CH4: Babysitting Before Exams
Present day.
"God!" Ritsu groans, "Babysitting sucks!"
"That's enough, you're gonna blow our cover." Shieri says sharply.
Both the Silver Knight and the Titanist sit perched atop the roof of a building across the street of a small dust shop. The same shop that their current target just entered.
After sitting for hours, playing the waiting game, Ritsu removes himself from his current position to go lay down near the edge of the roof. From where the muscular boy lies he gazes upon the stars in the sky, and then the shattered moon.
Soon, I'll be strong enough to do that. The Titanist thought.
Silence soon filled the air as Ritsu's thoughts continue to ponder on the idea of how much dust he could consume to make himself powerful.
While the Titanist continues to stargaze, Shieri—who's been watching with absolute concentration—switches the vision mode in his HUD to X-ray mode. With X-ray vision, the assassin spots an average-height skeletal figure and a short skeletal figure.
Already, Shieri confirms the short skeletal figure as the girl they're supposed to be watching.
"So what's she doing?" Ritsu says calmly.
"She's just reading a magazine." Shieri says, without diverting his attention.
The Titanist groans loudly, causing the Knight to turn to him.
"Can you groan any louder?" Shieri says through gritted teeth under his mask, "I don't think she can't hear you, yet."
"Yeah, whatever." Ritsu breathes.
At that the muscular boy, rolls over and looks over the edge of the building.
Ritsu yawns, "Man, when are we supposed to go talk to her…"
Shieri turns his attention back to the dust shop, across the street below.
"When something happens that requires our support."
"Like what?"
"Like a fight or something…she does want to be a huntress." Shieri says irritatingly.
"Ha." Ritsu reaches over and slaps Shieri on the back, "Why be a huntress, when you can be a Titan."
For a moment, Shieri felt a little annoyance because of Ritsu's personality, as well as an unexpected pain from the slap the Titanist gave him. Though, the Atlesian's facial expression does not betray him, to reveal that he feels any pain at all.
I didn't think Titans were that strong, Shieri though. Let alone that I'd be related to one.
"Hey," Ritsu whispers. "Shieri, check this out."
The Knight sighs, out of frustration. "Why do you insist on distracting me from our mission?"
"You know this is important." Shieri adds, while watching the skeletal figure of the young girl flip through the magazine that she must have.
"We need to make sure this girl gets home safely tonight, due to the rise of Dust robberies, in this area."
"Yeah…about those robberies…"
At that Shieri notices the different tone in the Titanists' voice, which causes him to take is eye off the girl and look at the muscular boy.
From where the Atlesian lies, he sees the muscular boy's eyebrows furrow with concentration. Although from Shieri's position, he cannot see what Ritsu is seeing. So to get a better view, Shieri crawls over to lay next to the Titanist and looks down at the empty road. And from what the Silver Knight is gazing upon, he could have only hoped for anyone else but Him.
"What's this guy's problem…everyone seems to move out of his way."
Shieri switches off the X-ray mode built into his HUD, only to curse under his breath.
"What?" Ritsu turns to his brother, "You know this guy?"
The Silver Knight snorts, "yeah…I'm surprised that you don't."
"Yeah…well I'll remember to ask peoples' names' first before I kill them."
Shieri glares at his brother for a moment, before going back to watching the man in the white coat, dark-brown slacks, black gloves, brown dress-shoes; who also wears a bowl hat; and walks with a cane.
"You know I was joking, right?" Ritsu says feigning concern of his brother's sense of humor.
"I'll remember to laugh next time…but right now…That man in the white, down below…is the infamous Roman Torchwick."
"He is well known for robbing Dust shops, and military armaments; kidnapping; escaping arrest; and being a well-renown sociopath." The Knight adds.
Ritsu, makes a low whistling sound.
"Sounds like this guy has been around town, a lot lately."
"Yeah…"
At that Shieri, slowly turns his head as the Kingdom of Vale's greatest thief/sociopath, continues to cross the road…and into the Dust shop.
"No…" the Atlesian says quietly.
Swiftly and quietly, Shieri summons his wings and leaps gracefully across the street. He then lands atop the roof of the Dust shop. Luckily for the Silver Knight, the thug below guarding the front door below did not notice—or hear, him. The same goes for the Atlesian's brother since he followed suit.
