Darkness was all that surrounded Ruby as she laid on the cold floor. Though, she couldn't tell if it was really dark or just her swollen eye blocking her vision. Her entire body was drenched in blood and sweat with every bone and muscle either aching or sore. The armor plates of her suit were tattered and barely hanging onto her frame. Not that it mattered. It was weighing her down anyway. Her shattered aura would be of no use anymore with her drained state. But while her body was against her, Ruby's mind kept telling her to get up.
Easy steps now. She first detached the heavily damaged pieces of her ruined suit. That left Ruby with only her boots and gauntlets. Next, she first used her arms as leverage to lift herself from the floor before using her legs to get her to straighten up. Every part of Ruby's body screamed for her to cease, but it didn't faze her. With the remainder of her strength, the vigilante pushed herself onto her feet and steadied herself to keep herself standing.
A bright light shined above to single her out from the darkness. The sound of slow clapping echoed along with metal boots pressing itself onto the concrete floor. Then she heard his calm, booming voice from the shadows.
"Impressive. You're still breathing."
Just hearing that voice forced Ruby into her combat stance. Arms raised and eyes focused, ready to attack anything that comes out. She tried to keep her breathing steady, but was only able to take large deep breaths to compensate for broken ribs.
"Unfortunately, only because of a lack of trying."
A slash of pain then erupted from Ruby's back as another sharp pain flared her sides. She screamed in pain as the wind got knocked out of her from a blow to the chest. The Girl Wonder tries her best to block or even parry the different slashes and hits only for it to be a futile attempt.
It took only the final kick to Ruby's chest to send her back onto the floor. Her lungs struggled to take in any air as the pain in her chest only grew stronger. The sound of heavy boots grew closer until it stopped before her. Ruby tried to crawl away until a boot stopped itself onto her leg. An agonizing cry left Ruby's lips before looking at her attacker.
There was no mistaking who he was. They'd fought far too many times for her to forget, and through his torments, he made sure she never did. Silver eyes met a cold eye behind his half-black and orange mask.
The man moved closer to her, ignoring the Girl Wonder's futile kicks to the shin, with determination and his signature sword in hand.
"A true shame that things had to end this way."
He lifts his sword right above Ruby's chest before looking at the fear in her eyes.
"Goodbye Robin," he says before forcing the blade down.
Ruby thrusts herself forward as she awakes from another nightmare. A mix of sweat and tears incessantly beading down her face as her lungs try to gather as much air as possible.
It had been over a year since she last had any dreams relating to her failure with the Titans. An entire year since she and her old team were forced to disband because of that one-eyed bastard. Ruby had really tried her best to forgive herself and move on from her failure as the head of the team. Unfortunately, guilt outweighed any sort of sympathy, so she tried burying it into the back of her mind. Her recent position as team leader for Team RWBY probably didn't help in that matter.
Speaking of which, last the girl remembered, she was standing in the auditorium after the initiation. Where the hell was she now?
Observing her surroundings, Ruby, still in the combat uniform from the previous day, appears laying on a soft bed in one of the school's dorm rooms. The dorm itself was pitched in darkness, having only the shattered moon of the night sky illuminating enough for her to make things out. Stacked in the corner of the room are various bags and luggage of, from her guess, her's and her teammates. On her left, there are a couple of occupied beds parallel from her own. Yang's golden mane, and loud snoring, was easy to spot from the farthest of the beds and Weiss' sleeping figure was easier with her being in the bed parallel to Ruby's, which leaves Blake in the bed in between the two.
So they brought me to bed after my attack. Gods, they must've panicked when I fainted. Several thoughts began popping into the ex-vigilante's head as she tried to get up from her bed. Sigh, no use going back to bed.
With a quick face splash and change of clothes, Ruby readied herself for another workout to keep her mind busy in the meantime. In the middle of the room, and as quietly as she can, Ruby began her regular stretches and basic warm-ups for the next couple of minutes. Afterward, the academy gym would be the best place to work off any remaining frustration.
Would've gone off without a hitch had Ruby not accidentally knocked something off a nearby tabletop while reaching for her phone. Lucky, her reflexes were able to catch it before it reached the ground, but not without sound. A quick glance towards the still sleeping figures in bed helped suppress the girl's fear.
Not wanting to stay any longer, the Girl Wonder made her leave as quietly as she could before softly shutting the door. Unfortunately, had she been looking a lot closer, she would've noticed the bow of a certain teammate twitching at the various "sounds" made in the room.
Not a lot of time had passed since Ruby started beating the lights out of one of the gym's wooden post dummies. More often than she would like to admit, these things were often left with a few broken arms or legs back in the Batcave whenever she was in a bad mood or just wanted to take her frustrations out of something. However, having been far too long since she last trained like this, the only damage she was doing was to her palms and fingers, which only internally frustrated her even more.
Various thoughts started emerging in Ruby's head as her frustration continued to grow; I'm not as strong as I used to be, am I really worthy enough to lead another team? I'm not mentally ready to even lead a new team. Does the team respect me? Would the team even listen to me?
A cough interrupts her flow and train of thought. Turning around, there stood Blake who was still dressed in sleeping attire.
Nothing was said between the two as they maintained their stares. It lasted for a couple more seconds before Blake broke the building silence.
"You should be resting."
"I think I've had enough rest" Ruby replied, leaning onto the dummy to fully face her teammate. "You're up pretty early."
Blake's face kept a neutral expression, but Ruby did notice the bow on her head twitch. "I got woken up. And don't change the subject."
There were three options at the moment; either Ruby speaks the truth and tells Blake why she couldn't sleep, come up with a story that Blake would hopefully buy, or she just goes with Blake, forces herself to sleep, and possibly re-dream the nightmare. Yeah, option 3 wasn't happening. How about a mix with options 1 and 2?
