A/N: I'm baaaaaack. Getting this out in under two weeks is so exciting. A little less impressive considering I did have most of this written already, but I'm happy that I beat my own self-imposed deadline.
This is what I call the logistics chapter, because there's a lot of talking. personally that's my favorite part of time travel fics, the logistics. ya know that scene back in V1 where Weiss gets uber-hyped about the planning that goes into the Vytal festival? that's me with time travel plotting. hopefully y'all like it too.
I'm kind of pleasantly surprised how much Ruby took over this chapter, because normally Oscar dominates my creative process.
V8E14 spoilers
Unrelated to the chap, but I was rewatching fight scenes from V8 and I gotta give a shout out to CRWBY for the foreshadowing they did for that fall. noticed that there were two scenes early in the volume where RWBY + J almost fell perilously to their deaths, but didn't. one is during the Hound chase scene where JYR is trying to get Oscar back. At the end of it Yang and Jaune are falling, but Jaune is caught the foot be by Ren's wires (just like how Yang and Ruby are NOT caught by Blake in ep 14). then, during the fight against the Ace-Ops while infiltrating the military base, RWB falls off the edge of a bridge and are brought back up on the bridge by Ruby using her semblance (which again, doesn't work in ep 14). that coupled with Oscar and Ozpin's little fairy tale moment about the girl who fell through the world, you got some pretty interesting foreshadowing. fucking fantastic, I love it.
Thank y'all for your lovely and supportive comments last chapter! They really mean a lot to me, and I have so much fun responding to some of your questions. Very exciting ^_^
No content warnings this chapter I think. Let me know if there's something I should have tagged.
WC: 6582
*Break*
Oscar had to admit, Junior was fast. In the three days since he and Ruby had… requested his services, and he had already managed to turn around and call them back to deliver the goods. Now, late morning on a Tuesday, the two of them were sitting down at the bar of an empty dance club.
The strobing lights were off and set to a standard fluorescent white; the back lighting of the dancefloor and the light towers were shut down as well. Save for a few of the grunts that ambled around cleaning, in casual clothes now instead of their matching suits, the whole space was empty of people. Even the stench of alcohol had greatly subsided, though what remained was already going stale. In Oscar's opinion it was a much more pleasant place to be during the day.
He sat next to Ruby on a high barstool. Junior stood on the other side of the counter, still eyeing them warily. He handed them each a thick, black accordion file and a basic scroll. "These are your new identities. As we agreed, there's enough identification for three different people in each of those. The one in the front is going to be your sturdiest of the three. It should pass you through a run in the system for any of Vale's public and police held records. You'll be good for criminal background checks, credit checks, immigration records, medical. Hell, there's even witnesses lined up for your new employment and education history. Keep it clean, and you'll appear like any other normal, law-abiding citizen in the city of Vale."
Oscar paged through the manilla folder and the sheets of information he'd have to memorise about himself. 'Pine Garden,' it said at the top in plain printed letters. His new identity. Clipped to the stack was an identification card with his face and new name, as well as a new date of birth. It looked quite authentic, even to his old eyes.
Pine Garden. Nostalgia hummed up from somewhere in his chest, from the same place that liked to drown him in deja vu whenever he stumbled across one of his numerous stimuli. One of the perks of being Oz, he supposed. Of course the act of assuming a new identity would set it off; he had done it many times before after all, even if it was a little different this time. There was nothing new added to him, nor anything left behind. It was just a new label, not a new life, nothing more.
This was for the best. The only Oscar Pine that could exist right now was a thirteen year old farmhand living in a tiny settlement in Anima, whose only existing records were a few scraps of paper in a little town hall. Should they succeed in their goals, that Oscar Pine wouldn't have reason to leave his farm for years to come. It was a little melancholic to think that his actions from this point forward would actively prevent a version of himself from becoming, well, him, but it only made sense. There was no need to involve the younger him in the events to come if it was avoidable.
A glance at Ruby saw her shuffling through her own ream of documents. Another new ID card sat shiny and innocuous on the edge of the bar. Her new name read 'Rosie Garden.' They were sharing a last name, which was, hmm. He fidgeted a little as the idea made an odd but pleasant spark in his chest. With a hint of amusement he noted that her eye color was listed as 'gray.'
