trying her best not to attract attention to herself as the rest of the group fills in the waiting area. A few minutes later, Ilia finds herself even more anxious as she starts to run out of lies to tell in order to deflect the small talk made by the other teens in the group and a couple of the parents as they all wait for Dr. Oobleck to arrive. Suddenly, a sloppily dressed, green haired man holding a large thermos, suddenly rushes into the office followed by a slightly out of breath group of people that Ilia assumes is the previous tour group.
"Ah, welcome back Dr. Oobleck." The staff member greets. "Did the tour go well?"
"Indeed it did." Dr. Oobleck excitedly replies.
"Well the last tour group of the day has arrived." The staff member says, directing Dr. Oobleck's attention to Ilia and the rest of the group who waiting for the next tour as the previous tour begins signing out to leave.
"Excellent!" Dr. Oobleck excitedly says after looking saddened by the fact that this is the last tour group. He fast walks into the waiting area and claps his hands together to get everyone's attention. "Hello future hunters and huntresses, I am Doctor Bartholomew Oobleck the history professor here at Beacon Academy and I'll be your tour guide! Before we begin, there are maps of the campus for everyone to take so that no one will get lost and know where you are in case you do get lost." Dr. Oobleck gestures to an unassuming stack of folder paper on a nearby table that the group snatches up before Ilia has a chance to do the same. "Are there any questions and/or concerns you want to address before we begin?"
The group erupts into cacophony of generic questions while Ilia remains silent and somehow Dr. Oobleck answers all of the questions in order very rapidly. Once group exhausts their questions, Dr. Oobleck leads everyone out into the courtyard and Ilia is stunned by how beautiful Beacon Academy looks up close now that Ilia has a chance to get a good look. As she is admiring her surroundings, Ilia inadvertently tunes out whatever Dr. Oobleck is saying, missing the fact that he is speaking very rapidly and is nearly incoherent.
After a minute of gawking at her surroundings, Ilia turns her attention her attention back to Dr. Oobleck but she finds that she is standing there in the middle of the courtyard alone. Looking around wildly, she catches sight Dr. Oobleck moving quite rapidly towards one of the buildings followed by the rest of the tour group who are struggling slightly to keep up with him. Ilia panics slightly and begins jogging to catch up.
"Watch out!" A familiar voice calls out causing Ilia stop in her tracks after a couple seconds of jogging. Ilia turn towards the voice in time to see a trolley stacked with boxes of various sizes come flying right into her, knocking her over and out.
"…eckles! Are you ok?" The familiar voice worriedly asks, waking Ilia up slightly. Ilia groans as she slowly opens her eyes find a blurry red and black figure kneeling down next her while fretting over her at the same time.
"Little Rose?" Ilia asks, blinking a couple times to refocus her vision and discovers that she is lying on her back in the courtyard.
Little Rose gasps happily at the sight of Ilia being awake. "Ms. Freckles, you're okay! I thought for sure I accidently killed you when I ran into you at full speed."
"Well it'll take more than that to kill me." Ilia confidently says, sitting to see multiple boxes of various sizes scattered around her. "What happened?"
"Well you see, I was returning from picking up some weapon parts I had ordered for a project of mine and was to get started on it. So as soon as I got off the airship, I ran full speed using my semblance and uh… wasn't paying any attention to what was in front until I saw you in the corner of my eye at the last minute." Little Rose sheepishly explains with a blush on her face, idly twirling the hem of her hooded cape around her index finger.
"And once again, we literally run into each other. Are all of our encounters going to start like this, Little Rose?" Ilia asks with chuckle and a smile, causing Little Rose to blush even more.
"H- Hopefully not. I would like to know more about you before I accidentally put you in the hospital." Little Rose nervously says before taking a deep breath, standing up, and stretching her hand towards Ilia. "My name's Ruby Rose. What's yours?"
"Ilia Amitola." Ilia replies, accepting Ruby's hand to be helped up to her feet.
"So Ilia, what brings you to Beacon Academy?" Ruby inquires.
"I was part of the tour of the campus but..." Ilia looks away in embarrassment. "I wasn't paying attention and got left behind."
"The tour with Prof. Port right?" Ruby asks for clarification. "We can easily catch up with him."
"It's actually Dr. Oobleck guiding the tour." Ilia corrects.
"O-oh my. I'm not sure if that is better or worse." Ruby says, trying to wrap her head around that conundrum.
Ilia finds Ruby's thinking face incredibly adorable and tries her hardest not to stare. "Why do you say that?"
"Well, Port really, really loves telling stories but unfortunately the way he tells them makes them so incredibly boring." Ruby explains, shuddering at the memories of Salk the times throughout the year Weiss had to wake her up in the middle of his classes. "While Oobleck talks really fast. Possibly due to him drinking so much from that seemingly bottomless thermos of his." Ruby remembers the calculations she did to how much the thermos could actually carry only to be more confused she witnessed the thermos transform into the doctor's weapon.
"I see what you mean." Ilia simply says in response before sighing. "Probably by now, Dr. Oobleck is nearing the first stop of his tour."