From where he stands, Ritsu leans over the edge to look down at the thug dressed in black, with a red sword in one hand.
"Hey" Ritsu says, "did I forget to mention that I knew where those thugs in black came from?"
Away from the edge of the rooftop, Shieri takes out his dual pistols to inspect them. He doesn't take his eyes off his weapons as he speaks to his brother.
"No. You forgot to mention that."
"Yeah, it was a couple of nights ago when Kluá and I went to go celebrate." Ritsu says, with a smile on his face. "Those guys belong to the club owner, Junior."
The thought of that Goldilocks girl fighting in Junior's club, came to the muscular boy's mind.
Damn, Ritsu thought. What would I've given to see that girl again?
"Yeah, again. You both forgot to mention that too" Shieri says, interrupting the Titanists' reverie.
Ritsu shrugs, "What-evs."
At that, the muscular boy crouches low to the edge of the rooftop, eyeing the guard below.
"I'm gonna knock him on his ass." Ritsu says calmly.
"What!?" Shieri whispers sharply, turning his attention away from his weapons, only to see his brother leap over the roof.
God damn him, was the Atlesian boy's thought as he tried to catch his brother from jumping off the edge.
Now as Shieri watches his brother land on top of the thug guarding the front door, he quickly thinks to his HUD to turn on the X-ray vision.
I hope no one saw that. At that Shieri looks down through the floor of the rooftop, and as it turns out, no one saw…especially since, the thugs below seem to be busy doing something.
Job comes first I guess…wait a min-
To the Silver Knight's surprise, he notices two skeletal figures on one side of the shop counter and one on the other. Instantly, Shieri confirmed that the two are the thugs and the other be the shop keeper. He also noticed that one of the thugs appears to be holding something in his hands, which seems to be why the shopkeeper is keeping his hands up in the air.
Shieri frowns.
God dammit. The assassin thought, I better do something
At that, Shieri moves towards the edge of the roof to jump; though he froze when the sound of glass breaking broke the silent night.
"Dammit Ritsu!" Shieri says sharply.
The Knight leans over the edge to look down at the sidewalk, only to see his brother slowly get up off the sidewalk.
"God…the hell was that?" Ritsu groans. The muscular boy rubs the back of his head as he moves up into a sitting position.
From where he sits, Ritsu looks straight ahead, only to see the girl he saw outside Juniors club.
Damn, who knew this little girl could be that strong. The Titanist thought
At that, the muscular boy watches the girl rest her weapon on her shoulder and slowly rising into a standing position, just as her weapon unfolds into a large red and black scythe. The girl then performs a series of twirls and spins of her weapon, before stabbing the tip of the curved blade into the cement.
"Okaaay." An unfamiliar voice says calmly. "Get her."
Ritsu looks to his right, just as the rest of Junior's henchmen come storming out the Dust shop.
This otta be good. The Titanist said just as he watches the idiots attack the girl.
The first henchman that ran out of the building first took the first swing at the little girl, only to have her dodge the attack and counter with a flare double-kick to the man's face.
Ritsu barely had enough time to duck under the man that flew overhead, back into the Dust shop through the window.
Damn this girl has some power, the boy thought.
Atop the roof of the Dust shop, Shieri watches the girl that he and his brother were assigned to guard—and evaluate, move onto the offensive tactics.
From this point on out, the girl in the red hood performs a series of maneuvers at high speeds which included a series of flips; spins to dodge bullets, and heavy swings with her scythe to the rest of the henchmen. The Atlesian boy also notices flashes—followed up by gunfire sounds—that seem to come from the top of the girl's weapon. He again, also notices that one henchman tried shooting her but ultimately failed.
She's got a sniper and a scythe, Shieri thought, that's a good combo for her.
Intrigued by her weapon design, the Atlesian boy continues to focus on the girl's weapon rather than her skills with it, to see if there are any other instruments built into it.
That design is unique, but the baseline of it, is very familiar. It has to be he-
A familiar, though unpleasant, voice breaks the Silver Knight's reverie, forcing him to look down at the sidewalk, where the infamous thief stands. And where an unconscious henchman lies next to him.
"You were worth every cent," Roman says, sounding displeased. "Truly you were."
