Author's Note: Yay! Semester is finally over, also merry Christmas to whoever celebrates, happy holidays to the rest, and happy new year.
Disclaimer: I don't own RWBY.
Early Riser
Ruby was feeling lucid after having just woken up. The night previously consisted of what felt like a rather underwhelming commencement speech from Professor Ozpin. It was followed by basically a giant slumber party. Memories soon flooded Ruby as she groaned into her pillow. It should have been a normal night, write a letter to her friends back in Signal, then go to sleep ...then Yang had to go and drag her over to the cat faunus from earlier. It got a little loud and was then cut abruptly by an angry voice telling them to be quiet in a rather colorful way. To her horror, when she looked over in the direction of the voice, and saw Grant with a rather menacing death stare. Weiss from earlier sat across from him trying everything in her power to keep him from storming over.
"Come on, we gotta hurry," whispered a voice.
The voice completely broke Ruby out of her chain of thought. She took a quick peek at her scroll saw the time which read 4:30 AM. She sat up, looked over, and saw a pair of dark shadows silently tiptoeing around the other students.
"Well maybe we shouldn't have chosen a spot in the dead center of the room!" another voice hissed back.
She almost instantly recognized the voice as Evan, she quickly paired it to a familiar silhouette in front of her.
"Evan?" she quietly calls out. "Is that you?"
"Ruby?" he calls back in a surprised voice
He then turns on his flashlight which shined with a low-light red lense and it slowly moved onto her.
"Oh did we wake you?" he asks apologetically, "Sorry."
"No, its fine," Ruby whispers back now fully awake, "I was already up for some time ...w-what are you doing?"
She squints and spots him in what looked like track-shorts.
"Me and the guy are going on a run. Well, seeing as how you're already awake…." he then awkwardly shifts to his right before asking "Do you wanna come along?"
"I-ah, um…." Ruby blinks, "It's...but it's four."
"Soon to be five," Evan corrected before adding, "Trust me on this, it's always good to start the morning off with a run, makes your day feel completely different."
Rubby thought it over all while Yang's voice ran through her mind, she also imagined a chibi Yang talking to her personal reasons.
"You need to go and meet new friends Rubes, break outa your shell, you know, be the bees-knees."
"Alright sounds fun," Ruby quickly accepted be further thought.
"You have work-out clothes right?" he asks quickly.
"Y-yeah." she nodded.
She always kept a set of running shorts and a tank top should she ever get the chance to go to the gym, you never know when you'll get that opportunity thrusted upon you and the huntsman and huntress career is a rather demanding one to say the least.
"Alright, meet us downstairs at ten before five, right outside the entrance," Malarkey instructed, "Last thing you wanna do is keep the CPT waiting."
Ruby recalled his scowl from last night and felt a shiver go up her spine. Without another thought, she reaches into her pack and then rushes off to the bathroom. In an instant she stuffed her things into her locker and jumped into her clothes all with a toothbrush in her mouth. Then, in a fury of rose petals, she zoomed off to the designated meet-up spot. As she left the entrance, she was greeted by the chilly morning air which clung to her skin like a thin blanket. When she got to the spot, she saw a group of people scattered about. By the fountain sat a chartering pair of gingers, one of them was talking about sloths for some reason, and by the grass she spotted Weiss who was stretching her calves. She felt completely lost and after a few seconds of mental gambling, she picked a direction and-
"Hey you're early!" a voice calls out excitedly making her jump and yelp.
It was Evan in his Atlas standard PT uniform.
"Oh sorry," Evan apologized bashfully, "Didn't mean to scare you."
"It's fine," she whimpered out as she tried...and failed to calm her pounding heart.
"You alright?" Evan asks, concerned, "I can hear your heart pounding all the way in Mantle."
"S-sorry," Ruby replies blushing from embarrassment, "I'm just nervous is all."
"Relax," Evan chuckles, "It's only a run."
"I just don't want to upset Grant anymore than I already have," she murmured, twiddling her fingers, "Especially with last night and the whole dust incident."
