One more fresh off the press.
REAPER IN RED
Chapter 15
"Weiss! Weiss, where are you!" I shouted through open hands. It had been an entire day since we last saw her. My white haired partner hadn't even returned to our room last night. I would know if she had come by, even for a second. I was up and pacing the room.
And the hallway.
And the entire dorm building.
So what if I had some excess nervous energy? It wan't like I really needed that much sleep to begin with. I was just a little annoyed with past me that she didn't use that time properly. Instead of pacing, I could have written down places where Weiss could be! Like the Forever Fall forest. Or the outskirts of Vale, close to the walls, but not so close as to be seen. Maybe even an abandoned building on the bad side of town!
Wait, that's where I would be. Weiss was like a human princess or something. They wouldn't be in abandoned, dusty, rust-covered dumps of a building. She would be living the high life! That's what Yang says rich people do.
"Hey Yang, we should check out the tops of those super tall sky scrapers."
"Why's that, Rubes?" Yang replied, digging her hands into her pockets as we walked.
"Well, you said rich people like Weiss enjoyed the high life. So shouldn't we be checking out the tops of the tallest buildings?"
"Good one Ruby." Yang laughed, punching my shoulder. "Glad you can still make jokes. Keep it up."
She didn't answer my question!
"She does have a point though," Blake commented, eyes focused ahead of her, bow twitching slightly. "Weiss is an heiress. There is a good chance that she is in some penthouse suite somewhere. We should be checking the major hotels in the city."
Yang nodded, quickening her pace. At the same time, Blake slowed down until she was walking in-step with me.
"Thank you for taking my side," Blake whispered. "If you hadn't, I think I would have accidentally told them what I was."
"You still should." My attention was still on the task of finding Weiss. What I wouldn't give for vampire hearing. Or free space to use some magic. Or even have magic that would allow me to pinpoint Weiss's location. Darn that would be awesome. Why did Yang have to fight my idea of all splitting up? It wasn't like we could all get lost in the city at the same time. Maybe.
"I don't know... With you it sort of just slipped out without meaning it to. Humans generally hate faunus. There's a reason why the White Fang is continuously growing."
I shrugged, "i don't know much about that sort of stuff. You all are just humans to me. Cat ears or fox tails are no different than having black hair or yellow eyes."
"Isn't that a little bit naive to think, though?"
"How so? You guys have better eyesight at night, sure. But humans and faunus can mate and have children. They live to around the same ages, they have the same abilities for thought and speech. Maybe it's naive to think they are any different." I continued on ahead, leaving Blake to her thoughts.
I tried shouting for Weiss one more time, but still, nothing. Looking up at the super tall buildings around us, I tried to see if I could spot anything. Darn setting sun and windows blocking my view of Weiss. If she was even in any of those buildings.
"Oomph," I let out as I walked into someone, knocking them over.
"Rubes, you alright?" Yang walked over to me and the girl lying on the ground.
"Salutations!" Shouted the strange girl. Her hair was bright orange and poofy, reaching a little passed her chin. Though, some hairs were out of place, falling in front of her or sticking up in the air.
"Umm, hi?" I tried, giving a tiny wave.
"Salutations!" She repeated.
"Hello?" I tried again.
"Salutations!"
"Rubes, I think you broke her." Yang leaned into me, whispering.
"Are you alright? Would you like to stand up?"
The girl looked around and seemed to only just notice her position on the ground. With a quick hop, she was on her feet. Her green eyes were wide and her smile was a little too big.
"Salutations!" She said.
"I'm Ruby. What's your name?"
The girl cocked her head, her smile widening. "Salutations. Ruby."
"Hello."
"My name. Is Pen-Pen. Penny! Polendin... a. Penny Polendina. Salutations!"
"She's a little off her rocker," I nudged Yang with my elbow, getting her to stop talking.
"My name is Blake."
"Sup, Yang here."
She turned to each of us slowly. "Ruby. Blake. Yang. Good. Afternoon!" Even though she talked somewhat slowly, that friendly smile never left her face.
"Well, goodbye friend." I said, taking a step away and nodding my head to get my teammates to follow.
"Friend?" Penny seemed to ask, that smile not changing.
I looked to Yang and Blake, who were both vigorously shaking their heads and waving their hands.
"Yes? Sure. We can be friends."
"Salutations friend Ruby!" Penny jumped up high, crashing into me with a tight hug. Ha! I've been practicing with Yang. Your choking hugs have no effect on me!
"Penny has no never friend before. This has her greatly glad. I... will see you. Friend Ruby. Blake. Yang. Food first!" She slowly let go, allowing me to step back, before turning to leave herself, a small skip in her step.
"Well that was a little odd." Yang rubbed her neck, "you think she was on something?"
"Hey, that's rude. Maybe she's just a little bit too friendly. She said she never had a friend before." I crossed my arms, pouting.
"Ya, and she was talking about herself in the third person." Blake commented, Yang nodding along. "Among other things."
Huh, I didn't notice that.
I was a little too preoccupied with her wide smile and unblinking eyes.
Unblinking?
I thought humans needed to blink! Or was that just a common misconception. Like a strange quirk that all people have. Similar to people swinging their arms while they walk. Should I stop blinking too? I stared at Yang and then Blake. Nope, they both blank. Blunk? Blinked? Where was Weiss to fix my grammar when I needed to her.
Oh right.
"Weiss!" I shouted to no avail.
"Don't worry Rubes. We'll find your partner or my name isn't Yang Xiao Long!"
"That truly inspires me," Blake's voice was filled with so much sarcasm even I could understand it.
"And when we do, Blake and Weiss are going to talk with us and share their secrets!"
Blake threw me a nasty glare, but remained silent.