He reorganized his papers. "This all seems to be in order."
Junior scoffed. "Well, I'm pretty damn good at my job. All your electronic credentials for those are also already uploaded onto the scrolls, so you won't look like a pair of shady weirdos who still only use paper records.
"The other two are a little more fragile. They won't stand a deep dive into your history if someone chooses to look into it, but they should get you around just fine. If you're going to do something illegal, it's better to get caught with those. Should be solid for trips in and out of the kingdoms, but don't try to buy a house or run for public office." He paused, his brow scrunching up. "Actually, don't ever try to run for public office on either of them. I can't make any guarantees at that point. Avoid all intense scrutiny."
Oscar nodded in acknowledgement. "We intend to. Now for the other items?"
From behind the bar Junior brought up a large crate. "Right, first the ammo you asked for." At that Ruby jumped up to peer inside, taking over the conversation. Oscar listened as she fired off a litany of questions that he mostly-kind-of understood, even as the person who didn't use any firearms. Junior seemed able to keep up with her though, answering each one quickly. "The customized gravity dust rounds were the hardest to get. My normal manufacturer was able to rush job these with all the correct specs, but the dust was hell to find because-"
"Because of all the dust robberies, yeah," Ruby cut him off, paying more attention to the pile of ammunition she was already sorting and storing onto her bandolier. "Fair warning: don't get involved with Roman Torchwick in the next few months. You will regret it."
"Right," Junior stretched the word out, glancing between the two of them suspiciously. "So you two are well informed. I'll keep that in mind. Now for the last item-" This time he pulled out a smaller silver case and placed it on the bar, popping open the lid with little fanfare.
Inside sat a cylindrical object, about a foot and a half long and two inches in diameter. It appeared to be made of dark, almost black wood, and was embossed with a silver vine pattern that flowered into roses. At one end, the pommel, a large square cut crystal of orange incendiary dust was affixed. Oscar pulled it out and rolled it around in his hands, getting a feel for the weight.
"Once again there was a little trouble getting the dust for it, but it was sorted out. My guy was more uh… curious about the specs you provided for that thing." Junior commented.
"Was there an issue with them?" Oscar had been able to pull most of it from his memory, but Ruby had helped to refine them to probable perfection. He had a great deal of faith in her weapon designing ability.
"No, but, it's kind of old fashioned. You sure you don't want any long range capabilities? My guy could probably fit a shotgun or a rifle into that."
Oscar's thumb found the button on the side of the handle, and the rest of the weapon extended out to the floor. A staff, not a cane: aesthetically it was an echo of the one used in Ozma's first life. He twirled it experimentally, getting used to how differently it handled compared to Long Memory. It was a good height, reaching just under his chest, and was comfortable to wield. "This is fine."
"If you say so." Junior shrugged. "There are two more crystal replacements in the rest of the ammo, one in wind dust and one in earth. They're huge, so they should last you a good three months of constant use. Standard sizing, so you should be able to get replacements anywhere provided there's any dust in stock at all."
"What, don't want us coming to you again?" He teased. Junior said nothing in response. Oscar gave a dry chuckle before retracting the staff, only to feel Ruby tapping his shoulder. She made a 'give-me' motion at his new weapon. Grinning he handed it to her, enjoying the way her face lit up as she examined the mechanisms. "Is there anything else we should know?"
"That's all from what we agreed on. Although…"
"What?"
"I'm surprised you didn't ask for a prosthetic," Junior answered nonchalantly, a hint of his curiosity peaking through. Oscar's gaze shifted to his stump of a right arm. Missing limbs were expectedly rather common for the people of Remnant, especially amongst those who actively fought the Grimm, but those who intended to keep fighting were usually quick to seek out replacements. He supposed his lack of one was conspicuous.
"I don't need one, but thank you for asking." He answered. He watched Junior's brows raise, but the man made no further comment. "Rosie," he turned to Ruby, taking care to use their new names, "Is there anything else you wanted to ask about?" Ruby wretched her attention away from the new staff for a few seconds of consideration, before shaking her head 'no.' "Then I just have one more thing. Are you by any chance associated with a Lil' Miss Malachite?"
