Disclaimer: I do not own RWBY or any characters depicted.

This is a slight AU story. Events will not fully match up with canon.

Cover Art: Official commissioned art for this story done by the amazing Noxypep

Ruby pulled up her hood as she and Ren approached a large opening to a cave that was carved into the side of a jagged cliff.

She had always found it strange that the resistance had chosen to make their newest base on Patch. Ever since they had been driven out of their previous base to avoid Cinder's forces, she was sure they would try and find an area outside of the kingdoms to settle, but Ironwood had chosen here of all places to make a base. Surprisingly it had worked.

It seemed like hiding in the first place Cinder would have looked for them was just dumb enough that she didn't think they would actually do it. There had been few patrols to come over the island in the first months that they were there, and now one came on the same date bimonthly, making them easy to avoid.

They passed through the opening and into a small path tightly packed with rocks that created a small narrow walking lane leading to a larger open area. The only thing that they could see was an old wooden door along one side of the flat rocky cave wall. Old rotted signs hung on the door warning of a closed mine, and to keep out due to the danger of falling rocks from a cave in.

Ignoring the signs, Ren opened the door and held it as Ruby walked in. "What a gentleman." She teased placing her hand over her heart as she spoke. Ren rolled his eyes before following her inside making sure to shut the door behind him.

Inside was a narrow corridor created by the walls of the cave, the light from outside was blocked by the door so they were standing in complete darkness. Feeling around next to him, Ren found one of the many lamps that hung from a rotten wooden post built into the wall. He quickly lit the lamp illuminating the area around them. The now visible walls making them suddenly feel cramped in the small space.

"Come on let's get going, the sooner we get there the sooner we get this over with." Ruby said as she grabbed the lantern from Ren's hand and continued further into the cave.

The pair quickly navigated the many twist and turns of the cave, after about ten minutes they came across a dented and worn metal door, a single slit in the door rested at about eye level. A light hung above the door, illuminating black marks and scratches that looked like they had been created by grimm long before they ever found this place.

As they approached the door Ruby blew out the flame of the lantern and hung it on a similar post that had been near the entrance of the cave. She sauntered to the door she pounded on the door three times before she took a step back and waited.

After a few seconds, a sound came from behind the door as the metal slit was pulled back and a pair of dull blue eyes fell upon the two. "Password."

Ruby raised an eyebrow at the man behind the door. "Really? If we were one Cinder's goons we would have already blasted the fucking door down, and killed you all."

The man behind the door rolled his eyes at her response "Look I am just doing my job to make sure everyone is safe, now can you please give me the password so I can let you in Ms. Rose."

Ruby was about to retort when Ren spoke up from behind her. "O-G-Q-I-W"

"Thank you." The man shut the slider and the sound of a large latch could be heard. After a few seconds the door began to open.

Ruby shot Ren a dirty look as they began to walk inside. "Come on Ren I was trying to have a little fun." As they walked inside the base, Ruby met the cold stare of the soldier who was manning door. He quickly turned away from her as soon as she shot a glare of her own back at him.

"It was just faster to say the password, besides you delayed us getting here enough by taking us three miles in the opposite direction." He said as they walked through the small receiving room of the base. The tiny room was bare except for a small table that was littered with playing cards sitting off to the far left wall. The white fluorescent lights shone against the unpolished metal wall that surrounded them.

In front of them stood two more guards in front of an old steel elevator that led down into the heart of the base. One of the guards opened the gate to the elevator, and took a step back as both of them got on board. "Come on lighten up a little." She jabbed him with her elbow as she took her spot next to him before the guard shut the gate.

"Ironwood is waiting for you in his office. I know you don't need directions there." The guard slammed the button to send the elevator down below and turned his back as they started their descent, the elevator shaking loudly as it was lowered.

"Ruby I don't want to be here anymore than you do, but the sooner we get to Ironwood's office the sooner we can leave." Ren raised his voice over the sound of the elevator. Pulling out his scroll, he quickly sent Jaune a message that they were almost to the meeting.

"Fine, you have a point, I just wanna get this stupid meeting over with. It probably is just him asking us to go on another mission anyway." Ruby watched the walls outside the gate as the elevator slowly moved towards their destination. Her attention did not waver as she spoke.

After a minute the elevator finally came to a stop. The gate opened up to a grey hallway that seemed to go on forever as it branched off into other hallways that ran perpendicular to it. Doors of varying sizes lined the walls all clearly labeled as to what they stored behind them. The white fluorescent lights like above shimmered off the silvery polished metal of the walls. A people were commuting through the hall either carrying things, relaxing as they walked around, or just trying to get back to their barracks.

