Disclaimer: See first chapter, but replace Rooster Teeth with Viz Media.
Competition
Ruby stared down at the flyer in undisguised horror. This was the worst thing that could have happened, even more since Qrow and her had broken the training arena for the...actually she didn't know how many times they'd broken it.
Enough times that the repair men were nearly on permanent speed dial on her scroll. And they had a near permanent quote for her repairs. Seriously, the amount of money she gave to those guys probably kept them afloat herself. Fortunately she had warranties...
But no, this was the worst thing that could happen! The absolute number one worst! Zwei barked at her, in an attempt to get some more food out of her. He must have sensed weakness, and weak she was not!
And if she didn't catch herself until after the bowl was filled with extra dog food and Zwei was almost whining in happiness, that was alright. She was not weak, after all! No, not weak!
And yet here it was, a sure sign she wasn't doing the best she could be! A flyer of a grand opening of another! Weapon! Store!
Oh, Ruby was happy for them, especially as Robin's Combat Clothing was actually half sponsoring them, and it was always good to have more competition. And so what if they had an extra discount for the grand opening? It was just the grand opening, that didn't mean the extra discount would be there permanently! And besides, she was doing well. Some extra competition wouldn't do anything to her bottom line no matter what happened-her scroll rang out as a message from Yang came in.
"Hey Rubes, heading to check out the new competition! Wanna come with!?"
Oh come on Yang, where was the sisterly bond!? She was supposed to support Ruby, not some greedy no name other weaponsmith who didn't happily design and rebuild Ember Celica from the ground up!
"Fine" she answered instead of what she actually wanted to respond. Okay, so instead of doing what she wanted to do, which was curl up into a ball and cry, or go out into the forest and live out the rest of the year and a half before she'd get to go to Beacon just killing Grimm and surviving on the land she knew how to farm she could totally handle this kind of thing-
No! No, bad Ruby! She wasn't going to randomly go out into the forest to cull the Grimm population just because she could, although honestly she probably should. No, she would suck it up. Yang wanted to go check out the competition, Warlock Weapons.
And thus, she would go. Warlock Weapons, according to the flyer that had been put on her door, her door!, was a new weapon store, and promised low prices on ammunition, dust, and various weapons. Exactly the same as hers.
Except nowhere on it did it say anything about custom weapons. Did they just...buy the weapons from somewhere and sell them? That was a good methodology if they were in Atlas, as the military liked standard weaponry.
Huntsman and Huntresses, on the other hand? Absolutely did not like standard weaponry. Standard was a way to get killed out in the wild. It meant it was easy to change out weapons between people, but also meant that every type of ammunition was coveted, and if the Grimm ever learned how to fight against that weapon type, the entire team was screwed.
That was the main reason actually that Hunters used individual weapons. Grimm had proven in the past that they could, if not learn, at least adapt. Most of the adaptations had long since already occurred, and Ruby didn't want to think of what life was like back then, but non-standardized weapons or brand new designs on weapons was the norm.
The fact then that Warlock Weapons did not, actually, offer customization was one of the worst signs for their future business. It meant the only main sellers they'd have was dust and ammunition. And considering how badly the SDC was mowing over the dust competition, to the point where there had been a forum post that Blake had linked her suggesting that the SDC was setting up a dust shop in Vale of all things, that wouldn't last long.
And no one, even Amor's Ammunition, could survive entirely off of ammunition sales. It was the biggest chunk of her profit, sure, but only because she had the smallest overhead. And she bought all ammunition types, and could easily identify which type was needed for which weapon.
The fact that Blake's were .38's, along with Jaune's pistol shotguns, were kind of an anomaly. Pyrrha used a bigger caliber, which made sense as she was using essentially a rifle, although that was still nothing compared to Yang's shotgun slugs. Or occasionally shot, if she wanted to spread out.
Although really, if Yang couldn't hit the broad side of a Nevermore by shooting it in its mouth, yes she'd heard that story, then she doubted shot would make much of a difference.
"Okay Ruby, it's just checking out the competition. That can't be too difficult!" Ruby tried to cheer herself up.