Oscar wouldn't admit he was just a little amused when he saw how white Junior went at the question.
*Break*
After receiving their items from Junior, the two of them decided to continue familiarizing themselves with Vale as it was twelve years ago. In their future it had been almost five years since the city had fallen completely to the Grimm, which was the last time either of them had been in the area. It went without saying that it was a much different place at the current point in time.
For Ruby it was dreadfully nostalgic. She had grown up on Patch, but the island settlement was close enough to Vale that she had visited regularly in her childhood. It was her home, like Beacon was. To see it war torn and crumbling had wringed out her soul and made it ache. Now she was faced with a much different city, one alive with vibrancy and color. All of her old haunts-her favorite weapons shop where she spent all her allowance, the movie theater her team would go to for midnight showings on the weekends, the bakery her dad would bring her to when she was younger and got full marks in all her classes-were still standing and not crushed under a mountain of rubble and broken glass.
Ruby and Oscar walked around the edges of Firefly Park, the biggest greenspace in Vale. Since it was the peak of Summer it was packed with people: riding bikes, running, walking along the trails. There was a small amphitheater built into a hill, where a funk-jazz fusion band jammed a decent size crowd. They were backdropped by the cheerful shrieks of children, because a little ways away was a massive jungle gym crawling with them. She thought she vaguely remembered climbing up and down it too when she was a child and her parents took her here, in a memory that dripped with honey gold sunshine and the warmth of her parents' hands holding her safely.
Besides her Oscar chuckled softly and bumped her arm. "You're smiling."
Immediately the spell broke and her face fell. Had she really been? She covered her mouth with her hand and frowned.
Apparently Oscar didn't like that. "No no no, I wasn't trying to chastise you, I'm sorry it came across like that." He backpedaled. The two of them stopped walking. "I'm really glad you can still smile, it's been too long since you have."
Ruby said nothing for a while and just stared at her feat. Why did that matter, why did he have to bring that up? She felt the sudden need to justify herself. "I just- I don't know. Sometimes I feel bad, like I'm just goofing off when I could be doing something to help the future. There's this great big countdown til doomsday hanging over our heads, Oscar, and we know just how horrible it will be if we don't do anything."
"And smiling at a nice scene in the park keeps you from saving the world?"
"Well, no, but- you know what I mean."
The two of them stood a little ways off the path while the world kept moving around them. The funk-jazz band finished their song and there was a lull in the ambient sounds, so people's voices rose above in a soft din. Somewhere across the park someone must have been selling hotdogs, because the scent of meat and grease wafted through the air. Oscar's gloved hand curl around her fingers. "Let's sit down for a while, we could use a break."
"What? No, Oscar we just started!" She protested.
"It's fine, it's still early. Just sit down with me for a bit, we'll start moving again soon."
He gently pulled her down to the grass with him. Ruby hesitated for a moment before joining him on the ground. The world seemed to slow down to a crawl; sunlight painted warm streaks on their faces as the early evening sun shone through the trees.
She curled her legs to her chest and sighed. This was going to be another talk. Like the one from early this morning, only worse because everything said would be out in the light of day. It was so much easier to speak of demons in the dead of night, where they were hard to see and would disappear completely at dawn.
Oscar sat forward, crossing his legs under him. "You know, Ozpin really loved cooking shows."
"Huh?"
"Not even the serious ones with really good chefs," he continued. "He liked the super gimmicky ones with all the screaming and crazy time limits and weird ingredients."
Ruby was having a hard time seeing where he was going with this. "Well, that's a cool fact I guess."
"I found out about it when I first left home. I was leaving the only place I'd ever known only half convinced I hadn't spontaneously developed schizophrenia or a split personality, I was absolutely scared out of mind, and while I was waiting at the train station there was a screen playing reruns of one of those shows. Remnant's Worst Cooks, I think it was, something really stupid.
"And while I'm damn near having a nervous breakdown, Ozpin was going off on how one lady was absolutely insane for trying to make a finishing raspberry glaze in the last 30 seconds."
Oh. Oh . She couldn't help it; the corners of Ruby's lips visibly quivered as she exhaled sharply through her nose.