"I can't go back to sleep."
Blake's interest was drawn. "Why?"
"Nightmares."
"Of what?"
"Bad memories."
"Was that why you fainted yesterday?"
Ruby kept silent at that, but it only confirmed her black-haired teammates' observation. Blake wanted to ask further questions, but she knew she couldn't. Not yet, at least. Best to build trust between them first before asking such personal questions.
The same could be said for Ruby as well as she too has questions for Blake. Yang's snoring was louder than her accidental ruckus in the dorm room so she couldn't have woken her bow-wearing teammate. Unless, of course, she was Faunus. But, best for Blake herself to admit it rather than forcing her to.
An awkward silence began growing. Neither one of the two wanted to continue any deep personal line of questioning and were unsure what to say afterward.
Fortunately, it was at that moment when Ruby's scroll started to beep, signaling her that it was already 6 am.
"Guess it's time to wake the others up. Wouldn't want to be late for class if we all plan to shower". Ruby said, wanting to drop the topics and the conversation.
Luckily, Blake took the hint and hated the awkwardness in the air as well. With a nod, she headed back to the dorm, leaving Ruby to her lonesome.
With a heavy sigh, the ex-vigilante knew that this was going to be a long day.
By the time the rest of team RWBY was awake and dressed, they only had less than 20 minutes to get to class. While most of their necessities were out, fully unpacking would have to wait until after class.
As the team was walking to their Grimm studies class, Ruby noticed that her partner seemed to be stiffer and a bit angsty.
Earlier, when she and Blake came back to the dorm room, they had already found a recently awoken Weiss. It looked like she tried waking up earlier than everyone else, but never took into consideration Ruby waking up way earlier alongside Blake.
Afterward, Weiss had taken way longer than everyone else to get ready. While the end result had her being the most presentable of the bunch, it did cause them to be delayed for an extra 10-20 minutes.
Now, she was practically escorting and mostly pushing the team towards the classroom. Her excuses were the lines of "I do not want us being late to be our first impression" and "Our reputation will not be tarnished".
Before she could ask her partner about her behavior, the team had already arrived at Grimm Studies class.
There wasn't much to the class itself. Rows of chairs and tables surrounded the center podium where their teacher, Professor Port, stood. By his side appears to be twin cages holding growling animals with red piercing eyes. Students who arrived earlier had already taken their seats, but some of those older-looking students had dreadful looks on their faces. That wasn't a good sign.
As team RWBY took their seats, their sister team, JNPR, burst through the doors, narrowingly escaping tardiness on their first day. Professor Port looked neither surprised or happy at their entrance. But that would soon change as his posture changed into one of confidence and his booming voice echoed through the classroom.
"Monsters, demons, prowlers of the night! Yes, the creatures of Grimm have many names," Professor Port started, grabbing everyone's attention. "But I merely refer to them as prey!"
The teacher looked carefully towards the audience for any other reactions from them, only for him to be greeted with blank expressions and neutral reactions. After that awkward silence, Professor Port then began the normal introduction towards the subject itself and its importance in the huntress curriculum. However, soon enough, his introduction slowly drifted off into him retelling his own experiences with Grimm in a boastful manner.
"But first, a story. A tale of a young handsome man, me! When I was a boy…"
Ruby could only sigh at the professor's distraction from the main topic. If this was how this class was going to be, she might as well just study the subject herself in the library. Was the class supposed to dissect the teacher's stories for lessons?
Speaking of the class, the young leader couldn't help but look over to her own team and sister team to see if they had any interest. For a majority, that wasn't the case; team JNPR looked very uninterested as most of them were either bored or asleep alongside Yang. Blake was currently reading some novel that Ruby couldn't read from her position. It was only Weiss who looked to be remotely listening to the teacher's rambling, aggressively writing down notes in her notebook.
It would appear that she noticed Ruby's staring because Weiss had stopped her notetaking to look next to her.
The look she gave was less of a stare and more of an icy glare that tries to look past Ruby's own silver eyes. Both girls continued to stare at each other as the heiress' gaze continued to burn itself through Ruby's. Another thing to note was that Weiss was somehow still able to jot down notes in her notebook, only slower this time.
While their staring contest continued, so did the teacher's lecture/personal tale, but only did the latter seems to be coming to a close.
"...A true Huntsman must be honorable!..."
Weiss stopped her writing, but her glare intensified.
"...A true Huntsman must be strategic!..."
She gripped her pen as it threatened to snap into two.
"...A true Huntsman must be strategic, well-educated, and wise!"
If looks could kill, Ruby would've been dead seconds ago.
"...So, who among you believes to be the embodiment of these traits?"
It didn't take much of a detective to figure out what Weiss was gonna do next. What exactly was she trying to prove? It wouldn't matter because whatever it was, she would get hurt if she fought with that mindset, aura or not. Before Weiss even got the chance to raise her arm halfway, Ruby instinctively raised her arm first.
"I would like to volunteer sir!"
Weiss was immediately flabbergasted by Ruby's actions.
Professor Port looked up in surprise but smirked at the quick response.
"Very well then," His smirk grew wider under that mustache before gesturing towards one of the cages next to him. "Step forward to prove yourself."
The Girl Wonder only started to notice now that those cages were becoming more restless as their growls grew louder in pitch. Perhaps she bit off more than she can chew.
Updates for this story would continue to be slow as I am still working on the flow of not only this story, but also "The Sins of our Fathers". I can guarantee that the next update would be between the two.
I do not own any of the characters. All characters and names used are owned by either Rooster Teeth and Detective Comics (DC).