"Hmm, perhaps I should invest in a journal, it would be interesting to document these events," Ruby thought to herself while eating her lunch, it's been a week or so since she killed that boarbatusk in Professor Port's class and her advice seems to have sunk into Weiss. "Jaune are you okay?" Pyhhra asked Jaune concerned about the events that occurred earlier that day.

- Earlier -

"Wonder if I should help Jaune by training him? I mean I've learned some of the basic forms for a short sword and shield," Ruby thought to herself while analyzing Jaune's fighting skills during his match against Cardin Winchester, local school house bully and strongman extraordinaire, or as Ruby liked to say to herself, the next tragedy in action, "I'm probably being too harsh about him, maybe he's just brutal in his fights," She thought to herself looking at the aforementioned mace wielder.

Going in for a lunge Ruby watched as Jaune missed it and tumbled to the ground only for Cardin to slam him square on in the chest with his mace. "Yeah that's gotta hurt," She said quietly to herself. Trying to stay neutral, she looks at aura meters on the screen above the arena. It read out showing how Jaune's aura was in the yellow, while Cardin's is well in the green still.

"Did he even learn how to fight with a sword before coming here?!" one of the audience members jeered. Sighing Ruby starts to mentally make notes on how to teach him to fight, "Can't send him to the captain, cause then I'll have to explain to him about the OSS. I can't send him to the teachers that's just asking for trouble. Maybe our teams can teach him? Would he accept that though?" she pondered, perhaps some lunch will help, it is coming up soon.

"This is the part where you lose," Cardin said, swinging his mace above his head.

"Over my dead-" Jaune unfortunately doesn't get to finish his sentence, being cut off by Miss Goodwitch.

"Cardin, that's enough! Students, as you can see, Mr. Arc's Aura has now dropped into the red. In a tournament-styled duel, this would indicate that Jaune is no longer fit for battle and that the official may call the match," She said, calling the match and explaining the system. "Not like I need to know, I think this is rather tame compared to the high-flying missions I've done in the past," Ruby thought to herself tuning out what Glynda had been saying.

- Present -

"Hmm? Oh, yeah! Why?" He replied to Pyrrha, looking up from his tray.

"It's just that you seem a little... not okay…" Ruby said with an eyebrow raised.

"Guys, I'm fine. Seriously! Look!" he said putting his thumbs up and smiling.

"Jaune, Cardin's been picking on you since the first week of school!" Pyhhra said concerned..

"Who? Cardin Winchester? Nah... He just likes to mess around! You know, practical jokes!" He said defensively.

"He's a bully," Ruby said, sighing to herself.

"Oh, please! Name one time he's 'bullied' me." Jaune said, looking slightly indignant.

Ruby raised her eyebrow higher, "should I write a list for you?" she said slightly disappointed in him.

"Oh come on, I didn't land far away from the school. It's not like they did any real harm," he said, trying to laugh off the incidents.

"You have to make a change eventually Jaune, it's not exactly healthy for you to bottle up your issues," Ruby said, reaching for her cup of coffee.

"Guys, really, it's fine! Besides, it's not like he's only a jerk to me; he's a jerk to everyone." Jaune said motioning over to Cardin's table. Looking over the group sees one of their upperclassmen Velvet Scarlatina having their ears being tugged on.

"You have got to be kidding me," Ruby said while staring in disbelief. She then turned back to Jaune, "even so, you have got to stop bottling it up, it doesn't make you any more of a hero or man to do so," she said with a sigh. "Now if you'll excuse me," Ruby said while getting up. She walked over to Cardin from out of his vision and clocked him in the jaw.

"What the" he said with a growl while recovering from the punch. "You little-"

"Nothing, you'll say nothing 'cause I'm saving you the trouble of dying by court-martial," Ruby said while pointing to team CFVY who was stalking up towards Cardin. "Those are your judges, I don't think they're in the mood to give a light sentence, so you'll let go of Velvet and shut your mouth," she said firmly while giving him a death stare.

"Whatever," Cardin scoffed, "c'mon let's get outta here," he told his team.

"Thank you," Velvet said cheerfully once Cardin was out of sight.

"I'm killing him," Coco said as she walked up.

"Coco!" Velvet protested.

Ruby sighed, "look I don't care what you do, I'm just not in the mood to stand by and watch while someone gets bullied," she explained.

