AN: Since I started writing this before Season 6 came out, it's now just started at this point in the story. So this will be AU from season 6 onward, maybe I'll add in a few things here and there if I feel it will fit with the story.

Heart to Heart

Chapter 9: Ruby and Oscar's night out

Oscar wasn't sure what to think as Ruby led him out of the building and into the streets. The night air was nice as she was quickly walking. He couldn't help but notice how her hand felt, the outside was smooth but her palm was rougher. He was no stranger to that growing up a farm hand so he wasn't surprised by it, his own hands were rough from years of work too after all.

Suddenly he realized something and voiced it to Ruby.

"So…do you know where you're going?"

Ruby paused, as she seemed to think about it and embarrassing let go of his hand and scratched the back of her head. "Uh…no I don't."

He couldn't help but smile as he started walking. "Well I think I remember the area but we'll have to double back to the house first and then go the way I came there for the first time."

"So it's a straight path?" She asked him following in step with him.

"Not as such," Oscar admitted shyly. "I had to find Qrow first and well…Ozpin told me to start checking every bar I could find."

Ruby sighed as her shoulders shagged. "Yeah that sounds about right."

She loved her uncle, she really did. He was the fun uncle you had, the one that let you try things your father wouldn't approve of. But his drinking was a bit of a problem, thankfully he was never a mean drunk or anything like that. It was just sometimes he would get a bit wasted when he was looking after them when their dad had to be away when they were younger. They had had to drag him to bed or roll him onto his stomach in case he threw up in the night on those times.

She learned more about the effects of drinking and about hangovers from her uncle than most people her age did she bet.

"I just have to try and remember to retrace my steps." Oscar said although he was trying to remember. This was a big city and he wasn't used to them, he hadn't memorized any street signs and he was largely going by landmarks. Unfortunately, things always looked slightly different at night when they do in the daylight so it was causing him some issues.

Even at this time of night the streets had plenty of people on them as they made their way back to their resident. From here he tried to retrace his steps as he started in the direction he found Qrow.

"So," Ruby tried to carry a conversation as she figured this was a good time to get to know their new friend. "You're from the small town too?"

"Yes, it's a small farming village," Oscar nodded. "I think I heard you say you and your sister are from somewhere called Patch once?"

"Yep," Ruby said happily. "It's a small island in Vale not that far from the mainland."

"Oh?"

"Yeah I mean I always thought it was big enough, takes you a few days to walk across it but that was before I had to walk halfway across the planet." Ruby laughed. "Boy I'll never complain about distance again when I get back home."

Oscar smiled at that, he thought of his aunt and he really hoped that letter he sent this morning would make it. He knew that she had to be worried sick and he hated doing this to her but this was just too important and she wouldn't understand. At least one day he hoped she would, plus he would try and make it up to her at some point. He had no idea how but he would try after all.

"What's Patch like?" Oscar asked taking them down a street.

"It's nice," Ruby thought back to home. "We live in this house in the woods it's not far from town, like a ten minute walk so we're not too far away in case of Grimm."

"Are there much there?"

"Yeah there are some, usually just Beowolves. Since it's an island not many can get across the water to get there."

"Makes sense," Oscar paused and looked around. He wasn't sure but he felt he had been here before but again at night things looked differently.

"Are you lost?" Ruby asked.

"A bit," Oscar sighed looking around. "I'm pretty sure it was somewhere this way, at least I was sure."

"Well there's one thing we can try then," Ruby went up to a stranger and asked for directions. The man didn't know so they went along the way and asked a few more people. Eventually they got someone that pointed them in the right direction so they started to walk. Oscar wasn't far off but he had been slightly wrong in which direction.

As they moved along the buildings got a bit more businesslike, there were a lot more shops in this area of the city it looked like. Ruby looked around taking it all in, from a small place like Patch large cities like this were always an experience. Then that was when she heard it, the chiming of a familiar tune that many youths knew, the small melody got louder as they continued on.

"Do you hear that?" She asked.

"Yeah what is it?"

Ruby gasped at she looked at him in shock. "You never heard the sounds of an ice cream vendor?"

Oscar shook his head, "Small farming village remember? There was only one shop you could buy that and it was in a small tub."

