Chapter 2
Of Conspirators Unwilling
Part 2
Mind like a speeding motorcycle racing a gauntlet of illogical loop-the-loops with malfunctioning breaks, Ruby's near-apoplectic confusion-addled outrage left her rooted in place pointing a furiously quivering finger at its source, that eccentric and now not so benevolent stranger in who she had confided her life's ambition and who's council she'd foolishly heeded. Confusion fast became anger and Ruby's pointing finger shook into overdrive as she began subjecting him to the most facile and brutally righteous tongue-lashing that a tongue ever did lash!
"Y-y-y-you-you-you-you-you-you-you-YOU-YOU!"
"M-m-m-me-me-me-me-me-me-me-me-ME-ME!... wait. What are we doing? Nyaa who cares." Magician-like, Roman, with one cavalier wave, suavely flipped his cane off his forearm, dismissed her outburst then caught and twirled it with that same hand while its opposite returned his cigar to its rightful throne. Stepping onto the sidewalk, he mused "Iiiii'm gonna go ahead and assume that tsunami of verbal diarrhoea you just projectile vomited my way means I've been recognised, after all you'd have to be a dimwited yockle living under a rock in the boonies to not recognise the illustrious gentleman criminal Roman Torchwick. Not that that does me any favours;" He sneered, advancing a step, heedless of the incapacitated hireling near him being dragged away by a concerned cohort "I mean just when I thought tonight would be a nice, boring success, some wannabe hero barely out of diapers pops up outta dust-damned nowhere and ruins it!" The loud, punctuating thunk of cane greeting pavement jolted Ruby's already fraught nerves "But alright I'll humour you Little Red. The doughnut squad haven't rolled over yet, so our stars align. You wanna play huntress." Then lowly, caustically "And I want my pound of flesh."
Meanwhile, battered, limping in pain, their suits marred and torn, Torchwick's three least injured henchmen, sensing impending trouble, were already dragging their worse off fellows into the relative cover of a nearby alleyway. The comradely display of solidarity among bad guys might've earned Ruby's respect were she not presently discombobulated.
First Roman deceives her, then behaves like he hadn't all but invited her along, and now he's challenging her to a 1V1? The absolute gall!Just what kind of sick joke is he playing? Implicating her into... "Oh no..." Ruby's heart lurched. She felt ill "I-I'm an accomplice! H-he tricked me! What did I expect, though?! Trusting a complete stranger?! Stupid-Stupid-Stupid!"
Roma...no, Torchwick, whipped up his cane, took aim, simpering "Incidentally..." as a reticle popped up to, unsurprisingly, reveal a wide gun barrel.
Normally Ruby's inner-nerd would've excitedly squealed "Cannon Cane!" but lost in the fog of anger, hurt, betrayal and self-depreciation as she was, not even her reflexive weapons enthusiast tendencies could stabilise the volatile miasmic cocktail of bubbling negative emotion threatening to blow.
Torchwick however, seeing Ruby open her mouth to more coherently express her righteous outrage, snapped "Think fast!"
Trained combat instincts compensating for her distracted mind, Ruby reflexively evaded the high explosive flare shrieking toward her by jumping and firing Crescent Rose downward, launching herself up above the ensuing detonation which gutted the road, its miniature shockwave slinging smouldering bitumen that raked building sides. The dust shop's remaining front window shattered. The nearest neighbouring windows did not. Reinforced glass to the rescue; though cracked, they'd protected the audibly distressed occupants admirably.
Reaching the zenith of her jump astride a scorching air current, Ruby, again lucid, spared the two teenagers a concerned glance. Shaken but unharmed, the excitedly trembling pair stubbornly kept those death-gripped scrolls rolling. Sillies.
"Crud. Gotta stop him shooting more of those." A strategy quickly crystallised "I'll crowd him in CQC. Keep him center-street away from buildings. He's probably got aura, but it should still discourage close range flares while I speed blitz his overdressed butt." Eyes hardening, Ruby, still airborne, reverse fired diagonally downward "Fifth!" propelling herself toward Torchwick's position. Finding him absent however she abandoned her plummeting overhead axe-chop, alighted facing the shop and glowered rearward at the explosion's lingering smoke "Hide and seek? Fine!" , Ruby again vandalised the road with an aura-boosted stomping spin and swung Crescent rose side-on like a fan. With a great whoosh of air the stinky smokescreen, accompanied by an empty soda can, blew away "Right. Now to get..."
