Notice Me, Ruby!

Chapter 20: The Kraken

Ruby's body was getting slammed against the walls around her, as she was being dragged away by the snake Grimm that had her in it's jaws. The redhead was desperately trying to get a hold of her weapon, as she could possibly use it to break out of the hold she was in. Unfortunately, the jaws that were closed around her were holding her tightly, so even the tiniest of movements required all of her strength.

With all of the strength and effort she could muster up, Ruby was finally able to reach her beloved Crescent Rose. Once she did this, she was able to open up her weapon and break free from the Grimm's hold, as well as decapitate the monster in the process.

However, much to the scythe-wielder's surprise, the creature didn't seem to die, as it's body still retreated back where it had come from. Ruby didn't know why this was, but she wasn't about to find out, as she wasn't about to face this beast on her own. Considering how dangerous this thing was, she would need at least the help of team LION in order to take it on.

The sniper was about to use her Semblance again and run back to her comrades, when the wall next to her was suddenly destroyed. Despite all the dust and debris that was in front of her, Ruby was able to see what had caused the destruction. It was the same Grimm she had killed before, except it still had it's head. Before the redhead could properly defend herself, the monster used it's body like a whip to hit her, sending her flying backwards the way she was being taken previously.

With a painful thud, Ruby landed on the floor while coughing. She slowly got up and looked behind her to see a sight that made her blood run cold.

Behind the young team leader was what seemed like a gigantic round pool with water running down in several directions from it. And in the middle of the pool was the biggest Grimm she had ever seen in her entire life.

The massive monster resembled an octopus. It's main body was massive, almost taking up the entire pool. The Grimm's body was covered by the bone plating that all Grimm had in a shape similar to that of a human skull, except this one had three rows of spikes on it. One row went down the middle of it's face, while the two other rows were on the sides of it's face. The beast also had multiple eyes, six in total, with the biggest ones being located where a human's eyes would be, and the two smaller eyes were above the big ones. And those snake creatures Ruby and team LION had faced were actually the Grimm's tentacles, most likely used to get around the temple to catch prey and bring to main body as food.

Despite facing this massive monster on her own, Ruby still stood her ground, tightly holding her scythe in her hands. She knew that her only chance at getting out of here alive was to fight, since the Grimm would just send out it's tentacles to catch her, if she tried to run away. However, the main reason the scythe-wielder was willing to face down the beast was because of team LION. If she ran away, her third-year friends might become it's next targets. Ruby was willing to put her life on the line, if it meant that her friends would be able to escape safely.

"Alright, big guy," Ruby said as she readied her stance. "Let's dance."

Almost as if answering to the redhead's taunt, the giant Grimm tried to strike at her with it's tentacles. Thanks to her speed, Ruby was able to easily avoid the attacks and cut off the heads on the tentacles. The monstrous Grimm roared from pain and anger, as the severed heads of it's tentacles fell down. Ruby's plan was to keep her distance for now and to weaken the beast by taking off it's limbs. After that, she would either run away or finish the fight, depending on the situation.

However, the red-cloaked girl's plan turned out to not work the way she had hoped, as the Grimm easily grew the heads back to it's tentacles.

"Okay. I didn't see that coming," Ruby mumbled to herself. "Guess this is going to be harder than I thought."

The Grimm tried to attack again, this time by sweeping over the place with one of it's tentacles. The young Huntress was able to jump over the attack, but this was followed by another tentacle coming towards her. Ruby was able to avoid the second attack as well, this time by firing a shot from her weapon. But when a third attack came at her, she wasn't able to get out of it's way and she was smashed against the floor.

The tentacle on top of Ruby rose up, so that the creature could catch her in the jaws of one of it's limbs. The Grimm would have most likely caught it's prey this time, had the redhead not been able to slash at the incoming tentacle with her scythe, pushing it back.

'This is bad... This thing isn't just big and strong, but also pretty smart and fast as well!' Ruby thought to herself as she got up. 'It has clearly learned a lot from fighting fast opponents, since it was able to predict my movements! I hate to say it, but I might not make it out alive from this one...'

