Recording #109

April, 22981 AEA

"It has occurred to me that I could use an assistant or two for this endeavor. So, I built one! Determinate Assistant Laconic Laboratory Investigation System, or D.A.L.L.I.S for short. Say hello, D.A.L.L.I.S!

…

Right, not a talker, I forgot about that. Anyways, as both an artificial intelligence and a magical construct, D.A.L.L.I.S. will be acting as an extra set of eyes, ears, hands, fe—you get the point. Now that we've moved on to attempting physical interaction with the Veil, I believe the android will be extremely helpful in the days to come."

Beacon Academy

March, 79 AGW

The first five weeks of school passed by without much incident. The academic side of things were quite literally child's play, and it allowed Ruby to continue to devote every moment of her time to research, apart from her daily meetings with Ozpin, which the Headmaster had tacked on as an additional requirement at the last minute. Ozpin had insisted, in their frequent meetings between or after class, that she 'keep up appearances' by acting as a model student for the first years, which she begrudgingly agreed to after he promised Ruby additional funding and resources for her lab. He certainly knew how to bribe his way into a girl's chest cavity.

Since the Headmaster had promised total completion of her lab—located just a short walk away from the tower—by the start of the Vytal Festival, she figured she could humor him just a bit longer. Plus, given her study habits, she didn't really need to do much else to fit the role.

Aside from that, their meetings consisted of vague probes into Ruby's past—or at least what Ozpin thought was her past. It was abundantly clear to Ruby that no one, not the Headmaster nor her teammates, was willing to accept the truth that came out of her mouth. There always had to be some other explanation, one that 'made sense' and fit their close-minded worldview. Regardless, it didn't impede her quest in any way, so she let it slide.

Speaking of, it was by midway through the fifth week that her preliminary research had reached its end. Armed with enough raw knowledge to put Remnant's greatest scholars to shame, she began formulating a plan.

Thus, Ruby spent her time swapping out her textbooks and library card for world maps and hard-light modeling apps on her Scroll. It became immediately clear to anyone watching that she was planning out a journey, which piqued the interest of several students, her team chief among them.

It was the Friday of their sixth week together. The eight of them were once again crowded around a table in Beacon's dining hall after an intense combat class. Well, intense for the rest of them, maybe. Ruby still hadn't been called upon after her initial bout with Jaune.

"You're WHAT?"

Weiss slammed her hands on the table, jostling her tray and knocking a stray apple onto the floor. Ruby was actually getting quite used to seeing that expression of disbelief appear on her face every time they talked about something serious. What she wasn't ready for was Pyrrha's ashen expression at hearing the news.

"Did Ozpin not tell you? I mean, didn't you go to him asking about me a while ago?"

"He never mentioned this." Blake spoke quietly.

"Wait, so the Headmaster agreed to this?" Yang interjected.

"I'm a guest." Ruby said simply, folding her arms. "I can leave whenever I want, and we both know it."

"Then why stick around?" Yang pressed, unaware of her circumstances. "Why are you even here if you're just going to leave in the middle of the semester?"

"It was just the first place I happened upon. Ozpin offered me a place to stay, and I figured it would be more efficient to take advantage of Beacon's resources."

"So you're just using Beacon for your own ends? Do you even realize the opportunity you're squandering? This is one of the most prestigious Huntsman Academies on Remnant!" Weiss threw up her hands in disgust.

"You know I don't mean it like that." Ruby frowned, her countenance growing serious. "I actually think what you people do here is quite admirable. But I have my own goals that I must accomplish no matter what."

"Like what?" Ren asked, in what was probably the first words he'd ever directed at her.

"Well, if you're so curious…"

Ruby took out her Scroll and opened a mapmaking application, sending a hard-light display across the table. A shimmering display of Remnant as a flat projection covered everyone's food. The brightest point on the map was Vale, or more specifically Beacon, and various colored lines snaked out from its epicenter. Some moved to Vacuo, Mistral, and Atlas, while others completely ignored the Kingdoms in favor of encompassing the wilderness. There were plenty on and around the unmarked locations of the map, chiefly Menagerie's desert and the Grimmlands.

"This is…" Pyrrha gasped, her fears briefly forgotten.

"At first, I found it completely unbelievable that there wasn't a single mention of anything related to the Eternals in your history books. But, I soon realized that it might be because Remnant is vastly underexplored." She gestured to the vast stretches of land outside of the Kingdoms.

"Excuse me, what are you talking about? Who are these 'Eternals'?" Weiss interjected.

Ruby chuckled lightly. "It's a long story."

