RWBY: The Redeemer
Beta-read by Starlight's Poet
Chapter 25: Semester Break (III)
It was another day of Beacon's semester break, and team JNPR was situated on an empty yard within the campus ground with Claude.
"First of all, I want to apologize for the long overdue of training you." Claude began. "I've been busy dealing with matters outside of Beacon, so… again, I'm sorry. Shouldn't have neglected you for long."
"No, no. It's fine. Ruby told us what happened. You've been helping Blake." Jaune replied with an easy smile. "By the way, I don't know what you said to my dad, but thanks for convincing him to let me stay at Beacon."
Claude simply waved it off with his hand. Team JNPR was about to officially begin their training session and Claude happened to walk by. Seeing that the young huntsman had free time, Claude decided to do his role as Jaune's guarantor properly, and offered to oversee the team's training.
"Before we begin…" Claude then looked to the side, where there were four more individuals standing next to team JNPR. "I don't mind if you want to watch, but are you sure if you guys just want to watch?"
"To tell you the truth, I was about to have another shopping trip with my team, but all of them digress." Coco Adel of team CFVY lowered her sunglasses to throw her team a stink-eye. "...You guys are particularly no fun today."
"Coco, you've shopped enough and our budget is barely enough for us to buy other necessities. You can go shopping again once we get our stipend next semester." Velvet Scarlatina said with a soft voice, but her posture hinted that she was standing her ground. The other two males of the team also stood by her side, silently showing whose side they were on.
With a sigh, Coco then turned back to Claude. "...There you have it. We don't have much to do, so we might as well see some action." she then gestured at her team. "Oh, by the way, I haven't introduced you. The redhead with the sexy piece of ass is Fox Alistair." team JNPR could not help but feel a little awkward at the introduction, while the man in question simply snorted before nodding to Claude and the juniors. "...And the beefcake is his partner, Yatsuhashi Daichi."
"It is a pleasure to meet you." Yatsuhashi greeted with an unexpectedly mild manner. "Please don't mind about Fox's silence, he's never the talking type."
"No problem. I'm cool with that." Claude smiled and he returned his attention to the team he was supposed in charge with. "...Right, so now we got that out of the way, let's start with a little warm up, shall we? Give me..." Claude gave a quick look-around at the size of the open field. "Eight laps while carrying your weapon."
The team nodded and began running, with Claude leading in front of them. The second-years made themselves comfortable on the side while watching with mild interest. Rather than huntsmen training, it looked more militaristic, in a manner of speaking. Then again, huntsmen, in a way, were soldiers, only with different authorities and jurisdiction.
Around four laps later, team CFVY was feeling bored from just watching as well. Nodding to each other, Coco was the first to stand up as she began doing her own set of stretches, followed by the rest of her team.
Long story short, the first run ended and team JNPR had warmed up quite a bit. "Okay, now the warm-up is done…" Claude then eyed Jaune. "Let's get to work on you, shall we? Even if the training you've been doing, you're still behind the rest of your peers."
At the back-handed remark, Jaune simply nodded with a determined expression, his team glanced at him with supporting looks.
"First, we'll have you go for a few rounds." Claude then fished through his pants pocket and took out three white ribbons in his knuckle. "Pick one." he said as he offered the ribbons to Jaune.
Jaune looked at the ribbons for a second, before he pulled one out of Claude's knuckle. On the tip of the ribbon, hidden inside Claude's hand earlier, was a letter 'R' written in green. "Alright, Ren. Come here, keep yourself and your leader warmed up!" He jerked his head at Ren.
Ren blinked once but he soon nodded and he was currently facing off against Jaune with Claude standing between them, playing the role of referee. "We'll use the first-blood rule. Do I need to explain how it works?" Claude instructed as he checked on the combatants' aura level on his Scroll. Hearing no question or objection, Claude nodded. "Ready?" Jaune hefted his shield up and got his sword ready to strike, while Ren deployed his Stormflower. "Fight!"
Both Jaune and Ren were the cautious types when it came to one-on-one - the former after the habit had been pounded into his head, while the latter had always been using that approach, not to mention the first-blood rule. They circled each other in the beginning, Jaune kept holding his shield's surface forward towards Ren, whose face remained stoic as usual.