"Go ahead and laugh, it was exactly as ridiculous as it sounds," He encouraged. "The backdrop to the greatest crisis of my life, up to that point, was an old man's ghost complaining about cooking shows. So I, being filled with all that teenage angst-" and she snorted again at that, causing Oscar full stop as he turned to grin at her in that infectious way that always made her heart flutter a bit. "So I, being filled with all that teenage angst, snapped at him for not taking the situation seriously enough.
"I remember him going very quiet after that. He apologized, and I could feel some of his feelings slip past our bond. I wasn't very good at identifying those feelings yet, but in hindsight, I recognize that the emotion I felt from Oz was guilt."
Ruby paused and looked over to him. "Guilt?"
"Right, guilt. For something as simple as enjoying a tv show. Isn't that sad?"
She blinked and turned to look back over the scene in the park. Watched the children and the families and couples and the regular ordinary people simply existing and enjoying the day. In that moment Ruby was overcome with a feeling of sonder; she wondered how many of them were facing troubles, carrying burdens that she couldn't imagine or see. Did they carry any guilt, any deep-seated fear that they were wasting time? When she looked out and saw them all, she couldn't find reason to fault them for being here and living in this moment.
"Oz lived for thousands of years, through hundreds of different lives, all with the belief that an immensely heavy duty rested squarely on his shoulders," Oscar continued. "He believed that he would have to unite humanity alone, face Salem alone. I don't have to imagine how crushing that loneliness was, or how deeply his own insecurities cut him. The weight of it all would have destroyed many men and women several times over.
"So that's why I think those little joys were so important. Crappy cooking shows, fancy hot chocolate-"
Her lips quirked into a sardonic half-grin, "Launching his students off of cliff sides?"
"Yes, especially that," Oscar giggled, "Gods, you have no idea, that was the highlight of his year ," and now Ruby was smiling too, though not with as much energy as her partner. "Finding enjoyment in life and living is what was able to keep Oz going after all that time, it helped him keep his humanity. I think about that a lot, about how he could have been a much worse person. He could have been needlessly cruel and ruthless, or completely apathetic. But he was just a person, just like us."
Ruby turned her whole body towards him. The look on his face was soft, complex. His hazel eyes shone with a quiet determination that she had grown to know well, but there was something else there too. Pleading, desperation maybe, she thought; he was trying to reach her. Oscar extended his gloved hand and cupped her cheek softly. It was warm, nice.
"Ruby, you shouldn't feel guilty about being able to laugh. You shouldn't feel guilty about being alive. I think I knew our friends well enough to know that none of them would ever begrudge you for things like that. You don't have to constantly deny yourself to achieve our goal, not like this. We're trying to save the world, but that doesn't mean we can't live in it too. This is about the happy ending, isn't it?"
For a moment the world around them melted away; the band, the children, the runners and bikers and walkers along the trail, swirled into the sunlight and washed over and through the two of them. All of sudden the decade of self denial, of repeated trauma, of the crushing reality that they had returned to the past welled up from within. The desperate wanting, what drove her to decide to come here that she had pushed down since they arrived, flooded past the walls she had put up. Ruby hiccuped a sob and put a hand on top of Oscar's. She was trembling, but the burden of it all felt so much lighter now, as if she had received absolution.
She was crying, but she now let herself smile honestly. A little laugh escaped her as she blinked away tears. "Those," she breathed, "Are some very wise words Oscar Pine. Do you think you can follow them yourself?"
And now it was Oscar's turn to smile bitterly. "I'm trying, I might need some reminding from time to time. It's easy to preach, practicing is harder."
"Let's keep each other accountable then, I'll keep reminding you and you'll keep reminding me."
"Sounds good me." Their fingers laced together. "I probably don't have to say this, but none of that means you have to force yourself to be happy either. It's okay to take your recovery at your own pace."
"Of course, that's one I already know. Now come here, I feel like enjoying life by hugging you."
So Ruby pulled Oscar into her arms and basked in their shared warmth. They laid in the grass, in the glow of the sun, and simply existed in a time when it was free to do so.
It was the greatest feeling in the world.
*Break*
"I'm so, so grateful we're together for this."
"Mmmhmm, me too."
