Ruby opened her eyes, feeling a fiery stabbing pain coming from just above her elbow. She winced, pushing herself up through the pain until she was sitting up in bed. Looking down to see a pile of clothes had been covering her, she immediately realized two things. First, she realized that her shirt had been torn off, and so she was topless. Second, it was getting cold. Very cold.

"Great. This shit again." She went to get up, and felt her arm weighing her down. "What the-" Then she remembered what had happened. The flood. The fish. The parasite. Her arm. Quickly clamping her still-existing arm over where she was sure there would be a stump, Ruby felt her hand grab onto cloth and metal.

Looking, shocked, she saw that she did indeed have an arm. But it was cold metal, attached to her arm and wrapped in cloth, red from her wound staining the cloth with blood. It was so heavy, but, knowing what she was trying to lift, she held her new arm up to inspect it. It still hurt, like hell, and it was heavy, so lifting it strained on whatever was keeping it attached to her, causing more pain, but it was an arm. And it was hers now. Neo had to have found it somewhere in the building, somehow. Who knew the small woman would be so capable with attaching a prosthetic? Ruby wiggled the fingers. It was definitely fully attached to her. It was a bother that it had some clear signs of rusting, but it looked like that was mostly in the joints. She hoped Neo would be smart enough not to attach a rusty piece of metal to an open wound.

On the upside, well it was all upside as far as she could tell, since she now had an arm again, but aside from that the new arm looked absolutely nothing like Yang's. It wasn't even the right side. That meant Neo hadn't pillaged Yang's corpse or anything, so a living Yang was still in the cards for a future encounter. She would always hold out hope that they would find someone else alive. It didn't look like one of the Atlas combat robots either, though, so Ruby was starting to wonder where Neo could have gotten it. Maybe it was best to go and ask Neo in person. Looking down at herself, and the affects the cold had had on her, she decided to put on a shirt first. Maybe two shirts.

Appropriately layered, or more appropriately at least, Ruby got out of the bed. She was glad for the overabundance of clothes to select from, but while a third shirt would be a bit much, as well as difficult to put on since the shirts that were there were a bit small for her. She grumbled a bit, as her body's reaction to the cold was still visible under the double layers, but there wasn't anything she could do further until she got a bigger shirt. She opened the door and stepped out of the room, marveling at how well the robotic arm fit through the sleeves of her shirt. It was like they were built for a slight figure.

Leaving the door open, just in case there arose the need to once again run and dive into a pile of clothes quickly, Ruby surveyed the hallway. It was near identical to the upstairs of the first house she and Neo had stayed in. In fact, it probably was identical. She didn't think they'd gotten that far from their starting point, so some of the homes were bound to have been made the same. A significant difference, however, was the water resting just below the floor level, covering the entire staircase. She could barely see anything below the surface, but she did notice floating pieces of ice. A thin layer was beginning to form. Swimming out was not an option, but maybe soon they would be able to walk out the second story window. Hopefully, anything dangerous swimming around below would be trapped away from them before that ever happened.

Slowly, quietly, she moved away from the top of the stairs and to the next door down the hallway. She didn't want to search every room for Neo, so since she was sure they were alone in here, she called out. Not loud enough to alert anything that wasn't already in the building, though. She wasn't that stupid. "Neo? You there?"

To her surprise, instead of the small woman popping her head out of one of the rooms, she heard a voice respond to her. "I'm in the room at the end."

Without rushing, so as to avoid damaging the connection holding her new arm in place, Ruby quickly made her way to the end of the hallway and entered the room, where she found Neo bent over something on the bed. Whatever it was, it was made of metal. It actually looked like a robot, which told her it was probably the source of her new arm. Neo looked up from her work, which seemed to be cleaning off rust, and walked over to Ruby. She quickly checked the bandages around Ruby's arm, then stepped back once she determined everything was in order.

"I'm glad you're awake. It was really touch and go for a while."

"Yeah. Hey, I can talk again. And you can still talk. What's up with that?"

