The Beowolf could smell blood and it made it salivate. Carefully, it stalked through the thicket of the Emerald Forrest, it's eyes never letting go of its target. She was human, female and completely unaware of the fate that was coming to her. The Grimm had seen it hurt several of its kin and it used it as a distraction to blend in with the foliage and attack her from her rear. Diseased drool dripped from his jowls as it inched closer. It could smell her life essence and the thought of ripping her artery out and guzzling down the sweet nectar within made it even more crazed with hunger. Closer and closer it stalked, ready to rip her and her red cloak to shreds. It lunged forward, teeth bared, claws outstretched and the human girl still never turned around. It would feast on her blo-
Out of nowhere came the heavy head of Magnhild, as Nora sprang from her hiding location and swung with all of her might. Her aim was true as the hammer connected with a solid shot straight to the solar plexus of the Grimm, sending it far and high into the air. Ruby whipped around and drew a bead on the creature.
"You get one shot, remember that!" Nora reminded her. "And if you miss, it's my kill to make." Ruby scoffed in such a way that it would make her wife proud.
"Miss? Ha, you're funny," she said smugly. Ruby lead the flying Grimm with her scope before firing a single fire dust shot where the Grimm should be and the two collided with perfect accuracy. The beast roared and slashed at the air in a futile attempt to save it's life as it's ascent arc began to wear down into a flaming plummet, crashing unceremoniously somewhere in the rocky hills. "A falling star! Make a wish!" Ruby giggled. Nora applauded, hoisting Magnhild back into it's transformed grenade launcher form on the holster on her back.
"Okay, okay," she said smiling "you totally made the shot. Looks like I owe you a box of cookies now."
"Double chocolate chip too," Ruby added, collapsing Crescent Rose. "You try passing off raisin oatmeal again and I'll break your legs." The two Huntresses shared a laugh as they made their back to the nearby town in Vale that had hired them to clear out some Beowolves that had been spotted. Nora was one of the few members of Ruby's inner circle who was still a full-time Huntress, so she was always willing to help out a friend. Weiss had sarcastically nicknamed them Team Sugar Rush, but both girls decided the name wasn't actually that bad and stuck with it. "Hey, you know, I was thinking about something the other day. We never really had super girly childhoods, did we?"
"Not exactly the best, though for different circumstances…" Nora admitted. "but I get what you're saying."
"So I was thinking…why don't you come back to the Manor with me and we can have a girl's night sleepover?! I never had one as a kid, mostly because I never really had any friends outside of Yang, but now we can have one!." Ruby chirped excitedly. Nora was giddy, but a thought entered her mind and she sobered up.
"Uh, won't Weiss have a problem with that?" she asked hesitantly, puzzling Ruby.
"Why wouldn't she? We're all friends!"
"No, no, I know that…" Nora said, "but Weiss isn't exactly…ya know…the sleepover type." she added diplomatically. Ruby snorted in derision and waved away Nora's concerns with a hand wave.
"Nah, she'll be fine! I've known Snowflake for so long, she definitely won't have a problem."
LATER THAT DAY
"A sleepover?" Weiss asked in disbelief. "Are we 15 now?"
"Told ya." Nora smirked under her breath so only Ruby could hear, but the Silver Eyed Sniper was not to be denied.
"Weiss, it's just for one night! We'll have a lot of fun! We can order pizza, watch terrible movies-"
"-do each other's hair," Nora added, interjecting into the conversation "talk about cute boys we like…well, uh, cute girls in you and Ruby's case." Weiss sighed and finished packing her briefcase, putting in a bottle of spring water and some unsalted peanuts to munch on.
"I'm not going to deny you your fun, Ruby, you know this. I was just a little surprised, that's all," she admitted, clasping the Mistralian leather parcel closed. "Unfortunately, I won't be able to attend as I have important business in Vacuo to attend to. I trust you two can manage to stay out of trouble while I'm gone?" Ruby gave a military salute, causing her and Nora to break down into hysterical giggles. Weiss rolled her eyes and sighed. "Gods help me, what have I gotten myself into?"
