Author's note: During V4, when we were still led to believe that Penny wouldn't come back, I made up my own origin story for her. After V7, I had to slightly modify it, but it remained largely the same.
The day after the election, everyone slept in until the late forenoon, as they had done more than one check to see if Mantle was alright. Marrow was the only one who was up at the usual time, since his training allowed him to get by fine with less sleep. Ruby had also asked Sophie's swarm to prepare two more devices like the ones she had put on the angel's tears, and after a late breakfast, she and Jaune went into an unoccupied room to take care of some things. They stuck the devices to each other's necks and sat down as the devices slowly started up. After a short period of adjusting, they found themselves in a similar looking room, except that it had light blue lines of energy all over it.
"What is this?" Jaune asked.
"Cyberspace," Ruby answered.
"And you're sure it's fine if I'm here?" Pyrrha asked and said, "I mean, I've never been the best with electronics." Ruby and Jaune looked around and found her sitting next to Jaune.
"Hi Pyrrha," Ruby said and answered, "Don't worry, it'll be fine."
"H- hello," Emerald said, sitting next to Ruby and half hiding behind her so Jaune and Pyrrha wouldn't see her.
"Hello," Pyrrha said and asked, "You're Emerald, right?"
"Yes, that's me," Emerald answered, "And… I'm sorry for what I did."
"What do you mean?" Pyrrha asked.
"I used my semblance to make you see all those swords back then," Emerald answered, obviously regretting her actions.
"Wait, you did that?" Jaune asked and angrily tried to push past Ruby, but Pyrrha put her right hand on his right shoulder.
"Jaune, it's fine," Pyrrha said, "It's in the past now, and getting upset over it now won't change anything about it. It'll just make it harder to move forward."
"Now, if that's settled, we should go," Ruby said, "Penny is waiting for us." The four of them got up, and while Jaune was still clearly a bit upset with Emerald, he didn't want to show it, seeing how Pyrrha didn't hold Emerald's actions against her.
~o~
Ruby, Jaune, Pyrrha and Emerald arrived at the virtual equivalent to Amity Tower's launch site, and saw a heavily fortified location, with walls and battlements. AI guards armed the balistas that were mounted onto the walls, but there was still need for additional protection.
"And remember, this area isn't protected by Mithala's semblance," Ruby said as the group walked onto the area. They felt a slight tingling sensation, as usual when they went from one computer to another, and kept walking. A cyber-Grimm resembling a Teryx flew overhead, but a sphere of energy slammed into it, and Ruby heard the sound of an all too familiar shotgun. Jenny killed the Grimm in one hit, turned into a sphere again and slammed into the ground.
"Hey Ruby," Jenny said and asked, "And, are those friends of yours?"
"Hi Jenny," Ruby said and answered, "Yep, they are."
"Hello, I'm Jaune Arc," Jaune said, and shook Jenny's hand.
"My name is Pyrrha Nikos," Pyrrha said with a small nod.
"Emerald Sustrai," Emerald said.
"Nice to meet you all," Jenny said.
"Anyway, where's Penny?" Ruby asked.
"Well, she wanted to be here," Jenny answered, looked at Pyrrha and asked, "Wait, you're the girl who broke my sis' first body, right?"
"Actually, it was my fault," Emerald said.
"Penny's systems didn't detect your aura influencing her body, though," Jenny said.
"That's because I used my semblance on Pyrrha," Emerald said, "But the purpose was to have her destroy Penny."
"So she did it," Jenny said.
"I'm sorry," Pyrrha said, slightly upset.
"It's fine, really," Jenny said with a smile, "The guys who built that thing had no idea what they were doing anyway. That's why Penny designed the new one herself. Well, with some adjustments to fit in better."
"You're… not mad at me?" Pyrrha asked.
"Nope," Jenny answered, "And if I were, you wouldn't have time to feel sorry for what you did. Like I said, that old body was garbage, and completely incompatible with her programming. It was like trying to put an elephant's soul in an eel body. She could barely move in that thing, let alone fight." In the distance, they heard the familiar sound of some very specific propulsion jets, and Penny landed in front of the group.
