You're my destiny
I can't look away
You're all I see
You're my destiny
I can never leave you
You're my Earth
The center of my day

Chapter 3: Destiny
"Aw man, Emerald's gonna be so mad at me!" Ruby exclaimed as she quickened her pace, heading away from campus grounds. Timeliness had never been one of her strong suits, and today proved especially of that statement.

The redhead looked at her watch as she changed her stride to where she was practically running, seeing that she had five minutes to get to her destination that took at least double that by car.

"Yang just had to take Cinder for a joy ride! She could have taken Bumblebee, but no, she wanted to be classier." The girl huffed frustratedly, knowing in the back of her head that it was her own fault that things turned out the way they did. She sighed, thanking high school track that she could keep her pace up until she got to where she was meeting Emerald, and decided to focus only on her running.

Ruby was so focused, in fact, that she almost didn't notice that she was about to run into someone.

An all too familiar someone.

"Whoa!" Ruby saw Weiss' eyes widen as hers did the same, but luckily, this time the redhead was able to sidestep out of the heiress' path, effectively swerving and preventing the past from repeating itself. Ruby stopped in her tracks and turned to the heiress, quickly bowing her head as she caught her breath.

"Sorry! That was my fault this time. I can make it up to you the next time we bump into each other!" Ruby said quickly before starting her run once again. If she hadn't been so worried about running late, she definitely would have stumbled more on her words. That was Weiss Schnee that she almost ran into...again, but because of her concern for Emerald being mad at her, she couldn't be bothered.

By the time Ruby had finally gotten to her destination, a small coffee shop outside of campus grounds, it was already 20 minutes past the time she had planned with-

"Ruby!" A voice called out as soon as the girl walked into the shop.

Ruby turned her head to meet the eyes of a certain green haired girl, who Ruby found to be more than a little frustrated at her.

"You were suppose to be here 20 minutes ago. What would have happened if Mercury had shown up before you?"

The redhead caught her breath, straightening her posture before answering back to the older girl. "I told him to meet us 30 minutes after we were suppose to. It'll be fine, Emerald. Just relax."

Of course, in her head, Ruby knew that Emerald could do no such thing. She had been working on this case for a while now, and the chance that the green haired girl hadn't been affected by Ruby's powers yet were close to impossible. Love was a powerful force, after all, and Ruby only amplified that force with the presence of her powers. Like how a lightning rod attracts lightning, her dad used to say.

"I am relaxed, but you said that you wouldn't be late today. Glad to see this is a priority for you." Emerald huffed, crossing her arms as her eyebrows furrowed.

Ruby laughed awkwardly, a few broken up 'hehs' escaped her mouth as she scratched the back of her head. Emerald, from her experience, has always been a demanding...friend? Is that what she would call people she's helped? Though, admittedly, Ruby's never kept up her cases after she got them together, but that was besides the point.

"And I'm sorry about that! My sister borrowed my car, so I had to run here and I almost bumped into Weiss Schnee again and-"

"You're rambling."

Ruby pressed her lips together and covered her mouth with her hand as soon as Emerald had pointed out her bad habit, making the older girl roll her eyes.

"If you almost had a run in with Miss Heiress, then I guess I could forgive you, but this is the last time." Emerald said, her warning coming off sternly. "Now let's go over the plan quickly before Mercury gets here."

By now, it was practically routine to Ruby. At first, she was a bit apprehensive to approach her basketball teammate, considering the two were never close to begin with, but after she had seen a certain gray haired boy conveniently show up to one of their games, she couldn't ignore it.

Actually walking up to the older girl proved to be the most difficult part, but Ruby found that asking Emerald to help improve her layups was enough to break the ice. Idle conversation followed, and soon, the two got close enough for Emerald to comfortably admit that she had a crush on someone: a guy in the same Sports Management program as her. His name was Mercury.

It didn't take much after that for Emerald to ask Ruby for her help in getting his attention, though the older girl was quite stubborn about it. Naturally, Ruby accepted the plea for help, as she had done so many times before, and got straight to work.

Surprisingly, she found that the older boy had been easy to contact and approach. For whatever reason or another, Cinder had known who he was and exchanged his contact info with the redhead (probably one of the only times Ruby's said thank you to the girl). Their first encounter was awkward to say the least. Through some exchanges via text, Mercury had gotten the impression that it was, in fact, Ruby that had an interest in him. His reasoning being that he couldn't remember Emerald's face, so she must've been a lure to get him to hang out with the younger girl. The redhead quickly denied this, reminding him of the time he had gotten to a basketball game and sending a picture of the green haired girl. After sorting out his confusion, Ruby asked, with Emerald's permission, if he would think he'd be interested in her teammate.

Obviously, he had agreed. Slowly, Ruby helped put the pieces of their puzzle together, and soon it would be complete.

