Team RWBY and most of JNPR sat at their table during breakfast, eating peacefully. It was then that Nora arrived, setting her tray down and slamming her hands down on the table, determination clear on her face. This startled her friends a bit.
"Guys, I have come to a decision," Nora said solemnly, frowning slightly as she stared at them.
"... What?" Weiss narrowed her eyes, wanting to get back to her food.
"I want..." Nora started, trailing off.
"Want what?" Yang asked impatiently.
"... To see a sloth in person!" Nora grinned, sitting down and bouncing in her seat.
Ren sighed. He definitely didn't have the energy for this today.
"Is... that all you want?" Pyrrha asked, eyeing her suspiciously.
"Yep! I want to see one as soon as possible!"
"You're kidding, right?" Weiss smiled a little, despite the snide remark.
"So you're saying you want to go to the zoo?" Jaune asked his energetic teammate, who nodded vigorously. Jaune sighed. "How much Lien do we have?"
Now he knew how Ren felt.
"Eeeeee! I'm so excited!" Nora squealed, hopping up and down as they waited in line to enter the zoo.
"I'd be more excited if there were Grimm here," Yang muttered under her breath, moving up a bit with the line.
"You know Grimm can't be held in captivity for very long, right?" Weiss raised an eyebrow. "Why do you want them here anyway? We're dedicating our lives to fight them off."
"I just wanted to make faces at them," Yang said innocently. "Maybe taunt them a little..."
Weiss certainly wouldn't put it past Yang to do that.
"You are so childish."
"Hello," the employee greeted them at the ticket booth. "Eight people?"
The teens nodded.
"160 Lien," he said, smiling as Jaune paid him the exact amount. He decided to make small talk with them. They looked interesting enough, after all. "So, how old are you guys?"
"I'm fifteen and they're seventeen," Ruby replied, pointing to herself.
"Great." The employee smiled again. "Where do you go to school?"
"We all go to Beacon," Pyrrha answered. "Ruby was let in early, skipping two years."
"Really? What do you wield?"
"A High-Caliber Sniper Scythe." Ruby grinned. "My Uncle Qrow taught me. He's a teacher at Signal."
"That sounds amazing!" The man chuckled, impressed. "Now run along. There's a long line up. Bye!"
"Where are the sloths?" Nora asked no one in particular, whizzing around as her friends casually walked around the zoo.
"Nora," Ren said calmly, getting Nora to stop in front of him and walk backwards.
"Yes, Ren?"
"Stop running around. You'll run into someone," Ren warned her.
"Okay!" Nora grinned before skipping ahead.
The others looked at each other before Yang spoke up. "Ren, I think we need to clear something up," she called him.
"What is it?"
"Well... Uh..." Yang wasn't sure how to say it.
Pyrrha instantly knew what she was talking about. "I think what she wants to say" -she looked at Yang- "is how you deal with Nora so well."
"Yeah. You being, uh, you and everything," Yang struggled to find the correct words, "you would be, er... annoyed by her."
Ren blinked at her before responding. "We've been friends for a long time," he said with a faint smile. "I got used to her. It's not that bad."
"Oh. Okay." Yang nodded, her nervousness dying like a fire. "I'm getting something from the vending machine. Be right back!" She ran off, Lien in her hand.
Once she reached the snack machine, she saw a bag of chips, punched in the code and paid the Lien. Yang frowned when she realized the chip bag didn't move and stuck her arm in the slot to grab it.
"Oh... Oh no."
"I wonder what's taking her so long," Blake muttered, watching Nora fawn over the sloth exhibit. "Yang's been gone for a while."
"I'm not sure, I'll go check on her," Pyrrha said, worried about her blonde friend, speed walking to where the vending machine was.
"Ooh! I'll name you Billy Bob Joe!" Pyrrha heard Nora gush as she walked past her.
The redhead wandered around in search of the vending machine.
"Yang!" She called. "Yang, where are you?"
"Over here!" Yang's voice shrieked over the volume of the crowds.
Pyrrha got even more worried about her from the shrillness of her call. She sprinted to the source of her voice, pushing past people with 'Sorry!'s and 'Excuse me!'s. When she reached Yang, she couldn't help but giggle.
Yang had her arm stuck in the vending machine.
"Yang, what are you doing?" Pyrrha tried to stifle her giggles.
"I think this hunk of junk is broken." Yang frowned at her friend. "My chips wouldn't come out, so I tried getting it out myself. It's not working."
Pyrrha let her laughter slip from her lips.
"Hey, it's not funny!" Yang pouted.
"Smile!" Pyrrha whipped out her Scroll, ready to take a picture of the unfortunate blonde.
Yang herself couldn't resist a picture of a funny moment. She went with it and made a peace sign with her free hand, sticking her tongue out with a wink. A loud 'clickclick!' was heard as Pyrrha snapped the photo, proud of herself.
"Could you send it to Ruby so they can help me?" Yang asked, getting out of her pose.
"Sure, hold on." Pyrrha grinned, sending the picture to the scythe wielder.
"Wait, you can't free me with your Semblance?" Yang asked wth a frown.
"I would break the machine if I tried that."
"Oh."
"Hello, friends!" A familiar voice called loudly.
Pyrrha looked behind Yang curiously while the blonde turned around as far as she could without twisting her arm.
