Author's note: While I was writing what was supposed to be chapter two, I realized that this wasn't just a story centered around Jaune. So instead of scrapping everything, I decided to take a little more time with the setup since I left a few questions unanswered in the last chapter. Anyway, I have to run off to class now. Oh, and one more thing before I leave, if you're gonna call my writing shit without a suggestion on how to improve, you're just being an asshole.

"Give up kid, he's dead," Qrow sighed as he pulled out his flask, "look around, there's nothing left."

"I won't believe that until you give me proof!" Ruby screamed as she fruitlessly dug through the rubble, her fingers raw, "Make yourself useful and actually look."

"Ruby," Ren started.

"I don't wanna hear it!" Ruby cut off Ren as she continued to dig.

"Uncle Qrow's right," Yang pleaded, "You've been at this for a week. We need to move soon, we're sitting ducks out here and we're running out of supplies."

Ruby finally turned, her face contorted in anger, "I am not about to let another friend, my best friend, down again."

"This was all we could find," Nora meekly said as she stepped forward, a battered and bloody Crocea Mors in hand, "Yang's probably right, we need to move on."

"How can you say that?" Ruby fell to her knees defeated, fidgeting with the green bracelet that clung to her right wrist, "This isn't how it's supposed to go."

"It's not your fault, the information was faulty," Blake spoke up, "With global communication down, there's no way we could have gotten reliable intel. Weiss, wait!"

A loud slap rang through the air as the heiress stood square in front of the young huntress in training, tears splattering on the ground next to them, "We've all lost someone Ruby, and that's why we're all here. If we don't stop Salem, we'll lose everyone we care about. Pyrrha, my mother, Blake's parents, and now Jaune. Everyone we've lost in this battle, we do this for them."

As soon as Ruby got on her feet with Weiss' help, the heiress embraced the grieving girl to comfort her. Ruby whispered with a raspy voice through her sniffles, "I didn't get the chance."

"Don't miss the next chance you get," Weiss said as she rubbed her leader's back.

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Ruby sat in her dad's recliner, a mug of tea nestled between her hands that rested in her lap, staring blankly ahead, her silver eyes devoid of emotion. The warm breeze of summer swept through the house as the front door violently swung open. Yang leaned against the door frame gasping for breath as the words spilled from her mouth, "Have you checked the mission boards at all recently?"

"Nope," Ruby lazily let out as she sipped on her now cold tea.

"You need to see this," Yang approached her younger sister, scroll held up, "I was checking out the CCT message boards earlier and I found this registered to a high-risk mission. This was a week ago."

As the image registered in her mind, Ruby's eyes widened, choking on her tea as she attempted to gasp. Spitting out the contents of her mouth (and lungs), Ruby coughed out, "That's impossible, Jaune died at Vacuo."

"We didn't find his body, and Weiss said they didn't find any other sign of him when the SDC cleared the rubble for rebuilding," Yang explained.

"If he's alive, then why hasn't he contacted any of us?" Ruby asked, wiping away the leftover trails of liquid from her face.

"It has to be him," Yang encouraged, "There's no way anyone can fake that. You need an authentic license to register your name for a mission. Ruby, Jaune's alive."

"That still doesn't answer my question," Ruby replied, setting her mug down, "besides, I've moved on. I've accepted that he's gone and never coming back."

"I guess you'll have to find him and ask him yourself," Yang smirked while shrugging echoing the message of Weiss' words just months earlier, "or are you going to miss your chance again?"

Ruby paused to contemplate for a few minutes, a smile creeping up on her face as the call to adventure returned to her. She sprang up in a blur of red, a trail of rose petals leading up the stairs, her voice now coming from her room, "Tell dad I might be gone for a while."

"Before you leave, you might want to bring this with you," Yang pulled a small laminated card from her pocket, "You might want to hurry, the last airship to Vale leaves in an hour. Also, I'd start in Mistral, since this job listing is your only lead for now."

Throwing on a new outfit, Ruby haphazardly threw the bare essentials into her backpack. Grabbing the fresh Huntress License out of Yang's prosthetic limb, she dashed out the door slamming the entrance closed behind her. Ruby savored the wind in her face once again, reinvigorated by her new quest, she was ready to face another day.

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Ruby awoke from her dream, a bittersweet smile across her face. She peeled her face away from her backpack she had used as a makeshift pillow and rose off the concrete ground. Pulling out her scroll, she pulled up an image of her latest lead revealing a hooded figure with douchey sunglasses on. She zoomed in on the bunny face on his chest and smiled as her heart fluttered in excitement, "It's gotta be him."

