Italics: Scarlet mental and physical speech

': thinking

":Talking

In the bustling city of Vale, much could be said about it's location and it's beauty. The abundance of its native shades were incorporated into everything, a gray walled city covered in earthy tones of greens, yellows, reds and browns. Such a sight gave off a warm feeling of comfort to those housed within.

Scarlet wasn't immune to those feelings either, she was easily swept up in scenery and sounds that surrounded her. While Ruby had long since experienced the wonders of life, Scarlet was for all intents and purposes a newborn, therefore, everything was new and fresh in her eyes. So much so that she quickly forgot about her game of cat and mouse with the others. She was far too captivated with the city to care at the moment as she sailed around, leaving a trail of her red calling cards behind her.

"What a beautiful place, it's one thing to see it in Ruby's memories, but being here... it's completely different." Scarlet marveled at the world around her with eyes full of wonder and amazement.

"The people here... each of them living their own lives... how beautiful," Scarlet was truly enamored.

Just then, her eyes immediately locked onto a garden of red and blue Roses inside of a nearby park. In no time flat, she was gliding her way to the beautiful flower patch. Gingerly, she sat in the middle of the Garden, taking in the scents of flesh flowers as she the world go by around her.

A duet of opposing colors danced in her vision as petal after petal swirled before her, mixing with her own semi-ethereal variant of flora. Her child-like mirth only grew as more of her petals gathered around her, a small crowd having gathered after witnessing the beautiful display she was giving them.

"Ruby, your world is... so lovely, I wish I could stay longer." Just as the words left her mouth, she suddenly felt a shift take place inside her.

"Oh! I guess it's time for you to wake up huh? Well I guess this is as nice a place as any to rest at." She softly laid into the bed of Roses as she stared into the blue sky.

"I hope I get to come out more often, I wanna see so much more of this world...!" Scarlet spoke ecstatically as she felt her own consciousness drift away. Pretty soon, Ruby would regain control and everything would seemingly go back to normalcy, but she sincerely hoped that Ruby would let her out more consistently.

[FB]

Roses.

When she opened her eyes, Ruby quickly realized that she was absolutely surrounded by them. Still, trying shake the eternal-like slumber she felt she had just awoken from. Rubbing her eyes softly as began to stand up, she was immediately hit with stark realization.

She remembered everything.

Scarlet and her temporary switch-over, the cat and mouse game that she played with her sister and friends. Everything.

"Woah... that was something new," She muttered quietly as she looked around to somewhat regain her sense of direction. Immediately knowing where she was after a quick glance and taking a moment to skim through her or Scarlets memories.

"Her? Our...? Hah~... well that's gonna be confusing..," she spoke aloud as she put and hand to her chin in thought.

'Not really. I am you after all, just another aspect of you. So, I guess any of them will work.'

"Ahh!" Ruby jumped as she heard her own voice speak to her mentally. "Oh my gosh! I can hear you in my head-," she paused. Realizing she was in a public area and beginning to talk to herself, her mouth slammed shut as she started to mentally speak what she wanted to say aloud.

'I kinda thought that we established this already,' Scarlet huffed in Ruby's mental space.

Ruby could feel Scarlet deadpanning in her minds eye.

'Oh yea, sorry about that. Still just surprised about it all.' It was true, she was still in the midst of quite a jarring experience to say the least.

Sentient Semblances...? How wild is that? She still was sure what to think about the entire affair, granted, It wasn't like she was too upset or angry at the situation.

'That's the spirit! Think of what we do together!... well we already are together, but you get what I'm saying!'

In the midst of her inner conversation, she ambled out of the park and decided to wait for her friends at the Bullhead station. She knew they'd return there at some point and it gave her ample time to somehow come up with a plausible explanation for what just happened earlier.

'I'm not 100% sure... I did scare that cute blonde boy, not intentionally but... he didn't look to enthused.' She didn't sound so chipper about that little segment of her day. 'In my defense though, he was just too cute!~ Oooh Ruby you've gotta snag him as a boyfriend, then I can see him all the time!'

'Woah woah woah! W-wait a second, boyfriend..!? Jaune...!?" In her teenage panic, she had pretty much screamed it loud enough for everyone on the street corner she was walking through stared in bewilderment. 'N-no way! I'm not ready for a b-b-boyfriend!~ Not to say that Jaune's not a nice guy but we hardly know each other and Yang might not approve-!'

'Woah, woah, Ruby slow down! Your mouth was blurring, you were muttering so fast...,' It seems even Scarlet somewhat disapproved of Ruby's incoherent rambling.

'Ehehe... sorry..., but I really don't think now is right time to be worried about boyfriends and girlfriends and who's dating who. Bad guy's like Roman Torchwick are out in the streets running amok and ruining lives, there's way more pressing thing's going on...' Ruby couldn't help but feel like she had a lot on her plate currently. Having to worry about love, as nice as the idea sounded, it wasn't something that she put much stock into.

Huntress duties come first, right?

'Point taken. He's still really cute though...'

'Ugh...'

Tired of the mental embarrassment, she simply continued walk to the station silently.

