Despite the strangeness of their first meeting, Ruby actually had a lot of fun with this strange girl. She has a real knack for timing, never spending more than a second necessary for each location and thanks to her they've visited the other two key stations in New Glenn City that were used formerly as staging grounds for its reclamation, touring the park located outside of NEST HQ, visiting the Club of Aces bar where ace pilot mercenaries drank at (only on the outside, since only mercenaries could enter), and so much more.
However, they had a few hurdles, mostly Ruby's insistence on checking out every weapon shop they passed by, leaving them only ten minutes before the Expo started.
"Come on, friend Ruby! If we take this shortcut, we can make it in time!" Penny says as she runs down the street near the airship ports where airships carrying cargo would routinely deposit their goods or ship them out.
"I'm sorry!" Ruby apologizes again as she follows Penny, "But they had such cool mods. I'm sorry, I spent so much time focusing on those weapons, those mods and rambling all the while."
"Perish the thought. I enjoyed my time with you, friend Ruby. Your lecture on mechashifting weapons was quite fascinating."
"Oh, really." Ruby blushed in embarrassment, "You must think that was annoying."
"No, in fact, I enjoy listening to you talk. I've never had a friend to do that with before." Penny smiles at her widely,
"Well you got one now." Ruby smiles back gladly, "One that will talk your ears off."
Then Ruby suddenly notices something over Penny's shoulders at the port, "Huh, that's a neat airship isn't it?"
"Hm?" Penny turns to look at what she is seeing and she spots it, what appears to be a sleek black airship with an angular shape landing at an empty landing pad in the distance. Penny immediately skits to a halt with confusion as she looks intensely at the airship, "Strange, that airship does not match any design known on Remnant."
"Wow, you know your ships that well?" Ruby asks as she stops as well to look at the airship although it landed behind a warehouse so their view was blocked, "Maybe it's an experimental one for the Expo?"
"Really? But Miss Ayre made no mention of it." Penny says frowning.
"Well maybe- Wait, Ayre?" Ruby asks looking shocked, "Ayre as in the CEO of NEST Inc?! You know her?!"
"Well, I- Uh…" Penny starts stuttering before pointing at the port with worry, "And there are no workers as well. There should be some on night shift, at least some security guards but where are they?"
"...Maybe they're just at the Expo?" Ruby suggests sounding confused and worried, "Do you think we should call the cops?"
"Affirmative. Dialing-" Penny says before hesitating and looking at Ruby awkwardly, "Can I borrow your Scroll? It appears I left it in my hotel room."
"Right, do you know the number for the cops here?" Ruby asks as she hands Penny her Scroll before she taps the numbers quickly and begins the call,
"Hello? 12th Precinct? Right now my friend and I are witnessing very suspicious activity at the airport docks where a black airship of unknown make is proceeding to land…No, there appeared to be no discernable markings…No, that is what I wanted to report as well. There appear to be no workers or security guards on the premises…Yes, I understand. Thank you very much."
Penny hands back Ruby her Scroll, "it appears there are no scheduled airships to arrive at this time. A patrol car has been sent to investigate, they will arrive in at least five minutes."
"That's a while, don't you think?" Ruby asks worried glancing at the airship in the distance behind the warehouse, "What do you think they're doing? Stealing stuff? Smuggling? What if they're planting a bomb?"
"...Are you suggesting we investigate by ourselves?" Penny asks worried,
Ruby nods and takes the case containing Crescent Rose off her back and unzips it, whipping out the sniper-scythe hybrid and unfurling it, before loading in a full magazine from the case.
"Like my dad said, if you see something, do something. Who knows what they're doing to those missing people?" Ruby asks.
"Very well." Penny nods, "I shall search for the missing dock workers while you investigate the presence of these criminals."
"Really? Can you fight?" Ruby asks concerned as Penny salutes,
"I'm combat ready," she affirms, and not wanting to waste any more time, Ruby nods her head before the two set out.
"Alright people, just like we practised. Get to work, we don't have all day." Roman Torchwick says towards the towering white and red robots using hooks to cling the shipping containers onto the hull of their black, ugly airship before fastening straps on them to make sure they're secured.
They were all full of the latest NEST Inc. AC gear in the public market with some prototypes as well meant for the Expo for demonstration purposes. Besides that the robots were also wheeling in crates full of infantry-grade weaponry into the airship's hold.
