Authors Note: Next chapteeeer! More Story Stuff! Shenanigans ensure! Longer chapter to apologise and to make up for the delay and I got more to say at the bottom to explain that.
Also is being annoying, so piece of advice, check stories daily in case they don't come up as updated.
Swing horizontally her sword at her assailant, Pyrrha is blocked by Jaune's shield, reacting in time to block her, but leaving his flank open, to which Pyrrha slams her shield into Jaune's sword arm, causing the man to gasp in sudden pain. Jaune moves back, shield forward and sword pointed at his teammate. While Jaune is improving, it will take quite some time before Pyrrha can have him trained up to professional huntsman level.
Jaune, noticing a slight drop in her guard, thrusts his sword forward as a distraction to try to 'punch' Pyrrha with his shield. The champion fighter however deflects his thrust off her shield and Jaune's follow up hit narrowly misses. Pyrrha then draws her own sword into a thrust, striking Jaune in his chestplate, which absorbs the blow. She backhands Jaune with her shield, and trips him over with a sweeping leg.
Jaune looks up at Pyrrha, who merely smiles before offering a hand to him. Picking Jaune up off the floor, Pyrrha smiles at him, pleased with his progress.
"You are getting much better Jaune, just remember not to attack because your opponent might be a little less focused or else this might happen." Pyrrha reminds her leader, who nods at her, obviously taking in the consideration. "Well, we might as well head in now, it's late as it is." Jaune nods, rather exhausted in his attempts to beat his teammate. Pyrrha can't help but admire his drive and determination. Under her tutelage, she knows that he will become a great huntsman. And maybe some more to some people...
...Wait, what?
Pyrrha blinks once she just realised what she had just thought. Shaking her head to keep that memory out of her head for now, the two are walking back to their room when they notice Ruby walking out of her room, what sounds like an argument over something going on between Weiss and Yang. Ruby looks over at the two sword users, and waves at them.
To Pyrrha, Ruby was rather odd. She seemed constantly alert, noticing the smallest things as if it may be a threat. She had told Team JNPR and her own team at lunch once about how she was raised on the streets of Vale, yet her abilities seemed to be that of a professional like herself. Then again, it could be she just had to be like this to get ahead in her life. Pyrrha doesn't want to pry into her personal life, but she can't help but find the little girl to be an oddity in a school for huntsmen.
"Hey Jaune, Pyrrha." Ruby says to them casually.
"Hey Ruby, Weiss and Yang fighting again?" Jaune asks back, to which Ruby nods.
"Yeah, Yang 'accidentally' lost Weiss's homework which she claims she had to move since it was 'in the way' so now Weiss is getting up her since it's was due soon." Ruby explains in bored tone. Pyrrha looks at the bored fifteen year old, in charge of what was probably the strangest team in Beacon. Team RWBY: an enigmatic fifteen year old prodigy, the Schnee Dust Company heiress, a quiet, book loving girl and a brash, loud but nice girl that seems to be the kind to go partying lots.
Then again...
Her own team was too, rather strange, with a famous champion fighter, a leader that doesn't seem like he should be here, Ren, who was basically a ninja with automatic pistols. Oh, and Nora, not else needing to be said there.
"Been training Jaune have you Pyrrha?" Ruby said to them, Pyrrha a little surprise she knew, but nodding her head regardless. "Well, if you every want a hand, feel free to ask." Ruby continued kindly.
"Thanks Ruby, how's your own training with Mr Branwen going?" Jaune said to his friend.
"Well, he's taught me a bit, and my skills are getting ever so better." Ruby replied. A small silence ensured.
Shrugging to the younger girl with a apologetic smile, "Well, I hope they don't keep up you and Blake up this time." Waving goodbye, the two members of Team JNPR walk into their own room, to the sound of Nora talking about something random to Ren, likely one of her recurring dreams. Just how they had been when they left. Pyrrha smiles at the sight of her team.
It was everything she could have wanted here, and more.
James, standing on his ship's bridge as the flagship prepared for departure in a few days. Things were going rather smoothly, until a lieutenant walked up to the General.
"Sir, Professor Polendina asked me to inform you that his prototype has arrived in Vale." the soldier reported to Ironwood. The general said nothing, before dismissing the soldier.
The genius scientist had keep bugging him about letting his 'child' go and participate in the Tournament, to which James finally agreed. It would good for the girl to get some combat experience. He would have to assign his troops to keep an eye on her though, it wouldn't help if people knew about her just yet. And there would be outrage if people knew an android was participating in the Vytal Festival.
A few days later
So, when Weiss suggested a trip to Vale that Friday afternoon, Ruby thought they might just go around, buy some stuff, maybe grab a bite to eat. While she could maybe visit her dad if he wasn't busy. It sounded like a great idea honestly.
But then again it was Weiss.
SO, after flying to Vale on a school Bullhead, Weiss had proceeded to drag them around, figuratively, as people prepared for the Vytal Festival, and the visiting tourists from Atlas, Mistral and Vacuo started to arrive. It wasn't too bad, Ruby thought, lots of people to pickpocket, good pickings from Atlesian visitors, the posh idiots. Ruby was casually listening to her partner talk about how much preparation went into the event. Ruby stopped listening intently a while ago, her thoughts going to the time Roman had taken her and Neo to the Tournament.
It had been fun, before Roman was as major a criminal and mostly unknown. They had front row seats as teams of Huntsmen and Huntress fought for their school's glory. To the girls, it had been some casual fun. To Roman, as he explained afterwards, it was to teach them on how those kinds of people fight. Ruby had learned much, and regularly attended the Vytal Festival, usually with Neo or her dad, before he was too infamous.