The Grimm moved to attack the battered Huntress once again, this time sending out three tentacles at the same time. Ruby grit her teeth and readied herself, only for someone else to take down the tentacles. One was shot with a powerful bullet that blew it into pieces, another one was sliced in half by a stream of water and the last one was crushed under a large rock.

The young redhead looked where the attacks had come from and saw the members of team LION standing there, weapons out and ready for battle.

"Ruby, are you okay!?" Elaine asked the younger girl, before turning her attention back to the Grimm. "LEAVE HER ALONE, YOU UGLY BASTARD!"

The four third-year students all gathered around Ruby, making a protective circle around their young friend. The scythe-wielder stared at her comrades with wide eyes, having not expected them to come to her rescue.

"Why didn't you guys get out of here?" Ruby asked. "With that thing occupied with me, you all could have gotten out of here easily. By coming here, you have all out yourselves in danger."

"Do you even need to ask?" Isabella said with a smirk. "We might be facing a monster that no one has ever defeated, but there's no way we would ever abandon one of our friends. That's not our style."

"It's exactly as Isabella said," Oliver added. "If we were to run away, we could never live with ourselves, knowing that we abandoned you."

Even Nilo gave a confident nod to Ruby, showing her that he agreed with his teammates. Seeing how serious the third-years were about helping her, the young redhead felt confidence run through her body. They might actually be able to make it out of this alive.

"So, what can you tell us about our ugly friend here, Ruby?" Elaine asked, as she aimed her rifle at the Grimm. "What do you think would be the best course of action for taking this thing down?"

"This guy's a really dangerous one. Not only is it strong, but it's also quite fast with it's attacks and it can even predict some of your moves," the younger redhead explained. "Not only that, but those tentacles it has regenerate back after being sliced off."

"So, how do we fight it then?" Isabella asked.

"The best way is to have couple of us attacking it from afar, while our fastest fighters defend them," Ruby answered. "Elaine and Oliver should focus on damaging that thing, Elaine with the use of her rifle and Ollie by using the heaviest pieces of rubble he can get his hands on. Isabella and I will protect them from that thing's attacks. While this is going on, Nilo should use his camouflage to sneak behind the Grimm's blind spots and deal heavy damage with explosives. Does that sound good to you?"

"We're in!" Elaine replied with a grin, before looking at her teammates. "Come on, you three! Let's get this bastard!"

With their strategy set, Ruby and team LION went on to take down the monstrous Grimm. Before everyone broke apart to their positions, Elaine managed to use her Semblance to give everyone a quick boost in power, giving them all a better chance to defeat their enemy.

Elaine backed away from the beast a good amount, as her weapon had a good amount of range in it. After putting enough distance between herself and the Grimm, the third-year team leader began firing her rifle at the monster, causing a good amount of damage to the gigantic octopus' body. While it wasn't anything massive, it was clear that Elaine's bullets were hurting the Grimm, as it roared from the pain the hits caused.

Close to the sniper was Ruby, whose job was to protect Elaine. Whenever the Grimm tried to attack the third-year leader, the scythe-wielder would use her Semblance to slice apart the tentacles, while also taking shots at the creature's actual body with her own rifle. Thanks to this, Elaine was able to focus on damaging the Grimm's actual body with her own attacks.

Meanwhile, Oliver was using his strength to tear chunks of rubble out of the walls and the floor, which he then threw at the Grimm. In order to make things easier for himself, the berserker had even activated his Semblance a bit. It was enough to give himself a boost in strength, but not enough to make him lose control of himself.

Isabella was working with her large teammate by playing the part of protector for him. Thanks to her speed and ability to manipulate water as a means to move around freely, the dark-skinned girl was able to swiftly move around her teammate and use her claws and Semblance to cut apart any tentacles that tried to strike at Oliver.

Last but not least, Nilo had turned himself invisible, allowing him to sneak around the Grimm without being detected. He would look for any chances to place explosives near the monster, before running away to another spot. By doing this, the Grimm was unable to catch the invisible bomber. By the time the octopus tried to get him at the area he had just attacked, Nilo would already be long gone.