"There, you got your gear, Torchwick." a security officer, the same man he had met up with earlier today, walks up to him fully kitted out, "Now hurry and pay up, I just got a call that suspicious activity is reported at the airship docks. They'll send a patrol car and catch us if we don't hurry."
"You think you're talking to an amateur?" Roman smirks, "I sent a little parting gift to ensure any patrol cars get distracted on their way. Trust me, I had it all planned out. I've been running gigs like this before you were even in diapers. We'll have…"
He checks his wristwatch, "About an extra ten minutes, more than enough to make our getaway. One of you rust buckets check in on Neo, and tell her to get our distraction ready in case they do arrive early. And call our parting gift, tell her she's on her own from-"
Before he could finish, he heard a scream from above the warehouse as someone slipped off the roof before tumbling downwards from a stack of shipping containers and landing flat facefirst between Roman and the rogue security officer.
"Red?" he mutters as he recognises the red cloak from earlier, "Well ain't this a surprise."
"Ugh…" the girl shakes her head to recover from the fall, "They should really add safety rails up there-?"
She pauses as she looks up to face the barrel of Roman's cane, crosshairs flicking up and revealing a gun barrel pointed at her face as the rogue security guard whips out his service pistol.
"Shit! You're the one that called this in, didn't you?" he swears as he pulls back the rack and the girl gulps before Roman pushes his gun aside with his cane,
"Now, now, we don't want to make a mess do we?" Roman asks rhetorically, "You shoot her and everyone knows it's someone carrying a standard Model IV."
"Er, Model V Type I of the Redgun series actually." Ruby corrects getting confused looks from the two criminals in response, "They updated it two weeks ago. Better stability, accuracy and heat capacity, doesn't overload as often when firing stun rounds without interfering with its capabilities with live rounds."
"...She's actually right." the security officer admits, taking his eyes off her for a moment as the two criminals looked at each other confused at their interloper who suddenly whips out something from behind her back and smacks them aside, brandishing a giant scythe at them.
"Alright, nobody moves! Security's gonna be here soon and you all have a lot to answer for." Ruby says, her eyes scanning the area before getting a closer look at her enemies, "Wait, are those robots-?"
She gets cut off as she ducks her head to avoid a live round fired by the security officer before bursting into petals to dodge more incoming fire from both him and Roman.
Roman whistles at his robots, "Boys, get her!"
Instantly they dropped whatever they were doing and turned their optics and lock onto Ruby Rose, drawing their weapons before charging at her.
The red robots charged at her with double-ended glaives and the white ones whipped out miniguns with grenade launchers slung under them. Ruby would be geeking out at their weaponry right now if she wasn't in danger, so she decided to focus on wiping out the ones with guns first.
Zipping between the swings of the glaives she dashes towards one of the white gunners and stomps on its head, burying Crescent Rose into its chest and firing to launch her upwards, tearing it in half vertically as she does so.
The second gunner attempted to fire at her while she was above but using recoil from Crescent Rose she managed to avoid it long enough to close in and decapitate it.
"Shit, just our luck. A freaking girl with Aura!" Roman grumbles as he picks up his fallen bowler hat while the security officer starts taking cover with his gun raised,
"We need to get out of here!"
"We?" Roman scoffs as he walks off, "There is no we, our agreement is you get paid. That's all. Nothing about it says anything about you getting on my airship."
The security officer's eyes widen as he points his gun at Roman's back, "You're taking me with you, or I pop your head open right now!"
"Go ahead. Airship won't take off without me, keyed to my biometrics and pulse." That was a lie and Roman knew it, but the security officer didn't, "You run now and chances are that you can still get out of the city. Shoot me, you better not miss it because I guarantee I'll kill you. Between the two of us, only one has Aura."
He says as he stomps towards the black airship, the security officer cursing as he runs off, while the robots keep that scythe-wielding girl busy. They weren't built to take down Aura Users, just act as security against minor Grimm, their processors probably can't keep up with her movements. But they should last long enough to
As he thinks this a bisected red robot lands in front of him and he turns to see the girl standing amongst a pile of torn-up robots leaking oil and sparks.
"Going somewhere?" she asks with a smirk that Roman returns.
"Why yes I am. I have a delivery to perform, I don't want to keep my customers waiting," he asks as he gestures towards the cargo containers strapped to his airship's hull. As her eyes shift to look at them, his hand behind his back pulls out his Scroll and taps a few buttons, "As much as I enjoy this little spectacle, Red, I really have to be going."