"Well then we're in for a treat," she smiled as again she grabbed his hand and led him towards the sounds. They turned a corner and there was a small ice cream truck parked handing out those cold delicious treats. Ruby's mouth watered at the thought of getting some ice cream.

They got up to the van as she quickly looked at the list and her eyes lit up as she saw her favorite.

"See something you like little lady?" The man running the van asked seeing her.

"Chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream!" She excitedly said jumping up and down at the window.

He chuckled as he went to get a few scoops into a cone and came back. "That will be three Lien."

Ruby reached for her wallet but paused, she didn't feel it. She felt around for it but horror grew onto her face. She had forgotten her wallet when she had changed into this outfit. She still had her scroll but her wallet was most likely next to her weapon.

"Noooo!" She wailed.

"I got it," Oscar said handing him the money.

Ruby's eyes lit up as she got her cone. "Thank you so much Oscar! I can't believe I forgot it."

"How did you pay for your drink before then?"

"Yang got it for me," Ruby started licking her ice cream.

"I'll have a vanilla one," Oscar told him as he paid and started to eat his cone but then noticed Ruby's face. "W-what?"

"Vanilla, really?"

"What? I like vanilla."

"But it's…it's so plain."

"What's wrong with that?" He muttered looking down at his white ice cream starting to eat it. He liked vanilla, it wasn't as if he hadn't tried other types he had, he just liked this kind.

"It's just, it doesn't taste like anything."

"It taste like vanilla," he defended.

"Exactly."

"This from the girl eating basically cookie dough."

"Hey cookies are great so cookie ice cream is best." Ruby grinned at him as with her thoughts was that what she had said was perfectly logical and a fact.

Oscar rolled his eyes as he went to enjoy his ice cream.

Eventually they found their way to the Arcade, the building had the words Mistral Arcade in neon above it as the muted sounds of games could be heard from inside. Ruby was bouncing on foot to foot eager to go in. Oscar felt looking forward to it, they didn't have these in his village so he was eager to see what an actual arcade was like.

Ruby pulled open the door as they went in and immediately the sounds of various games and the flashes of lights and many voices hit them. Oscar looked around with wide eyes the place was about the same dimensions as the first floor of the place they were staying only the walls were lined with machines. There were rows of machines lined up next and back to back as there were many people more their own ages here.

"Wow it's a lot busier than I thought," Oscar had to raise his voice slightly to be heard.

"Larger city so more people to come here," She replied. "Now let's get some tokens!"

She found the small black machine that you put in money and get tokens as she waited for Oscar since he had all the money. Oscar smiled as he looked at the machine and saw how it worked, he put in enough money for each of them to have an equal amount of tokens between them. Looking around he wasn't sure what to try first.

"So any recommendations?"

Rudy looked around and saw the perfect game to start out on. "Oh look it's Dance Dance Remnant."

Oscar followed as she came to a large machine that looked to have some kind of control pad built into the floor with some kind of dance music coming out of it. Ruby got on one side so Oscar took the next one. Ruby eagerly put in her tokens and so he followed suit. Ruby picked a song as they waited for it to load.

"So how does this work?" Oscar asked her.

"When the arrows on the screen show up you hit the ones below you with your feet."

"So you don't like to dance in real life but in a video game you're okay?" Oscar asked with a bit of a smile.

"W-well this is different!" Ruby tried to defend herself but he wasn't sure how to explain it. "That with someone else and this I just have to worry about me and hitting the buttons at the right time. Real dancing is too complicated."

He was about to say something before the game started and his focus was quickly on the screen in front of him. It took him a few tries to get the right time on when he had to hit the pads below him. He focused his attention to just the screen and tried not to think too much. Although he found it harder than he thought.

A couple of times he found his footing missed or he used the wrong leg because he was getting used to a rhythm and when it suddenly switched up on him be couldn't keep up. He took a moment to glance at Ruby. She was smiling widely as she quickly moved with the music and she was really getting into it. Moving her body with the music even though she didn't need to, it was kind of captivating to the young boy.

It wasn't until he got a warning from the game that got his attention back to the screen as he saw that he was quickly losing and was about to get a failure rating. He quickly snapped back into it as he finished the song.

"Now that's fun!" Ruby jumped a little seeing her score. She looked at Oscar's and winced. "Ouch."

"Hey it's my first time playing this," He defended himself.

"Want another round then?" Ruby grinned at him.

