The screen turns on again, this time however Ruby is not adjusting the scroll's camera as it is steady…ish. The angle was different from last video, for one Ruby wasn't facing the desk but rather the camera that was being held up at eye level to the left of the desk. The cue cards were on the desk however and within her reach.
Ruby looked confused. "Is it recording?..." She asked to something above the camera, slight movement. "Right! Hello true believers and welcome to another episode of, drumroll please!~" Ruby said with a smile.
A sigh came from behind the camera and then a quiet sound of what sounded like tongue rolling to make a "drumroll" sound effect.
Ruby smiled and picked up a sheet of paper with the words 'Ruby's Mystery Corner!'.
"Ruby's Mystery Corner!"
The sheet was new, it had the title of the young reaper's web series written on but it was more detailed now, better even. The usual title written in what one could only compare as an Arial font was now big, bold, and sharp the letters were a dark red with a black border to each letter, still made out of markers but not rushed. On the side was Ruby's rose emblem. Ruby discard the card onto the floor
"Now, before we get to today's mystery, I'd like to address some stuff about last week's episode." Ruby went from smiling to serious very quickly. Ruby looked slightly above the camera. "I would like to apologize to Jaune Arc for putting him through the pain of my punch…and the 24 or so steps that soon followed it." Ruby looked resentful. "Which!" she recovered very quickly. "As an apology I've knighted him my assistant director and co-producer of Ruby's Mystery Corner!"
The camera shifted to show Jaune looking down on it. "Gee, thanks Rubes." Jaune looked at the camera with an eyebrow raised.
"Jaune!" Ruby scolded. "The camera's not supposed to have a face! It ruins the immersion for the viewers!" Ruby whined.
Jaune had a quick panic on his features before setting the camera back to focus on Ruby.
"Right then, as I was saying, Jaune is now co-producer and assistant director!" Ruby reached into her skirt pocket and pulled out a confetti popper and pulled on the string, a small puff of yellow and red confetti flakes came out. "Right, unrelated note, the show now has some more production value thanks to you the viewers and part of Jaune's allowance!"
The camera shifted again to see Jaune looking down with an unamused look on his face. "Yes, thank you all of 12 viewers for the huge monetary increase." Jaune said sarcastically.
"Jaune! Immersion!" Ruby scolded.
The camera shifted again to focus on Ruby.
"Now, with that out of the way here we go with this week's mystery!" Ruby reached for the card but missed it. She looked behind her, grabbed it, and turned back towards the camera. "*ahem*this week's mystery is:" She revealed the card, "What is Blake actually reading?"
On the card was a drawing like last time except this one, like the title card seemed to be of better quality than the stick figure drawings that Ruby made last week. It was a safe assumption that Jaune was now in charge of these cards. This one had a drawing of a book with a question mark on it and cartoon version of Blake's face off to the side. Ruby, once again, discarded the card towards the floor.
"Now, let's see the facts!" Ruby pointed towards the bookshelf to the left of her and the camera followed. "That over there is the Team RWBY bookshelf! Every book owned by Team RWBY is stored in that bookshelf!"
The bookshelf was divided into 4 sections each having a strand of tape to the left of it with the team member's color. Ruby's had a Red, Blake's a black and so on and so forth. Weiss and Blake's seemed to be filled from left to right with books while Yang's shelf halfway full and having two copies of textbooks required for each class. Ruby's shelf had magazines and comic books stacked into two separate stacks from bottom to top.
"As you can see, Blake has filled her shelf so much she has had to rely on her partner to hold her textbooks for her. Now, that in of itself isn't suspicious, but!" the feed cut off into a video of Blake reading a book and a voice over began.
"Blake in this video seems to be reading a book titled 'The Tryst in the Mist', yet when we see her shelf,"
The feed cut to the shelf being inspected by Jaune wearing a cast on his right arm. After another double take, he turns back to the camera and shakes his head.
"there's no such book to be found." Ruby's voiceover continues. "And this isn't the first time either! Other books not found in the shelf were her "Ninja's of love'," A video of Blake reading the book. " ' Howling at the Moon'," another video of Blake, hardly moved but with a different book. "and most famously, Dealing with Hyperactive Children." Ruby finishes.
The camera cuts to it being set up by Ruby with her tongue sticking out while Jaune is nervously messing with something on his hand. After a while of straightening the camera, Ruby sits down on her chair next to Jaune.
"Now, since we don't have all the time we usually have seeing as how Blake is off shopping with Yang and Weiss and they could be back at any moment, we'll have to skip Weiss-puppet's section." Ruby said.
