Disclaimer: See first chapter.
Dog Food
Ruby whistled happily, walking down the street. On her back was the stowed away from of Crescent Rose, and in her hand the leash heading to the form of Zwei who was just as happy as she was, panting as he sniffed at every fire hydrant, lamp post, person's leg, and bush.
It was a sunny morning, only thirty or so minutes after dawn. She still hadn't heard much from Yang, Blake, or anyone on Team PABY over the last few days, and she was starting to get a bit worried.
But that was a worry for later in the day. For now, it was just her, Zwei, Crescent Rose, and the niggling fact in the back of her mind that Zwei needed dog food.
Right, her actual reason for coming out this early. She'd tried to feed Zwei this morning and realized that she needed to get dog food today, or otherwise she wouldn't be able to feed him tonight. Her own food stores were good to last until the next weekend, or rather the next weekend that she had off which wasn't for another several days, but Zwei unfortunately couldn't live off of her food.
Actually he probably could, including the cookies, but she wasn't going to test that theory. Just because he had aura...and she had awakened that aura in him on accident a few years ago when she was testing her own aura awakening ritual chant...didn't mean he was immortal.
It did mean, however, that was extremely tough, surprisingly smart, well-groomed, and one of the best looking puppies on Remnant. In her mind.
But it also meant that he needed a specialized food that increased the caloric amounts to account for the aura. It was common enough that there were several brands for it, although not many people actually awakened their animals aura. Most people were like her and did it on accident.
Then there were the strange people who wanted to do it on every animal, and are barred from every pet store on Remnant because of it. Ruby's face was not on that list, thankfully, because that's where she needed to go.
The major pet store in Vale was a bit off of the beaten path, kind of tucked into a corner. There were bigger chains, sure, but Ruby preferred this one. The food was more expensive, although only by a hundred or so lien which was essentially nothing, but it was owned by the same family that started it years and years ago. And her dad had told her that she should shop there to make sure they don't go out of business anytime soon.
Zwei was confused at first why she wasn't stopping at her usual park bench that was the beginning of the end of their walks, but as she walked on down the particular street, she noticed that he got a much brighter grin and was trotting along happily next to her. Yep, Ruby was sure he knew exactly where they were going.
A few other people on the street gave half waves, or gave charming smiles to Zwei. A few runners were out, taking small sips from their water bottles as they ran by her. The pet shop was open early, fortunately, and the automatic doors opened as soon as Zwei stepped on the plate. Ruby felt the warm rush of air come out, and took a deep breath as she entered.
It was a smaller pet store, with mostly brown walls and a few small posters here and there. Along the walls had small cages with other pets like hamsters or guinea pigs. In the middle was a glassed off section for birds from Mistral and the south of Vale, dozens of colors in their feathers. They tweeted about without a care as Zwei passed them, only giving them a small glance as he started to pull on his leash, wanting to get to his section sooner rather than later.
It was buried in the corner, and she passed the normal dog food and treats without even a glance. Zwei had long since outgrown most regular dog toys, even the ones that were touted as 'extra sturdy'. Perks, or annoyances, of being an aura awakened pet. Perks for the pet, annoyances for the owners.
The aura awakened animal section was even smaller, only half an aisle or so, split into three sections, one for birds, one for cats, and one for dogs. It was this doggy section that Ruby was led to, and Zwei started prancing around, trying to find a toy that would please him for...Ruby hoped at least half a day. Zwei has been known to pick up a new toy, play with it for about five minutes, and then declare he was bored with it.
"Oh no..." Ruby muttered as she looked at the dog food shelf. There were only three bags there, and the one kind that Zwei had actually liked and eaten, another reason she went to this shop, wasn't there. "Well...you gotta try something new?" she asked him. Zwei gave her an unimpressed look, and he motioned raising his back leg on one of them.