"Then how about I give you a tour campus instead and maybe we can catch up with Dr. Oobleck and his tour at the end?" Ruby suggests.
"I would love that." Ilia replies. "But first, let's pick up your boxes before someone else trips over them and before we forget about them."
"Oh yeah." Ruby says, remembering the reason why she left then returned to Beacon in the first place.
They begin their task with Ilia finding out that the boxes are heavier than they look and Ruby thanking herself for getting a trolley to transport the boxes. But after a couple minutes and more than few instances of accidental hand holding when they go to pick up the same box later, Ilia and Ruby stack the last of the boxes back into the trolley with barely visible blushes on their faces.
"So where to first?" Ilia asks, dusting off her hands.
"Uh... do you know which way did Dr. Oobleck went with his tour?" Ruby in return.
"That way." Ilia says, pointing in the direction Dr. Oobleck went.
Oh perfect!" Ruby exclaims. "Those are dorms which means I can drop off my stuff and then I can really show you the campus! Now if you will follow me please."
"So Ruby, are you a student here?" Ilia asks for a bit of clarification as Ruby begins pushing the trolley towards the dorms and Ilia walks alongside her.
"Yes I am!" Ruby proudly says, surprising Ilia a little bit.
If you don't mind me asking, how old are you?" Ilia inquires.
"16!" Ruby proudly replies.
"Wait I thought the minimum age to get in was 17?" Ilia exclaims.
"Well before the school year started, I stopped a dust store robbery which got me into a little bit of trouble but Prof. Ozpin, the headmaster, saw something in me and asked me I wanted to attend Beacon 2 years early. Of course I said yes and the rest is history." Ruby says after taking a deep breath.
"A dust store robbery?" Ilia inquires with curiosity. "Do tell."
"Well you see, I was minding my own business perusing the magazine stand…" Ruby begins as they walk towards the dorms, Ruby tells Ilia of her first encounter with Roman Torchwick with exaggerated sound effects and dramatic poses. Ilia listens to Ruby's story intently while helping push the trolley when Ruby mimes poses that require her to take hands off the trolley.
They reach entrance to the dorms as Ruby finishes her story with a proud pose. "And that's how I am able to attend Beacon Academy and become the leader of Team RWBY."
"Wow." Ilia simply says, blinking a couples times in surprise and stares incredulously at Ruby. "If I didn't know any better, I would say that you're lying. But after hearing that, you're even more amazing."
"Thank you." Ruby says, blushing in embarrassment while chuckling slightly before composing herself and gesturing towards their destination. "W- Well here we are at our first stop of the tour: The Dorms. A home away from home for all of the teams to rest their heads after classes and missions along with being one of the many places for hanging out with their friends!"
"Do the dorm rooms live up to Beacon's reputation?"
"Possibly." Ruby replies after thinking about this for a moment as she opens the door. "I'll let you decide that when we get inside and get to my team's dorm room."
"Reasonable." Ilia says in response, pushing the trolley inside. 'I wonder if Adam knows about this failure of Torchwick.'
Once inside, Ruby takes the control of the trolley and the lead again while Ilia once again walks alongside her. They slowly make their way through the halls due to trolley's lack of maneuverability while Ruby does her best to explain the general life in the dorms. But soon, Ruby finds out things to explain and silence falls over them.
"So…" Ruby nervously begins to say, breaking the silence. "What about you? Do you have any interesting stories to tell?"
Ilia looks away guiltily. "Not really. I've been doing various odd jobs in Mistral to get by and most of the time, I was alone."
"Oh." Ruby replies, disheartened by that fact. "What about coworkers?"
"Well…" Ilia thinks back to all of the White Fang members she has worked with back in Mistral and cringes. "…nearly all of them aren't the best of company to hang out with."
"Aw that sucks." Ruby says in disappointment.
"Yeah I know. Plus, I'm sure any story I would have to tell couldn't match how you got into Beacon Academy unless how the story of how you became team leader is somehow crazier." Ilia says and Ruby looks away with a guilty look her face as they reach the stairs. Ilia looks at Ruby for a couple moments with a dumbfounded look on her face. "How do you top stopping a robbery all by yourself then get asked to attend a huntsman academy for very, very vague reasons?!"
"Well I'll tell you once we get this up to the floor where my team's dorm room is at." Ruby says, first gesturing to the trolley then to the stairs.
Ilia looks at the stairs then at the trolley as Ruby says, "It should be an easy climb."
Ilia take Ruby's word and they begin pick up as many boxes as they can carry and begin climbing the stairs to the second floor. A couple surprisingly easy trips later, Ilia and Ruby take a small break after getting all of the boxes plus the trolley onto the second floor and let added back onto the trolley.
"Now where was I?" Ruby asks herself.
"You were about tell the tale of how you became team leader which somehow is crazier than how you got into Beacon."
"Ah yes." Ruby says, thinking off a good place to start. "Let's see... after arriving Beacon for the first time at the start of the year and going through orientation, we, the new students, were told to report to cliffs overlooking the Emerald Forest for Initiation after retrieving our combat gear from the locker room."