Zwei barked again, moving his empty bowl closer to her. "Did you forget to feed Zwei again?" Yang's voice called out. "And no, it's not that difficult," she finished. Ruby twisted, turning into a burst of flower and rose petals as she glomped her blonde sister.
"When did you get here!?"
"About two seconds before you were trying to psych yourself up. Come on Rubes, let's go!" Yang cheered, throwing one fist into the air. She grabbed Ruby's hand, and despite the fact that Ruby was trying to fight back, even she had to admit that Yang was just that much stronger.
"Zwei please remember to lock up and watch the shop for me-!" Ruby shouted just as Yang practically launched them out of Summer's Weapon Shop. She heard Zwei give another bark of...approval, maybe? She didn't know, but really, she had to work to eat and Zwei was working now so he'd get to eat more later tonight! Win, win, especially when he was begging.
"You aren't closing the shop, sis?"
"Nah, but the custom orders are done and aren't supposed to be picked up until tomorrow. Zwei can do most transactions on his own."
"I'm surprised you let him."
"I did give him an extra bowl of food on accident this morning," Ruby admitted. Yang let out a chuckle of 'ahh'. Zwei would do a lot for food, including begging, attempting to mess with the calendar that Ruby used to determine if she'd already fed Zwei, messing with her scroll to make the alarm go off multiple times...he was a surprisingly smart puppy when food was considered.
The outside of Warlock Weapons was mostly plain, a tall banner of "Grand Opening!" sat above the blood red awning over it. It was in one of the worse areas in the neighborhood, so while it was close to Summer's Weapon Shop it definitely would have its own clientele.
The lock on the door was green, and Ruby could see that it had more customers than had ever been in her shop at once. Again, the feeling of despair started to hit her at just how successful this new place was going to be.
The doors opened, and Ruby was hit by a waft of cold air. Did they seriously use ice dust to cool off the air? What were they, the SDC? Usually only they could afford to use ice dust like that. It especially hurt because ninety percent of the shops in Vale couldn't afford to do that.
She certainly couldn't.
There were a few aisles locked on the sides, all of them small and focused on each type of gear and weapon.
The array of weapons was both astonishing, and to be honest, kind of lackluster. "Yang, Yang! They have the Mark 3 Replica Scythe!" Ruby's eyes widened as she took it in. It was a replica of the 'Grimm Reaper's scythe back when they were still around. "And look at this! A Rockton Sharp!" Ruby managed to not scream out as she glanced at one of the pistols and rifle combinations. "It's capable of firing every ammo under the sun with an impact force of nearly six thousand joules!"
"That's...impressive?"
"Ember Celica does barely four."
"Impressive, then?"
"Very."
"I'll be impressed then," Yang smirked. "Not much to this place though," she said as she looked around.
"Yang look at this place, look at how many customers it has!"
"Yeah but most of them are just...walking around. Their enjoying the ice dust in the air, not...actually shopping. So far you've been the only one to actually look at some of these weapons, and most of these just look like hardlight versions. Look at this one," Yang said, pointing to a small shotgun in front of her. It was a hardlight projection, with a note on the front saying 'please see front desk for more assistance'.
"They're just...worried about thieves? Admittedly I did get robbed the other day by Torchwick so I can't blame them..."
"Ruby, that was by Torchwick. It's not like regular people are just going to be thieves stealing weapons," Yang said, pointing to a small girl with bubblegum pink hair and an umbrella. The girl froze and stared at them for a moment. "Look at her, does she look like a thief to you?" she asked.
Ruby looked at her. The strangest part were the eyes, one brown and one pink. But other than that, a tight white shirt and pants with heels on them. "No, I guess not," Ruby said. The girl gave them a bright smile and did a little happy dance.
"See, most shops don't need to worry about that, especially things like your shop. Seriously, you're fine."
"Is that Ruby Rose!? My latest competitor!" a loud voice boomed, and it was one that Ruby had only vaguely remembered. Specifically from her first day, the first ever person to walk into her shop.
"Winchester!?" Yang asked, disgust more than evident on her face. "Seriously, what are you doing here!?"