"Well thanks, next time you need a refill on ammo, it's on me," Coco said with a smile.

"Sure," Ruby replied with a smile. She walked back to the lunch table where her team and her sister team were located and sat down to continue eating. They all stared at her in disbelief. "Wuff?" She said with her mouth full.

"What was that?!" Yang asked.

Ruby swallowed, "uhh me stopping Velvet from being bullied," she said plainly.

"You know that's not what I mean, where did you get that death stare from?" Yang asked sternly.

"Probably from Dad, or you, you also have a pretty good stink eye when you get mad," Ruby said uncaringly.

"I will admit, it is a rather…concerning look for you to have," Pyrrha interjected.

"Is it? I guess I wanted it drilled into his head that he needs to stop 'fucking with the wildlife'," she said with a frown. Everyone stared at her again, "…err not in a racist way, sorry a friend of mine has a parent in the military and they say that a lot when we go camping, I wasn't thinking when I said that, I guess Cardin really bugged me," Ruby sighed. "I think I'm gonna call it an early lunch, I'll be in the library, call me if you need me," she said as cheerfully as she could.

"So what's with your sister?" Blake asked, breaking the silence that formed after Ruby left.

"I have no idea," Yang replied, equally confused.

– Library–

Ruby collapsed into a chair near the front desk, "-and then Cardin just had to piss me off by bullying Velvet," she said exasperated. She decided that she needed to vent to someone in her inner circle that wasn't her team who she had just accidentally said a racial slur in front of. "Not to mention me accidentally calling Faunus, wildlife," she groaned into her hands. Nora was only partly paying attention, most of it being focused on some explosive device. Ren was the resident therapist in the group though, turns out he has a whole semblance based around muting emotions.

"I'm sure your team and friends understand that you didn't mean it and that it was accidental," Ren said after a moment.

"Are ya sure? Cause they all seemed to be very quiet when I left," Ruby said looking up from her hands.

"Well, maybe give them a bit and then apologize again, it couldn't hurt," he offered.

"Yeah, in any case, I'm sure my Faunus teammate is gonna be just thrilled to have me around," she said with a roll of her eyes.

"Blake right?" Ren asked.

"Yep! Honestly, I dunno how people haven't caught on to her disguise yet, it's not very good," she chuckled. It wasn't a fair comparison, Ruby worked as a secret agent who had to commit felonies on the regular, so she had to have an airtight disguise, meanwhile Blake probably just wanted to hide her Faunus traits from her classmates. I mean Cardin does still draw breath, so it's not like it's unwarranted.

"I've actually been looking into your partner," Ren said, slightly changing the subject.

"Oh? Find anything on her I should know about?" She asked.

"Nothing of note sadly, it seems she's either a truly normal student with mutism or she has excellently forged documents," Ren replied.

"Alright well we'll just have to assume the former then, no good in assuming my partner is also a spy," Ruby said with a shrug. Her intuition said that she was wrong, but without evidence, it wouldn't mean much, so for the moment she elected to look the other way. At least until something fishy happens, which is hopefully never. "Did HQ ever mention specifically what I'm doing here anyhow? I love being here don't get me wrong, but 'events are happening in the next year or so' is so vague, it may as well not be a mission," Ruby asked.

"No, nothing recently anyway, though maintaining a connection to HQ without our signal being picked up and tracked is a difficult task on a good day," Ren said with a sigh.

"Alright well let me know if a message gets snaked down to me, I'd like to get back to work, I'm starting to get a bit antsy, blame the Xiao-long genes for that one," Ruby said with a chuckle. She got up from the table and stretched for a second before walking out and returning to her team.

"I still can't get over how laid back she is compared to everyone else we work with," Ren said to Nora.

"I like that though," Nora said while continuing to tinker with her device.

– End –

So I live! Uhh truth be told, I had forgotten about this story, but I decided to pick it back and starting writing it again. Though as said before, consistency is going to be spotty at best.

Also just to address a common review to anyone who's still reading this far in, Ruby isn't wearing and fighting in heels all the time. She's only doing it when she dons her Crimson Rose persona, since the femme fatale look is quite distinct and all. That being said, I should be updating the previous chapters shorty after this one goes live to make that more clear. Alternatively assuming you read this note after I had changed this, just pretend Im not rambling about something random.

That being said, hope everyone is having a good day (or night, whenever you're reading this really).

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