With the combination inserted, the back-mounted point defences light up and begin unloading rapid-fire ultraviolet lasers at Ruby. Her eyes widened and she started moving before the turrets were pointed at her, taking cover behind cargo containers as the lasers melted into them.
"Now, where is that little-?" Roman wonders about his partner in crime before seeing her jump out of a window in the warehouse, making a mad dash away from the building with a panicked look on her face.
Just as he was wondering what could possibly scare her that much, the walls bust down revealing another teenage girl with literal floating swords circling her,
"Please remain still, otherwise I am incapable of incapacitating you without major bodily harm. Attempting to hold innocent workers hostage earns you lifetime imprisonment. Please surrender at once." the sword girl announces in a cheery voice, slicing her swords at Neo and missing, accidentally cutting a cargo container in half as she does so.
"...Alright that makes sense," Roman mutters as he uses his Scroll to divert one of the turrets towards the girl with floating swords. Seeing this, she begins spinning them to deflect the incoming bolts before dodging behind cargo containers for cover.
With another push on his Scroll, the airship began automatically taking off as he flipped his cane, pointing the handle at Neo before firing it as a grappling hook. Seeing this she hooks it with her parasol's handle and hangs on while she is reeled in, giving the girls a mocking salute.
As Roman helps her up he flinches at a sniper shot landing next to him and looks to see Ruby behind a melting crate for cover firing her scythe rifle at him. Annoyed, he reaches into one of the weapon crates and kicks it open, pulling out and loading in an Anti-Pack Launcher. While primarily dedicated to wiping out packs of minor Grimm, it could be used just as well to scatter infantry.
He aims it at Ruby who's eyes widen as he fires an airburst rocket towards her which she barely manages to dodge in time. Penny, seeing her friend almost get injured, steps out of cover as her swords spin, charging some kind of green energy orb before firing it at the airship, blasting the point defence cannons apart.
"Shit, what is up with kids nowadays?!" Roman shouts annoyed as the ramp to his airship begins closing once Neo is on board, giving his foes a mocking bow, "See ya around, kiddos. I'd say it was a pleasure, but it wasn't.
Ruby continues firing her rifle futilely, shots bouncing off as Penny begins charging another blast only for the black airship to suddenly shimmer and disappear from sight. Both girls look in shock as Penny cancels the charge, eyes scanning the horizon.
"They…disappeared." she mutters, "A Corvette-sized airship is unlikely to possess the power source necessary for a cloaking device of such quality. Even then those are military-grade equipment, not something found in the hands of common criminals."
"So what do we do now?" Ruby asks before a voice spoken over a speaker interrupts them.
"You can die."
They turn to find a Security MT stomping over towards them, stun rifle in hand as it begins unloading at them. The two managed to dodge in time behind cover as the pilot roared in anger,
"This was supposed to be quick and easy money, damn it! Now I gotta cover my tracks!" he screams in anger before taking a breath, "Thankfully I think I got a plan. Two armed thieves assisted a smuggler and I was forced to engage with lethal force. While I was unfortunately forced to eliminate the thieves, they distracted me long enough to buy their smuggler friend time to escape…Yeah, I can work with that."
"That is an absurd lie! Miss Ayre will never fall for that!" Penny shouts from behind her cover as Ruby tries shushing her.
The rogue officer initiated his MT's jump pack capabilities and leapt on top of a stack of cargo containers before ports on its core opened up to fire a barrage of tear gas grenades trying to smoke them out.
Ruby and Penny were forced out as they did their best to remain under cover while the MT fired a barrage of stun bolts at them, each packing enough power to fry them if direct contact was made.
"Penny, that green laser thing, can you do it again?" Ruby asks and Penny nods,
"Affirmative but I am required to be still while it charges, making me vulnerable to the rogue MT's stun bolts," Penny explains and Ruby nods, reloading Crescent Rose.
"I'll keep it busy then! Fire when you get a clear shot." Ruby says before making a break for it.
The rogue officer's MT fires another volley of tear gas grenades as it again aims before a blur of rose petals bursts out of the smoke heading directly for it. Surprised at the speed, he instead switched to his core-mounted machine guns that fired rubber bullets hoping to intercept his target.
Ruby dodges with shots from Crescent Rose, using its recoil to change her course as she circles the MT before landing on top of it and swinging the scythe downwards at the joints where the arms meet the MT's core.
But before she can pull the trigger and use the recoil to assist in tearing off the arm, high voltage current courses through the hull of the MT, shocking and stunning her as she falls off the MT.