The fight seemed to be a strange match-up at the first glance; Jaune was equipped to fight on the front lines, to tank hits. Ren, on the other hand, was more of an all-rounder with equipment that were meant for quick attacks with small yet continuous damage. Some might thought that the match-up was not compatible, but everyone had a different perspective.
Ren suddenly dashed forward while sending a flurry of bullets at Jaune, forcing the latter to instinctively raise his shield against the projectiles. Knowing that his field of vision was obscured by his own defence, Jaune was about to swing his sword forward when he felt Ren had come within the range; only for Ren to suddenly shifted his direction and slid past Jaune's left flank.
Weeks of training that had been ingrained into his muscles allowed Jaune to spin on his heels and send a horizontal swing, "Hah!" causing Ren to jump back in evasion. Immediately, Jaune was facing his shield towards Ren once again.
From the side, Claude pursed his lips, but he nodded slightly in approval. Jaune's movement was still amateurish as he was too focused on defence, but his reflex was passable enough to keep him alive when he would be thrown out on the field.
Back to the match, Jaune knew better that Ren was not a push-over. Hell, it was only a short exchange and Jaune could already feel that he was sweating - his heart was beating fast. Ren on the other hand, did not seem even winded. Feeling that he needed to end the fight as soon as possible, Jaune began to march forward with his shield still raised.
Ren took it in stride as Jaune roared and began to throw several swings; the former easily dodged and parried every single strike, but he could not retaliate yet since Jaune made sure that he kept his shield level - ready to block incoming attacks at any moment. However, Jaune was steadily getting desperate as he lowered his shield in favour of faster attacks. That was all the opening that Ren required.
When Jaune threw an overhead swing with his sword, Ren simply spun on his heel, causing Jaune to overreach. Once Ren had slipped through his guard, he gracefully struck his elbow at the back of Jaune's head. The blonde stumbled on his step from the shock on his head before he fell face-first to the ground.
"...And that's the match! Ren's the winner." Claude announced as Ren relaxed, while Jaune was taking a deep breath on his fours. The young huntsman then approached and knelt next to his apprentice, checking over him. "You good there?"
"...Yeah, yeah, I'm okay." Jaune replied with another deep breath. "Where did I go wrong, though?"
"You got nervous from the first exchange." Claude tapped his finger on Jaune's temple. "Calm down, your body responds kindly to your state of mind. If you panic, your body will waste energy responding to your thoughts. The same goes when the opposite happens. You might have a lot of Aura, but your physique is still not developed enough to harness it properly."
"So… I need to keep working on my stamina instead?" Claude could hear the hint of disappointment in Jaune's tone.
"Honestly, it'd be counter-productive if we're to focus on techniques when you're still a newbie. Here's an advice; if you can't outclass your opponent, outlast them." Claude replied with a knowing smile and a wink.
"Huh… Okay." Jaune sounded skeptical at first, but he agreed soon enough.
"Good, with that in mind…" Claude then stood up and smirked at Nora. "Valkyrie, do you want to help your fearless leader breaking some legs?"
The rest of JNPR, especially Jaune, got their eyes wide in worry while Nora was flashing a feral grin on her face.
While Nora took charge in beating Jaune into shape, with the help of both Pyrrha and Ren in tow, Claude was approached by team CFVY. "Hey, Sterling." He turned to see Coco with her team behind her. "...Say, we're kind of bored from just watching. You mind if we have a few shots with you?"
Claude eyed the woman for a few seconds, then his silver eyes trailed to the team, which looked almost, if not the same, as eager as their leader; then he glanced at team JNPR - Nora was seen talking and gesturing at Jaune, who was gradually looking horrified, with Ren trying to placate his partner, and Pyrrha was crossed between encouraging Jaune to take whatever Nora was telling him, or backing him up.
Looking at team CFVY again, Claude saw no harm in indulging their request, thus he nodded with a smile. "...Gear up."
A few minutes later, team CFVY had summoned their weapons and gear via their rocket-lockers. "So, how do you want us doing this?" Claude asked with Shatter Storm on his back, as he did some stretches.
"Um… Can I go first?" much to Claude's surprise, Velvet was the one who raised her hand up first.
