Beta: ShadowMeister234

As reluctant as Mercury was to accept Ruby's assistance, he didn't put up too much of a fight. His wound and cold must have been bothering him more than he wanted to admit. He wasn't weak by any means, but he seemed content to not push himself and mostly preferred to sleep the day away.

Ruby brought him breakfast, lunch, and dinner for the two days she had watched over him. He accepted it with that look that said, he could have gotten it himself if he wanted to. Ruby could only giggle every time.

They talked a bit while he ate. Nothing too serious, and he always steered the conversation to a different topic when she tried to talk about their relationship or what they would do after he was all better. It was a little frustrating since she could never shake the impression that he thought her feelings were just that of a childhood crush, and if he just ignored her for long enough, they would go away.

It wasn't fair. She knew there were some serious issues between them and their chosen lifestyles, but he wouldn't even give her the chance to prove herself. Wasn't the whole point of dating to see if you could overcome your differences together.

It was just so frustrating. What could she do to convince him?

It was the question that was on her mind every day since their boat ride, and even more so after he had gotten her weapon back. He cared about her enough to get himself sick, but not enough to take her seriously. She was sure he would say something like he was doing this because it was the best for her, but that was stupid. Only she knew what was best for her.

She fumed about it all the way down the stairs and to the inn lobby where she went to get her and Mercury's breakfast. The nice innkeeper behind the counter was already waiting for her.

"Hello, Ruby, here for two breakfasts again?"

Ruby scratched her cheek in slight embarrassment. "Yeah, my friend still isn't feeling that good."

The innkeeper giggled. "No worries. I'm sure he's grateful to have someone so nice looking after him."

"I wish," Ruby whispered under her breath.

While the innkeeper was preparing their food, Ruby heard the sound of an engine backfiring which was very unusual for a place like this. Before Ruby could think too much about it a very unexpected person made their way into the inn.

Ruby's jaw nearly hit the floor when she saw them, and it didn't take long for that person to notice Ruby and come running towards her.

"Rubbbyyyy!" The person smothered Ruby in a vice-like hug. "Oh, I've missed you so much. Look how big you've gotten."

Ruby had to claw her way out of her attacker's breasts to get some air. "Yang, what are you doing?"

Yang pulled away and gave Ruby one of her famous smiles. "I came to see you of course."

Ruby couldn't believe it. The last time she had seen Yang she was held up in her room looking like she had lost everything that was ever important to her. Now she was sunny and cheerful and back to the Yang Ruby knew. She also had a new robot arm. Ruby already had a million questions about that like how Yang got it and how it worked, but first, she just wanted to enjoy her sister's company.

The two embraced in another hug. This one a lot softer than the last. "How did you find me?" Ruby asked.

Yang laughed. "I just asked around for a girl traveling in a red cloak. You're pretty recognizable you know, and people couldn't stop telling me about all the ways you helped them. It was pretty easy to pick up your trail from there."

"I can't believe you came all this way to see me."

"Are you kidding me? Of course, I'd come looking for you. You're my sister."

"What about Dad and Zwei, and Uncle Qrow? How are they doing?"

"They're fine, though Dad never stops worrying about you, and Qrow's off in Mistral somewhere, but everything's been good. Heard they're even making some progress on taking back Beacon."

Before Yang could say anymore, the innkeeper tapped Ruby on the shoulder. "Your food is ready."

Yang noticed that there were two plates of freshly cooked food. "Oh, did you make one for me too? That's so nice of you."

The innkeeper coughed politely. "Actually, that's for Ruby to bring up to her friend."

Yang perked up and nudged Ruby with her elbow. "A friend you say. Do they happen to be a boy?"

Yang was just doing her normal teasing and Ruby tried to play it off that way, but inside she was having a crisis. Yang could not see Mercury. There was no way she could explain why she was hanging out with one of Beacon's attackers. Yang would flip out, and that was before she even knew what Ruby's true intentions with him were. Luckily, Mercury was upstairs in his room, so as long as she could keep Yang away from there, they shouldn't have a chance to see each other.