Neo turned back to the robot on the bed, clasping her hands behind her back. "I don't know, but I'm not going to dwell on it. Look who I met." She patted the robot on the shoulder. "Come on, sit up."

Obeying the request, the robot sat up in the bed, and Ruby could now see the unsettling state it was in. It seemed to have blackened hair, obviously not the color it had started with but changed by poor treatment. The other most striking feature of the robot was the bright glowing green eyes. Ruby walked around the bed, getting a good look at the machine from the other side as well. Its left arm was missing, and its right arm was a mirror image of the one now attached to Ruby herself. This was obviously where the arm came from. Ruby unconsciously put her human hand on the robot arm.

"Hey..." Ruby looked down at the floor, feeling a little weird about what she was about to say. "Thank you... for letting me have your arm." While she was staring at the floor, she noticed something a little odd sitting there, attached to the robot by a fine string. It was a blade, and despite the damaged condition, Ruby recognized the design.

The robot opened its mouth, its voice crackling and gurgling. "The two of you have to help me get into my father's vault so I can get repairs."

Ruby looked up at the robot, shocked. It was Penny. Obviously, this changed things. On one hand, now Ruby wanted to embrace her friend in a big hug, but on the other hand... she didn't exactly want to touch her right now. As a result of her indecision, it sort of looked like she just took it in stride that they had finally found someone else who had survived in this world. "Your father's vault? Unless he kept it upstairs, it's going to be underwater."

Penny buzzed awkwardly. "I know. It's under his workshop."

"That's going to present a problem. I don't know if you guys noticed, but it's starting to freeze over. It's going to be cold and wet getting in there. Even if the weather reverses again, which could be weeks, it'll be a while before we can get in anywhere like that. This water is going to take its time draining out of here."

"Again, I know." Penny lay back down. "It's not going to be easy, but that's why I need help. It's a very secure vault, since it contains replacement parts for me. My father did not want those falling into the wrong hands."

Ruby looked down at her new arm, closing her fist and opening it a few times. She owed Penny at least that much. At least a replacement for the arm she was given. Maybe a better fix for her own arm could be found in that vault as well. "Okay. We're gonna need you to lead us there, but we'll do our best to get in. But for now, there's no way for us to get there. The water is starting to freeze, and if we try taking the rooftops, one of those monsters showing up again would be too dangerous. Do you think you can wait it out until either the water drains or it freezes over enough to walk on?"

"I've lasted this long. What's a few more dayszzzzzzzz-" There was a loud click from somewhere inside Penny's head.

Neo quickly went to work, sticking a few bent pieces of wire from coat hangers into an open part in the robot head. "Aw, it's seized up again. Just let me get this... there."

There was a jittery whirring sound, and then Penny started talking again. "Can you hear me now?"

"Yup!" Ruby gave her a thumbs up, then her smile disappeared. "Penny, can I ask you something?" Penny turned her head toward Ruby, nodding rigidly. Ruby took a deep breath, still not sure if she wanted to get the answer, but asked anyway. Whether or not she wanted to know, she needed to know. "What happened here? I don't remember what I was doing, and suddenly I was waking up in the snow. I found Neo freezing to death inside one of these houses, several weeks ago, and other than a couple of horrific monsters, you're the first living thing we've seen."

The green light from Penny's eyes flickered, and she opened her mouth without saying anything for a few moments. Then, finally. "Ruby... how are you here? My instruments must be malfunctioning. Am I... dreaming? I haven't seen you in so long. Everyone else said you were gone. How long has it been?"

"Penny?" Ruby didn't want to have to tell her friend to focus and answer the question, but her rambling had raised a few other important questions. "When you say everyone else, are you referring to others who are still alive in Mantle? Are there people up on Atlas? Is... is Yang okay?"

She was silent for a few more seconds, then answered. "I have not seen anyone in Mantle except for you. Not since the parasites came."