Claude blinked at the timid Faunus girl before he glanced at her team, who were not looking surprised whatsoever. "Sure thing." Once Velvet stood a few meters from him, Claude asked. "So, you fight hand to hand?"
"Oh, I actually have a weapon." Velvet replied, though her expression turned sheepish afterwards. "...But it's something I need to use sparingly. Field mission use only."
"Hm, fair enough." Claude nodded as he readied his unarmed stance.
"Um… are you not going to use your weapon?" Velvet asked. Seeing her opponent not brandishing the sword and shield on his back was kind of a strange spectacle. He could not be looking down on her just because she was unarmed, could he?
Claude gave an apologetic smile. "My case is similar to yours; Shatter Storm is more suitable against Grimm. Also, to tell you the truth, I used to fight close and personal before I picked up my own weapon, so… colour me interested whenever I'm against an unarmed opponent."
Velvet nodded in understanding. "So… Are we good to go?"
"Ready whenever you are." Claude smirked, then he sensed the air around Velvet changed as she took a deep breath, the look in her eyes became significantly sharper.
Suddenly, Claude could barely react when Velvet suddenly leapt forward, spun twice in the air, which followed with a roundhouse kick. He managed to step back to reduce the impact, but Claude could feel the force behind that attack. The shy girl he met in the cafeteria that day had been replaced with a huntress.
Knowing that Claude had to take off the kid's gloves, he sent a right jab - which Velvet easily dodged out of the range and retaliated with a couple of kicks - which Claude easily blocked. Claude then countered with his own roundhouse kick, which Velvet evaded and countered with her own frontal kick. Soon the two were caught in a heated exchange, where unlike Claude who used both hand strikes and kicks; Velvet mainly used her legs to attack, and relying on her arms mostly on defence and evasion to react against Claude's strikes. However, when Claude threw another straight, Velvet managed to parry the attack to force him to overreach, and she immediately delivered a reverse roundhouse kick that Claude barely blocked.
Claude stumbled ahead and while he just finished balancing himself, Velvet was already throwing another kick from behind him. However, Claude was able to see the attack coming and simply stepped aside, and when Velvet's overreached with her leg, Claude swiped Velvet's footing and sent her falling on her back.
Claude was about to send down a punch, but Velvet prevented the punch from coming all the way down by jerking her hips up and sent her feet towards Claude's head, forcing him to take a few steps back. Velvet then got back to her feet, ran towards Claude and leapt to perform a somersault drop kick. Claude crossed his arms to receive the incoming blow and staggered another few steps back.
From the sidelines, team CFVY was showing various degrees of approval; Coco was grinning knowingly, Yatsuhashi nodded while Fox had a tiny smirk on his scarred lips. Team JNPR on the other hand, was gobsmacked at the display, their training was forgotten when they heard about the commotion from the match.
Claude regained his bearing in a second and watched Velvet's stance with an impressed look. "...What happened to the timid cute girl I met on that lunch time? Where the hell did she go?" He asked with a small joking tone.
In return, Velvet simply winked while flashing a cheeky grin. However, Claude was merely even more amused, as he turned to Coco. "Is she always like this?" He asked while pointing at Velvet.
"I know, right?!" Coco replied with a mirthful tone. "But if you think that's Velvet's all about, you got another thing coming, Cole!"
Claude blinked and sensed that Velvet was coming at him again. Simultaneously, both he and her sent a reverse roundhouse kick at each other.
oXo
"Well, I can only say, y'all have gone far." Claude said as he handed out several drinks to team CFVY. "...Keep it up, and you'll go even further."
"Gee, thanks." Coco grumbled, albeit good-naturedly, as she took her bottle. "How can you still look like you can go for more? I'm pretty bushed myself here." She actually took off her beret hat and sunglasses from her sweaty face.
"Rather than me, I'm more impressed you can kick ass in those." Claude eyed at Coco's attire - her clothes were something more for modelling rather than fighting. However, Claude's eyes trailed to Coco's handbag. "Moreover, what the fuck was that thing?"
Coco merely smirked knowingly, "In reverse order; this here... is women's one of the most, if not the most, effective weapon against men folk." Then, she gestured at her attire. "Second, what can I say? If I'm gonna go and risk my life out there, I might as well do it in style." Coco replied with a knowing smile."