Bonk! Right on the noggin.
Sounding like a startled duck taking a full loaf of bread to the face, Ruby skittered crablike sideways for some space to reorient herself, but the flamboyant criminal was already on her. As expected his onslaught of practised aggression boasted the attributes of one packing aura.
"Good."
Almost feral, Ruby answered shrewd aggression with bombastically exuberant aggression. Scythe and cane clashed, whistled and sang as they danced in the evening breeze. Advance and retreat, feint, parry, repost, footwork, positioning circling, circling "Sixth!", just two aura-enhanced blurs of violence, the elder a fleet-footed mobile fortress of impregnable defence and cunning counters, the younger a chaotic crimson hurricane flitting and bounding all about, illusive, vicious and unpredictable.
Parrying the strokes of a scythe wielder trained by a true master is a challenging feat, only Torchwick wasn't just doing so effectively, he was flaunting it and laughing; deflecting and redirecting her every effort amidst crude, throaty chortling.
With a guard-breaking flourish Torchwick elbowed her in the stomach and cracked the cane's handle up under her chin. Aura humming, Ruby darted away, firing "Seventh!" Circled, "Eighth-Ninth." then sped back in after her bullets, launching into a complex sequence of whirling supersonic slashes and handle bashes which concluded with a backward hop and "Tenth!"
Yet, Torchwick stonewalled everything, then, with amazing skill, caught the bullet with his cane's hook, spun and launched it back faster than she'd fired it. Her own round hit her aura-enshrouded shoulder and Ruby wasn't even mad "Awe-sooome."
Exploiting her unbalance, a black-gloved fist made her forehead's acquaintance. Watching her stumble, nigh-tumble back, Torchwick tutted and, like a heckler at a comedy show, drawled "Lame!"
"I take it back. Screw this guy!" Rebounding, Ruby cut low at the lying jerk's shins. Nimbly he hop-stomped on Crescent Rose's blade, pinning it underfoot... and suddenly Ruby found his cane's handle encircling her throat. A squeakily strangled "Whargh" escaped the girl when Torchwick yanked her toward him. The heady scent of cigar smoke invaded Ruby's nostrils as he leaned down and mockingly singsonged into her ear "Still not impressed!"
Snarling, Ruby hoicked and fired her baby "Eleventh!" while slamming her head sideways into his, thereby slipping free of his cane, knocking him staggering off balance and using the shot's recoil to swing Crescent Rose in a full 360, her blade whisking for his neck. He ducked it only for her small boot to impact his chest and send him skidding back with a crazed cigar-adorned grin splitting his face.
Alas Ruby wasn't fast enough retracting her leg. Torchwick's cane hooked her ankle, and by that ankle he began spinning her, scythe and all, around once, twice and once more before hurling her at a nearby lamppost.
Feeling obliged to show she can do cool stuff too, Ruby altered her areal positioning and amplified her velocity with another shot "Twelth!" Loudly Ruby's boots impacted the streetlight's thick metal base where its sturdiest, meanwhile her masterfully angled sniper round ricochetted off a neighbouring lamppost onto a collision course with an impressed looking Torchwick who narrowly rearwardly deflected it then even more narrowly leaned limbo under the blurring slash she'd aimed at his shoulder milliseconds after kicking off the now horribly mangled lamppost which currently resembled a gut-punch victim gone vertically fetal. Had Ruby not carefully calculated her strength, she'd have completely bisected it without rebounding. Her Uncle's special training was paying dividends.
"Thirteenth-fourteenth!" Torchwick was now weathering a veritable storm of blitzing follow up slashes and close range shots from myriad bizarre angles. He actually appeared pressed until some fancy footwork positioned him about perfectly to parry then roundhouse kick her away.