"Is that it?" Evan laughs, he pats her on the shoulder reassuringly. "Trust me it's fine, the CPT may seem rough and stern, but don't let that fool you. He's a nice guy one you make it past the initial stages." He looks up and mutters "Speaking of which…." He snaps to attention and salutes "GROUP, atten-TION!" Everyone in uniform, even Weiss to the surprise of Ruby snaps to attention. He then salutes and announces "Good Morning sir!"
Ruby freezes in fear and trembles as the Grant walks to them. To his side was boy who she hadn't met yet, she took note of his amber eyes and scales on the sides of his neck which he did nothing to hide, in fact he wore them proudly.
"Good Morning to you as well," he greets and returns the salute. He then stops at the two and nods at Evan, "Malarkey, Miss Rose," he greets, "How are you doing?"
"Fine sir," he then lightly elbows Ruby who was still frozen.
"I'm fine thank you for asking!" Ruby replies almost robotically.
Grant quirked his eyebrow slightly ad shares a glance wit the other boy be nodding and asking Evan "Hey can you gather all the non-Atlas people here, I want a quick chat with them."
"Sure thing," he replies. He turns and shouts "Hey Nora, Ren! Get over here, the CPT wants to talk to you!"
"All yours sir," he then gives one final pat to Ruby and whispers, "Relax you'll be fine."
Though Ruby was happy at his reassurance, it didn't do much to calm her nerves from Grant's cold, calculating stare. She watches as the ginger-sloth-girl as she excitedly pulls the boy with the pink stripe over.
"Alright," Grant began, "I'm happy that you three decided to join us and since you were invited by people from my group, I'll let a few things slide. There are some rules I would like you to follow though. First things first," he turns to the boy with the scales, "This is SSG Streicher, he'll be leading us in morning PT or Physical Training."
"Hello," he greets politely.
Grant continues "When we are on the field, he is in charge, do everything he tells you. Next, no screwing around, you wanna goof off fine, do that on your own time, not here. Finally, this is more advice for you, don't cheat on yourself. Though the PT that we do is only designed to sustain the muscles you already have, it still won't do you any good to cheat on yourself. We're about to go on a 5K run, so there's not a lot you can do to cheat, keep that in mind should you choose to join us for future sessions. Cheating includes using your aura or semblance to make it easier on yourself. I just want you to remember those rules, if you screw around, goof off and interrupt training, I will kick you out, no questions asked. Unlike my soldiers, you're civilians meaning I can't punish you and I have to retain discipline amongst my ranks somehow. If you're confused on what to do, just follow the people around you, if you need help, just feel free to ask, we good?"
They all nodded.
"Alright, now other than that," Grant smiles with the cold glare quickly melting away, "Just enjoy yourself and have a good time."
They each have their own acknowledgments.
"Go ahead and line up with the others, we're just gonna do a little warm-up first. See you in formation," he and the other boy walk off to join the others.
The ginger-sloth-girl cracks a wide smile and turns to Ruby.
"Hi I'm Nora and this…." she yanked over the poor boy next to her ...who did;not even flinch at her actions, "...is my best friend Ren! We're together, but not together-together. We've been best friends for the longest time and we're very excited to meet and attend Beacon with you!" She pauses for a deep breath and asks "What's your name?"
"Ruby," she blinks.
Still slightly dazed by the girls extroverted nature, she was caught off guard when Nora grabs her hand and pulled her and Ren along to the gathering, chattering the whole way.
"Oh I can see it now!" the eagerness oozed off of her like radiation, "We're gonna be the best of friends. We can go shopping, paint our nails and talk about cute boys! I gotta introduce you to Penny!"
"It's nice today," Pyrrha murmured to herself as she exited the gym.
She liked working out in the morning, not a lot of people like to be up in the morning so that left a rather empty gym, which results in a much lower likelihood of running into someone who knew of her. There was at least one person she was hoping to see here at Beacon, but sadly with all of the chaos of last night, it didn't look like she would get the chance to talk to her friend before initiation. She is then brought out of her thoughts as the sun crept over the horizon and illuminated the school yard. She soon found herself distracted by a distant sound of clapping and chanting. As I continued on, the chanting and clapping grew louder meaning it was coming closer.