Smiling at her fond memories and happy times, Ruby watches as Weiss leads them to the Vale Docks. Ruby spent lots of time at the docks, working with her dad on criminal activities, so while the smell wasn't that bad, Ruby wasn't exactly impressed that Weiss led them here. There is a rather large boat that had just arrived, that was not familiar to Ruby however.
"Weiss, why did you come to the docks?" Ruby asks her partner, somewhat confused why her Schnee teammate would want to be here of all places.
"Well, I heard that the students of Vacuo will be arriving here by boat, and as Students of Beacon, I think it's our duty to welcome them to Vale." Weiss says with grandeur. Blake, however soon exposes her true reason.
"She just wants to spy on them, so she has an advantage in the Tournament." Blake explains, to which Yang shrugs and Ruby merely nods. While Weiss turned around to deny the fact, Ruby did note it was a good idea if they wanted the best chance of winning. As people start walking off the boat, Rudy looks around bit, a habit she of hers, to see some police in front of a dust shop. It's been cornered off by police, the door and windows have been broken, so has mostly everything else inside the store.
Ruby sighed, she had been talking with her dad, when he had to get off since some White Fang he had sent with one of Roman's personal crew to rob somewhere, they had arrived back but apparently stuffed up somehow. Roman had been really annoyed, before apologising and hanging up.
Ruby didn't trust the White Fang, but not in the sense that they were terrorists, though that is another reason why. It was because that Cinder had insisted that Roman had them help him with robberies, and boy, could they be incompetent. As Ruby watched the cops go about their jobs, the other members of her team noticed what she was looking at. Weiss and Yang started walking up to the cops, with Ruby and Blake in tow.
"Excuse me Officer, but what happened here?" Weiss said to one of the cops, who was bearded and had a tablet out, marking something down.
"Robbery, another Dust shop hit this week, it's turning into a madhouse here..." The cop says, before he walks off and starts discussing with his partner. Ruby hears Yang say how terrible it was, but the team listened in as the cops discussed the robbery. Weiss crossed her arms when the cop that they had talked to said it might have been the White Fang. Ruby gets a nice smug feeling knowing how useless the cops are, still grabbing at vague and irrelevant possibilities. Though it WAS the Fang, the cops wouldn't be able to work out why in a million years.
"The White Fang, what a disgusting bunch of criminals and lowlifes." Weiss says, her voice clearing stating her hate for the group. What Ruby didn't expect was Blake's reaction.
"What's your problem against them?" She asks her Schnee teammate, who looks at Blake like it isn't obvious.
"My 'problem' is that I simply dislike the criminally insane murders and thieves that is the White Fang." Weiss replies to her teammate, who looks rather livid at Weiss's remark. While the two started debating what exactly the White Fang were, Ruby and Yang stood off to the side, until Blake brought up the good point of why they would rob a dust shop.
"Blake has got a point, why bother stealing dust from a store? It was probably some other criminals, like Torchwick or someone else." Ruby says to her team.
"Still doesn't change the fact that the White Fang is a bunch of scum." Weiss says, looking away as if to say she won't change her mind any time soon. Blake looks almost ready to attack her when Yang is starts to talk, but is cut off when a guy shouts out, "Somebody stop that faunus!" The girls turn around and run back to where they saw the boat being moored.
Down at the docks, on the same boat, are two men chasing after some Monkey Faunus with a unbuttoned shirt, revealing his abs and chest. He has blond hair and the same colour on his tail, and also has some red armoured gloves, similar in colour to Crescent Rose. Judging by his looks and actions, he was probably some visiting huntsmen in training, that decide to stowaway on the boat.
"Thanks for the ride guys, he he he." the girls hear the faunus says to the dockworkers, before jumping of the side of the boat and onto the dock. One of the man shouts out to the faunus, calling him a "no-good stowaway". The guy is hanging upside down on a light, much to the surprise of many people on the dock, eating a banana. He then goes on to say that he was a great stowaway for not getting caught. The cops from before must have noticed the commotion, as they had walked down to the docks to see what was going on.
"Get down from there now!" the bearded cop said, to which the faunus replied with a banana skin to his face. Ruby almost laughed when he did that. Doing stuff like that to see a cop's reaction was one of her favourite past times as a kid. The cop on the other hand, was less than impressed. Laughing at the cop's angry expression, the faunus jumped down over them, and proceeded to sprint away, cops in pursuit. As he ran past the girls, Ruby could have sworn he had winked at Blake.
"Well, you wanted to scope out the competition, there is goes." Yang says to Weiss, who just realises what the blond meant.
"Quickly, after that faunus scoundrel!" Weiss shouted dramatically, before running off in pursuit, Blake and Yang hot on her heels. Ruby shrugs, before quickly catching up with her semblance. Running alongside her team, Ruby can tell Blake is getting very agitated, and Ruby knows the sneaky faunus girl is gonna snap soon. Since that wouldn't be ideal, Ruby makes a reminder to get Weiss to lay off the faunus hate with some viable excuse. Running down a street the police had chased the faunus, Ruby almost ran into someone, but managed to twist out of the way.
Weiss was less fortunate however, running right into the orange haired girl, but seemed to not even care about the fact she was lying on top of someone.
"Damn it! He got away!" Weiss complained as the faunus leapt onto a roof, and out of sight. Looking back at her teammates, Ruby was standing there with a suppressed laugh, Yang was point down at her and Blake was looking down at her as well. She only just noticed that she was on top of someone. "AHH!" Weiss yelled, getting up as fast as she could while trying to look dignified.
