74

Chapter 74Chapter Text

"So…."

"Mm."

"Y'know Ren, if you just wanted to like… add grappling hooks to Stormflower you really didn't need me to do all of this…" Ruby rubbed the back of her head a bit awkwardly, looking at the binder paper sheet of plans that Ren had given her- mostly just care instructions and maintenance needs for Stormflower, plus something for grappling hooks so he could quickly move in and out of combat. "Like… you could have just gone to Professor Mulberry for help with the hooks. I'm more specialized in um…. Hey so, what about like, Dust magazines like how Gambol Shroud works? Extra firepower is always worth a shot… or um… maybe some enhancements on the blades? You said not to change the blade shape from where they're already at, which is doable, but… Are you sure this is it?"

"I'm sure- I don't need much, if anything in terms of upgrades. Most grimm I can handle either with martial arts or with Stormflower's blades, and anything I can't… well. Nora," Ren answered, shrugging a little as he set Stormflower down onto the towel stretched across Ruby's grimmified desk, the entire thing turning to look at the pair of green machine pistols with multiple eyes on stalks, of all kinds of varying sizes so Ruby could work without needing too much expensive equipment or magnifying glasses for finicky parts. She still had all of those tools, but those were if she was working with something really small.

She liked her normal tools anyway, but reeeeally hated how finicky most magnifying arms were. Anyway.

"You're not always gonna be with Nora, at least let me modify the mechanisms a little so Stormflower can handle either larger caliber or higher powered rounds- the Wind Dust propellant rounds are nice, but they're only really good at high penetration at short ranges. I know the packaging says they're grimm armor piercing at two hundred meters but they're kinda not - not if it's bigger than a regular King Taijitu, and even then it's pretty unlikely you'll get deep penetration," Ruby huffed, flipping one of the magazines into her hand and ejecting a single bullet so she could sniff it and run it against her keen, weaponsmith's eye. "These are… Midoridan branded aren't they? Out of Mistral?"

"Uh- yes. How… did you know? I've never seen any brand marks on them other than on the box," Ren blinked, tilting his head at Ruby and looking quite surprised at her deduction. "You… have more of an eye for weaponry than I thought. I… think I'll size up, then. Just in case."

"Well, I've only been reading weapons magazines and engineering textbooks for the last nine years," Ruby shrugged, placing the bullet onto her table before ejecting the rest of Stormflower's rounds- including the one in each chamber- and setting them gently down, the material of her table lightly gripping the cartridges so they wouldn't topple while she examined the magazines. "As for how I can tell- Midoridan uses this specific Wind Dust mix that smells kinda like mint and petrichor if you really get close. I only really notice it cuz I have my nose, but it's there if you know what you're looking for. Either way, you've got a few options for sizing up, I can go from your current 10mm to a .45 caliber like Blake's but with heavier cartridges for more stopping power- I can go high impact, armor piercing, or explosive fragmenting depending on what you want, though I can also re-configure the internals to accept just about anything of the right caliber as long as it's rimless and fits in the magazine."

She paused, shaking her head. "I'll do the latter and get you a couple test magazines. Professor Mulberry really likes me so I don't think he'll protest if I make you some custom infusion magazines- how big of a size do you want, by the way? With the right infusion I can do… let's see… Stormflower's already at about two hundred per, right? With the standard Keiheiki magazine infusions? I know I only went with forty shots per for Gambol Shroud but that's because Blake uses semi auto and swaps out ammo types a lot for her Semblance. Actually, I don't think I've ever seen yours, come to think of it."

"There… hasn't been much in the way of reasons to use it lately," Ren shrugged, then awkwardly shuffled around and looked down at Stormflower. "I trust you with my weapons, Ruby. Just… maybe don't make a presentation about them in the cafeteria again? Nora keeps complaining about how she's been banned from keeping Magnhild's grenades in our dorm and I'd rather not have to keep Stormflower in a locker if I don't need to."

"... Yeah, tell Nora I'm sorry but that was the only time when all of our schedules lined up! A-anyway um…" Ruby hummed, chewing her lips as she reached down and pulled out a section of her desk, scooting back in her chair so she could start sketching down Stormflower's dimensions with a ruler and pen, observing every angle with a keen eye from her eyestalks and starting to dismantle it slowly with her hands while the desk itself continued drawing alongside her ministrations with tendrils of inky black. "So, I can get all the maintenance work done now- you might need to do some re-syncing with Stormflower before you go out anywhere or do combat training cuz I might need to replace some parts. Also, if I actually upgrade you, it's gonna take a week and you're gonna have to let Professor Goodwitch know that you'll be doing hand to hand only. Uh… That, or borrow some of my spare weapons? I don't really have anything that matches one to one with Stormflower but you can borrow Morpho Wings? They're like, a pair of dual revolver daggers? One mode only like Stormflower, but fewer shots. Higher power, with a different blade configuration. Actually no, you might perform worse than without Stormflower- how are you with a blade and pistol?"

"That was the first thing I learned- I wanted to use the ceremonial dagger I use to remember my father at first… but it's too fragile to use for long hunts," Ren shrugged, unsheathing a dagger with the exact same blade shape as Stormflower from… somewhere on his body. Huh. Did Blake and Ren go to the same ninja school or something? Both of them were really good at hiding stuff on themselves… Whatever. Not important at the moment. "It isn't reinforced, and adding the infusion would require entirely reforging the blade. I could use it on one, maybe two or three grimm, at most. Either way, I learned a pistol and dagger first, and I could borrow one for a week if need be."