The battle went well at first, as the group of Huntsmen and Huntresses were slowly but surely wearing down their opponent. However, it didn't take long until one problem became very clear to everyone in the group. They were starting to run out of strength.

While the Grimm had regenerative powers and seemed to run on almost infinite stamina, the group of Beacon students didn't have any of that. They all could use their Semblances and Aura only as much as they could, before they would become completely defenseless in front of the monster. And once the Huntsmen and Huntresses started to run out of stamina, it became much harder for them to not only fight back, but also to evade the Grimm's attacks.

"Sheesh! How much does it take to kill this thing!?" Elaine said while panting heavily, having exhausted herself from using her Semblance too much. "It's almost like that thing's immortal or something!"

The gigantic octopus seemed to notice the redheaded third-year's plight, as it sent one of it's tentacles towards her in an attempt to catch her. Elaine would have surely been caught as well, had Ruby not managed to save her in time. The younger girl used her Semblance to catch the older girl by the back of her jacket and drag her out of the way of the attack, and then take both of them to a safer distance.

"Okay, that got WAY too close!" Elaine said with wide eyes, thinking about what could have happened to her, had the Grimm caught her. "Thanks for the save, Ruby!"

"A-... A-Any... time..." Ruby barely managed to answer, as she was breathing very heavily now. The scythe-wielder was practically running on the remains of her stamina by now, and she had to lean on her weapon in order to stay up.

Elaine was obviously shocked by the younger girl's condition. Ruby was normally so full of energy even in battle that to see her in such a state was enough to bring chills. Her condition was a clear sign that the battle was not going well for them at all.

'Ruby's barely able to stand up anymore, and I doubt the others are doing any better either!' the older team leader thought, as she looked at her comrades and saw that they weren't doing much better. 'I need to find some way to either end this fight or a way out of here! The problem is that the damn monster can follow us practically anywhere with those tentacles it has. No wonder no one has come out of here alive before. This place is practically a perfect hunting ground for that octopus!'

Seeing as how victory was not likely for them, Elaine decided that they would attempt to escape. With a determined look on her face, she loaded her last clip of ammo, charged the bullets with her Semblance and fired right into the Grimm's eyes. The best roared in pain, as it was momentarily blinded.

"EVERYONE, LISTEN UP!" the sniper yelled, getting the attention of all of her comrades. "RUN TO THE EXIT THAT'S BEHIND ME! WE ARE GOING TO-"

"ELLIE, WATCH OUT!" Ruby yelled, before tackling the older girl out of the way of an incoming tentacle, which destroyed the exit that had been behind them.

The Grimm wasn't done with it's destruction yet, as it began to lash madly with it's limbs at almost every other exit there was. Once it was done, there was only one way out that wasn't completely blocked by rubble, and it was right behind the monster.

"What the-!? Did it understand what we were going to do!?" Elaine asked with wide eyes.

"I guess it makes sense. This thing must be centuries old," Ruby said. "During it's lifetime, it must have encountered numerous people and heard them talking. It has probably learned to notice when it's prey is thinking about escaping."

"DAMMIT! Thanks to that monster realizing what we were going to do, our only way of escape is right behind it!" the older girl cursed. "We're either going to need to kill that thing or somehow incapacitate it in order to-"

A sudden pained scream cut off Elaine. The third-year leader and Ruby turned to see that the Grimm had finally found Nilo. Thanks to his exhaustion, the young boy's Semblance had begun to drop, revealing his location to the monster. Once he was found, the Grimm wasted no time to bring down one of it's tentacles on top of the boy. It was only thanks to his remaining Aura that Nilo wasn't immediately crushed to death, but he was still pinned under the creature's gigantic limb.

"NILO!" Oliver yelled and rushed to help his young teammate. "Hang in there, pal! I'm-"

The berserker had been so focused on his friend that he failed to notice another attack coming towards him, as the Grimm used another one of it's tentacles to pin him down to the ground. Oliver just barely managed to hold back the limb's jaws from closing on him, but he didn't have the strength to push back the monster's attack, and the jaws around him were starting to close slowly.