Ruby tells the tale of what happened during initiation as Ilia listens in disbelief at the fact that the headmaster just launched a group of teens off a cliff into a Grimm filled forest without any prior safety precautions. When Ruby explains how she hitched a ride on the back of a fully grown Nevermore Grimm after meeting Weiss, Ilia becomes even more skeptical.
Ruby pauses her story when they reach a kitchen/living room. "This room is the common room for this floor which allows student to cook, store, and eat food at any time when there aren't any classes even though there is a cafeteria on campus." Ruby explains. "But the cafeteria is only open at certain times of the day for so long."
"Uh huh." Ilia says in return before noticing an odd sign on wall near the entranceway they are standing next to. Looking closer at the sign, she discover that it is a notice signed by Prof. Ozpin stating that all actual games of Compost King are to be played outdoors unless the board and game pieces are used in a different manner.
"Is there anything you want in particular about the common room" Ruby asks, drawing Ilia's attention away from the peculiar notice.
"Can you cook anything you want?" Ilia asks of the top of her head.
"Yes, you as long as you provide your own ingredients and clean up after yourself." Ruby replies. "Also alcohol is very strictly forbidden on the school grounds for very obvious reasons since this is huntsman academy after all."
"Understandable." Ilia says with a shrug.
"Continuing on!" Ruby excitedly says, resuming their journey to her dorm and her story.
Ruby begins again by starting at the part where she jumps off the nevermore and skydives into the ruins where the relics were being held. Ilia is slightly surprised when Ruby gives a quick description of Blake wearing a bow in the top of her head but says nothing about it as Ruby gives vague descriptions of everyone in the story. Then Ilia has a hard time believing Ruby's story when she tells how her friends, Nora and Ren, came riding in on top of a fully grown Ursa.
"Really? An Ursa?" Ilia asks, pausing for a couple of moments to give Ruby an unbelieving look.
"Well you have to meet her in person to understand the insanity that is Nora Valkyrie." Ruby simply says in response.
"Uh huh." Ilia replies.
Ruby shrugs and resumes her story by telling that once she and her friends united and got their relics, they were attacked by an aggravated fully grown Deathstalker Grimm and the Nevermore that she and Weiss hitched a ride on earlier in the story. This segues into them splitting up into two teams of four then taking on the Grimm at the same time. They arrive at Ruby's dorm room just after Ruby tells Ilia of the plan she came up with to defeat the Nevermore that apparently involves her sister, Yang, being a distraction along with a makeshift launcher that is a combination of the ribbon attached to Gambol Shroud and Weiss' semblance of glyphs.
"...and then I was launched towards the cliff face, clothes lining the Nevermore midflight. Thanks to my semblance of speed and the assistance of Weiss's glyphs, I ran straight up the cliff while dragging the Nevermore by its neck and decapitated it when I reached the top!" Ruby exclaims as she strikes a proud victory pose. "And that is how I, Ruby Rose, along with Weiss Schnee, Blake Belladonna, and my big sis Yang Xiao Long got selected to become Team RWBY with me as the team leader!"
"If I didn't know any better, I would say that you are simply too good to true." Ilia says after giving a Ruby curious look for a minute or two. "Should I be worried about competition scrambling to earn your affection?"
"No." Ruby squeaks, blushing profusely at what Ilia ask and nervously shifts on one foot. "What about you?"
"N-not really." Ilia stutters, blushing profusely as well.
The two of them awkwardly stand for couple of moments before Ruby tries to compose herself and opens the dorm room door. "Well here is a... not so great example of the academy's dorm rooms *cough*."
They walk inside and the first thing Ilia sees in the spacious, homey dorm room is a messily made queen sized bed hanging precariously in the air above a neatly made bed by some rope that is attached to the ceiling, which frightens her. Tearing her gaze away from the sight, she looks to the other side of the room hoping to sees actual bunk beds but instead she sees two queen size beds stacked on top of each other with books being used as the support pillars.
"There is no way Blake would willingly let the loves of her life be used in such manner." Ilia says out loud, without thinking as Ruby parks the trolley next to the neatly made bed.
"You know Blake?!" Ruby exclaims, turning towards Ilia.
Ilia realizes what happened and quickly comes up with something. "Blake is an old friend whom I haven't seen in a couple years. But we parted on some bad terms."
Ruby face lights up with excitement at first but quickly Morphs into one of disappointment, which makes Ilia feel guilty. "What happened?"
"We were having differences in opinions just before she had to move away somewhere else."
"Oh."
"So... about the tour?" Ilia asks, trying to change the subject.
R-right." Ruby stutters. "As you can see, the rooms provided are spacious but with four people living in it, it can get a little cramped. Luckily students are in charge of room maintenance which gives us some freedom in personalizing the room like what I and my team has done."
"Have you had any problems with the beds?"
"Surprisingly no. Though don't ask Blake for the book she just put back. Her murderous glare is very scary." Ruby replies, shuddering at the memory of the time when she asked Blake if she could read The Man with Two Souls just after she swapped it out for The Man with Four Souls. "A-anyway, as long as you don't cause any major damage to the room, the staff won't care how the room is personalized to a degree."
"Understandable." Ilia says without taking her eyes off of the bunks. "But are sure there haven't been accidents regarding the beds?"