Ruby stood in the front doorway of Schnee Manor, waving with eagerness as Weiss' sports car drove down the twisty turning driveway and out in the street. When the car was nothing more than a dot on the horizon, Ruby turned to Nora with a huge grin on her face.
"Okay, now the fun can begin!"
LATER THE NEXT DAY….
Nora and Ruby sat on the now ruined main coach in the living room area of Schnee Manor like two school children being lectured by the principle. The entire room looked like a war had broken out - Crescent Rose was fully extended and deeply embedded into the couch, Magnhild was lodged firmly in one of the walls, the couch itself was soaking went and burned while pools of water had accumulated on the carpeted floor. Not to mention the walls were black with soot and smoke, with various sniper bullet holes pockmarking the infrastructure. Weiss paced back and forth in front of them, her designer boots sloshing on the soggy carpet. She was taking deep breaths to try and defuse the nerves that wanted to explode.
"I can explain!" Ruby pleaded, but was silenced by a single index finger that was outstretched by Weiss.
"I'm not going to yell, but I am going to firmly, but politely, ask you some questions and I want answers. All of them. Let's start with the most obvious…why the bullet holes? Ruby?"
Ruby shifted a bit, feeling the damp fabric of the singed couch soaking through her blue jeans.
"Okay…well, you know that big box of comic books I have that I found back at the basement in Patch? Okay, so, Nora and I were looking through them and we were laughing at the ads cause they were so old, I mean they had stuff like rubber puke, X-Ray specs, itching powder, shocking bubble gum-"
"Please stay on track," Weiss said firmly. Ruby meeped a bit, self-aware that she was rambling again.
"Right, sorry, Snowflake. One of the ads was for an ant farm and Nora and I never had an ant farm before and we thought it would be really cool. But the company in the comic book no longer exists so we hopped on my moped and drove down to the Pet Store and we bought an ant farm starter kit." Ruby said quietly, fiddling with her fingers.
"That still doesn't answer my question."
"I know, I'm getting there! So we set up the ant farm and then we ordered some pizza and soda and we decided to have a dance party-"
"Ruby is a really good dancer, Weiss! …not sure why I decided to add that," Nora said bashfully, under a withering glare from the Ice Queen.
"…anyway, we were dancing and having fun and we got a bit too carried away and I bumped my butt into the ant farm while doing a little dance and the ants spilled everywhere."
"So you shot them?!" Weiss said exasperated. Ruby flinched and began to panic, but Nora jumped in to save the conversation.
"Well, Ruby worked really hard to try and gather them all up," she added, "but I looked at the box and it said we had bought carpenter ants by mistake and they eat wood and we were worried they'd eat your house down."
"So you shot them?" Weiss repeated, starting to get a headache.
"I thought I had ice rounds loaded!" Ruby whined. "But instead I had fire rounds and I didn't realize it till I fired a few shots and the walls caught on fire. When the fire began to spread, we panicked and hooked the garden hose up to the sink in the kitchen." Weiss rubbed the bridge of her nose and sat on the ruined remains of her favorite coffee table.
"Now I know how the bullets and fire happened, but why the weapon damage?" she finally said after a tense pause. Ruby and Nora shot each other nervous glances before Ruby finally spoke.
"We wanted to smash the queen. We figured if we could kill the queen ant, the worker ants would panic and leave. Just…I don't know, go to a new ant city or something." she admitted.
"But we didn't know what the queen actually looked like," Nora interjected. "But to be safe, we started smashing the ones we thought looked different. One of them had to be the queen, right?"
Weiss said nothing but stared both young women down with a glare cold enough to cause flurries in Vacuo.
"So…are you mad at me?" Ruby whimpered pathetically. Even as mad as she was, seeing those puppy dog silver eyes made Weiss weak. But still, a lesson had to be learned.
"Here is what is going to happen - Nora, for the next several weeks, you and Ruby are going to fix this living room. You will replace the carpet, haul the furniture, repaint the walls, everything. By yourselves. I, of course, will be there to supervise. And during this time, Ruby, there will be no lewd behavior until this is complete." Ruby visibly sank and deflated.
"Aw, no naked smooches? Don't be so stingy!" she complained, but Weiss held firm.
"No. No lewd behavior until this is fixed. Now, go to the garage and grab a mop. Your work starts now."