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Previously on Paradigm of the Rose:
Within the span of three days, team RWBY had become acquainted with seven different alternate-universe copies of Ruby Rose. In between all of the confusion and chaos, they finally learned why all of this was happening in the first place: all of space and time is being threatened, and the only way to save it is to help three of the AU-Rubys (Rose, Red, and Sapphire) become strong enough to survive their ordeals.
They only have two weeks to get ready, and the consequences of losing are dire indeed…
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The laughter of the children echoed down the hillside to where the mother and child sat on the front porch of the house. The single-floor cabin wasn't very big – but for a family like Ruby's, it was just right.
The young girl was trying hard to keep her tears from falling, but little by little her face became rather damp. She'd scraped her knee on a rock. It hurt. Oh it hurt so bad. Her tail was swishing the wood behind her and her ears were flat against her head in agony.
But she couldn't let herself cry. She was a Big Girl.
"You're so brave, little one…" her mama said comfortingly. Her purring voice was soft and gentle. Soothing. "The other kids would have been mewling their little eyes out by now." She said with a smile. She was currently rubbing an ointment on the scrape, the kind that stung like the bite of a hornet. And she didn't care what Big Sis said – hornets bite, darn it.
This was home. Here, she was simply called Ruby. It would be some time before she went to the place where they called her Cherry.
Mama's long tail swayed side-to-side as she started saying, "Now Ruby, when you go back up there…"
"I'm not going back up there! *sniff* Sammy pushed me! Big meanie-head…" *sniff* She whined, the tears falling a bit more freely now.
The woman looked at her with the calm assurance of an experienced mother. And she was, too – little Ruby had no less than five brothers and sisters. It was a good-sized litter. "I'm sure it was an accident, Ruby. You and Sammy are good friends. If he says sorry…" Mama turned Ruby's face up to hers, their silver eyes locked onto each other, and said, "Would you please forgive him?"
Ruby looked for a minute longer, sniffed, and muttered, "…Okay, mama."
The woman burst into a smile bright enough to make the sun jealous. She gripped the child in a big hug and beamed, "Ooh, you're my favorite Ruby!"
The child squeaked in protest, saying, "Mamaaaaa~ …I'm your only Ruby!"
They parted from the hug and Mama gave her a wet razzberry. The child gave it right back. Both were grinning.
Then the tickling began. Mama's longer arms proved invaluable for reaching her child's weak spots. No amount of squirming would allow her to escape her fate. The tears that fell now came bundled with huffs of laughter. The final blow came by way of a vicious belly-fart to the girl's midsection, prompting a happy squeal from the poor child.
The pair laughed merrily, matching the sounds still floating their way on the fading breeze. Overhead, a lone gray cloud drifted by on it's way to nowhere in particular.
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Chapter 7:
Cat's Eye
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10:00 AM, Wednesday
Beacon Academy South Courtyard, The Gardens
(Morning of Day 2)
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She liked it out here. Nice and sunny, and no one around to bother her.
The young catgirl was currently curled up in a ball under the shade of a large oak tree, dozing peacefully. Low purrs made their way out of her throat every few minutes. Her tail lay still around her feet. Warm drops of sunshine danced across her face as the light fell through the treetops. A single leaf landed on one of her large cat-like ears and was absently flicked away.
Cherry was happy.
She was wearing what she had on when she first came to this new world, a simple black tunic (that looked just like Big Sister's clothes) and a red cape her Mama had given her a few months ago. Her shoes were still okay, but she would soon grow out of them and need new ones.
Her ears twitched to one side – a noise had woken her up. A cry of pain and a coarse laugh. Cherry cracked open her eyes and examined the source.
Across the empty plaza stood five of the Tall Ones. Four of them were guys that smelled of the Bad – people who enjoyed being mean. Cherry had always made a point to keep away from the Bad whenever she could. They were never nice and would always pull on ears, or tails, or anything else they could grab. Bunch of meanie-heads, they were.
The other one smelled of old paper and green tea. She had bunny ears sticking out of her head. Cherry thought she was similar to another girl she knew back home, but the smell was a bit different. She also seemed to be in pain. The Bad ones were pulling her ears and laughing.
Cherry's tail began to twitch in irritation.
Mama had always told her that there were two kinds of people who laughed like that – the good kind, where everyone was laughing together, and the bad kind, where everyone else was laughing at the one who was crying. She hated to see it. She knew Big Sis would hate it, too… and so Cherry did what she had always been told not to do in times like this.