Isabella tried to go assist her teammates, but was also quickly snatched up by the Grimm, this time by having one of the tentacles wrap tightly around her body. The dark-skinned girl screamed in pain, as she felt her body being crushed. She only avoided death because of her Aura, but it was broken from the attack, and the giant octopus began to take her towards it's mouth.

"I have to save her!" Ruby said before disappearing in a cloud of rose petals.

"Ruby, wait!" Elaine barely managed to say, but the younger redhead had already left.

The giant tentacle wrapped around Isabella was suddenly cut off, as Ruby used her scythe to aid her friend. The dark-skinned girl fell to the floor with a thud, along with the severed limb that had been holding her not too long ago. She was hurt and exhausted, but still breathing.

Before Ruby could go and help Isabella, the Grimm struck her once again. While the scythe-wielder would have normally been able to escape the attack, her exhaustion seemed to catch up to her, allowing the monster to successfully hit her. The Grimm seemed to have grown especially tired of Ruby, as it put as much of it's strength into the attack as it could, which sent the redhead flying through the air, before she crashed into a wall and fell down.

Elaine's face turned pale over seeing her young friend get hit like a golf ball. She could feel the chills run down her spine, as she watched Ruby's body fall to the ground and remain unmoving. To the best of her knowledge, the first-year student was dead. But before she could run up to the girl and check her condition, Elaine also had a tentacle wrap itself around her body and squeeze her tightly.

While the members of team LION were all in the Grimm's hands, Ruby had managed to wake up. She looked around and saw the peril her friends were in, which triggered certain images in her head. Memories of her mother flashed through her mind, along with images of Taiyang and Yang broken and crying over the loss of Summer Rose.

"Never... again..." Ruby managed to say, as she began to slowly get up. "I will... never... allow something like that... to happen AGAIN!"

As soon as she had gotten up, the scythe-wielder used all of her remaining strength to push her Semblance to it's maximum. With the speed she gained from this, Ruby was able to cut off all of the Grimm's limbs before it even managed to realize what had happened. This in turn freed the members of team LION from it's clutches.

Just as the Grimm was beginning to realize that all of it's tentacles had been cut off, Ruby used her Semblance to run all around it's main body, slashing wildly at any part of the monster's body she could reach. Deep wounds appeared all over the Grimm and it's eyes were all taken out, blinding it completely. The beast could only roar in pain, as it couldn't do anything to defend itself.

Meanwhile, the members of team LION were watching with wide eyes as a red blur came out of nowhere and dealt immense damage on the Grimm they had been fighting. Just a few seconds ago, they had been certain that they were going to lose their lives. Now, they couldn't help but feel hope once again, as they saw the monster get it's limbs severed and it's sight get taken from it.

"W-What just happened?" Nilo asked as he managed to crawl out from underneath the severed Grimm tentacle. "Who just did that?"

Elaine was about to say that she didn't know, but then she noticed something red from the corner of her eye. It was Ruby, who had just stopped using her Semblance and was leaning on her scythe once again. However, this time the young redhead wasn't simply exhausted as the expression on her face was one of pure agony and her body was trembling a lot. The girl then threw up blood on the floor, before falling down.

"RUBY!" Elaine screamed as she and her teammates rushed to the scythe-wielder's aid. Once they reached her, they saw that her body was twitching violently, like she was in constant pain. The third-year team leader gathered her young friend in her arms and held her gently. "Oh God... Hang on, Ruby! We're going to get you out of here! Just hang in there!"

"Thanks to her, we now have a chance to get out of here!" Oliver said while pointing at the exit that was located behind the Grimm. "We need to get out of here before that thing regains it's strength!"

Elaine nodded and gently lifted Ruby up in her arms. Isabella made sure to pick up the first-year student's weapon, as she knew just how important it was to her. Once that was done, team LION began to run as fast as they could towards their way out.

