Ruby's chest heaved with panting breaths as she crouched on all fours, collapsed in the middle of a street miles from Junior's club. The expanse of road surrounding her was empty, but Ruby still had yet to quell the overwhelming tsunami of panic that overtook her the moment she laid eyes on Torchwick's face.
Why was he there? Of all nights, why did he have to show up on the night that Ruby went? Ruby recognized that asking why a criminal was in a certain place at a certain time generally led to an answer she would not want to hear, but she didn't care. What mattered was that it was happening; he was here, and now, Ruby and Yang had to deal with him. Oh crud. Yang.
Ruby left Yang in the nightclub.
Ruby gathered herself in a sitting position and massaged her temples, waiting for her headache to abate. Ruby knows that Yang can handle herself easily against Junior's thugs, but in a crowd full of innocent civilians, she might hold back. Ruby audibly drew in a sharp breath, wincing at the image of Yang getting hurt at the hands of their enemies. She had to go back.
Ruby slowly pulled herself onto her feet, feeling where her body protested with each movement. Note to self, Ruby thought, strengthen aura and learn to control semblance. Ruby straightened out her legs and raked a hand through her hair to move the windblown strands of hair away from her face.
Ruby centered herself in the middle of the street, taking deep breaths. As she collected her composure, Ruby lowered herself to the ground and imagined starting blocks behind her feet. Her index and middle finger touched the ground as she prepared to break into a sprint. Feeling the sudden rush of energy in her limbs, she pushed off of her back leg and took off, leaving a vortex of rose petals in her wake.
Ruby's skin buzzed with new life as she bolted along the street, buildings and lampposts blending into an indistinguishable blur. Her feet barely made contact with the ground beneath her, but with each step, her feet pressed off the pavement and sent her hundreds of feet forward within half a second.
When she passed underneath the highways to cut a straight path to her destination, exhaustion began to creep into her system. As a person who primarily fights with a scythe, Ruby never trained diligently with aura, and her uncle Qrow never pushed her to practice daily because there are only so many ways she could coordinate sudden bursts of speed with her attacks. She never trained to draw from her reserves conservatively for extended periods of time even though avoiding public transit would be a major plus. Unfortunately, tonight, without Crescent Rose, her inexperienced aura was one of the few things she had to fight with.
Ruby found the exit Yang took overhead and changed direction, an action that strained her joints—darn you, inertia. She slowed down upon approaching the club, coming to a full stop in the middle of a street she recognized. She walked around slowly, picking her pace up to a light jog even though lead weighed down her limbs. Her head turned to the right, and Ruby spotted Yang's motorcycle. Just from the sight of it, Ruby knew that Yang still had to be in the club unless dire circumstances required her to find another way to escape. In either case, Yang was in trouble. Ruby almost ran past the alley but stopped herself, thinking that leaving some sort of indication that she was here might be a good idea. She quickly took off her shoes and threw them toward Yang's bike, sacrificing the longevity of footwear for expedience.
Ruby jogged as quickly as her body would let her in the direction of the club while she tried to remember where it was and made split-second decisions when she came to a fork in the road. After turning the next corner, Ruby saw the door Yang stopped her from walking into about an hour ago. Ruby slowed to a walk and pulled out her scroll.
No new messages.
Ruby texted Yang, "Where are you?" and put her scroll back in her pocket the moment she hit send. She bit her lip as she thought about all the things that could have happened to her sister, but she willed herself not to think about the possibilities in order to focus on her objective: finding Yang.
Ruby ran as fast as she could across the road without bothering to check for oncoming traffic. Except for the fatigue in her bones and the migraine that was quickly growing intolerable, Ruby felt capable of fighting even though the last time she fought hand-to-hand, she failed miserably. She slipped down the side of the building, found the right door, and wrapped her fingers around the handle. She prepared herself to throw open the door and barge right in, but before she turned the handle, she hesitated.
A lot of people are down there. Torchwick's definitely stirred up some commotion by now, so walking in would definitely be walking right into a mine field. For all Ruby knew, Torchwick could be holding Yang hostage and waiting for her to come back. That certainly wasn't the most ideal situation for her to be in, but if that was the case, then Ruby had no choice. Ruby squeezed the handle, but stopped again. She growled at herself, annoyed with her sudden caprice.
When has danger ever stopped her before? It didn't on the night she met Torchwick. It didn't on the night at the docks. It didn't on the train, and it didn't any other time she faced danger. Why was she so afraid now? Ruby remembered the image she saw on the news a week ago, and she remembered just how much it shook everybody up. It didn't affect Ruby, though, at least not in the way it did everyone else.
Ruby's grip on the handle loosened, and she considered walking away and succumbing to fear. Ruby silently scolded herself for thinking of something so ridiculous. But instead of telling herself that's not what a huntress would do, she thought about what she would say to Blake and Weiss through sniffles and tears when she got back: "I could have done something! If I had just been there, maybe she'd still be here. Why do I have to be so weak?" She cringed. Those were the same words Ruby said when she learned of her mother's death.
Biting back tears, Ruby forbade herself from ruminating any further and opened the door.