"Hard work!"
"Hard work!"
"Hard work!"
"Hard work! Hard work,work!"
"Everybody's doin'it right (Hard work, work)
Hard Work, that's what they say (Hard work, work)
Hard Work, to earn my pay (Hard work, work)
Hard Work, do it every day (Hard work, work)
I get up bout' a quarter to three (Hard work, work)
Gotta go and earn my pay (Hard work, work)
Put my boots on and lace em' up (Hard work, work)
I got another days work (Hard work, work)"
Pyrrha watched in fascination as a formation of two by five crested over the hill with their cadence caller running alongside the formation. The first five were wearing standard Atlas military PT uniform with the gray cotton t-shirts and running shorts with a yellow logo that read "Expeditionary Force" on them. After the five was to her surprise, Weiss Schnee who was also wearing her own set. The six of them were running as if it was just an everyday occurrence to them, though Weiss did look a little more weathered compared to the others with her deeper pants. Then came the final four, first was a bubbly ginger girl who seems more interested in the things around the formation rather than the run itself, in fact Pyrrah could have sworn she wasn't even breathing, she was also wearing a set of Atlas PTs. The last three were in their own gear, in front was , dark-red and black haired girl who was managing to hold it together despite her weathered breathing and the heavy amount of sweat polling around her forehead.
Behind her was a boy with a pink stripe in his hair, he basically looked like he was stuck between deciding to cry or to die, this was of course no help from the girl behind him who was another ginger this one being even more hyper than the first somehow. She was behind the poor boy shouting encouraging things to him as they ran. All in all a rather peculiar assortment of people. As the group came to a stop, they got back into a formation and did some quick stretching and in the dead center of the group, she spotted the person she was looking for.
"So how was it?" Evan asks Ruby suddenly while they were stretching their hamstrings. "Wasn't so bad was it?"
"Well ...it was different," Ruby chuckles softly.
"I mean you looked fine," Evan adds, "You seemed to hold it together really well."
"It's just a simple run," Ruby repeats, "Though, I'm really more of a sprinter."
Evan laughs "Yeah I figured with your semblance but, I think these endurance runs like this would do you good in the long run ...if you keep doing them."
Evan offers her a hand, she glances at it for a moment before taking it and letting Evan pull her up.
"I should probably have drank more water," Ruby muses, "But I really didn't expect to run a 5K the following morning."
"Still better than my first time," Evan reasoned.
"And I really could have done it without sprinting up every hill we could find," Ruby complained.
"Yeah," Evan snorts, "You're lucky Streicher didn't make us do suicide runs for a kilometer. Come on, if we hurry back we can beat the line to chow."
Ruby smiles and says "Race you back!" and disappears in a cloud of rose petals.
"Hey that's cheating!" Evan protests before taking off after her.
"Alex!" Pyrrha greets cheerfully.
"Pryvit Pyrrha," Alex waves walking up to her.
"Pryvit, dobroye utro," she replies.
Alex quirks his eyebrows up before chuckling, "Ah, you're working on you Slavic."
"It's all I know I'm afraid," Pyrrha bows her head bashfully.
Alex waves it off saying "Don't worry, it shows you are trying and in most places that can get you pretty far. How have you been?"
"I have been well," she replies as they start off to the locker room. "Just got done in the gym."
"Hm," Alex nods and comments "I see you're an early riser as well."
"Well, it's really the only time I can get to work out without getting recognized," Pyrrah reasoned, "I would go at night but most gyms are open that late."
"You go alone or by yourself?" he asks.
"Myself," Pyrrha, "I really wouldn't mind working out with a partner but I'm afraid I can never find a person who can look past ...well, you know."
"I guess I am lucky for wearing a helmet," Alex chuckles, "My face isn't common knowledge."
"Oh, you have no idea," Pyrrha mutters, "Your fans would riot if you ever lost the helmet."
