AN: Woo, nice, I got the chapter done. And I got it out on Friday too. I was really doubting myself for this one. There'll probably be typos. I'll edit them out as I notice them.
I walked behind Yang as she walked through the mall. Ruby was following a bit behind me, though she was looking a bit nervous. It made sense, sort of. She still wasn't too good with crowds.
"Okay, this is the place," Yang said, stopping in front of the store.
It looked fancier than the rest, with white marbling on the floors and everything neatly set up. It gave off a more expensive feel than the other stores.
And the prices matched. They ranged from one hundred lien for a shirt to almost a thousand.
"Yang, this place is expensive," I said.
"Yeah, I know. Why do you think I came here?" she asked. I sent her a look, and she put her hands up defensively, offering an explanation, "I've been working a part-time job lately, so I have money to spend."
"So you're just going to- Never mind, do what you want. It's not like I'm gonna be buying anything anyway."
"Really? Nothing?" Yang asked.
"Nope. Nothing."
"Come on, buy something. No point in going shopping if you won't buy anything."
"We're here for you, Yang, not me."
"One thing. Just one."
"I don't want to spend my money," I said, looking away.
"Come onnnn. Even Ruby's buying something. Ain't that right, Rubes?"
"Y-yeah. I saved up some money. Not from here, though – that's dumb."
"It's really not," Yang said.
"Kinda is, sis," I said.
"Nope." Yang covered her ears and started walking towards the store. "I can't heeeear you."
I shook my head in exasperation. Ruby and I shot each other a look and started following Yang.
Once we caught up to Yang, she was already waiting for us, a shirt in one of her hands. It was yellow, obviously, and had short sleeves. In the other hand was a jacket with a darker shade of yellow. It had buttons going down it.
"Hey, how does this look? Looks great, doesn't it?"
"It looks like all your other outfits, I think," I said.
Yang pouted. "Really? What about you, Ruby?"
"I think you should go for more variety, Yang. You know, besides yellow," Ruby offered, looking at one of the dresses next to her.
"Seriously? Not yellow?" Yang asked. Ruby and I nodded, and she sighed. "Fine, I'll try. I barely ever wear yellow."
"Not true. You wore a white dress to the Signal dance last year, right?"
"Yeah, but I mean like casually. I guess I can try, though."
"Do that."
Yang nodded and walked away to do her thing. I moved towards the bench in the corner of the store and sat on that while I waited. A few minutes later, Ruby came to sit next to me too.
"She's taking forever," Ruby said.
"Yeah. She-" I stopped talking when I saw Yang coming this way, a pair of clothes in her hands. Oh look, perfect timing. She's coming this way now."
"Look, these are white. And I like them too. What do you think?" Yang asked.
"They're nice, Yang," Ruby said.
"Yeah, I think so too," I agreed.
"Okay, come with me," she said, grabbing both of our hands. "I'm going to change into them, and then tell me what you think."
I nodded and followed her to the changing room. Yang walked behind that curtain that was serving as the changing room, and closed it behind her. A few minutes later, Yang came back out, wearing her new clothes.
"Yep. I think it looks good on you Yang," I said.
"Yeah."
"Really? I thought it looked a bit off," Yang said.
"No really, it's fine," I said.
"Okay, but I think I'm going to go check some other clothes real quick. Don't worry, it won't take long," she said, walking back in the changing room.
Ruby and I groaned.
It continued like that for a while. Yang showing us some new clothes, us saying it's good, and then Yang going back to check out some new ones. Thankfully, I had my scroll with me to pass time. I would have died from boredom if I didn't have it. An hour later, Yang finally decided what she wanted.
"You ended up getting the yellow one anyway," I deadpanned.
Yang rubbed the back of her head. "Yep. I ended up liking it the most."
"If you were going to get it anyway, you shouldn't have taken an hour," Ruby said with a pout.
"I'm sorrrry," she pleaded. And she really did look sorry.
We walked out of the store with Yang's stuff. She didn't get much from this particular store, saying that it was too expensive to get multiple things from, and that she didn't have that much money. I thought she shouldn't have gone to the super expensive store in the first place if she didn't have that much money.
"Ooh, look," Ruby said, tapping me on the shoulder.
"What?"
"An arcade! Can we go? It's been forever," Ruby said, shaking my shoulders. "Yang, let's go to the arcade."
Well, it was probably less boring than shopping.
"I'm down. Yang?"
"Sure," Yang agreed.
Yang swung her bag over her shoulder and started walking towards the arcade. Ruby and I followed after her, and Ruby was practically bouncing in excitement. I know she liked arcades, but not this much. Maybe it was just this occasion? Or because it had been a while?