The parasites. Ruby looked back to her arm again. That was right. It had crawled under her skin. Neo's quick actions had saved her, and who knows what that parasite would have done to her if it had been allowed to spread. "Right... what- Penny. What do the parasites do? Is that what made those monsters? Do the parasites infect people and turn them into those monsters?"

"Zzzzt!" Penny reached over with her remaining arm and prodded Ruby's chest. "The parasites don't turn people into anything but food. They eat people, consume them, Ruby. They eat people. And they eat Grimm. They are not from Remnant. I do not know what monsters you are talking about."

That was less helpful, but at least they now understood the danger. The people of Mantle had been fed upon by those parasites. Penny and the others had probably done everything they could to save as many as possible, and that's how Ruby assumed they'd taken casualties. Not that she could remember the names or faces of the two people they'd found. She could only remember a void where a missing soul belonged in her memory. She shook it off, and pressed Penny again. "Never mind about the monsters, then. What about Atlas? What about Yang? And Weiss and Blake?"

"If those monsters are the result of the parasites consuming people, then I know there's at least one more out there. If they're unrelated, then... well, then I know one person we're not going to see turned into a monster."

Ruby looked over to Neo, questioningly. "Who?"

"Emerald. I didn't see the parasite, but something definitely got inside her. She screamed at me to cut her arm off, just like you did. I... I ran instead." She shivered, remembering it again. "I thought it was just some kind of Grimm, but if those things are eating the Grimm..."

"Then there's less Grimm to deal with."

"You're optimistic." Neo shook her head. "Let's assume, for a second, that the parasites do turn their victims into those monsters. That means there are a lot of them out there. Including Emerald, and a lot of Grimm, mutated into those... things."

Ruby was taken aback. "Oh... that isn't good. Regular people are turned into huge monsters, I can't even imagine what would happen to the Grimm." She turned back to Penny. "So what about Atlas, and our friends? Are they okay?"

There was a quick sound of a few mechanical innards moving about, and then Penny answered. "Last I saw, General Ironwood was still in his office. The rest of your team... when we were evacuating Mantle, they stayed behind because you went missing. I went to try and find you from the air, and I never saw anyone after that. When I got back to the airship, there was no one in it. I was attacked, and my systems were damaged so I couldn't fly anymore. Since then, I've just been... protecting Mantle. In the absence of its people, I take care of their homes. I found that the parasites are weak to cold, so I've been cycling through the weather and regularly freezing them."

"That was you? We almost froze to death!"

"Neo, hold on." Ruby stepped closer to Penny's side. "You've done this over and over. If you can do that, you should be able to get all this water out of here. So why don't you do that?"

Penny shook her head. "I may have... miscalculated. Repeatedly changing the weather out of season... it's not good for the planet. I sped up the natural seasons, and they've become more extreme as a result. I haven't used the Maiden powers on that scale in... years, I think. I'm not sure how many. It's going on its own now."

"Damn. That's really bad. Well, we survived everything so far, so we should be able to survive from here on out. We just need to keep an eye on the changes around us and respond appropriately." Neo looked to Ruby for confirmation. When Ruby gave her a nod, Neo went back and asked another question. "Okay, so we have our objectives. Your father's vault, the power plant, and the hydro station. Have you seen anything in any of those areas that looked out of the ordinary? We want to be careful about approaching these things, since there are definitely giant monsters around, even if you haven't seen them."

"Sounds reasonable." Penny thought about it for a few seconds. "There isn't anything I can think of. Obviously, we should keep alert for more parasites. They like to use small animals as carriers, like fish and birds, even rodents. Out of the ordinary... last I saw, the main power plant was completely flooded. The entire building is sealed up, with water filling it up to the ceiling. I don't know what most of it looks like inside. The hydro station, I think, has a tree growing in the middle of it now. You'll be able to see it coming through the roof."

"A little weird, but that doesn't sound too dangerous. Draining the power plant will be tricky, but I think we can do that easy enough." Ruby nodded to Neo. "We'll wait to see if the water freezes over, and if it doesn't get too cold after that, we'll go over the ice."