"Idiot. You think these new MTs don't have countermeasures for people trying that stunt?" he mocks as he raises his MT's foot to step on her, "You think that a brat is enough to take me on?"
"Maybe not…" Ruby groans as she glances up at him through his tinted windows, smirking to his surprise, "But I'm enough to keep your eyes on me and not her."
Before he can ask, a green laser beam tears his MT's foot off and he screams in surprise as the MT begins toppling over from its loss of balance. With that, Ruby grabs Crescent Rose and uses her Semblance to manoeuvre herself right in front of its cockpit, blasting the glass apart with five shots from Crescent Rose at point-blank range before reaching in to grab the pilot by the collar and pulling him out,
"W-wait, let's not be hasty-!" he shouts before getting decked across the face by Ruby,
"That's for ruining my vacation!" she shouts before remembering to add, "And stealing. Can't forget about that."
"Excellent work, friend Ruby!" Penny cheers as she hops up to where Ruby is before suddenly squeezing her, "We were amazing, weren't we?"
"Y-yeah, I guess we were," Ruby grunts out from the pressure before Penny released her, hearing the sounds of approaching sirens.
"Ah, it appears the authorities have finally arrived!" she waves at them as a patrol car skids to stop nearby, with two armed security officers rushing out with weapons pointed at them, "Greetings, officers!"
"Freeze! Both of you drop your weapons and step away from the MT!" one of the officers demands while keeping their weapons trained on the two before reaching for their radio, "Dispatch we have two armed teenagers, suspected Aura users, and an officer down. I repeat, officer down."
"Wha-?" Ruby starts before realizing how bad this may look to people without any context, begins waving her arms in the air, "Wait, wait, wait! This is all a misunderstanding, this guy attacked us!"
"Officers, I am Penny Pollendina, VIP ID PN-035567." Penny immediately speaks with her hands up as well, "This is all just a misunderstanding as my friend says. We are happy to cooperate and offer answers."
The officers slightly lowered their weapons as one went for their radio, "We got a girl claiming to be a VIP, ID PN-035567… Description matches…Copy that. Ma'am, we're going to need to see your security tag."
"Of course, officer. I have it right…" Penny smiles and reaches for something on her hip only to pause, and then pat her entire body in search of something as her smile falls, "...Oh. It appears I may have misplaced it."
The two officers look at one another sceptically before one raises two cuffs, "Protocol says we'll need to get you down the station to confirm your identity then. Cuff them all."
"What?!" Ruby asks as reinforced handcuffs are slapped on her wrists.
"Don't worry Ruby." Penny assures while an officer secures handcuffs around her wrist, "This is all standard procedure, the two of us should get out of this just fine."
"Trespassing on private property. Breaking and entering. Recklessly discharging firearms. Reckless endangerment. Vigilantism. Thousands of Lien of property damage." a Faunus security officer with green eyes flips through the files with a neutral look on his face while Ruby sweats in her seat in the interrogation room, "You know we could be looking at years at least in a sentence, not even getting into the fines that would bankrupt your average person."
"They started it." Ruby weakly defends, "I was just trying to help."
"And you did. Which is why you're not being charged with all the above and more." The security officer's gaze softens slightly, but when Ruby smiles at this proud herself, his gaze hardens back, "That doesn't mean I approve of what you did. It was stupid, reckless and you're lucky no one got themselves killed. You were firing off anti-material rounds with that oversized weapon of yours. What if a stray shot got to the hostages?"
Ruby winces at that, "I'm a pretty good shot, I wouldn't have-"
"Can you guarantee that?" the Faunus security officer presses looking stern, "No. You can't keep track of every bullet fired in a skirmish. Shots go wild, they hit something you don't mean to. Sometimes people pay for that. What are they teaching kids these days in the Academies?"
"I…I'm not an Academy student yet." Ruby can't help but point out getting the officer to raise a brow, "I'm still in Combat School."
"Really?" he asks, crossing his arms, looking only a slight bit impressed before it fades, "Well here's advice if you wanna keep at being a Huntsman. We all have good intentions, but nobody ever knows the consequences of our good intentions, no matter how noble they are."
He says, sounding a bit tired at that, green eyes looking unfocused for a second before snapping back. Honestly, he looked somewhat familiar, but where had Ruby seen him before?
"Erm, sorry to ask, but were you a Huntsman or something?" she asks nervously hoping she wasn't annoying him. Instead, the man sighs and shrugs,
"I was. Retired after only one year," he mutters, sounding slightly bitter as her eyes widen, that little tidbit of information clicking something in her mind.
