Disclaimer: See first chapter.

Qrow

Ruby checked the lock one more time. It was closing time, and she had everything set up for the next day already. But for some reason the lock wasn't working, as if the tumblers just decided that they wouldn't align this time.

"And here I thought it was an electronic lock," Ruby said as she jammed it in manually. The small lock turned from green to red, firmly alerting that it was finally locked.

"Having problems there kiddo?" A gruff voice said from behind her. Ruby flushed, turning around instantly. An older man with jet black hair, and a sword at his waist that Ruby could tell could turn into a scythe at the press of a button. She would know; she based her own weapon off of his.

"Qrow!" she yelled, darting forward with petals everywhere as she hugged up abruptly. "What are you doing here, I thought you weren't supposed to be back for a while!"

"What, you don't like seeing me break into your store?"

"I left the window upstairs open didn't I?"

"No, Zwei opened it for me. Good boy, by the way," he said, his eyes glancing over to the corgi, who was coming down the stairs all innocent and cute, as if he didn't know what he did.

"What are you doing here though?" Ruby asked after a long moment. It was exciting to actually see her Uncle Qrow again, it'd been several weeks since she'd last seen him.

"Thought I'd stop by, see how the little firecracker is doing," Qrow responded. "Seems to be doing pretty well for yourself. Tai said you've been paying your own rent too."

"I couldn't just live off of you guys forever. Eventually I was going to have to; I just felt I made enough to make it feasible without too much worry."

"Good to hear you're doing well though," Qrow said as he leaned against the counter. He immediately stood back up as he heard a small crack.

"You can sit down if you want Qrow. Or better yet, since I'm locking up, come on, I'll show you around upstairs!" Ruby shouted. Qrow's eyes widened as he took a step back only to realize Ruby had run up to him, grabbed him, and was now flying up the stairs at speeds that Ruby was sure he didn't know she could do.

She put him down on the sofa, and ran over to grab a chair before he could get settled. "Do you want anything to drink?" she asked with a smile.

He looked around the small apartment before he shook his head, holding up his hip flask. "Nah, I'm good. Cute place you got going. I didn't stick around to see much of it."

"Yeah! It's pretty nice. Ooh, noodle's should be done soon," Ruby said as she flew into the kitchen.

She heard Qrow's voice behind her. "Oh, you're actually cooking using the stovetop now-?" he asked before there was a loud ding. She pulled on some of her heat proof gloves as she pulled out a large pan full of cooked noodles.

"Nope! I can't cook worth a darn. But you know I can bake with the best of them!"

Qrow looked at it. "Ruby...when was the last time you checked your stove?" he asked. Ruby blinked, before looking at it. One of the knobs had been set to 'on' with the highest number that it could.

"Shoot, no wonder my bill's been so high!" she shouted as she reached for it to turn off, only for the knob to come off as she pulled it.

Qrow was starting to look uncomfortable, and Ruby knew why. He'd long since told her about his Semblance, uncontrollable though it was. A crow's bad luck, he'd called it. She was certainly feeling the effects of it now.

Not that she cared. "You! Go sit down, I'll handle this," she said, pushing him back to the chair as she flew back down to the workshop to grab a screwdriver and a wrench, running back in the same amount of time that it took Qrow to really get comfortable. In an instant the stove was off, and Ruby grinned at him. "See? Told you I had everything-"

That was when the fire alarm decided that the stove had been on for too long, and told them both quite loudly that it didn't like that fact. Ruby rushed over to try to reset it, with Zwei opening the window as quickly as he probably did when he recognized Qrow.

There was no smoke though, and Ruby managed to reset it without too many problems. She breathed a sigh of relief. "See? Told you-" she started, as Zwei hopped on one of the chairs, breaking it into multiple pieces. The corgi himself was sent flying into the sink, where he abruptly and accidentally hit the faucet, setting it to run as fast as possible.

Ruby rushed over to try to stop it, only for the handle to break. Qrow sat back, watching the incoming storm with an appropriate smirk. Ruby growled, turning off the water underneath the sink, which stopped the flow.