"Okay, okay, not that one. No need for that kind of behavior Zwei..." Ruby whispered. She reached for another one just as Zwei sniffed it, immediately shaking his head. "Zwei, you need to be fed. They don't have the kind you like, but you need at least something. Can you at least tolerate one of them?" Ruby asked. He sniffed the last one, giving it a small look, before he nudged that one. He still looked distinctively unimpressed with it, but at least Ruby knew he'd eat it.
She picked it up with a huff, heaving it over her shoulder. She was about to turn and walk off when Zwei gave a short whine behind her. Ruby sighed and expected the worst as she turned around, seeing Zwei panting happily in a small pile of doggy toys that he picked out. "We're not getting you all of those Zwei!"
Zwei gave another whine, and Ruby could already feel herself starting to fall for the puppy dog eyes of doom. He was so darn cute, his eyes even managed to have the lights reflection in them, slowly tearing up behind his eyelids. He gave himself a small sniff, and started to tearfully put the toys back.
She knew she was being manipulated.
"The worst part is, I know you're playing me..." Ruby said aloud as she picked up three of the toys. "Okay, three toys. Think you can limit it to that?" she asked. Zwei gave a small whine, but nodded a moment later. He'd pulled down seven of them, and Ruby knew that she had a few minutes while he picked them out.
She went to the front of the store, not surprised to see only the cashier up front. He was another teenager, similar to herself, with slight brown hair and a small apron on the front that read the shop's name. "Hey Pewter," she said, lugging the dog food up front. It was a heavy bag, and she wanted it off of her back as soon as possible.
He looked up from his book, looking a bit bored. "Oh, hey Ruby! More food for Zwei? That's not his usual brand, is it?" he asked, looking at the small mark on the side.
"No, but I think you're out. Know when it's coming back in?" Ruby asked. "I'll make sure to come back then. He's back there choosing a few toys. I've told him three."
"Three? You usually only get the one!" Pewter laughed. "I'll ask Dad when it's coming back in. I didn't do the ordering this last month, I was too busy helping my mom with stocking."
Ruby put the bag onto the counter, reaching down for her wallet. She'd pay for the food now, and the toys after Zwei was done choosing. Assuming he didn't try to sneak a fourth or a fifth. He'd tried that before too.
"It's because it's not the brand he likes, so I have to mollify him somehow!" Ruby answered. "He definitely didn't want the other two, so I'm hoping he'll at least eat this one until it comes back."
"Yeah that's understandable. He's mostly a dry food dog right? Or do you give him any of the wet?"
"Mostly dry. Wet's too expensive," Ruby answered. Although really, she could at least try now, although the last time Zwei had wet food he had...picked up the can, filled it with water, dumped it over the wet food, filled the can again with it, and then poured it onto a plant. How he managed that without hands, Ruby didn't know, and she had watched him do it. And she still didn't know.
"Yeah, and some dogs are picky, especially aura awakened."
"Zwei especially especially. But on the other hand he's a good companion puppy."
"That's always a good thing," Pewter answered. "Alright, so total for just the food is twenty five hundred."
That wasn't too bad. She'd seen worse, and she had no doubt that the toys were going to be expensive...
She wasn't wrong. Zwei came up trotting along happily a moment later with three small plastic cases. A small rope that had been made extra sturdy for tough play, a ball that made squeaky sounds, and a cat feather toy. Also made extra sturdy because it was supposed to be for an aura awakened cat.
"Really, Zwei, a kitty toy?" she asked. He dropped them all and gave her a large grin with a loping tongue. "Ugh, fine. You can get it, but you're not teasing Blake with it," she said. Zwei let out a whimper and rolled onto his back, showing more of his cuteness.
Ruby bent down to pick them up, ignoring the dog slobber on them. That was one part of Zwei that she could do without, but whatever, it was part of owning a puppy. Although really she could be doing a lot worse, like her first thought ages ago about how she could be out in the forest all alone except for her and Zwei, together killing Grimm and making the world a better place!