It didn't work well.
"Salutations!" The girl said to them, still lying on the ground, but waved at them politely. Ruby looked over at her team, equally confused as them while the girl continued to lay on the ground, smiling at them.
"Um, are you...ok?" Yang asked, her voice sounding rather confused. The girl looked at them for a moment.
"I'm wonderful! Thank you for asking." The girl said to them with a voice so polite, she had to be messing with them. Looking between each other, RWBY had no idea who this girl was or what she was doing.
Yang, always the one to risk it, looked over at the girl again. "Do you wanna get up?" she asks, to which the orange haired girl nodded, before getting up by flipping. They all took one healthy step back. The girl looked at them again with her permanent smile.
"My name is Penny. It's a pleasure to meet you." Penny said to them, still sounding all kind and polite. She had to be joking, there was something weird about this girl.
"Hello Penny, I'm Ruby.", "I'm Weiss", "Blake", "Are you sure you didn't hit your head? Ow, I mean, I'm Yang."
"It's a pleasure to meet you." Penny repeated, making Ruby raise an eyebrow, but said nothing, unlike Weiss who pointed out she had already said that. There was something off about her...something that made Ruby very suspicious. Maybe, a little info gathering might be in order...
"Well, sorry for running into you." Weiss apologised, and the team turned around. As they were walking away, Ruby turned to the girl and said, "Take care friend." Not really giving her words much thought
"She was weird..." Yang said, mostly to herself.
"Well never mind her, but where did that faunus riffraff run off to then?" Weiss said, looking around. But everyone was very surprised when the girl, Penny, appeared in front of them.
"What did you call me?" She said, to which Yang started trying to apologise, while Weiss pointed back at where they had just left her, confused on how she got in front of them. However, Penny walked past the two of them, and faced Ruby, who was standing tall and staring back at Penny with her eyebrow raised. "You called me friend. Am I really your friend?" Penny asked, her face looking both confused and hopeful.
Ruby, despite looking rather determined, wasn't sure if she should say yes or no, would she be a hassle or not? A moment passed, her team behind the girl clearly saying that would be a bad idea. But, Penny didn't really seem dangerous, despite her flip which seemed rather like she had some measure of skill in...something, be it combat or gymnastics. Shrugging to herself, Ruby sighed, "Sure, why not." and waited for the probable backlash. Which started with her teams shocked expressions.
"Sen-sational! We can paint our nails our nails and try on clothes and talk about cute boys!"Penny rambled on, while Ruby moved discreetly over to Yang.
"Is this what girls usually do?" The criminal asked the blond bombshell, who merely shrugged.
"So, what are you doing here in Vale Penny?" Yang asked, curious to know why the odd girl was here. Ruby wondered why as well, and was glad Yang saved her the time to ask.
"Oh? I'm here to fight in the Vytal Festival Tournament." Penny told them, to which Weiss looked sceptical. "Wait, your here to fight in the tournament? You hardly look the part." Weiss says to Penny, who replies, claiming she's 'Combat Ready'. Judging by her choice of language, she's probably from Atlas. They liked their professional way of speaking there. Blake looked over Weiss's attire, before saying, "Says the girl in the dress."
Ouch, it was a combat skirt, and Ruby wore one too...
"It's a combat skirt." Weiss replies, to which Ruby raises a hand, which is meet by Weiss's. Weiss then seemed to realise something. "Hey, wait, if your here to fight in the tournament, do you know that faunus...delinquent?" Weiss said, grabbing Penny by the shoulders. The Atlesian girl didn't seem to mind though, and merely looked at her with her happy look. "Who?" she asked innocently, not understanding what Weiss meant. Ruby sighed, obviously she didn't know, the faunus certainly wasn't from the faunus hating Atlas, so why would the Atlas looking girl know him? Weiss didn't seem to make the connection, "The filthy faunus from the boat!" She almost shouted.
Blake by this point had had enough and was outright glaring at Weiss. Ruby casually put her hand on her scythe, ready to intervene. "Why do you keep calling him that!?" Blake shouted at Weiss, who was shocked the Blake of all people said that. "Stop calling him like scum or a scoundrel simply because he's a faunus! He's a person too!" Blake continued to yell at the unrelenting Schnee.
"Oh, I'm sorry. Would you like it if I stop calling a lamppost a lamppost? Or a chair as a chair?" Weiss retorts, causing Blake to only get angrier.
Ruby and Yang watch on as Blake starts walking away, but Weiss stops to continue arguing. Yang whispers to Ruby, "Maybe we should go?". Ruby shakes her head and walks up to the arguing girls.
"Alright then," Ruby mutters to herself, "SHUT UP!" Ruby yells right into Weiss and Blake's ears, causing them to stop arguing and look at Ruby. "Now that I have your attention, maybe we can discuss this like civilised people?"
Weiss and Blake look at their leader, slightly shocked that the kind, but somewhat mysterious Ruby could have such an authoritative tone. It was certain not what they would expect her to act like. Despite both of them wanting to continue their argument, the look Ruby had going persuaded them not to.
"Now, I think we should head back to Beacon and discuss this away from strangers, don't you think?" Ruby said to her team sternly, before turning to Penny. "Penny, we need to go and have a chat, give me your scroll number, and we can meet up later ok?" Penny smiled and passed Ruby her scroll, who copied its data digitally with a hacking program installed on her own scroll. Passing the strange girl her scroll back and bidding her goodbye, Ruby walked her team back to the Bullheads to Beacon. It was about time for a bit of an intervention.
