I guarantee no expertise or even basic, correct knowledge of Mcdonald's chain restaurant's menu, FDA health and safety policies, Parkinson's disease, cars, color psychology, nutritional requirements, romance, dating, how adult men flirt, babysitting, or petty rivalries.

However, I am trying to be as respectful as possible in regards to disability. I welcome any corrections, if anyone has any insights.

-OOO-

The children chanted and danced as they dressed to their outdoor clothes, which mostly just added shoes and jackets to their normal attire.

Glynda stepped into her sneakers, not bothering to untie them. She hopped on one foot and bent her right knee to fix the tongue on her right shoe (her left shoe could deal with it), and she followed the chanting, jumping children into the driveway.

Qrow's car was a 2015 Subaru Impreza, and it looked well kept. The windows looked newly washed and there wasn't any visible clutter seen in the windows (Glynda suddenly became very self-conscious of the state or her own car).

Qrow pulled out his keys and unlocked the car. He turned to the younger of his nieces.

"Ruby, did you want to ride shotgun?"

"Green shak- no, that's okay. I want to ride in back with Glynda!" Ruby skipped over to Glynda and smiled up at the babysitter. Glynda rubbed her head.

Qrow's nose twitched, just slightly. "but- you always like to sit up front. That's why I keep a carseat in the trunk."

"I'm too big for a carseat now." Ruby pouted. Then she scrunched her face, just a bit, looking quizzical. She turned to Yang. "Why don't you ask Yang? She never gets to ride shotgun?"

"I-" Qrow furrowed his brow. "is that right? I swore she's rode up front before..."

Yang scrunched her mouth and shrugged. "Yeah, I never sit shotgun with you. Or with Summer."

"Oh. Ok. Yang," Qrow turned to his niece and smiled, "Would you like to ride shotgun?"

Yang stifled a smile. She waved the air. "If you want me to. Sure."

Qrow beckoned Yang over to the front of the car. For just a moment which Yang probably thought went entirely unnoticed, her face widened into a massive smile as she silently giggled, shaking her wrist and jumping on her toes, slightly, once.

Ruby held the door open for Glynda, which the sitter accepted with a smile and a flourish of her hand and a later wish that she had thought of something clever to say. Ruby then ran around to climb into the car on the other side.

Aftwr Ruby nestled into the seat next to Glynda, she turned to the sitter and held her hands about. "Glynda, can you put my seatbelt on for me?"

"Umm" Glynda protested, but started doing so anyway, "Surely you've put your seatbelt on before?"

"Yeah, but grown-ups do it better, and I want to be safe!"

"She's still just a teenager," Qrow mumbled under his breath.

"Well then," Glynda pulled the seatbelt over Ruby's waist and shoulder, nice and sturdy. The babysitter sat up straight. "As the babysitter it's my job to ensure the safety of my charges."

Ruby beamed. Glynda smiled back. Then she caught Qrow's look, and chuckled nervously.

Glynda then checked Yang's seatbelt. 'Checked' may have been to strong a word, because other than making sure it was buckled, this 'checking' thing seemed a little redundant.

But Yang approved the approval. Then the car jolted onto the roadways.

During the ride. Yang and Ruby resumed chanting their strange recitations to viridescent sugary liquid-solid hybrid matter.

"So, uh," Glynda ventured, " I guess you're really fond of Irish mint shakes?

"Green- Yeah!" Ruby said, smiling. "Green shakes! Green shakes!"

"Umm," Glynda turned to everyone in the car. "So is there a special reason you like them? Like there was a special occasion when you've had them that makes them special to you?"

"They're green!" Ruby explained.

Glynda blinked. "Is that it?"

"Yeah!" Ruby nodded three times, "Green is the tastiest color, but only on desserts."

"I disagree," Yang said, "But green connotes a specific dessert experience, like how yellow can be lemon-y on donuts and cake but be mango-y on smoothies."

"Or like how orange is the most dangerous color on clothes!"

"Like how red is the tastiest color, on meat." Yang said.

"Or how purple is the royalist color!" Ruby said.

"Or how grey is the plainest color."

"Or how pink is the babiest color!"

"Or how blue is the warmest color."

"Or how heliotrope is the color most associated with emotional equilibrium."