Poking her head out of the alley she slept in, Ruby felt relieved to see the streets still empty and the sky still barely lit from the morning to come. She looked down at her scroll once more to check the time.

'6:30 am,' Ruby made a mental note as she stuck her hand into her backpack to exchange her scroll for a pack of field rations. She scowled as soon as the lump of nutrients touched her taste buds, 'Bleh, you'd think I'd get used to it after six years of eating this crap on and off.'

Ruby walked a few blocks down before waltzing into a nearby motel, greeting the owner at the front desk, "Hey, Torchwick, got any new info today? By the way, I'm using one of the empty rooms to shower."

"Morning, Red," the former criminal greeted back, sliding a key card across the counter, "as for your bunny man, I haven't heard much about him other than as of late he's been spotted at the message boards right as the data updates, then disappears quickly."

"What about his weapons? Have you spoken to any of his clients or any of his temporary teammates?" Ruby listened intently as she pocketed the card.

"Well, from what I've heard, he doesn't take too kindly to working with other people," Roman answered in a hushed voice, "the man's like a ghost, he only takes high-risk solo missions and his clients have never even seen his face. It's always a different person who picks up the salary. As for the weapons, like I said, no one to witness him fight means no one knows what he uses, but he always finishes the job in a day."

"It's not much, but it's enough to go off of from here," Ruby thought to herself while fishing through her backpack. After pulling out an envelope full lien cards, she set it on the counter, "This is all I have but it should cover the fee for the intel plus the shower."

"A pleasure doing business," Roman greedily smiled, to Ruby's disgust, as he picked up the envelope before stuffing it into his overcoat, "I hope you find your boyfriend."

"He's just a friend," Ruby repeated for what seemed to be the millionth time before walking off to the motel room number on the key card, pulling her hood up to cover her face.

"From my experience, people don't look for a person for six years unless they either want that person dead or they're looking for a long-lost love," Roman called after her, "so, which is it, Red?"

"None of your beeswax, Torchwick," Ruby's voice came from down the hall followed by a door slamming shut.

Ruby went straight to the bathroom of the surprisingly clean motel room, turning the knob for hot water before going to set her bag on the bed. After propping up a chair under the doorknob, Ruby then fished out her toiletries before stripping down and hopping into the shower. Upon feeling the hot streams on her back, the stress and tension seemed to melt away as she scrubbed the filth off her body.

After toweling off and putting her combat outfit back on, she checked her scroll for new messages before checking the time, '8:30, shit, shit, shit, I'm gonna miss him.'

Quickly gathering her belongings and knocking the chair aside, Ruby dashed out the door, flinging the card at Roman, barely missing his face and embedding it into the wall behind him. Calmly turning to pull the card out, he thought out loud to himself, "I did say that they were getting weirder and weirder every year, but I knew this kid was crazy since the day I tried mugging her."

Ruby made her way towards Beacon as fast as she could, the signature rose petals her semblance created scattering in her wake. As the CCT came into view, she looked down at her scroll once more to check for the time before seeing a lone black hood in the distance, her boots skid against the pavement as she slowed to a stop. Taking a few deep breaths to slow her heart rate, she approached the terminal next to the hooded figure.

'Just stay calm, Ruby. He's still your best guy friend, even though it's been six years since you last saw him,' Ruby thought to herself, focusing on her peripheral vision while she pretended to flip through the mission listings.

'Yup, that's definitely him. Does he recognize me? I hope he recognizes me,' Ruby turned her head to face her neighbor, her hand raised in hesitation, 'Wait, is that him? I can't tell with those douchey sunglasses in the way, and I don't think Jaune grew facial hair the last time I saw him.'

As Ruby stood there debating with herself, the man turned in the direction opposite to her to walk away. Pulling her hand back, she stared blankly at his back as he walked away. Looking at the terminal her eyes widened at the sight of the name registered, 'Dammit, I missed my chance again. Hold on, there's still room on this mission.'

Still keeping her eyes on the hooded figure, Ruby quickly pulled out her huntress license and scroll. Holding both up to the terminal, she waited impatiently for her name to register for the mission. As soon as the confirmation message splashed across the terminal screen, she dashed after him as he turned the corner.

"Jaune, wait!" Ruby called after him.