"Thanks for waiting," Penny said, "I know I'm late, but my father wanted to talk to me first."
"Wait a second," Jaune said and asked, "You… have wings?"
"Yep," Penny answered, "I was programmed to control a faunus-like body, as were all my siblings, for when-" Jenny gave her a stern look and she stopped talking.
"Our mother wanted us to look our best," Jenny said, "That's also why I've got this tail."
"What kind of animal has a tail like that?" Jaune asked, looking at the flat scaly tail.
"A deep-dweller," Jenny answered, "A serpentine creature most known for not being well known, since they live very deep underground. Anyway, let's show you around and let you get accustomed to everything." She and Penny walked off, and Ruby, Jaune, Pyrrha and Emerald followed her around the site, looking at all the different fortifications and security measures.
~o~
Ilia stepped off of a Mistral airship and her seismic sense mapped out the entire area. She gave the people inside the ship a small nod and a few faunus stepped off the airship as well. As the airship flew away again to look for a proper landing space, the other faunus began preparing a small base camp with tents, storage containers, barricades and watch towers.
"So, why are we here?" Kuu, a moth faunus woman, asked. She had antennae on her head, shoulder-long light gray hair and light blue eyes, and wore the standard White Fang outfit.
"To help build the turrets," Ilia answered and crouched down.
"How do you plan on doing that?" Kuu asked and said, "I mean, we're in the middle of nowhere, and it's not like iron, steel, copper and whatnot grows on trees."
"We'll use deep-dwellers," Ilia answered, "They feed on all manner of material, and those materials get deposited in their scales. If they shed them, we get purified deposits of whatever they ate. I know someone whose semblance lets her shape metal, meaning that she can separate the different materials." She took a deep breath and manifested her aura as a tail, horns and chameleon feet, startling Kuu. Ilia created a large plate of stone from her hands, forcing it into the ground by creating more stones above it and making her feet cling to the ground. Using her semblance, she made the stone attract deep-dwellers, and imprinted the desire to bring all of their metal-rich scales to the top of the column in the stone.
"H- how are you doing that?" Kuu asked.
"My skin cells can behave like earth-dust if I want," Ilia answered, "They can also act like ice-dust, which also tends to be very convenient at times." She kept extending the column until she reached the right depth, using her seismic sense to detect any signs of deep-dwellers near the stone.
"And that energy?" Kuu asked, reaching to touch Ilia's aura horns.
"Don't touch them," Ilia said and answered, "Those things are pure energy. Touching them would be like a fruit fly being hit by a lightning."
"How are you doing that anyway?" Kuu asked.
"Training," Ilia answered, "It also gave me a couple additional abilities. Since I share a trait with the only chameleon that can do it, I can stick to walls, for example. I have a seismic sense, and of course, can overcharge my aura regeneration and have some of that aura manifest as additional traits to boost my aura reserves to thrice the normal level."
~o~
After Penny and Jenny showed their guests the area, the group arrived at one of the gates in the wall around the area, where they saw a large man wrestling with a Big Ursa, which had red metallic rods sticking out of it. The man had long black hair and wore a fur-trimmed leather kilt, a bear fur cape on his back, and fur boots and bracers. He had an axe and sword hanging from his leather belt, but didn't use either of them. He threw the Grimm to the ground and stomped its head into the ground, killing it in a single hit.
"That… was… awesome!" Ruby exclaimed and ran over to the massive beast of a man. He turned around and Ruby saw that he had silver eyes.
"Hello Harald," Jenny said as the rest of the group walked up to Ruby, "Those are friends of mine." Harald looked all four of them up and down, and everyone was kind of nervous, seeing how the man was easily the biggest they had ever seen.
"You must be Ruby Rose," Harald said, looking at Ruby, "It is an honor to meet you. Your friend Penny has spoken highly of your accomplishments."
"Really?" Ruby asked, looking at Penny.