"Oh okay," Glynda said, "wait-"

Ruby and Yang continued about color psychology for a while. Glynda nodded along.

They arrived at the Mcdonald's. The door had the giant golden 'M' above it. On one side was a large adjacent glass complex that housed a signature Mcdonald's brand playpen, reflecting the midafternoon light onto the well-kept parking-lot pavement.

Ruby and Yang jumped out of the car as soon as it parked, and they ran around the car and then Qrow when he excited the car and then both Qrow and Glynda once the babysitter scootched out of the vehicle.

They entered the eatery. It was a Mcdonald's; red and tan tiled walls and booths and fleureacent lighting and ketchup spills on the floor.

"Green shakes! Green shakes! Green shakes!" chanted the children.

There wasn't a line for the register, so Qrow walked up, ending up far enough away that Ruby and Yang could comfortably circle him without bumpingt into the counter.

"So can I have," Qrow said to the screens above the register. "Lets just go with four happy meals-"

"Green shakes! Green shakes!"

Qrow tapped his chin. "Another two large fries and a chicken nugget box-"

"Green shakes! Green shakes!"

"And four large Irish mint shakes," Qrow finished.

"Green shakes!" the children concluded.

"uhhh," said the clerk, figeting nervously, " We're actually out of the syrup for our Shamrock Shakes(tm). Sorry."

And the world went silent. The air froze in apprehension.

...

...

"What?" said Yang, the hope gone from her voice.

"Uhhh, we have vanilla shakes-"

"Are they green?" asked Yang.

"uhhh, no."

"Then no deal!" Yang said. She tucked her arm under her stump and frowned.

"They're out of syrup." Ruby said to the floor, looking like she just got rejected from college or if some other apocalyse had occured.

Glynda's heart involuntarily ached at the absurd profundity of how sad Ruby and Yang looked. The babysitter bit her fist and blinked the beginnings of tears out of her eyes.

The clerk grinned awkwardly and ducked a little. "You know, Arby's has some really good mint shakes."

Glynda turned to her eating group, "There's an Arby's like two blocks from here."

There was a voice from behind the fryers. "New kid," said the manager, "Are you telling our customers to go somewhere els- Oh hey Glynda."

The manager tucked a strand of wavy black hair behind her ear and flashed an obnoxious smile at Glynda.

Glynda straightened her posture and flattened her expression. "Cinder."

Cinder smirked and tucked the rest of her loose hair behind her ear. She eyed the children. "Cute family, Glynders. Sorry we're out of irish mint sy-"

Glynda made a face. "Do I really look old enough to have a ten and a half year old daughter?"

"Ten and legitimate math"

Cinder chuckled. "I had meant family as in 'siblings', but wow, who knew that prim and proper Goody-two-shoes-witch managed to get pregnant twice before her junior year of high school."

Glynda bit her cheek Ruby's mough wobbled. Yang laughed.

"And with some sort of unshaved hipster indie-band-looking doodbag." Cinder gestured to Qrow. "Not bad-"

"What?" Qrow backed up. "Oh no. No no no no no no. Not even."

"No way no no no no-" Glynda declared.

"Nooooooooooo!" Ruby said. She waved her arms around in distress.

Qrow and Glynda shared a smirk. "Glad we're all on the same page," one of them said. They both nodded. Ruby sighed in what sounded like relief.

Cinder almost rid herself of a very unprofessional lopsided grin by the time Glynda turned back to her.

"As I was saying," Cinder said, "We do have different desserts I'm sure you'll like. Would you like a strawberry-banana or a mango-pineapple smoothie instead?"

Yang refreshed her pout. "Are they green?"

Cinder scrunched her mouth. "They are not."

"Then no deal." Yang pouted harder.

"We have apple pies. They used to be green, before they became pies."

"Then I guess we used to have a deal."

Cinder refreshed her obsequious food technician smile. "We also sell apples. Some of the are Granny Smith apples, which are green."

"Apples aren't desserts."

"Did you want to go somewhere else?" Qrow asked.

"Nowhere else has a playpen." Ruby intoned. "Oh well. I guess this Mcdonaldy trip will just be less special than we wanted."

