The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting.
-Sun Tzu
Chapter 11-
Heading back to Beacon courtesy of Naomi. Ruby, Mizu and Winter spoke in hushed whispered about the event while the rest of team WBYN were at the other end of the aircraft speaking about Blake and her involvement with the White Fang.
"So he got away?" Winter asked.
"He did, I doubted the fact he would use Dust crystals once more. This won't happen again I promise you." Aria said, speaking entirely from Ruby's prospective.
"How are you? And I mean really, not the crap you gave the police and your team." Mizu asked, worry filling her voice.
"Mother is tired, she used a large amount of her Aura in protecting Blake. The injection mother gave her won't last for much longer before she collapses." Aria stated, ratting her mother out to the two women.
"Why didn't you say anything?" Mizu asked, angry that Ruby tried to hide her injuries.
"Mother doesn't like letting people know of her injuries. Neo only knows of the injuries she sustained through her gift." Aria explained.
"Gift? What gift? Do you mean her semblance allows her to see Ruby's health?" Winter asked.
"No, her proposal gift. It allows her to check mother's status and alert her to any injury alongside a few other things." Aria informed them.
"Proposal gift? Are they married?" Winter asked, shocked at the idea these two women were married.
"No. They are fiancés." Aria stated plainly.
Mizu was silent throughout the exchange as she was trying to understand what this meant for Ruby and Neo, who had both lived widely different lifestyles to her.
Deciding to bite the bullet as Qrow would say she decided to tell her, "Ruby I have something to tell you." Mizu said, looking at the woman who fell forward and would have hit the floor if it wasn't for her restraints.
"What's wrong?" Mizu asked quickly.
"Mother has fallen unconscious. Her breathing is stable and her Aura levels are slowly rising however her heart rate is a little low suggesting deep sleep." Aria informed the pair calmly.
"What!" Winter shouted, immediately rushing to Ruby's side as she went to get a pulse and check the woman.
"Mother is perfectly fine Winter, she is sleeping. She'll be ok in a few days." Aria reported calmly.
"You sound as if this is normal." Mizu pointed out.
"It is. Mother quite often overuses her Aura leading to this sort of reaction. Neo normally looks after her during this time." Aria explained but she quickly kept her silence as the other girls on the aircraft came over to see what was going on.
When they arrived back at Beacon Ruby woke up long enough to tell Aria, and thus the others not to take her to the infirmary before she passed out once more.
Mizu quickly took charge as she ordered everyone away except for Winter and Neo who using Neo's semblance to teleport them into the hallway of their room.
The three women expertly got Ruby onto the bed and stripped her down as she was starting to burn up, prompting Winter to state.
"I've never seen anything like this before." Winter said.
"What do you mean?" Neo asked, once Ruby was laying in the bed devoid of her clothes except for underwear, headphones and her choker, while laying on her back.
"I mean Aura depletion, I haven't seen it before and never knew it could cause this." Winter explained.
"She's already started developing the fever aspect, it's from all the excess energy she used up from her Aura. It all has to go somewhere and for her it transfers into heat energy inside her body." Neo explained.
"What are these?" Winter asked after a few minutes, observing the tattoos on her wrists.
"They are two sets of roses. On her right wrist is red roses while on the left they are black roses. She has a much bigger tattoo on her back though I don't want to move her to show you." Neo explained.
"What do they mean? The tattoos on her wrists, not the one on her back." Winter asked.
"It is subtle but Ruby uses her right arm to hold me or to hold my hand with, red roses are seen as signs of love, around her right wrist she has fifty roses all together which means unconditional love. The black roses on her left however have a double meaning, they mean death but also tragic love. She has that on her left arm because that is the arm she uses to pull the trigger of her sniper." Neo explained to the two women.
"She has a black rose on that choker, is that the same? And what's the story behind it. The flower looks almost real." Winter asked quickly.
"It is real, it's held in animated suspension to keep it alive and fresh. But the item was what I used to propose to Ruby with. She doesn't enjoy rings so I chose something else." Neo explained, smiling softly as she looked at said item.
"You proposed?" Winter asked, surprised at the thought this woman proposed to Ruby at a young age.
"Yes. Or rather we proposed to each other, I got a specially made choker as Ruby said she liked them and she brought me a ring she made herself." Neo said lovingly.
"A ring? Why don't you wear it?" Winter asked, Mizu remaining oddly quiet throughout the entire exchanged.
"Oh, sorry." Neo said as she held out her hand which now proudly showed a plain silver ring which held a small metal rose coloured pink, brown and white and on the underside of the ring was a small ice cream cone in the same colours.
"That's beautiful. Ruby made it herself as well? That's amazing." Winter said admiring the ring.
"She's also hand engraved a message on the inside of the ring as well. She did it all by hand." Neo said proudly.
"Don't you think you're a little young?" Mizu said quietly.
Neo just turned to look at Mizu smiling sadly at the woman, "Perhaps, but life is short isn't it?" Neo said before leaving the topic and it was clear it wasn't up for debate.
Neo stood up walking over to the shared wardrobe, opening up the door as she reached inside to gather a first aid kit sitting just inside.
Taking out a syringe from inside the kit she wandered over to Ruby to inject the contents into her neck once more. "Another Aura injection, she won't need another till tomorrow morning now." Neo informed the pair.
"Why don't you tell us the routine and we can help you?" Mizu suggested, which Neo while hesitant accepted the help.
Ruby was unconscious for three days, two of which she had a fever while the final day her body started to calm down.
The three women alternated their time with Ruby, making sure there was always someone with her although Aria could warn them immediately if something happened.