The thief removes the cigar from his mouth. "Well Red," the red-haired man says, "I think we can all say that this has been an eventful evening…" At that the man stomps out his cigar with the bottom of his cane.
"And as much as I'd love to stick around," the thief aims his cane at the girl "I'm afraid this-" the bottom of the cane opens "-is where we part ways."
At that, a ball of explosive Dust—followed by the sound of a roman candle screaming—comes from the tip of the nefarious criminal's cane.
NO!
Wide-eyed, Shieri puts on his mask that covers the lower half of his face and then drops from the rooftop. When he lands, the Atlesian boy makes the motion to leap after Roman Torchwick, though a strong hand—almost painfully—grips the boys shoulder, stopping him completely
"WHY ARE YOU-" Shieri growls.
"She's got it under control. Just watch." Ritsu says nonchalantly.
Just as Ritsu said this, both boys turn their attention to the girl, in time to see her leap into their air just as the Dust ball impacts the ground, and explode, creating a small crater on the pavement.
Shieri raises an eyebrow, "Her reaction time is good."
Ritsu nods in response.
Although the two brothers were too busy being impressed with the girl's excellent reaction time, they were completely oblivious to that fact that, when she landed in front of them, Roman Torchwick wasn't where he was standing before.
With a quick glance at their surroundings, the two brothers and the Red-hooded girl finally catch a glimpse of the Infamous Thief reaching the top of a fire-exit ladder on the side of a building.
For a moment, the red-hooded girl looks to the Titanist and the Silver Knight, with a determined stared.
"Is it okay if I go after him?" She asks. Her body still tense and ready for action.
In response, Shieri nods while his brother gives the girl a thumbs up, with a winsome smile.
In an instant, the young girl dashes at blinding speed towards the building before firing her weapon at the ground to give herself a giant jump boost.
Both brothers watch the girl disappear at the top of the roof of the building. Just as the girl moves out of sight, Ritsu—the impulsive boy he is—runs in her direction before his twin brother could stop.
"Wait! Where're you going!?" Shieri shouts.
"To do my job!" The muscular boy shouts, before leaping into the air and disappearing atop the same roof as the girl.
The Silver Knight curses under breath. Are Titans always this impulsive?
On top of the roof near the almost-ransacked Dust shop, the infamous thief, Roman Torchwick makes a run for the other end of the roof, until the voice of the Red-hooded girl stopped him in place.
"Hey!" the young girl shouts.
Irritated the thief mutters under his breath, "persistent."
At that both twin brothers have already made it atop of the building and stood a good distance away from the girl. At the same time though, the sound of a drop-ship's engines fills night
Hovering in front of the master thief, is a drop-ship that was mysteriously hiding in plain sight.
Ritsu turns to his brother with a puzzled looked on his face, only to receive shrug in response to the unspoken question that hovers between the two.
The thief uses the three kids sudden surprise as an opportunity to climb into the side of the drop-ship with ease. Once inside the drop-ship, the thief turns around with a Dust crystal in his hand and looks at the kids…particularly the Red-hooded girl.
"End of the line Red." Roman says happily. At that the man tosses red Dust crystal at the girl.
At the moment the crystal landed between the girl's feet, Roman fires a shot from his cane-weapon at the girl, making contact with the crystal and causing an explosion, three times the size of his original shot from earlier.
"Woohoohoo!" the thief shouts into the night.
Though the moment of glory for the man lasted a short while when he realized that girl did not explode like he knew she would have. Instead, the only thing that kept the girl from exploding was the fact that the Ritsu blocked the attack with his hand, after he had already kicked the Dust crystal away from the two of them.
At that some moment, Shieri summoned his wings and took to the air, firing a barrage of pure Dust bullets from above, at the drop-ship, causing the whole thing to shake as if it were caught in a rough gale-wind storm.
In the moment before Shieri took to the skies, the thief caught a glimpse of the Atlesian boy's mechanical wings, causing the man to curse under his breath.
Now once the shakes started, the thief managed to maintain his bearings as he made his move towards the cockpit. Once inside the thief looks to the pilot, who's a young girl with black wavy-hair; wearing a long-sleeved red dress with yellow detail designs, dark gray heavy high-heels and a red jeweled anklet. Even though the girl is pre-occupied with keeping the ship steady, the words that the thief say to her would have caused the whole thing to crash if she wasn't already prepared for the battle that is to come.
