RWBY A Day in the Life of Crime
Chapter 12: Nora Strikes Back
A/N: A bit of angst in this one
"Nora." A pause, the crunch of metal filling it.
"Nora." Another pause after the verbalization, shattering of glass filling the silence.
"Nora." A heavy sigh as the orange haired girl squared her shoulders.
"What, Ren?" Nora snapped her head back to look with annoyance at the boy who had been calling her name in the same inflection for the past two minutes.
"I don't think this is a good idea," he said when he saw he finally had her attention.
"What isn't?"
"This whole...revenge thing," Ren said, gesturing to the space around him. This stopped Nora in her motions of smashing the cash register as people ran screaming around her in the bakery shop, and out the door. She gave Ren an odd look, eyeing how he stood there next to her, his weapons hidden.
"Ren, what are you taking about?" She couldn't keep the hurt out of her voice and Ren winced at this, but he wasn't going to let her guilt trip him like she did every other time. Because their lives were at stake here.
"I've been doing some thinking...and I don't think this is a good idea. Don't you remember what Ruby said? Not to cross her. And we're on her territory right now. And we're wrecking it."
Nora's eyebrows descended. Her voice was mocking. "Are you scared Ren? Scared of a little girl?"
"That little girl put us in the hospital for two months with broken bones. She's dangerous."
"Broken bones are just a small price to pay for saving the town's bakeries from evil."
Ren shook his head, exasperated. "Nora, I'd love to help free this city from evil. But we're not strong enough. You saw how easily Ruby wiped us out and with such an odd weapon. We don't stand a chance against her. We need to retreat. To stop this plan."
"Then you can go. Because I don't need you holding me back!" Ren's eyes widened at this. Never before had they ever separated like this. Never before had they had a fight like this.
"Nora..." he started softly.
"No." Her face was set. "You've done nothing but complain about this Ruby girl to me. You're just a scared little boy and I don't need you holding me back on this. If you don't want to send a message to Ruby then fine, don't. But I will. Because I'm not scared of her."
"Nora..." Ren stretched out a hand, to touch her and see if this was the Nora he always knew because she was acting so different. Ever since Ruby had broken her bones she had seemed a little darker. Intent on getting the girl back and on bringing her monopoly of bakeries down. Nora hated when she was denied something, even if that something was bad for her health.
"Just go away Ren. I still have nine more bakeries to drop by." With that Nora turned her back on him, sledgehammer slung over her shoulder, and left Ren alone in the dark dim bakery, the lights sparking above him and reflecting on the shattered glass around him. He merely looked downwards, his shoulders slumping.
"I guess I'll wait for you back home in the hideout," he said quietly.
"Sweet Tooth Nora." Ruby's voice was hard and unamused. It caused Nora to stop in her actions of bringing her sledgehammer down on the glass case containing the cookies and other baked goods.
"Ruby Rose," Nora swiveled on her heel and slung her hammer over her shoulder. The Grimm gang leader was standing in the doorway, or what remained of the doorway, of the store. Tables and chairs lay overturned between the two of them and music ran on a loop, the radio having gotten a good smacking but not enough to stop the music.
"What brings you here," Nora asked, gesturing with her right hand to the area around her, "to my bakery?" Ruby's eyebrow twitched at the phrase my bakery. How brazen was Nora to declare that. Did she have a death wish? It sure looked like it!
"Nora, I already told you what would happen if you interfered with my plans again. This time I won't be so kind to you." Ruby's scythe was out and propped onto her shoulder, the blade menacing in the store lights.
Nora tsked. "I'm not someone who backs away easily, especially when it comes to things I'm passionate about. You can't take away these people's bakeries. They deserve to have their goods fair and square to them."
Ruby didn't deign to comment on that. "Where's Ren?" she asked, looking around the store covertly and not finding the Asian boy anywhere. Weren't the two an inseparable pair? What had happened? Was he waiting in hiding, only to spring out on her as some form of a trap?
"He decided he didn't want to help me. So I told him to leave," Nora righteously said.
"He had the right idea," Ruby hummed. "Because your little shenanigans have really pissed me off, especially because I so explicitly warned you to stay away from my territory."
"I'm not scared of you!" Nora hefted her sledgehammer and pointed it right at Ruby. She could sense a fight coming, and she was going to go into it swinging first.
At this Ruby's expression lightened up into a smile, or at least it tried to. Cinder had told Ruby that the combination of her swinging around her giant scythe and smiling would make anyone scared, but Ruby was honestly too upset to pull that off right now. Nora had decimated not only one but eight of her bakeries! Eight of them! They were ruined, smoldering wrecks, the conflagrations only being doused out and controlled by Cinder's powers.
"Well, you should be," Ruby settled on that response to Nora, her lips staying straight and thin with anger and her silver eyes alive with some inner flame. Then she moved forwards.
Ren was worried, to say the least. Never before had he and Nora not gone on a mission together. It was always just natural for the two of them to do something together. It made him unsettled to be away from her for so long. He couldn't stop worrying about it, the sensation of missing something important by his side annoying him. Was she okay? Had she destroyed the ten bakeries? Would she be coming back soon? He gave a heavy sigh and resumed his pacing around the small apartment flat the two of them shared. It shouldn't be taking her this long. She should be done by now. Ren reached for his weapons where he kept them strapped to his legs but stopped, his fingers curling around them but not pulling them out.
They had had an argument and Nora wouldn't want to see him now. She was probably still mad. Maybe he could make some pancakes to cheer her up. Ugh, maybe he shouldn't have said anything and just gone with her. But it was too late for that now.
He went to the kitchen and began mixing some pancake batter to get his thoughts off of his best friend. He had already fried ten pancakes by the time the doorbell rang. Wondering who it was, as Nora wouldn't have any need to ring the door as she lived here, he took the stack of pancakes with him just in the small case it was her so he could surprise her.
But it was him who was surprised and the plate of pancakes slipped out of his grip and to the floor where they flopped around him as he dropped to his knees. In a cardboard box that was leaking on the welcome mat in front of his door, was Nora's head.
Severed clean off.
His hands went up to his mouth to cover the screams that threatened to come up, but it wasn't screams that were coming up but something else. As he hurled onto the floor the contents of his stomach, the words written in a childish scrawl in red blood on the flap of the box were burned into his mind.
I warned you.
A/N: Ruby did warn them. But Nora had to not listen. Poor Ren. What will he ever do now?