The arcade was a lot bigger than the ones I'd visited in my past life. It seemed almost never-ending, with games of all types, everywhere. I'd only been to this arcade once before when I was younger, and even then I was surprised by how big and advanced it was. I had to keep reminding myself that Remnant was way more advanced and futuristic than Earth had been. Things like flying cars and mechashift weapons were normal here.
"Let's go play that game!" Ruby suggested, pointing to the zombie shooter game.
It was a virtual reality type game where you play the game in virtual reality, and there would be a screen that displayed your gameplay to everyone else.
There was a girl who looked to be around ten years old playing. Her hair was styled as a long braid, and there was a red ribbon tied and intervening in between. The screen showed her shooting down another horde of zombies with impressive accuracy. She was good. Zombies were going down left and right.
We waited for the little girl to finish. She took off the headset and got off the seat, the TV switching to it's main menu screen as she did.
Ruby stepped forward. There wasn't any line, so there wasn't any wait. Ruby sat down on the chair and put on the headset. The TV lit back up. There were several choices on which enemies to fight. Things ranging from mutated plants to alien chickens to, well, zombies.
Ruby moved the cursor over to 'zombies' and selected it. It's what the little girl from earlier had chosen too. I looked at the leaderboards that were displayed next to the TV screen and noticed that zombies took up most of the ranks. There weren't many other groups that came close, save a few. The seventh highest score at 6,090,234 points was mutated plants, and that was the only one besides zombies in the top twenty.
So it made sense everyone was picking zombies.
The game started and Ruby chose the sniper rifle.
"Why'd she choose the sniper rifle instead of a faster shooting weapon? Aren't there a lot of zombies?" I asked Yang, but I didn't really expect a response. Yang was about as knowledgeable as me about these games.
"I don't know? Maybe she wants to make it harder or something?" Yang offered, but she didn't exactly sound confident. "She also uses a sniper rifle, so there's that."
Yeah, that was probably the reason.
"That's not a normal sniper rifle. That's the Rad Ripper. It's one of the best weapons in the game," a voice said. Yang and I turned to the voice and saw the girl from earlier standing next to us. I thought she'd left. Seeing she had our attention, she continued, "It's a semi-automatic sniper, but unlike the others, which have a high fire rate to compensate for their lack of damage, this has both high damage and a high fire rate. It should be able to one-shot the normal zombies with a body shot, two-shot the elite ones, and three-shot the armored ones. They all die in one hit with a headshot, though."
I stared at her. She was rather… well-spoken, for someone her age. Using words like 'compensate'. The explanation was also pretty good, and I understood why Ruby chose the sniper to an extent.
"Well, don't we have a little expert over here," Yang commented, a smile on her face. Her tone was teasing, but not to the point where the girl would feel put down.
"Mhm! I play this game every day. I'm the expert."
"Every day?" I asked.
"Yeah."
"So you must be really good, huh?" Yang asked.
"I am," the girl agreed. Then she pointed to the leaderboard. "Look on the leaderboard. See Supergamer114? That's me."
I scanned the leaderboard from bottom to top, looking for the name. I thought it might not have been there in the beginning since I couldn't find it at the bottom of the leaderboards, but as I got further up, I noticed it. I widened my eyes. "Second place."
The girl nodded, a certain pride on her face. She looked proud that she could show off.
"You're second place? That's crazy, kid!" Yang yelled.
"Thanks," she said, her hands on her hips and a big smile on her face.
I turned my attention back to the screen. Ruby's character was sitting on top of a tower, sniping the zombies from afar. It looked like it was working, too. The zombies were going down quickly.
Some time passed, and the round ended. Ruby got off the seat and turned to us, smiling. As she walked to us, the score behind her showed up. 5,029,998. It wasn't anywhere near the highest scores, but it was still high.
"You're good, Ruby," I said. "I knew you liked playing video games and all, but I didn't think you were this good."
"I come here to play sometimes. I play this game a lot," she said, rubbing the back of her head. "You should try, Rory. Go next."
"No, no, I'm good," I said. I wasn't exactly the best at video games. And I doubted the fact that it was a virtual reality game would help much.
"Come on, just try," Yang said, nudging me towards the seat.
"Ugh."
"What's the worst that could happen?"
I thought about it for a bit, before I sighed. "Fine. I'll try."
I walked over to the chair and sat on it. Grabbing the headset, I put it on and tightened the straps. Immediately, I was greeted with the sight of the main menu screen, asking me which opponent I wanted to face. I imagined the cursor moving over to the 'zombies' option, and it did. I clicked it, and it asked me to pick what gun I wanted to use. Well, I used a pair of pistols in real life, so that was probably going to be the best choice. I clicked on the dual pistols, and I was suddenly transported to a barren wasteland. There was the same watchtower that Ruby had been on, but besides that, there was nothing, really.