Ruby was always a little surprised when she came into the base, in the little time that they have been here they had turned what started as an abandoned mine into an actual working base of operations.

Ruby and Ren stopped of the elevator, Ren pausing briefly to hit the button to send the elevator back up. Ruby was not even able to take two steps forward before a resistance fighter walked directly into her. She fell backwards and landed on her ass, her hood falling in the process, she ignored Ren's helping hand and quickly stood up, dusting her outfit off with her hands as she stood back up.

"Hey watch where you are going next time bitch." Ruby raised her eyebrow as she looked up at the at the resistance member who stood in front of her. His standard uniform and helmet made him indistinguishable from the mass of others in the hall.

"You're the asshole who wasn't looking where he was going, don't be a dick and try and blame me." She threw back at him. The calm cold tone she was using only seemed to make the man more angry.

"Look here, if you get in my way again girl you're gonna have a bad time." The man was trying to sound threatening, but it had little effect on Ruby as she simply cast a sideways glance to Ren who was shaking his head at the scene in front of him.

"Oh, I doubt that." The man was about to continue his tirade when another soldier came running up from behind him. He quickly clasped his hand over her aggressor's mouth and began to drag him away from Ruby.

"I'm terribly sorry, , he is new and doesn't exactly know know who he is talking to, please continue on your way." The fear in his voice was rather evident from the nervous laugh at the end of his explanation.

"Whatever." She motioned for Ren to continue, and they began walking down the hall towards where Ironwood's office was. As she they departed she heard the conversation the two were having behind her.

"Don't ever do something that fucking stupid again, unless you want that girl putting you in the damn infirmary for a few weeks." failing at his attempt to whisper.

The rest of them walked to Ironwood's office was silent between Ruby, and Ren. As they approached the door to their destination Ruby was able to make out Weiss, and Jaune leaning against the dull grey metal wall next to the office.

Jaune looked like he had came from straight out of bed to get here, his hair was a mess like he hadn't bothered to brush it, and he wasn't even fully dressed in his normal attire. All he had on were his shoes, a simple pair of jeans with a black belt around his waist, and a tight sleeveless black shirt that showed off his muscles. He was talking to Weiss about something when he turned, noticed both of them, and gestured to Weiss to look.

When Weiss turned her back, Ruby could immediately tell that the woman was not happy. The glare she was sending her way was one Ruby was all too familiar with. She had to stop herself from cracking a small smile at the former heiress' face as she approached.

Jaune was the first to speak up as they approached. "Morning Ruby, morning Ren." A smile plastered on his face as he spoke to them. He approached Ren and gave the man a hug.

He turned to Ruby and offered a hug to the smaller woman. She simply offered him a smile back and a nod of her head. Jaune dropped his arms as he realised he was not going to get a hug out of Ruby.

"Where the hell have you two been? Jaune and I have been here for an hour waiting for you." Ruby looked at Weiss who was standing with her hands on her hips, her lips pulled into a scowl as she stared at the red clad girl.

Ruby scoffed at her old partner as she walked past her and towards the office door. "We took the scenic route." Ruby quickly pulled open the door and simply walked into the office.

Ren and Jaune both watched as Weiss simply stood there for a few seconds before she stomped her foot on the ground in anger. "That girl is seriously pissing me off already!" The sound was muffled by her clenched teeth.

She forcefully opened the door to the former general's office as she strode in after the other woman slamming it behind her.

Jaune sighed as he scratched his beard. "It is just gonna be one of those mornings with them isnt it?" He asked looking to his friend. Ren nodded as he walked towards the door.

"Come on Jaune, let's make sure they don't get into another fight." Walking to the office, Ren left Jaune alone in the hall by himself before he too made his way over to the door and into the office.

'Well at least Ruby is actually speaking to her today.'

As Jaune walked into the room he saw that the general was sitting at his desk, looking through papers of some sort. Ruby had sat herself down in a chair right across from Ironwood's desk, her feet propped up on his desk as she relaxed into the chair. Weiss was standing next to the general's desk, the glare she had been giving Ruby still on her face. Ren had taken a place leaning on a wall next to Ruby, his arms crossed over his chest and his eyes closed as he waited for the meeting to start.

Jaune quietly took a seat in a chair next to Ruby, crossing his legs as he got comfortable. Not soon after he did, Ironwood broke the silence that had fallen over the room.

"Good, you are all finally here." His voice boomed as he set the papers back down on his desk, and went to grab a glass of brown liquid that had been sitting next to him. His speech slightly slurred.