"We've got the Silver Knight overhead!" the thief exclaims.
At that, the girl quickly gets up out of the pilot's seat and hurriedly makes her way to the side-hatch of the drop-ship. And at the same time, Roman makes a grab the joystick to keep the ship balanced.
Once at the side hatch, the girl in the red dress looks down at Ritsu and the Red-hooded girl.
From where he stands, the Titanist gently pushes the young girl behind him further away.
"Check this out." The muscular boy says.
With enough space between him and the girl, Ritsu widens his stance and closes his hands into tight fists, as he curls his arms at his sides. In this stance the Titanist builds up his aura into his hands, encasing them in raw power, which transformed them into black, rocky-textured hands; with thick red-veins showing on the surface of the newly-found skin.
"Woooah…"
The Red-hooded girl gawks in awe as the Titanist's aura glowed blood-red as he performed one-two jabs at the air and ended the attack with a double jab. Such devastating power that built-up inside the muscular boy's hands, have caused his attacks to send precise gusts of wind, like missiles, at the drop-ship.
At the same time the Titanist made his attack, the girl standing in the opening of the drop-ship opens her palms out towards the air and fires beams from her hands, obliterating the gusts of wind with perfect ease.
What the!? The Titanist thought, feeling shocked. No one has ever countered my attacks before.
"You wanna try that again!?" Ritsu shouts, almost angrily.
At that, the girl—who makes no remark to the boy's question—makes a motion with her hands, and in almost the same instant, the area of the roof under the Titanist and the young girl's feet lights up like a volcano, ready to explode.
Shieri abruptly stops his attack when he notices the ground light up.
Wide eyed, the Atlesian shouts "No!" before flying at the speed of sound, though the shockwave of the explosion stopped him still, causing him to cover his face from the debris.
Shieri removes his arm from his face and scans the top of the roof frantically for his brother and the girl they were sent to watch over.
"Ritsu!" Shieri shouts.
From where he hovers in mid-air, the sound of the drop-ship's engines blaring—meaning it's going to take off—grabs his attention. In the same moment, Shieri instantly transforms his body into his full "Silver Knight" form, and transforms his weapons into his usual arm-blade. Though, this time the weapon doesn't have a blade, instead it has a tri-barrel.
Shieri takes his weapon and aims it at the ship—though more specifically, the girl inside the open-hatch.
The assassin's face contorts in rage, though the only thing that gives away the emotion he feels, is the upper part of his face, since the lower half is covered by a metallic mask.
"GET LOST!" Shieri shouts in fury, firing three huge orange-colored concentrated beam from his weapon.
As the beams make their way to the ship, two of the beams miss but rock the ship violently, almost causing the girl to stumble. Although, once she maintained her bearings once again, she crosses her arms together and then drops them at her side, causing a wave of pure aura energy to wave out, negating the last beam.
In the moment the girl in the red dress negated Shieri's tri-beam attack, the thief looks out the side of the large cockpit window and notices that the Silver Knight has stopped attacking them. Assuming that the boy isn't going to attack any further, he uses this opportunity to switch the position of the engines from hover-mode to escape the area at full speed.
"Damn her." The Atlesian says tiringly, as he watches the drop-ship speeds out of site.
Shieri lowers his weapon as the feeling of exhaustion takes over, slightly. At the same time, his Sylvanite armor and his tri-shot cannon dissipate. The boy then looks down at his hand as he makes a clenched fist.
"If I only I was faster…" The Atlesian boy doesn't even bother saying the last part of the sentence.
"Way to go stupid!" a familiar voice shouts.
Before Shieri could turn around and see that his muscular brother is still alive, Ritsu smacks him in the back of the head. Though not hard enough to knock him unconscious.
"Damn, that hurt." Shieri says through gritted teeth. He grimaces in pain when he rubs the back of his own head.
"It should, you idiot," Ritsu replies, feigning disappointment in his twin brother. "You could've kept on fighting and we could've stopped them. Instead you acted like an idiot, and got all bent outta shape cause' of a tiny explosion."
The Atlesian boy gives his brother a blank stare.
