Another chapter since the one earlier today was so short.
"Stop! Running! Away!" Ruby shouted through the forest as the she lost sight of the grimm for the umpteenth time. She was getting tired of this little back and forth. It wasn't like she was doing anything wrong! She just wanted to see the grimm. It just walked off every time she tried to approach and when she followed it would move faster. If she started to jog it would speed up a little bit more, so on until Ruby was almost using her semblance.
The beowolf was just completely uninterested. Or scared. Did she annoy it? No, she was being cheerful. She wasn't waving blades around like Pyrrha was.
Waaaaait. He likes weapons.
The reason why she was out in the woods looking for the resident reclusive possibly-murderous monster was because she was interested. It had been four days since anyone had last seen it, and even Zwei seemed to have trouble sniffing it out. Nothing weird had happened, nobody had been hurt, and aside from Jaune's scroll being scratched up a bit (which she had a hunch about) nothing bad had occurred. So obviously the grimm wasn't up to anything. Well, it wasn't right now.
Drawing Crescent Rose she extended the scythe completely before balancing it arc-down on the soft forest floor. She waited for a couple minutes before sighing and starting to tap her foot. "Come on, I don't just let anyone touch my weapon."
Her voice was swallowed by the forest.
Scanning left and right she eventually turned a full circle to see the beowolf standing on its hind legs within some underbrush, watching. It didn't approach, but also didn't move when she looked at it.
Well, that's a bit creepy. She thought to herself before taking a few steps away from the scythe. She motioned to it with her hands then pocketed them and took a few more steps back. Just don't decide you need to practice on me.
The wolf appeared conflicted as it approached. It took a few steps through the bushes quiet as can be before tilting its head questioningly towards Ruby. It raised its muzzle to the air and took a deep breath, probably to see if anyone had come with her. She hadn't really told anyone so she didn't think anyone was around.
The grimm lowered its nose again and approached her with a slow gait, eyes on her until it was within twenty feet. It looked to her then the scythe before motioning with a paw for her to step back.
Pleased with the fact she had actually gotten the beowolf to approach her she did as asked and took two steps back. It was like trying to pet a wild dog or a new cat. They just had to be given there space and the proper encouraging. This was one dog that Ruby didn't think she was going to be playing fetch with though. It was already scary smart, and she was sure that somehow it already knew what being patronized felt like.
Once she was about six feet from the scythe the grimm finally walked all the way to the weapon. It peered at crescent rose again in much the same way it had when she had first seen it a week ago. It looked closely at the handle through the firing mechanism to the blade itself before looking up at Ruby. She just waved, and it was apparently accepting of that response.
It grabbed the handle of the scythe in one paw and swung it from its position vertically to sideways in front of it. Grabbing it with the other hand just below the 'head' of the scythe it brought its eyes close to examine the materials that the weapon was made from. Some of it was cool and heavy while others seemed light and the same temperature as the surrounding air.
From Ruby's perspective it was practicing unsafe weapon handling but if what Pyrrha said was right even if the weapon collapsed to its carrying form the beowolf probably wouldn't be to too hurt. Even now to test the sharpness of the blade it was running a finger along the twin edges… Something which would cut the fingers of a human or faunus.
Grimm really don't use any weapons, do they? She thought to herself. She had fought a lot of grimm in her time and none of them even used rocks. Some would hide but that was the extent of it she supposed. So that might explain why weapons were so interesting to it. It had fought humans before and seen other grimm fall to them, so something which would let humans who unarmed pretty weak, fight grimm, might seem cool. Well, if it's doing that then it might be learning how to teach other grimm how to use weapons. But… Wait, am I teaching it how to fight people?!
She was brought out of her thoughts by the grumblings of the grimm. It was holding the scythe with one hand while pointing to something in the firing mechanism. Ruby wasn't sure what it meant until she saw the empty slot where the magazine was loaded.
"Ah, you don't need those." The huntress-to-be said, waving her hands 'no'. The wolf continued to stare at her blankly, obviously not catching on. Does it not understand 'no' or does it not understand what I mean? Probably not that smart. "No."
To her surprise the beowolf looked back to the weapon without making any more noise.
So… Maybe it does. She paused on that thought before shaking her head. No, even a bird could understand words if you trained it. It's just normally smart for an animal, super-smart for a grimm.
For a few more minutes the grimm continued to draw the ends of its fingers along the weapon and stare at the smallest detail. Ruby wasn't sure what it was looking for in the weapon. Yeah, there was a lot in it. There were different mechanisms to change the shape of it, compensate for the crazy speed it got up to, things like that. But that was all under the surface. It couldn't admire craftsmanship when it barely knew what it was in the first place. She was perplexed.
Eventually it stopped and held the blade in one hand while moving to a nearby tree. Ruby wasn't worried about the grimm harming Crescent Rose since it was so robust so she watched with curiosity as it rested the blade perpendicular to the trunk. Its hand was on the right side of the tree holding the scythe while the blade rested against the left side. Was it trying to do a standing cut through a tree? The blade was sharp enough that if enough force was used it would work, but to do it from not moving and across the fibers of the tree was a bit… Silly?
Before the grimm could try Ruby walked forward a few steps before stopping to check and see what the wolf would do. It paused and dropped the weapon down slightly to rest it on its outside edge before turning to look at her. Its eyes were narrowed in suspicion but after a moment it stepped aside and looked at her expectantly.
Ruby picked up her weapon before taking a half-step to reposition herself for the best angle at striking the target. She waved the grimm over which did as asked after a moment of confusion.