"Yep," Penny answered, "I was programmed to aid in everyday life and promote social interactions."
"I see," Ruby said, turned back to Harald and asked, "Do you know about the silver eyes? What abilities we have, that is."
"I know of a foul darkness that seeks to destroy us," Harald answered, "And yes, my father taught me what gift we were given by the god of light." In the distance, a pack of Grimm appeared, coming towards the fortress, and two more people walked up to the group. One of the people wore a full steel plate armor, completely hiding his features. The other had light green eyes and short brown hair and wore white linen pants and shirt under chain mail armor, and with brown leather boots. Seeing the Grimm approach, Harald walked out onto the stone bridge connecting the area with the surrounding computers.
"Shouldn't we, you know, help him?" Ruby asked, looking at Jenny.
"Don't worry, he's got this," Jenny answered, "Just watch." Harald copied himself a couple dozen times, creating a total of sixty clones, and the men waited for the Grimm to approach further. The original Harald held his left hand up.
"Wait," Harald said, waited until the Grimm were close enough, and said, "Now!" He let his hand fall and all of the men extended round shields with a metal spike in the middle from their left bracer. The cyber-Grimm didn't have time to slow down and hit the shield wall with full force. Ruby flinched just watching the Big Ursai throw themselves against the wall, but Harald didn't budge. The spikes on their shields killed the Grimm, and whenever one of the enemies tried jumping over the wall, one of the clones further behind would draw his sword, sometimes extend it to a spear, and impale the Grimm as it landed or cut off one of its limb and then kill it before it could recover. A Beringel jumped over the shield wall, and one of the clones grabbed his axe and extended it to its battle axe form. He caught the Grimm on his weapon's handle and threw it to the side. The Grimm roared at him, but the Harald clone sunk his axe into the Grimm's head. One by one, the clones started to disappear from taking too much damage, and the ones further behind had to step in for them. With the wave of Grimm not seeming to end, the original Harald closed his eyes and took a deep breath. The Grimm charged one more time, and just before they slammed down on the shield wall, the clones willingly disappeared, leaving the Grimm confused and a bit off-balance. In that exact moment, Harald unleashed the light of his silver eyes, copying everyone's semblance and turning the Grimm to stone.
"Harald, could you please not do that?" Penny asked and said, "The system can't handle those kinds of power spikes." She pulled up a small window of information and looked at it.
"How bad is it?" Ruby asked, "Also, why didn't you tell me that this was a problem back then?"
"I didn't know back then," Penny answered, checked the report and answered, "But that spike in astral energy busted a transformer in a hospital, and the auxiliary generators only last for five hours."
"And what did I do?" Ruby asked.
"Not much," Penny answered, "You just overcharged an old transit signal and caused an explosion in an abandoned subway station."
"That's good to know," Ruby said.
"But, what do we do about the hospital now?" Jaune asked.
"Let Joshua deal with it," Jenny said and gestured towards the guy in full plate armor.
"Fear not," Joshua said, "I shall fix this issue at once." He stepped up to the window, held his hands over it and let a wave of green energy flow into it, using his semblance to repair the damage. After chatting a bit more, and explaining the idea and drawbacks of copying semblances to everyone, Ruby, Jaune, Pyrrha and Emerald left and returned to the material world, along with Penny.
~o~
The next day, Ruby, Weiss and Maria were in Pietro's office in Atlas, where Pietro was trying to get the actual footage of the attack out of Penny's cybernetic brain. He and Maria were sitting behind an L-shaped counter and watching the news, while Penny was in a chamber, with a wire connected to her bow. People were still shocked about what happened at the election, and while luckily noone died, the majority of the population still demanded that Penny was deactivated.
"How is she doing?" Ruby asked, despite already knowing the answer.
"She is scared, confused," Pietro answered, "We'll have her recorded visual data shortly. That should prove her innocence, but the damage has already been done. The things the people are saying about her." He coughed and had to calm himself down. Ruby hesitantly stepped forward.