"I could've killed them if I had a partner who wasn't so careless and actually cared of the safety of those around." Shieri folds his arms across his chest, "You're useless as a huntsman, let alone a Titan." He says, ever-so calmly.
Irritated, Ritsu throws his hands up in the air. "What, and you being Atlas's pet knight-assassin makes you any better than me."
At this point, the muscular twin brother has made his way the Silver Knight, leaving only a foot of space between the two.
"If we weren't doing this for sakes our kind," Ritsu pokes his brother shoulder, "I'd beat you down, just to show you how powerful we Titans still are."
As the two brothers continue to argue, the Red-hooded girl was only paying half attention to their conversation, though she perked up when she heard the word huntsman.
"Wait," the girl says as she runs up to the twins with excitement. "You two are huntsman!?"
Red-hooded girl almost gasps a breath when she spoke again, as she holds her hands up in front of her chest.
"Can I have your autographs!?"
At that the two just stare at the girl in disbelief, completely disregarding the argument they just had only seconds ago.
In a room, sometime that same night, at Beacon academy.
"I hope you realize," Glynda paces around the young red-hooded girl, who sits at a table in the middle of the room. "that your actions tonight will not be taken lightly, young lady."
"You put yourself and others in great danger." The huntress adds.
"They started it!" the young girl exclaims.
At that Glynda stops her pacing and stands in front of the girl. She then glares at the two boys who stand at the opposite end of the room. Both of them looking seemingly guilty for reasons that the two boys and her know only.
Before the young girl could turn her head to look in the same direction, the sound of huntress clearing her throat grabs her attention.
Glynda looks down at her tablet for a moment. "If it were up to me," the huntress turns to the young girl, "I'd give you a pat on the back. And a slap on the wrist." At that last part, the women slams her riding-crop weapon on the table, dangerously close the young girl's hands. Though the girl—who's smile disappeared—managed to remove her hands from the table in time to avoid getting hit.
"But—" Glynda removes her riding-crop from the table "—someone would like to meet you."
Now as if on cue, the headmaster—Professor Ozpin—enters the room, wearing his usual green three-piece suit attire, with a cross sewed on the front of his scarf collar and with his walking cane.
Though to everyone's surprise—minus Glynda's—the headmaster enters the room, with a pile of cookies on a plate in one hand and a coffee mug in the other.
"Ruby Rose" the headmaster says calmly.
Ozpin places the plate of cookies on the table, and leans in to get a better look of the girl.
"You have…silver eyes." Ozpin says carefully, before moving away from the table.
Feeling a little uncomfortable and slightly confused, "Uh-h um…" was the only response that Ruby could give.
In the back of the room, the Titanist and the Silver Knight stand quietly, and patiently, waiting for the Beacon headmaster to acknowledge them as he continues to converse with the girl.
When the headmaster mentioned Ruby's eye color, Shieri froze in place momentarily—though discretely so as to not attract attention—as thoughts rushed into his mind. Wait a min—she has silver eyes!? She can't be…there's only one person who had those colored eyes. She couldn't have…
At that final thought, Shieri carefully looked over at Ruby and scanned her with his HUD. He reads and mentally confirms the suspicions that he had about the girl's personal life.
"Hey," Ritsu says elbowing his brother to get his attention.
The Atlesian boy finishes up the last of his search on the red-hooded girl before turning his head to face his brother.
"What?" Shieri says.
"I know that look." Ritsu replies.
"What look?"
"That look you get when something disturbs you somewhat."
"Now there's a look?"
"Don't be stupid…what's up brother?"
Shieri sighs. "This girl, Ruby Rose. She has silver eyes."
"So? Why's that a big deal?" Ritsu asks sounding irritated.
The Atlesian assassin looks at his brother carefully, only to notice that the muscular boy's irritation comes from his own personal boredom.
"Because there was only one person I knew during my training back in Mantle that had those colored eyes." Shieri says discomfortingly.
"Who?" Ritsu asks, feigning his curiosity.
Now he's interested. Shieri thought, feeling irritated.
"Her name was Su-"
Shieri never got to finish his response because the sound of the headmaster clearing his throat grabs the attention of both twins.
While making eye contact with the Ozpin, the twins ignore the stares that they're getting from a Ruby and an impatient Glynda.
"Yes sir?" Shieri says, sounding like his old-self.