She closed the projection and stuffed her Scroll back into her cloak. "If you'd like, I can tell you all about my people—but it'll take a while, so we should do it when everyone's free. Don't you all have lunch to finish?"

The seven humans—though Ruby had her suspicions about Blake—all glanced down at their uneaten food.

"This isn't over." Weiss said.

"Yeah, I'm actually pretty interested now, too." Jaune added. "Can we meet in the common room tonight?"

It was actually quite refreshing, recounting both her current situation as well as the wonders of Eternal civilization to an audience, albeit with a few changes to keep it in line with Ozpin's rules. Reception was… mixed, to say the least, especially since they all thought she was making most of it up. Still, Nora, Jaune, and Pyrrha were enraptured with her tales of royal mishaps and colorful lab accidents, throwing in their own experiences and jokes when applicable. Ren and Blake both respectfully stayed quiet throughout, and offered no comments. Weiss was a big detractor, but she ran out of steam eventually after one too many interruptions earned Nora's ire.
Most curious was Yang. At first, she'd matched Nora and Jaune's energy and enthusiasm, but became oddly quiet when she brought up her meeting with Qrow. Incidentally, the man in question actually turned up halfway through the night to listen in, and probably to make sure she wasn't leaking any secrets. Seriously, did they think she was a child?

Regardless, reflecting on her situation in such a manner actually reminded the Eternal of certain mysteries she'd overlooked. Her memories of what she was doing immediately prior to waking up were still missing. Not to mention the lack of talking Grimm after their initial encounter weeks prior, despite having gone out to the Emerald Forest and Forever Fall for Grimm-slaying excursions as a part of the curriculum. It was all quite perplexing, yet Ruby also felt much more comfortable tackling these problems now that she had built up a bit of a knowledge base. She had to wonder what Ozpin was getting out of their little deal, because all the cards seemed to be in her favor so far.

After describing what Nora had dubbed to be 'the craziest stories on the entire planet', Ruby's teammates seemed to at least understand her intentions. Weiss was still adamant that she was making a mistake, Blake was accepting but disappointed, and Ruby could tell Pyrrha had something to say, but kept quiet for some reason. It helped that they couldn't really complain to anyone about it, with Ozpin himself backing her.

And so the rest of the semester passed by without much incident, at least for Ruby. Sure, there was a weird moment in the later weeks where Yang and Jaune seemed to have some sort of feud, but the situation seemed to have resolved itself, and things had gone back to normal shortly after. Ruby did as little to attract attention as she could, and continued mapping and planning out potential places where her people might have any clues behind.

"Okay, so places of interest include the dragon continent—aka the Grimmlands, the eastern tip of Anima, deserts in Menagerie and Vacuo, and… all of Solitas?"

It was the day before the Vytal Festival was set to begin. Team SAPR were all relaxing in their dorm: Weiss was studying, Blake was reading, Pyrrha was taking a nap after a training session, and Ruby was mapmaking.

"Solitas has always been inhabitable. You won't find anything—" Weiss began.

"So, last on the list, then." Ruby finished.

"...Honestly, I'd advise against it. There have been plenty of cases where explorers have disappeared without a trace in the middle of—" The heiress' Scroll buzzed, and her eyes widened in surprise.

"Winter!"

"I'll just go in the summer, then."

"What? No, no, I meant my sister, Winter. She's here for the Vytal Festival!" Weiss bounced up and down on her bed with glee.

"Congrats." Blake said dryly, not bothering to look up from her novel.

Another buzz, and Weiss jumped out of her bed. "She's touching down with General Ironwood now. We need to go greet her!"

"You two go on ahead. I'll wake up Pyrrha." Blake shut her book and shifted off her bed.

"Come on, Ruby, let's go!"

Weiss grabbed her by the hand and dragged her out of the dorm. While the Eternal wasn't particularly keen on meeting new people at this juncture in her quest, she recalled Weiss mentioning her sister was in the military, which made her the slightest bit curious. Maybe the military knew something she didn't?

Weiss let out an involuntary gasp as she entered Beacon's main avenue. True to her sister's word, a large Atlesian fleet, heralded by General Ironwood's flagship, stationed itself over Beacon's docking bay. Several Atlesian soldiers and students began filing out of the airships, flanked by several AK-200 units.

"That's it? I was kinda expecting more from Atlas." Ruby lamented.

"W-well, obviously this is not their entire fleet." Weiss stammered. "Why would General Ironwood bring the full military might of Atlas to Vale? Come on, Ruby."

"...I was referring to those combat droids, but okay."

Before she could respond, a distinct airship with a snowflake insignia and four light blue banners waving behind it flew by and began docking.