"I… know why she's one of a kind," Ruby said, much to everyone's surprise.
"H- how do you know that?" Pietro asked, and had another coughing fit.
"A while back, I fused with her," Ruby answered, "And I gained access to some of her knowledge. Also, I always sort of wondered why she would be the only one of her kind if it really was possible to create an artificial aura."
"Well, yes, it's not as easy as I tell everyone," Pietro said. His aura flared up, and the group saw several holes in it.
"You… gave her some of yours?" Weiss asked.
"Well yes, and no," Pietro answered and said, "You see, while I was trying to get a new program to become self-aware, create a protector with a soul, something happened. A girl contacted me. She asked about me, my work, and about the world in general. I should have probably been more suspicious of that last bit, but I was so happy. Talking to her felt like talking to the daughter I never had." Ruby was a bit confused, since the conversation didn't go as she had expected.
"That was Penny, right?" Weiss asked.
"Yes," Pietro answered, "Her mother had allowed her to become a real person, with a physical body. However, in order for that to work, she needed to find someone whose aura had the exact right frequency to let her bond with the body, or else she would not be able to transition into our world."
"Her mother?" Weiss asked.
"The one who programmed her," Pietro answered, "An incredibly skilled huntress by the name of Talia Star. I know the name well, but I have never seen her. But to pull of something like this, she must truly be incredibly gifted. The kind of genius that borders on madness." Suddenly, Talia manifested in the room, right in front of the chamber Penny was in.
"Talia?" Ruby asked, "What are you doing here?"
"Wait, Talia?" Pietro asked, coughed a bit and asked, "The Talia Star? The one who programmed Penny?"
"In the flesh," Talia answered.
"I… imagined you a bit taller," Pietro said.
"I get that a lot," Talia said.
"What are you doing here?" Ruby asked.
"Just checking on my little girl," Talia answered, "I can understand Weiss not knowing parental care, but you seemed to have a relatively decent upbringing. Well, until Kaala came along."
"Who?" Ruby asked.
"Doesn't matter," Talia answered, "But if you need to know, when Sophie saw what he did, she hit him with thousands of silk pellets and splattered him all over the place."
"But, how did you create an artificial soul?" Weiss asked.
"Funny you should ask," Talia answered, "I didn't. This has to stay between us, though."
"Talia, what did you do?" Ruby asked, giving Talia a stern look.
"You know those things everyone tells you not to do?" Talia asked and said, "I wanted to see why I shouldn't do them, and plucked some souls from the afterlife."
"Wait so… Penny has a real person's soul?" Ruby asked.
"Well, yeah," Talia answered, "But I had to save some energy somewhere, so I picked souls from the top of the sea of the damned. It made things minimally more complicated for me after that, but over all, I saved a lot of energy."
"Why did they make things more complicated?" Ruby asked.
"Because they were the more reprehensible ones," Talia answered, "So I had to break them down in a simulation and let them build themselves back up a couple thousand times. I wanted to get a specific semblance, one that could very easily protect large areas from Grimm for extended periods of time. Penny was the closest to being a success, so I let her become a real girl, hoping she'd find what was missing. Turns out, it was you, Ruby."
"So, to clarify, and to make sure I didn't miss anything," Ruby said and asked, "You ripped the souls of the damned from hell, turned them into computer programs and tormented them in simulations until they broke, all to get a specific semblance?"
"Pretty much, yep," Talia answered nonchalantly, and a bit cheerful.
"Have you completely lost your mind?" Ruby asked, almost shouting.
"Nope, I actually got a few more," Talia answered, "They seem to be really nice people. Maybe you'll meet them one day."
"I- what?" Ruby asked, shook her head and said, "Never mind, what's important is that you can bring back dead people."
"Could, actually," Talia said, "I spent too much energy on getting the most vile criminals in the history of Remnant out of hell, so now I'm pretty powerless."
"Is there a way to get your power back?" Ruby asked.
"Nope, power spent is power spent," Talia answered, "But I can get new power."