*Break*
They sat down in a booth at a cafe in downtown Vale once they finished their patrol. The sun was just beginning to set, so Ruby pulled Oscar into this little place that she remembered for having amazing strawberry pie. The corner they sequestered themselves in was fairly isolated from the rest of, the admittedly few, patrons, which gave a sense of privacy. A waiter came and took their orders, and she might have gotten a little over excited and ordered too much. While the meals they received at the immigration center were decent quality and nutritious, the prospect of real food after years of living off of scavenged canned goods and military rations made her salivate. They were technically millionaires now, right? She was definitely getting the whole damn pie.
After their orders were placed, she leaned forward over the table. "Time to sort out our plan then?" She was feeling a lot better after the talk in the park, but now it was time to get down to serious business.
Oscar made an affirmative noise. "We have everything we need now to be able to move freely. We can really get started now. First, I'd like to affirm our general strategy."
"You mean running around Remnant like a couple of manipulative ninja to alter important events in the timeline without anyone being the wiser?"
"That's the one." He chirped.
Adorable , she thought, smiling for a moment until she came back to what it meant as a whole. Ruby sighed, resigned. "We have to lie."
He hummed a low note. "It'll be more like obfuscating the truth, but yes. Lie by omission." This was one of the issues they had debated at length before coming to a final decision: whether or not to tell anyone who they were and why they were there. She had been against it in the beginning, because so many of the problems they had faced had been caused by people's inability to just be honest with each other, herself included.
The thing was she understood why subtlety was the better option. Salem's plan was already in motion and they had to work quickly to stop it. Any time wasted trying to prove her and Oscar's validity and earn the trust of the people in power wasn't time they could afford to lose. Not to mention they had no way of knowing who and where any potential spies were. Lionheart was
one, high profile and very precarious by nature of his position, but they had no way to be certain if he was the only one. If the Grimm Queen managed to get word of the nature of their existence before they were ready, all their efforts could become meaningless.
Oscar had confided in her some of his other reasons as well. Surprising her, yet also not surprising her at all, was his admitted distrust in the current time's Ozpin. "He's trying his best, but he still keeps things too close to his chest," he had told her. "If we went to work together now the insistence on secrecy might accidentally cause divisions among his circle, which we want to avoid. Even if it means we may be seen as a threat by them in the beginning."
They had already established that, so their next course of action was deciding what to change and how to actually change it. "We can't take actions that look dramatic on the surface." Oscar stated. "If we carelessly alter the situation we won't be able to predict the fallout."
"As long as we're not too passive. We'll have to deal with the consequence of our actions eventually, the whole point is to change things."
"Of course, I'm just saying we can't do it recklessly. Do you remember, when all of us were living at Atlas Academy, those nights we'd play boardgames? Remember Jenga?" She nodded yes. "It's a little like that. If we take out all the pieces from the bottom of the tower, it'll just fall over right away and scatter pieces everywhere. If we're careful about it though, then we can get an idea of what options are still available to our enemies and make plans around them."
Ruby smirked a little at the absurdity of the comparison. Altering the fabric of time and they weren't even playing chess, they were playing Jenga . "So, I guess finding Cinder and slitting her throat is off the table?"
"That would indeed be a 'bottom of the tower' piece, yes."
"Drat."
Oscar chuckled. "While it would be convenient, killing Cinder now might mean Salem could have enough time to find a replacement we don't know and send them to do her job."
"And we might not be able to figure it out until it's too late, I get it." What a shame. Ruby liked to think that she wasn't an overtly hateful or malicious person, but damn if she hadn't been a little bummed that she wasn't part of the team that finally did Cinder. There were very few people she truly despised with all of her soul, Cinder was one of them. "So then our primary mission is?"
"Stop Beacon's fall at the Vytal tournament."
Ruby inhaled sharply. Oh that brought her back. "That was the beginning of the end, wasn't it?" She said sadly. How long had it been since then, the last time she had such unshakable faith that everything would turn out okay? She wondered what the version of her that existed in this timeline would think if she saw her now.
"Beacon's fall was the event that made the first crack in the foundations of which the current peace is built upon." Oscar nodded solemnly. Before they continued the waiter came back with a tray laden with food, which brightened her mood. She did not squeal when the whole strawberry pie she requested was put down in front of ther, thank you very much.