Backflipping to bleed off the impact which would've tossed her down the street like a kciked can otherwise. Decided to try a favourite field-tested combat trick, Ruby murder-stomped more bitumen and propelled herself racing directly at him, feigning an overhead strike. The sucker bought it, cane already prepping a parry-counterstrike. Gunning her semblance, Ruby slid in low, dexterously manoeuvring Crescent Rose's massive head around past Torchwick until its crescent blade practically hugged his flank.
Heady with her success, Ruby mustered all of her ridiculous leg strength further bolstered by aura, took a two-handed death grip on her baby then simultaneously sprung explosively, violently, road-crackingly backwards, twisting her body viciously and, the cherry atop the victory cake "Fifteenth Baby!" Ruby glanced back, caught his eye, smiled triumphantly "Check m-whaaa?!"
Stillborn, her smile died.
Foiling a surprise move only seasoned combatants could on their first try, Torchwick repositioned his cane pointing vertically upwards at his flank right as she fired. Performing a gentlemanly bow the crook flawlessly angled his weapon to guide Crescent Rose grinding up its shaft and over his dipping upper body until the cane's barrel pointed levelly at "Oh crap..."
Even before their weapons parted, his flare crashed into her unguarded back. The explosion's kinetic force, combined with her semblance boosted jump, flung her hurtling toward a building. Despite everything spinning, Ruby successfully reduced her velocity with one well-timed "Sixteenth!" gunshot downward before the inevitable.
Wham-Crack Face met reinforced concrete wall; it was a short, ugly friendship, their falling out resoundingly, reboundingly literal as Torchwick's excessively villainous laugh rang out.
Toppling backward off the wall onto her butt, her aura singing, a relieved Ruby almost laughed at the veiny cracks surrounding her human-shaped signature; had she not fired she would've cannonballed clean through the damn building.
Quickly bouncing to her feet, Ruby faced the enemy, readying Crescent Rose which thankfully she hadn't dropped; the mere thought of losing her baby threatened waterworks.
"Better." Torchwick glibly complemented.
While nowhere near her uncle's level, Ruby acknowledged Roman's skill. He'd sacrificed some aura pulling that stunt but it payed off. Why hadn't he gone flying like her, though? Shaped flares? An aura technique? Maybe he's got an awesome gravity manipulation semblance; though if so, he's holding back... Actually, thinking about it, the physical blows he'd dealt her thus far should've damaged her aura more than this. "Is he... sandbagging? Why? To test me? Maybe. B-but his theatrics, behaving like we never met; its like, like he's putting on a stage show starring himself and... me."
Angered by how well the pieces suddenly fit, Ruby forcibly forbore voicing her epiphany knowing he'd interrupt any attempted accusation to preserve the narrative, just like earlier. Instead, Ruby made a, Come At Me, gesture. Smirking knowingly, Torchwick counter-gestured likewise; apparently they'd seen the same movie. "Fine; your funeral."
Tension. Narrowed eyes. Set jaws. Twitching fingers. Raw concentration.
An old fashion standoff...
One second...
Two...
The damaged section of wall randomly half-collapsing was catalyst enough.
Semblance firing on all cylinders Ruby rocketed forward, reaching him long before the falling rubble kissed pavement. Mildly flummoxed, Torchwick fired at the ground between them. However the flare had barely taken flight before Ruby materialised, slashing for his ribs. Scrambling, Roman intercepted, but Ruby, expecting it, used his parry to aim at his stomach and "Seventeenth." Right as the flare went boom, further mangling the poor road, testing windows and gusting ignited rose petals everywhere; a cacophony concealing the ping of a scarcely deflected 50 calibre sniper round at not quite point-blank range.
The stiff night air reeked of burning roses and rang with weapon violence "Eighteenth!" Meanwhile on the sidelines, one brave henchman was timidly trying to rescue his fallen hat.
Mid-exchange, Torchwick simultaneously ducked a slash and retrieved the slightly scorched hat then gently frisbeed it to its relieved owner who's expression of uncharacteristically childlike joy and reaching hand fell into abject, mournful despondency when...
"Nineteenth!"