"It's her!" Weiss cried out, and quickly made her way over when she saw her sister exiting the airship, similarly accompanied by AK-200 units.

"Winter! I'm so happy to see you! Oh…" Where were her manners?

Weiss gave a curtsy. "Your presence honors us."

Beside her, Ruby followed suit and gave a curtsy. Well, maybe she wasn't completely hopeless after all!

"Beacon…" Her sister began. "It's been a long time. The air feels… different."

"You've been to Beacon before, sister?"

"That's classified."

"Oh, right. Well, what are you and General Ironwood doing here?"

"Classified."

"I see. How long are you staying?"

"Classified."

"Of course." Well, at least she was here. That's what mattered.

"Leave us." Winter addressed the AK-200s behind her. "How have you been?"

"Oh, splendid!" Weiss began gushing about her challenging, albeit unique academic experiences at Beacon, but her sister swiftly cut her off.

"I don't recall asking about your ranking, I'm asking how you've been. Are you eating properly? Have you taken up any hobbies? Are you making new friends?"

"Well, there's my team. Oh, but Blake and Pyrrha aren't here yet. This is Ruby." She turned towards her teammate, who was staring off in the distance with a curious expression.

"Uh, Ruby?"

The red cloaked girl didn't respond. What was she even staring at? Weiss traced her vision to an orange haired student stepping off one of the other Atlesian airships. Was she scouting out the competition? Weiss waved her hand in front of her teammate's face, snapping her out of it.

"Oh, I'd almost forgotten about you." She exclaimed, turning towards Winter, who was looking very displeased. "Ruby Rose, but please call me Ruby."

"So this is the girl you wrote of?" Winter said with a strained smile. "How… interesting."

The girl grinned. "Flattery will get you—one moment please."

Ruby pulled out her scroll. "Hello, Ozpin. Did you need something?"

Her eyes widened as Ozpin said something on the other end of the line. "Really? And one day early, too! I'm impressed!" She said in an almost patronizing tone.

Weiss watched her delight morph into annoyance as Ozpin continued the conversation. "Fine. But you better follow through on that." She shut her Scroll and turned back towards them.

"Sorry about that. Ozpin just informed me that my lab has finished construction, so I must be off. It was nice meeting you!"

Wait, what? What lab? Where was she running off too?

"She's certainly unique. Clumsy, too." Winter commented as they watched Ruby accidentally crash into the orange haired girl from earlier.

"So… what do you think of this year's students from Atlas? Anything interesting?" Weiss attempted to change the topic.

"Trying to scout out the competition?"

Drat. How did she know?

"I've only had the pleasure of observing—" Winter cut off and her head snapped towards where Ruby had run off to. "What is she doing?"

Weiss glanced over in confusion, but it wasn't hard to figure out what her sister was referring to. Ruby was standing in front of the orange haired girl, and was rather tightly gripping the poor girl's face with both of her hands. She was twisting and pinching, as if she was handling a piece of clay and not some girl, who oddly enough, didn't seem to be objecting to this behavior. Winter turned to address them when Ruby suddenly dropped her hands and said something to the girl.

Her eyes widened suddenly as she said something in return, followed by what was clearly a hiccup. Weiss made to follow her sister as she walked up to the pair, as she was admittedly curious as to what was going on—

*SLAP*

Everyone watching froze as Ruby withdrew her hand and began muttering to herself. After a brief pause, the orange haired girl reacted.

"You just assaulted me." She spoke in a low tone, tentatively shifting into a combat stance. "Under Section C Article Twelve of Valean Law for Huntsman Academies, I have legal grounds to retaliate."

"Oh, please." Ruby scoffed. "An impromptu internal stability test hardly counts as assault. Plus, you had ample time to object while I was examining your synthetics. Why didn't you?"

The girl hiccuped nervously, glancing around at the curious bystanders out of earshot. "I'm afraid I have no idea what you are talking about."

Ruby clicked her tongue in disapproval. "Language compilers could use some work, too. You already used that exact sentence earlier, try again."

"I-I'm—" The girl stammered.

"Excuse me?" Winter strode up and stood between the two. "Ruby Rose! What is the meaning of this?"

"Calm down. I was just talking to her when I noticed some flaws in her design. Wouldn't it be in your best interests if I gave her a few upgrades?"

Winter looked like she was about to blow a fuse. Suddenly, her sister turned towards her.

"Weiss." She hissed. "It's time for you to go."