A creaking on the staircase alerted an already stressed Ruby, and she nearly screamed when the worst person possible walked down them. Of all the times Mercury could've decided to come down and get his own breakfast it had to be this one.

There was no hiding Ruby's expression, so of course, Yang looked to see what had gotten her sister so worked up just as Mercury noticed the tall blonde standing next to his traveling companion.

The two didn't even blink as they both froze in their tracks. Mercury looked up the stairs like he was hoping that if he just made it back up, Yang would forget she saw him. As good of a plan that might have been, it immediately fell through when Yang shouted his name and deployed her gauntlets. "What are you doing here!"

Mercury looked to Ruby for assistance, and she tried to give it by placing her hand on Yang's shoulder. "Yang calm down. Let me explain—"

"How can I be calm! That's Mercury. He attacked our school and killed our friends. I'm not going to let him get away. Not after everything he's done."

"Please wait," the nervous innkeeper said, but it fell on deaf ears.

Yang's gauntlets exploded behind her as she propelled herself towards Mercury. To avoid it he basically had to throw himself off the stairs. He landed on top of a table and nearly cracked it in two. Yang was right on him though, and did much more than just break the table in half when she punched it. Mercury was able to roll off it before that, but the table splintered in a hundred pieces that flew in every direction. While not harmful to someone with aura, they certainly weren't pleasant to deal with.

Mercury threw a kick as Yang continued the assault, but it was obvious, to Ruby at least, that his kick was much slower than normal. Yang had no issues ducking under it and throwing her whole body weight into Mercury's stomach. He made a choking sound and Ruby was afraid his wound had opened up again.

Mercury was pushed up against a wall and Yang pulled back her fist to give him a lesson he would never forget. Thankfully, that punch was never sent as Ruby used her semblance to close the distance and wrap herself around her sister's arm. "Stop, don't hit him!"

"What are you doing!" Yang tried to shake her off. "You know who this is. Why are you trying to protect him?"

"Because I love him!" Ruby shouted.

"If Yang's head had twisted any faster, she would have snapped her own neck. Her face was stuck in an expression of absolute bewilderment. It was like she had just been told Ruby had adopted a pet Grimm. "What did you say?" Maybe she had just heard it wrong. There was surely a reasonable explanation.

"I said I love him."

Yang imagined her eyes rolling into the back of her head and smoke coming out of her mouth as her brain had a meltdown. However, before she could completely shut down and reboot, Mercury hit her in the side, releasing him from her grip.

"Mercury," Ruby chastised.

"What? You think I want to be in her strike range after you drop that bombshell."

Yang didn't look like she would be doing any striking as she was still frozen in processing. Her eyes darted between the two as she wondered how the two of them could be so casual with each other. Eventually her lips did move to produce a single word. "How?"

Ruby walked up to Yang and held her hand in hers. "I think we have a lot to talk about. Just the two of us."

"Shouldn't I get a say in this," Mercury asked from the sideline.

"No," both sisters agreed.

He threw up his hands in defeat. "Fine, I'll leave you two alone, but Ruby," his eyes caught hers, "this is what I was warning you about."

After Ruby profusely apologized to the innkeeper and offered to pay for the broken table. The sisters sat down together. Yang had calmed down a bit since before, but her anger hadn't ceased. She wanted to go upstairs and beat the crap out of the guy that had humiliated her during the Vytal festival, but she controlled her emotions for her sister's sake. Yang still couldn't understand how her sister could support someone like him and even going as far as confessing to him, but she planned to find out.

Ruby squirmed on her side of the table under Yang's fierce gaze, and it took a while before Yang realized Ruby wouldn't start speaking until she started. "Explain everything," Yang said harsher than she intended.

Ruby wasted no time. She gave a rundown of everything that had happened since she left Patch, and Yang would concede that from Ruby's stories Mercury seemed like a reasonable and somewhat okay guy. She also knew that Ruby was biased and was probably making him out to be a lot kinder than he actually was.