Oscar pulled out a notebook from his breast pocket and placed it on the counter. "I spent last night reviewing Ozpin's memories and there were four main factors that contributed to what happened. We should focus our efforts on mitigating or preventing these all together." He said while writing out four bullets and turning it around so she could see:
Penny's murder on live television
White Fang siege at Beacon
Atlas drones attacking civilians on camera
CCT tower going offline
He tapped the back of his pen on the table, letting it click in and out several times. "We'll need to address each of these if we want to stop what is to come. Let's ask some questions, where are our enemies right now?"
"Cinder, Emerald, and Mercury didn't come to Beacon until the beginning of second semester. They snuck in with the students from Haven," recalled Ruby while she cut out her first slice. "Speaking of, we also don't know when exactly Lionheart went traitor."
"We'll assume he's already turned. At some point before Beacon, the three of them managed to steal half of the Fall Maiden powers from Amber. I wish I had asked Emerald for more details now," Oscar sighed and shook his head. "At any rate, we do not know when or where Amber will be, or already has been, attacked. Assuming the worst case scenario, it's too late."
"Then we'll have to catch them at Beacon."
Oscar nodded. "Now for the-" he stopped dead and squinted at her.
"What?"
"Ruby that's salt, not sugar."
She looked down at her plate, where she was sprinkling salt from the table onto her slice of pie. "And?"
A distressed, confused look spread across his face, "Why are you putting it on pie?"
"It's sweet and salty? That's a legitimate flavor combo!" She knew it was! Sea salt caramel and chocolates were amazing!
"You're putting table salt on pie ."
"Oscar, we haven't had food with flavor in like, at least three years. Let me live a little." She took a bite of her newly salted strawberry pie to prove her point, and it tasted amazing . Ruby did this two more times, maintaining unflinching direct eye contact with Oscar for each bite. Finally he blinked and sighed, before carrying on. That meant she won.
"Alrighty then… Then, let's talk about the others present at the Vytal festival: Roman Torchwick and Neopolitan."
"Torchwick is running around on dust heists right now, Neopolitan," she said that name as a low growl. The psychotic ice cream themed lady had been particularly troublesome to deal with, considering how she made it her life mission to try and shank Ruby at the most inconvenient times. Many, many perfectly fine plans had gone awry because of unexpected intervention by her murderous stalker. "Should be helping him out until those three get to Beacon. Then she was on Cinder's fake team. That means they should both be here in Vale." She leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes, trying to recall details from the night of the fall. "I remember, Torchwick had a device that let him take control of the Atlesian drones."
"Some kind of virus, maybe the same as what took over communications during the festival. That has to be Watts's doing. And we don't know where he is either. Watts is tricky because he can be anywhere with net access and still cause chaos. If we can't find him we have to at least hinder him somehow." Oscar held his fist over his mouth, deep in thought. "He was… an Atlesian scientist, correct? That faked his own death?"
Ruby pondered the question. Watts had died-presumably, they never got to confirm it-so long ago, and she had never encountered him personally, just his work. He was difficult to remember, especially compared to Salem's more up-close-and-personal minions. "I think so, when we were working with the Specialists they had threat analyses on him, Tyrian, and Hazel. His was the most detailed."
"You don't think he still had access to Atlas's systems after his supposed death, do you?"
"With how paranoid Ironwood is? Doubt it."
"Still, he would have definitely been intimately familiar with it. Enough so that designing a virus to take over their tech would have been relatively simple. We'll have to find some way of alerting Atlas of their potential security breach. Not only convincing them that there is one, but that its perpetrator will be a man they have already declared dead."
And convincing Atlas meant talking to someone she'd honestly rather not. Her nose wrinkled at the thought. "You mean we're going to have to talk to Ironwood?"
"We were always going to have to."
"Oscar he tried to kill you."
"I lived."
"Oscar no."
Oscar raised his hand in appeasement. "Look, at this point in time he isn't quite as bad of a person. Is he still overbearing and controlling? Yes, but he hasn't done anything overtly questionable."
"Yet."
"Yet. However, so long as we can prevent the fall of Beacon, I think we can avoid setting off his more extreme paranoia."