The experience felt extremely lifelike. It wasn't the first time I'd experienced it, but it was still a bit weird. My real body was sitting on a chair, unmoving, but my consciousness was in this wasteland full of zombies. It was surreal, in a way.
A few seconds passed, and zombies finally started to flow in. It was only the first wave, so there weren't many. I grabbed the pistol that was in my holster on the side of my hip. I tried to aim in at one of the zombies, but as I did, my vision changed. The zombies now looked a lot closer, and my vision was a lot more restricted. It was like the view you would see when you aimed down sights in a first-person shooter.
What the fuck? I thought. This was so weird. How was I supposed to fight like this?
I moved my aim towards one of the zombies and tried to shoot, but I missed. I fucking missed. Me. I took pride in my good aim. I wasn't as good with guns as I was with a pair of knives, but I could hit my target most of the time. And I'd just missed. To a slow-moving zombie.
Moving my cursor to the zombie once more, I pulled the trigger right when I thought it was right on his head. Another miss. This body was so fucking weird. I would never shake around this much when I was aiming. But this character in the game was doing it no matter how stable I tried to keep him.
I tried one more time, but this time I aimed at the zombie's body instead of the head. I shot a bullet, and it actually hit. The zombie slowed down, and I took the chance to shoot another one. This time it hit the head – even though I didn't mean for it to, but it worked in my favor, so whatever.
Finally. Now to-
A zombie jumped from behind me, pushing me down.
Shit. I'd been caught off guard. By reflex, I activated my semblance. But it didn't work as I had wanted it to. Instead of getting the positions of the zombies, I got all the information from the real words. Ruby, Yang, the little girl- wait, were they laughing? Seriously?
While I was distracted by my semblance, another zombie jumped on me. And another. I tried to shoot them with my pistol, but the zombie that had just jumped on me had his knee on my shooting arm.
They kept piling on me, one by one, and my health bar at the top right of my vision kept getting lower. It only took a few seconds before it reached zero.
Game Over!
I had lost. So easily.
The screen flashed, and a new picture was displayed in front of me. It showed my points. 40898 points.
Are you serious? That's less than a hundredth what Ruby got.
I took off the headset, still a bit dazed by what had just happened. Getting off the chair, I turned back and saw Ruby and Yang there. The girl was walking away with a woman holding her hand, most likely her mother.
"R-Rory," Ruby said, trying to hold in her obvious laughter. "W-what did you think of the game?"
"It sucked. Zero out of ten. Would not play again," I said in a completely neutral tone. Deadpan, even.
Yang almost let out a laugh at that one, but she covered her mouth before she could, and composed herself.
"Don't be so down. Maybe it's because you were skull-king like that that the zombies killed you."
Sulking. Skull-king. Ha ha, real funny, Yang. I looked over to Ruby, who didn't even look phased by the fact that Yang had made a pun, despite the fact that she would almost always voice her displeasure for them. She looked like she was about to laugh more, even.
"Oh, sure. I get it. Let's laugh at Rory's poor attempt at playing a video game. That sounds fun," I said in a deadpan, looking them both in the eye.
That did it for them. Yang started laughing, holding her stomach, trying not to fall to the floor. Ruby leaned against her, laughing with the same enthusiasm.
"You guys are finding a lot of amusement from this, aren't you? Real mature," I said, but even I smiled a little as I did so.
This only caused them to start laughing even harder. Eyes turned to us, and we were starting to get a bit of attention.
"Let's go," I whispered to them as I grabbed their hands, pulling them towards the exit. They walked with me, but their laughs didn't cease. Were they trying to be funny? We walked out of the arcade, and went over to the bathroom area so Yang and Ruby could settle down.
It took around five minutes before they were completely out of laughs, and I meant completely, random giggles that led to even more laughter and everything.
"Seriously, you guys are such dorks. It wasn't that funny," I said, rolling my eyes.
"Yeah, it was," Ruby said, a huge grin still on her face.
Yang had a similar, goofy smile on her face. "It felt good to laugh that hard. It's been a while."
"And for something that was not even that funny. You two are so weird."
"You say that, but somehow you take three shots to kill a zombie that's basically standing in one place? How do you even miss that?" Yang asked.
"It didn't feel like my body at all. It was making me shake so much, and when I tried to do anything even remotely close to aiming, it did this thing where it would zoom it really close, so I couldn't see anything around me. Trashy game, I think."