"Ha, can't say I disagree." Claude returned with a bark of laughter, before he returned his attention at his supposed protege. "How are you kids doing there?"
"Running smoothly, sir!" Nora grinned with a salute. "Our fearless leader will kick ass and take names in no time!"
The said 'fearless leader' was out-cold from exhaustion, he had to forgo his armor so he could breathe better, and he was lying on his back with his head rested on Pyrrha's lap - the girl's face looked as if she was having the moment of her life, but at the same time she was also confused and awkward of what she was doing. Ren on the other hand was doing his job in controlling the damage Nora had caused.
"Good." Claude nodded. "Once he wakes up, get him some drink and get him to stretch again! We're far from over. Ren, why don't you dish out your healthy recipe? Your leader can definitely use some." The boy in green looked contemplative for a second before he nodded and dashed off, presumably towards the kitchen.
As if he was listening, Jaune groaned in his sleep with his face looking as if he was having a bad dream. "Um… Perhaps we can go slower, sir?" Pyrrha implored.
"Nonsense. I told you during your first combat class, didn't I?" Claude retorted. "You will grovel on the ground, you will train until you bleed, and you will cry to your mom. I sure as hell will see to that." Jaune groaned a little more, with Pyrrha giving a resigned laugh.
"Come to think of it, I haven't really paid attention to you three yet, have I? We've been working on Jaune only." Claude spoke just in time Ren returned with a bottle containing his recipe. "While we're waiting for Jaune to recover, let's see what I can do to whip you all into shape, shall we?" He said while cracking his knuckles eagerly.
Ren froze in his tracks, Pyrrha was akin to a deer caught in the headlights, while Nora's grin grew ferally.
It was a productive day for everyone involved.
It was later at night when Claude was walking through the downtown area. He made sure to dress in more casual attire - Jeans, grey shirt with a jacket; still functional enough should he run into some random mess. He also let his hairdo down, and put on fake glasses for disguise. He did not bring his Shatter Storm, but he brought his Mjolnir Mk. II on his person, hidden behind the jacket.
He walked towards the apartment building where Blake had brought him before. A few days after the debacle at the docks, Claude had bought a room at a relatively affordable price.
He looked around, to check if he was not being tailed before walking towards the building. Entering the lobby, Claude nodded at the reception and went up the stairs. A moment later, he was standing in front of a door. He looked around once again before he proceeded to knock on the wooden platform.
A few minutes later, the door opened slightly, revealing a chain-link holding the door at bay. From the gap, Claude could see a part of Roman's head peeking through. "Who is this?" The man asked from inside the room.
"It's me." Claude replied while lowering his glasses to show his face.
In return, however, Roman narrowed his eyes. "...Password."
Claude blinked, "...What?"
"You heard me."
Claude narrowed his eyes this time - he could tell Roman was smirking from behind the door. "Cut the shit, Rome. We set no password."
"Wrong." Roman then slammed the door close.
Claude's jaw clenched as he took a deep breath, before he knocked the door harder. This time, he could hear some snickering from the other side before the door cracked open again.
"Password?" Only to be greeted by the same question.
"Hilarious, Rome. Nice one. Now let me in." Claude spoke, his patience began to wear thin. He attempted to push the door open, only for Roman to hold his own ground as well.
"...Is that your password?"
Claude then whipped his hand-canon out, he was only a few steps away from breaking the door down himself, and pointed the gun through the gaps. "Open, the goddamned door."
"...Fine." Roman finally relented; he closed the door briefly to take off the chains, before opening it again wider for Clause to walk in. "Spoil-sport."
"Cunt; what was that for, seriously?" Claude bit back as he walked past Roman.
"Sorry not sorry, after what I've gone through before coming here, I kind of needed that." Roman - with his hat and coat hung on the rack nearby, only replied with a small smirk as he followed behind.
When Claude arrived at the living room, however, he was greeted by the sight of a young woman sprawling on the couch with a cup of multi-flavoured ice-cream in her hands, while watching a B-movie on the television.