"Do it," Oscar got ready as she put in the tokens.

There were various other games they tried throughout the night there was a Wack-A-Grimm, which Oscar made up for his loss in the dancing game in. Ruby was used to shooting things and not hitting them after all. They found a shooting game much to her joy although she did complain how the 'gun' didn't seem to track as a real weapon did. After that, they found a two-player fighter they went for best of three on that one. Oscar didn't really care if Ruby won most of those he was just having fun being with her.

After all the craziness that he had been going through, it was just nice doing something normal again. Something a kid his age would be doing normally instead of going off on an adventure with a voice stuck in his head. He had gone through a life and death fight and with everything going on, he just wanted to pretend that none of that was happening. If only for an hour, he just wanted to be a normal kid again.

In addition, it helped that he was doing all this with Ruby. Her energy was very infectious. It amazed him how she could be this great fighter and leader and yet still act like a kid just like him. Maybe she wasn't very different from normal people. This was actually one of the times he had seen her act so at ease since they all first met. He liked this side of her, this fun loving side.

"Oh look at that," Ruby found a small stall with targets and baseballs. Apparently, you got points for knocking down a certain number and type of targets and you could get a prize. It was all automated and the prizes were in a small plastic case next to the machine.

Ruby looked over the prizes and her eyes locked onto something that she just had to have. It was a small little teddy bear but it wore a cute little red hood like her own that she wore. It was as if destiny was calling her, she had to own this little toy. It was as if fate that they met and she would earn the points needed for it.

"I'm so going to win that," Ruby grinned as she put in her tokens. She was given three balls and so she looked at the targets as they started to move about. There was a small sign that showed what was worth what. She found a small Grimm cutout and threw her first ball, it hit as a ding sound was heard as it fell down.

"Yes!" She saw a readout of her points and looked for another target. She looked at a set of spinning targets and threw it but missed. "No!"

Looking at the points she needed she found she needed to the most points to win her prize. The problem was that what she needed to hit was the smallest target that was quickly going back and forth up high but the thing also made random stops. Biting her lip, she took careful aim making sure to track it, when she felt the time was right she threw the last ball.

To her horror the target stopped dead and her ball sailed past the point it would have hit.

"Oh come on!" Ruby shouted out angrily. Her end points didn't even add up to enough for the smallest of prizes. She went to grab more tokens but when she reached for more all she found was an empty pocket.

"Oh no, no-no-no-no." she searched everywhere on herself just in case she might have missed one but she came up empty.

"What's wrong?" Oscar asked.

"I'm out of tokens and I really wanted that prize," Ruby pouted and then looked to Oscar. "Do you have any more cash on hand?"

He shook his head, "I'm out, and these are the last of my tokens too."

Ruby looked a bit depressed, she wouldn't want to take his last tokens he had paid for the ice cream and for everything else too. She had made a mental note to pay him back as soon as she could but she really wanted that prize. She sighed looking at the small little bear.

Oscar saw this and put his tokens into the machine as his balls were given to him. He wasn't sure if he could pull this off but she really seemed to want that bear.

'Need a hand?' Ozpin's voice said in his head.

'Can you make it?'

'Certainly just close your eyes when we switch so she doesn't see the glow.'

Oscar closed his eyes and made a show of taking a breath to make it look like he was concentrating. His eyelids hide the slight glow of his eyes as now Ozpin was in the driver seat. He tested out the ball, so far it seemed right, there was nothing at odd about it. Looking at the targets, he could see the patterns and saw which three targets he needed.

He threw his first ball and it hit, the second came soon after as Ruby cheered him on. When he got to the final ball, he noticed something. The ball seemed slightly heavier, it wasn't too much but he knew little tricks like this were used at times. It would help to throw off a person if only slightly if they didn't notice it.

He did notice and adjusted as needed, in his time in Oscar's body he had gotten used to the boy's height and reach. Although it had been some time since he had been resurrected in a body this young. It was odd being this young again normally, he came back in an older adult body. How long had it been since he had been this young? Maybe it was because of how soon he had come back, he wasn't sure. He didn't fully understand many things about this process, even after all this time.

Well at any rate the final ball hit the target and he quickly gave the boy back control.

"You did it Oscar!" Ruby jumped into him and gave him a small hug. "That was great!"