Walking up to the bullheads, Ruby noticed that someone was following them. Smirking to herself, Ruby boarded the Bullhead as the stalker hid behind a wall.
It was a few hours later, and while Ruby hadn't made her team speak yet, it was clear that the time was to be spent cooling off. Ruby's professional gaze kept watch over the Schnee and Belladonna as they sat at opposite ends of their dorm, waiting for the inevitable talk.
Ruby was sitting on a chair in the middle of the room, having spent this time doing three things:
One: Making sure Weiss and Blake didn't try and continue their argument prematurely. Two: To work out how to make the conversation play out how Ruby wanted it to. And Three: Keep an eye on their stalker, who was currently hanging outside their dorm window, clearly waiting for something.
Getting up and moving the other two chairs she needed to form a triangle, Ruby looked at her teammates, Weiss then Blake, before gesturing to the chairs. Blake obeyed without question, while Weiss was about to argue, one hard glare from Ruby made the Schnee move over and take a seat. Looking at the two of them, Ruby sighed deeply. "Now that we are all calm and ready to have a rational conversation, I think it's time we all had a nice little chat." Her tone left no room to argue.
"Now, Weiss, I think you should explain yourself, so we can have a better understanding about why you hate the White Fang and dislike faunus in general, hmm?" Ruby said to Weiss, who sighed and got up from her chair and put her hands on the bookshelf/stand in front of the window. "You want to know why I hate the White Fang, and distrust faunus? It's because my family, and our entire company has been at war with them for years. Actual violence against people. Ever since I was a child, I have seen family friends disappear, board members be executed and so much dust stolen, it makes the dust robberies here look like a bully taking candy from a baby. Mines 'liberated' and the dust destroyed, shops that bought from us being attacked simply because they interacted with the SDC! Even an entire train car has been stolen. And every time my father came back from work, he was furious, which made for a very difficult childhood!" Weiss smacks her fist on the stand. Turning around and looking at her team, she continues, "All the faunus have been to me and my family is a bunch of liars, thieves and murderers." Weiss finishes, sitting down, her face looking at the ground.
Ruby couldn't help but see a shocked, almost guilty look on Blake's face when Weiss mentioned a train. Keeping her suspicions to herself and keeping herself from acting like she noticed nothing, Ruby looks over at Blake. "I think, Blake, you should tell them the truth." Blake looked at her, confused as to what she meant. "You know what I mean, don't try and hide it now." Ruby repeats to Blake.
Blake looks over her team, scared of they might think. Getting up herself and walking to her bed, her back facing her team, she reaches up and pulls at her bow, undoing the knot and pulling it off, revealing two black cat ears. Ruby smiles gently, her guess correct, her team's reactions showing to her. Yang looks at her with a surprised look, but it seems she is more interested by the ears than the fact she is a faunus. Weiss looks at Blake, her mouth slightly opened in shock. Weiss had not expected that Blake was secretly a faunus, and upon realising everything she said about faunus, she knew she had been insulting her own teammate. Blake turned around, her cat ears flicking slightly. "I...was born in Menagerie, and throughout my life, I have only seen faunus being treated unfairly. I took part in rallies and protests, even as a kid. And...when the White Fang was formed as a peaceful group, I was part of it, as were my parents. I thought we were making a difference, but..." Blake trails off, which leads to Yang coming up to her and giving her a small, friendly hug. A moment passes, Ruby watches as Weiss seems to have some sort of internal conflict. Blake continues after Yang lets go, "It wasn't, and when our leader stepped down and the new leader, Sienna Kahn, turned the organisation into the terrorist group it is now..." Blake paused, clearly scared of what she had to say. "...I join with them. I wasn't involved much with the crueller things, like killing innocents or attacking stores, but I was involved in attacks on SDC mines, and I was one of the people that robbed that train. No one else was doing anything! And I honestly thought we were doing the right thing, but until now, I have realised that the White Fang is not helping the faunus, only making things worse!" Blake starts to cry slightly, clearly saddened by having told her team the truth, especially to Weiss, having heard her own story and reasons. Yang once again comes to her aid, letting the cat faunus hug her.
Ruby looked at Blake with a surprise expression, almost shocked that Blake was an ex-terrorist. Or was she? No, she clearly was shamed by her actions, and wants to redeem herself.
Weiss on the other hand, had another shock, that not only was her teammate a faunus, but a terrorist? Weiss looked at Blake with a horrified expression. Ruby, looking over at her teammate, says to Weiss quietly, "Weiss, Blake is still your friend, the same person we know, and she obviously isn't proud of her actions. Give her a chance." Weiss went to say something but stops herself. Ruby watched the expressions play on Weiss's face. Shock, betrayal, fear, concern. It's clear she doesn't know what to think.
A few minutes pass, and once everyone calms down, Ruby faces Blake and Weiss. "Well, now we have that out of the way, I think we need to make sure this isn't going to be a problem." Blake looks at Weiss and takes a deep breath.
"Weiss, I want you to know, that I regret what I did in the White Fang, and that I am no longer associated with them and that I only want what's best for us and our team now." Blake says to Weiss honestly, the Schnee appearing to take what Blake said seriously.
A moment passes before Weiss replies. "I...understand, that you want to make amends for what you did. You are still Blake to me, and I think...that I can try and be a better person, to the faunus and you."
Ruby smiles as the two give each other a hug, her plan to keep her team intact complete.