"It's not a look many can pull off," Alex admits, "But it is undeniably me, why should I hide it?"
"I couple never be you," Pyrrah laughs she then pauses and lets out a sigh.
"You're kidding right? I think you're lucky to have just normal membership in the famous people's club," he scoffs, "Everytime I put down my turret is like a religious experience for my fans, in fact I am pretty sure I am supposed to call them my followers seeing how they treat me as this "great prophet.""
"Doesn't that bother you though?" Pyrhra counters, "Isn't wrong that, that is probably all they see of us?"
Alex stops to think for a moment, he looks to her and says "For me, I really only care for the actual fight, I really don't have time to worry about what the public perception is of me. So I simply stopped trying long ago."
"What do you mean?" Pyrrah asks confused.
"The more you try to pander to the audience, make them like you, the less of a person you will seem to them," Alex explains, "Some people will be there to dislike you no matter what you say or do. At the end of the day, you are you, and as long as you're honest with yourself, they can never take that away from you. Trust me, you and I have much bigger things to worry about than what the tabloids print about us. I am not saying you shouldn't think about what your responses are, just don't be afraid to speak your mind."
"Why is it that every time we talk, you manage to confound me with how much wisdom you can dump on me?" Pyrrha laughs.
"Hey," he shrugs, "If you have spent as much time as me in the places I have been, you tend to learn things. Oh and by the way, we should probably expect some article to pop up about whether or not we are dating."
"Of course there would be," Pyrrah groans.
"I have seen worse," Alex shrugs.
The two came to a stop right outside the showers.
"I should go," Alex sighs, "We'll talk more on this later yes?"
"I'll hold you to it," Pyrrah replies. "We have some catching up to you."
Alex nods at her, tells her goodbye and then walks into the male showers.
"I know! We'll have some sort of signal! Like a distress signal!" Nora let's out an excited gasp, "A secret signal so we can find each other in the forest! Can you imitate a sloth?" she asks curiously.
She then goes on to perform her best idea of a sloth impersonation.
"Nora?" Ren finally responds.
"Yes, Ren?" she childishly chirps.
"I don't think sloths make a lot of noise," he replied curtly.
Nora thinks this over for a moments, she then smiles and squeals "That's why it's perfect! No one will suspect we're working together!" Then all of a sudden, she turns and asks their third member. "Ruby what do you think?"
"Huh?" she blinked owlishly.
Truth be told she wasn't exactly invested in the conversation, she was more worried about the up-in-coming team formation.
"What do you think of our secret call?" Nora asks, "I mean you didn't think we weren't going to offer you a chance of ending up on our team did you?"
"Oh, um," Ruby thought about it for a moment, "I think a secret code is a good idea, it'll help when looking for your friends."
With a smug look that just exploded with 'I told you so,' Nora turns to Ren and says "See?"
Ruby then spots Yang waving at her from her locker.
"Hey, my sister is over there, I better go," Ruby said.
"Oh, alright, bye Ruby!" Nora waves.
"Farewell," Ren smiles.
Yang watched in fascination as the two continue to chatter away as Ruby ran over to her.
"What's up with them?" Yang asks.
"Oh, they're just coming up with ideas on how to find each other in the initiation," Ruby replies while pull Crescent Rose out of her locker.
"So where were you this morning?" Yang quirks an eyebrow at her sister, "Your sleeping bag was all packed up and you were nowhere in sight."
She replies, "I couldn't sleep so I went on a run."
"On your own or with a group?" Yang asks.
"With a group," Rub replies, slightly weirded out by Yang's questions.
"Who?" Yang asked, growing more curious.
"Just some friends," Ruby quickly glances at Yang, back at her locker, and then back to Yang again before asking rather flippantly "Why do you care?"
Yang's eyes started to tear up with pride.
"Oh my Oum you're making friends already!" Yang squeals and pulls Ruby into her arm and gives her a noogie, "See, I told you, you were the bees knees."
"Yang stop!" Ruby protested as she wrestled away from her sister, "I'm not the bees knees."