Claude blinked thrice at the woman - she was short, perhaps around Ruby's height, yet her figure seemed more mature than her height. Her hair was a mixture of three different colours - pink, brown and white; her eyes were brown and pale pink in hetero-chromatic. Her white tail jacket - with pink interior, along with her black gloves were laid on the seat of the couch, leaving her in a brown corset and brown pants that hugged her body; the corset exposed her neck, bare shoulders and cleavage with multitude of necklaces on her skin; the corset was also curved in the middle and at the bottom, exposing a little of her hips. Her bare feet were propped up against her comfortably, with her high-heel white boots situated on the floor below her. Next to the couch was an umbrella with a similar motive as hers.
Claude then turned to Roman who was not sporting his usual hat and coat - which were hung on the rack at the corner. "...Who's this?" Claude could not help but ask while pointing at the girl on the couch.
"An associate of mine. We can trust her." Roman cryptically replied.
"Ah, right." Claude nodded. "Sorry, for a second I thought you're… Y'know?" He gestured at the girl, who raised an eyebrow at the guest.
"I'm… what? Playing hooky with a minor?" Roman quipped with his own quirked eyebrow before he smirked at the girl. "Neo, this guy thinks you're some kind of an under-aged prostitute."
"His words, not mine." Claude shook his head at the girl, who was sporting an unamused look, while pointing at Roman - who was rolling his eyes. "Though, how old is she? No offence, she is kind of on the short side." At his last remark, the girl pouted at him.
"Old enough to beat your nieces' asses six ways to Sunday." Roman replied, causing Claude to raise his own eyebrows in return. "Anyway, come on. We're not here just to catch up, are we?" He said as he walked towards the dining table, with the girl following after she put her boots on.
"Right, right." Claude nodded as he followed suit. "By the way, try not to refer to my nieces' asses again like you did earlier, Rome. It kind of pisses me off." Roman simply waved his hand at Claude's last sentence.
However, the multi-coloured girl walked by him, Claude asked, "...Sorry, I haven't gotten your name."
The girl only smiled as she pointed at her hair and the ice-cream on the small table before the TV. Claude blinked before darting his eyes between the girl and the cold dessert. "...Neopolitan?" Claude replied hesitantly, but he earned a nod from the girl. "Really?" Another nod. "...Someone actually named you after an ice-cream?" Claude smiled, finding the idea to be actually amusing.
When the girl - Neopolitan pointed her finger at Roman, Claude snorted. "For real? Roman, you named this girl after a food?"
"Yeah? She never told me her real name ever since we met for the first time. So sue me." Roman, who had taken his seat, only replied with an annoyed tone, "Now are we gonna talk business or not?"
Claude and Neopolitan - or Neo, only giggled a bit before they finally took a seat on their own. Neo sitting next to Roman while Claude sitting across them. "First of all, this is kind of too late to ask, but were you followed?" the master-thief asked.
"No, I wasn't…. Were you, though?" Claude asked in return; the playful tone had been replaced by a more serious persona.
"No." Roman replied as well before he propped his arms on the table, leaning forward. "Moving on, I… ran into some development that might make things more complicated."
Claude narrowed his eyes, "Which is…?"
"...Do you remember that one woman who nearly beat you during the 30th Vytal Festival?"
Claude blinked for a few seconds before his eyes went wide in realization. "For real…?"
"Yeah, I don't know what happened, but she's in cohorts with them." Roman nodded grimmly.
Claude sighed and sagged a bit on his seat, swiping his hand over his face. His expression was contemplating, his mind was running through several possible scenarios. "...Does she suspect you of anything?"
"If it's worth anything, she hasn't arrived at Vale yet." Roman replied - that was actually a good news. "...But to prevent her from suspecting us too soon; this is where she comes." Roman then gestured at his partner-in-crime. "Neo will be your contact."
Claude glanced at Neo, who simply waved at him with a confident smile on her face. "Not that I mind, but are you sure? Again, no offence, but her appearance doesn't really say 'subtlety' and 'blending around'." He commented to Roman.
In response, Roman only smirked and snapped his fingers; and Neo was suddenly wrapped in brief glitters before her appearance suddenly changed - her hair became black with her white streaks in lighter tone, done up in a twin-tail with white bows; and her eye colour became green. Her outfit had changed as well; with black and white color theme - a sleeveless black blouse with white frills on the chest area, a collar and a black ribbon bow hanging from the front of the collar. The blouse exposed her midriff, and she wore medium-length black armbands on both of her wrists. Along with the blouse, she had a knee-length skirt fastened with a white belt. Her high-heel boots also changed into black shoes with a triple tomoe emblem on the soles, with white leg-warmers
Claude blinked again at the sudden transformation, before the girl suddenly transformed back to her previous appearance, eliciting a chuckle from the man. "Huh…. Okay, that's actually pretty cool. Any limits I should be aware of?"