"I-it was just luck," He said and then looked at the prizes. He punched in the number as the machine accepted it and soon the little bear was pushed forward as it fell down. Oscar reached down and grabbed it through the small opening slot at the bottom.

He turned to Ruby and passed it to her. "Here, you wanted this one right?"

"Y-you're giving me this?" Ruby tenderly took the small bear looking at it and then at Oscar. "But you won you should have gotten a prize you wanted."

"Well I didn't really see anything I wanted and you really had your heart set on that." He scratched the back of his head. "Plus I wanted to thank you for, well you know, showing me a fun time and all. It's been a long time since I had this much fun."

Ruby smiled warmly at him pulling the small bear to her chest. "Thanks for everything too."

"Well we're out of money so what now?" He asked.

She pulled out her scroll and checked the time it was starting to get late. "We should head back I guess. Not like we can have any more fun here without some tokens."

Back at the house the rest of the teams were already getting back from the club. They were all in good moods, they had fun and it was just a way for them all to just act their age and not have to worry about the fate of the world or any other problems at the moment. They entered the front door and the first thing they noticed were Kali and Ghira at the main table with him looking over something.

"Hey mom, dad. What are you looking at?" Blake asked her parents as her father was looking at some kind of document with a very intent look.

"You're father is writing a speech that he'll be doing." Kali told her.

Her father nodded, "I've had time to think, working with the Faunus and the White Fang members in custody. I shouldn't have given up the leadership so easily back then."

He sighed and rubbed his eyes. "I thought that with the way things were going no one wanted my kind of leadership. More and more young members were looking to Sienna Khan for leadership. I shouldn't have given up so easily. They may have wanted her leadership but what it wasn't what it needed."

"Seeing all those young men and women in prison because of the choices they made, the rifts made between friends and family. I wanted to create a group that was to promote our people's rights but maybe I should have gone a bit further."

"Dad?" Blake asked.

He smiled looking at his daughter and all her friends, "I think we also should have been trying to promote unity not only with Faunus but between Faunus and humans. Looking at the friends you've made helped show me that if we could forge bonds like that then equal rights and treatment would come with it."

Blake smiled at her father, "I think that's a great idea dad."

Kali then noticed something, "Wait you all left but where's Ruby, Oscar and Sun?"

"Sun's team showed up so he's spending the night with them catching up," Blake explained.

"As for my sis she and Oscar snuck out saying they were checking out something," Yang pulled out her scroll. "Maybe I should text her to see what's going on."

Before she even opened up Ruby's contact info the door opened as the two youngest members of their group walked in laughing at something they had been talking about. They paused seeing everyone look at them.

"Oh hey I was about to text you that we're back but you beat us here," Ruby smiled at her big sister.

"Have fun?" Weiss asked seeing the two of them.

Oscar looked a little bashful but Ruby was all smiles hugging a small bear to her chest. "Oh yeah, we found this arcade and had a blast."

"Wait there's an arcade here?" Nora asked with a gasp. "We so got to go there at least once."

Ruby turned to Oscar, "thanks for the fun Oscar, we should do this again."

"Really?" Oscar looked into her silver eyes and felt himself getting nervous at them but also he had to admit they were kind of pretty. "Y-yeah, sure."

"Cool, well I'm going to bed," Ruby walked past everyone to the stairs.

Yang's eyes never left her little sister as she looked at the young boy and how he watched her go up the stairs, it wasn't some kind of perverted look or anything like that. He did seem to take a lot of interest in her younger sister. She looked at the other three members of her team as they silently agreed to an unasked question between them.

Ruby was happily humming to herself as she was in the bathroom getting changed. She had a quick shower as she had worked up a sweat from all the walking and fun. Tonight had been a blast she hadn't hung out like that in so long. She had taken in her pajamas in with her to change into to save some time. Plus it was kind of a habit from when they all roomed at Beacon.

They might all be girls but they did want their privacy and that was most likely how Blake had kept her secret of being a Faunus all this time when she had to take off her bow.

Picking up her cloths, she walked out and into the shared room and stopped seeing everyone looking at her. They were each on their own beds but the atmosphere in the room was a bit too heavy. Was she in trouble for something? She didn't think so, it didn't feel like that and she hadn't done anything wrong. Was this because she snuck out of the club?

Putting her clothing away she asked, "Hey, what's up?"