After another twenty minutes of wandering and, admittedly talking to herself, she'd found a nice bench at the airfield to rest on. Unfortunately, the somewhat comfy bench was the only reprieve she'd get. Now came the hard part of trying to get the others to understand what just happened to her and explain why they had to chance her through half of Vale.

"What a day this turned out to be... What do I even begin to say...? A crazy sugar rush...? No, that's a not gonna work. Uuugh!~" She stressed and fidgeted around in her seat, worry growing quickly on face. 'Racking my brain for answers has never been so hard, why is it so hard to come up with a plausible excuse??'

'Maybe tell them the truth?' Scarlet offered her opinion, to Ruby's immediate chagrin.

She was alone for the most part, so she didn't mind speaking quietly instead of mentally communicating. It was very jarring at times, holding an intelligent conversation in your head with a sentient part of yourself.

"I highly doubt that they'll believe that my Semblance took temporary control over my body and ran amok around town..."

'You never know Ruby, they look like smart kids to me. I'm sure it can't be that bad to tell them.'

Could she really? Would they really understand why she felt the need to do this on her own in the first place? Looking back, it felt even more childish to have kept it a secret for so long but she didn't care. She knew she would probably always be seen as the youngest and most child-like of Beacons roster, but she absolutely refused to let anyone say that she wasn't pulling her own weight.

"I'm just so tired of being seen as the 'little kid huntress,' or hearing about how I was too young and probably still too immature to handle being as such a prestigious Academy." She finished her out-loud thoughts and looked to the floor with a defeated look on her face.

Sensing the turmoil in Ruby's thoughts, Scarlet was speaking like a guidance counselor once again.

'I'm sure if you explain that to them, they'll understand.'

"Maybe.."

[FB]

"Ok! This is just ridiculous," resident 'Ice Queen' Weiss Schnee nearly shouted. "It's been nearly two hours since when last even a trace of her! At this point, I really think we should call Miss Goodwitch."

Hearing that, Yang was immediately up in arms. It's bad enough the Ruby was currently M.I.A and she wanted to add the possibility of disciplinary action as well? "Woah there, Ice Queen. It's not like Ruby's broken the law, she's just not exactly acting like herself at the moment."

"Clearly!" Weiss was not about to even entertain anymore running around and gallivanting through Vale.

"Regardless we still haven't found her and we have idea where she could be." The resident ninja of RWBY, Blake, was just as worn out and confused as the test of them.

"Maybe, she went back to the station, even she can't stay in Vale all night."

From the other side of the alley the currently were occupying, Jaune spoke up. "She could've got tired of running around and decided to take a pit stop...?"

Unfortunately, the snow-cone of team RWBY disagreed with that notion. "Why would she do that, when she clearly was having the time of her life running around the city earlier," Weiss immediately questioned Jaune's logic. Seconding her teammate quickly Yang jumped in, "I'm with Weiss on this one Vomit Boy, I don't see her just giving up the ghost after all of that..."

Blake however, stayed silent on the matter. Not entirely sure where to place her opinion on the subject, so she vied for a middle ground. "Maybe we should split up one more time. One team keeps searching the last known areas we saw her and one team goes the Bullhead station to check for Ruby and, save the rest of us a spot on the next flight back to Beacon."

"Sounds like a good idea, Blake," Ren softly said as he looked at her. He stepped forward with a small smile and nod of confirmation.

"So, I guess team JNPR is on the way to the Station! All aboard!" Nora cheerfully shouted away as she pumped her arms up and down. Next to her, Pyrrha and shared a small smile between each other before she spoke.

"Well, I guess that settles it. We'll call you if she's there and save you guys a seat."

Weiss was NOT happy having to continue walking around however, "I really don't see why we shouldn't be calling the Headmaster or Miss Goodwitch right now. We have no idea where she is!"

Having had enough of Weiss creams hissy fits, Yang was quick to voice her opinion, "Well Weiss, nobody's stopping you from going with JNPR..." The comment earned a sharp gasp from said Ice Queen, but as she opened her mouth to retort...

Bzzztt, Bzzzzt, Bzzzzzt!*

Her scroll was suddenly vibrating and ringing... all of them were suddenly too still and quiet for anyones comfort. "Are... you gonna answer that...?" Jaune curiously questioned, causing her to shake and stir from her absentmindedness.

Reaching into her dress pocket, she pulled out her scroll with the intent on figuring out who exactly was calling her right now. Though, as she saw the screen she gasped in surprise again.

"R-Ruby's calling...," she said in a hushed tone.

"Give me that!" Yang snatched the scroll from Weiss's hands before she could even protest to the thievery. Wasted no time in answering the call, "Ruby! Where are you? Are you ok," she asked, almost frantic in her questioning.

"H-hey Yang... I'm fine don't worry. I'm at the Station and I've got everyones seating arrangements taken care of."

She sounded nervous, Yang would question that later. "Ok Rubes, we're on the way. Stay where you are until we get too, ok?"

"Sure thing, Yang. I'll be here." With that, the line went flat and they now had a definitive location of their wayward friend.