"Ruby, why are you asking her that?" Weiss asked.
"Because we can bring back people," Ruby answered and asked, "So, how can you get new power?"
"From the arch-demon," Talia answered, "Basically, he needs life force to make new demons, and if I kill beings with a soul before they die of old age, I get their remaining life force. I can't do anything with it, but he can, so we trade."
"I see…" Ruby said, "Forget I said anything, then."
"But wait," Weiss said and asked, "Weren't the gods the only ones who could bring back the dead?"
"Yes, and no," Talia answered, "They gave magic to humans, so they must've had magic themselves. They were just incredibly powerful. But, if you know my fighting style, you'll know that I excel at doing things with very little energy input that would normally take a lot more energy. Anyway, I have to go take care of some other business now, bye." Talia disappeared and everyone looked at Penny, not sure how they should feel about the fact that she is the result of a crazy scientist experimenting with the dead, or that she has the soul of one of Remnant's worst criminals in her.
"I… have a plan," Ruby said after a while, "We tell the people that she was deactivated, once Sirena takes care of some things. We'll also tell the people how she was created. Most of it, at least. We'll tell them that she can't be reactivated any more."
"But why?" Pietro asked and said, "That would destroy the people. They love her, and losing her forever would be horrible."
"Do you know what's going to happen?" Weiss asked.
"Of course I know that," Ruby answered, "But I can use their sorrow to guide them into a brighter future. If everything goes well, the city will be safer than before."
"And if it doesn't?" Weiss asked.
"Then I'll take full responsibility for what happened," Ruby answered, "Also, Sirena has at least three backup plans in case I fail." They discussed their plan a bit more, including Sirena's backup plans, and filled Pietro in on a lot of things, such as magic and the silver eyes. Ruby also told Maria about using her silver eyes with negative emotions as a trigger, and the benefits and drawbacks of doing that.
~o~
Jacques got a message from Pietro, letting him know why Penny couldn't be reactivated if she was deactivated now. As he sat in his chair, not knowing what to do with this new information, the door to his office opened.
"Hello, Jacques," Arthur said as he entered.
"Hello Arthur," Jacques said and asked, "Did you know this about Penny?"
"Of course," Arthur answered, "But it's not nearly as bad as the good doctor makes it out to be. Just tell him to deactivate her for now. After all, he built her once, so there is no way he couldn't just turn her back on again."
"I suppose you're right," Jacques said, "Alright, I'll tell the public immediately."
"Good," Arthur said, "Now, if you would excuse me, I have other things to take care of as well. I will contact Robyn Hill though, just to make sure the people know you're telling the truth. Good thing semblances can be manipulated, if you know how." He got up and left the office again. When the door closed, Arthur's appearance shattered like glass, revealing Sirena Blue, who was smiling confidently and contacted Ruby via communicator.
"Everything is good on my end," Sirena said, "Now, if only there was a way to prove he was telling the truth." She assumed Robyn's appearance and voice halfway through her sentence, and made an illusion resembling Robyn's semblance appear around her right hand, switching it from purple to green and red a little.
"Good," Ruby said, "Now get ready for the next phase. And tell Sophie to be ready, too."
"Of course," Sirena said.
"I still can't believe we're doing this," Yang said, "The people will feel horrible."
"That's sort of the plan," Ruby explained, "I need them to be sad so that my silver eyes affect them."
"Didn't we talk about this?" Blake asked.
"Yes, but this isn't for my own gain," Ruby answered, "I'm doing this to protect all of Mantle. I need them to work together as one, humans and faunus alike, and to do that, I need them to follow me."
"I still can't believe all of this is happening," Robyn said, "But, if it helps Mantle, I'll let you do your thing. However, if only one person dies because of this, I'll notify the council."
"That's fine," Ruby said, "But you don't have to worry about anything. I promised never to let our enemies kill another person, and I'm keeping that promise."
"Don't worry, I'll take the blame," Pietro said, coughed a bit and asked, "After all, I'm old and sentimental, and who could blame a father whose only daughter received death threats from the very people she tried to protect?"