But that also meant that now water came out of her refrigerator, which was strange because she didn't have a water socket in her refrigerator. She growled again as she pulled the large appliance out from the wall, going to turn off the water entirely downstairs.

She felt lucky that her Semblance essentially let her hover a couple of feet above the floor, because otherwise she had no doubt she'd probably slip on the stairs.

The water finally turned off, she trudged back inside as a small dust crystal exploded in its case, setting off a chain reaction that caused her counter to shatter. "What the heck!? I checked those this morning!" she yelled, checking the small pieces of dust to make sure the others wouldn't explode.

The glass from the counter was all over the floor, and Ruby sighed as she went and slowly swept up the pieces. "Everything down here alright?" Qrow asked from the stairs. "I heard an explosion."

"Yeah, one of the dust crystals decided it wanted to explode. It was one of the least stable ones though, red purity thirty," Ruby explained. "It exploded all over the counter, so now I have to pick up the glass. Don't come down."

"I'm sorry Rubes, if I'd known my Semblance was acting up this bad I'd have never come here."

"It's not your fault Uncle Qrow! Things like this happen. Besides, didn't you explain to me that your Semblance is only partially bad luck? It just exacerbates things that can happen, not necessarily what will. All of this is stuff that could have happened."

"But one right after the other? You have to know, that's not normal, even for my Semblance," Qrow said.

"It's alright! I don't mind. It's frustrating, yes, but that's okay, because bad things happen all the time. It just so happens it's focused on me right now," Ruby answered. All of the glass shards entered the pan easily enough, most of them fairly large.

Then the garbage can didn't want to open up, which was strange to Ruby since it was entirely mechanical, but it was only after she opened it manually that the bag she'd put in just the other day had ripped.

It was almost classic, Ruby thought. If Qrow was doing this intentionally he was doing a good job of hiding it, but she knew him. He wouldn't do it to her on purpose. He'd do it to her dad sure, just because it was fun to mess with him, or to Yang...sometimes. He was able to tell, generally, when it was a good idea to mess with Yang.

"So...did you want to show me what you can do?" Qrow asked after a long moment of watching Ruby struggle with the garbage can. "I've been meaning to drop by."

Ruby's eyes widened. Was he...he was! She hugged him tight before rushing off to get Crescent Rose, heading towards the now repaired hardlight training ring in the center of her shop.

"I'll..take that as a yes," he said, gripping Harbinger in its straight form. "Usual rules apply, first to hit gets one point, first to five points," he said calmly.

Ruby rushed up, swinging Crescent Rose horizontally, vertically, diagonal, every which way she could think of. Qrow blocked it without almost trying, his sword just always being in the way whenever she was about to connect. After only a few swings he started to take a few potshots back at her before she dodged out of the way. "Still prefer speed over blocking, I see. Tai did not manage to knock that out of you?"

"Blocking takes energy, dodging not as much!"

"Only with a Semblance like yours," Qrow chuckled as he kept up the duel. There were small aura markers around that showed when either of them were hit, small ticks and nicks that showed up in how much aura they had.

"Use every weapon available!" Ruby shouted in answer. She wasn't worried about not being able to hit Qrow; Qrow almost always won these spars due to one reason or another, and it was honestly his Semblance that became the reason-

Crescent Rose jammed up as she tried to turn it back into rifle form, before she hit another button to complete the transformation anyways.

-that Crescent Rose was so overdesigned. With as many moving parts as it had, it needed each one not just to look cool but because Qrow's Semblance liked to screw it up so much. So she had about a half dozen override switches that performed different functions for each and every moving part on Crescent Rose.

Qrow blocked another strike before he help up the sword and his hand in a 'wait, hold on a sec' way. Ruby gave Crescent Rose back to its small form, waiting for him to keep going. "You want to try some of these other weapons? You even said 'use every weapon available.'"

"That's what Dad had me doing when I broke the projector the first time. By the way, do you know how much it cost to repair this thing!?" Ruby said, pointing downwards at the training area.