She got involved.
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Velvet Scarlatina was a bit weary. Nothing was going the way it was supposed to these days.
Her team's troubles seemed to have started with that mission they finally finished …right before The Breach happened (which was yet another problem). Then to make matters worse, the higher-ups went and postponed the Vytal Festival Tournament! What a bummer.
On the plus side, that gave them a bit of time to rest. Also, Amity Stadium would be docked nearby for the time being, giving the citizens of Vale something to look forward to.
While the postponement would give them another two weeks or so of standard festival activities (which were always welcome), it would also mean an additional two weeks of giant airships in the skies over the city. The Atlas Military had been deployed to Vale for the festival, but now that the tournament was postponed… well, they'd be stuck in the shadow of war machines for that much longer.
The faunus was not looking forward to the delay. But at least it gave her a chance to take more pictures.
Among the student population of Beacon Academy, only about 8-10% were faunus (and that was probably a generous estimate). Half of those faunus were the hardest workers in the school – they were the kind who would rather take away any excuse to be ridiculed with their own hands. The other half were the wall flowers, the quiet ones who preferred to simply keep to themselves. Velvet was one of them. It was true that the members of her team were working hard to get her to come out of her shell, but she was a tough nut to crack. She had to be. When you grow up with a target on your back, sometimes that's your only defense.
Just to be clear, Velvet didn't hate anybody. She was too nice for that. But Cardin Winchester came really, really close.
For one thing, wasn't he supposed to give her at least some respect? She was a second-year, and senior over both him and the rest of his team. So what if she wasn't a team leader like he was? So what if she was a faunus and he was a human? That shouldn't matter. It was a fact that all four of these boys loved nothing more than driving her crazy. Was it any wonder that she preferred to be by herself? Sheesh.
Which made it all the worse whenever they cornered her like this. And they always seemed to know when she was too far away from Yatsuhashi and the others to call for help. They wouldn't dare do this if Coco was nearby.
They were pulling on her ears again. She hated when they did that. They had only been reprimanded once for the act, and only because they'd pulled hard enough to cause physical damage at the base of the ears. They got quite the scolding from the school nurse and promised to never do it again. Naturally, what they meant was they'd never get caught again. Buncha' jerks.
In the midst of her torment, Velvet suddenly heard a scampering noise, followed by a cry of pain from Dove Bronzewing. He was standing furthest out from the group.
Everyone turned to find a tiny version of Ruby Rose, the captain of the first-year team RWBY, latched onto the boy's leg and biting it, growling angrily. She also had cat ears and a tail for some reason – the ears were flat and the tail was lashing about. She reminded Velvet of a pissed off tabby cat.
Dove shook her loose and tried to kick her, but she dodged nimbly and darted around to Russell Thrush. The small girl leapt up and drove her head into his midsection hard, knocking the wind out of him and sending him stumbling backwards. Sky Lark stepped up next, giving an angry cry of, "…Little shit!" as he took a swing at the child – only for the catgirl to duck around his fist and sink her nails into his forearm like claws. He yelped in surprise and pain.
With three of the four dealt with, the small child hopped over to where Velvet was standing and took a ready stance, growling lightly. Her ears were flat against her head and her tail was fluffed up to twice it's normal thickness, flicking rapidly. Challenging them to try and get past her.
Velvet was almost startled enough to run away. Almost.
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Cherry was mad for the first time she could remember.
She knew why, too – the Bad ones were bull-ees (a word she learned from Big Sis Yang). She really didn't like the bull-ees. She knew that the bunny girl needed help and there was no one else coming over to help her. She would have smelled them coming if they were.
The scary part was that she was getting madder. Like she couldn't stop. When she landed in front of the bunny girl, Cherry was only going to scare the Bad Ones off. And if they tried to get closer she'd bite them again.
But then her vision began to fade to red (her favorite color, by the way). She fought back the urge to jump forward and try to bite their necks – and she didn't even want to do that. They probably stank up close. They were saying something to each other, but Cherry couldn't hear it. The blood was pumping in her ears too loudly, leaving the world behind in a dull roar.
And she wanted to bite them. Badly.
It was getting harder to control herself the longer she looked at their big, stupid faces.