"Well we would have gotten here sooner had it not been for someone stalling." Weiss spat out as she continued to stare at Ruby who simply rolled her eyes at the comment.

"Ironwood let's just get to the point, what is so important that you called us all here on our day off?" She took her feet off the desk as she spoke and sat up to look the general in the eye. " 'Cause it if isn't something important, I am just going to go."

Ironwood simple held his hand up, motioning for her to stop. "I can assure you that this is important, so if you would all listen to me I can get you out of here and back to your break from work." As he spoke all eyes in the room turned to him.

"Now as you may know the resistance we have built ourselves is not exactly in the best spot." He paused as he took the last sips of his drink, sighing as the burning liquid passed down his throat, "We are losing more and more men with ever mission, and recruitment has slowed drastically, our resources and money are starting to go down as our backers from the outside are pulling support from us…" He rubbed the side of his face as he composed himself, thinking about what to say next. "I am gonna be honest with you four, there is not much time for us left. Pretty soon Cinder is gonna be able to just do away with us, and there is almost nothing we can do about it."

Ruby scoffed at his statement. "Well we might as well try and take out as many of her forces as we can before we go down, you're fucking crazy if you think I'm just gonna give up at this point." Ren and Jaune nodded in agreement.

"At this point we might as well try and go all out on her forces and try to take her out, if we are gonna die, I would rather it be trying to take her out. I don't wanna just sit by and accept defeat." Jaune said as he sat up in his chair. He knew that things were dire, but if what Ironwood was saying was true he was not just gonna let it happen.

"I agree, the only other solution to our problems at this point would be making it to where they weren't there in the first place." Ren chimed in from behind.

"Well sadly that isn't a realistic option Ren." Weiss replayed dejectedly.

"That isn't exactly true." Everyone paused and turned to look at Ironwood.

"What do you mean? There is no way that we can just make it to where Cinder isn't in power Ironwood, don't tell me you are going crazy in your old age." Ruby replied "Our only option is to go at her with everything we have, and just hope we can take her down along with us, which to be honest I am perfectly fine with."

Ironwood looked at the young woman before him, his mind wandering back to when he first met her, and she was a small, happy bundle of energy. 'You have changed so much from when you were a girl, this conflict has affected you more than anyone else, and it has lead you down a terrible path. Hopefully what I tell you can start you done the road to fix that.'

He gave an exaggerated sigh to make sure he had everyone's attention before replied. "We live in a world of many unexplained and fascinating things. Everything from silver eyed warriors with the power to stop evil in it's tracks..." He gestured to Ruby "To 'maidens' that wield unimaginable powers, without the aid of dust or a semblance," He gestured to Jaune. "But we also live in a world of science. A place where we can create and explain things with technology and reasoning."

He reached into the pile of papers on his desk as he grabbed a particular file that he had acquired just this morning. "Before Cinder came to power, and attacked our kingdoms five years ago, Atlas was the top scientific and military researcher in all of Remnant. We used the resources we had to try and create many things, some of these came to fruition like putting aura into a synthetic person..."

Ruby's fist clenched as the memories of her old friend Penny flashed through her mind. She took a deep breath to calm herself, his fist uncurling as she counted down in her head.

"Some never made it out of the idea phase, but some were still being researched at the time of Cinder's attacks. Crazy ideas that you would only think about as fictional. Cloning, creation of new dust elements, space travel, and finally this." He slapped the folder down on the desk in front of Weiss who quickly picked it up and looked at it.

The light tan folder had the words 'Project Tempas" labeled in the middle of the folder. She quickly opened the folder and quickly read over it's contents.

Her eyes widened as she read more and more of the folder, she looked at the former general as she finished. "You can't be serious, you had people researching this?"

"Yes."

"Are you telling me that they actually were able to…" Ironwood looked Weiss directly in the eyes and nodded. His unwavering face letting her know that no part of this was a joke.

"What the hell are you two talking about?" Ruby asked confusion written on her face as she looked between Ironwood and a bewildered Weiss.

"Tell me Ruby, what would you give to be able to go back and fix our past mistakes?"

Alright everyone here is the newest chapter, I think it came out a little worse than I was expecting, but it was pretty hard 'cause I was focusing on the chapter out of this and this one was just to kind of get it there. I apologize if this at all caused a drop in the quality.

Anyway the prologues continue and will until we get to the main plot. This is planned to be a long story so I am sure no one will have an issue. I doubt there more than 10 of them, but we will see.

I hope you all enjoyed it and please remember to leave a review and let me know what you think. The more feedback I get the more motive I have to keep writing. Thank you all and I can't wait till you get to see what is happening next.

~Redwing~