"Well, yeah. It's a game. It's not going to be like real life," Yang said. "I could probably do better, and I haven't even played before."
"Then try. And I hadn't played before, either. That was my first time."
"Fine, challenge accepted. Let's go back to the arcade."
"Wait," I said. I'd had enough arcades for today. I made up an excuse, "You guys created way too much of a scene there. I would rather not go back. Let's just continue our shopping?"
"Okay, sure I guess. We'll go next time though, and then I'll show you."
"Yes, please do, wise one," I said, rolling my eyes.
We walked to the next location. The one that Ruby wanted to go to. It was not like the one Yang had gone to. Instead of dresses and suits on display, there were weapons and different kinds of armor.
"Ruby… I thought you said you wanted to buy some clothes?" Yang asked. Her tone was exasperated in a way that made me believe that she expected this to happen.
"Um, I am? I need a new combat skirt," Ruby said, emphasizing the 'combat'. She looked away, turning towards me, a nervous look on her face.
"You know, I kinda should have expected this. I'm not even going to try to convince you otherwise. Come on. Let's go get you the best dress we can find."
"Combat skirt."
Ruby started walking a certain direction, and we followed her. She walked for around a minute, before she stopped, reaching towards one of the clothes on the hanger. It was black and red and completely identical to the one she already had.
"Isn't this the same one you already have?" I asked.
"Well… yes. But mine is getting too small for me, and I need a new one," Ruby answered.
I nodded in understanding.
"Well, let's go buy it and then leave," I said.
"Wait!" Ruby stopped me. "I'm gonna try it on, first. Give me a second."
"You already know how it looks on you. What's the point?" I asked.
"But what if it's too big? I need to try it on."
"Okay, fine. Go ahead."
She nodded her head and walked towards the changing rooms. She sent one last glance at me and Yang before she entered.
Yang and I walked over to the bench next to the changing rooms and sat down.
"Hey, Rory? Can I ask you something?" Yang asked.
"Sure, go ahead," I said. I was a bit confused, though, since Yang wasn't the type to ask if it was okay to ask a question. She would just do it.
"Has something been going on with you and Ruby? An argument?"
I almost dropped my scroll.
"Why? Is something wrong?"
Yang being insightful wasn't something I was used to. Sure, it happened from time to time, but not enough to where I had gotten used to it. Why had she chosen this specific subject to be perceptive about?
"It's just… I don't know. You guys have been acting kind of weird lately? Like, it's mostly gone now, but a few weeks ago you were acting really awkward. You guys barely talked during breakfast and dinner, and even when you did, the conversations were short and brief. It's hard to miss those kinds of things, y'know?"
"I guess we got into a sort of… argument," I responded.
I didn't have any real intention of lying to her.
"Wanna talk about it?" she asked.
"Um. Not really. Sorry."
Not that I would tell her the complete truth, either, though.
I could have just lied straight out, but if she ended up asking Ruby about it, and Ruby told her, she would know that I had lied, which would not be good. So I went with just not telling her straight out.
"If you're sure," Yang said, but I saw her grit her teeth a bit. She seemed to be frustrated about the fact that I wasn't telling her anything, but she didn't want to pry either. "But just know, Rory, that I care about you. Ruby and you, both. If there is something that is troubling you, you can come to me. That's my job as your big sister. If there's really nothing going on, then I'll drop it, but if there is, please tell me."
I paused. "Really, Yang, there's nothing going on. We had a little argument, but it was not that big of a deal. It's already resolved now, anyway, so it's fine."
I saw Yang open her mouth to say something, but she was interrupted by the sound of the changing room curtains opening. I turned my head and saw Ruby standing there, wearing her new clothes.
"Well?" Ruby asked. "How do I look?"
She put her hands on her hips and did a sort of pose, a proud-ish look on her face.
"I think you look..." I paused for a bit to create a sort of 'dramatic tension', before I continued, "...exactly the same."
Ruby pouted, throwing her hands over her head before she walked back into the changing room.
"Look, Yang," I said when I was sure Ruby was gone. "It's really nothing. Ruby and I had an argument, it was awkward for a bit, and not it's not. It's over. Just forget about it."
Yang didn't say anything, but she nodded slightly.
"Stay safe, all right, Yang?"
"I will, Mom."
They hugged each other. Mom looked like she was about to cry – a mixture of anxiousness, happiness, pride, and sadness – but she didn't. They hugged for a few seconds before she let go and turned to Dad.
"What your mom said, Yang. Stay safe. Also, send letters. Wait, no, you don't need to do that. Just text us, or call, or-"
"I got it, Dad," Yang said with a little laugh, hugging him as well. Dad reciprocated the hug, and like Mom, these were tears threatening to leave his eyes.