Ruby's sniper round perforated it mid-flight. The poor thing flopped sadly to the ground at the goon's feet, almost cleaved in two.
Feeling petty, Ruby turned to smirk at Torchwick... and ate an outraged cane handle to the schnoz.
Reeling on unsteady legs, Ruby rallied, scowling fiercely at Torchwick's righteously scandalised expression before zipping forward in a swirl of rose petals, scythe heroically scything at his precious Bowler.
"Woah!" Nearly losing his cigar, Torchwick tap-danced inelegantly clear, free hand shielding his hat. Low and flinty through grit teeth he chuckled, a feral gleam entering his eye "hehehaha, ya just had to make this personal, didn't chya."
Personal?... The hypocrite.
"Grrrr!" Ruby attacked in blind fury... and tripped over Torchwick's extended leg. Two vicious blows followed, heavier than before, faster, unrestrained, driving her to her knees, aaaaand how did his cane handle get around her neck again?...
The next thing Ruby knew she was being spun by her throat then unceremoniously flung, scythe and all, at Dust Till Dawn
Ruby let out a strangled "Woah Momma!" as she sailed through the very window she'd originally broken. Except for a satchel rack toppled by Crescent Rose, Fortune's favour carried her safely above the expensive displays before she hit the sturdy, shelf-adorned back wall. Ignoring their inhumane passenger welfare protocols, Torchwick Airlines' boasted some preemo service;
Aura purring, Ruby hoisted the mangled metal shelf off herself as she stood, tentatively leaning it against the cracked wall one-handedly before reverting Crescent Rose to its more indoor friendly rifle form.
A buzzing ceiling light flickered; Ruby glanced up, shrugged "...Déjà vu."
Leaping over the mess of fallen, albeit mostly intact, merchandise and a familiar magazine rack, Ruby sped to the storefront's window where she beheld Torchwick... impatiently consulting his watch. Rolling his eyes at her reemergence "Well Red. I think we can all say its been an eventful evening," Flippantly he discarded his cigar and pointedly squished it beneath his cane "and as much as I'd love to stick around, I'm afraid this." He took aim "Is where we part ways."
Ruby panicked "He wouldn't."
He didn't. Evidently reconsidering the wisdom of shooting explosives into the powder keg that is any dust shop, Torchwick fired a different looking flare at the ground instead. With a pop, dense grey smoke rapidly engulfed the entire intersection.
Ruby glanced back at the elderly Shopkeeper peering over the counter "You okay if I go after him?"
He nodded "Mhm."
Semblance coughing pettles as Crescent Rose reentered scythe form Ruby ripped through the smokescreen, scattering it. Glimpsing Torchwick a block yonder ascending a tall residential building, Ruby's inner-nerd gushed "Ahhhh-his cane has a grappling hook! I-Want-One IWantOne!", then more shrewdly "Well if he didn't mind letting me ruin his robbery then he won't mind going to prison for me either; after surrendering his weapon specs, of course."
Corralling Nerdy Ruby back into her cage, Serious Ruby slammed her semblance's metaphorical accelerator, executing a heavily aura-augmented running-jump that covered two thirds of the building's height. A booster-shot from Crescent Rose hoiked her the remaining third onto the rooftop.
"Hey!"
Standing frozen meters ahead by the roof's opposite edge, shoulders tensed, back facing her, Torchwick growled "Persistent."
Under different circumstances Ruby would've immersed herself in the gorgeous highrise view, enjoying the cool urban-scented winds, marvelling at the radiant sprawling city or ogling Beacon enthroned atop a distant hill, its great tower's soft emerald glow beautiful beneath the moonlit swirl of the cloudy dark blue sky.
Alas...
"Why?!" Ruby, rather nebulously, demanded, her anger etched with hurt "Wh..."
"Whadoya'mean Why?!" He snarled, whirling, still interrupting her inquiries even up here "I'm Roman Mothfucking Torchwick!That's why! I do whatever I want, and despite the reputation hit I chose to cut and run with my meagre haul without bloodshed. But then you just had to chase me up here." He threw up his hands "You won the battle, kid! Thwarted a legend! Now call it a night and go to bed, Red;" He stared her dead in the eye "Don't make me kill you."
