Many, many apologies for the delay in this chapter. Stuff came up in real life, and I didn't give this story the attention it deserved for far too long. Now, though, I'm back. I intend to pick up the slack, because I have more than enough ideas for this one. Thanks for your patience, and don't forget to R&R! Now, enjoy the chapter!
Chapter Three: Into the Wild
Monday morning. Not really my favorite moment of the week, normally. Today, though, I was filled with energy. Yesterday we'd spent all day preparing for our long trip into the world outside the kingdoms. Unlike last time, when we went to Mountain Glenn for only a short time, this time we'd go in carrying more equipment because we'd be out there for much longer. We'd need to maintain our weapons, for one thing, and let me tell you that Crescent Rose isn't the easiest weapon to maintain.
You might say, 'Well, Ruby, that's your own fault for making a high impact sniper scythe,' but you can't deny that she's just about the most awesome weapon ever seen by human eyes. I'm thinking Weiss would scold me for not being modest enough, but she's just jealous she didn't come up with it.
Then again, Myrtenaster certainly fits her. It's sleek and regal, but it has a nasty sting. As Weiss puts it, 'Myrtenaster is an elegant weapon, for a more civilized age.'
I'm pretty sure there's an insult hidden in there somewhere but I'm not the kind of person to go looking for things to get angry over. I like to see the good side of people, even if that side is hidden behind a nasty look. With some people it's easier than with others. When I'd just met Weiss I once told her I hated her because she was just being really annoying. But even back then, I knew she wasn't a bad person. I still wanted her to like me, despite what I said. Is it weird to still feel guilty over something I did so long ago?
She's really changed a lot since then, but I guess that goes for all of us. I quickly scanned around the dorm room to see if I'd forgotten to pack anything vital, but by the looks of it I didn't. I swung my backpack onto my back and looked at the others.
"Everyone ready to go?" I asked, raising my fist into the air.
Yang cracked her knuckles and said, "Hell yeah!"
Blake nodded once. I think that's about the height of enthusiasm for her when it comes to missions.
"I'm ready," Weiss said. Something seemed to be different in her. She seemed somehow more determined than usual. It's hard to explain because she's always focused and serious for a mission, but this time she seemed to have a sense of purpose she usually doesn't have. Maybe it was just because this mission was so much bigger than anything we'd done before, though. Oh well, whatever the reason of Weiss's determination was, we were ready.
Dr. Oobleck was waiting for us at the airship docking pad. He was dressed in the same safari-like gear from last time. I wonder if anyone's ever told him he looks kind of dorky like that. It wasn't like I was going to ask him, though. Despite his, um, strange looks he was a very powerful and smart Huntsman. I was honestly glad that he would be the one to come with us on this mission.
"Good morning, Dr. Oobleck," I said happily as we approached him.
"Good morning ladies, good to see you. Once you're all aboard we'll depart immediately. I'll brief you on our first destination once we're airborne," he said.
I swear he talks faster with every word he says. My theory is that he wants to fit every word he'll ever need to say into a single sound at some point.
"Something wrong, Miss Rose?" he asked.
Whoops, I was probably staring again. "No, nothing," I said quickly.
We boarded the airship and lifted off almost immediately. Once we were well clear of Beacon, Dr. Oobleck called us closer.
"Given the real goal of this mission, we're going to start our search to the northeast of Vale," he began. "We know from our source…"
"My uncle Qrow," I interrupted.
Dr. Oobleck gave me a blank stare and Weiss hissed, "He knows that, you dolt."
I smiled sheepishly and allowed Dr. Oobleck to continue. "We know from Qrow," he said, looking pointedly at me, "That an old White Fang hideout is located in the plains there. Fortunately for us, an outpost was built nearby to facilitate missions in the area. It'll be sparsely equipped but it will provide us with a roof over our heads for at least a few nights. Since there is generally little human activity in that particular area, the concentration of Grimm will be relatively low."
Blake frowned. "I don't want to sound rude, or anything, but the hideout you're referring to was abandoned long ago," she said.
Dr. Oobleck seemed completely unconcerned with that news, since he smiled in response. "There are signs it's been active again. It's not much of a lead, but perhaps we can find out more within," he said.
"If you say so," Blake said hesitantly.
"Don't worry, Miss Belladonna. We've never received false information to date. I'm sure this time will be no different," Dr. Oobleck said reassuringly.
