The day when Ruby is meant to meet up with Oscar again, the party goes out.
They finish up before nightfall mostly due to her own precision and haste.
Raven watches her carefully the whole time, but Ruby pays no mind to that.
She still manages to get back to Glass Lake in time that night, still smelling of smoke and a little lower on aura levels than she might like, but she makes it.
Oscar is already there this time, waiting for her in the same tree she'd waited for him the previous time. She waves up at him and he hops right down.
"Ready to show off how well you know how to use that bow of yours?" Ruby asks, and it's hard, she finds, to muster up a pleasant tone after a day with the party, even if she does like seeing him.
"Why do I feel like I'm not going to be the one showing off?" Oscar asks in return.
She shrugs, "I don't know, maybe you only feel like that because you don't have anything to show off," It's fun, to tease, to have someone to have a friendly competition with. She knows there's no real stakes, and it's a strange idea for there to be no consequences to losing now. "Okay, only rule is to use just arrows or bullets, nothing other than projectiles. Deal?"
"Deal– hey!" He's interrupted by her taking off with a boost from her semblance. He just sets off in a similar direction. They both are on the hunt for Grimm now. They both stay close to each other, relatively speaking.
When fighting is such a big part of life, much of relearning who a person is can be through knowing how they fight.
Ruby has never seen Oscar use any ranged weapon before. He's good at it. A bow seems to suit him well, he hits his targets and hits them to kill. He's faster than he used to be, and more readily uses his aura to aid him.
It's more difficult for Oscar to put to words how Ruby's fighting has changed.
She's as nimble and captivating as ever, and she's always looked serene, almost happy, while fighting Grimm. Her movements are more calculated now, but other than that the only way he could describe it was in a feeling, it was if the air around her ran cold while she was in the zone. She looks like a predator that fixed it's eyes on its prey in the moment before it pounces.
This whole area was cleared of Grimm by the time they are both breathless and tired.
They meander back over to the tree by the lake and sit.
"I didn't actually count," Ruby confesses, she's long ago stopped counting anything, all it does is let the anxiety creep back into her veins, but she doesn't explain that part.
"I think that means I win by default," Oscar laughs, still gasping for air.
"Does not!" She actually looks a touch indignant, which is the most openly expressive he's seen her so far. "How many did you take down, then?"
Oscar opens his mouth, then closes it again, and looks away. "I lost count too," He admits, which earns him a shove and a huff from Ruby.
"So we both win, or- both lose. Whatever. You're not half bad with that thing though," Ruby mumbles, looking away, off into the distance. "It's good you have a weapon of your own."
It's good you've kept your soul.
That part goes unspoken.
"Yeah, I guess I really needed one. The cane- I kept reaching for it, when I was upset or scared, but I realized it wasn't really me who knew how to use it, I was falling back on his skills and- well I know there's other lives that have used bows before, but I still got to learn how to use it on my own." Oscar looks more content talking about this than she's ever seen him. There was always something strained, some shadow of fear and uncertainty when talking about Oz before, but now he seems comfortable with it. He's made peace, in a way.
"Plus dust is fun to use, right?" Ruby asks, to keep it light, to keep her own thoughts from drifting too far.
"Really fun to use. Weiss showed me how to combine it for different effects." Again he was watching her reaction out of the corner of his eye to the mention of a familiar name.
She doesn't react at all.
There is not a hint of emotion reflected on her face, no normal spark of recognition at the name. He might have worried she genuinely doesn't remember her old teammates if it weren't for her next words.
"Mhm, you can really blow yourself up with that stuff if you don't know what you're doing."
"Yeah, I've heard," His shoulders relax. She remembers, of course she does, it was a silly fear to have at all.
The night is coming to its end once again.
She doesn't want to move, and yet she wants to run.
It's a strange conflicting feeling that is pulling at something inside of her.
She longs for numbness, and hates him a little, for the way his presence disallows that.
She still doesn't want to move.
"Well… you're good with a bow, but I can take you down in hand-to-hand no problem now," She says.
It's an invitation,
A challenge,
A confused plea,
I want to see you again.
"Oh yeah? I want to see that. Tomorrow then?" It's the first time he gives the actual invitation, sets the time.
Ruby nods. She can move now. She can pull herself up from where she sat and disappear into the darkness of the night.
Oscar keeps his eyes fixed forward,
not watching the direction she goes,
not trusting himself enough to keep himself from following otherwise.