"The bed hanging from the ceiling, which is mine, is perfectly secure according to my calculations and the other bunks are …" Ruby confidently says but falters a bit when she looks at the pillars made of books. "Err… fine since Blake thankfully sleeps on the bottom bunk."
Ilia pictures a tall buxom blonde girl that sort of looks like Ruby in pajamas haphazardly sprawled out across her bunk, kicking out her legs in her sleep and agrees with Ruby. Ilia suddenly compares Yang to the blonde woman Adam fought against but brushes it off, thinking that of it as mere coincidence.
Finding that she can't think of anything else significant about the dorms, Ruby decides that it is time to continue on with the tour with a clap of her hands. "So moving on, our next stop of the tour are the classrooms."
Ruby grabs one of Ilia's hands and leaves the dorm room with a momentarily dazed Ilia following closely behind. Ilia comes out of her daze and picks up her pace in order to walk side by side with Ruby. As Ilia doing this, she doesn't let go of Ruby's hand and a pair of small smiles appears on their faces as the reach the stairwell.
"Are you sure you don't have funny random stories from your odd jobs?" Ruby asks, speaking up to break the ever present silence.
Ilia makes a variety of faces trying think of a story among the many that would most likely get laugh. But all of those stories would immediately reveal Ilia's active involvement with the White Fang which would most likely cause Ruby to hate her and that would break Ilia's heart. "I'm sorry, Ruby, but all I got are stories that involve me in very embarrassing situations that would rather not remember."
"Aww..." Ruby says with a saddened face that makes Ilia want to suddenly hug her and tell her that it is going to be okay.
"What about stories from when you were still in combat school?" Ruby asks after a couple moments of contemplation, looking no up at Ilia with very clear intent of getting to know her better.
Ilia visibly tenses up for a few moments and unintentionally squeezes Ruby's hand at the question. Ruby notices this and turns her attention to Ilia with a very worried look on her face.
"Ilia, are you okay?" Ruby asks. "Did I ask you something I wasn't supposed to?"
"Not really." Ilia hesitantly says, hanging her head as she tries to decide how best to approach the subject of what actually happened in her past. "It's just..."
Suddenly, Ruby accidentally walks right into somebody from behind, causing both of them to stumble a bit followed by the sound of something shattering.
"Are you okay, Ruby?" Ilia immediately asks as she turns to check on Ruby who nods to confirms that she is okay. Ilia turns toward the person Ruby walked into but freezes up in shock when sees that the person is the suspicious silver haired man from the gym.
"Oh gods, I'm sorry Professor Ozpin. I wasn't paying to where we were going." Ruby quickly says, apologizing while causing Ilia to internally panic at the mention of Ozpin's title.
"It's quite alright, Miss Rose. I wasn't paying attention to where I going either" Ozpin calmly replies before noticing the frozen stiff Ilia. "Oh hello, Miss. I'm Professor Ozpin, Headmaster of Beacon Academy."
"I-I'm I-Ilia Amitola, sir." Ilia stutters as she tries to maintain a calm expression as her internal panicking evolves into internal screams of terror.
"I don't believe I've seen you around here before. Are you visiting?"
"Yes sir. I'm here for the tour but i got separated from the tour group." Ilia truthfully says as she unconsciously moves closer to Ruby, taking ahold of her hand once again. "Thankfully, I ran into Ruby and she offered to give me her version of tour until we catch up with my original tour group."
"I see." Ozpin says, noticing the closeness between Ilia and Ruby which he raises a curious eyebrow to. "I'll call Dr. Oobleck to tell him not to worry about your absence and that you're in capable hands."
"Are you sure, professor?" Ruby hesitantly asks.
Ozpin chuckles a little bit. "Who better to give a tour of the school than a student who is already very familiar with the grounds and is a close friend to the one taking the tour?"
Ruby and Ilia blush at the question and nervously fidget in their spots while stealing nervous glances at each other. Ozpin goes to take a sip of his beverage to hide the small, amused smirk on his face but quickly realizes that his coffee mug is currently lying on the ground in pieces.
"Well, I better get going to find a broom, a dustpan, and give Dr. Oobleck's tour group a small reprieve from his undoubtedly long winded yet very informative history lesson of whatever section of the school they in." Ozpin says as he maintains a straight face before turning to leave. "Have a good day, Miss Rose, Miss Amitola."
"You too, professor!" Ruby calls out to Professor Ozpin as he leaves. When Professor Ozpin begins walking away, Ruby turns to face Ilia. "So where were we going to?"
"I believe you were going show me the classrooms." Ilia replies.
"Right." Ruby says before fidgeting. "Um... Ilia?"
"Yes?" Ilia asks.
"I'm sorry for bringing up unwanted memories." Ruby apologizes with guilt clear on her face as she nervously shifts in her spot.
"It's ok, Ruby. You couldn't have known that." Ilia replies.
"But..." Ruby begins to say but is cut off by Ilia hugging her.
"It's ok." Ilia reaffirms. "Thank you for your concern though."
"Your welcome." Ruby says, returning the hug. "You don't have to tell me anything if want to."