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By this point in time Cardin Winchester wasn't feeling too good about himself. First he'd been getting awakened during the night by a bunch of loud noises, losing a fair amount of sleep as a result. Then he'd had a run-in with some army chick who treated him like a worthless insect (and he threatened to contact that general dude and get her in trouble if she didn't leave him alone). And now, in the middle of messing with the animal, another one jumps in. Not only that, but the rest of his team can't even touch it!
"Hey… look at her eyes, man! Kid's freaking out, man!" Dove's sage comment pulled the rest of the team's attention to the small girl standing between them and the faunus chick. At first there was nothing but the eerily familiar silver color they'd all seen before.
Then, for just a moment, the eyes turned blood-red. And the kid was looking even more pissed than before.
Cardin finally decided to try and save face. "Buncha losers is what y'all are… whipped by a damn squirt." He tried to remain as calm as possible, but anyone with eyes could see the sweat breaking out on his brow. He was scared, too. "We got some trainin' to do, losers. I'm not puttin' up with a team that can't handle a little pussycat!" He spat the last word for emphasis.
His next few words caught in his throat as he glanced at the little beast – because it appeared to be having convulsions of some kind. Hard spasms in her arms and legs. Her face was tight with teeth bared, a look of someone putting a lot of effort into something (he would have said she looked like she was taking a shit, but this was not a good time to joke). It looked like her little fangs were longer than before, too. The taller boy would later swear he felt a real killing intent at that moment.
Was Cardin seeing things… or was this kid… changing?
"Time to go, morons! Sparring center! Now!" He quickly said to his squad, doing an admirable job of keeping the trembling out of his voice. He turned back to Velvet and said, as cool as can be, "We'll see you later. Have fun with your little doggie!" And then team CRDL was gone.
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Velvet watched the dust cloud rising from their hasty retreat with growing contempt. What the heck was his problem, anyway?
She then realized that the anger and tension in her immediate vicinity had suddenly vanished. The kid just sat right down on her little rump in the middle of the plaza, now with her arms crossed and all the anger drained out of her body. Her expression dripped with disgust, her bottom lip stuck out half an inch. She was sulking.
"Cherry's not a doggie…" she pouted. Her ears were low on her head again, this time in sorrow. Her tail was tucked tightly against her side. "Big meanie-heads…"
Velvet couldn't help but chuckle at how cute she was.
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Cherry was now sitting next to the paper-and-tea-smelling bunny girl (she said her name was Vel-vet) on a bench near the spot she was napping at earlier. The taller girl talked a bit funny, but the child had no trouble understanding her words (most of them, anyway). Instead she was taken in by the smells.
And there were so many! Other than Vel-vet's two main smells, Cherry found herself discovering dozens of new ones just underneath. She found three types of chocolate, a rich cake of some kind, large amounts of herbs, a few flowers, a hint of coffee (a smell Cherry was quite familiar with by this point), and other, less pleasant smells. Oil and metal. Body sweat. A hint of blood. It became a bit unpleasant but the girl kept sniffing anyway, like she was looking for buried treasure.
"Um… are you okay?" She said are like ah. Vel-vet seemed a bit uncomfortable. She did have a strange child sniffing her after all.
The kid stopped, sat back on her heels and smiled. "Cherry," the girl said proudly. Vel-vet only blinked. She tried again, placing a hand on her chest to make it clearer, "Cherry."
"Ah, okay… that's your name. I like it. It's cute." The faunus grinned brightly and gave Cherry a light scratching between her ears. The child purred in gratitude.
They sat together for a few more minutes, but then something in Vel-vet's pocket beeped, a shrill sound that made Cherry's ears ache. She pulled out her glow-box (why did everyone have one of those?) and looked at it for a bit. She stood up and began to walk away, then turned back to say something… but stopped once she saw the girl had gotten up to follow her.
"Oh… Are you gonna come with me, little one?" She said with a grin.
Cherry nodded, her body swaying under the weight of her head. "Yep. I'm gonna keep Big Sister Vel-vet safe from the big Meanie-heads!" She pumped one little fist into the air to drive the point home. "I'll fight 'em off for you!"
Vel-vet made the same squee noise the others usually did when she said more than a few words (and sometimes when she said nothing at all, leaving her quite confused). But she didn't reject Cherry's offer, and the two of them made their way back inside the main building. Cherry grabbed Vel-vet's hand before they got too far, though – her short legs were bad at letting her keep up with the Tall Ones.
