Was talking about this idea with a friend last night, and naturally, since I have finals coming up and I'm failing two classes and I hate myself, it wouldn't leave me alone until I wrote it down. This is set at the end of volume 4 with some canon divergences. Content warnings for major character injury, mentions of alcohol, and eye trauma. Enjoy!
Why is this guy attacking them? What does he want with her? Why and how is Qrow here? And if their attacker isn't working for Cinder, then who is he working for?
Ruby's head is spinning with questions, but there's no time right now to ask any of them. There's no room for anything right now besides fighting for their lives.
The faunus laughs again, and Ruby grits her teeth. His crazy shrieking laughter is starting to grate on her nerves. And really, Qrow expects her to just sit back and watch while he and her friends fight for their lives? Not on her watch.
Still, she tries to keep her distance, taking shots and sniping wherever she can, making use of any openings she can find, and flinching whenever one of her friends take a hit. But then, she sees an opportunity, a weakness, and even though she's supposed to staying out of reach, she acts.
Vanishing in a blur of rose petals, Ruby zooms away from her vantage point on top of one of the abandoned houses, and re-materializes almost within arm's reach of their opponent. As soon as she's able to, she takes her shot—and hits her target dead on. His tail falls to the ground with a few drops of blood, and Ruby allows herself a glimmer of satisfaction as Tyrian freezes, letting out a shriek of rage and pain. There, that should do it.
Faster than she can even think, though, he twists around and lunges for her. Before she can even think of fighting back, or using her semblance to get out of the way, the left side of her head explodes with pain. She falls to her knees, screaming, and her hands fly up to clutch at her face.
"An eye for an eye," Tyrian chuckles, before . . . turning to walk away?
She feels blood trickling between her fingers and lets out a sob, but crying only makes the pain worse. There's a rush of noise as her name is shouted and panicked footsteps rush to her side. A pair of hands on her arms shakes her gently and a deep voice that sounds like her uncle is barking orders. Ruby finds herself drifting despite the commotion, wanting to get away from the pain.
It feels like she drifts in the darkness for a long time.
When she wakes up, she's covered in soft blankets, and the surface she's laying on is too comfortable to be a sleeping bag in the middle of a forest. Opening her eyes, she finds herself in a bed in a cozy-looking room. The windows are open, letting a breeze drift in with the sunlight. She can hear people outside. It sounds like they're in a fairly big city. Judging by the bright skies outside, it's daytime, but that doesn't help her figure out how much time has passed, or where she is, or what happened. Something about the room seems off, too, strange, almost like there's something wrong with her eyes.
Pushing herself to sit up, Ruby spots her uncle sitting in a chair next to her bed, slumped over and sound asleep. Her body feels stiff and sore and she groans. Qrow's eyes fly open at the noise. "Hey," she says, clearing her throat when her voice comes out as a croak.
"Hey yourself, sleeping beauty," Qrow replies, smiling tiredly. He looks like he hasn't slept for a couple of days. "Good to see that you're finally awake."
His comment does not ease any of her worries. "How long was I out? What happened? Are the others okay? Where are we?"
"We're in Mistral, to answer your last question. As for the others, they're okay. They're here in the house, resting up."
"So we made it," she breathes a sigh of relief. "How did we get here? What happened—" She cuts herself off as she tries to scrub at her face, only for her left hand to catch on a carefully wrapped bandage. "What?"
"Hang on a second." Qrow strides over to a small door that must lead to the bathroom. He comes back over with a small hand mirror and holds it out in her direction. She takes it automatically, face scrunching in confusion. "This might be easier to explain if you can just see for yourself. They said you can take the bandages off, by the way."
So Ruby slowly begins to unwind the bandages from the left side of her face as Qrow talks. "Tyrian fled, and we managed to stop the bleeding, but infection set in pretty quickly. We booked it out of there as fast as we could, and by some miracle we managed to get picked up a couple of airships passing through the area. They rushed us here and they were able to treat the infection, but." He trails off as Ruby finishes unwrapping the bandages and sets them to the side, gesturing for her to look in the mirror.
"Uncle Qrow, what—" The girl that stares back at her in the mirror looks just like her, but there's a jagged scar where her left eye should be. Ruby feels numb. "Oh." She brings a hand up to touch her face, carefully brushing her fingers over the scarred skin. Her reflection copies her. This isn't a dream, then.