"Thanks again." Ilia replies as they pull apart from the hug. "Though there is a couple things I want to get off my chest."
"What is it?" Ruby inquires
"When that H.S. Member confronted us with the police, I panicked... and lied." Ilia confesses.
"Ilia..." Ruby begins to say.
"I know you just said I don't have to say anything but if I don't say this now, telling you later might it look like I was lying to about everything and ruin things between us forever."
"I... understand." Ruby says after a moment of thought. "What did you lie about?"
"The truth is that my parents died in a mining accident while i was attending a combat school in Atlas..." Ilia begins to explain, catching Ruby off guard. "...and after the accident, I ran away from school after outing myself as a Faunus while trying to defend another Faunus from bullying."
"Were your friends the bullies?"
"No they weren't but instead they just stood around watching and did nothing to stop the bullying which sparked an intense argument between me and them afterwards."
"That's horrible." Ruby says with tears threatening to spill out of her eyes. Ruby then takes a couple moments to choose her next question carefully. "Did your attempt to apologize and/or try to stop you from running away?"
"I..." Ilia thinks back on this but doesn't recall anything. "...don't know. I just ran away and never looked back."
"Then there's definitely a chance for you to make up with them in the future." Ruby exclaims with a hopeful expression on her face.
Taken back by that statement, Ilia stares at Ruby incredulously, wondering how it was possible for her to meet such a wonderful person. Ruby notices this and stops in her tracks as well. "Did I say something wrong?"
"No... no." Ilia replies, shaking her head. "It's just... are you sure that's possible?"
"Mhmm." Ruby hums before a confident look appears on her face. "Sure things will be said and done all the while not going as smoothly as one can hope for. But if they truly are your friends, then they'll understand and accept why you did what you did over time."
"You're very amazing." Ilia whisper, causing Ruby to blush.
"I'm not that amazing but thank you though." Ruby says, causing an obvious offended look to appear on Ilia's face which Ruby notices the look right away. "Before you say anything, I had a sort of similar experience when I told my friends back at Signal Academy that I got enrolled at Beacon and of the circumstances surrounding said enrollment."
"That doesn't make you any less amazing." Ilia simply says, earning a soft smile and a deeper blush from Ruby. "Instead it makes you even more amazing knowing that you were able to gain back those friends of yours. Especially compared to the time me and my friends got away scot free when we accidentally hit the principal's car stuck on top of a tree."
"Now you're just buttering me up." Ruby mutters, blushing profusely while Ilia merely grins. "Well anyways, I believe we were heading towards our next stop on the tour, the classrooms. If you would follow me please."
"After you." Ilia says before making obvious movements just to hold Ruby's hand. Ruby does not make any objections to this and moves closer to Ilia as her smile widens.
A couple feet into their journey, Ruby realizes what Ilia had said and finds herself very curious on such a thing happened. "Sooo~. How does one get the principal's car stuck in a tree?"
Ilia pauses for a split second before a large grin appears on her face. "Well you see, a couple days before the incident occurred, one of my friends just discovered her semblance…"
Ilia regales Ruby with the story as they continue walking towards the main building as Ruby listens intently, laughs at the funny parts, and gives feedback. Soon into their journey, Ilia's story becomes another story followed by both of them swapping stories of their high school shenanigans and learning tidbits about each other likes and dislikes. Eventually, they arrive at the main building but instead of arriving at the main entrance, they find that they had arrived at a side entrance leading directly to the library.
"Oh! It uh... looks like we sort of missed our original destination." Ruby says with a nervous chuckle and a nervous rub of the back of her head. "B-But no matter! The library is as good of a place to start as any."
They walk up to the door and opens it for Ilia with a courteous bow. "After you."
"Why thank you, milady." Ilia replies with a thankful bow of her head as she walks through the door.
"You're very welcome." Ruby replies back as she closed the door behind her. Ruby rushes past Ilia and begins her explanation of the library in a hushed tone.
"So welcome to the library where you can find books on from specific Grimm to the history of a specific part of conflict and just about everything in between. But as you can see..." Ruby draws Ilia's attention to the library which she finds a lot bigger and more crowded than she expected. "...the library is lot more crowded than one would expect."
Ilia notices Emerald and Mercury sitting in a pair of comfy chairs with Emerald nose deep into a text book and Mercury blatantly reading a comic book. Sitting at a table next to them is Team JNPR, from what Ilia can tell from Ruby's descriptions of them. Nora (?) attempting to absorb the information of the textbook she is sleeping on through osmosis while Pyrrha (?), Ren (?), and Jaune (?) are quietly studying with Ren (?) shooting Quick glances at Nora (?).
"Why is that?" Ilia asks, pulling her attention back to Ruby.
"Finals Week is taking place right after the festival and everyone, teachers included, are either too busy prepping for the finals and/or for the Vytal tournament." Ruby explains before sighing heavily. "And the worst part is that none of the teachers have told any of us students that the exams are going to be written, practical or both."
"Oof, sounds rough." Ilia says, wincing at the thought and memories of past exams along with all of the studying she had to do.
"Yep." Ruby replies, popping the p, nodding her head slightly in agreement just as a thought crosses Ilia's mind.