I understood why Blake was hesitant to believe Dr. Oobleck. She'd been a member of the White Fang for years, so if anyone would know which of their hideouts were abandoned it would be her. Then again, I had no doubt that at least Headmaster Ozpin knew about Blake's history.
"The White Fang have done stranger things since you left them, Blake," I said softly. "Like working together with Torchwick."
Blake gave me a pained look. "That's exactly why I'm worried," she replied. "This hideout was abandoned because its location was discovered. I can't help but feeling we're heading into either a trap or a false trail."
Well, when she put it like that it certainly sounded more like a problem. I looked at Dr. Oobleck again, who still seemed to be in a very good mood. Now, I'm not always the brightest person around, especially when it comes to dealing with people, but I knew that Dr. Oobleck would never lead us on a false trail.
I looked at Blake again and said, "Don't worry. I think Dr. Oobleck knows what he's doing. Let's just trust him."
Blake still didn't look happy, but she seemed to accept that we were going to do this. I just hoped my trust in Dr. Oobleck would pay off.
The grass around us was long, longer than I'd ever seen it within Vale's borders. It was a pale yellow and lazily blew in the breeze. Not too far away from us was a single tree that looked very old and weathered. Only a few leaves grew on the old branches. I didn't feel any Grimm around us, but that didn't say much. Sensing the presence of Grimm using my Aura was a trick I never really got the hang of. I generally rely on my regular old senses when I'm fighting them.
I could tell the others weren't much more comfortable than I was. I turned to Blake. Having four ears, I figured she would be the first person to hear Grimm if they were around.
"Anything here?" I asked her, keeping my voice down in case Grimm were around us. Blake shook her head.
"Not that I can tell. They have no reason to be here, anyway," she replied.
I breathed a sigh of relief. Grimm don't scare me in the slightest, but being ambushed isn't a lot of fun. Last time it happened an Ursa tore a hole in my combat skirt. It was even a new one. Needless to say that particular Ursa never made that mistake again. Dr. Oobleck brought me back to the present.
"Alright, ladies. The outpost is about an hour's walk from here. We should head there as fast as possible so we can set up a temporary base of operations," he said.
"An hour's walk? Why didn't the pilot just drop us off there?" Yang asked in a slightly annoyed voice. Yang's dangerous when she gets annoyed, so I hoped for Dr. Oobleck's sake he had a good answer.
"Regular traffic to and from the outpost might attract Grimm to it," Dr. Oobleck said. "Whenever teams of Huntsmen need to use it, they're dropped off within a radius of the outpost, in a different spot each time. Humans would correlate that data and figure out the center of the circle, but Grimm aren't the world's greatest thinkers," he went on.
"A sound decision," Weiss commented. I think Weiss was the only one of us to actually listen to the second part of Dr. Oobleck's explanation, probably because it contained the word 'correlate'.
We began walking through the long, yellowed grass. To stave off the boredom, I began to hum a tune from a movie I'd seen long ago.
"You realize half the group was killed in long grass when they played that tune, right?" Weiss said after a moment.
I stopped humming, more out of surprise that Weiss even knew that movie than anything else. "Weiss, I never knew you liked movies," I said with wide eyes.
Weiss put on the rich girl look I knew so well. "There is quite a bit you don't know about me, Ruby Rose," she said, trying her best to sound all fancy.
I giggled. Weiss is adorable when she does that, especially when she's so obviously not serious. "Ooh, aren't you mysterious?" I teased her.
"Well, if you're such a movie freak, then what's this?" I began to hum a different tune, this time from a movie about a magical ring.
Weiss rolled her eyes. "Are you even trying? I think pretty much everyone in the entirety of Remnant has seen that one," she said. I considered that. The trilogy had indeed been immensely popular.
"Okay, then how about…um…" I trailed off as I tried to think of another movie. Not that I didn't know any other movies, I just wanted to challenge myself by sticking to a general theme of open fields and long, perilous journeys.
Before I could come up with anything, though, Weiss began humming a tune herself. For a moment I was mesmerized by just how beautiful her voice sounded even when she was just humming, but then I recognized the tune.
"That's that pirate movie, right?" I asked her.
Weiss smiled. Now, Weiss has two different smiles. A real one, and a mocking one. Right now, she was using her real one.
"Correct," she said. She was still trying to sound all stiff and Schnee-y, but I could tell she was having fun.
"Okay, my turn," I said.