"Guys, if possible... I want to try and see if the White Fang really is robbing dust stores in Vale. Most of the faunus are just misguided into believing this is good for them. I want to prove it's not them, to clear their name. And prove that I mean what I said" Blake asks her team, much to their surprise. Weiss, somewhat surprisingly, nods.
"Of course, I will help you, it is a noble cause, and we can do this see as a way to prove how much we mean what we just said." Weiss declares, much to Ruby's delight.
"Well, sounds like fun, I'm in." Yang says simply, true to her roughhouse nature.
"And of course, I'm going to help." Ruby says finally. Ruby really doesn't want to, she knows the truth her team doesn't, and this might be a problem. "But first, we have a little problem to handle." Walking up to the window, Ruby draws Crescent Rose swiftly and reaches outside, into the nearby tree. A yell is heard and one pull later, a guy comes flying out of the tree and onto the floor. Ruby positions her scythe on his neck. "Who do you think you are spying on us! Eavesdropping?!" Ruby demands, giving the guy a fright.
"I wasn't dropping any eaves, honest! I was just, uh, pruning the tree!?" the guy, who turns out to be the same monkey faunus from the boat. WBY is looking at Ruby in surprise, wondering how she knew he was there. Ruby pushed slightly down on her scythe, biting into his Aura a little. "OK OK, I WAS WATCHING THE FAUNUS GIRL, BLAKE WAS IT?" the guy clearly wasn't used to people interrogating him with a scythe to his neck. Releasing him from her scythe and standing by the window to block his escape, Ruby gestured to Blake.
"Why are you spying on me?" Blake asked him, who quickly shook his head.
"I saw you at the docks, I wanted to say hi to a good looking faunus like yourself. Name's Sun." Sun said, trying his best to look somewhat impressive. He failed terribly. "Sooo, I heard your talk about the White Fang, and I heard that you want to prove their innocent? Dunno why, but I can give you a hand." Sun said to the girls, who immediately looked interested, except the girl in the red hood. "I heard from some dock workers on the boat I came on, that they were going to be offloading a TON of dust, straight from the SDC tomorrow night." Blake looked happy that Sun had proved that faunus can be trustworthy, while Yang and Weiss looked pleased that they knew where to go, Weiss happy to save company product, and Yang knew it was somewhere she could get into a good fight.
As Sun told them where to meet up with him, Ruby stopped to think. If they intervened the robbery, it would be a great chance to have Blake and Weiss become honest with each other. But...if it was her dad doing the robbery, it wouldn't be ideal for them too cause him more grief from Cinder. Then again, it wasn't like he could be beaten by her team easily, he was far too strong for them. Sun waved goodbye and jumped out of the window, Ruby and co non-verbally decided to go to sleep. As Ruby lied down on her bed, she started think about how tomorrow might turn out.
As Sun made his way to the room at Beacon he was staying at, he thought about what just happened.
That Blake faunus, man was she a good-looking girl, and seemed like a good enough person, even though she was ex-White Fang. She was definitely interesting to Sun.
It did amaze him that of all people, a SCHNEE had been on her team, and now they had set aside their differences for the sake of their team? That was, in his's opinion, a pretty cool thing.
And that blond girl? Well she looked pretty fine, for a human, and Sun wouldn't have said no to her.
But that last girl, in the red hood? He didn't know what, but something about her seemed...odd.
Suspicious even. She set all kinds of warnings off in Sun's head, and he didn't know why. She seemed nice enough and wanted what was best for her team. Sighing to himself, Sun jumped down the building he was on and into the dorm he was given for the Vytal Festival guests. He'd have to think on it.
The next day...
Walking down the hall that Saturday morning with her team to breakfast, Ruby had still been unable to make up her mind. She wanted to help her dad, and she knew she should, but this was such a good chance for her team to improve their relations and make Ruby's chance of succeeding here at Beacon better. As they arrived at the cafeteria and went up to the table she shared with JNPR, the two teams had their usual conversations about their usual stuff. Weiss and Pyrrha had a small conversation, Blake was reading, Jaune and Yang were listening to Nora tell a story while Ren merely sat by. Now, normally Nora had weird dreams about strange things, but the one she had last night was really confusing to Ruby. She had a dream that Ruby got betrayed by Weiss, Blake and Pyrrha and some other random students, and proceeded to gather grimm to get her revenge. Honestly, how could Nora have such weird dreams? Ignoring the hammer wielding maniac's outrageous story, Ruby casually pulled out her scroll and typed a small message to her dad.
As the two teams finished eating, RWBY left on a bullhead, heading to the spot Sun had told them to go to later. While they were walking, Ruby open up her phone was about to text her that Penny girl, when said eccentric walked around the corner.
"Salutations, friend Ruby!" Penny said as she walked up to them. "How are you today? Have Blake and Weiss reconciled?" Penny continued.
"Yes, Penny they have. We're just heading to a place a friend wanted to meet at." Ruby said to Penny, who smiled at her.
"Really? Can I come?" Penny asked with so much kindness, it was impossible to say no.
"Ok, but you might need to leave later." Ruby said as they reached the same place they had seen Sun jump off the boat. It was also where he asked them to meet at. Around 30 minutes passed before Sun finally arrived.
"Hey, you're pretty early." Sun said to them casually, before noticing Penny. "And who is this? She isn't on your team, is she?"
Ruby shook her head, "No, Penny is just a friend that came over to say hi." Penny walked over to Sun, greeting him in her strange, formal way. After introducing herself to Sun, he started walking over to a small dock with a couple warehouses on it. "That's the place, the SDC shipment should be offloaded tonight, we can catch them in the act then." Sun explained to team RWBY and Penny, who seemed confused.