But she was here, now. She dropped the three toys onto the counter, making sure that she only heard three thumps. Pewter gave a chuckling smile as he rung them up.
"Okay, so just the three toys alone is...eighty three hundred. Combined with the food, total comes to ten thousand eight hundred lien."
"Zwei! Over eight thousand in dog toys!? Couldn't you have chosen something a little bit cheaper!?" Ruby claimed. Zwei gave another whimper, and she saw the puppy dog eyes start.
"Oh wow he's good at that."
"The worst part is I know he's playing me but I can't resist it he's just so cute and lovable!" Ruby cried out as she bent down to hug Zwei. He gave another loping grin as Ruby put him down. "Expensive though."
"I'd say," Pewter agreed. Ruby reached for her wallet, pulling out a few of the cards to pay. It was expensive, but it was worth it because Zwei. And whatever made Zwei happy, made her happy.
At least until he did another thing that made her irritated with him, like refuse to go to the bathroom outside like all normal puppies would for the next half an hour it took for them to get back to Summer's Weapon Shop.
Of course, then he immediately dove into the bathroom and hogged it until opening time.
Dock Debrief
Despite the excitement of the morning, the afternoon slowed to a crawl within five minutes of it being after her lunchtime, a simple sandwich that she'd made earlier that day before taking Zwei on his walk. Said dog was also now playing with one of his new toys, the surprisingly well made knotted rope, threatening to trash everything in the shop as he shook it around like trying to break something's neck.
She'd almost been given a bruise when she stopped it from slamming into the dust counter, if she hadn't had her aura up already.
The cat toy was dangling from the counter, acting as a trap for whenever he wanted to jump up to try to get it. He'd almost gotten it a few times, but those were when Ruby had sped to it, pulling it up just another few inches, and then speeding back to the customer. Sometimes they hadn't even noticed that she'd been gone.
But now the customers were gone, Aneisadora wasn't meant to be back for another few days because Velvet had gone on a long term mission, she didn't have another arcade day planned out for a bit, and she was bored.
Not to the point of speeding around all day in her Semblance like she had done by complete accident that one day. That was not a fun day for her. How was she to know that her Semblance would turn on when she woke up and then just never turn off.
Until she ran out of aura, at least. That turned it off, thankfully. Which was at...what, ten? Maybe the cookies the previous night hadn't helped...but they were cookies, so of course they had helped. Cookies help everything.
Maybe she could go make a batch. Or maybe she already had one in the oven! Ooh, she should go check on that before starting another batch, she could definitely finish one in the same time it took to make another...but wait, she was running low on sugar, wasn't she? Of course she wasn't, but enough actual sugar in her pantry?
But the counter demanded her attention, so instead she looked up various applications on her scroll to try and find a grocery list. It'd be a lot easier than just taking notes or actually making a list when she was bored!
Besides, this way she got to look on that walkthrough for Amazing Ninja 4. She was stuck again...if the game hadn't actually been good she'd feel bad for the developers having to make puzzles so hard they literally required walkthroughs to be made. All because the others in the series were derided for having 'puzzles too easy'. Of course they were easy, they needed to be!
The door bell rang again, and Ruby looked up with a sigh of relief. Only so much could she stand of applications that would demand everything her scroll had, or of walkthroughs that mocked their readers for needing their assistance.
Yang and Blake. Together, again, for the first time that Ruby had seen them in ages. "Ruby!" Yang called out, flying towards her and gripping her in a tight hug. Zwei joined in a moment later, the chew toy still in his mouth.
"Yang! Finally remembered I was still down here?" Ruby teased. "I've only been texting you like every day! For the last five days straight!"
"Hey, hey, I get enough of that from Dad. Besides, you could've texted Blake too."
"I was!"
"She was," Blake answered coolly. "Hi Ruby. Shop's going okay?" she asked. Ruby nodded.
"Yeah, shop's going fine. So. Yang!" Ruby commanded to her older sister. "Tell me! Tell me tell me tell me tell me tell me tell me!"
