25

Black Rose Blooms SilverCyberQueen_Jolyne

Chapter 25

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

"I'm…. Ruby, I need you to know… I wish I was the leader… but I can understand why you are instead. Even if you're a faunus and a child… your combat skill is impressive and your knowledge base isn't as behind as I'd feared it might be," Weiss sighed, sitting down on her bed and twiddling her thumbs together as she looked down at the floor, a heavy frown on her face as she tried to avoid coming off as a bigot. "I… I'm sorry for asking to speak with you privately about this, but I feel that, as a Schnee, it's my responsibility to make sure the air is cleared between us and that both of us do our best to make sure our time at Beacon is as productive as possible. I understand if you hold dim views of me or even hate me due to my father's company but… I'd like to work together. To be a proper team. And-"

"Weiss, I don't hate you, I don't even dislike you- it's the first week of school and we've barely even talked to each other," Ruby cut in, tilting her head to the side in confusion as she looked at the other girl, standing before her and taking Weiss' hands in her own- they were cold, strangely, even compared to Ruby's own naturally low temperature. She sighed, taking a moment to look around at their room- it was almost a little cramped with all of their books and desks and bookshelves and posters and the paintings that Weiss had brought and the curtains… the bunk beds in the room were a nice touch, though she'd had to explain her Semblance to the others a lot earlier than she'd have liked… then again, she'd explained the gist of it to Blake in the Emerald Forest, and Yang already knew, so she supposed it was just explaining to Weiss. Or, at least, the sanitized version of what her abilities were. "I think you're fine."

She paused, wanting to say more but- really, just grabbing onto Weiss' hands and saying those two short sentences was a little more than she'd thought she'd be able to say. Somehow, Weiss and Blake were able to worm their way past her own natural anxieties about talking to people and make her open up, weirdly enough.

Then again, Uncle Qrow always did just say she was an extroverted puppy that hadn't been quite properly socialized. Maybe he had a point? 

Eh. Nah.

"I- thank you. And… I'm sorry if I say something out of turn or rude. I'm trying to work on… seeing that not all faunus are violent thugs or part of the White Fang. I told myself that I'd be more accepting and a better person than my father, so… please tell me if I say something rude," Weiss continued, chewing her lip and wishing she was anywhere else so she didn't have to have this conversation- but with her team leader's lack of criminality and her general aura of happy-go-lucky adorableness, Weiss was hard pressed to actually keep up her paranoia around the open faunus that was before her.

It probably didn't help that Ruby was very frank about her ears and tail being like a weird corgi. Weiss loved corgis, possibly more than life itself. She knew she'd do damn near anything to be able to hold onto and pet and cuddle and snuggle with one of those adorable little marshmallow dogs.

"I'll let you know. Don't… worry about it too much, though," Ruby murmured, barely moving her lips as she kneeled before Weiss, her cloak fluttering as though it were alive as she clasped Weiss' hands in her own. "I understand that you want to be better. Thanks for… letting me know. And for agreeing to work with me. I won't disappoint, I promise."

"I… will hold you to that," Weiss nodded slowly, clenching her hands slightly as Ruby held onto them, chewing her lip as she looked to the side and tried awkwardly to change the topic. "S-so… um… on a lighter topic- you said your Semblance was Grimm Rose, correct? How you can… manifest Grimm traits based on what you've killed or subsumed? I've… never heard of a Semblance like that before. It's… quite interesting."

"Yeah… it's… um…" Ruby shrugged, idly motioning at the spires of bone that propped up their bunk beds- much safer than the horrible series of ropes and books that they would have had to use had Ruby not been able to just grow new grimm at will. She could even make ladders out of them! And as long as she didn't leave a ten mile radius of them for more than a week or so, they wouldn't even dissolve! "It's… useful. Kinda awkward, though. I…"

"I can see how that might be… problematic," Weiss muttered, clearing her throat a bit awkwardly before looking to the side. "And… I'm sorry for trying to say that I deserved better, on our first day. I treated you unfairly when you've been nothing but polite."