Ruby and Yang let out identical, exhaggerated, despondant sighs.

Glynda's mouth wobbled before she caught herself and before she herself sighed a defeated sigh.

Glynda knelt down and unstrung her shoestrings. Her right foot had managed to slip in just fine when she put on her shoes before they left but her left heel had a slight misalignment. She looped her hands around all four shoestrings and pulled up to her knees. Then she tied her shoes, for real this time, and then Glynda double-knotted them."Again, there's an Arby's not too far from here. I can run and grab some shakes."

"What's McDonald's policy on outside food?" Qrow asked Cinder.

"As long as you order something here, you can use our dining facilities. " Cinder said. She frowned as she spoke though, but only slightly. "Again, apologies for the inconvenience-"

Glynda didn't stay to listen to the corporate syncophant. She bolteded out the door fast enough to regret not stretching before hand.

And ten minutes and $12.91 later, Glynda returned with four Mint Chocolate Swirl shakes in a cardboard container for easy transport.

Glynda rushed into the restaurant and regretted not taking a moment to catch her breath and compose herself before she kicked open the door, because she had to double over for three breaths. It probably looked less heroic than she would have liked.

But it got Ruby and Yang's attention. The children's faces lit up and they sidled out of their booth as fast as they could and ran up to Glynda, running around her in circles.

"Green Shakes!" they chanted in unison, resuming the hideous ritual.

"They're so green!" Yang said.

"They're so shakey!" Ruby said.

Ruby and Yang bounded in circles around Glynda.

"Yay! Glynda, you saved the day!" Ruby said. She then hugged Glynda's right leg.

"Oh," Glynda said between breaths. She smiled awkwardly and tried to believe in her own heroism. "You bet I did."

Then Glynda cleared her throat "Okay, so which ones did you want?" she said.

Ruby broke off her hug and Yang stopped running around. Ruby turned to Yang and gave her the first pick.

"Gimmie," Yang said, "The shakiest one."

Glynda blinked. "Ok, yeah. Um. Which one's the shakiest one?"

Qrow had caught up to his nieces by now. "Well, first compile a list of all qualities that describe a 'shake', and then develop a test protocol to determine how well each quality is represented in each sample."

"And then run the test 40 times across different samples, and compile a gausse curve based on an aggregate of the data," Yang said.

"And whichever shake is rightmost on the curve, that's the shakiest," Ruby said.

Glynda blinked. "Wait, for reals?"

"Yeah, that's how bell curves work," Ruby said.

Qrow smirked. "Didn't you take statistics?"

"I did, yes, but I meant, do you actually only want the shake that is, demonstrably and empirically, the shakiest, Yang?"

"Yes!" Yang smiled her biggest smile.

Glynda looked over the four chocolate mint swirl shakes.

The shake on the top left was a cold and viscous milk-based blended dessert, with whipped cream and chocolate syrup and sprinklings of chocolate pieces crumbled on top.

The shake on the top right was a milk-based and blended cold viscous dessert, with chocolate syrup and whipped cream and pieces of chocolate crumbling sprinkled on top.

The shake on the bottom left was a blended and cold viscous milk-based dessert, on top of which was chocolate syrup and whipped cream and sprinklings of crumbled chocolate pieces.

The shake on the bottom right was a blended and milk-based viscous cold dessert, with chocolate crumbled sprinkle pieces on top of whipped cream and chocolate syrup.

Glynda scrunched her mouth. She picked the bottom left shake and shook it up.

"There. Definition 2: shaking it makes it more shakey. Here you go, Yang."

Yang's face lit up and she took the shake. "Yay! Thanks, Glynda." She stuck the straw in her mouth and closed her eyes and slurped a big slurp, rising up on her tiptoes as she did. She swallowed and looked content.

Glynda turned to Ruby, who didn't wait to be asked which one she wanted. "I want the greenest one!" Ruby said. She looked to her sister. "Of the ones that remain, I mean."

Glynda pulled out her phone and downloaded a chromatography app. Cinder smirked insufferably when Glynda leaned over to ask the wifi password.

After running the test, Glynda gave the top left shake to Ruby. It was, according to science, the greenest one.

"Yay! Thanks, Glynda!" Ruby said, eyes wide and little hands clasped triumphantly before she reached out to grab both sides of the shake.