"Whoa, tell you what sis? That we totally kicked butt?" Yang asked with a smirk, leaning against the counter and checking out her fingernails, as if the conversation was beneath her.
"Yes!" Ruby agreed. "And more! Tell me! Tell me! Your sister demands it!"
"Does my sister have any other demands?"
"A few cookies and a soda would be nice."
"Sorry Rubes, I don't have any cookies and I definitely don't have any soda," Yang said. Ruby snapped her fingers, her attention not having left Yang.
"Fine, fine. So after Blake's little runaway act, she followed the White Fang to the docks. That's when you contacted us-" Yang started.
"Which we're going to have a talk about privacy," Blake said, her eyes narrowing at Ruby. The red cloaked girl waved her off without paying attention to her.
"And so Pyrrha and I ran down there. Jaune was already in Vale, apparently he was trying to find a restaurant that might've seen Blake, so he rushed off and found her."
"He found both Sun and I looking over the docks. He was the one to actually find Torchwick there."
"They said he was the one to call the police," Ruby supplied. Yang nodded.
"Yep! He was. Only reason he didn't get detention for nearly as long as the rest of us did. But any case, he ran back to the station because he didn't have his scroll on him."
"He should carry it more often."
Blake nodded. "That's what we said. Apparently it'd been on low battery, it's why he left it at Beacon."
"Carry an extra battery? They're right there!" Ruby said, pointing to a small display stand.
"I'll be sure to let him know that you carry them sis," Yang laughed. "But anyways, we got there, right? And it was so darn cool! We were beating them up without taking any hits at all! There was one giant guy with a chainsaw, now he was cool. Super big, but he could use the chainsaw like it was nothing."
Ruby's eyes turned starry. "It must've been a chainsawd mark two! Almost fifteen hundred pound-feet of torque and thirty two horsepower but weighs nearly as much as I do!"
"Uh...probably," Yang said, definitely not as excited as her at the idea of 'fifteen hundred pound-feet of torque'. "Fortunately he didn't hit any of us, but that was because a strange girl had shown up. Jaune apparently ran into her on the way to the police, and told her to, as we found out later, 'stay far away from the docks as possible as Torchwick was there'."
"Which led to her running there."
"At full speed," Blake agreed.
"She was so cool though! If nothing could touch us, we were nothing compared to Penny. Although now Penny and Pyrrha don't get along well."
"Sun and I tried to double team Torchwick," Blake kept the story going. "While Yang and Pyrrha and Penny took out the other White Fang. I didn't see the leader though, so he might not have known."
"Oh yeah, that Adam guy," Yang mentioned. "He wasn't there either. Anyways, we kicked butt, but then a helicopter started to come in, with a few more White Fang guys in there. And then Penny started literally flying, green lasers coming out of her swords!"
"Yeah she was in here not long after. I've never seen those weapons before. She's from Atlas, I know that much, and the blades are pure dust crystal. Sharpened edges of only a quarter of a millimeter, those things are tiny and sharp," Ruby said.
"Are they? No wonder then she was running through everyone. No one died, at least."
"They said on the news it was a close call though. A couple of the White Fang guys had broken arms or legs, and could see up to fifteen years in jail depending on how badly they screwed up."
Blake nodded. "That's about what they deserve too. If they got out like Tukson did, it's not a worry, but even he's on the VPD watch list."
"And you are too, now," Yang said to Blake, before turning to Ruby. She straightened up. "Yeah, turns out emo queen here was part of the White Fang! Only found that out because Sun blurted it out."
Blake flushed and looked away. "It was a different time. And I got out. If I could get out, so could the rest of them."
"Sure, sure. I don't blame you there princess. So where were we?" Yang asked.
"The helicopter and Penny doing something amazing."
"Oh, right! So she flew straight up and just charged this massive laser, bigger than any dust laser I've ever seen, and just cut the thing in half! The dust that was being used as fuel was still hot-"
"That explains the explosion," Ruby interrupted.