"Ah yeah, so Penny, Blake's a faunus, and wants to prove the White Fang isn't stealing dust from stores in Vale. Sun heard about a huge SDC shipment coming in tonight and wants to catch them in the act." Ruby gave Penny the 20-second rundown. Penny nodded and continued walking with them. "Uh, Penny? What are you doing?" Ruby asked, to which Penny looked at her oddly.
"I thought we wanted to catch the thieves stealing dust?" She asked innocently. Ruby was about to say she isn't involved but figured she could use to time to learn about the eccentric girl while her scroll processed the data hacked from Penny's scroll. It had a very tough encryption, but Ruby knew it wouldn't last too much longer. She and Neo had hacked the CCT in Vale for a job once, while Roman and some guys stole from a store, they had caused a ton of ads to start playing on basically everything.
It had been funny!
"Eh, sure, why not Penny." Ruby relents and lets Penny join them.
"So, we got a few hours to kill before night, so we can just go out and do something else. We'll split up in teams of two, Me and Penny, Blake and Sun, Weiss and Yang. We'll meet up here later ok?" Ruby organises, and everyone heads their separate ways. Hopefully, Ruby can learn more about this Penny girl, while Blake can learn more about Sun. He seemed like a nice guy, and it would be a shame to have to hurt him because he knew something about them he could use as blackmail.
Roman was walking up to the map he had in this warehouse. While he owned quite a few, this one was new and hadn't been filled yet, but the raid tonight would probably change that. He had gotten a text from Little Red, saying her team had a little issue last night but had solved it well. To hazard a guess, the criminal guessed the faunus girl had been discovered by the Schnee, but Ruby managed to keep everything from falling into disarray.
Well, she was his daughter, and he didn't exactly want her to NOT know how to be a skilled planner and manipulator. Smiling for a few seconds, he shortly went back to scowling as he walked past a few White Fang goons. Really? Why did Cinder insist on having these useless mutts around? They were terrible thieves! Going on and on and on and on about their 'Equal Rights strategy'. Honestly, their entire idea was so floored, and it gave Roman a headache to think about it.
Walking into a private office area, Roman sat on a chair, Neo relaxing on a sofa with a bowl of ice-cream. Roman hated Cinder for all her restrictions: 'Don't use your experienced and skilled men, use these White Fang mutts, don't use Neo, we need her for our infiltration where we will have her assume a false identity anyway.'
Roman sighed, before looking at Neo. "Neo, can you make sure none of these idiots blow up the warehouse while I'm out? I kinda need this place for the dust storage." Roman says to Neo, who nods and raises a thumb.
At least this robbery shouldn't have any issues, it was at night and at an unoccupied dock. As bad as the White Fang was there was no way this could go wrong right?
It was almost time, Sun and Blake were waiting for the thieves to show up, on the roof of an office building. Weiss and Yang were in position, hiding amongst the containers that had been left on the dock. They had the SDC symbol on them, confirming what Sun said, and so they waited for Ruby to arrive with Penny, and for the thieves to arrive.
"So, tell me again what the plan is?" Yang said over her scroll, which had been linked to the entire teams at Ruby's suggestion.
"Honestly you dunce, don't you ever pay attention? When the thieves arrive, we wait for them to start loading the dust, then intervene and subdue them." Weiss explains over her own scroll. Yang shrugs and asks, "What if it IS the White Fang? Did we consider that?" That leaves no one to talk about, however Ruby soon speaks up.
"If it is the White Fang, we let Blake call the shots, if you want to try to convince them to stop without violence, it's up to you." Ruby says to Blake, giving her the choice.
A few minutes later, a bullhead flies over the dock, search lights on the ground and looking for any intruders. Whoever was in charge of them didn't expect anyone to be on the roof or in between the containers, as it misses the girls and Sun, and lands on the ground. The ramp extends to the ground and out walks a man in a white top with an image of an animal's head on the back with three claw marks, the symbol of the White Fang. Blake sighs sadly, "Oh no..."
"Is that them?" Sun asks, to which Blake nods as four more members walk out, all armed with some kind of gun or sword. One of them, clearly a senior member with a rifle, starts shouting instructions to the others. "You really didn't think they were behind all this, do you?" Sun says.
"No, I think deep down, I knew that they were. I just didn't want to be right." Blake says and grabs her scroll. "Get ready to move on my go. Ruby, get back here as soon as possible." Blake instructs.
"On it, we're almost there. Penny! Let's go!" Ruby says and hangs up. Blake looks up at the White Fang when she hears someone shout.
"Hey! What's the hold up? We're not exactly a bunch of inconspicuous thieves right now, I suggest that you animals get on with this, BEFORE, someone notices eh?" Roman Torchwick says, walking out of the bullhead. Blake gets up, "This isn't right, there's no way the White Fang would work with someone like Torchwick." Blake draws Gambol Shroud, jumps down and starts running over to the bullhead.
Sun quickly grabs her scroll, "Hey, so some Torchwick guy is here, and Blake is running over to them, get ready in case something happens." Sun says, jumping down himself but hanging back in the shadows slightly. He notices Weiss and Yang doing the same, Weiss behind the corner of a container and Yang laying on top of one.