"Oh? Blakey has some secrets she wants to share? Anything devious? Or are they just deviant? Judging by your book preference, I'm going to say the latter." Yang cackled as Blake tried to defend her favourite books.
"Any secrets you want to share?" Yang asked me, her smirk still firmly in place.
"Nope!" I said much to quickly. "No secrets here. Not a one. Just regular old -young!- Ruby Rose, regular human huntress girl at your service."
Nailed it.
"I should probably apologize to Weiss though, it is my fault she ran away."
"That's only if we can find her tonight." Blake said, peering at the setting sun. "It's going to be dark soon. We should probably start heading back."
"But what about Weiss?" I whined.
"Tomorrow Rubes. She already lasted one night. She could for sure last another. Don't worry, she's a huntress in training too. We'll find her." Yang rubbed my shoulder with a sisterly grin. One which I couldn't help but reciprocate.
I nodded, silently thanking her. Hopefully she understood. And with that, back to Beacon we went.
This was too much waiting! Another night and sleep was again not coming to me. Darn you Weiss for making me worry. Don't you know Reapers need our sleep too? But there I was, back in the halls of the dormitory, pacing back and forth, trying to get rid of this feeling of nervousness buzzing through me.
Looking around for anyone awake and finding nobody, I allowed myself a soft breath. Closing my eyes, I let go of my human form. Shadow wafted off of me, the hallway dimmed as all the shadows along the walls scurried towards me. As soon as they reached me, I forced them out. Away from my body, from my darkened cloak, and as far from me as possible. To the furthest extent I could muster.
I let the feelings and sounds my shadows collected to blow over me. Well, they weren't really sounds nor feelings. They were... life. The essence of life. Every living thing with a soul had it. Even Reapers had it, though ours were a little easier to distinguish. At once, I knew exactly how many living things were within my range. Most were bugs and spiders. Some fairies, brownies and goblins. A bunch of humans. Well, humans and faunus, they were too similar to tell apart. Well, then that means there might be some vampires too. They would need to be very close to me before I could tell them apart from other humans.
Nothing useful. I knew the rough locations of where everything was, but still I couldn't tell if Weiss was among them. And this was tiring me out more than I would have liked to admit. In a split second, everything returned to normal. The hallway's lights flickered back to full strength and my hood was its nice shiny red once more.
"Why did I even bother," I whispered to myself. Why couldn't I be as strong as Salem? It was no use. I was a child Reaper without even a spec of territory to her name. And here I was, wishing I could be as strong as Her. Stupid, stupid Ruby.
Walking down the hallway once again, I made my way to the staircase and down to the main floor. The main floor of the dormitories, like the rest of the public spaces, was empty of people. Everyone being smart enough to sleep during the night. It did however, give me a chance to actually marvel at how large the space was.
Six couches lined the walls, with another two placed at awkward angles around the room. They had once been along the walls with the others, but students had probably moved them to sit with their friends. A small bookshelf held a few dozen books -some school books, but mostly fake stories- beside the stairwell, and a water fountain was beside that.
"Darn, where is that light switch?" I muttered. The room of course, was pretty dark without any light. The only real source of light was from the stairway, leading up to the dorm rooms. Even the large windows and mostly glass door leading outside were dark. No stars or moon in the sky tonight.
There were two, no, three small tables nearby the couches, some with empty coffee mugs or plates that people forgot to bring back to their rooms. One even had a board game on it. with a small note on top. It probably said not to touch it. At that moment, I really wanted to touch it.
I moved one of the pieces. I'm a bad, bad Reaper. Shame on me. I had to move it back.
Penny was standing there is silence-
Wait.
"Penny?"
"Salutations!" She said in a voice much too loud for the quietness that surrounded us. I cringed at the noise.
"What are you doing here?" I whispered back.
The girl leaned forwards, placing a hand on my shoulder, "The night has been wonderful. Farewell my first friend, Ruby."
She then turned and left, opening the door slowly and walking outside into the open air. What was she doing at Beacon? Could she have been a student here and I only found out now?
No, that seemed unlikely. Was she following me? She definitely wasn't a malicious spirit or anything too out of the ordinary, or else my shadows would have picked up on her. I placed my hand on my shoulder where she touched me. That girl was creepy, even for me. And why was my shoulder sticky? Gross. She had to be human. What else could she be. If she were a Reaper, time would have froze and one of us would most likely be dead or gravely injured by now. No way was she as nice as Cinder. This girl struck me as something else. Definitely not a Grimm. Or a chimera. Way too tall to be any of the household or friendly spirits. Could she be one of the Singular Salemites?
"Huh." I wondered aloud, heading back upstairs to my room to try to get even an inkling of sleep before my day trying to find my partner.
As I reached the light of the stairs and then that of the hallway, I looked down at my sticky hand. Over top my naturally pale complexion, was a colour I was used to seeing, but never on me by accident. It was dark red and shiny.
Blood.
Spoopy.
FN75 - I can tell you now that Reapers do not in fact have souls. As for what souls grant a Reaper, I did mention it in chapter 13.
lasereye27 - Ruby may be a little stressed about that soul
JackTheSpades - I liked to think of it as less of Ruby standing up for the faunus and more so her standing against classifying humans -ahem, faunus- as monsters
Alucard5 - You are correct with your point about the differences between killing and Reaping. Yang is going to live until 99, not another 99 years But can you imagine a 116 year old Yang? She'd still be getting into bar fights. I'm also happy with how the interaction between Ruby and Weiss went down. Blake already confided in Ruby that she is a faunus and Ruby definitely has seen some stuff during her life.
TiberiumSnow - I'm glad you enjoyed it!
Dragonueen1993 - I think you will enjoy next chapter *fingers crossed*
ajokitty1026 - Oh yes. Very much so. You will be seeing Bities for sure and most likely Chompies (well, what they are actually called) in this story.