Neo smiled smugly before glancing to Roman who was also as smug. "I say she can still grow, but for now she can alter her outer appearance however she likes, just don't expect her to transform into a man or something."
"...Okay, I guess that will do just fine." Claude nodded before turning to Roman. "But I need to ask something…. Does she talk? I haven't heard her uttering a single word ever since I came here."
Neo only smirked with a snort, while Roman replied, "She's been a mute ever since I found her. But at least she's not a deaf and knows her stuff, just deal with it for now."
Claude stared at Neo again, who only stared at him challengingly, before he nodded. "Okay...I take it you're still doing Dust robberies?" Claude talked to Roman again.
"Yes, I am; more like I have to." Roman took out his cigarette and had a smoke. A second later, Roman picked something out and offered a brown envelope on the table. Claude peered inside the content and creased his eyebrows as he skimmed through some of the pages.
"...A novel?"
"Something I picked up to kill time when I have no heist to pull off." Roman grinned. "Why don't you have a read? You might find it interesting."
Claude stared at Roman for a few seconds until the former smiled. "...Sure, I'll give it a shot. Maybe I'll share this with Barty and Peter too. They might find themselves liking this." Claude looked through the pages again when he found something else. "Um, why is there a picture of a guy here?"
"Sort of a source material, just take it along." Roman shrugged. "Speaking of, the guy owns a bookstore in the commercial district, and I heard he planned to retire to Vacuo soon."
"Is that so?" Claude replied. "Have you talked to him? Say thanks or goodbye, maybe?"
"Been trying to; but I can't be found meeting with a humble shop owner like that, can I?" Roman retorted with a sigh. "Can't really do much about it; not to mention once the guy leaves Vale. I heard the guy is kind of popular too, since people believe he has some kind of dodgy past with some faunus group."
"I see… That's too bad." Claude nodded in understanding. "Welp, it's good to talk with you again, Rome…. And it's great to get to know you, Neo." He smiled at Neo, who smiled back and winked at him.
"Yeah, now get out." Roman replied snidely as they stood up from their seats. However, when Claude was by the door, Roman called out, "One more thing, are you really gonna tell those girls about… you?"
Claude paused on his tracks - his eyes regarded Roman's own for a few moments before nodding. "...Yes, maybe tomorrow. The dusty old crow is coming too."
"Right..." Roman nodded, but he did not leave his eyes off Claude. "You know, it's not too late to change your mind."
"I can't. You know I can't." Claude replied with a bitter smile.
"Of course you can't…." Roman then blew out a smoke while sighing a tad harshly. "Just be mindful of what you are telling them. Remember what we've talked about." Roman said with a pointed look.
Claude's face showed that he did not particularly like what his old partner was insinuating, but had to go along, nonetheless. "...Yeah, I know. I'll keep it in mind."
Claude then shut the door, leaving Roman behind with Neo throwing a worried glance at the latter.
Days went by - on the Island of Patch, team RWBY had finished another grueling day of training, as well as homework. Yes, homework - apparently Beacon Academy wanted to ensure that the student would spend their vacation by doing something productive, hence they gave a simple assignment of writing a journal about their holiday - 800 words for each day.
Thankfully for team RWBY, despite being more rural than the metropolitan Vale, there was always something to do and see at Patch - sightseeing, hiking, even camping; as well as the training regimen that team RWBY had to attend for every morning or afternoon, sometimes both. Not to mention when Taiyang happened to be free and decided to throw in his own weight.
Besides, Ruby and Yang could always make things up; they had written stuff about fighting a horde of grimm invading the island and wrote it as epic as they could imagine, much to Blake and Weiss' chagrin. Overall, the journal was not too difficult.
It had been one of those days when Taiyang Xiao-Long happened to 'help out' with the training - namely giving the girls a beatdown in sparring matches. Upon finishing in the evening, the girls were exhausted - they were on their last legs as they took shower, had dinner, and went straight to bed.