During their short walk, the school's PA system kicked on with a man's voice saying, "Mister Winchester, please report to my office… immediately."
Vel-vet muttered a short, "Uh-oh…" as they continued. She sounded worried.
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They soon met up with three other Tall Ones – all of whom smelled even more like desserts to Cherry – and made their way to the main courtyard. The newer girl practically reeked of coffee. Cherry wrinkled her nose when she first approached Coco Adel, the teenager in brown.
"And who is this adorable little thing, Velvet?" She had cooed upon first seeing them, peeking over her designer sunglasses. "Ooh, …I just wanna eat her up!"
Cherry squeaked and ducked behind Vel-vet's leg, giving coffee-girl a look of open suspicion. The other two Tall Ones, both guys, simply shook their heads in exasperation. They've clearly had to deal with her before.
"Her name is Cherry and she's just following me around for a bit," the faunus said as she reached back and patted Cherry's head lightly. "She's gonna 'protect me from the big Meanie-heads,' is what she said." Vel-vet couldn't help but grin when she used the girl's own words.
The tallest boy, who smelled of bitter tea and body odor, said, "Team CRDL again?" Cherry liked his voice. It was nice in her ears. If there was one thing Yatsuhashi Daichi was not known for, it was his conversation skills. He was that quiet.
Vel-vet nodded grimly, her smiled faded. "Yeah. They just can't leave me alone anymore." Can't came out as con't. Cherry blinked as she processed the word.
"So she scared them off?" the other boy asked with a touch of shock. He was shorter and his eyes were a bit weird, but Cherry didn't mind. He smelled like things Cherry hadn't smelled before, and she was a bit curious to know what they were…
"Yep, she got all mad and started biting them. They looked like they were gonna wet their pants- ...oh, uh, don't mind her, Fox. She did that to me a lot, too." Vel-vet smiled apologetically. The little catgirl was leaning close to the boy and sniffed for several awkward moments. Fox Alistair seemed to be at a loss for what to do.
"You smell funny…" Cherry said very matter-of-factly. It was an honest opinion and she meant it to be totally normal. The girl was understandably confused when three of the Tall Ones began 'laughing their heads off,' as Big Sis would have said. She wasn't trying to be funny …but the Tall Ones were just strange like that.
She didn't mind, though. They liked her enough to give her scratches between the ears, so she put up with them.
She liked getting scratches between the ears.
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The coffee-smelling girl had gone to the city, part of a small group called out by the one called Carmine (who Cherry thought smelled like sour water). It had something to do with assigning some of the Ruby Squad to a few of the teams. Rose (the one who smelled like poop all the time) and Red (the boy who smelled like fear and cheap body spray) were there as well. Cherry was asked if she wanted to go, but it was noisy in the city. She liked it here instead.
Cherry got to hang out with Vel-vet for the day as a result, which was great. The other, taller boys had gone off to 'stud-ee' for awhile, leaving them to hang out on their own. Cherry liked sitting in Vel-vet's lap.
The child had known a bunnygirl back home just like Vel-vet. Caiti was her name. She liked to write little stories and tell them to all the kids of the village. Cherry loved the stories, they were funny and made her laugh. She missed Caiti. She then realized that now she had a story for Caiti when she got home. She was looking forward to that.
But right now Cherry had a job to do. She was a Big Girl, after all.
First they went to a giant room with big long tables. Vel-vet got a sandwich for them to share called a 'pee-bee-en-jay.' It was salty and sweet but made Cherry's teeth all sticky. Her attempts at cleaning her face off were met with more squee noises.
On their way to the next room, Vel-vet and Cherry saw the big Bad One walking down the hallway towards them. Vel-vet moved them to the edge of the walkway to let him pass, the child holding her hand and giving the boy her best glare. Cardin didn't even see them. He just walked along, his face downcast and staring at the floor.
As he passed, Cherry smelled something odd coming from Vel-vet… but she didn't know what it was. She looked up and found the bunny girl staring after him with a look that was almost… sorry. Like she didn't want him to get in trouble.
Remember, Velvet didn't hate anybody.
Eventually the pair found themselves in a large room full of dust and paper. That was all Cherry smelled, anyway. There were shelves that seemed to stretch miles into the air – but Vel-vet reached the tops with relative ease. She was gathering books. Cherry held some for her, but the dust on some of them leapt into her nose. She had to put the books down to sneeze it all out. She could hear more squee noises between sneezes and wondered why everyone did that all the time. It was almost like some kind of greeting to these people.