However, before they left, Nilo stopped at the exit, letting his teammates run past him. The older team members soon stopped in their tracks as well, once they noticed their youngest member's sudden stop.

"Nilo, what are you waiting for!?" Isabella asked. "We need to get out of here NOW!"

"That thing hurt Ruby," the small boy said in a cold tone that his teammates had never heard him use. "It needs to pay for that."

Before anyone could ask what he meant, Nilo pulled a bomb from his backpack. He pressed a few buttons on it, before throwing it at the Grimm. After he was done, he resumed running away from the monster with his teammates following behind.

Once the group had gotten away from the Grimm, there was a large explosion that shook the whole structure around them. A massive cloud of dust even washed over them from behind, where the explosion had occured. The blast had been so powerful that all members of team LION fell to the floor.

"Geeze, Nilo, what the hell was that?" Elaine asked with wide eyes, wondering what her young teammate had just used on the Grimm.

"Something a bit stronger than what I normally use. I had prepared it just in case there ever was a time I would need it," Nilo explained while getting up. "I couldn't use it before, as we would have all gotten caught in the blast. But when we were getting out, I felt the time was right to use it."

"...Okay, from now on, you're officially the scariest member of our team."

Some time later, Ruby was beginning to wake up after losing her consciousness due to pushing her body was past it's limits. The redhead's body was burning with pain from all the stress that had been put on it and she could barely move. She opened her eyes and saw a stone roof above her that she couldn't recognize. A warm blanket had been draped over her body and a pillow had been placed under her head, making her rest as comfortable as possible.

"Hey guys! I think our brave heroine has finally woken up!" Ruby heard Isabella's excited voice yell from afar. It didn't take long until the members of team LION were all surrounding her, staring down at her with relieved smiles on their faces.

"Glad to see you awake, Ruby," Elaine said happily. "You gave us quite a scare out there. The way you recklessly damaged your body with that stunt of yours really had us worried."

"Sorry about that..." Ruby replied with a small smile and a tired tone of voice. "I kind of did it without thinking things through..."

"As much as I would like to be angry with you, you did save our lives, so I'll let it slide this time," the third-year team leader said, before playfully flicking the younger girl's nose. "But if you do it again, I'm going to have to really punish you."

"Heh... I'll keep that in mind..." the younger girl said. "I'm just honestly glad that everyone's safe..."

"In case you're worried about your weapon, don't be. We managed to take it with us and it seems to be in good condition," Isabella told her young friend, knowing how much she cared about her scythe. "You should still probably take a good look at it, once you've recovered. It was a pretty rough battle, after all."

"Thanks... It's good to know that my sweetheart's safe..."

"You'll be out of action for a while. The strain your body went through and the exhaustion of your Aura are going to keep you in bed for some time," Oliver explained. "However, we doubt there is going to be any real damage left, once your Aura gets back up and starts to fix you. For now, though, you should rest and leave the whole assignment to us. We'll get what we need, so you don't need to worry."

Ruby simply gave a small nod and closed her eyes, trying to get back to sleep. Seeing how their first-year friend was trying to rest, the members of team LION began to walk away from the young redhead, hoping to give her some peace.

However, before the third-years left, Isabella remembered something.

"Hey, Ruby! Before I go, I need to ask you something!" the dark-skinned girl said, getting the younger girl's attention. "I was supposed to ask it back when we were on the watch on the first day of our assignment, but I forgot about it when the Grimm attacked us!"

"Hey, let her rest, will you!?" Elaine scolded her teammate angrily. "Ruby has had a rough day and she doesn't need YOU to keep her awake!"

"It'll only take a second!" Isabella argued. "Besides, I'm sure you'll be interested to hear her answer on my question!"

"What are you talking about?" the third-year team leader asked, as Oliver and Nilo were also listening to the conversation out of curiosity.

"You'll see," the white-haired girl replied, before turning back to the first-year. "Ruby, which one of us do you think is the coolest?"

There was a moment of silence, as everyone simply stared at Isabella. Her teammates were wondering if the dark-skinned girl was really serious.