"Probably not nearly as much as it cost to install it the first time! I should know, I paid for that!" Qrow answered. He backed away slowly. "You uh...you got that covered, right? With a warranty?"

"Uncle Qrow?"

"Yeah?"

"I know you. Of course I got the warranty," Ruby said. Qrow nodded, before he tossed over another of Ruby's own forged weapons. This wasn't truly mechashift either, but rather just some gloves with pistols on the side, triggers next to the fingers.

"Good, good. We might need it," Qrow smirked. He dove in with Harbinger at the ready, just long enough for Ruby to put on the gloves. They fit surprisingly well, and she was glad she'd molded them around regular leather gloves. That way the metal wouldn't bite at her.

Each pistol shot spun her around, but she made the best use of it that she could by diving around Harbinger. He was slower than normal, which was good because Ruby was not the best at fighting hand to hand. She was a scythe user, darn it.

"You need to get used to fighting hand to hand," Qrow admonished as he dodged her incredibly sloppy left hook. "You never know when it might come in handy, especially with Crescent Rose being as big as she is."

"I'm not Yang!"

"Never said you had to be."

For the next few minutes, he gave startling tips on how to get better, oftentimes just having her figure it out and telling her why it was better. Harbinger was battered and battered, but the sword kept going. She knew exactly how well it was forged, considering it had to deal with Qrow on a regular basis.

Then one of his strikes hit her solid in the torso, sending her flying into the hard light projector...which promptly disabled itself as the system failed.

Ruby looked around for a moment after she dusted herself, before she sighed. She was glad she got the warranty...

Ember Celica

"You just have to make sure you use fifty five grade dust, otherwise it gums up the mechanism. If that happens, you don't even need to bring it in for maintenance, I can show you how," Ruby said to the most recent customer she was having.

The last few days had been going quite well, if she had to speak for herself. Her homework was done and completed, to the satisfaction of most of Signal's staff, she had enough in the books to make rent for the next two months, including random expenditures such as more dust and forging days, and she was having a pretty decent line of customers.

Almost every day there was at least one new person that came in to check out her weapon supply. Some of them wanted custom ones, and using what she'd learned from Jaune's weapon, she'd made up a form to make it a bit easier for her to keep an order for them. She would deal with them the next day she was at the forge.

"Oh, okay," the girl said in front of her. She was young, probably around only twelve or so, with her mom standing behind her. Obviously a Flare student, the local Vale huntsman academy, or preparatory battle school.

Vale's equivalent to Signal, essentially.

"Isn't fifty five grade dust the most unworkable? I always hear about accidents with that grade of dust!" her mom spoke.

Then again, Ruby's newfound success had a bad side to it; helicopter moms. Granted, Ruby didn't mind so much; she was glad that their parents had such a hand on their sons or daughters. She would hope that Summer would have been...much the same?

"Not any more volatile than any other grade of dust, really. The main reason you would hear about it is because that's the biggest seller; pretty much all cars, scooters, bullheads, et cetera, use fifty five grade. The most volatile in my experience is actually twenty two grade, because when they cut it with whatever they cut it with, it tends to make it explode more," Ruby answered.

"Twenty two grade? What weapons use that?"

"It's pretty uncommon, mostly just large cannons over in Atlas' fleet. If you need a really big caliber it's decent, but at which point I'd suggest going to thirty grade. It's much more stable." The bell jingled as a new customer walked in. Ruby couldn't tell who it was, whether it was a repeat or a new one.

"I...thank you then, ma'am," the mother said quietly. "Do you know of a good place for Nuveen to practice?" she asked. Ruby blinked, staring down at the ranged slash melee. It was a bow in its ranged form, that when a button was pushed it unlocked into two curved shortswords. It wasn't actually mechashift, because there weren't truly moving or spinning parts, and it wasn't truly 'transforming' the way she'd call it.

"Check out Flare's practice hall, they're bound to have one for students," Ruby said. "Not to mention I suggest not letting anyone practice with it without huntsman supervision. It's way too easy for a novice to hurt themselves."