On their way out Cherry let loose one more sneeze, this time falling on her bottom with a little grunt when she did so. Nearly the entire room squee'd behind her.
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Several hours had passed by now and the pair found themselves back in the south courtyard where they first met. Sitting on that same bench, too. Vel-vet was reading one of her big books and looked very interested in it. It was amazing how anyone could read such a big book that didn't have one single picture in it.
Cherry was tired. After taking one last sniff to make sure no one was coming (all was clear, she proudly decided), Cherry adjusted herself on the bench next to Vel-vet and laid down, placing her head on her folded arms and tucking her tail around her feet.
The taller girl's hand absently went to the place between Cherry's ears and began rubbing it, causing no small amount of pleasure in the young catgirl. Cherry squirmed on the bench, trying to get into a better position for more rubbing. Her purring was loud enough that anyone who passed would have clearly heard it, but no one did.
Since her eyes were closed, Cherry didn't notice that Vel-vet had closed her book in order to give the child her full attention. The rubbing became more focused, more intense. The catgirl squirmed more, loving every second of it.
Eventually Cherry put her head on Vel-vet's lap, hoping for more. She was not disappointed.
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This kid was more like an actual cat than a faunus. Of that, Velvet was now certain.
It was mainly the way the child acted like a cat, shamelessly growling and hissing at the boys of team CRDL if they passed by (which Velvet did not mind at all), as well as the little mannerisms the girl was probably totally unaware of. She would occasionally rub her ears with her hand in a paw shape, for example. That little cat-sneeze fit she had in the library was completely adorable, too – and it looked like everyone else agreed. If they weren't all busy studying she figured the kid would have been crushed by their hugs. Heck, that's what she wanted to do, too.
All in all, this was probably the most peaceful day Velvet had experienced in a long time. And it wasn't just being protected from the 'big meanie-heads' – she felt like she was bonding with this catgirl version of Ruby Rose, a human girl she hadn't had much interaction with, to be honest. Velvet made a mental note to try and make Rubys acquaintance someday. If she was anything like this little furball, then she figured they'd get along just fine.
The faunus also spared a thought for Cardin Winchester, a boy whose future was less than certain at the moment. Velvet heard the announcement just like everyone else, but she had a more …personal connection to the events that prompted it. The look of shock on Cardin's face made Velvet wonder just what kind of punishment he'd been handed. The bunny girl grinned a half-grin as she realized something – if anyone knew that she actually felt sorry for the young man, they'd probably flip out. She really didn't hate him, despite having lots of reason to.
In truth, Velvet didn't want to know what happened to Cardin. She'd probably lose sleep out of guilt.
The purring brought her back to reality. Velvet had never considered owning any kind of pet (it's a faunus thing), but with little Cherry following her around like this, she felt like she had her very own kittycat. This kid was just too cute for words. Not once during the day today did Velvet think to ask where this kid had come from. Neither did she meet any other members of the Ruby Squad – that wouldn't happen until tomorrow when all of team CFVY would finally meet Rose.
And now, sitting on the same old bench from earlier in the day, little Cherry was demanding some lovin' …in this case, scratches between her large kitty ears. Velvet was more than happy to oblige.
The faunus' self-control was tested to it's limits when the girl practically climbed into her lap, purring all the way. Damn it… she really wanted to snuggle the living crap out of this kid… it was almost unfair.
Slowly but surely Cherry fell asleep on Velvet's lap, giving a soft and constant purr like a running motor. The taller girl smiled warmly and gently picked her book back up to continue reading.
And at this moment, there was nowhere else she'd rather be.
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It was 3:35 in the afternoon when Velvet's thoughts were interrupted by a deep, soul-crushing chill that swept over her all at once, causing the faunus to give a violent shiver. Cherry's purring stopped at that same instant and she gave a sad little mewling sound. To Velvet it sounded like the girl was crying. So she felt it too, it seemed.
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…Just what the hell was that?
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Meet the Rubys:
Name: Cherry
Age: around 7
Home World: Remnant-2208
Description: Very short, with large cat-like ears and a tail with deep red fur that matches her hair. Size of a young child. No weapon.
Last but not least, we have little Cherry (she was originally going to be called Strawberry, but this worked better). Cherry is love. Cherry is life. :3
=^w^=