Glynda took the top right shake and handed it to Qrow. "Unless you want to make some irrelevant request?

'Well actually-"

"Too bad, you're an adult."

"I was just going to say thank you, for getting these shakes." Qrow looked down to his nieces. "Sorry, I meant 'Yay, Thanks Glynda!'."

Glynda's expression flattened.

Qrow coughed. "But for seriously, thank you. For Ruby and Yang's sake."

"Oh. Yes. For the children's sake. Of course. You're welcome." Glynda clamped her mouth down on the straw of the remaining shake.

And so they ate. There was some nice small talk and then Ruby and Yang started dueling with their french fries.

And at some point, a ding and a shuffle marked that two new people entered the Mcdonald's. Glynda saw them tepidly approach the counter from the corner of her eye. She didn't pay any attention to them, until she noticed that Qrow was staring, unblinking, at the arrivals.

"Something up?" Glynda asked idly.

"OH? N-nothing. Not at all." Qrow then became very focused on dipping one of his french fries in ketchup.

Glynda then turned around to see what was up- it had to be the new customers, right? That was the only thing that had happened.

One of the arrivals was a stern, stocky middle-aged man- someone with had some tufts of grey at his temples. That didn't necessarily mean he was old, but it meant he was either old or was under a lot of stress. He pushed a wheelchair with a young, orange-headed girl in it.

"Who's he?" Glynda asked, idly. Yang and Ruby looked between themselves.

"Who's who?" Qrow said, to the wall. His voice almost squeaked.

Yang grinned mischeviously. "Is that the guy from your work you have a crush on?" she said.

Glynda paused eating her fries.

Qrow was-

Well, Raven was- and there wasn't anything wrong with that, of course- and didn't she read somewhere that it was genetic?

Glynda shrugged and resumed eating.

Qrows' mouth flattened. He rubbed Yang's head. "It's possible I tell you entirely too much." He inhaled and exhaled. "But yes. That's James."

"You should talk to him."

"No~"

"Do it!" squeaked Ruby. She held her arms in the air theatrically. "Believe in yourself!"

Qrow sunk his head into his shoulders. "Hey, keep it down, will ya~

"Do it! Do it!" Yang started chanting.

"I really shouldn't-"

"Do it! Do it!" Ruby joined in as well.

"Okay, okay," Qrow said, "Just stop making a commotion."

Qrow snuck out of the booth and put his hands behind his back and awkwardly sidled up to stand in line behind the man and the girl.

Yang got out of the booth and followed him.

Then Ruby followed Yang.

Ruby turned back and beckoned to Glynda. Glynda sighed internally and followed her charge.

So now the line had six people, single file.

Qrow wasn't saying anything. Yang was looking between the back of Qrow's head and Ruby and the girl in the wheelchair, and Ruby was looking between Glynda and Qrow, and the man and the girl in the wheelchair tried to make up their minds on what to order.

"So I admit I don't come here very often," said the man to the girl.

"Oh," said the girl to the man, "I thought this was what normal people did?"

"It's one of the most popular fast food places, yeah." The man nodded. "It's totally normal for people to eat here. I just meant to say, I am not normal in this way."

"Oh okay." Said the girl. "Well, we get to be normal now."

The man chuckled twice."Yes we do. So does anything look good? Let me know; it'll help me make up my mind."

"Ummm," The girl brought a hand to her mouth. "They have, like, sandwiches, right? I should pick the best sandwich."

"There's pictures of some of the food. We could try the 'Big Mac'. It has a very large picture."

The girl nodded sagely. "I remember the commercials for those."

The man and the girl talked for a while more. Cinder the food service technician was standing patiently behind the register, smiling her corporate smile, waiting for the two of them to come forward with an order. Qrow still didn't say anything; he stood up straight, with his hands behind his back.

Glynda opened her mouth on but then Yang turned to her, with a pointer finger vertically across her lips. Glynda clamped her mouth shut and nodded.

Cinder asked the pair if she could help them with their order. Then the man and the girl tried to categorically determine how positively correlated popularity was to excellence, and if in a situation where every experience was commoditized, if there actually was a meaningful choice between a popular but impersonal choice and a unique choice with a higher chance of being sub-optimal. Robert Frost was quoted at some point.