"I want details!" Yang demanded. "Who did you go with?"
Ruby rolls her eyes, "Yang come on, it just a run."
"Hey!" Yang scolds, "I may be proud you're finally breaking out of your shell, but it doesn't mean I'm not gonna see if these friends are the right ones for you." She places her hands on her hips, "Now who did you go with?"
"Well," Ruby sighed, "Are you sure we can't do this later?" Ruby pleaded.
"I'll only get worse as time goes on," Yang warned.
"Fine," Ruby pouted, "It were those two earlier you saw me with, Evan, Weiss, and a few of their friends."
"Oh, Evan huh?" Yang smirks playfully, "You must really want to be around him if you got up that early for a run."
"Yang!" Ruby cried, "It's too early for this!"
"Clearly not early enough since you went running well before I woke up," Yang retorts.
Ruby deadpans and counters with "That really isn't saying much considering how much you like to sleep in."
Yang looked offended and argues back "You will never understand Ruby, mama needs her beauty sleep. You think I was born like this?" she strokes her hair.
Ruby replied flatly "Yes."
Yang lets out a huff before moving on and asking "So how are ya feeling right now Ruby, ready for initiation?"
Ruby smiles confidently "Yep! No more awkward small talk or "getting-to-know-you" stuff. Today, I get to let my sweetheart do the talking."
Ruby thumps her chest with her fist to emphasize her confidence.
Yang rolls her eyes before commenting "Well, remember Ruby, you're not the only one going through initiation. If you wanna grow up, you're gonna have to meet new people and learn to work together."
Ruby lets out a frustrated groan saying "You sound like Dad!" Ruby shuts her locker before saying "Okay, first of all: What goes meeting new people have to do with fighting? And secondly: I don't need people to help me grow up! I drink milk!"
"But what about when we form teams?" Yang counters.
Ruby nervously rubbed her neck asking "Um, I don't know, I... I'll just be on your team or something..."
Yang lets out a tired sigh as she brings her hair around her shoulder and starts stroking it, "Maybe you should try being on someone else's team. I mean you already made friends, I'm sure they'd be willing to let you be a part of theirs."
Ruby narrowed her eyes, she felt slightly upset about Yang's comment.
"So you're saying you don't want me to be on your team?" asks Ruby growing irritated.
"No, I did not say that," Yang stated firmly, "But I'm not always going to be there for you Ruby. You really gotta learn to be more self-sufficient, you know, break out of your shell."
Ruby takes a deep breath, she lets out a huff and slings her weapon over her shoulder.
She then turns to Yang and says "Just so you know, I am self-sufficient and I am fully capable of breaking out of my shell should there be a reason I have to." She then takes a step closer and her voice grows softer, "But Yang we are family, and family…."
"And family sticks together," Yang finished, a smile creeps on her face as she rolls her eyes and says, "You really gonna play that card huh?"
Ruby beams confidently and says "You know it."
The pair stopped as they come across a group of six teens, they were all gathered around a table that had their gear scattered about it as they methodically price their loadouts together.
"Woah," Yang whistled.
Ruby was practically drooling at the sight of their weapons, she admired the amount of care the teens showed as they all ran through their basic function checks. Each boy took note of the amount of ammo they could carry as well as compared with the weight of the other equipment they would need. She stopped when she spotted Evan who was currently linking rounds into an ammo belt. Ruby takes a look at Yang, takes her hand and drags her over to the table.
"Hey Evan!" Ruby calls out.
Evan looks up surprised, he quickly spots Ruby dragging behind a tall blond girl with long, flowing blond hair and rather prominent assets.
"Hey Ruby," Evan replies, "We're just getting our stuff ready."
"I can see that," Ruby nods, she then nudges Yang forward and says "This is my older sister Yang."
"Sister huh?" Evan murmurs giving her a quick glance, "Father's side or the mother's?"
"Father," Yang smiles.
Evan smiles back and offers his hand, "Evan."
Yang smiles back and takes the hand.