Was he frigging serious right now? As if she'd capitulate to this lunatic farce and bow out on cue. No. She will end this folly and Roman Torchwick's criminal career with it like any true huntress would.
Noticing her galvanising resolve, a vague hint of regret, among other complicated emotions, flickered behind Torchwick's eyes then vanished so quickly Ruby wondered if she'd imagined it.
No warnings this time. When Ruby's mouth opened to counter-monologue, his cane whipped up and shot gunslinger-style. He was finally taking her a bit more seriously now.
Pouring aura into Crescent Rose Ruby spun it like a fan, neutralising the brunt of the explosion. Nevertheless the building quaked, prompting frightened screaming from inside as the parapet flanking her was blasted into scorched chunks of plummeting concrete. Hopefully the street below remained deserted.
Pissed, Ruby sprung over the clearing smoke "Twentieth twenty-first twenty-second!" firing three rounds at his head midair before bringing Crescent Rose cleaving down, the air audibly cracking with its passage. Torchwick expertly batted her bullets back at her, each hitting her, then horizontally no-selled her follow up only to stagger half a step when her boot once again met his chest, rebounding off him. Not a particularly good kick, but small victories.
Grimacing, Torchwick brushed invisible dirt off his coat where her heel contacted and Ruby used that laps to zoom zigzagging back at him, Crescent Rose becoming a cyclone of streaking red violence that belied its every attack's expert precision. Torchwick met her onslaught with a manic chuckling grin which contradicted his previously expressed vexation.
"VvVvVvVvVvV!" Ruby's aura vibrated excitedly.
"Holy crapples. This guy's Defence Stats are freaking bullshit!" Ruby stepped it up, flitting all over the rooftop, yet he stonewalled everything, holding his position by the parapet with increasingly suspicious stubbornness, almost as if...
Roaring engines quick-starting into an ascent drowned out all other sound. A grey armoured bullhead rose from below to hover behind Torchwick; his emergency extraction stratagy.
The pilot lowered the aircraft's boarding ramp and beamed its non-standard issue floodlight directly in Ruby's face, effectively blinding her whilst her quarry presumably sauntered aboard.
"End of the line, Red." Declared Torchwick, voice laced with some unreadable emotion.
Wary of incoming flares but failing to squint past the obnoxiously bright light, Ruby began trying to use aura to temporarily augment her vision, a technique still new to her, when a disgustingly familiar tinkling clatter emanated at her feet. Stepping back, eyes adjusting, heart thundering, Ruby hazarded a nervous glance down at...
A pure-cut fire dust crystal.
"Not good!" She had no way of stopping the flare that'd already be well on its way without the fire crystal blowing. She couldn't kick it away either; they're sturdy but not six story plunge sturdy, and that's assuming her kicking it over the parapet didn't exploderise it first. With her moderately damaged aura Ruby would survive the combined blasts, probably; but the civilians on the building's upper floors?
The bone-deep dread, like frigid spiders partying on her spine, that Torchwick's flare was instants away paralysed Ruby. The crushing weight of responsibility...
"We Huntsmen and Huntresses dedicate our lives to protecting those who cannot protect themselves; from grimm, from natural disasters and even from the monsters hiding among them... As that old song goes:: a true huntsman's life, is all about the sacrifice... hmm-hmm-la-da-naaa, If not us, then who?... Hmm-hmmm-hmmm, this sacrifice I do; in truth I do it all, for you..."
Those fragmented, half-remembered words, lyrics and the faint sensation of warm lips upon her forehead resonated in the deepest recesses of Ruby Rose's memory and the burning prickle behind her eyes they elicited drove back the grim pall of despondent indecision crippling her judgement, leaving only clarity and an almost spiritual resolve. Ruby couldn't stop the flare, but if she can just...
"Think Fast!" Torchwick bellowed...
Torchwick, who hadn't even fired the flare that triggered her terrifying yet deeply emotional watershed moment. Torchwick who'd just counter-productively announced his impending attack when he probably could've already initiated the supersized kaboom. And Torchwick who'd experienced Ruby's super speed firsthand...