It was later in the awfully early morning that Ruby's eyes suddenly snapped open. She blinked a couple times, noticing that it was still quite dark around her. She woke up from her sleeping position to glance at Yang sleeping next to her. She turned to look at the clock to find that it was still ten minutes before the sunrise, causing her to silently groan. Seriously, why could she not wake up in the morning during school days, yet ended up waking up even earlier during holidays? Ruby kind of blamed the brutal training her father threw at her team at the last minute.
Feeling she might be able to go back to sleep after burning some of her energy, Ruby slowly got out of bed without waking Yang up and walked out of the room. She sighed once she was in the corridor - of course everyone, including Zwei, would still be sleeping. Having nothing to do, Ruby decided to go to one place that actually calmed her.
It was an old bedroom at the corner of the first floor; where her father and mother used to sleep together. Nowadays, Tai had been sleeping in a guest-room most of the time; perhaps despite his claim and cheerful persona everyday, he had not completely moved on from the grief. The room was unlocked - both Ruby and Yang knew better than making a mess; Weiss and Blake so far were polite enough not to intrude on their own. Tai had purposely left the door unlocked so he could have more easier time in cleaning it.
Ruby quietly opened the door and stepped inside, scanning the simple room, particularly the medium-sized bed in the middle. Ruby smiled sadly and fondly at the same time; she remembered that she, Yang, Tai and Summer would cuddle together whenever the children were too scared to sleep during stormy nights.
Without further ado, Ruby then plopped herself back slowly on the bed, making sure not to make too much mess. She then simply closed her eyes and relaxed herself, her mind trailed back to the happy memories during her life before Beacon, before Signal, before huntress.
Look here, my little rose….
Ruby found herself reminiscing the voice of her mother, whenever they were alone together. She remembered Summer was reading her something….
The one over here is another member of our family.
Ruby then vaguely remembered her mother actually showing her some kind of album, a photo album; it was rather messy with some of the pictures not properly attached on the pages.
He's…. Special, I guess? Sometimes it was even difficult for me to know what is running through his head.
Ruby then recalled her mother's amused giggles as she told her about this certain man.
Nonetheless, before mommy met daddy, he's always been my hero. Don't tell your dad about that.
Then Ruby recalled how highly her mother spoke about that person.
He's currently going somewhere far away, most likely doing what he does best - protecting and fighting for those he cares about; and he will come back once he is done. By then….
Ruby then remembered her mother's expression upon uttering the last words - her eyes were a mixture of sadness and most of all, hope.
Let's give him a warm, welcome home, okay?
Ruby then snapped her eyes open again, noticing that the sun had begun to rise, illuminating the room she was in. She rubbed her eyes, and found them slightly misty. More flashes of memory, and she still could not understand what that was all about. Letting out a breath, she stood up from the bed and did a quick work on tidying up the sheet.
That was when her eyes caught something inside the brighter bedroom, at one corner - within the gaps between the bed and the drawer, there was something sticking out. Ruby blinked her eyes and found herself being drawn into that one particular detail. It took a bit of time to reach deep and used her fingers to grab on the corner of a piece of paper, but Ruby managed to pull it out.
Judging from the texture she felt on her skin, it was some kind of an old photograph. She blinked again at the writings on the back of the picture. If she had the math right, the dates went back during the time when her and Yang's parents were still huntsmen and huntresses in training. However, what caught her eyes the most was the names written on the blank space, just above the date.
Claude & Summer Rose - 30th Vytal Festival, Kingdom of Vacuo.
So the picture was taken all the way from the 30th Vytal Festival at Vacuo? The thought was kind of amusing for Ruby as she snorted a bit. She turned the paper around to look at the picture, wondering who this 'Claude' was. Could it be he was… What did Yang call it again? An ex-boyfriend or something? Ruby could not help but feel a bit curious and excited at the idea.
However, when she got a good look at the picture, she found herself frozen on the spot she stood on. Her silver eyes could not tear themselves from the picture of a young man standing next to her teenage-looking Summer Rose.
Sorry if this chapter seems rushed. Despite the pandemic, it's been quite hectic days since I'm starting a account. You can find the link in my profile.
As usual, constructive reviews, please. Stay safe and healthy, folks. :)