It stood a few feet behind Ruby which gave her the room she needed to comfortably raise the scythe into the air at an angle and… Swiftly bring it down at a perfect angle. The momentum of the blade did the rest as it slipped through the tree. Unlike a single-edged blade which would have let the tree slide apart the twin edges in the curve of the scythe removed a thick slice. The tree immediately tumbled to the side with a crackling of wood and branches.
Pleased, even if it was easy for her, she turned to see an Atlesian knight staring at her. The grimm was nowhere to be seen, thankfully, but soon she heard the sound of Goodwitch playing through the mech's speakers.
"Ms Rose, I do not know what you are doing, so please come to my office so we may speak about how to respect the nature around the school premises?"
Fiddlesticks.
While Ruby was making the solemn trek back to the school buildings the beowolf was returning to its hide out in the trees. It had managed to keep its little workstation out of the sight of humans, the sole exception being whoever had put the devices there three days prior. It had been suspicious of them and hadn't used them for two days, but cracked on the third.
The screen similar to the one it had stolen from the Blonde but significantly larger and a better fit for its hands. Unlike that one, though, this one had a very simply explanation of how to use it with cartoon renderings of human fingers tapping on different symbols for different effects. Some of it the grimm already knew from the experimentation it had done before, but a few options were completely new. Some like being able to quickly activate something without returning to the origin were useful but others like changing the noise it made were a bit less so.
But the truly useful thing, the suspicious thing, was the set of objects that came with it. Two small slotted items could be inserted into the device to show one of two things. The first was a selection of human symbols that when touched would make a noise. After some toying about it became clear that the speech was the repetition of the word, something that was verified by choosing longer and longer strings of letters and the speaking taking longer and longer.
It was interesting, but on its own didn't help. That is where the second item came into play.
The second device when connected to the screen showed a series of scenes with different outcomes depending on the word chosen and did not play sound. Early on it became clear that if you selected two characters, the character in green wouldn't do something shown in a short video. If you selected the three characters it would continue as normal.
The two together created an indispensable resource. Using the choices of the scene it could learn what a series of characters meant after trial and error, then use the speaking device to hear what it sounded like. It was impossible to repeat what the device said since the beowolf had no vocal cords but it could listen, and in that listening remember.
It hadn't had much time to search the city for technology because of that. Two days observing humans, one working its way through the device, and the morning had been interrupted by Red appearing nearby and hollering after it. To be fair the grimm was starting to understand what made up the blade, if only in general terms and the morning was not actually wasted. Just delayed with less important information.
It sat at its rock and opened up the character differentiation program and watched the scene. Looking at the commands available which it knew the grimm would spend the next twenty minutes observing each outcome for differences and similarities. It would take a while, but it had time.
oooooooo
Yang and Blake were standing on the very top of the campus residences. Yang was holding up Jaune's incredibly scratched scroll to see if the perspectives matched up.
"Yep. Whoever took the pictures must have been up here." Yang said as she closed the device and put it in her satchel for safe keeping. "Hard to believe it. It's like a hundred feet up here."
"We could do it, someone else could too." Blake reminded Yang, who shrugged. "But it is weird that they'd go all the way up here to take some pictures. Seems likely that whoever did wasn't in their right mind."
"I think the trying to slice the scroll to death kinda makes that clear."
They both stood in silence for a moment before Yang made a humming noise.
"It wouldn't be so close to the campus." The faunus countered before her partner could say anything.
"Well, if it was its huge claws could easily scratch up a scroll."
"It could, but so could anyone wearing a gauntlet."
"And climb all the way up here…"
Blake took a deep breath before sighing. "It's supposed to be smarter than this. If it is this close to the dorms then it is writing its own death warrant. We might not go out of our way to deal with it but there are second and third years here who would be more than happy to kill a grimm on their doorstep."
"But this is the one place where even Zwei couldn't find it." Yang pointed out. "Up here there's nowhere for a huntress to see it and none of the students would think to check. It's also so high up that it could see everywhere without anyone being able to see it clearly. If it were watching us this is the safest place outside the forest."
Blake hummed, not convinced. "It seems an unnecessary risk."
"What, do you have a weakness for puppies?" Yang joked, poking Blake in the ribs. "Big ones who are centuries old and covered in an exoskeleton like a buuuug?"
"Hah hah." Blake replied. "I'm barely used to Zwei now thank you very much."
"You're still worried."
"We all are."
"True."
A few more moments of silence passed before Yang's scroll started playing a happy tune. She pulled it out and answered.
"Yang?"
"Rubes?"
"Yeah, let Weiss know that if I'm not at lunch it's because I'm planting trees." Her tone was dripping with misery. Not true misery, just the same tone a child uses when they're faced with something they really do not want to do.
"Why are you planting trees?" Yang asked, a brow rising into her bangs in confusion.
"I cut down a tree trying to show the wolf how to use a scythe. One of the patrols found me so now Glynda has me digging holes as punishment." It sounded like she was begging for something but the sibling had no idea what. She did find it incredible that the school was going to make Ruby plant trees as punishment for cutting one down. "So I might not be back until late."
"Alright, I'll let her know."
"Thanks."
"Also sis?"
"Yeah?"
"Next time let us know when you're going to play with the super intelligent monster, alright?"
"Alright…" At least she sounded guilty there…
Blake was close enough to have heard the entire exchange and smiled herself. "Our fearless leader has managed to get in trouble for mundane things despite her own best efforts."
Let's hope she keeps it that way.
Remember the poll on the profile, I'll be deciding over the weekend who to include in the fight.