Now, he fired; a flare Ruby immediately recognised as a weaker, slightly slower variant of those previously used. Had he depleted his primary ammo?
Regardless, Ruby cranked her semblance, dove, grabbed the crystal, pocketed it mid-roll and found her feet with moments to spare while amping her aura to shield herself and the crystal both. Simultaneously her aura's passive senses detected a non-malicious new arrival closing in, fast... from above?
All plans to hop rooftops crumbled when Ruby's backward glance scarcely registered the purple-white streak elegantly crushing down atop Torchwick's airborne flare.
"Woohohoho! Eh?" Torchwick's oblivious cheer choked off into confusion Ruby herself shared as the smoke dispersed at unnatural speed, both gaping at the newcomer rising from an epic superhero landing pose.
Green eyes, pale blonde hair, white blouse, black skirt and heeled boots. Most eye-catching was her awesome stylised cape, purple inside, black outside, billowing behind. This woman radiated that intimidating no-nonsense disciplinarian mojo, an impression her delicate glasses and pretty earrings somehow only enhanced, nevermind the riding crop.
Amid her fixation on the newcomer Ruby only half-registered the large, radiant but fading magenta glyph blanketing the rooftop which had warded against further building damage. Only one word described this awe-inspiring and weirdly familiar woman.
"Huntress." Ruby felt giddy
Until now Ruby hadn't seen the dapper criminal truly flustered, but hoo-boy under that blonde's withering glare Torchwick's expression eerily resembled Ruby's six year old self when caught plundering the cookie jar at midnight. Catching himself, his exceptional pokerface ran damage control.
Surveying her surroundings for tactical advantages, Ruby clocked two top floor window-peeping, scroll-toting numbskulls in connected buildings risking death by stray flare for those sweet holonet likes. Had Torchwick noticed them earlier and improvised that dust crystal stunt to make her look heroic? A thought for later examination.
Flicking her riding crop, which probably wasn't also a gun, not that Ruby was judging, the huntress conjured a swarm of radiant homing energy projectiles that peppered the bullhead's heavily armored hull and smashed that stupid floodlight as it span and juddered amid the deadly but waning lights show. Just when the pilot reasserted control however, the huntress summoned... a freaking storm cloud out of thin air!
"Wooaahh." Ruby breathed, awed as that cloud vomited vicious torrents of icicles down upon the poor bullhead turned pincushion. The pilot was skilled however and rotated it until the open hatch again faced them. Within its darkened compartment, their upper body cast in shadow... Either Torchwick had been hiding a red-orange dress and a killer pair of long, smooth lady legs under that snazzy ensemble, or this shady supermodel strutting before them in high-heeled contempt of turbulence was a new adversary.
Two demonically glowing amber eyes raked them from the darkness. Ruby's aura and instincts screamed "Danger!" the former jubilantly, and her Uncle advised her to always heed such warning signs. Cold flint on searing brimstone, the huntress matched stare for stare, professionally unruffled. Patiently, predatorily they sized eachother up; then...
In short; epic Awesomeness ensued.
...Lady Legs struck first, extended palm propelling a jet of condensed fire that broke against another defensive glyph. Some liquid-like splash-off however spattered around the glyph onto the ground, swiftly forming into an incandescent circle beneath the blonde, brightening and brightening then irrupting into a great, whooshing geyser of flames the huntress backflipped away from. The flaming pillar's surge skyward superheated the air about it and slung chunks of reinforced concrete everywhere.
Dust she hoped the residents had already evacuated; its a miracle the entire top floor hadn't collapsed inward. Perhaps the huntress negated the damage like before.
Landing beside Ruby, said huntress wasted no time, or resource, suspending the debris midair and forging the many jagged pieces into a rapidly spinning drill-like spear then launched it whirring at Lady legs who busted it apart with three consecutive fiery blasts powerful enough to create shockwaves. Yet The scattered fragments simply reformed and retaliated, a phenomena only an incredible semblance could explain.