"You've met my brother Cardin then?" the man asked, a smirk evident. "And if you're here to bow before the greatness of Warlock Weapons, I've afraid I can't let you. No, I'm sorry Ruby Rose, but I have to win my way. And crush you completely!"
"...Ruby you never told me about this guy."
"I have no idea who he is!" Ruby yelled out. The man froze, looking like the wind had taken out of his sails. Chatter around them started to stop as more people recognized her. "He just came into my shop the first day I was open and was telling me to let him have a weapon for free because it would lead to good exposure. Dad and I set him right before he went and damaged the bathroom before he left."
"Set...set me right!? All I did was ask a few questions you naive twit!" the man, really a boy by the way he was acting, yelled. "All I did was ask if you were from the backwoods of Menagerie because you don't know who we Winchesters are!"
By this point more people were stopping to talk and just watching the interaction. A few of them were whispering words to their neighbors that Ruby couldn't hear. "No, I don't, because I've never cared! Why did you choose to opens a weapons shop of all things!?"
"Because I can do it better than any girl ever could!" the man smirked.
"But you don't do customs," another voice called out from next to them. "She? She does customs. And her prices are like...two thirds of this."
Ruby heard Mercury's voice. "And she can actually repair the stuff she sells. What did you tell me when I asked? Oh yeah, 'go to hell you mistralian vagabond'."
"I did not tell you that! I said go back to the seller!" He tried to vaguely defend himself.
Despite the attempt, more people were starting to leap on him. Yang grabbed Ruby's arm. "I think...we should go..." she muttered quietly. Ruby looked to the weapons around her.
"Goodbye my pretties...I'll come back, I swear it..." she responded to the soulless weapons as Yang dragged her out of the shop, the man whose name she still didn't know trying to defend himself.
Weiss
"I still think this is far below my station," Weiss said as the heat of the sun beat down onto her brow. Behind her was a large hovercart, being pushed by a few employees of the SDC. "Having to make a menial trip like this."
"Um, Weiss, you agreed to this," her teammate Lie Ren muttered behind her. "And in fact you agreed to get the whole team on this."
"Well of course I did! As your leader, my choices must be backed by the entire team!" Weiss said, her head held high. Where did Ren get off on talking back at her?
"Ren, just...don't. You know how she gets," Cyril said off to the side. One of her other teammates, he was interning at one of the news stations before Beacon had somehow managed to get him to cough up the tuition. Honestly, how a scraggly guy like him got in, Weiss would never know. Then again, Ren and Nora weren't exactly the normal team either.
No, Team SILV, short for Team Silver, was the best team in Beacon of their year. So what if PABY had three of the best fighters in the year? They also had Jaune Arc. She, on the other hand?
She could have had greatness. She was close to getting Pyrrha Nikos as her partner. Imagine the world in which Pyrrha Nikos and Weiss Schnee took the world by storm! Oh, those would be happy days indeed. Instead she got stuck with Cyril, of all things.
And all because the teachers had made their partner 'meet each others' eyes'. It was a bad romance book gone mad with power. And then because she had deigned to let Cyril choose the chess piece, she ended up with Lie Ren and Nora Valkyrie.
The two were uncontrollable at the best of times. Ren wasn't bad when he was by himself, but Nora was...well, Weiss had learned early on that she was going to have to be the pull on the team to make sure they all worked well.
And that was troublesome. And now that they were allowed to pick their own missions, even if it was just the ridiculously easy ones that anyone could do, Weiss had to make sure they were easy enough for her team, but hard enough that she could challenge them. And honestly, delivering dust from one place of shipment to a...what was it, some kind of weapons store? Honestly, who needed a weapon store in this day and age!?
"Cyril," Weiss commanded, just as the short brown haired boy gave her a mock Atlesian salute. "Don't bother. You don't do it right," she said, and he rolled his eyes as he relaxed. "Out in front. You're making sure nothing attacks the convoy from the front."
"Weiss, we're in Vale. Nothing's going to attack-"
"Vale was attacked by the White Fang at the docks not long ago, or do you not remember how Team PABY is still in detentions every week!?"