"Kind of what we wanted to ask you." Blake said to her.

"Huh?" Ruby blinked sitting on her bed and picking up her gift from Oscar.

"What's with the bear?" Yang asked.

"Oscar won it for me," Ruby shrugged and then held it up. "See it's got a cute little cape just like me, I had to have it but when I couldn't get it, Oscar used up the last of his tokens to win it for me."

The three exchanged looks before Weiss spoke up next. "I think you should take it from the top."

So Ruby explained what they had done when they left the club, how they went out walking, how they found the ice cream stand, how they got to the arcade, everything until the moment that they got back to their place.

Yang blinked at all of this and then gave a small laugh, "Oh man I can't believe my little sister went out on a date."

"W-what!?" Ruby asked blushing madly. "It wasn't a date Yang! We were just hanging out!"

The three older girls again shared a look although this time with a little amusement to it.

"So let me get this straight," Yang grinned. "You two went walking out on a moonlit night together."

"I don't remember if it was moonlit, it was dark and there were street lights," Ruby defended.

"Then you get ice cream," Weiss said next. "Which he paid for."

"I said I forgot my wallet."

"Then you go to an arcade where he pays for everything again," Blake smirked.

"I'm going to pay him back," Ruby muttered not liking where this was going.

"Then he wins you a prize that you wanted," Yang shook her head. "Ruby, that's a date."

"Oh come on, can't a guy and a girl just have fun together and not be a date?" Ruby was exasperated by all of this.

"She did say she wanted to do it again with Oscar," Blake commented.

"W-well we can invite everyone else I didn't mean it exclusively!" the little reaper cried out.

"But does he know that?" Yang sighed. "My little sister is toying with the heart of a young boy, oh I never thought I would see the day."

"Yang!" Ruby shouted out angrily at her big sister's teasing.

"Well I suppose she could do a lot worse," Yang mused aloud pretending she didn't hear her sister. "He's a nice kid and I wouldn't have to worry about him trying anything."

"What's that suppose to mean?" Ruby demanded.

"Don't pay her any attention," Weiss said sitting down next to her partner. "She's just being Yang."

"Hey!"

"We're just happy that you had a good time," Weiss told her friend. "Maybe we just thought too much about it, you two just seemed really happy when you came in and after hearing what you said it sounded like things between you two were, well more than just friendly."

"It's not like that," Ruby said looking down at her bear. "I mean yeah we had a lot of fun but I've never been the girly-girl type of girl…if you know what I mean."

"I'm not used to the whole boy and girl thing," Ruby sighed. "I had a small batch of friends before Beacon and never really got into the whole dating thing. I didn't really have guys coming on to me like Yang did."

"Well when puberty hits you this hard," Yang gestured to her very curvy body and larger than average chest area. "It's kind of hard not to attract attention."

"Yeah and then there were those creepy guys trying to be nice to me so you would be nicer to them," Ruby sighed.

Yang pulled a face, "I hated that. As soon as I saw what those jerks were up to I kicked them to the curb, sometimes literally."

"Well still I've never been on dates or had anyone even ask me before," Ruby played with the little cape on the bear. "When I got to Beacon I was two years younger than everyone, plus I was made leader and had to catch up with my studies. I was so busy that I didn't even think about that kind of stuff."

"Oscar's the first friend I made that has a lot more in common with me when I was at Beacon at first. I just wanted to be a good friend to him like you all have been to me as well as Jaune, Ren and Nora."

"That makes sense," Blake told her as the others nodded.

"Alright we won't bug you about this," Yang said getting up. "Well I'm going to hit the shower, I swear I haven't danced this long or hard in a long time. Jaune really knows how to cut up a dance floor."

"You were dancing with him the entire time," Blake commented.

"I could say the same about you and Sun," Yang winked at her partner before leaving the room.

"Well I'm going to turn in," Ruby pulled her covers as Weiss and Blake got ready to take their own turns.

While they did that Ruby held the bear to her chest, it was soft and furry and as she thought back on tonight she had to admit. It had been fun, Oscar was nice and despite everything going on with him he was trying his best with a nearly impossible situation.

She smiled to herself as she suddenly realized she was thinking of Oscar in ways she hadn't really thought of him before.

'Stupid Yang and her stupid comments,' she mentally grumbled to herself trying to sleep.

TBC…