"I'm going to miss you," Dad said.
"Me too, Dad. Don't worry, though. You'll still have Ruby and Rory to keep you company."
Dad nodded and reluctantly let go.
Then Yang walked over to us. She stretched her arms out and brought us both into a big hug.
"I'm going to miss you, Yang," Ruby said.
"Me too," I muttered.
"I'll miss you both too. I really will. It's not all bad, though. In two years you both will come to Beacon as well, and we'll have tons of fun when that happens."
I nodded.
"Hey, Blondie! You're holding us up! Get in here!" the airbus driver yelled.
"Oh, shut up! Can't you see we're having a family moment?" Yang yelled back. Nevertheless, she walked away from us and towards the bus. "I have to go now. See ya guys. I love you!"
"We love you too Yang!" Ruby and I yelled, and our parents did something similar.
Yang walked into the airbus. I could still see her from the windows. She walked to a seat in the middle and sat down. The airbus started to leave the group. Yang turned her attention at us and waved.
It didn't take a long time for the airbus to leave completely.
"All right, let's go home," Mom said.
Ruby and I nodded.
This came way too fast. I thought. It'd taken fifteen years, so it wasn't fast, fast, but it had still come way faster than I hoped it would. Yang left for Beacon, and that meant that starting now, shit was about to go down.
Shit was about to go down and I barely had anything done.
Sure I had stopped a few crimes here and there, but I hadn't actually done anything to stop any of the bad things that were about to come.
I had to be more assertive. I didn't have as much time anymore. Things were going to happen soon, and I had to stop them. If not me, then who? Nothing would change if I did nothing. People would die, Remnant, my home, would be in peril. This timeline didn't have a Ruby to save them. It didn't have a team RWBY. Instead, it had me.
For Remnant; for my family, I told myself.
There were changes to be made, and I would be the one to make them.
Before I walked into the warehouse this time, instead of just checking once with my semblance, I went a step further. I walked around the warehouse, flickering my semblance on and off to see if there was anything around it. Once I did a full circle and found that there was nothing, I took a sigh of relief. He was just bluffing after all.
The doors opened with a slight creak, alerting Roman.
He was sitting on the exact same sofa as last time, Neo sitting next to him. Neo waved at me, while Roman just sat there, a confident smirk on his face.
I strolled towards them, expecting what was coming. As I thought, the other sofa appeared out of nowhere. Well, not nowhere – I'd noticed it when I was checking for anything dangerous. Neo looked at me expectantly, probably waiting for a reaction.
I put my hands on my cheeks and made a face of mock surprise.
"Oh my god. Where did that come from?"
It ended up coming out a lot more sarcastic than I had intended. Neo frowned, turning her head away from me with a pout.
"Okay," Roman started, "let's not do this now, all right?"
Neo nodded. I just stared.
"I really thought there was going to be some kind of ambush this time. A reason for me to sock you in the face."
He smirked, and it felt like that was going to be his default expression, with how much he was doing it. "Oh, is the fact that I'm a criminal, not enough?"
I shook my head. "No. It probably would have been enough if I didn't need something from you. But I do, so it's not."
"By that response, I'm assuming you already have your answer?"
I nodded.
The day Yang left had been a huge wake-up call for me. The main events of the show were going to come, and I hadn't done anything major to stop it. Sure, there was a chance that none of it would actually happen because of the butterfly effect, but I wasn't counting on it. If I kept doing things as I had been doing so far, I wouldn't be able to change anything, Beacon would fall, people die, and I would be partially responsible for not stopping it.
But I didn't intend for it to go like that. Roman – or more accurately, Cinder – had taken interest in me. They probably had a plan with what to do with me, and probably expected me to say yes. But what they didn't know was that I knew what was going to happen. I knew about Emerald, Mercury, Adam, even Salem to a certain extent – though not much since I hadn't watched past Volume 3 – their plans, and how they were going to act in the future. Cinder hadn't anticipated that when she tasked Roman to recruit me.
I could use that to my advantage.
And I planned to.
"Yes, I have," I said.
I got off the sofa, strolling towards Roman. He didn't move, even as I stood right in front of him, staring down at him, staring him right into his eyes.
I held out my hand. No words were spoken, but Roman smiled, taking my hand into his, giving it a firm shake.
"I'm happy to be working with you," Roman said.
From the corner of my eye, I saw Neo. She had a huge smile on her face, which made me wonder why she was so happy. It seemed weird.
I looked back at Roman and nodded. "Likewise."
Keep your friends close, but your enemies closer.
For some reason, I felt that line didn't fit with my current situation.