"The White Fang's not here Weiss!" Cyril shouted back, just as a young man with floppy dog ears passed by them. His ears perked up and he pretty much ran away. "Look, now you're scaring people by saying the White Fang was here."
"The White Fang was here! Argh, Cyril, just do as I say!" Weiss commanded. "Ren, you're...on the other side. Close to Nora, who's guarding the back."
"I'm guarding the back!? Ren, she gave me an order! Ren, she told me to guard the back!" Nora cheered as she promptly unsheathed the giant hammer she called a weapon. "Now bring on the meat!" she called out, looking around dangerously.
"Nora, we're on guard duty."
"...I don't get to bash someone's legs in?"
"No, Nora, unless they attack us first."
"...Fine..." Nora's response. Weiss sighed. She was thankful she had at least one sane person on her team. Nora was far too energetic at the best of times, and Cyril was just too darn lazy. Oh well, one good person was what she'd have to work with. She could, and would have to, shape up this bunch if they wanted to be any good in the Vytal Festival.
The employees of her company gave mirthless laughs as she commanded them forward. The roads in Vale were surprisingly nice, but Weiss found that she'd greatly appreciated Atlas' more. If only because Atlas didn't have to worry about so much heat.
She looked down at her scroll, making sure that she was on the right path. Seemingly so, according to the map application. She checked the manifest for the shipment too, making sure that it all seemed to be there. She didn't want anyone to try to get the idea that she stole from the SDC.
Cyril was walking with his hands behind his head. "Cyril! Look alive, we're almost there!" Weiss commanded.
"We're a mile out," Cyril responded. "I looked at your scroll last night, I know where it is. It's that weapon shop."
"Ooh, Summer's Weapon Shop!? That's where they have that awesome hammer rocket launcher! Ren, do you think we can get it now? Do you think you have store credit built up to just get it for free!?"
The store did what now!?
"Nora, Ruby doesn't do that," Ren answered monotone. Weiss gave a sigh. And here she was almost convinced by something that Nora had said. Where was the world coming to if she couldn't even see through Nora's random conjectures? And what kind of name was Ruby?
"She doesn't? Then why do you go there, if it's not to hurt my heart and speak to another woman!"
Weiss sighed. There she went again, going on about them not being 'together together' but yet together nonetheless. She wanted to lock them in a closet and not let them out until they either kissed or more, or decided they hated each other after all. "It's Ruby. And also because the ammunition is about half of what it is elsewhere."
"That seems stupid. What kind of shop owner deliberately undercuts everywhere else? That just makes people hate you," Weiss asked.
Cyril answered, "She doesn't undercut. She just doesn't up charge as much. The other stores around here like to up charge just because we're in the high class of Vale. It's cheaper in the dock...er...areas."
"If you mean slums, you can just say slums," Weiss deadpanned. "How come I haven't heard of this place?"
"Do you need custom work done, or maintenance on your weapon? You don't use much ammo either," Ren noted. "You'd have almost no reason to come in here."
"You could've told me you needed some, Ren. I would've been fine!" Weiss said, although that was more the micromanager in her. Her Father in her. The knowledge that Ren and Nora, and even Cyril knew of this place when she didn't, it bit at her and rankled her. She knew it shouldn't have, as Ren pointed out she didn't have much reason for visiting a weapon shop of all things.
"I'll go in and get the shopkeeper's attention," Weiss said as they neared the corner. It was a small shop built in between two other shops. A bakery on one side and a small furniture store on the other. Farther down the road were the empty signs of a bookstore, and a few clothing shops a bit closer.
"That's not-" Cyril pointed out, before Weiss gently pushed him aside. She was team leader here, Ozpin and Goodwitch had made her the leader, not Cyril, not Ren, although that one wouldn't have been bad, and not Nora.
The interior was...sparse. There was a large hardlight arena in the center of the floor, complete with small podium for scrolls. A training arena, in a weapon store? That made sense, Weiss guessed. There were a few aisles around, each of them clearly marked. There was no one around, even after the small bell rung her entrance. "Excuse me!? Is anyone here!?" Weiss shouted.