"My darling Nuveen would never hurt herself! Come, we can practice in the shop at the back," the mother said, holding her nose into the air as she walked out. Nuveen gave an apologetic glance before grabbing the unnamed weapon and running out to meet her mother.

"Wow, some people huh?" Yang's voice said to the side. Ruby's eyes snapped up to see her sister, smirk and all, standing next to the counter.

The blonde tried to dodge the incoming Ruby-missile but misjudged her step as Ruby rushed behind her into a giant hug. Ruby wasn't sure if Zwei standing right where Yang wanted to step was an accident or not, but either way she made a mental note to give him an extra cookie later.

Not one with chocolate chips, she knew better! Although he was aura-infused, and could use it...better than most Signal students...and...yeah. He'd probably be fine even if she did.

"Woah, hey, didja miss me or something?" Yang said, her arms coming around Ruby and holding her tight.

"I think it's fair to say she did, Yang," Blake's voice answered from off to the side.

"Oh this is great! Yang as you can tell the shop's doing good, how's Beacon! Tell me everything, everything!"

"Whoa hey, calm down there Rubes. This isn't just a sisterly visit, although it could be. But rather because I had an idea on how to update Ember Celica and wanted to run it by you," Yang explained.

"Update, she says..." Blake said from the side. Her eyes slid down to Zwei and Ruby could tell the instant that the faunus saw him. She froze up, and started to back away slowly.

"Zwei, can you go upstairs and pull out something for lunch?" Ruby asked quietly. The corgi gave an adorable ruff as he ran off upstairs, thrilled by the idea of food. Blake seemed to relax the instant he was gone. "Upgrading Ember Celica? Why, what happened?" she asked.

"Nothing bad!" Yang responded, before she reached into a small satchel and pulled the weapons out. They were still in bracelet form, although Ruby could tell that something had gone wrong. The mechashift mechanisms had been blown out entirely.

"Nothing bad, Yang this is terrible! What'd you do, shove them into a meat grinder?" Ruby asked as she cradled the broken weapons.

"Not on purpose! Just...it was just a spar with Pyrrha when Cardin Winchester decided to try to woo Pyrrha. It was...pretty bad. Anyways, she was really pissed off later so I went to take her one on one, and, uh...yeah you can see the result."

Ruby stared at it. "Wow. She hit almost every single piece of the mechashift in here. Did you at least learn not to anger Pyrrha?"

"Nope!" Yang answered with a grin. "It was the best darn fight I've had in a long while!" Ruby sighed. Of course her sister would think like that. "But uh...can you fix it? And if so, would it be possible to put in some additional shielding for the more finicky parts?"

"You mean the entire thing?" Ruby asked deadpan. "Ember Celica as a whole is finicky. These measurements weren't easy to come by, Yang."

"Yeah, that!"

Ruby rolled her eyes. "Yeah, probably. Did you two want to hang around while I'm doing this? Velvet usually gives me a date she needs to have it back by, but I don't know what your schedule is."

"Combat class isn't for another three days, and the next several days are only for tests in history and Grimm studies," Blake answered.

"So yeah, next three days would be great!" Yang confirmed. "And Pyrrha wanted me to pick up a few things at the store while I'm here. She was helping Jaune re-learn Mors."

"Okay. I may stay here for a bit, I wanted to get some ammunition for Gambol Shroud," Blake admitted. Yang's grin slightly disappeared before she put the mask back up, heading out the door.

Ruby put Ember Celica on the glass counter, pulling out her tools at near the same time. "Sorry about Zwei, other faunus have that issue sometimes with him too," Ruby said absently as she started to pick out the broken pieces.

A broken spring, a broken clockwork, dozens of small hinges that were broken, or just barely out of alignment. What had Yang done with it!? Ember Celica had been reduced down to an it, for her sake! It was almost meticulous, and Ruby honestly didn't think her sister had it in her to damage Ember Celica this badly!

Blake had frozen, the bow on her head twitching for a long while. "I...how...did you know?"