"Besides giving me a tour, why aren't you with your team studying or training?" Ilia asks.
"We somehow agreed to train for the tournament first and depending on how we do, we use whatever time we have left to study." Ruby says with a shrug.
"Somehow?" Ilia
"Yang and Weiss had bit of an argument this morning about this until Yang showed us a couple from previous Vytal tournaments that showed some intense fights and the Amity Stadium central stage itself changing into different biomes for the participants to fight in." Ruby explains with an excited twinkle appearing in Ruby's eyes at the end that Ilia definitely notices and finds herself lost in them.
"Which led to Yang and Weiss agreeing on a deal where Yang studies since she got herself banned from the on-campus gym while the rest of us train. Which we started doing as soon as classes were over." Ruby continues explaining, unknowingly breaking Ilia from her trance.
"With that said, Yang is studying somewhere, Blake and Weiss are still possibly sparring, and I finally got to meet you..." sorta "...properly." Ruby nervously finishes with slight blush dusting her cheeks and a squeeze of Ilia's hand that she recaptured at some point.
"Makes sense." Ilia quickly says, not paying attention to the second part of what Ruby explained before a small smile appears on face with a slight blush as well and a return squeeze of Ruby's hand.
Ruby does her best not to squeal out loud which results in Ruby's smile growing bigger, vibrating in place, and blushing profusely the color of her cloak. This cascades to Ilia whose smile grows bigger and blush deepens as they both look away from each other shyly. It takes a solid minute for them to calm down after they realize where they still are. Ilia looks around carefully to see if anyone saw them but finds that everyone are still engrossed in what they were doing beforehand.
"Anyways that segues into the next destination on our tour: The gym!" Ruby excitedly whispers a giving herself a couple moments to remember where she left off. As Ruby turns to the way the side entrance to the rest of the main building, a loud yelp of surprise catches their attention.
Turning to the source of the yelp, they see Cinder sitting on the floor rubbing her lower back as a panicked Pyrrha (?) quickly gets out of a chair to check on Cinder.
"Oh! I'm sorry, Cinder!" Pyrrha (?) exclaims. "I should have paid more attention to where I was going."
"Well this better not happen again, Pyrrha." Cinder grumbles as Pyrrha bends over to check on Cinder.
"Here, let me help up." Pyrrha says, holding out a hand to help Cinder up when she is sure Cinder is okay. Cinder warily looks at Pyrrha's hand before hesitantly taking her hand with a look of slight disgust as Pyrrha pulls her up.
"Er... thank you..." Cinder hesitantly says, unsure what to say in that situation as she dusts off her uniform.
"You're welcome." Pyrrha awkwardly replies.
At the same time as this happening, Emerald quickly gets up and rushes over to check just as Jaune (?) stands up to do the same at the wrong moment. Which causes them trip over one another with Emerald falling onto her back followed quickly Jaune (?) falling face first on top of her. Emerald stares at Jaune (?) with a shocked scowl on her face as Jaune (?) sits up quickly with a shocked look on his face that has a faint blush appearing on his cheeks.
"Are you gonna get off or keep enjoying the view, Jaune?" Emerald pointedly asks while giving Jaune a very annoyed glare.
"Oh, right. Sorry!" Jaune quickly replies before he stands up just as quickly as his reply, hitting the table with his back which wakes Nora up. Nora lifts up her from the open textbook and looks upon the scene.
"Ren, what happened?" She asks as Cinder and emerald separate themselves from Jaune and Pyrrha to rejoin Mercury, who has witnessing the scene unfold from over the top of the comic he's reading with a hidden smile on his face.
"An accident." Ren plainly states as he starts cleaning up their mess.
"What's their problem?" Ilia asks, gesturing to Team CEM.
"No idea." Ruby replies, stroking her chin with free hand. She turns back to the side entrance and tugs on Ilia's hand, telling her that they are moving on.
They leave the library without further incident but leaves Ilia unsure if Team CEM saw them or not. But the thoughts vanish from Ilia's head when Ruby begins humming as they walk down the hallway, prompting Ilia to move closer.
They walk for a few more minutes in this comfortable bubble they created, only stopping by Professor Port's, Dr. Oobleck's, and Professor Peach's classrooms to give a quick rundown of which belongs to who and who teaches what. Further along in their tour as they approach the door to the combat classroom, they hear muffled sounds of metal echo through the door, indicating that multiple people are fighting.
Ruby and Ilia look through the doors window to find a bow-less Blake sparring against a determined Weiss in the middle of a large semicircular arena. Ilia looks on with great curiosity as Weiss doesn't react to Blake's cute kitty ears as they go at each other like they are dancing instead of sparring. Ruby remembers what Ilia said about not wanting to meet Blake just yet. So she tugs on Ilia's arm to get attention as holds a finger to her lips and Ilia nods her head in acknowledgment as they silently walk away from the door towards the gym.
"So as you that was the classroom for the Combat Class that Professor Goodwitch teaches." Ruby begins to explain when she is sure that they are out Blake's gearing range.
"Which explains the arena in front of the stadium like seating." Ilia deduces.