"I'm sorry, kiddo. If I'd gotten to you sooner, or realized that Tyrian was after you before he attacked, then maybe I could have prevented this."
Ruby forces herself to snap out of her troubled thoughts. "Uncle Qrow, that's enough. This isn't your fault. I knew the risks of what I was doing when I set out on this trip." She tries for a reassuring smile. Judging by his expression, it comes off as more of a grimace. "Although I do want to know, why were you following us? If we were all traveling to the same place, why not just travel with us?"
"That's actually what I've been wanting to talk to you about. You and your friends. I'm afraid it's a bit of a long story though, so I'd rather only tell it once." He sighs, getting to his feet and running a hand through his messy hair. "I know you're probably still exhausted, but how does getting breakfast sound? I'm sure that everyone will be glad to see that you're awake, and we can talk about it over some food."
"Breakfast sounds great," Ruby replies. "But, is it even still morning anymore?"
"Eh, it's the first meal of the day, so it's breakfast. I'll leave you to get ready, let the others know that you're up. I hear that Ren makes good pancakes."
"He makes the best pancakes. I'll see you in a little bit!"
It takes her a little longer than usual to get ready. She finds her gear easily enough in the closet, and slips it on without too much trouble. She'll have to thank whoever cleaned it for her. Her legs are a little shaky, though, and she feels off-kilter and clumsy in her movements. As she brushes her hair and splashes some water on her face, she keeps finding her eyes (eye) drawn to the scar over her left eye in the mirror.
She runs her hands through her bangs and arranges them carefully so that they cover where her left eye should be. Problem solved. Out of sight, out of mind.
With a deep sigh, she braces herself to head out of the room and face everyone. She finds herself glancing to the left frequently as she makes her way through the hall and down the stairs, turning her head to make up for her new lack of sight on that side.
"Ruby!" She hears Nora squeal as soon as her foot hits the bottom step. The redhead rushes over to hug her, almost knocking her over. "I'm so glad that you're okay!"
"It's good to see that you're awake, Ruby," Jaune says, stepping forwards to hug her when Nora finally releases her.
"Indeed," Ren nods and hands her a plate of pancakes. "Why don't you have a seat? We've all been very worried."
"I knew she would be fine," Jaune insists.
"You should have seen him pacing!" Nora exclaims, bouncing over to sit on the couch next to Ruby.
"So, what happened while I was out?" Ruby asks, taking another mouthful of pancakes.
Jaune and Nora take turns on filling her in. They tell her about rushing to Mistral after she was injured, splitting up, and fighting the Nuckelvee. Surprisingly, Ren insists on chiming in for the last part.
"And then the airships found us, and brough us here!" Nora finishes her story with a dramatic flourish. They fall into a shared silence.
"Where did my uncle go?" Ruby asks, glancing around to make sure that he's not hiding in the corner or something. "I thought he wanted to talk to us about something."
"I think he said he was going to refill his flask, something to do with not doing this sober?" Jaune shakes his head.
"Of course," Ruby sighs.
"So, Ruby, I'm thinking you should get an eyepatch!"
Ruby isn't following. "Nora, what are you talking about?"
"You know, for your eye!" Nora says, gesturing to Ruby's face. "You could be like a pirate!"
"Oh. Yeah." Ruby swallows hard against the sudden lump in her throat. "I'll keep that in mind."
Nora pumps her fist in the air with a victorious grin, but fortunately Qrow interrupts before she can ask any more questions.
"It's way too early for you kids to be this loud."
Ren blinks. "It's—" He checks the clock hanging on the wall. "2:30 in the afternoon."
"Uncle Qrow, didn't you say that you had something to tell us?"
"Yeah, yeah." He takes his seat in the armchair across from them, taking a swig from his flask and looking at them warily. "Tell me, what's your favorite fairy tale?"
Thank you for reading! Please leave a review if you liked it.
This is definitely going to have a few more parts in the future. I don't plan on doing a rewrite of all of canon, because I do not have the time or energy for that, so it'll just be occasional little scenes whenever inspiration strikes. I'm already planning on doing them going to Haven for the first time, and I definitely plan on writing a Ruby and Yang reunion scene, but from there, who knows? Also, I shouldn't have to say this, but this fic is not meant to be medically accurate. I did a bit of googling when I was writing this last night, but as a first year med student I'm begging y'all not to take medical advice from fanfiction.