Ruby blinked. "What, was that supposed to be a secret? Sorry!" she said, turning red. "It's just...well, you use a Menagerie weapon, and you're obviously skilled in it, which means you were trained in it, and really the only place to do that to any matter of skill is in Menagerie...and your name. You're not exactly a secret."

Blake relaxed. "It seems to have been working so far. I don't think anyone else on the team has noticed it yet."

Ruby gave her a look, "Or they just all realize you don't want to talk about it and are giving you room. I know Yang, if she figured it was supposed to be a secret she'd keep her mouth shut. She's a good sister like that. I'd think Jaune and Pyrrha are probably much the same."

Blake sighed. "I...I just wanted to see what it was like on the other side. It's...not easy for faunus."

Ruby nodded. "I know. I've been trying to make it better. The White Fang came around here a few months ago in some demonstration, involving lots of yelling and really badly drawn signs. Tukson drove them out , or at least made them go away."

"Wait, the White Fang, really?" Blake asked, leaning forward. "Who was in charge of them? A bull faunus!?"

Ruby leaned back the same amount as Blake was leaning forward. "I don't know!?" she answered. She tried to keep her voice straight but she winced a bit internally as it cracked. "I didn't see any leader. It was just a crowd doing a demonstration. They were peaceful!"

"The White Fang are never just peaceful!" Blake yelled. She took a step back and whispered, "Not anymore..."

"It's fine, Blake, don't worry. I won't tell anyone you're a faunus if you don't want me to," Ruby nodded, her attention going backwards as she heard Zwei on the stairwell, holding a plate in his mouth. "Zwei's back with lunch. Did you want some?" she asked.

"I...no, I should just go-"

"Blake," Ruby said, trying to make her tone show how serious she was, "It's fine. If you don't want him here, I'll send him back upstairs. And you still need ammunition. Join me, seriously. It's fine."

"I..." Her decision was made for her as Zwei leapt up onto the counter, putting a plate with three sandwiches on it, each of them having a large stack of tuna.

"Zwei, did you use an entire can on each sandwich!? That was all the tuna I had left!" Ruby admonished. "And why only three!? There were four of us when I sent you up there!" Zwei panted with a happy smile. Ruby imagined she could see a spot of tuna on his tongue.

Ruby blinked, and suddenly there were only two sandwiches left. She looked at Blake, who had mysteriously taken ten steps back, holding a small sandwich in her hands, a large bite already taken out of it. "I...ah. Go upstairs Zwei, and take one of these with you. Good boy," Ruby said as she patted his head, getting an affectionate nibble back as he took his sandwich and left upstairs.

"Just leave your account stuff and I'll bill directly," Ruby sighed as Blake wrote something down on her scroll, Ruby's buzzing a moment later. "Gambol Shroud uses .38 right? Third drawer to the left, it comes in cases of forty. Take however many cases you want. Each one is 1500 lien."

"That's not very expensive," Blake said.

Ruby wanted to say that she was getting a special discount, called the 'sister's hopeful girlfriend' discount. She'd seen the signs on Yang of another crush starting to come up, especially during that disastrous dinner a few weeks ago. Honestly, Ruby doubted that either girl knew. "Eh, consider it the sister's... teammate discount," she said, waving her hand around, barely watching what she was saying. She had to catch herself before she did say something off!

The black haired girl's eyes narrowed, but she nodded before she took around five cases worth, running out of the store as Ruby ran her account. 7500 lien, just as charged. If nothing else, Ruby hoped that Blake wasn't capable of sensing thoughts.

"Zwei, I don't think I'm going to understand people," she said absently as the corgi leapt up onto the counter. "And more to the point, I'm not sure I can forgive Yang for doing this, THIS, to Ember Celica!" Ruby shouted.

Ahh Qrow, an easy way to make anything bad happen. And I'll be honest, in the original version Ruby accused Blake of being Yang's girlfriend, but I decided to change it because no matter how funny it would've been, I don't think it would have fit...

Until Next Time!