"Oh my gods! You're a Pilot!" she screams in realization causing his eyes to widen in surprise, "I thought you looked familiar! You were a member of the Watchdogs! You're Nightwatch! I saw you in that Retaking Glenn documentary in an interview! What happened, they say you retired from active duty after Glenn?"
"...Turns out I'm just not suited for this life." the former pilot mutters to himself, sounding sombre, "These days I'm just Sergeant Pardus Sable."
"But being a Pilot must've been the best thing!" Ruby cries out confused about why anyone would want to leave such a life, "Soaring through the skies, no one there but you and your AC! It all sounds amazing, why would you give that up?"
"...You want to pilot an AC? Become a Mercenary?" Pardus asks, ignoring her question as she nods.
"Ever since I was a kid, being a hero is all I ever wanted." she explains, "Whether it's being a Huntsman, Mercenary, I just want to help people."
"...If you want more advice from an old man like me, there are more peaceful ways to help people." Pardus closes the file and gets up, "Being an officer for one. It's not exactly perfectly safe, but compared to life as a Mercenary or Huntsman? It's not glamorous, but like I said, peaceful."
He moves to leave the room but turns back before exiting, "There'll be someone wanting to speak with you after this. No idea how, but it looks like you're one well-connected girl."
The door slams shut before Ruby can ask a question, leaving her alone in the interrogation room.
"...What was that all about?" she mutters to herself as she waits for the next person to come through the door, all the while thinking how mad her dad was going to be after hearing the phone call about this.
As she dreads her punishment, the door creaks open and she expects another security officer to walk in. Maybe a secret agent type in a full suit and sunglasses.
What she wasn't expecting was a familiar man dressed in green with short white hair and round glasses, walking in with a cane in one hand and a plate of cookies in the other.
"Ruby Rose." he sat down and put down the plate in front of her and leaned forward slightly, "You have…silver eyes."
"Can't believe the Headmaster of Beacon himself's here." Pardus mutters as he watches through the two-way mirror looking into the interrogation room, "She's not even an Academy student, what's he doing here?"
He wasn't alone in this room though, sitting in a corner on a chair was a man in a dark grey coat and square cap, bandages wrapped around his face revealing only a singular blue eye.
"What the headmaster does in his own time is his business…" Raven shrugs uninterested, "Nightwatch… status report…"
"I'm not exactly a Pilot anymore." he mutters before obliging, "Description of the suspect, as well as surveillance footage we were able to salvage, reveals him to be Roman Torchwick and his partner, Neopolitan, Valean criminals extraordinaire. Your usual criminal nutjobs, with rap sheets longer than my arms."
"And armed with a stealth-capable airship…and a small group of combat drones…" Raven analyzes the report given to him, "Only ones closest to this level of tech are the SDC…"
"You don't think this is another incursion by them? Are they escalating?" Pardus asked worried but Raven shook his head,
"No, not their style… Not even Jacques is this stupid…" he grumbles before pausing, "Maybe. But Watts is definitely not…"
"Well, I don't know anyone else in the world with stealth tech like this." Pardus mutters, "What's your plan then, Head of Security?"
"Interrogate the traitor for one…" Raven points out, "Squeeze out everything he knows… Next, we contact the Vale Council, and cooperate to try and root out Roman Torchwick… whoever supplied him with equipment is powerful…"
"...You think he might know something?" Pardus gestures towards Ozpin through the two-way glass, "He asked some weird stuff before you came along. Something about if we've seen any woman with powerful fire Semblances. We've got reports of possible illusion Semblances targeting first responders sent to investigate, but nothing other than that."
"Know something? Probably…" Raven grumbles annoyed as he stands up with help from his cane, "Share it? Unlikely… I'll report this to Ayre, she'll want to know if Ozpin is dragging whatever this is to our city… Have you seen her?"
"Last I saw, she's ripping Miss Polendina a new one." Pardus shudders, "Reminds me of my mom when I did something stupid."
Raven snorts at that, "I don't envy her position… Still, it's good to hear she's made a friend…"
His eye trailed to the girl speaking with Ozpin, the one he took an hour's flight straight from Vale just to see. Just what was so important about her that the Headmaster of Beacon came to personally meet her, directly after their latest violent robbery?
This smelt of a mystery to him. And Raven knows he'd had more than enough mysteries to last a lifetime from Rubicon. Whatever this was, he hoped that at least Ozpin kept this on his side of the world far from theirs.