…
She elbowed Jaune, he sighed and raised his free hand, revealing Weiss-puppet. "What? But Ruby, what is Weiss-puppet supposed to do now?" Jaune raised his voice's pitch very high.
Ruby smiled at Jaune's impression of Weiss. "I don't know what to tell you Weiss-puppet, we just don't have time!"
"But I really wanted to spend time with you today, bestie!" Jaune said with his high-pitch voice.
"And I, you bestie, but time constraints are very serious!" Ruby said this all with a smile.
Jaune smiled as an idea came to his mind. "B-but Ruby, I-I need this paycheck! I have a family I need to feed!"
Ruby looked surprised by this, as Jaune was going off-script.
"A f-family?"
"Yes! I am merely a puppet and not an heiress to one of the most successful dust companies in Remnant!"
"Jaune, what are you doing?" Ruby looked at Jaune with a worried look.
Jaune smiled and ignored her. "Oh, poor Winter-puppet! She won't be able to go to those dance classes she wanted to go for years." Jaune said with a sad tone but still kept his high-pitch.
"Dance lessons?"
"Yes, dance lessons! Ever since she was a child all she ever wanted was to dance!"
Ruby looked guilty. "R-really?"
"Yes! Oh, how am I gonna pay rent this month?" Jaune was really getting into the role.
A slight tear formed at the corner of Ruby's eye. "R-rent?"
"Yes, rent! Winter-puppet and I were kicked out of our father's home because of her aspirations to be a world-famous dancer, and I, a world-class singer!" Jaune tilted the paper bag's head down a little to show pain.
""Jobs like those won't ever get you by on life!" he said. "Come back when you're ready to get real jobs!"" Jaune, honestly should've won actor/actress of the year.
"…" Ruby said nothing but you could see tears about to roll down her face.
"And worst of all, soon we won't have enough money to pay for Cake Butler-puppet's services!" Weiss-puppet finished.
"NO! Not Cake Butler-puppet!" Ruby lunged forward and hugged the small puppet with tears on her face. She tightly embraced the puppet. "Listen to me Weiss-puppet, as long as I live you will be paid!"
"Uh, Rubes-"
"Not now Jaune! I swear to you, Weiss-puppet, that Winter-puppet will go to dance lessons!"
"Rubes…"
"and Cake Butler-puppet WILL have a job!"
"Ruby!"
"What?!"
"It's just a puppet…" Jaune said and for effect let the puppet fall limp in Ruby's embrace.
Ruby realized she wasn't hugging a friend in need but rather Jaune's hand and a puppet she made a week ago with a lunch bag and some construction paper.
"…" she let go with a red face of embarrassment.
"Do you wanna try the shot again?"
Ruby nodded her head, still silent as Jaune reached for the camera.
The screen turned off and on as Jaune went from adjusting the camera to sitting in his seat.
"Alright! Because of some unforeseen technical difficulties," Ruby started again, still a little red in the face. "we'll both only present one of our theories!" Ruby discarded a card as Jaune sighed and did the same thing with his top card of two.
"I'll go first!" Ruby revealed her card. "Okay, so I suspect that each book that's on the shelf is a false cover to cover up the real books behind!" the cue card had a very detailed drawing of a cartoonish shelf with a few books, all of them not full books but more like a book cut in half, pulled out to reveal more books.
"Or a more reasonable theory," Jaune interjects, and flips over his card. A drawing of a ridiculously high stack of books next to a cartoonish picture of Blake reading one book.
"She goes to the school library. We know Blake loves books and we know the library allows a book checkout for a week but Blake finishes them in a day, so with all those context clues we can safely assume that Blake makes daily checkouts to the library." Jaune finishes, proud of his reasonable theory.
"Psh! That makes no sense at all Jaune! Everyone knows the library doesn't have copies of Ninjas of Love!" Ruby states in a matter-of-fact tone.
"I don't know that…how do you know, Ruby?" Jaune asked with an eyebrow raised.
Ruby's face blushed a heavy crimson again. "Let's just go on to the solve!" Ruby reaches for the scroll
"Ruby you didn't answer my-" the feed cuts to another shot of the book shelf, Ruby stands in front of Blake's shelf. Ruby reaches for one of the books, however, her hand goes through it and makes a ripping noise of paper.
"What?" Jaune says from behind the camera.
Ruby noticed that she had stuck her hand through paper. "I stuck my hand through paper! Jaune do you know what this means?"
"Blake will definitely notice that we messed with her stuff?" Jaune says from behind the camera.