"What's going on?" Weiss replied worriedly. This was not how she anticipated things to go. She hadn't seen her sister this upset since—

"Your teammate here has stumbled upon highly classified information. She will be coming with me for questioning." Her expression softened slightly. "Don't worry, she's not in trouble."

Ruby's lips quirked up in barely disguised mirth. "Is that so? In that case, would I be able to meet her creator?"

"Enough out of you!" Winter snapped, before leveling a glare at Weiss.

The heiress quickly backed away, sending a worried glance towards Ruby, who simply flashed a thumbs up. She shook her head and smiled. Classic Ruby. It seemed like nothing could faze the red cloaked girl. She watched as Winter barked a few commands at the AK-200s, and pulled out her Scroll to contact someone before motioning Ruby and the other girl along.

"What's happening?" Weiss whirled around and saw Blake and Pyrrha running up in a hurry.

"There you two are! Where were you?" She hissed. "Actually, never mind. It seems Ruby got herself mixed up with the Atlesian military."

Their eyes became wide as saucers.

""What? How?""

"I didn't get all the details. But it's fine, Winter is with her."

"Your sister?" Pyrrha asked.

"Yeah. Anyways, Ruby didn't seem all that upset about it, so I guess we'll have to wait until she gets back?"

"I suppose so…" Pyrrha trailed off thoughtfully. They seemed distracted, did something else happen while she wasn't looking?

"Hey Weiss." Blake spoke up. "We actually need to talk about something important. It has to do with Ruby."

Penny. Her name was Penny. Ruby had asked if it stood for anything, but apparently the android also had a last name, which she shared with her creator. Unfortunately, that was all the info Ruby managed to squeeze out of her before Winter told her to shut up.

Interestingly enough, they were walking up to Beacon Tower. Winter had initially directed them to the Atlesian flagship, but after learning of the General's whereabouts, they decided to reconvene at the Headmaster's office. A bit odd, given that this was technically an Atlesian affair, and it led Ruby to believe that Ozpin held some amount of influence over the General's decisions. She filed that interesting tidbit away for later as the trio got in the elevator.

The door to his office opened, revealing not only the General and Ozpin, but also Qrow and Glynda. It looked like they were in the middle of a discussion.

"Ah, Miss Rose." Ozpin said. "Thank you for joining us."

She tapped her foot impatiently. "Make it quick. I have important business to attend to."

"The laboratory, yes?" The Headmaster replied, ignoring the shocked look the General sent him. "Don't worry, this won't take long at all. I believe you've heard of General James Ironwood?"

"It's nice to meet you, James." She said, prompting a snort of amusement from Qrow.

"General." Winter corrected.

"...Anyways. If this is about Penny, then I assure you, I can keep a secret. I got caught up in the moment and didn't realize I was dealing with sensitive information back in the courtyard. I'm sorry." Ruby said in as polite a tone she could muster.

Gaining the ire of the military of an entire Kingdom was not on her list of priorities.

"Can we back up for a moment here?" Qrow interrupted. "Just what exactly is this 'secret' that was big enough to piss off the Ice Queen here?"

Winter remained silent, and glared at the drunkard.

"Normally, that would be classified, Qrow." The General responded. "But everyone in this room either already knows, or can be trusted with this information."

"First, though." He turned to Ruby with clenched fists. "I want to know how exactly you found out about Project P.E.N.N.Y, and why you decided to confront her in public."

"Umm…"

She shifted awkwardly. The Eternal had a sinking feeling he wouldn't like her answer. Better to take this slowly.

"There's a… specific tell in her movements. The way the landing ramp jolted when she got off the airship exposed her unusual weight distribution, which is what first tipped me off. After that, I started looking a bit more closely at the way she moved."

"You found out by the way she moved? You can't be serious." The General replied.

She shrugged. "It's a skill I picked up back in the day. But I couldn't definitively say she was an Android until I got closer."

Penny hiccuped nervously. A soft gasp escaped Glynda's lips at the sudden reveal, and Ozpin merely raised an eyebrow at Qrow, who shrugged and went back to drinking.

"Are you saying you ran into her on purpose?" Winter asked incredulously.

"No, that was an accident. I was trying to get to my lab." Ruby gave Ozpin a pointed stare. "Still trying, by the way."

Ozpin barely hid his smile. "Please continue, Miss Rose."

She sighed. "Once I, um, made contact with her, I confirmed my suspicions. My actions from there were just out of curiosity. Are we done here?"

She looked around expectantly. The Atlesians in the room were varying from aghast to incredulous. Glynda and Qrow looked about as lost as one might expect, and Ozpin had a look of mirth in his eyes, like he'd just caught one of his students breaking curfew.