The fast-thinking pilot dexterously angled the bullhead to deflect the homing projectile off its thick armour plating without much damage; a delaying tactic as the blonde badass split the spear into several great coiling serpents contorting to strike from multiple sides and ruin the bad guys day.
Lady legs stumbled as the bullhead righted itself, but those legs kept her upright where Ruby might've faceplanted and their steadfast confidence presaged their owner's coming counter; and what a counter. A massive orange tinted aura-infused pulse burst outwards, obliterating the rubble serpents without harming the bullhead or, oddly, the rooftop at all.
Huntress and Lady Legs paused, both visibly recalculating how to continue a duel against their respectively unexpectedly formidable opponent.
The status quo was clear.
Stalemate.
A Staredown in dilated time.
One second...
The bullhead hovered, idling engines thickening the tension.
Two...
Neither moved.
Three...
Those smugly superior legs betrayed nothing. Being Lady Legs' only discernible characteristic bar her molten amber eyes in a shadowed face, those legs were, all Ruby could, focus on. Those. Tall. Woman. Legs.
With legs like those, she'd have the height required to fully utilise Crescent Rose to a level rivalling her Uncle.
With legs like those she and her baby would become an unstoppable, incomparable terror unto Grimm and Torchwicks Remnant wide.
With legs like those, she could become a huntress worthy of succeeding her mother's legacy!...
Alas...
"There's not enough milk in the world!"
Unaware she'd just shouted that aloud, Ruby reverted Crescent Rose into gun form and emptied the remaining clip at the vile woman who, with infuriating laziness, blocked all six bullets with one palm.
Click-click-click: went the empty chamber's lament.
Thus it fell to Ruby's far more professional ally to telekinetically shunt the preoccupied girl clear of the five flaming geysers that irrupted all around them; a distraction the wily pilot capitalised on.
The Bullhead made a clean getaway; and Ruby's bout of insanity magically departed with it... only for an entirely different strain of mania to seize the young teen.
That had to be the single most phenomenally creatively, masterfully wicked display of semblance-aura-dust combos she'd ever seen. Movie directors would froth at the mouth to recreate such a flashy contest of power after seeing this civilian-filmed footage. Indeed, she had just witnessed the pinnacle of what she so passionately aspired to become in action. In person. In participation! Incredible!
"Can't, resist... Must, start, fan-girling!"
Vibrating like an overloading reactor, fists clutching her own collar Ruby stared with wide-eyed adoration up at the irritated blonde now looming sternly over her.
"You're a huntress... eeee-can I have you're autograph!"
Sorry about the stiff, bland writing in this, I'm unsatisfied with it, but meh, writing the fight was fun. Frankly I'm amazed I got this one done at all. There's two more unfinished chapters left, both even lower quality. I'll try to finish chapter 4 but don't be surprised if I abandon the effort. Ideally, this fic will conclude on chapter 5. I Sorta wish I could do a full story, but sadly I'm not skilled enough and any attempt would fail horribly. I know my limits. Plus I'm fickle and lazy, so I'd probably quit part way, lol.
Clarification- Ruby's dust crystal freeze up. As a young trainee, I figure Ruby's crisis management skills under stress and collateral risk aren't very developed. Should I rewrite her to be more competent?
This stage of Roman's desperate improvised by the seat of his pants scheme is extremely fragile and possesses many variables that could screw him. He had to put on a convincing show where Ruby "Drove off" Vale's Most Wanted in front of security cameras and civilians while keeping her from saying anything to ruin it and landing him in deep shit, which was a pity since I had fun writing mid-fight dialog I then had to scrap because, plot.
Also, despite having Ozpin pegged as a shady, influential, rule-bending opportunist who'd happily skip the niece of an infamous elite huntsmen two years ahead, Roman cannot guarantee it. Nevermind his relying on Ruby's naivety and self-interest keeping her from telling anyone how they really met. A dangerous gamble indeed. Furthermore, well, lets just say Torchwick had a silent "Observer" (Not Cinder) he also desperately needed to buy his act... Yeah, like I said back in Chapter 1, this story idea isn't plausible; too much can go wrong.
Anyways. Hope you enjoyed it.