"Seriously!?" Elaine yelled angrily. "THAT is what you felt was so important that you couldn't let her rest!? What's wrong with you!?"

"Oh, don't even pretend like you're not interested!" Isabella shot back at her team leader.

"Of all the things..." Oliver mumbled and rolled his eyes.

"That's an easy question to answer!" Ruby replied suddenly, getting the attention of team LION. "I think the coolest one of you is Oliver!"

"...WHAT!?" both Elaine and Isabella yelled at the same time, shocked over the answer they were given.

"Well, that was unexpected," Oliver said with slightly widened eyes. "I'm honored by this, of course, but mind if I ask your reasons for your answer?"

"Why wouldn't I think you're the coolest? You're always the calmest and most composed member in the group, until you use your Semblance, which is an awesome ability. Not to mention, you often surprise me with how great company you are," Ruby explained. "I honestly can't think of anyone more cool than you."

"B-B-But what about me?" Elaine asked desperately.

"Or me!? I'm pretty much coolness personified!" Isabella yelled.

"Now now, don't get all upset," Oliver said to his teammates, although you could clearly see a small smirk on his face. "It's not really such a big deal."

"That's easy for you to say!" the dark-skinned girl yelled at the tall boy. "Besides, you should at least wipe that smirk off your face, before saying something like that!"

"W-Well, maybe Ollie is number one, but who is number two?" Elaine asked Ruby, hoping that she could at least claim that title.

"The second coolest person is Nilo!" the younger girl answered with a big smile. "I admire how he's willing to push forward, despite being so shy and scared. He's someone I can even relate to, which makes him even cooler in my eyes."

"H-Huh!? M-M-M-Me!?" the shy boy practically squeaked.

"Would you look at that, my friend. Seems you've got yourself a fan!" Oliver said jokingly with a grin on his face, as he picked up Nilo and placed him on his shoulder. "How about we go and leave the lame ones in our team with Ruby? Perhaps that way they can become as cool as we are."

The large boy walked away with his young friend while chuckling to himself, leaving behind Ruby and the two girls of team LION, who were frozen still from shock. Neither of them had expected to lose to their two teammates the way they had.

"How about we don't ask who is the third coolest in our team? I doubt it would make either one of us feel any better," Elaine said to Isabella.

"Agreed."

Author's notes: And with that, the whole assignment that Ruby and team LION were sent on is finally done. Apparently, it seems I might have given the idea that this story is going to end soon after the whole assignment is done. I would like to correct this by stating that we are NOT close to the end yet. In fact, I'm not even sure how far we are in this story, as I'm still kind of thinking things through. I'm still going to work on the relationship between Ruby and her own team, especially when it comes to Yang. This whole part of the story just became bigger than I originally thought, as I started adding stuff to it while writing it.

I decided to save the whole bit about Isabella's question to the end of this chapter, as it felt natural to place it there. As I have stated before, it wasn't anything big or important. Just something fun I thought of while writing this story.

Now, there's one big thing that I need to address here. It's about the possibility of making this story Ruby/Yang/Elaine. I have decided to keep this story's pairing as simply Ruby/Yang and not add a third person to the mix. While the suggestion did get support, there was a good amount of people not really behind the idea. Not only did the people not supporting the idea give some good reasons as to why I shouldn't add a third person to the pairing, I also wasn't personally behind it.

I would like to offer my deepest apologies to those who wished for the extra person getting added to the pairing. I know some of you might have gotten excited by the idea, but I'm afraid it won't happen. I mostly put out the idea in order to see how much it would be liked. Had there been a big amount of support for the idea, I might have gone with it. I'm sorry if I gave anyone the wrong idea.

Anyways, the next chapter will be about Ruby's return to Beacon, where we'll see the WBY again. After that, I'm going to take a break from this story, so I can work on other stories and figure out how to continue this one properly.

Until next time.

RWBY is owned by Rooster Teeth.

P.S. I know naming the octopus Grimm Kraken isn't exactly original, but what else was I supposed to call it?