"Yep!" Ruby ecstatically replies, popping the p. "And the purpose of the class is to teach us the advantages, disadvantages, and dangers of fighting one or more non-Grimm opponents."
"How useful." Ilia simply says mostly to herself as she briefly thinks about what might have happened if she stayed in school.
"I know, right?" Ruby rhetorically asks. "I was surprised how useful such a skill was when fighting Torchwick and his White Fang allies."
Ilia involuntarily tenses up without Ruby noticing the slightest of hand squeezes at the mention of the White Fang. So Ilia changes the subject quickly. "Speaking of arenas, I noticed a cute little sparkle in your beautiful eyes when mentioned how the Amity Stadium arena changes biomes. What is that about?"
Ruby briefly becomes the color of her cloak at the way Ilia way describes her eyes before taking a deep breath to calm herself. "Oof... where to start? I guess the complexity of how the arena switches biomes is a good place to start because oooh boy. I thought building and maintaining my baby, Crescent Rose, was complex. But the thought of that stage going from a warm savannah biome to a frozen landscape within a few minutes is perplexing."
Ilia nods her head in agreement and contemplates such a feat as well. They walk along the corridor, bouncing theories off of each other with the most plausible being a shrink ray that atlas secretly developed but found it useless in real world combat and the theory being an optical illusion combined with realistic holograms projected over force barriers for the sake of hyper realism. As they discuss the power requirements for keeping the stadium afloat and maintaining power for everything else, the walk by the entrance to gym without either of them noticing.
When the do notice, Ruby is already pushing open the door leading outside. They find themselves at the side entrance opposite of the one leading into the library along with the fact that they have a direct path to the church like building in front of them.
Ruby looks between where the and the church like building guiltily as she unsure if she should to the gym or skip the gym and continue on. Ilia notices Ruby's dilemma and places a hand on her shoulder. "I don't mind skipping the gym. I'm sure that it is like a regular gym but is more advanced so it can accommodate hunters and huntresses?"
"Ehh... more or less." Ruby replies.
"So what's our next stop?" Ilia asks scanning the grounds.
"Well, since we're skipping gym, the next destination on the tour is one of the most important places here on campus... THE CAFETERIA!" Ruby excitedly exclaims, striking a proud heroic pose which is followed quickly by her stomach rumbling very audibly.
Ilia falls into a fit of giggles that finds that she likes the sound of until Ilia stop giggling when her own stomach rumbles as well. This time it is Ruby's turn to fall into a fit of giggles that Ilia finds to be a sound she likes as well as Ruby leads both of them towards what Ilia assumes is the cafeteria.
As they get closer to the cafeteria, the smell of the food gets stronger and stronger which makes their stomach growl even louder. As they enter the sort of empty cafeteria, Ilia stares up in awe at the high vaulted ceiling that remind her of a cathedral's interior as they navigate a small maze of lunch tables and other students.
"Is there a limit on what you order?" Ilia asks, noticing the large empty buffet trays when they approach the line to order food.
"Not really just as long as you don't order anything too crazy." Ruby replies with dismissive shrug.
"Really?!" Ilia exclaims.
Ruby snorts a laugh at this exclamation. "Uh-huh. You'd be surprised by what they have back there."
"Hmm we'll see." Ilia simply says, thinking of what she is going to order. The line in front of them moves quickly as the people in front quickly their food until it is Ruby and Ilia's turn.
"Good day ladies, what can I get started for you?" The staff member cheerfully greets.
"I'll have the usual to go." Ruby replies.
"And I'll have a bowl of homemade apple cinnamon oatmeal with a crunchy peanut butter and grape jelly sandwich and a large cup of apple cider to go as well." Ilia orders, unsure what Ruby has planned and catching the staff member and Ruby slightly off guard but the staff member jots down the order anyways with a knowing smirk.
"Anything else?" The staff member asks for clarification but Ruby and Ilia shake their heads no. "Alrighty then. Your food will be ready in a few minutes."
As the staff member pins the order on to the order queue for the cooks to begin making the meals, Ruby and Ilia move out of the line to stand near the food pick up window. They stand there waiting as they watch kitchen staff members make a show of moving various food around the kitchen which includes a couple whole cooked turkey and an entire swordfish.
"Oatmeal and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich is an odd choice to challenge the cooks." Ruby states. "Why choose that?"
"Well..." Ilia begins to say, nervously rubbing the back of her head as she figures how to best explain her reason. "It's something that parents used to make me for breakfast whenever they had time to do so which was a pretty rare occasion. Plus, the last time I had this meal was a couple weeks before they died."
"Aww… that's so sad." Ruby says, sniffling a little bit as fights to hold back her tears while stroking the back of Ilia's hand in a comforting manner.
"Thanks Ruby." Ilia softly says.
"And if those cooks screw up your order, they'll get an earful from me." Ruby announces, puffing out her chest in an attempt to make herself look tough. The sight of Ruby doing this causes Ilia devolve into fit of giggles along with a couple of kitchen staff members saw what happened.
"My hero..." Ilia dreamily says, taking in how adorable Ruby looks right now.