"And that's why you developed feelings for him?" Yang clarified once Ruby was finished.

Ruby nodded.

"Even though he's a terrorist."

"He was only involved because of Cinder."

"Is that the truth, or is that only what he told you?"

Ruby flushed. "He wouldn't lie to me about that."

"He's a criminal. He'll say whatever it takes to make himself seem sympathetic."

"I think I know him better than you."

Yang slammed her fist on the table. "Wake up, Ruby! Even if it was all Cinder's plan, he still went through with it. Beacon is in ruin because of him. People died because of him, and here you are just willing to forgive him. What happened to being a hero? Can't really do that when dating a terrorist. Do you even know what he's capable of?"

"I do," Ruby replied sternly.

"Do you really?"

Ruby thought back to Mercury almost beating Neo to death.

"Yes. I know he's not perfect but nobody is."

Ruby could feel Yang's anger building. "There's a big difference between not being perfect and plotting the death of all your classmates! Let's say you do hook up with him. What then? You can't come back to Vale. You'll be arrested on the spot."

"It's not like I'm going to announce this to the whole world. I can still come visit on my own."

"Visit," Yang scoffed. "How lucky of us that you'll grace us with your presence every once in a while. What about Team RWBY then? What happens to us!"

Ruby had enough of being yelled at. She stood up from her chair and for the first time in a long time shouted at her sister. "There is no more Team RWBY! Blake is gone. Weiss is in Atlas. You were at home. I think it's pretty clear Team RWBY is never getting back together."

"Not if we don't try it won't."

"And what if I don't want to try?"

Yang sucked in her breath. Of all the things she expected to hear from Ruby this was last on the list. It took her a moment to collect herself. "So that's it then? All it took was one cute guy for you to turn your back on everything. To turn your back on me. To turn your back on Summer."

Yang regretted it almost as soon as she said it, but Ruby didn't flinch and wasn't taken aback like Yang expected. Instead she stood her ground. "I didn't turn my back on anyone. You turned your back on me when you locked yourself in your room and refused to come out for weeks."

Yang looked at her new robotic arm. "I was—"

"You were what!" Ruby interrupted. "You were hurt? You had lost something? Well, you weren't the only one. We all lost something. I watched Pyrrha die." Ruby's eyes were running. "I watched Cinder burn her to ash. I saw Penny ripped apart. I saw Roman get eaten by a Grimm, and I couldn't do a thing about any of it, yet I got up. I kept moving forward, so don't tell me after losing an arm, you couldn't have done the same."

Yang was speechless, but it didn't matter because Ruby still had more to say. "I left home to try and find myself. I left because you weren't there for me, but you know who was? Mercury. He didn't have to; in fact, he had every reason not to, yet he was. Because despite how he acts and what he says, and maybe what he even believes, he's actually a good person, and he cared about me a whole lot more than you did."

Yang looked like she had been slapped as Ruby caught her breath. Neither of them knew what to say to each other after that. They just watched each other waiting for the other to make the first move.

"I'm sorry for yelling at you." Yang finally deflated.

Ruby sat back down. "Yeah me too."

"I guess I didn't really think about what you were going through, or how much you changed. It really has been a long time since we've seen each other hasn't it?"

"Yeah, and I missed you every single day."

"Me too."

The sisters brought their hands to the center of the table and placed them on top of each other. It felt like they were finally back to being family. It was all Ruby had ever wanted since leaving Patch.

They enjoyed a quick meal together brought by the innkeeper who kept eyeing Yang with suspicion. Once they were done, Yang spoke up. "Are you serious about this? If you stay with Mercury, it's not going to be easy for you to come home, or go anywhere really. He's always going to be hunted."

"I know," Ruby conceded, "but I've made my choice. As long as we stick to the smaller towns, we should be okay. There's always people who need help out here, and truthfully, I'm happier helping these people than I ever was chasing Roman or the White Fang."

"I see." Yang looked off into the distance.