Ruby sighed and rubbed her face with her hands. She really didn't like the idea. Those last few days of chaos in Atlas had been among their worst moments. Not for the Grimm invasion, which was the first of many worse to follow, but for the sheer pressure that stemmed from being waist deep in the politics and gnashing teeth of men. The constant socio-economic struggle between Mantle and Atlas, the accusations of treason, how their group had to go head to head with the Ace-Ops that had been their friends and mentors, the attempted bombing of innocent civilians for no good reason-! Ironwood had played such a large role in that clusterfuck, somewhat of a victim but undeniably complicit, that it was… difficult to be sympathetic or forgiving. "Oscar, you said it yourself, we'll be keeping a lot of secrets to pull this off. And we know how well Ironwood handles secrets. How do you know that by doing this we won't be focusing his sights on us instead? That he won't target us, or double down twice as hard in response?"
"I don't," He admitted. "But I do know that it took around a whole year of isolation, massive political pressure, and a full on siege by the largest army of Grimm anyone had ever seen to make him finally snap. I think there's a good chance we can resolve the main issue discretely before the clock runs out on his patience. Plus, he has anchors at this time. He'll still be in contact with Ozpin and the other headmasters. They should do an adequate job of styming some of his more aggressive actions." She pursed her lips. Oscar tilted his head and tried his best to give a comforting smile.
Finally she sighed and threw her hands up in the air. "Alright then, we'll use Ironwood and Atlas to hinder Watts. Watts's virus wasn't just in Atlas though, Cinder uploaded it into Beacon's systems the night of the dance." Ruby's voice turned to mumble, "Would have been able to stop her, if it weren't for those stupid feet prisons."
Oscar snorted at her mutterings. "You were fifteen and she had half of the Maiden's power. I think it's fair that she got away then. We'll have to prevent her from getting access to the tower that night. That should be fine, we know the where, when, and how she did it, so we should be able to physically stop her so long as we're discreet."
"Then she won't be able to rig the matches. Without access to Beacon or Atlas systems, Cinder will have a much harder time executing half her plan. No hacking of Atlas drones," she stabbed a fork into her piece of pie. "And no setting up Penny and Pyrrha's match."
Her partner nodded, smiling slightly. "Next then, the CCT tower. It was brought down by the Wyvern."
"Oh, I'll take care of the Wyvern. Make sure to do a better job of it this time."
"I know you can, but please be careful. It's not quite an eldritch Grimm, but it's still one of the worst in this time."
She found that statement oddly hilarious, she couldn't help the giggles that slipped past her tongue. "Ha, can you believe it? We're back when Grimm were normal and not intelligent, acid spitting abominations spawned out of Salem's ass crack. It's almost like a vacation."
"At least the ones that will be near the main settlements, she likely has had her more… volatile experiments for a while, just kept them close to her. Again, please be careful," Oscar cautioned, placing his hand over hers.
Ruby smiled and used her free hand to boop his nose. "Don't worry, you aren't going to lose me that easily. You're stuck with me."
The soft grin that spread across his face reminded her of sunflowers. He made a happy hum before returning to his bulleted list and tapping the second point. "Then that just leaves one thing: the White Fang."
The two of them sit in silence, the first lull since their plotting began, and stare at each other. Ruby took a few more bites of her third slice of salted pie. "I've got nothing."
"Me too," Oscar slumped against the back of the booth.
"All I remember is that the first time around when we were gathering intel, Blake and Sun infiltrated one of their meetings and got the location of the Mountain Glenn incident. Otherwise, all I know is that they'll eventually end up working with Torchwick for dust heists."
"Mountain Glenn and the Breach of Vale was what got Ozpin kicked off the security commission, and what convinced Vale's council to allow for Atlas military occupation."
Ruby perked up, "So we definitely need to stop that. Take Atlas drones out of the equation all together."
"Unless Ironwood still strong arms his way in anyway, yes. At the very least, there's no way he'd be permitted to bring in as large of a force as he did," agreed Oscar, a frown forming on his face. "It's great to know that, but we still don't know what to do about the White Fang. They're our biggest wild card at the moment."