Which led to today. By now, Ruby was practically nonexistent to the two, both Emerald and Mercury cancelling the redhead out with their sarcastic exchanges with one another. But the younger girl didn't mind. This was the last piece, after all.

"Oh please, I could sweep you away at basketball any day of the week." Mercury said cockily, laughing as he leaned back in his seat and crossed his arms.

Ruby looked at him curiously, admittedly tuning out their entire conversation pretty much the entire time that they had been sitting in that coffee shop. Though Ruby was used to being ignored in this phase of her routine, she still couldn't help but feel a little abandoned. She rested her head in her hand as her eyes travelled back and forth, watching the exchange between Emerald and Mercury, wondering what she should make for dinner.

"You know you're talking to BVU's female power forward, right?" Emerald taunted, "It doesn't matter how fast you are if you can't make the shot."

To be honest, Ruby didn't know why Emerald even wanted her to come. Last security measure, maybe? Or...to make sure I didn't feel left out?

But whatever the reason, Ruby complied, watching as the two made plans to leave for a game of basketball to see who would win. Mercury and Emerald kept staring at each other as they both slid out of their seats and stood up, the clear competitive spirit running through both of them.

"Let's settle this then." Emerald whispered, hungry for the challenge. Ruby knowing she'd rather die than let Mercury beat her.

Before the two could leave, Ruby cleared her throat, drawing the attention of both. "So, uh, will you guys be okay if I leave? Not that I want to! It's just that I have to make dinner…" she said, her voice trailing at the end.

Mercury smirked at Ruby, while Emerald simply nodded. "Go ahead, Ruby. I honestly thought you had left a while ago actually." she mumbled before turning back to Mercury, "Ready to lose?"

Mercury rolled his eyes. "You wish." he said as he made his way towards the door, with Emerald following after him.

Ruby watched as they left the coffee shop, waving goodbye when she saw Emerald suddenly turn back to silently thank her. She saw the electricity fly between the two. Flames burned across their string, filled with passion and desire. It made Ruby smile. Her work here was done.

Grabbing her bag, Ruby headed out the door to walk to the grocery store to pick up supplies to cook dinner that evening.

Ruby smiled to herself as she slowly walked through the produce aisle, carefully thinking about what she should make herself for dinner. The redhead knew that Yang would be staying over at Cinder's place that night, and even though the thought of it made her cringe, that meant that she could make whatever she wanted and Yang would be none the wiser.

I could make myself Mom's old cookies and she would never know.

The thought made her giggle out loud, but in the end, she opted not to considering she couldn't afford to gain the extra weight while basketball season was still going on. Instead, she went to get a carton of eggs and some vegetables to make a mean omelet, because according to her 'anytime was breakfast time.'

As Ruby reached to grab the eggs, she couldn't help but notice a white head of hair out of the corner of her eye. She looked over, immediately recognizing Weiss Schnee, looking as though she was really struggling to pick between the organic and nonorganic eggs. Ruby raised an eyebrow, wondering if it was really that big of a deal since, at the end of the day, they were still eggs. She thought about an article that she had overheard Yang and Cinder talking about and wondering if it was really worth bothering the older girl over.

"I heard that there isn't a difference between organic and non." she found herself saying. The redhead's eyes widened a bit as did Weiss' as the heiress turned toward her voice. "I-I mean I heard that companies just stamp the word 'organic' on things so they can charge more so…"

Ruby's eyes focused on the ground, taking a few quick looks at Weiss just to see how to react. She saw the white haired girl's eyebrows furrow and her mouth frown before she looked at the organic eggs once again.

"Is that right…" Ruby heard Weiss say before turning to face her.

Ruby couldn't help but let out a small 'eep' and step back a little. "Sorry! I didn't mean to bother you again it's just that you looked like you really couldn't decide so I just-"

"Oh my goodness, will you please stop rambling? It's disrespectful." Weiss scoffed, interrupting Ruby.

Ruby sealed her mouth shut and waited for the older girl to continue. Why am I so nervous? I wasn't like this this morning. But then again, Ruby had been in a rush, leaving no actual time for the heiress to scold her even if she wanted to.

"This morning you said that you'd make something it up to me the next time we bumped into each other. I bet you weren't expecting it to be this soon." Weiss said calmly, "Well, how are you going to make up almost running into me a second time?"

"Oh yeah, I guess I did…um..." Ruby whispered as she rubbed the back of her head, remembering that she only said that because she was running late. It took a solid minute of thinking for Ruby to come up with an idea that would be considered even remotely good. Looking at her basket, she realized it was the only thing that she could offer.

"Have you eaten dinner yet?"

I have no excuses orz I'm sorry for not updating sooner, but better late than never, right? Thank you for 4,000+ views! Please leave a review if you can.