"Well, good for you that I've got plenty of machine pistols and plenty of daggers- seriously, I have more nameless daggers than I know what to do with and all of them are different sizes," Ruby stuck out her tongue into an adorable little blep, huffing slightly before extruding the aforementioned weapons from her chest and holding them out to Ren who took them with little fanfare. "This should take the same magazines you usually use, and the knife has a standardized mini-Dust cartridge, Type-D for adding elemental effects to your strikes. Trigger is to use Dust, and the sheath has a little V sharpener in case you need to quickly re-edge it."

"Thank you- uh. So… I'll… leave you to it then?" Ren tilted his head to the side, looking between Ruby and the swiftly being disassembled Stormflower with a look of slight dissatisfaction, as if he wanted to move Ruby out of the way and do maintenance on his weapon himself. Which… Ruby understood. Honestly, almost everyone at Beacon had a similar hangup about their own weapon- including Ruby. Weapons were, as she'd once said to Jaune, an extension of the user's soul- an expression of their personality and desires crystallized and made manifest in the ultimate tool to fight back against the encroaching darkness. In other words- self expression and agency made manifest, and used to rip apart grimm by the hundreds if not thousands.

Even Jaune was starting to understand as he felt more and more strongly about keeping Crocea Mors tucked under his pillow instead of being stuffed inside of a locker overnight. He'd also largely stopped coming to Ruby for maintaining Crocea Mors, and she'd since seen him fully disassembling and reassembling his weapon and shield multiple times to clean the inner workings with a delicate focus he usually reserved for some of his other hobbies.

"Well, just for maintenance yeah- I'll text you if there's anything I need to replace and you can do a full re-sync with Stormflower when I'm done," Ruby nodded, smiling at Ren and twirling a screwdriver between her fingers. "Though, once I start on the full modifications I'm gonna need at least an hour of your time every day until we're done. Probably after classes, if that's fine with you?"

"Should be. I'll let you know when I'm available. And… please, be delicate with them?" Ren asked, a blush coming to the normally stoic boy's face as he scratched the back of his head somewhat awkwardly. 

"I promise it'll be a feather touch and nothing too deep," Ruby promised, nodding again and patting Ren on the shoulder as she stood and guided him to the door, whereupon opening it, she found… a line of her friends, family, and a bunch of her other classmates she'd never really talked to much standing outside with their weapons. Even Professor Port and Oobleck were there.

She blinked.

".... Whaaaaaat's going on out here?"

"Well, Cinder and I were trying to get some maintenance done by you but then Weiss and Blake got into it and since you're better at weapon maintenance and upgrading than literally anyone else in the school… word got around at some point," Yang sighed (lipstick marks in purple and icy blue peeking over the scarf around her neck and dotting her jawline), palming her face as she stepped forward and rubbed her temples. "And since Professor Port n' Professor Oobleck are here and want to see for themselves… I can't just yell at everyone to get out and fuck off."

"... Right… uh. I know I kick everyone out when I'm talking about someone's weapon maintenance now and say 'step into my office' but you know that's a joke right…? I'm… not running an actual maintenance business here… they know that right? Cuz I think some of 'em have lien cards ready…" Ruby waffled somewhat nervously, tapping her fingers together and wincing at the fact that the line extended past the corner of the hall and seemed… very long- was that Team CFVY near the end???? Why were they here too!? "... Why me…?"

"Because you're suffering from success. Here, let me handle this. I'm at least somewhat used to bossing people around without feeling bad about it," Weiss sighed (hiding her own set of lipstick marks in gold and purple by hiking up her collar and bringing the fur of her jacket closer to her throat), shaking her head as she pushed her way into the room, deposited Myrtenaster next to Ruby's table, then turned around with her hands on her hips. "Alright everyone, clear out! Ruby's already busy with more important matters and we all still have homework! Professor Port and Professor Oobleck, would it be possible for Ruby to have an actual appropriate workspace in or next to the Beacon forges for the purposes of maintenance requests? If people are going to treat my team leader as the owner of a business, then she should be given the space of a business and not be harassed in her dorm room or in the corridors!"

"Ah- why yes, of course! That can be arranged!" Professor Port spoke up, pitching his voice to be heard above the crowd of disappointed groans. "Come along everyone, let's leave Team RWBY to their afternoon- Miss Rose, please stop by Professor Mulberry's office tomorrow and we'll get the paperwork sorted for your new business!"

"Wait wh- Weiss! That doesn't solve anything, that just gives me more work and makes me do that work away from the dorms!" Ruby complained, waving her hands rapidly in the direction of the leaving students (except for Team CMNE and the rest of Team JNPR, who awkwardly hung around until Cinder shrugged and walked away with her team, and Ren joined JNPR back in their dorm). "Why would you do that!?"

"Because now we don't have to deal with people lining up outside our door, you get to turn people away freely once you have your maintenance service set up, people will be forced to do their own maintenance and upgrades instead of outsourcing them to someone smarter, and you get paid for the work you do. Duh," Weiss snorted, crossing her arms and kicking the door shut as Penny and Blake (who rounded out the set with matching ice blue and gold marks beneath her scarf) walked in moments later. "Thank me later."

"... I don't think I'm thanking you for this, Weiss."

"Hmph!"