"Well? Lets go guys, I'm sure we've all got questions to ask so let's hurry." Yang quickly corralled both teams to high tail it back to Beacon on the double, so they all sprinted down the road in unison.

[FB]

Vale Bullhead Airfield

8:30pm

Laying on the very same bench she'd selected hours ago, Ruby was staring at the evening sky. The station was mostly empty now, with the very last flight back to Beacon now scheduled to allow boarding in fifteen minutes. She turned her head to glance around the nearly vacant area, but with no visible sign of her friends and sister yet, she couldn't help but get a little bit anxious.

"They should be here pretty soon and I'm still not sure what to tell them..." She trailed off into one of her famous rambling fits as Scarlet watched, deadpanning from within her mind.

'Ruby... we're still doing this...? What's wrong with the truth exactly?'

By now, Scarlet was genuinely becoming worried for her other self's mental well-being.

This kind of thought process she was caught up in couldn't be normal, though, in a strange way it was comforting to the sentient semblance clone. This really was classic Ruby shenanigans at it's finest. However as Ruby thought of her fledgling excuses to her, Scarlet too was in deep thought. With the realization that she remembered Ruby's live up-to this point, it made her wonder if she was always "awake" and just didn't realize it.

Regardless, she was here now and she would appreciate that for what it is and assist her true self as much as physically possible.

'Oh! I think I see them!' Ruby mentally tapped Scarlets preverbal shoulders as she perked up. A strange mixture of happiness, fear and anxiety spiked through her for a moment before she somewhat steeled herself.

"Ruby!"

Yep. That was Yang alright.

From where she sat, the seven silhouettes came into clearer focus as their individual features began to show and before she could even begin to dash her way to them, her sister and the rest of her friends were in already sprinting in her direction.

It was obviously Yang who was first to slam into her, picking up the little reaper and examining her for injuries of any kind before setting her down and giving her the annoyed sibling stare. "You've got a lot of explaining to do, sis. What... what even was that earlier, I knew your Semblance was changing but I didn't think half of what you did was even possible!"

As soon as Yang finished, Weiss was instantly in her face ready to pick up from where her blonde friend left off.

"That's an understatement! You've got some nerve having us chase you around the city like that, not to mention what you did to Jaune, Yang and Pyrrha," she huffed as she finished.

Shaking her hands in protest, "W-wait a second, I can definitely explain-!" However, in a split-second, a large plume of petals burst forth from Ruby's body and moved directly into the center of the eight teens. It swirled and spiraled into itself before congealing into a near completely solid ball. Before long, the sphere became a vertical oval with two sets of stubs on both sides starting to protrude outwards.

Apart from Ruby, everyone was speechless. No one had a clue as to what was happening, most of them thinking that Ruby was directly behind it.

She wasn't.

This was entirely of Scarlets own doing.

They watched, anxious and almost mesmerized as the stubs quickly turned into the silhouettes of arms and legs. The ovals top bulged out on its own and began to shape itself into what looked like a head.

Suddenly, humanoid shape began to shine a bright, dazzling red, momentarily blinding them all.

"Oh! My bad, I should probably work on dimming that light in the future..." A very familiar voice cut through the blinding light and confusion cleanly. It was so similar to Ruby's voice but to those who knew Ruby... the demeanor behind it just didn't feel completely the same. "You can open your eyes now."

"Yea, maybe a warning would've helped Scarlet.." Ruby was heard again, speaking to... herself

"R-Ruby?" Yang tersely questioned as she and the others slowly cracked open their eyes. Once they were, everyone was stunned to silence yet again.

Standing before them was a complete copy of the red reaper herself, the only difference being the completely different outfits the two wore. While their Ruby wore her gothic battle dress, the other was wearing the very same red dress, fishnets and boots from earlier in the day when she had absconded with Jaune. The only other glaring difference was that she was partially ethereal, small parts of her shoulders and ankles still broke apart into petals trailing away from her.

"Not quite. Hello everyone, I'm Scarlet and it's wonderful to meet you all again... especially you, cutie..." Shooting a wink in Jaunes direction, he couldn't help himself but to blush slightly at the flattery.

Weiss, finally having had enough of being left in the dark, pretty much screamed her complaint. "Ruby, what is going on!? Who is she and why does she have your petals?"

To which Scarlet huffed slightly and returned to Ruby's side.

"My, do you ever stop being an Ice Queen?" Scarlet quickly retorted, much to Weiss's surprise.

"To answer your question though, I'm Scarlet and I don't "have" her petals... I am her petals." She made sure to state that last part with some sense of finality. Ruby, having heard that, quickly jumped in to clarify as she nervously chuckled.

"Hehe... Yep, she's basically my Semblance..."

At that, Weiss deadpanned. "Ok, you got me. Now I'm stumped.

Words from the Author:

Hey everyone, been a while since I updated Full Bloom and admittedly, I had a moment of weakness when read some of the comments. I doubted if Full Bloom was something I could accomplish considering my original focus was primarily for Jaune centered fanfics, but I'm back and Im not going anywhere with this.

So with that being said, next chapter next month and up next is DIOB.

Bai~