Weiss, however, had other plans. "You just got two tries in a row, wait your turn," she said in the tone she'd usually use when she was trying to correct my behavior.
I grinned. I don't know why Weiss seemed to be in such a good mood, but it made me feel all giddy inside to see her like this.
"Okay, then please take your turn, Miss Schnee," I said formally.
For a split second, Weiss's smile froze, but just as quickly it had disappeared again.
"Well, at least you learn quickly," Weiss said smugly. "Now…let's see…Oh, I know," she went on.
She began to hum a tune from a movie I'd seen a million times as a kid, and yet she still had the nerve to say I was using melodies from movies everyone knew.
"That's cheating; you're humming a real song," I said. I held up my hand before Weiss could protest. "But I know that movie. I've seen it so many times. I don't think I ever cried as much with any other movie too, when his father died."
I paused for a moment. I wasn't sure whether or not to say what was on my mind at that moment. Weiss seemed to realize something was up, because she said, "Ruby? Is something wrong?"
I looked into her eyes and saw the same genuine concern in them as I'd seen back on Patch. "Well, that movie helped me deal with my mother's death," I said softly.
Weiss didn't reply immediately. Now she appeared to be the one struggling with something. "Weiss?" I asked.
"It…well, let's just say it means a lot to me as well," she said. Before I could press the issue, she firmly said, "And now it's your turn again, I'm waiting."
I pushed Weiss's momentarily frozen smile and hesitation just now to the back of my mind, and tried to come up with more movie themes to hum.
The trip to the outpost went surprisingly quickly because of the little game Weiss and me had been playing on the way there. The outpost itself was a small wooden building that looked like it had seen better days.
Yang got a dark look on her face when she saw it. I guess she was thinking about the time she'd gone off to find her mother, with me in a wagon. I couldn't remember much of that event, but I knew from what she'd told me it had involved some old wooden building.
Dr. Oobleck seemed oblivious to Yang's look. "This will be our base of operations until we've searched through the White Fang base nearby. We'll have a quick lunch and then we need to be on our way. We don't want to waste any daylight," he said.
He dug up a rusty keychain from his pocket and jammed the key into the equally rusty lock. He fiddled around with it for a bit, until the lock finally turned with a lot of grinding and creaking. The door swung open, and it evidently didn't want to lose out in the 'loud old stuff' contest because the sound it made was roughly equal to the sound Uncle Qrow had once made when he was drunk and attempted to sing.
We stepped inside, and my first impression was that no human life had been in that outpost for quite some time. I hadn't thought it was possible, but it was dustier in here than in Dr. Oobleck's classroom. There was a small stove on one side of the building, and four bunk beds that looked more dangerous than our contraptions back at Beacon were put up on the other side of the hut. There was no sign of a bathroom of any kind, or any other rooms beyond this one.
On my second look around, I noticed a small table near the far wall, with eight wooden chairs in various states of disrepair clustered around it. In no universe known to man could eight people ever fit at that table, even if they were as thin as Weiss. One single oil lamp hung from the ceiling. I wasn't sure how much light it would give, but I was quite sure the entire hut would go up in flames if anyone were mad enough to turn that oil lamp on.
Dr. Oobleck headed inside and immediately lit up the wick of the oil lamp. The flame was positively tiny, and the room didn't seem any brighter than a moment before. It really didn't help that all the windows were boarded up. Well, at least the hut hadn't burst into flame…yet.
Dr. Oobleck turned around to face us. "Well, ladies, welcome to our accommodations. I assure you, the beds may seem uncomfortable at first but they'll do wonders for your spine. Now, I'll prepare lunch; why don't you put down your bags and take some necessities for our excursion."
Giving each other uncertain glances, we crossed the room and headed for the bunk beds. We didn't speak, but we instantly arranged our stuff in the same order we used at Beacon. Weiss and I shared the left bunk bed on the far wall, and Blake and Yang the right one. That left the two beds closest to the front door for Dr. Oobleck. Weiss sat down on her bed, and I sat down next to her. Blake and Yang sat down across from us.
"So, is anyone else a bit…underwhelmed by this hovel?" Yang asked softly.
"That's putting it mildly," Weiss said in agreement.
I shrugged. "Look on the bright side, at least we have beds," I said.
I was determined to make the best of the situation. Weiss gave me a sour look and knocked on the mattress with her fist. It sounded like she was knocking on a rock.
"Well…you heard Dr. Oobleck: it does wonders for your spine," I offered with a smile.