They had put a wet rag over her forehead to help keep her cool and changed it a number of times throughout the three days, and each day they injected Ruby with three Aura injections spanning over the day. One in the morning, one in the middle of the day and the last one at night.
It wasn't until the beginning of the second day when things went wrong. It all started when Neo was walking back from her only class for the day where she was followed back to her room by Yang and by extension the rest of the team as well.
"Where's Ruby? She's hasn't been here the last few days." Yang asked, calm at first.
"She's unwell and resting in our room." Neo replied back. Not letting her know the truth.
"Can we see her?" Yang asked, pushing slightly.
"No." Neo stated bluntly, approaching the door to her room.
"Why not? She's our team member we have a right to see her." Yang said, annoyed at being stopped from seeing Ruby.
"Actually you don't. The right to see someone is only for family or partners, which you are neither." Neo replied back bluntly, turning to face the taller woman.
"So what? She's just in your room not at a hospital. Why don't you want us to see her? Did you do something to her?" Yang accused.
"Yang that's unfair." Weiss said, surprising Neo as she thought Blake would be the one to step in.
"What? Neo speaks for her all the time, Ruby doesn't even speak herself. The two of them are almost always together and so cuddly together I'm surprised she hasn't already collared her. I bet she's hiding her in there because of something she's done to her." Yang almost shouted at Neo and also towards Weiss as well. While Blake awkwardly coughed at the mention of a collar.
Blake watched as Neo simply leaned against the door, closing her eyes and seemed to count to ten in her head before she looked at Yang with a deadly calm, "I warned you before Miss Xiao-Long and I shall do so again out of courtesy for Ruby. Our relationship is none of your concern and if you need to know about the details of it you shall be made aware. However I will not accept you talking bad about myself based on no evidence except for thing you do not understand." Neo said deadly calm, her voice unwavering and steady.
"Now I kindly ask that you turn around and leave." Neo said, before opening the door and quickly closing it behind her not letting the three women inside.
Neo remained on the other side of the door to listen in what was happening on the other side. She had raised her finger towards the two women inside to keep them quiet.
She heard the debate happening outside, or rather Weiss was almost shouting at Yang at her behaviour while Blake added her comments in after as well, however Yang wasn't changing her stand point.
Neo jumped back as the door was kicked open by Yang who seemed enraged by Neo and her behaviour but also believing that she was right and this was justified.
Neo was standing in front of Ruby's bed, seemingly standing unconcerned but it was clear she was ready to defend herself and Ruby within moments.
Also inside the room was Mizu and Winter, both women were sitting by the only bed in the room who had both stood up as well on either side of Ruby's bed.
What surprised the girls coming into the room however was the almost holographic woman sitting on the bed, looking at them curiously before vanishing from sight as she took note of who was there.
"Miss Xiao Long I kindly ask that you leave. Neo has already done that and now I am saying it. Or else should I get Ozpin down here and you can explain to him what you believe." Mizu stated coldly, moving to stand in front of Neo to stop the woman from attacking the blonde brawler.
"Mother? What are you doing here?" Weiss asked, confused as to why her mother would be here with Ruby.
"Hello Weiss. Ruby is a friend and so is her fiancé Neo. Because we are here and she is unwell we thought to help Neo look after her so she could still attend her lessons." Mizu replied to her daughter, not revealing the extent of the relationship between Ruby and herself.
Weiss seemed to accept the answer although she still questioned how they knew each other but that was for a different time.
"Yang, let's go back to our room. We should leave the women alone while Ruby is still recovering." Blake said, easily spotting how Neo was behaving and was ready to beat the woman if she so much as said the wrong thing.
Yang seemed to listen to Blake's advice and with her tail between her legs the blonde woman left while Blake apologised for her actions before following her partner.
Weiss was torn between staying to question her mother and sister and noticing the hostile tension in the room and thought best to leave.
Once the students had left the room Mizu quickly turned to Neo to calm her down but it seemed she was already calm when Ruby moved in her sleep as the woman was by her side in an instance.
It was the middle of the third day when Ruby woke up, Neo was sitting on the bed talking with Aria who had materialised in her human form to speak to Neo.
Neither noticed that Ruby had woken up silently and watched the two of them talk between themselves with a soft but weak smile on her face.
It wasn't until Winter came into the room to speak to Neo when she saw Ruby was wide awake that they noticed.
"Ruby!" Neo cried out, enveloping Ruby into a tight hug.
"Hello Cheri." Ruby whispered softly in reply, her voice weak.
A/N
So another chapter down, the fight with Yang didn't seem right to me but it's something I wanted to do to get her issues out there and make it understandable, also remember that only Blake knows that Ruby is the Red Reaper so Ruby being missing would be very out of place for them.
Again more foreshadowing and what not in this chapter as well.
Oh and who saw the opening for RWBY Volume three? It's great, I really love it and we get to see SUMMER ROSE! I may or may not be planning to bring her into the story at some point but no idea yet and the idea is still up in the air.
However Raven will play a large role in the story and with Ruby, I won't tell you how she is or anything other than the fact that she is Yang's mother but this won't be her main role in the story ;) But I'm just writing her bit now.
Also I've got an idea sort of for the ending of this, or a one shot idea that will be extremely sad and involve death, which itself is quite hard for me to write, for reasons. If anyone has seen the comic of Weiss in a hospital bed and Ruby seeing her each day, you'll know the one I'm talking about. I'm thinking about something like that for Ruby and Neo, thoughts?
Anyway thanks for reading and see you next time. ^_^