Blake took cover behind a container and poked her head out. Three of the White Fang members were hooking containers up to metal cords, while Torchwick was talking with the last one. "No you idiot, this is not a leash..." Before Roman could continue, Blake run up behind them, as silent as death itself, and raised her weapon to Torchwick's neck. "Wha...? Ah for fu-" Roman goes to say as the other White Fang members turn around and draw their weapons at Blake, two wielding guns, one with a single sword and the last with two swords. "Nobody move!" Blake says to the White Fang members, Gambol Shroud pulled slightly closer to Roman's neck. The thief, however, seems to be rather relaxed, despite the situation. "Now, now, take it easy little lady, I know what girls your age are like." Roman says to Blake in an almost joking tone. Blake eyes the White Fang as they assemble in front of them. Reaching for her bow with her empty hand, Blake pulls her bow off, revealing her cat ears. The grunts lower their weapons slightly at the sight of her faunus heritage.
"Brothers of the White Fang! Why are you aiding this scum?" Blake demanded, her voice telling she was confused as why they were working with a human. The grunts lower their weapons completely, think she was some misinformed member. Roman chuckled slightly to himself, "Heh, oh kid, didn't you get the memo?" To which Blake pulled back on her weapon a bit more. "What are you talking about?" Blake demanded. Roman smirks before continuing, "Well, the White Fang and I are on...let's say a bit of a joint business venture together." Blake scowls at Roman, even though he can't see it.
"Tell me what it is, or I'll be ending your little operation." Blake threatened Roman, to which he could only laugh slightly as another two bullheads flew in. Roman raised his head to look at them.
"I wouldn't exactly call it a little operation..." Roman said as the bullheads hovered above them, drawing Blake's attention. Roman discreetly lowered Melodic Cudgel, and fire it into the ground behind him knocking Blake back. As Blake got up, recovering from the blast, Roman fired another shot at her, causing the faunus to roll away in her attempts to dodge Roman's explosives. Running around a container, Roman started walking forward and spinning his weapon by the handle. "You lot get your buds out and get the containers hooked up." Roman yelled over to the White Fang, before turning around again. "Now, where one is, the other three are too. Why is your team here Red?" Roman muttered to himself. As he walked slowly forward, trying to think of a way not to kill his little girl's team, a banana peel landed on his head, messing up his hat. Throwing the peel away and looking up, Roman dodged the monkey faunus that jumped at him with a "Woohoo!". Sun rolled on the ground and got up with a jump.
"Leave her alone." Sun said simply to Roman, who looked very angry that his hat had gotten messed up.
One of the bullheads flew over them, depositing eight Fang members, four behind Roman and four behind Sun. Roman snapped the length of Melodic Cudgel in half, as was meant to be, and loaded a burn crystal into his weapon. "You're not the brightest banana of the bunch, now are ya kid?" Roman said, flipping his weapon together like a double-barrel shotgun. Sun smirk, and as the Fang grunts were about to charge, Roman heard a whistling sound. Two explosive shot landed behind Sun, knocking the grunts behind him back. Yang Xiao Long fell from the sky in a roll, before firing behind her and launching herself at the terrorists. A similar, singular shot had landed behind Torchwick as well, this time being ice dust. Weiss Schnee, ever the dignified fighter, summoned a glyph under herself, and flew at the other stunned White Fang faster than humanly possible. With Roman alone facing the monkey faunus.
Blake, looking at what happened from behind some construction equipment, jumped over Sun, who drew his own weapon, a bo staff that collapsed into two nunchucks, that were also guns. Gunchucks? "He's mine!" Blake yelled as she jumped over Sun, swing her weapon at Roman, who looked rather amused, despite being outnumbered. Blocking Blake's strike, Roman swung Melodic Cudgel, hitting the girl, but passing through her as if she was a shadow, the real girls doing a backflip. She sliced both parts of her weapon at Roman, who blocked with ease, before randomly pushing into Blake's guard and punching her in the face, knocking her back. Sun came in, swinging his gunchucks at Roman, firing while swinging the blunt weapons, while Roman was forced to block the shots fired as if he had a sword. Knocking one of the gunchucks out of the way, Roman jab Sun in the chest with his cane, and swiped it up into the monkey's face. Blake jumped over the stunned Sun, and swing her sword into Roman chest, unable to block fast enough, but his aura absorbing the hit. Roman was sent back a few metres. Getting up, Roman noticed a container hanging on a crane. Roman quickly aimed and fired at it, causing the metal box to fall down, separating Sung and Blake briefly. Blake tried to roll forward, but she came too close to Torchwick, who kicked her in the stomach, and rested his boot on her chest, aiming his gun at her head. However, before he could grab her and use her as a bargaining chip, Yang's Ember Celcia augmented fist came flying at him, knocking him flying off her. Yang offered Blake a hand, who took it gladly. Roman got up, and looked over at the girls and Sun, Weiss just walking over to join them.
"Well then, this isn't ideal..." Roman said to himself, trying to work out if he could get out without killing these damn kids. It was now he noticed Ruby was on the roof of a building, her scythe out and ready. "Well, Hello there Red! Isn't past time for you to go to bed?" Roman shouted at his adoptive daughter, who played along to his charade.