"What? No! It means I was right!" Ruby smiled as she went to the corner of Blake's shelf and peeled back the paper.
A few books were revealed, not enough to fill the shelf but enough to notice it was a hefty collection.
"What the heck?" Ruby looked through the spines of the books. "Tryst in the Mist, Ninjas of Love, they're all here! Even some I haven't seen before!" Ruby looked through the books.
"Okay Ruby, Mystery solved I think we should leave now!" Jaune said, panic in his voice.
"Just a second!" Ruby looked excited. A message appeared on screen, it was from Yang.
Yangy-Yang-Yang: Yo Rubes, we're back! Blake bought you that new Blades of the Month magazine you asked for!
"RUBY! They're here!"
"Just one second!" Ruby picked up something else, a notebook. She flipped to a random page. ""What are we doing? We can't! We-!" Yang rushed forward and shushed him. "Shh, I think I can keep a secret, can you?" Yang then aggressively grabbed his hand, Sun felt his heart skip a beat- is this a story Blake wrote?"
Jaune realized that this was something that he and Ruby, or anyone for that matter, weren't ever meant to see.
"Ruby, this is bad!"
"I know! I mean, Sun being the Sub? That's nuts!"
Jaune huffed in frustration, dropped the scroll, rushed forward, yanked the notebook from Ruby's hands with a hey from the reaper, set it back and sloppily set up the false books. Jaune picked up the camera and sat down at the desk, Ruby followed.
"What was that for!" Ruby looked frustrated.
"Y'know something tells me you're entering this episode with some ulterior motives in mind." Jaune comments as Ruby takes a seat next to him.
"Hey guys!" from the corner of the screen the camera picks up as Yang walks in with Weiss and Blake in tow, all carrying shopping bags.
"And now we go on to the Mystery!" Jaune says excitedly. "Come on Ruby, lets go!" Jaune rushed out the door, leaving behind the camera.
"Uh, right!" Ruby grabs the camera. "Bye guys!" a flurry of petals covers the screen until she catches up with Jaune going full sprint.
"What now?" Ruby points the camera at Jaune's face.
"RUBY!" a loud growl is heard from behind the two.
"RUN!" Jaune speeds up a bit and Ruby follows.
A fast-paced tapping is heard behind them, they dare not look behind. "Run for our lives Jaune!"
"I'm trying to!" Jaune and Ruby both rush down the 36 stairs and run past someone with Jaune bumping into them. "Sorry!" the blonde boy looked behind him to see the person who he bumped into was the leader of Team CFVY, and she looked pissed.
In that brief Glance he saw Blake acrobatically jump the flight and land without missing a beat and she was more pissed so she scared him more right now.
"Eep!" Jaune sped up even further.
They then rushed down the other flight.
The camera turns off.
Then it turns back on this time with Jaune rushing through the main hall with no sign of Blake. This time Ruby was holding the camera and with the rather bobbing motion she filmed the back of Jaune.
After making their way outside into the commons Ruby was matching Jaune's pace but Jaune however, wasn't, seeing as he was panting heavily and looked dazed. Ruby made the camera show Jaune's face.
"Ruby, *gasp* I don't think *wheeze* I can go on!" Jaune collapsed.
"Jaune!" Ruby reached for the blonde boy, still holding the camera.
"No, Ruby, this is it for me!" Jaune breathed in. "We managed to lose her for a bit at the cafeteria but she'll catch up." Jaune put his head down and closed his eyes for his final re-
"That's dead people talk Jaune, you're not dead yet! Come on!" Ruby grabbed Jaune's arm but wasn't able to get too far dragging him.
Jaune lifted his face from ground and spit out some dirt that had found its way into his mouth from being dragged across the grass. "Ruby, don't…be a hero…ngh..Run! Upload the episode and tell my story! Tell…my….story….*bleh*" Jaune closed his eyes as dirt once again met face.
"Jaune? Jaune?! JAAUUNNEE!" Ruby cried out to the heavens.
"RUBY!" Blake called out from the doors, she had found them, heavy blush on her features.
"Oh shi-" Ruby used her Semblance and rushed away from Jaune's passed out form. The camera kept rolling as Ruby ran.
Ruby turned the camera to face her a tear could be seen on her face. "Thank you for tuning into another episode of *sniff* Ruby's Mystery Corner! Join us next week for *sniff* the secret to Professor Oobleck's coffee!" just at that moment Ruby tripped and the camera slipped out of her hands, it landed safely in the grass.
The last shot before the feed cut out was Ruby on the ground holding her hands out to protect herself as Blake pounced on her prey.