"So you're Ruby's first friend here at Beacon?" Yang observes.
"I am?" Evan asks, slightly surprised by the comment.
"Uh huh," Yang nods before looking up and down Evan as if judging him for something. She randomly says "Okay I approve."
Evan, slightly confused by the comment awkwardly says "Um, thanks?"
He then turns away just missing Yang grow a rather cheeky grin as she winks at her sister. Ruby on the other hand knew exactly what her sister had meant.
"Yang, no!" she silently hisses.
Yang shrugs innocently only further enraging Ruby. The three are soon drawn to a rather girly, high-pitched yelp followed by a resounding "thwp." They looked over and saw poor Jaune dangling from a spear stuck to a locker. Any questions they had were soon answered when they saw a satisfied looking Weiss stroll past followed by….
"Is that Pyrrha Nickos?" Yang asks curiously.
"Oh yeah, forgot she was going here too," Evan commented.
Ruby looks at Evan incredulously and says "Evan, you saw her this morning."
Evan thought back for a moment before he laughs upon realization, "Oh yeah, she was talking to Alex."
"Wait, wait, wait," Yang cuts him off, "Alex, as in Alexander Seneviev? Lord Tachanka and the Invincible Girl were together in a place and were just talking? How do you forget that? They're like titans!"
"Well, I'm sure it had nothing to do with a certain someone who left me behind, disoriented in a cloud of rose petals," he then shoots a glare at Ruby from the corner of his eye while she whistled innocently and glanced that other way.
"Should we help him?" Yang asks still looking at Jaune as he struggled to reach for the spear.
Right then Pyrrha walks by, shoots Jaune an apology before summoning the spear out making Jaune drop straight to the ground.
"It was nice meeting you!" Pyrah says cheerfully as she fled.
"Likewise…." Jaune groaned as he slumped against the locker.
"Oh nevermind, he's got it," Yang adds.
Evan sighs, walks over and offers him a hand and pulls him up.
"I think it's safe to say that whatever you told her didn't quite stick the landing," Evan comments with a blank face, "What did you even ask them?"
"I asked her to be on my team," Jaune replies.
"Well that doesn't sound too bad-" Ruby sits before Evan cuts her off.
"Wait for it."
"I don't understand. My dad said all women look for is confidence! Where did I go wrong?" Jaune asks.
"What did you say to her?" Evan asks, meaning Weiss.
"I may have called her "Snow Angel,"" Jaune answers sheepishly.
"There it is," Evan mutters.
Yang lets out a snort, "Well she definitely left you hanging now didn't she?" she turns to the others and for affirmation "Right? Guys?"
Ruby facepalsm and says "Yang, no ...just no."
"What do you mean no?" Yang cries, "You let him get away with it? His was worse than mine!"
"What are you talking about?" Evan asks blanky.
Yang stood, shocked at his response, especially when Ruby deadpans and says "Yang, not everyone is obsessed with puns like you."
Yang in disbelief, looked back at Evan who now had a mischievous twinkle in his eyes.
"Oh you-" she growls.
"Come on, let's go," Ruby quickly cuts in and starts pushing the group out the door. "We're gonna be late for Initiation!"
Author's Note: Alright this seems like a good spot to end, some more character building until they go through initiation. It would be a good time to see how I'm gonna form my teams, I have an overall idea but I'm still working on the final cut. Whether or not Pyrrah should survive her encounter with Cinder is up for debate, but here's the situation, if Pyrrha doesn't die, who died in her place? I have basically three options on this, first, I kill one of my main characters, it is ballsy, but it could easily backfire as any bit of character building I had would instantly be thrown out the window and wasted. Second, I could create more OCs and kill them off, and really the issues with that option should be obvious. Lastly, I could just not kill anyone in the main cast, considering I'm planning on expanding this story into a war drama as it progresses, it might be a good idea but I don't know. I'll keep working on it for now, but I am really a twisting and turning on where I am going to take my characters. I also gotta figure out how I am going to set up my teams. Until then, thank you all for reading, and remember, Big Brother is watching.