~o~
A few hours later, during a press conference, a reporter asked Jacques if he was aware that, if Penny was deactivated, it would be final. Sirena, disguised as Robyn, was holding his hand and pretending to use her semblance. While the conference was held in Atlas, it was also broadcast across Mantle, due to the significance to both cities.
"That is what I was told, yes," Jacques answered, "But I do not believe that statement one bit. Pietro has built her once, twice even, so, according to a reliable source, there is nothing stopping him from building her a third time." Sirena made the illusion of the purple aura around both their hands turn green.
"You mentioned a source," Sirena said and asked, "Who is it?" Before Jacques could answer, or refuse to do so, Pietro walked on stage and stopped in front of Jacques.
"It's done," Pietro said angrily, "I've shut her down, for good, and there is no way to get her back. Ever." Sirena let go of Jacques and took Pietro's hand, pretending to use her semblance on him.
"Now, again," Sirena said and asked, "Is there really no way to reactivate her?"
"No, there is not," Pietro answered, "And Jacques knew about it. He even knew why this was." Sirena made the aura turn green again, and the crowd gasped.
"Why can't she be reactivated?" Sirena asked, and Pietro sighed. He let go of Sirena's hand and turned to the crowd. His aura flared up, and Unakite, standing some distance away from the crowd and using her semblance to disguise herself as Ruby, used her Glamour semblance to make the black spots in his aura appear much bigger than they actually were. Another round of shock went through the crowd, and Ruby sensed Grimm approach the cities. Luckily, the wall, various gun turrets, Atlesian Knights, barbed wire fences and Sophie's swarm held them off for the most part, allowing the Ace-Ops, Winter and Ruby's friends to take out the few that managed to slip past. Unakite reverted back to being just Ruby, and used Penny's semblance to hack into the large screen standing behind Jacques, as well as the ones down in Mantle, to show a recording of herself.
"Hello everyone, I am Ruby Rose," Ruby said, "In times before huntsmen and academies and all that, there were tales of warriors so powerful, even the Grimm feared them, for these warriors could strike down any Grimm with a single look... of their silver eyes." She played a recording of when she disintegrated the Centinel that was about to kill Jacques at the mine, and the crowd gasped again, this time in awe instead of shock.
"Wait, what?" Jacques asked when he saw how close he was to having his chest torn open like an envelope.
"Not many of us are left," Ruby said, "But you can rest assured. Because I am here. I will admit, I have no means to increase the number of silver-eyed warriors, but that is fine, because we can keep up the fight with what we have. That is how mankind has always done things. Wars, famines, plagues, Grimm, they were all over our history. But here we are. Standing strong, side by side, united as one. Penny was a good friend of mine. She loved all life, both big and small, and she was, in many aspects, more human than some of the people I have met in my life. But she didn't hate those people. So please, if your grief motivates you to act, consider for a moment what she would have wanted. She dedicated her life to protect those who can't protect themselves, and if you want to keep her memory alive, do not seek revenge for what happened to her. Instead, follow in her footsteps, and continue doing so for as long as you can." During her speech, Ruby sensed the people's sadness fade, and the Grimm stopped coming. After she was done talking, the screen froze, then returned to the way it had been before, and the crowd stared in silence.
Author's note: Talia is really fun to write, especially when she is so casual about stuff like necromancy. Also, I'm very proud of her response to "Have you lost your mind?" She is just the kind of person who can drive anyone crazy, and Ruby getting so frustrated with her that quickly really drives that home.
Another fun thing is how she casually dropped the name of Summer's killer, and then promptly changed the topic. And yes, in this timeline, Summer died to one of Salem's minions. Various key elements of this story depend on that being the case, and by the time her fate was revealed in canon, I couldn't have changed my plans, even if I wanted to.
And no, Ruby didn't watch My Hero Academia. Sirena did though, and told her to add that to her speech. She didn't tell her that it's a reference to an anime from another reality, though.