"Would you kindly escort Mrs. Rose back to her home?" Ozpin asks as he stands up from his chair. "She needs to prepare her things, for the first day of the Entrance Exams."
"It would be my pleasure."
At that, Shieri's old courtesy-instincts kick in, and he bows to the head master. Though he slightly turned his head and averted his eyes to his brother when he heard him whisper "kiss ass."
The headmaster looks to the Titanist.
Ritsu sighs while rolling his eyes before responding.
"Yeah, yeah, I volunteer as tribute."
"Very well then. I'll leave you three to yourselves." Ozpin says as he and his assistant Huntress exit the room, leaving the door open.
Once the two adults left, Ruby—who watched the two leave—explodes in excitement.
"I GET TO GO TO BEACON!" Ruby shouts.
"Damn, I've never seen anyone that excited about anything before." Ritsu says with a wide-eyed—and almost shocked—expression.
"Yeah, neither have I." Shieri says, sharing the same look and feelings.
Ruby continues to her ecstatic jumping-around until she heard the voices of the twin brothers, which pulled the red-hooded girl out of her reverie, causing her to recompose herself as she turns to them.
"I mean uh…" Ruby giggles nervously. "yay, beacon."
Under his mask, Shieri couldn't help but smile. What I'd give to be in her shoes right now…
"Well, I'm outta here." Ritsu says as he beelines for the door.
"Ritsu, where do you think you're going?"
"To bed, that's where."
Before Shieri could protest, his brother had already left the room and disappeared down the hall.
The Atlesian quietly growls. "Damn him."
"Well, uh…I guess that just leaves us two." Ruby says gawking at the Silver Knight.
Shieri sighs, "It does doesn't it?"
At that, the Atlesian boy gestures a hand, "Come one. Let's get you home," he says. And the red-hooded girl follows suit behind and leaves the room.
For a while, Shieri and the soon-to-be-huntress, Ruby, have been walking in silence. Ever since they left the dark room that they were in earlier, and while they have been walking down the large pathway that leads to Beacon's airship docking platforms. Though, the young red-hooded girl breaks the silence once the two made their way pass the statue of a two hunters, and a conquered Beowulf.
"Sooo…" Ruby starts. "How long have you and your twin been huntsmen?"
Shieri looks to the girl. "You noticed huh?"
"What. That you're a twin, and you're both huntsmen."
"Yes…" Shieri halts his pace momentarily, making the girl stop as well. Ruby watches Shieri intensely as he chooses his words carefully. He continues to keep the same cold expression, so as to not be betrayed by his emotions.
"Except I'm actually a quadruplet, and neither of us are actual huntsmen…Yet, that is."
Ruby's jaw drops for second as she takes in this new information.
"Woah, that's awesome! Hey, where the other two that I haven't met yet?"
"I would assume they're sleeping…like we should be soon."
At that the two start walking again.
"Ooh…Wait, if you and your brothers are not huntsmen, then how do you and your big buffy brother know the Beacon headmaster?"
Shieri shrugs. This gesture was the only one that Ruby saw, other than the straight posture when he was addressed by the Beacon headmaster.
"Let's just say that we were handpicked just like you."
Ruby's face flushes. "That's cool! Does he do that often?"
Shieri chuckles a bit. "I would assume not as often as you think he would."
By this time, Shieri and Ruby had already made it to the platforms, though once they got there, not a single drop-ship was in sight to come pick them up.
Ruby gazes out into the moonlit sky in all directions, and focuses on her listening skills, for any sign of a drop-ship. But still nothing.
"Hey-uh, how am I supposed to get home? I don't see a ship anywhere."
Shieri smiles a wryly smile. "If you don't mind, I have an idea than might interest you?"
"Like what?" Ruby asks, looking quite puzzled.
As if on cue, Shieri summons his mech-wings.
"Have you ever flown before?"
The sight of the Silver Knight's wings struck Ruby in awe, as she gawks. "Ooh. Well…not like that anyway."
Shieri moves to stand behind Ruby and then wraps his arms around her waist. Completely shocking the girl.
"You don't mind do you?"
"I-uh…uh-h"
Ruby couldn't finish since she started to blush, as the Atlesian boy tightened his grip around the girl's waist and took flight.