"What about you? Are you going to stay in town for a while?"

"No," Yang admitted. "I was looking for you, but I'm also looking for Blake since I have a few choice words I want to say to her. I even did a bit of research, and I think I know where she is, but I need to get to Mistral to get there. It's just a coincidence, but Shinkai is one of the easiest routes. The plan was to bring you with me and try and reform Team RWBY, but I guess that's no longer happening."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. It's your decision, and while I still don't quite agree with your new company as long as you're happy, I think I can live with it. Man, but when I tell dad he's probably gonna tear up all of Saunas looking for you."

Ruby chuckled. "Yeah, he probably will." If Mercury thought her sister was bad, he was in for a very big surprise. "So you're leaving?"

Yang ruffled her hair. "Yeah, got to get on one of those boats, preferably before the snow and ice hits, but when I've gathered Blake and Weiss, I'll come back so we can all have a chat."

"I'd like that a lot."

Mercury was laying in his bed when Ruby opened the door to his room. "So you chose me," he said.

Ruby released a breath she had been holding for a while. "I did. It was hard."

"Yeah, I heard the two of you go at it from up here. Why'd you do it though? Am I really that important to you?"

A card was thrown onto Mercury's stomach. He picked it up and read it, "to my biggest and first fan, Ruby Rose." On the back was the note he had written when he left her at the mining camp.

"That's why." Ruby hopped into his bed and curled up next to him. "Enrollment in the Ruby Rose Fanclub is eternal."

"Really, there's no breaks?"

Ruby giggled. "None, not even for weekends or holidays."

"Then I guess I'm trapped, but are you really sure you want this. It's still not too late."

"I'm sure," Ruby said. "I know it's not going to be easy, but I want to be with you. I've made my choice, so can you please just give me a chance."

Mercury sighed, but he wrapped his arm around Ruby's shoulder, pulled her in closer, and gave her a quick kiss on the forehead. "I just hope you made the right one."

Ruby nestled her head in the crook of his neck. "I'm sure I did."

An: This concludes the story. If you're a fan of my other story Beyond the Boundary, you may I've noticed I haven't been as talkative in this story as I have in that one. I did that because I wanted to have this feel more like an actual book, with a shorter length, and I think it worked out pretty well.

Not exactly a ride off in the sunset ending, but with this pairing that takes place during this time in the story, that was never really an option. Someone was going to have to give up a lot to make it work and Ruby was really the only one who could give something.

I enjoy Ruby being the one to aggressively pursue the relationship. She strikes me as the kind of person that when she wants something she puts in 110 percent to get it. I also think it just fits with her character of never giving up and always trying to make the world and herself better even in small ways. It's a trait that I think a lot of people forget about, but to be fair, the actual story kind of did too once it became save-the-world-from the-big-bad-evil time.

Will Ruby's and Mercury's relationship work out and stand the test of time? Who knows. I'll leave that to your imagination.

Thank you for joining me on this journey, and even if it was an unusual ship, I hope you all enjoyed it.

Omake:

Yang leaned against Bumblebee looking over Shinkai from atop a small hill. Turns out she had missed the boat to Mistral, but if she traveled to the town south of here quick enough she could still catch it.

She still didn't know how to feel about leaving Ruby again, and she definitely didn't know how to feel about Mercury, but she guessed those decisions were out of her hands now. Ruby matured in ways Yang could never have imagined.

But that was enough contemplation. It was time to hit the road, but before Yang could get Bumblebee started, she heard a strange sound from behind her. She turned and saw another person she never thought she'd meet again.

"Neo!"

The pint-sized terror smiled and gave a happy wave. Yang was so surprised that she forgot to get into a fighting stance.

"What are you doing here, and what do you want?"

Neo pointed to Bumblebee then clasped her palms and bowed.

"You want a ride?" Yang guessed.

Neo nodded excitedly.

Yang looked at her bike then back to Neo then shrugged her shoulders. If Ruby could make such good friends with a criminal, she might as well give it a try.

"Hop on."