"I believe we are—"

"Not so fast." Ironwood cut in. "You just happened to run into her by accident? You 'just knew' from making contact with her?"

He began pacing in front of her, arms crossed behind his back. "Glynda, I want you to shake hands with Penny. Tell me what you feel."

After a bit of hesitation, the combat instructor awkwardly shook hands with the android girl, before making a face.

"I didn't feel anything out of the ordinary. If you hadn't told me beforehand, I would have assumed she was a real girl."

No one noticed Penny cringe slightly.

"As you can see." Ironwood continued with a hint of pride in his voice. "Penny's synthetics are state-of-the-art. There's no way you could have made such a leap in logic from one brief meeting with her. Tell us the truth!"

Ugh. Her patience was wearing thin. Ironic for an Eternal, she knew, but she couldn't help herself. The conversation was going nowhere.

"State-of-the-art for you, maybe." She sneered. "I could build better synthetics blindfolded and missing both arms."

Spinning on her heel, she turned and made her way back to the elevator door. "I've said my piece, and I promise I won't leak this to anyone. We're done here."

"You—"

"James." Ozpin's stern voice cut through.

"Four months!" The General exploded as the elevator doors began closing. "A whole semester and you still don't—"

The doors slammed shut.

...Huh, what was that about? It hit her as the elevator hit the bottom floor. Ozpin just let her get away scot-free once again, even at the risk of pissing off one of his allies. Why?

Ruby stepped off the elevator and paused. Maybe going to her lab could wait. Maybe checking to see if she had the resources to rebuild her body could wait. Maybe upgrading her Shapeshifter's Mask to function beyond just a cosmetic change could wait.

Maybe it was time for a little bit of extra research.

"Ruby is trustworthy." Ozpin stated plainly. "I won't have you challenging the integrity of my students, James."

A sudden ding cut through the tense atmosphere. That was odd. He didn't recall sending for someone else. The elevator doors opened to reveal…

Nothing.

"Hardware malfunction?" Qrow supplied.

Hmm. Well, maybe if he salvages this situation, James would be willing to lend him a technician. Their budget was already shot with the creation of Ruby's lab after all.

"So, what do you think?" Yang asked.

"I don't know…" Pyrrha began. "It doesn't feel right digging into Ruby's personal life like this. Isn't this an invasion of privacy?"

"What I'm more worried about," Blake added. "Is where to even begin. While I do agree with some of the points you've made, we've been teammates for an entire semester now, and I honestly don't know where to start in terms of an actual investigation."

Yang grinned. "Well, that's why I called you all here."

"After all, seven heads are better than one!"

"Report."

"Most of these kids are run-of-the-mill Huntsmen." Mercury began. "Nothin' special. But we did get a few names."

"All in a few short hours? Do tell."

"The Invincible Girl, the Schnee heiress, Qrow Branwen's niece—oh, there's one that's really interesting. A girl named Ruby Rose."

"Go on."

"Never heard of her, right? Well, neither has anyone else. Despite that, there are rumors that she was accepted personally by the Headmaster before the year even started."

"...How interesting."

"I talked to some of the other first years about her abilities. Apparently, she got called on for combat class on the first day, completely trounced some schmuck unarmed, and hasn't fought since. Whenever anyone tries to challenge her, she declines, and the combat instructor never forces her to do anything."

"Such favoritism. It seems Ozpin is losing his touch."

A small spiral of flame appeared in Cinder's palm. She let it burn for a moment, before crushing it. So, Ozpin wanted to put all of his pieces on display?

She couldn't wait to watch them all burn.

A/N: Making a small change to the author's notes. I'm going to try to keep my thoughts centered on the chapter itself, rather than tidbits about my personal life or what to expect in future chapters. So no, I'm not going to elaborate on where I've been in the past month or so.

And on that note...

If you're familiar with the RWBY timeline you might have noticed that I completely skipped over most of Volume 1 with this chapter, as well as kind of merging bits of V2 and V3.

For the former, it's primarily because Jaundice would have been basically the same song and dance, and Black and White is, to put it frankly, a bit unpleasant. To elaborate: I really didn't want to write Weiss in the way she's portrayed during V1C15. Yes, writing racism makes me uncomfortable, feel free to laugh. I felt I could reasonably skip over it without having it affect the story too much. Just assume Weiss's V2 characterization was always there.

The latter is a bit of a butterfly effect. Ironwood hears they found another Maiden, he brings even more forces than before, including Winter and Penny.

Constructive criticism is welcome. Seriously, if I ever go off the rails with this story, let me know. Thanks for reading!