"One second!" a voice yelled out from the back and top. A red blur of rose petals came down, carrying a large tray of freshly baked cookies. It smelled great, if Weiss had to be honest, and part of her wanted to chow down on a few, but no! She was on a job. She was on a mission, and her honor as a huntress demanded that it be completed!
The girl, now that the petals slowly died down, was in a large red hood and black combat skirt. She had grey, or probably silver, eyes and black hair that went down to red highlighted tips. On the wall next to her was a folded boxy type gun labeled 'Crescent Rose'. Who named their weapon something like that but then made it a box!? What kind of weaponsmith was this girl!?
"I'm Weiss Schnee-"
"Oh from Beacon! I remember Yang, that's my sister, telling me about you. I'm Ruby!" Ruby introduced herself far quicker than Weiss was prepared for. She had to parse through the words in her head. Okay, Ruby was going straight into the 'Nora' category of people she'd have to contend with. Wonderful. She could handle two Nora's and still have hair left. Maybe.
"Yes," she growled out. "From Beacon. I have a delivery for you-"
"Is that the dust I ordered!? Oh thank you!" Ruby said, throwing herself into a massive hug right on Weiss' hips. "I've been getting bugged about people not having the right kind of dust but seriously it's really hard to get dust right now, sixty five white prices are absolutely insane right now-"
"Oh you found Ruby!" Nora's voice shouted from next to her ear. Weiss tried to jump out of the way, only to be held down by Ruby as she fell onto her rear. "Hi Ruby! Still got that rocket launcher hammer!?"
"Nora! Yeah, I still have Giganto. It's over there," Ruby said, pointing to one of the aisles. Weiss stared at her. "It's not loaded, she can't hurt it. And there's no dust anywhere near it," Ruby answered. That was still highly irresponsible, letting Nora be anywhere near anything that could be considered an explosive or bludgeoning weapon.
"Hello Ruby. Dust delivery. Where do you want it?" Ren's calm and soothing voice spoke up. She was the team leader, not Ren, not Nora! What were they doing, she had explicitly told them to wait outside...wait, no she hadn't.
"Oh, in the back is fine. I'll open it up," Ruby said, heading to what looked like a small workshop in the back. Weiss gave a sigh before she pushed herself up. Cyril was standing outside, looking bored, with the two SDC workers standing there looking awkward more than anything.
"So um...Ms. Schnee, the owner usually prefers the orders-"
"In the back, I know," Weiss answered with a glare. "It's not far from here," she said. The workers shook their head, and activated the hovercart again, maneuvering it to the small alleyway barely in between the stores.
The alleyway was extremely dirty, in Weiss' mind, and she couldn't wait to get out of here and never come this way again. The back wasn't much better, a paved road that looked like it had seen better days and a messy workshop with the back door open. "Just in here, guys!" Ruby waved them on through.
Weiss hadn't seen such a mess in a smith's place since her own Myrtenaster was commissioned. "Sign," she commanded, holding out her scroll.
Ruby shook her head. "Sorry, gotta check things first. Don't worry, I'm fast," she said, immediately blurring into petals.
"As you can see, the shipment is here and everything is in perfect order," Weiss bragged. "Now sign the scroll so I- so we- can get out of here!" she said haughtily.
"Sixty five red?" Ruby asked the two workers, ignoring Weiss completely.
"Hey!"
"Sorry Ruby, sixty five red hasn't been processed for a bit. We downgraded to sixty red for that part of the order."
"Sixty red's worth a lot less than sixty five."
"Don't ignore me!"
Ruby kept ignoring her. "Well, thanks anyways. Alright then, Team...what was your team name again?" she asked Weiss, finally.
"Team SILV. Team Silver."
"That's a lot better than PABY," Ruby giggled. "Alright then Team Silver, your job is done."
Weiss pulled her scroll away, far more than eager to get out of this place. And then start another mission; guarding some young man as he went on his first date with the woman of his dreams. And she was hired by the parents to make sure he didn't put any moves on her, or more likely, for her to put the moves on him.
This was going to be a long day...
It only took twenty one chapters for Weiss to show up in person. She's very hard for me to write well. Hope I pulled it off.
Until Next Time!