Chapter 3

Somewhere Over the Sunset

*knock, knock*

A black bow followed by a reluctant white ponytail peeked inside the quiet dorm room as the door gradually creaked open. Concerned eyes scanning for life blinked away tears as the sudden rush of stale air escaped into the hallway, but through the mist they spied a pair of crutches and an empty water bottle tarnishing their once tidy floor.

Team RWBY's room residing at the end of the hall ordinarily left the window open in consideration of their resident faunus, as well as the peevish heiress who could detect even the slightest hint of body odor or dirty laundry, especially after combat training. And despite the best efforts of the sisters, all forms of clutter that resulted in migraines for the Atlesian were stored in the large walk in closet they shared together that much like their gravity defying bunk beds was considered a death trap.

Piles of books along with shoe boxes were stacked to the ceiling and threatened to collapse whenever the doors opened, but they were only half as dangerous as the stockpile of explosive sniper rifle rounds and shotgun shells that guarded one of the many perpetually hollow cookie jars that were emptied quicker than could be filled.

And despite almost solely wearing either school uniforms or their huntress garb at Beacon, there were clothes forgotten on hangers that hadn't been worn since the lavish dressing rooms of the northwestern department stores that populated the so-called 'unaffordable side of town'. Weiss was the leading culprit of course with Yang not far behind, but because the blonde took a 'less is more' approach with her attire, Weiss often commented that the larger girl had twice as many outfits but could store them in ziplock bags for convenience.

Sharing a bedroom, bathroom, and closet together had led to countless arguments and fights among the teenage girls, but mostly between Weiss, who had her own private library in Atlas, and the sisters, who seemed almost fond of lacking personal space after sharing rooms most of their lives. Blake having been raised outside the kingdoms found four simple walls as a luxury, but kindly asked that the window be kept permanently open.

Luckily, their beloved home had both a walking heater and air conditioner as well a rose scented air freshener to keep its quarrelsome occupants somewhat content. Now however, nauseating waves of body odor caused the sensitive pair to block the doorway until a weary blonde impatiently pushed her way through either not noticing the smell or not being particularly bothered by it. Blake and Weiss on the other hand covered their lower faces while staring at the source.

"Alright that's it!" Weiss declared, pointing at her stained sheets. "I'm burning my bed and killing your sister!"

Not taking the daily if not hourly threat of her sister being murdered seriously, Yang banged on the bathroom door before dragging her feet to the fridge.

"Ruby, I'm home!" she hollered, dropping the box of cookies and reaching for a bottle of water.

Blake tossed aside the black and yellow backpacks she'd been carrying that had their personal effects before skirting around her partner to open the window that had merely been cracked. Still at the door, Weiss dropped the much lighter white and red packs and watched in horror as water poured from Yang's chin as she guzzled it down as quickly as possible. When it was completely drained, she reached back into the fridge and casually bit into something with green fur growing around it. After swallowing she placed both the empty bottle and half eaten cuisine back into the fridge and raised her still dripping chin.

'UUUURRRRPPPPP!'

Yang bowed giving herself a solid seven out of ten before hopping onto her top bunk with baggy clothes sticking to her figure and her mane covering her unusually pale face.

Weiss shuddered recalling the girl's 'attempted murder' when she had first tried expanding her affluent palate, but despite having a near perfect memory even she couldn't remember what the green ball of fuzz had been months prior.

"They're both barbaric savages..." she muttered, watching her bed as if afraid it might move.

"Kinda redundant Weiss," Blake absently remarked from across the room.

With a huff, Weiss began stripping the sheets wondering just how many red dust crystals it would take to rid the world of such defilement, but slowly she began to notice how unnaturally quiet their normally chaotic room was, especially with the other barbarian just on the other side of the bathroom door.

She turned to the other bed biting her lip. "Do you think Ruby's alright in there?"

"Huh?" replied a sleepy groan.

Weiss rolled her eyes and was about to repeat herself when Yang gingerly sat up with tired-looking round eyes fixed on the locked door as if she'd been staring at it all day.

"If she were passed out on the floor, Zwei would be having a fit." She paused to chew on her cheek. "Or he'd be curled up beside her taking a nap..."

'Maybe he already ate her,' Blake thought darkly still by the window. 'And maybe we're-'

*slurp*

"EEEEEEPPPPP!"

The high-pitched scream for once wasn't uttered by Weiss, but nonetheless she leaped atop her partner's bunk and crawled under the covers as a small monochrome creature stood at the windowsill watching with its tongue lazily hanging out as a trembling shadow stretched across the room to atop the desk, where a panting faunus held the back of her neck while her heart threatened to burst out of her chest.

As Yang chuckled at her easily alarmed roommates, Zwei cocked his head to the side and gave the wide-eyed girl's shrinking shadow a friendly yip.

Weiss dropped to the ground brushing herself off before glancing back at the door as if nothing happened. "Now I'm worried."