"Order for Ruby Rose." A kitchen staff loudly announces ruining the moment as they set down two plastic bags filled with Styrofoam containers and a pair of lidded cups on the counter in front of the pick-up window.
"Thank you." Ruby says as she walks up to the window and grabs their meals.
"You're welcome, Miss Rose and enjoy the rest of your date." The staff member calls out as Ruby leaves, causing she and Ilia to look at the staff member with deer-caught-in-the-headlight looks before blushing up a storm.
Ruby and Ilia quickly retreat from cafeteria, leaving behind the staff member who is now chuckling slightly as they return to work. Outside the cafeteria, Ruby takes Ilia's hand then proceeds to lead her to a shaded spot underneath a nearby tree. Ilia chuckles when she sees where Ruby has lead her.
"What?" Ruby asks when they reach the tree, unsure if the chuckles are a good or bad thing.
"Maybe that staff member was right about this being a date." Ilia as they sit down on the ground.
"How so?" Ruby inquires as she eagerly unpacks the food.
"Well when we first started out, it was a tour. But now that we are here like this, the tour turned into one which I am ok with happening." Ilia explains as Ruby hands Ilia her food.
"The feeling is very mutual." Ruby replies as she opens up the largest container in her and hungrily eyes the cookies that lay before her.
"Wow. Do you want a little dinner to go with that desert?" Ilia skeptically asks, trying to be funny when she sees the large plate of piled on chocolate chip cookies and bowl of strawberries sitting on her lap. Ruby perks up at the Ilia's question, stopping mid bite into the cookie in her hand. She notices that Ilia hasn't noticed what she said and comes up with a mischievous idea.
"Are you asking me out on a proper date, Ms. Amitola?" Ruby asks in her best seductive voice that is accompanied by her attempt at a seductive look as she balances her food on her lap.
"I... er... um..." Ilia sputters as she realizes the implications of what she said as her skin slowly becomes a noticeable pink. Ruby struggles to hold back a laugh while preparing to brush off the question as a joke.
"I'm... uh... sure... I'm definitely sure!" Ilia says with more confidence and her skin becoming less pink. "But I'm not sure if this is the right moment to ask such a thing."
Ruby sits there slack jawed staring for a moment not expecting Ilia's answer before blushing profusely herself and looking away shyly. "Th-then are you f-free to stay over for tonight?"
Ilia's face darkens with regret. "Unfortunately I can't because of an overnight job I was hired to do in a..." Ilia carefully pulls out her scroll and checks the time. "...couple of hours."
"Aww..." Ruby visibly deflates at this information.
"But!" Ilia suddenly exclaims, shocking Ruby out of her glumness. "I am definitely available tomorrow night."
'Because if all goes according to plan, I can kill two birds with one stone without Cinder and her ever realizing it.' Ilia says in her head.
"So what did you have in mind?" Ilia asks, leaning towards the visibly, excited Ruby.
"Well my dad managed to send me all four Indiana Jones movies and I was thinking of us doing a marathon of them in my dorm room with homemade snacks and dinner."
"Hmm, that sounds lovely." Ilia states as her stomach rumbles to tell her that she hasn't eaten anything yet. Obeying her stomach, she opens the lid to her oatmeal and is hit with a wave of tear jerking nostalgia as the smell of baked apple and cinnamon enters her nose. Taking a spoonful, she hesitates to to take the bite due to a slight fear of that it won't Rasta's good as she remembers. But when she does take the bite, she metaphorically dies and goes to heaven as the deliciousness of the taste causes her to moan in deep satisfaction.
"It's good to know that I won't be giving the kitchen staff an earful anytime soon." Ruby whispers to herself, chuckling at the sight of Ilia enjoying her food before resuming the rapid consumption of her own meal.
They stay like this for a few minutes, enjoying their food as the world around idly passes them by. Eventually, they set their empty food containers onto the ground and lean back against the tree full.
"So, what's the next stop on the tour?" Ilia lazily asks.
"That would be the machine shop, the final stop of the tour." Ruby lazily replies.
"The final stop already?" Ilia rhetorically inquires before checking the time on her scroll. "Today went by far too quickly."
"At least you got spend it with me instead of attempting to keep up Dr. Oobleck all day as he flits from area to another." Ruby points out.
"True." Ilia says as she trembles slightly at what could have been if she hadn't gotten knocked over by Ruby. They take a deep breath and continue to relax as they take in the peacefulness of their surroundings when Ilia gets an idea.
"You know I do have a couple hours before I absolutely have to leave and it has been awhile since I gave my whip proper maintenance." Ilia suggests. "How about we go do maintenance on our weapons and maybe build some Rose Thorn prototypes to work out some of the kinks in the design?"
"Good idea." Ruby replies, nodding her head in agreement as she stands up.
She picks up all of trash and zooms to the nearest trash can to throw it away then zooms to where Ilia is and holds out a hand. Ilia takes Ruby's outstretched hand and Ruby lifts her off the ground a little too fast, resulting in them almost kissing. They quickly separate themselves from one another, feeling that wasn't the right time for a kiss.
"Onwards to the dorms again, I guess." Ruby shyly announces as both of them try not to be distracted by what almost happened.
Happy Valentine's Day