"Hey, who's telling the story here?" Yang questioned, her eyes narrowed. "You or me, huh? And I was there! So the dust was still hot and then it crashed into a bunch of the other dust. It all went sky high, but in the distraction Torchwick managed to beat down on Blake and Sun."
"We made him work for it though," Blake said, letting her arms down a bit. Ruby could see the dozens of bruises and scrapes running up both of them, even days afterwards. "I doubt he looks much better than we did. He's been quiet since, right?"
"He hasn't shown up here at least. I've asked Old Man Oliver, you know the one right Yang? If he'd seen any sign of him and he just shrugged."
"Old Man Oliver?" Blake questioned.
"Oh yeah, he's an old man around here who runs a bunch of the random shops. Doesn't speak often, but he doesn't really need to. He's an amazing cook by the way. I heard he already got his Vytal Festival permit for a ramen stand!" Yang said. "I can't wait to try it!"
"Already!?" Ruby echoed. "That's amazing! It's even more amazing that Ozpin actually accepted it that early."
"Eh, Ozpin's actually kinda chill when you meet him. Wait, you've met him," Yang said.
"Yeah, he wanted me to go to Beacon but the rules..." Ruby complained. "Whatever, either way it's now put me here! Here of all places!"
"You forgot the ending," Blake reminded quietly. She was still flushed a bit, and resumed looking away.
Yang blushed too. "Oh, right...yeah, the ending. So then Goodwitch comes by and just...puts everything together again, minus the dust. How she has such a powerful Semblance I don't know, but she's good at it. Then she starts railing on us, as if it was all our faults-"
"It kind of was?" Blake reminded.
Ruby nodded. "It really was, Yang. Well, actually it was Blake and Sun's fault, and then it was your fault and it was Pyrrha's fault, and then it was Penny's fault...and most probably Jaune's fault too. Somewhere in there."
"Yeah, he got off light. Lucky bum. Seriously, detention every night for a month, and a hundred community service hours on top of that? We're not gonna have time for anything fun!"
"That's kind of the point, Yang," Blake supplied.
"Oh hush you. You got even more, and you haven't changed your habits at all. What, how's another hundred community service hours going to change anything?" Yang accused. "Just...so unfair."
"Yang, that's part of having responsibility now," Ruby said. "You're a Beacon student, not just a Signal student having fun. People look up to you, not just because you're you but because of what you represent. And you have to remember that."
Yang looked at her. "Well, look at you, being all wise and old sounding. When did that happen?"
"About the same time you left me to go bar destroying right before Beacon started."
"Oh you can't be holding that against me still! Ruby that was months ago!"
"I can and I will hold it against you for as long as I remember it Yang! You just left me! Right there! Right on the street!" Ruby whined despite her grin.
"You haven't seen any sign of the White Fang around though, have you Ruby?" Blake asked, derailing the entirety of Ruby's planned tirade.
Ruby blinked, the air pulled out of her sails faster than she could pull them down. "Uh...no, I haven't seen any sign of them. I'll let you know when I do, I've been hearing there's gonna be another faunus rights demonstration here soon."
"Hey, I hate to interrupt, but uh...Zwei's not in the bathroom is he?" Yang asked. Ruby looked at it, glanced at the fact it was open, and gave another confused look at Yang. "Right, never mind, just going to..." she said, heading right on in.
"I just hope the White Fang doesn't do anything to interrupt this one-" Blake started.
Yang's voice came from the bathroom. "Hey Ruby? Why is there a stack of weird faunus pamphlets here with the SDC logo on a box labeled 'extra toilet paper, please take some'?"
"Dust discount if I put it out. I just never told them where I was planning on putting it out..." Ruby grinned.
As you can see we're nearing the end of Volume 1. One chapter left on volume 1, and then we start on volume 2!
Until Next Time!