Yang yawned and flopped her head back down on the pillow. "Alright, then you go check to see if Ruby's passed out on the floor or if she's just taking her first real bath since the mission."

"She definitely could've used one when we left," Blake pointed out, still watching the hellhound as she got to her feet. "And it wouldn't be the first time she fell asleep in the tub with her headphones on."

"And got out looking like a prune," her partner laughed.

"I'm being serious," Weiss crossed her arms but her tone was anything but stern. "What if she's hurt?"

Yang grimaced as she rolled off the top bunk and gracelessly landed on the floor below. Without her usual abundance of aura to fortify her muscles, she could feel every single rip, tear, pull, and break in her bruised body that was being held together by tightly wrapped bandages and sheer stubborn willpower, but she seemed to take pride that bordered on pleasure in every second of her discomfort as if they were badges, or possibly atonement...

"I guess me being the one to see Ruby passed out on the bathroom floor would be an ironic change of pace," she mumbled not entirely taking the situation seriously.

She came to a halt in front of the door and raised a reluctant fist.

*knock, knock*

"Hey, Rubes, you fall in again!?" Yang paused to listen but after a moment turned to the faunus who shook her head also unable to hear anything behind the door.

*knock, knock*

"Candygram!" She placed her ear at the door while the other two glanced at the box of cookies that would be a peace offering if the door were to open. One of the more infamous and violent incidents between the sisters had occurred when a 'candygram' turned out to be nothing more than Yang wanting the bathroom mirror to fix her hair, and after several minutes of both physical and verbal abuse, it had abruptly ended when the elder sister got bored and sat on the younger's chest.

The blonde tapped her foot as patience wasn't one of her virtues...

*BOOM, BOOM*

"Ruby, open up!" she yelled loud enough for the entire dorm to hear. "Weiss has to go winky-tinky-woo-woo something fierce!"

Yang ducked as a damp pillow was thrown at her head, and getting back up she shared a look of unease with her teammates.

She took a deep breath. "Okay, ready or not here-"

Before she could kick the door down, Blake pushed her partner away and stuck a paperclip into the lock and turned it several times.

*click*

Moving away, she glanced at Weiss who likewise was also reeling from almost seeing the bathroom door being kicked down for the second time that month.

'Our partners are insane...'

As they silently argued their strong cases for which sister was crazier, Yang turned the knob and without warning, threw the door open breaking the hinges which cause both girls along with the dog to jump.

"Is she passed out?" Weiss asked, covering both her and Zwei's eyes.

"No," Yang said sounding almost disappointed.

"Then close the door!"

"She isn't here, Weiss," she replied still holding onto the handle.

Slowly, Weiss, Blake, and Zwei peeked inside the large bathroom with its bare tub and walk in shower as well as two sinks, one of which was dedicated to makeup and had a pair of scissors laying out.

They glanced back into the bedroom as if looking for a hiding spot big enough for their leader, but the closet was ruled out immediately as they knew even Ruby wasn't that crazy.

"That dolt!" Weiss cried. "She actually thought she could trick us into thinking she was taking a bath!?"

"Fooled you," Blake remarked dryly.

"That's idiotic!" she fumed, pulling at her pony tail. "That's irresponsible, thoughtless, and-"

"-completely Ruby," they finished together.

After a moment of collecting their thoughts Zwei spoke up.

*yip, yip*

Yang let go of the door which fell to the side and turned to her partner. "You wouldn't happen to speak dog would you?"

The cat faunus stared back with an unamused glare.

"What about you Weiss? You act like a-"

"Where could she have gone?" Blake interrupted. "Her crutches are where she left them, and it took her hours to get here from the infirmary."

Brushing past the pair, Yang marched to her sister's bunk and lifted the mattress. Standing on her toes, Weiss' eyes widened at the dozens of candy wrappers and gun magazines that Ruby most likely didn't read for the articles.

Yang gasped and with a shaking hand reached out and retrieved what looked to be two silver shotgun barrels nailed to a metal fist with a pistol grip and trigger attached.

"I've been wondering what happened to Ember Celica 1.0!" she said, her bright smile lighting up the room.

Weiss gaped at the barbaric design and took a step back. "Ruby made that!?"

With the flick of her wrist, Yang activated her right gauntlet and held the two side by side and the girls noted how Yang's were much less bulky despite being a higher caliber and acting as vambraces.

"Nope. This is the prototype I built after graduating from basics into combat classes. Ruby, my brilliant and ingenious sister," she beamed, "built the version you both love and fear to keep me from killing anyone...accidentally that is."

"Thank God," Blake muttered, stepping away from the device that looked as though it had been made with scrap metal welded together in under a minute.

Despite her fear and its rather crude design however, she did find herself highly impressed with her then twelve or thirteen year old partner's engineering skills that were often overlooked or left forgotten due to her younger sister's unhealthy obsession with weapons and her own lack of finesse and patience.

"She must have made a mold of my hand before adding the grip and trigger," Yang began comparing the fists which had broken so many bones and killed countless Grimm in the time since.