"And neither of us could probably pull off an infiltration into their ranks." Ruby concluded. The thought of trying to pass themselves off as a Faunus to spy on the terrorist group was almost comedic, but the risk of discovery would be far too high and, well, she didn't want to join a terrorist group if she could avoid it. "Think Junior will have a bead on them, at least for the ones operating in Vale?"
"Maybe, we can ask." Oscar shrugged, smirking slightly. "I'm not sure how happy he'll be to help us considering the note we left on this morning, but until we check with him that's our rough outline for the plan. Now, we need to hammer out specifics."
Ruby gave a contented sigh. Half of her pie was gone now, and the sun was noticeably lower in the sky. She cut herself another slice, "Alright, let's plot."
*Break*
"Oscar, why are we here?" After finishing up at the cafe, Oscar had pulled her into a pharmacy at the corner. She thought maybe he wanted to pick up something like bandages or other miscellaneous supplies, instead she trailed after him as he walked down the OTC medicine aisle.
He hummed a noncommittal note, scanning through the shelves, "I have a hunch about something, I just want to test it."
"Test what?"
"Ah! Here it is. Can you try this?" He pulled one of the boxes off the shelf and handed it to her. Startled, she nearly dropped the box. It clattered around in her hands until she caught it, then steadied it enough to read the label.
"Pregnancy test? Oscar, I'm not pregnant."
"Please, just humor me?"
"I'm not pregnant I-"
"Put salt on pie."
"I thought we settled that sweet and salty is a common flavor combo and-"
"Threw up every morning the past three days." He cut her off, and her mouth clicked shut. "Mentioned that you've been feeling achy and tired all week."
"That could be PTSD and you know, who's to say I'm pregnant and not just traumatized?" Unfortunately Oscar didn't laugh at her little joke. He gave her a look, and she sighed. "Fine, I'll check."
"Thank you."
"It's probably nothing!"
*Break*
"It's nothing," Ruby firmly insisted.
"The box says you have to wait at least three minutes before we can confirm that, so let's be patient." The two of them stood in the back corner of the pharmacy, after Ruby had come out of the bathroom. She had handed Oscar the test kit to hold onto so she wouldn't accidentally crush it in her hands. "Thirty more seconds, by the way."
She put her face in her hands and made a noise. She didn't know why she was freaking out so much over this. She had faced down armies of Grimm by herself, had cut off Salem's godsdammned head multiple times, and she hadn't been this jittery.
"Times up." Oscar announced, and she jerked to attention. Ruby pressed herself into his side and waited anxiously while he revealed the results. He removed his finger from the indicator.
The two of them stared at the answer for several long seconds, blinking. "Huh…" Ruby muttered, dazedly. "I guess salt on pie is a weird combo."
"Told you so," said Oscar, still holding the test with the little plus sign steady.
"Well, shit."
A/N: WAIT WAIT WAIT don't click out. I swear this whole fic isn't a premise for me to shove my Rosegarden child OC down your throat.
Sooooo... Ruby's pregnant. If you're wondering why I chose to do this, it's because I'm a 'lil dramatic bitch, and early on when i was plotting this fic at three in the morning the thought came to me and I audibly cackled over how evil that'd be. so it went into my outline and it hasn't left since. now I have plot points wrapped up in it that I don't want to change, because I think they'll be fun and interesting to execute. tbh I'm kind of nervous about the reception this'll receive (though not as much now, since some of y'all's reviews on AO3 were very...enthusiastic about this concept) because I know I've dropped fics I was reading for less. That's mostly because I have very strong ideas on child OCs and usually I feel too much dissonance with the author's vision to enjoy the fic. If you do decide to drop this fic because of this direction, leave a comment and let me know. I'm pretty curious as to what interests everybody. i do solemnly promise that this won't go some weird renesmee cullen route where baby grows up instantly and becomes most powerful character. for the scope of this fic, the oldest baby will get is 10 months, so baby will very much be a normal, squishy, kind of useless baby...
also, was I too blunt about the foreshadowing for it? I thought i was being subtle, but a number of ya guessed it right away. huh...
Anyway, that's the last chap until after the semester ends. I'm really excited for the next three chapters, since they're about 75% of the reason why I started writing this fic :). I already have 2600 words of the next chapter, so hopefully the next update will be reasonable, and good quality.
please leave a review telling me what you think!