"Give up Torchwick, you can't escape!" Ruby shouted, which caused her team and Sun to look at her in surprise. This being the exact opportunity he wanted, Roman quickly fired a shot at the kids in front of him, knocking them all back. Using this chance to run while they were stunned, Roman ran to the end of the docks, where a bullhead, piloted by one of his own thugs, was. Penny jumped down, having seen her friends being attacked, Ruby following to make sure they were fine. Penny's backpack opened, revealing several swords that seemed to float, but were in fact being controlled by near-invisible wires. Two of the White Fang Yang had beaten had recovered by now, and tried to rush Penny, who responded by swing her swords like a buzzsaw and knocking them back. The rest of the terrorist on the ground, having noticed their friends get beaten so quickly by some girl with floating swords, quickly stop trying to get up. The three Fang Bullheads, however, decided otherwise, and started firing mounted Gatling guns at Penny, who blocked them with her swords. Sending two of them into a nearby wall, Penny flung herself backwards, and landed in front of said wall. Making a gesture, Penny's swords proceeded to from a circle, their hilts folding in slightly, and a green ball of pure energy started forming in the centre of them. Growing to a substantial size, Penny smirked as the ball turned into a goddamn laser and cut the attacking bullheads in half, the pilots falling out from the splits, however they were close enough to the ground that they would be fine. Maybe a few broken bones, but alive. The wrecks flew overhead and crashed in the water. A fourth bullhead was trying to escape with a container of SDC dust, but Penny merely shot her swords into the side of the vehicle, and slowly walked backwards, pulling the bullhead to the ground. As she was doing this, Ruby watched on in surprise. How could a human be doing that? Ruby pulled her scroll out and filmed Penny pull the bullhead down.
As Roman jumped on his escape vehicle, and watched as Penny destroyed three armed bullheads, he muttered to himself, "These kids get weirder all the time, every year..." and pulled down the hatch with his cane. Penny watched as his bullhead flew away, faster than she could use her swords to stop it. As Torchwick made his getaway, the police finally started to show up. Always late.
Ruby sat on a few boxes with her team, Blake looked rather sad, Weiss was pleased they had managed to save SDC product, Yang contented by a good fight and Penny was Penny. Sun was also there, but he was casually eating a banana. They were waiting for a member of the Beacon staff to come collect them, having explain to the cops what had happened. It wasn't new experience to Ruby, lying to cops, but it was new that she was doing it for a non-illegal reason. As they discussed amongst themselves the events of this evening, Ruby noticed her teacher, Qrow Branwen, walking over to them, as did Yang. Yang quickly got up and shout, "Hey Uncle Qrow, about time!"
Qrow merely sighed at his niece's antics. "I was wondering why Ruby didn't come for practise this morning, now I know why." Qrow says, and after a moment, he quietly says to the huntresses and huntsman in training, "You should have invited me, would have been fun." The girls laughed at the older man's joke, except for Penny, who Ruby noticed being walked away by a man in an Atlesian suit, and over to a car, while Qrow unwittingly distracted them. Ruby had talked to Penny that day, and the girl had let loose that she was visiting early from Atlas Academy, so it was likely she had a chaperone here, and he or she wanted to take her away discreetly. As Qrow walks them over to a bullhead, Miss Goodwitch waiting inside much to the student's, except Sun, fear. Ruby guessed she and the Headmaster would want to talk to the team about it.
As they walk onto the bullhead, Ruby pulls out her scroll, her hacking program finally finished. Putting her earphones in, she started reading.
Cinder watched as Roman returned.
Except he was missing the five bullheads the White Fang had. As the man walked up to a table inside the warehouse, Cinder nodded at Mercury, who opened the door. Roman quickly turned around in surprise, Cinder began talking.
"How very disappointing Roman, I expected more from you." She began as the criminal recovered from his surprise.
"Not my fault you wanted me to work with those useless mutts from the White Fang, so it wasn't easy fighting off six huntsmen in training level opponents by myself. Now, if I could use NEO, I would have been fine." Roman said to Cinder, who was smiling as she walked up to him, her disciples behind her.
"You will continue to work with the White Fang, until I say otherwise. But if it really is so hard for you, then I will let take your little assassin with you." Cinder says somewhat mockingly, but Roman knows better than to defy her. "We have very big plans for you Roman, all I need...is a little cooperation." She continues as she lights her hand on fire with the Maiden's Power. Roman looks at, before nodding and walking away, out of a side door.
As Roman walks away to where he told Neo to meet him, he pulls out a fresh cigar. Hopefully, he can get his own show on the road when Cinder's gone to Beacon.
He just can't wait to get back at her for this.
And so with that, the seen part of Volume 1 is complete! Next Chapter: Will be some intermission stuff, like Ozpin interviewing RWBY right after this. However, I want to point out that this chapter, being MASSIVE to all the ones previous, isn't going to be common.
I think
I'll be doing around 6k-8k chapters and 9k+ for big things like this, but this might change.
I kinda thought how odd it was that Sun was casually ready for Blake to run away, I always thought he HAD to be watching them most the time, so I used Ruby grabbing him out the tree as a way to not only keep the events that happen in episode 16 in, but also as a subtle reference; ten points for who gets it k? And because SOMEONE will mention it, Weiss and Blake didn't try and defy Ruby after she interrupted their argument, since they knew from Ruby's look and tone that continuing would be a bad idea in the sense that a brutal beatdown would insure.
And so, I kinda need to explain the long as hell update.
I've been really busy doing all kinds of 'fuuuun' things, and some actually fun stuff, so not much time to work on this, plus Windows has it out for me, since damn Windows updates caused me to not once, but TWICE, rewrite the chapter since I keep forgetting to save my progress. And so this has given me some serious writer's block since I keep getting really into it, but then it is all lost because BS. And don't get me started about going on the fritz, when I DO try to save it cuts out my work half the time, need to rewrite those parts.
I'm not gonna quit, just need to get back into it more...and have Windows stop screwing me over...
I have been writing a little fanfic on the side which I really feel like doing on the side, dunno if I will put a lot of time into it though. Just a casually thing I felt like doing.
Any advice or helpful criticism is always appreciated, AD