Chapter 7

Yay chapter 7! I'm trying to write Ruby as the happy and naive, but more inexperienced than dumb kind of girl. If you feel I'm doing something wrong please let me know! Also I might have shifted my writing style a bit unconsciously, so if you think something's wrong do tell me.

A blur of red and black, and a Nevermore exploded into gore with a surprised squawk that was cut off quite suddenly.

"No, birdy!"

She hadn't really wanted to do that. It was a tiny Nevermore the size of her hand, kind of cute actually, if it weren't a Grimm and wanted to murder Humans by nature.

Now, for the landing. Of course Ruby had wanted to go after Yang and be her partner, but big sister, ever the meanie, had just shot herself off into the distance with Ember Celica. It was totally cheating! Shotguns had just as much kick but fired so much faster!

Ruby pouted. Maybe she'd look for Jaune. He was a nice guy and so far Yang didn't seem to want to bash his face in yet. She already knew him, too, which was amazing as far as she was concerned because she wouldn't have to actually introduce herself. Judging by how she tended to meet strangers - lying on the ground or getting blown up - she was pretty sure she'd make a complete klutz of herself. (not to mention give Yang more, *shivers*, ammunition!)

But now she had to find her new best friend! It was kind of her only friend but that didn't matter.

She had tracked him easily when he was launched, and gotten quite worried too from how he was flailing around looking not the most confident in his landing strategy. It was probably just nerves though. He'd disappeared into the trees and she hadn't heard an impact so he hopefully wasn't a splatter on the ground. She swore there had been a shimmer in the air too, just before he disappeared through the leaves, and that he'd suddenly changed direction from a downwards fall into more of a sideways tumble.

Was it his semblance? He had been unnaturally fast on the Bullhead and she'd kind of glossed over it, but it was probably something incredibly awesome, so Jaune's even awesome-r that she thought!

Tensing her arms in preparation and raising her scythe, Ruby narrowed her eyes as she located a suitably thick branch that would support her weight.

A small "eep" escaped her as the razor blade of her weapon slammed into wood, sending shockwaves that would have broken a normal person's bone travelling down her arm. Even with aura, the impact was painful to say the least, but she ignored the strain on her arms, diverting her momentum diagonally so that her limb would not be torn from her body.

It would have been quite the impressive landing strategy as well, if not for the sudden crack, sharp and clear in her ears.

Ruby's eyes widened, right as the pivot of her rotation disappeared. There was a moment of weightlessness, but that quickly ended as the first of the painful blows on her way down hit her, driving every last trace of air out of her.

She then proceeded on her less-than-graceful thirty metre journey down the height of the tree, bouncing from one branch to another.

"Agh!"

"Ack!"

"Oof!"

THUD.

"Ooooooooow…" Ruby whimpered from the small crater she was lying in.

It was agony. It felt like someone had taken a hammer and smashed every bone in her body to dust, then stuck her in a washing machine.

This was exactly what she meant by first impressions! Oh gods, what if somebody found her like this? If Jaune was in the area then he might already be on the way! For Oum's sake she did not want to him to find her sprawled on her back a second time. Who knew what kind of idiot she'd look like?

Gripping her scythe that she'd almost miraculously managed to keep ahold of, Ruby weakly dug into the ground in an effort to regain her footing, only to freeze as a low growl rumbled through the forest.

Seriously!?

Ruby didn't have time to complain, as with a furious roar an Ursa burst from the trees, claws digging great furrows in the ground.

It wasn't a threat, unintelligent from the pure hate and nothing else festering in it's eyes. The swipe that whistled through the air, slamming into a trunk and launching an explosion of wood chips into the air was easily dodged with a shower of rose petals.

Hefting Crescent Rose and stepping into a spin in preparation for a sideways slash that would take the beast's head off, Ruby instead was forced to flip backwards as a spinning blade of some sort - was it burning? - shot through the neck of the Ursa, hissing as it sliced through flesh and bone with ease. It flew over her head, ricocheted off something behind her, and cut back through the back of the already headless Grimm.

"Oh Oum, I'm so sorry!" Jaune yelped as he jumped over the fallen monster. Ruby caught the weapon had just almost decapitated her in his hands. It was a disk, made out of intricate designs and runes that seemed to be traced from lines of burning, sparking embers. It flickered out of existence almost immediately as he reached down to help her up.

"J-jaune?"

He checked the top of her head, worried expression on face. "Yeah, it's me. I'd hope you still recognize me. Are you okay? I didn't see you behind the Ursa. I was afraid I hit you for a second."

Ruby just goggled where the Ursa had been, now only small piles of black dust.

"What was that!?"

"What was what?" A confused frown made it's way onto his visage.

Ruby stared at the blonde, and with a start of realization he rubbed the back of his head and laughed. "Oh, you mean my weapons?" With a flick of his hands they appeared in a flash of bright orange energy, emitting a low hum from before his opened palm. "Yeah, they're constructs of mystic ener-eh, uh, I mean dust." He closed hands, and it disappeared, like he had flicked a switch to turn it off."

Wait, so he could form weapons with dust…?

"That is SO COOL!" She cheered. This made him even more awesome than she thought! And he was already really awesome! The fact that her partner had an amazing weapon (not as good as Crescent Rose, of course, but it wasn't fair to compare others to her baby) only made it all the better!

"Uh… Thanks?" He hazarded with a small smile. "So you are okay?"

"Yep! I'm okay-er than I ever could have been!"

Maybe her day wasn't going to be terrible after all! She'd managed to get partnered with her friend, and he had those super awesome circle fire-knife things! Now all that was left was to make sure that she didn't run into the crabby girl that seemed to want to yell at her at every opportunity and it would be perfect. Maybe that was tempting fate, though?...

"You idiot!" A high pitched, female, and very angry voice yelled from some distance to their left.

Ruby paled, unconsciously turning to share a look with Jaune.

"Let's get moving?" He suggested with a grin that absolutely didn't look the slightest bit forced.

She nodded frantically. "Yeah, I mean, the relics aren't going to retrieve themselves!"

That's the chapter! I hope you enjoyed, and as usual, please let me know what you think, and how I can improve!

From now on most of the chapters won't be in Jaune's POV, but instead told in the perspective of other characters. It's so that I can keep what happened during the timeskip a mystery and also for something later that I won't spoil.

If you like the more dialogue-focused writing that I've been trying out, please let me know!