Yang then kicked Qrow's shin.

Qrow cleared his throat. "I always say, you can't go wrong with a happy meal," he said. "I mean, you can, but there's an option to get chicken nuggets, and they're pretty good."

The man turned around and raised his eyebrows in surprise, or perhaps delight. "Oh, Mr. Branwen." The man held out his left hand. "Fancy bumping into you here."

Qrow took the hand and shook once and then rubbed the back of his head and smirked at the wall. "Yeah..."

"We're not in line," the man said to the four of them, "feel free to go ahead and order."

"Oh, we're not in line either." Qrow said.

"Oh. Okay." the man said.

There was some awkward silence.

Yang then leaned out of the line. "Hey Penny!" Yang said. She waved her stump.

Qrow's mouth scrunched to the side, just for a moment.

"Oh, hey..." the girl said. The man turned her wheelchair around, so she wasn't turning her head so rigidly. "...you..." the girl said. She then brought her hand up and slowly moved it in an air-waving motion. "I mean, I remember you, I just forgot your name."

"Yang," said the owner of that name. She held out her left hand.

The girl and Yang shook hands.

"I met Penny in the support group, back when I still went," Yang said, looking to Qrow and Ruby and Glynda. Yang then turned to the man. "Hey mister, I like your arm!" Yang held out her stump to shake the mans hand.

"Oh. Huh. Would you look at that." the man took Yang's limb with his right hand, this time, and Glynda realized it was a prosthetic. A very fancy looking prosthetic, with wires running along the visible parts and rubber gripping suraces on the fingertips. Three aluminum and plastic digits closed around Yang's stump. "It's nice to meet you again, Yang."

"Yeah, and you work with Qrow?" Yang gestured to a now slightly red agricultural engineer, "He's the best!"

"Yeah, he's really smart and can run the fastest!" Ruby added.

"Ahahaha," Qrow put a hand on a shoulder of each his niece's and made to lead them away, "We'll be right in our booth."

"Come sit with us!" Yang said to Penny,

"Oh- Uh, okay," Penny turned to the man, "I just have to figure out what I need to order."

"Wait," Yang said. She stopped, and Qrow didn't push her forward. Yang rubbed her chin with her sole hand, "Is Mcdonald's good for people on Parkinsons' medication?"

"u-umm-" Penny began.

"Of course," Cinder said. She smiled a corporate smile and pontificated mechanically. "Mcdonald's restaurants is committed to the nutritional health of all our customers and we are dedicated to catering to a diverse and inclusive consumer base. Our restaurants regularly score perfect scores on our annual FDA inspections."

Yang tucked her left arm under her right armpit and jutted her chin out. "Hygienic facilities don't imply healthy food; that's obfuscating the issue. Mighty suspicious."

Cinder refreshed her fast food smile. "My apologies. I thought you were asking about risks of contamination." Cinder pontificated. "All food served at Mcdonald's restaurants is up to FDA standards and codes regarding heath and safety."

"Wasn't there a movie about a guy gaining 200 pounds on a diet exclusively of Mcdonald's?"

"And I think that movie's results were not reproducible with independent trails. Besides, weight is a function of calorie intake. You can gain weight on a vegan diet if you eat to much, you know."

"But why do more people get fat off Mcdonald's than on vegetables?"

"Can you blame our food for being so good that people want to eat too much of it? Furthermore, thinness is not equivalent to health and health is not equivalent to virtue. You shouldn't cast aspersions on someone just because they're fat."

"You can asperse your food for containing minimal nutrition and having too much sugar and fat, requiring customers to eat more empty calories to reach their minimum nutrient levels. You're basically just forcing people to eat too much salt, fat, and sugar."

"That is a false equivalency; Everyone eats food, and there's no food that's completely nutritional. We encourage our customers to eat balanced meals but it is not our fault if they do not."

"Aha!" Yang pointed and smirked a grin reminiscent of her Uncle's, "You admit that Mcdonald's isn't nutritional!"

Cinder smiled and bowed slightly. "I do believe I mentioned that no food is completely balanced. For example, chicken contains no vitamin C-"

"So they get scurvy?" Glynda interjected.