"Is that thing actually loaded?" a high-pitched voice asked from behind Blake.

Yang carefully opened the barrels and chuckled darkly. "Ruby Rose, the only girl who wishes there were a monster under her bed so she could shoot it."

Blake glanced down at the pale girl whose Atlesian tan was becoming transparent. "I guess that makes you the monster under her bed, Weiss." Yang playfully nudged the girl's shoulder nearly knocking her to the ground.

The heiress swallowed. "It's a miracle I'm alive, considering how she jumps up on her bed, kicks in her sleep, and all the times-" She covered her mouth as her eyes nearly rolled to the back of her head. "With the amount of times I've used glyphs to help that idiot sleep I could've shot someone's head off or blown us all to pieces!"

"I said my little sister was 'brilliant and ingenious'," Yang reminded with a crooked grin. "I never said anything about her being particularly smart, or not needing adult supervision for that matter."

Blake couldn't help but bob her head in agreement as the fifteen year old girl whose engineering skills rivaled the finest of the SDC and prowess with a scythe were unmatched, was the same who up until a few months ago believed chocolate milk came from chocolate cows, and that bees were milked for honey. Yang would've thrown the heiress out the window for spoiling her lifelong fun if her sister hadn't needed consoling after...

Gently, Yang placed the glorified shotgun-cannon back where she found it and pointed at an indent in the mattress.

"Looks like Crescent Rose was here recently."

"I've told her to stop sleeping with that overgrown gardening tool. It's going to be the death of me someday I know it," Weiss whimpered on the verge of tears. "And how did she even smuggle it in here?"

She turned to Blake who shrugged just as perplexed but had stopped questioning her leader's ability to move the giant weapon unseen by even her keen eyes. "You think she took it to the machine shop or maybe the gun range?" While Blake liked to hide away in the library and be comforted by the smell of books, their leader preferred steel, grease, and red dust explosions.

Yang shook her head. "No chance she'd make it that far," she licked her lips thinking, "but a six foot sniper-scythe does make for a really good crutch..."

She dug around her pockets and pulled open her scroll which caused the pair to quickly avert their eyes until she brought up her sister's vitals and almost nonexistent aura levels. Seeing the steady heartbeat seemed to calm their own, and smiles tugged on their lips as if a heavy weight had been lifted from their chests causing their moods to also lighten.

"You didn't actually have her chipped did you?" Blake asked, studying her partner with a raised brow.

She held up a finger. "Not yet, but thanks for reminding me."

"What are you going to do?" Weiss snorted in an unladylike fashion. "Wait for her to fall asleep?"

Yang shook her head as her eyes flickered. "I'm gonna walk up to Ruby with a syringe and tell her, 'This is for scaring me to death when you went missing in the lost city, now bend over'!"

The pair laughed so hard their sides hurt and eyes watered, but they soon realized Yang wasn't sharing their amusement and was glaring intently at her partner.

*gulp*

"I swear I'll never run away ever again," Blake solemnly promised as her shadow disappeared.

"Ditto," Weiss squeaked, again hiding behind her.

Looking past the pair Yang's eyes lit up despite the fading sunlight of her dull aura. Walking toward the window she immediately noticed a rusted swing set in the courtyard positioned under a shady tree for convenience of those with fairer skin, but poking her head out she craned her neck in an awkward angle toward the west where the sun was peeking behind the city's skyline.

Her eyes drifted down before finally she turned her head and blinked several times at the sky directly above. Pushing herself back to an upright position she blew the hair out of her eyes and dragged herself to the door.

"Be back in a minute," she called. "Try not to burn the dorm down or blow yourselves up."

*thud*

The pair shook their heads as she slammed her shoulder against the wall before correcting herself by running into the other. She disappeared around the corner with similar noises following down the hall and they couldn't help but glance at the ancient crutches lying on the floor wondering if she needed them more than her sister.

"I can't believe Yang might actually be the sane one," Weiss murmured, rubbing the bridge of her nose while lines of worry crossed her face.

"They'll be fine," Blake reassured reading the girl's mind. "I would say Ruby and Yang are tougher than two lien steaks but that's probably an understatement, and you've probably never seen one."

"You would have been correct." She nodded before pointing out the window.

Together, a curious black bow and white ponytail peeked down at the several story fall below to see a familiar looking crater with yellow dust around the edges.

After sharing a knowing glance they slowly tilted their heads.

High above were a pair of feet kicking the air with rose patterned socks stained red...

(A/N: Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed. I had a lot of fun writing this chapter and I'm really excited for the next as it'll be the first time Ruby and Yang have had a chance to talk alone in quite some time. With how things played out in "The Petals Scatter Now" I think they've got some heavy things to talk about, but as always lighthearted fun and heavy burdens are two sides of the same coin for our heroes. Thank you for correcting me on my mistakes and errors, I try to catch them all but sometimes they slip through. Also thank you for all the kind words and support you've given me. All credit goes to my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ who has made this story possible and blessed me with all of you. God bless