"I don't see the problem," Blake said casually, leaning back on the bed.
"Yeah, well, you're a cat," Yang said. "Your spine is probably supple as coiled steel anyway."
"Don't be hating," Blake replied with a grin.
Yang sighed. "You've been around Sun too much," she groaned.
"Ladies, lunch is ready," Dr. Oobleck announced from the small stove. How he'd managed to make anything on that little thing amazed me.
We headed over to the small table, and each chose a chair we hoped wouldn't fall apart on our first touch. Dr. Oobleck put a tray full of…well, I guess they were sandwiches…in front of us.
"Is the layer of charcoal on them…intentional?" I asked uncertainly.
"Why, most certainly," Dr. Oobleck replied. "These sandwiches were designed to be heated by being applied directly to the fire. I'm quite sure of that, anyway. Or maybe those were in my other bag. Oh well, eat up, we don't have much time."
With a look at my teammates, I sighed and picked up a sandwich. Despite being charred, it was cold. That didn't improve the bad feeling I had about it. I took a bite from the sandwich and braced myself for the taste…but quite honestly it wasn't that bad. I mean, I tasted the charred bread, but I could also more or less taste the contents of the sandwich through the bitter charcoal. It certainly wasn't as bad as the time I made pancakes and watched a movie while waiting for them to be done.
I gave my friends the thumbs-up and they too picked up a sandwich. Weiss stuffed it down as fast as she could, gulping water after every bite. Blake kept her face carefully neutral, but I saw a small twitch near her eye which let me know she was suffering. Yang ate the sandwich quite cheerfully. She too had suffered my fateful pancakes. I'd always known that one day they'd be good for something. Dr. Oobleck, meanwhile, scoffed down one sandwich after the other.
When we were all done eating (I'd eaten two sandwiches, Yang three, but Weiss and Blake had stuck to just the one) we headed back outside. The sun hurt my eyes for a moment after the darkness in the hut, but the fresh air was incredibly welcome.
"Now, if I'm not mistaken the entrance to the hideout is roughly thirty minutes in that direction. Let's move," Dr. Oobleck said, and he immediately began to walk.
I walked up to Weiss, who seemed paler than usual. "Want to play our game again?" I asked her.
She shook her head, something which made her go even paler. "Can't talk. Sandwich will…"
She stopped talking and clasped her hand in front of her mouth. I guess Weiss, being from a rich family, wasn't used to food of this 'quality'.
I rubbed her back as we walked, and soon Weiss seemed to calm down a bit.
"Better?" I asked her.
"A bit," she replied with a shaky smile. "Thanks, Ruby," she said softly.
I gave her a wide smile in return. "That's what friends are for," I said happily.
After some walking, we reached a tree similar to the one I'd seen when we had just landed on the plains. Dr. Oobleck stopped walking and looked around. "The information said the entrance should be near the tree," he said.
Blake stepped forward and said, "Go past the tree in the direction its branches are pointing until you get to a boulder which is barely visible over the grass. There's a smaller rock on the ground which acts a button to open the hatch."
"Splendid. It helps to have someone 'in the know' with us," Dr. Oobleck said, and without further ado he turned around and began to walk.
Blake was now clenching and unclenching her fists. "It'll be okay, Blake. We're going to stop them," I told her.
"Yeah, no sweat," Yang chimed in. "And if we run into that insufferable cu…"
"I've found the entrance," Dr. Oobleck's voice came over Yang's curse. We walked over to him, as he stood next to a rather wide, but low boulder with a smaller rock next to it. "I take it this is the one, Miss Belladonna?" he asked. Blake nodded wordlessly.
Dr. Oobleck knelt down and pressed the rock, which clicked into to ground a small bit. There was a lot of whirring and buzzing as the door mechanism began to work, but after a short moment the large boulder swung back, revealing a staircase that descended deep into the earth.
I looked at my friends. "Let's go."
Without waiting for a reply, I began descending the stairs.
What will they find at the bottom of the staircase? Will the White Fang be waiting for them? Will their first lead turn out to be a dud? You'll find out in the next chapter, when the plot really begins to kick in.
Oh, and the tunes Ruby and Weiss were humming were Don't Go Into The Long Grass from The Lost World, the main theme of Lord of the Rings, the main theme of Pirates of the Caribbean, and Can You Feel The Love Tonight from Lion King. Anyway, please leave a review if you've come this far, and hopefully see you next time!