Somewhere over the island called Patch.
"There!" Ruby shouts, over the sound of the wind muffling her ears.
Even without the use of his HUD—with which he is letting Ruby use momentarily—he was able to see where she was pointing to. Which turned out to be a small neighborhood that's illuminated only by each houses porch light.
As it turns out though. Ruby points to a house that's at the edge of the neighborhood, closer to the body of water, where—even in the dark—the Atlesian boy could see small beach behind the house.
While still carrying the young girl, Shieri halts in mid-air and hovers over the house.
Even in the dark, the Atlesian boy could tell that the architecture design of the house isn't the same as most of the neighboring houses. In fact, the origin of the design doesn't appear to be from Vale. Instead this house is built with a similar design to the villagers who live southeast, outside of the kingdom of Mistral.
Her family has great taste, Shieri thought.
Another thought, occurred to Shieri. "Where would you want me to drop you off?"
Ruby ponders on the question for several heartbeats before answering the boy.
"My bedroom window." Ruby says. "It's unlocked. Plus, I don't wanna wake up my sis, by going in through the front door."
"Right."
At that Shieri slowly descends to the back of the house, where Ruby points out which window is hers.
"She'd freak out if she knew I was out this late…and worse with a boy." Ruby adds.
Shieri snorts. "Sounds like your sister is very protective of you."
"Yeah, I guess you could say that. My dad is too."
"Where is your father? If you don't mind me asking."
While hovering by the window, Ruby reaches out and pushes half the window to the side—and, with the help of her personal Carrier, manages to climb in silently.
At this point the young girl watches Shieri hover outside the window, like an angel of some-sort.
"He's away on a mission somewhere near Mistral." Ruby says.
"He's a huntsman." Shieri says.
Ruby notices that what the boy said, was more of a confirmation than a question.
"Yeah. How'd you know?"
"Let's just say that Ozpin spoke highly of your father and his old team, when he offered my brothers and I, a spot at Beacon Academy."
"That's awesome!" Ruby starts, but then shrinks when she didn't realize how loud she just became. "uh-oops."
Shieri pulls down his mask—revealing a smirk on his face—and tugs on it to make a gesture. "That's why I wear one of these."
"Yeah, right…"
Ruby was about to say something else but then the sound of moving feet outside her bedroom door, caught her attention.
"Uh-oh, Yang is coming." Ruby whispers almost panic-like.
Shieri nods. "Right. I should go."
Before the Silver Knight took off into the night, he turns back to Ruby one more time.
"I'll see you on the first day."
Keeping quiet, Ruby's only reply was a thumbs-up and a goodbye wave.
On cue, Shieri hovers out of sight and then takes off almost at the speed of sound. The only thing left in his presence was a gust of wind that died down to slow cool breeze.
From her window, Ruby watches the Atlesian boy fly away into the moonlit sky.
"Flying is so cool." Ruby whispers in awe.
The sound of her bedroom door opening pulls the young girl out of her reverie, making her turn to the girl standing in the door way.
"Ruby…" The girl yawns. "When did you get back?"
The young girl chooses her words carefully as she notices her sister is wearing a yellow sleeveless-top, with a burning heart design, and black short shorts. Her sister's usual pajama attire.
"oh, Yang…I just got back now." Ruby says, acting nonchalant. Though on the inside, her heart races faster than her semblance ever could.
Yang yawns again. "Just now?"
The young girl nods.
Ruby's older sister looks to her clock that sits on the shelf above her bed.
"It's almost midnight," Yang says, "I know you were going a dust shop in town, but were you really there this whole time?"
"Uh. Yeah…I kinda lost track of time." Ruby says nervously.
"Uh-huh…"
At this point, Ruby's older sister, Yang, stares at her intently as she catches a glimpse of something shining green over her eye.
The young girl was going to ask her sister why the sudden look, but Yang spoke up first.
"So what's his name?"
"Wait-uh, w-who, h-h-how did you-" Ruby stutters, her face burning red.
Yang points to her own eye.
"The glowing monocle." She says.
For a moment Ruby froze in place because she completely forgot about the HUD she borrowed from Shieri, to navigate her way home.
"Oh…that," Ruby starts. "Well about that…"
At that very moment, Ruby's night went from awesome, to not-so-awesome.