Ruby tugged on Glynda's shirt. "Or maybe they're immune to scurvy, because they don't need vitamin C?"

"Then they'd make the perfect pirates."

"Chicken pirates! Are they more cowardly than regular pirates?"

"Maybe, but they are surely more delicious than regular pirates."

Ruby jumped on her tip-toes and waved her arms. "I think you're right!"

Glynda smirked. "Of course I am."

"Are you done?" Cinder said. Her brow furrowed as much as the corporation regulations allowed her to, while she was in front of customers, "I'm trying to take an order here."

"I was trying to defuse the argument." Glynda mumbled to the ground.

Yang pouted. "Well I'd be winning if she didn't keep spinning the issue."

"Young lady," Cinder refreshed her corporate smile, "I've taught Sunday school for years. I can spin this issue in which way, all day, every day."

Ruby chuckled. "You're funny, lady." she said.

"No she's not." Glynda said. She puffed out her cheek and crossed her arms.

"And, umm," Penny said, "I'm not on Sinemet anymore, I got the chip." Penny tapped the base of her spine. "So I don't need to watch what I eat."

Glynda decided against nitpicking that statement.

Yang blinked. "Oh, okay then. Ignore this conversation."

There was some more awkward silence.

Qrow then laughed nervously twice and led Yang away to their seats. After he was out of sight from the pair he made an exasperated face.

Glynda and her ... patron family? Her charges and their uncle returned to their booth. And a few minutes later, the man and the girl approached them, presumably to have company while they waited for their food. Qrow and Yang moved a few chairs to accommodate the wheelchair.

"So, umm," Glynda said. She held out a hand. "I'm Glynda Goodwitch. The babysitter."

The man smiled the most authentic corporate smile Glynda had seen today. "James Ironwood. I'm the finance director at the local Monsanto plant."

And it turned out that Glynda held out her right hand, so Mr. ironwood had to shake with his prosthetic one. It was plastic and metal and rubber and rudimentary motors. Three actuators whirred to life during the shake.

Glynda stopped herself from staring. "Cool," she said as she made mature eye contact. Glynda wondered if she should take this opportunity to network. Then she remembered there was a second person she had to introduce herself to.

"I'm Penny," said the girl in the wheelchair, once Glynda got around to holding out her hand in introduction.

"Okay, cool. Yeah." Glynda nodded and wondered what she should say next.

However, before her silence got too awkward, Ruby interrupted.

Ruby's eyes were wide with wonder. "So you have a computer chip in your head?" She sked Penny.

Glynda almost choked on her fries. Some of the chewed food almost went up her nose.

"Technically it's just an electrode in my head, but there's an external microchip." Penny turned her head and pointed to her hair accessory, which, on close inspection, concealed some contraption of wires and metal.

"It's an experimental procedure," Mr. Ironwood explained.

"So you're like a cyborg?" Ruby said. Her eyes widened even more. "That's so cool!"

Penny turned to the wall and rubbed the back of her head. "Oh. Uh, thanks."

Yang elbowed her uncle, and Qrow then leaned over and held out his own hand. To Mr. ironwood.

"Hello, again," James lilted. "I think we've met before."

Qrow's face relaxed into an insufferable smirk. "Yeah, you seem a little familiar."

James cleared his throat. "So this is my daughter, Penny." he gestured to the cyborg orange-haired girl.

"Qrow Branwen. I work under the same ceiling and drink the same coffee as your father," Qrow said. He ran some fingers through his hair. "I was unaware that James had a daughter," Qrow pontificated. "Your mother is a very lucky woman."

"Oh, uh," James rubbed the back of his head with his prosthetic head. "Ahem." He cleared his throat. "I'm not married, actually. I adopted Penny after we met at a biotech conference out east." James turned to Penny and gestured for her to continued if she wanted to. "

Penny wobbled her mouth for a moment. "I didn't have a family so I figured, why not volunteer for those medical procedures in the papers? And then I met all these nice people who knew what I was going through. It was nice."

And James scrunched his mouth to the side, "And I figured, hey, why don't I try to give a child a better life? Even if it's only a difference for a single person, it'd be worth it."