"It's… okay. I'm used to people not trusting me," Ruby sighed, then rubbed her arm and shook her head. "You… didn't have to start ranting about thieving faunus miscreants in the bathroom the other day, though."

"... Ah… you… heard that…" Weiss winced, looking to the side and looking decidedly sheepish. "... I'm… sorry. I…. grew up very sheltered, and all I ever got to know about faunus is that the White Fang is why the Schnee Dust Company kept losing employees- kept having board members assassinated, kept having shipments stolen, kept losing train cars and mining locations… I lost family to the faunus. Friends. People that I'd known all my life. And the only other thing I ever learned was that a greater proportion of Mantle's crime rate was disproportionately faunus- no human activity ever came close. Even in Vale, the disparity is… intense, even with the comparatively lower crime rate here. It's the same in Mistral, though the crime rates there and in Vacuo are… extremely high."

She sighed and squeezed her hands together, shaking her head. "I'm… sorry. I don't want to assume, but… I'm sorry."

"... At least you're apologizing," Ruby mumbled, shaking her head as well as she continued to eye the room instead of looking at Weiss- she really wanted to think the best of her sister's teammate, but Yang already didn't trust her after her initial freakout at not being made team leader, and Ruby didn't really want to tell Yang about some of the other stuff Weiss had said in the first day or so, so she'd just been trying to hug the badness out of Weiss, but that had only made it more pronounced up until the point that they had their first heart to heart. "And… those are arrest statistics. Not crime statistics. Faunus get arrested over twice as much as human criminals, and for much smaller things. There's… a lot to learn. I think Blake would know more, she's… trustworthy with her sources."

"I… see. How does Blake know more than you, though? I would assume that you'd be the foremost expert on the faunus condition on our team considering… you know," Weiss awkwardly trailed off, motioning towards Ruby's ears and tail and generally slightly feral looking countenance. "She's just… human, isn't she?"

"She was a faunus rights activist her entire life," Ruby huffed, her voice slightly quieter as she spoke about Blake in some slightly more vague terms than were probably correct. "I spent most of my life since I was six years old hunting grimm in the wilderness around the world and training to be the strongest, best, most skilled huntress I could manage to be. I was supposed to be in Signal Academy. Professor Ozpin decided I belonged here. I barely know anything about discrimination compared to Blake."

"I… see. Well… having seen your performance in combat, I can rightfully say that you are… at least… strong enough to earn your place here. I think even third or fourth years would have trouble taking down two giant grimm like that so easily," Weiss murmured, twiddling her thumbs a little and looking to the side. "Regardless… thank you for giving me a chance. And… for letting me see that there are more to faunus than just criminals and terrorists. I… you're… a pretty good leader, Ruby Rose. Even if you haven't had a lot of chances to lead yet."

"I'm sure they'll come up. Thanks, though," Ruby nodded, silver eyes shining as the glowing embers within shrank into the smallest of pinpricks, smiling softly as she held out her hand to Weiss. "Friends?"

"It's… a bit soon to ask that… but yes. I think… I think that I would like to be friends," Weiss nodded, returning Ruby's smile with one of her own. She paused then, after a moment, and pursed her lips as she looked to the side and caught sight of Ruby's specially reinforced desk that she used more as a workbench for Crescent Rose's maintenance, the formerly wooden table now completely hidden in a twisted, terrifying mass of grimm bone and shadowy tar, still creaking slightly under the weight of the redhead's ammo pouches combined with the actual scythe proper. "By the way… if and when you have to spar against someone in Professor Goodwitch's class… I'd suggest not using your big ammo, even if Beacon lets you make as much ammo as you want for free."

"Aww… but I don't get to use my biggest stuff as much as I'd like!"

"Yes, but I think Professor Goodwitch would be quite cross with you if you turned a classmate into a red smear on the sparring arena forcefields."

"Fine…"

Notes:

Honestly, I could have written Weiss being more of a bitch than in canon, but it just wasn't interesting to me tbh. Besides, Weiss got over the whole racism thing in like... a single weekend in canon.