"Penny?"
There stood Penny, waving vigorously with a wide grin spread across her face.
"Yes, it's me, Penny!" Penny exclaimed. "I missed you a lot, Pyrrha and Yang. How are things?"
"Things aren't so hot right now," Yang grumbled, wiggling the fingers of her trapped hand. "Could you help me?"
"Of course!" Penny nodded, putting her hands on the side of the machine.
She lifted it up and shook it, causing Yang to scream in pain as her arm miraculously slid out of the vending machine. Yang landed on her back, splayed out on the pavement.
"Are you okay now?" Penny asked innocently, placing the vending machine back in its original place.
"Yeah..." Yang's voice cracked.
"It's been a while, Penny." Pyrrha smiled at her as she helped Yang to her feet.
"Why, yes, it has!" Penny exclaimed in surprise, eyes wide. "A very long while."
"Penny?" Ruby's pleasantly surprised voice was heard.
"Ruby?" Penny put her hands on her own cheeks in recognition as she approached her. "All of our friends are here!"
"I know." Ruby nodded. "But why are you at the zoo? I mean, don't you already know about animals?"
"Yes, yes I do." Penny smiled. "I wanted to see my friends, though. I knew you all be here!"
"Wait, how did you kno-" Ruby started, but was cut off by Nora.
"Pennyyyyy!" Nora screamed with joy, rushing over to Penny, hugging her. "I thought I'd never see you again!"
Penny blinked at the display of affection, not used to it in the least. She slowly put her arms around Nora, a warm smile gracing her lips.
"Hello, Nora," she said happily. "Did you see the sloths?"
"Yep! I even named them!" Nora grinned. "Come on, I'll show you!"
Nora ended the hug, taking Penny's wrist and dragging her away. Surprisingly, Penny was not resisting one bit. In fact, she even ran ahead.
"Race you!" Penny exclaimed, getting a head start.
"Hey! Not fair!" Nora roared, clearly not happy with her friend. She sprinted to catch up to her.
Pyrrha smiled at the two. "They seem like best friends and they've only seen each other twice."
"Yeah," Blake said, a hint of wonder in her voice, "they really hit it off."
"We should catch up before they break something," Yang suggested, scratching her head.
"One step ahead of you!" Ruby grinned before disappearing in a trail of rose petals.
"-and he's Billy Bob Joe!"
They caught up to them just as she finished her explanation of the sloths' names.
"Guys, don't run away like that!" Jaune panted, winded from the run. "We could've lost you guys."
"Actually, I know where you are at all times," Penny said matter-of-factly. "I can sense and identify your Aura if I really wanted to. We couldn't lose you guys!"
"Wait," Yang said suspiciously. "You know where we are at ALL times?" She paled a bit, remembering when she got a carnival flyer from the boys' bathroom at Beacon. What if Penny knew about that? Would she tell the authorities and have her arrested or something? She wasn't sure if you could be put in jail for something so small, but she wasn't taking her chances.
'Do I have to pretend to be a guy now? Does she know about me breaking that rule? Did she check in at that time?' Yang thought, not really listening anymore.
"If I wanted to, I could identify your location. That's not often, though."
"So that's how you knew we were here!" Ruby exclaimed in realization.
"That's creepy though." Weiss frowned. "You never spied on us before, right?"
"Of course not. I know the meaning of privacy." Penny blinked.
'That definitely does NOT show that she knows about privacy,' Jaune thought.
"Well, I gotta go!" Penny called over her shoulder as she walked off.
"Hey! You can't just leave a conversation hanging like that!" Nora tried to call her back to no avail.
"She's gone." Pyrrha stated the obvious.
"Why does she always leave at the worst times?!" Nora wailed.
Yang snapped out of her stupor, noticing Penny's absence. She nudged Ruby. "Hey, Rubes, did you see the picture Pyrrha sent you?"
Ruby's lip twitched, holding back laughter as she responded. "Of course I did, but not everyone saw."
"Saw what?" Nora asked, her sorrows completely washed away.
"Just a picture of Yang Pyrrha sent me." Ruby grinned, taking out her Scroll. "Wanna see it?"
"Yeah!"
Ruby showed them all the picture of her sister and the vending machine, the blonde surprisingly not against it.
"Yang." Blake frowned at her partner. "What were you doing?"
"Well," Yang grinned as she puffed out her chest proudly, "I didn't get my chips, so I had to reach in to get them."
"Then why are you looking so happy about it?" Weiss questioned. "In the picture and right now?"
"Not everyone can say they got their arm stuck in a vending machine, you know." Yang laughed.
"Yeah," Nora agreed with a smile. "Not everyone can say they'd squatted while wrapped in toilet paper either!"
"HEY!" Weiss shouted, offended. "That's it!"
Weiss growled and put 2 Lien in a nearby vending machine. She punched in the number and a chip bag came out. She picked it up and chucked it in Nora's face.
"This'll keep you quiet about it," Weiss grumbled, watching he redhead munch on the snack.
Yang blinked when a troubling thought hit her. She'd lost her milkshake before, and now it was her chips. The very same kind she'd wanted was the one Nora was eating. That vending machine stole her money, and it made her angry. For the rest of the time they spent at the zoo, she sent evil looks to every vending machine that crossed her path.
Never trust a vending machine.