"Awww," Qrow said, sounding the most sincere as Glynda had ever heard him (which, admittedly, was only a few hours.). "That was very sweet of you."

Glynda agreed, but only non-verbally. She blinked a couple times to crush the inklings of crying in the corners of her eyes. She didn't want to show weakness in front of her charges.

James's cheeks tinted just a bit as he nodded in an a way that attempted stoicness. "Thank you."

Glynda was, guiltily, a little happy that nobody else seemed to know what to say to fill the awkward silence either.

Well, except Yang, apparently.

After a few moments and a few glances to everyone else at the table, Yang waved a fry around and got Mr. Ironwood's attention. "So biotech conference. Is that where you got your cyborg arm? Can I see it?" Yang said.

James pulled his right arm out. He pulled his sleeve to reveal more pieces of metal and wire. "The elbow joint's not very sophisticated, but the fingers are wired up to some muscle sensors, so I can grasp things when I'm not feeling left-handed."

Ruby wiggled the fingers on her own left hand.

"Electrodes? Can I see?" Yang's eyes flickered to Qrow for just a moment.

James rolled up his sleeve a bit more. The prosthetic ended just above the elbow, in a steel cage around the stump of his bicep, with a few clear plastic suction cups around several muscles groups that seemed signifigant. There was a gearbox where his elbow would have been. Yang reached out and touched the metal.

"Woah!" Yang turned to her uncle. "Qrow, come feel this.

Qrow's eyebrows rose just a bit as he leaned forward. "Can I? If you're a private man, that's okay, though."

"Uhhh," James said, He cleared his throat. "Not at all. Feel free, if you'd like to."

Qrow licked some french-fry salt off the tips of his fingers and wiped them on a napkin. He traded places with Yang in a surprisingly coordinated do-ci-do.

Qrow looked at James's eyes for a moment and smirked with a quick exhale through the corner of his mouth. He ran his hand along the aluminum bars that made up Jame's forearm. He touched the tip of the graspers with the tips of his own fingers, and then ran his hand back along the forearm bars up to the muscle tensions sensors. Qrow hovered his fingertips over the fleshy part of Jame's arm, and then looked up at the man's face for approval before tracing the skin around the sensors.

Yang then turned to Penny. "I don't think I've seen you in school this year."

"I've had to be homeschooled for a bit. I'd like to come back, if I get the nerve to."

Yang smiled. "You should! We can hang out at recess."

Glynda then unflattened her expression and turned back to Ruby. She leaned in conspiratorially.

"So I'm gonna be honest," Glynda whispered, "I have no idea how to talk to the crush of the uncle of the girl I'm babysitting and his adopted daughter. So I'm glad they're occupied with Qrow and Yang."

Ruby then smiled her biggest smile. "That's okay!" She whispered a little loudly, Glynda thought. "You can just talk to me! Like, what do you think chicken pirates eat when they're out at sea?"

So they discussed the logistics of chicken pirates some more.

At some point Yang leaned over to whisper something into her sister's ear. Ruby lit up and stood up in the booth and leaned over to her sitter.

"Hey hey Glynda," Ruby said. "if you were a pirate, would you put your parrot on this side," Ruby patted Glynda's shoulder which was closest to her. Ruby then reached over, extending her little arm around the back of Glynda's neck to reach the far shoulder, "or this side?"

Glynda had to think about the answer to that question.

END OF CHAPTER NOTES:

So I'm going to pretend I'm qualified to talk about this. This is the short version. If you find a medical source with differing information, trust that information. Apologies to any readers with PD who don't see their experiences accurately represented here.

Parkinson's Disease is a neurological muscle tremor disorder. Patients can take medication to calm their neurons, but there's also a procedure called Deep Brain Stimulation where an electrode in the brain regulates neurological activity. It's sort of like a pacemaker. The procedure has been around for decades, but early versions were crude and became less effective over time; most patients who elected for the operation had to return to supplementary medication at some point. However, modern versions are being worked on that incorporate computer magic to make the procedure more effective.

Thus, Penny's tremors are under control enough that she is able to walk, but she prefers to only do it in short bursts, hence the wheelchair, and she's not on medication at the moment but, like most people who've done DBS, might need to resume it in the future.