42

Chapter 42 Notes:

the images are embedded in the chapter this time instead of at the end :>

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

"So, the kitchen in our dorms is pretty awful even if it's got enough space for everything we're gonna be doing, but that's not gonna be too much of a problem," Ruby started idly, marching through the streets of Vale with a slightly exaggerated saunter as she led the rest of Team RWBY (all of whom had forgone their combat clothes in favor of comfy casualwear) around to some of the more familiar parts of town- avoiding the richer parts of the commercial district and making a direct beeline for the bus down to the area nearest the industrial and residential districts- that was usually where all the best faunus friendly shops were, and with Blake resolving to not hide anymore and Ruby's entire… thing … well. Shopping there was a necessity now.

"How so? It's not like we can borrow the actual cafeteria kitchens," Blake mentioned, sighing quietly as she walked just behind her partner, Yang and Weiss ribbing each other over something that was likely asinine and unimportant in the background- for all that the heiress was stuffy and up her own ass sometimes… she did get along well with Yang, somehow. Blake huffed, turning her ears away from their conversation in favor of paying attention to their fearless leader. 

"Yeah, but I can just make stuff with my own body anyway," Ruby shrugged, ears flicking as she raised her hand towards Blake to show off a little, the skin turning the same deep, pitch black as regular grimm matter before it started to bulge and warp- grimm bone forming in odd ways almost like a shell before her palm started to glow with orange heat. The air shimmered as Ruby grinned, wiggling her fingers some and igniting a fireball in the palm of her hand before shaking it all out and returning her hand to normal. "Tadaaa~"

"How… did you do that?" Blake asked, blinking in surprise and some small measure of amazement as she leaned down and poked at Ruby's hand- which, interestingly, was still warm despite otherwise looking entirely normal. "That- that's got to be part of your grimm thing, right? I've never seen anything like it…"

"Well, y'know, I ate a bunch of pyrokinetic grimm one time and then figured out I could replicate grimm abilities as much as I want," Ruby giggled, letting Blake poke her fingers before bumping her shoulder against her partner's. "So yeah, even if our oven's kinda jank and we don't have a stand mixer or a super big minifridge, I can totally make it all work."

"... Isn't the cake going to be full of grimm stuff then?" Blake hummed, cocking an eyebrow as her ears twitched slightly, giving Ruby a rather curious look, not quite sure how the physics or sanitation of grimm derived cooking utensils worked. 

"Eh, not really- don't worry about it, I've done it loads of times!" Ruby huffed out, still laughing a bit as she skipped along with Blake by her side, pointing over her shoulder at Yang (who was still arguing with Weiss about… some boyband or another? That, or the big "Let's Go Bite Throats" Pride text on the front of her tank top). "Yang's eaten my cooking a lot, and she's fine!"

[The LGBT friend group going out to brunch be like-]

"Your sister is over six feet tall, built like a brick shithouse, and bench presses almost as much as Nora . Also, she got grimm tattoos to match yours ," Blake deadpanned, forcibly trying to keep the blush off of her face as she imagined Yang's biceps (tragically hidden beneath her jacket) and Yang's abs (tragically hidden beneath her tank top and belt) and Yang's titties (still tragically hidden even with the cleavage) and somewhat failing as she looked to the side. "I'd say she's a bit abnormal."

"Abnormal doesn't mean not fine," Ruby pointed out dryly, then rolled her eyes. "Anyway! Yang!"

"Sir yes sir!" Yang instantly responded, snapping into a mock salute as she stood with exaggerated straightness and laser focused on Ruby. 

"I need you to go get Cinder's favorite ice cream and chocolate and a whole bunch of raspberry filling from La Meilleure Confiserie!" Ruby stated with all of the authority of a drill sergeant, pointing in roughly the right direction with dramatic aplomb. 

"Sir yes sir!" Yang answered, repeating herself as she flicked her salute towards Ruby and immediately ran off to procure the requested items.

"Weiss!"

"How can you perfectly pronounce a shop name in Old Southern Valean and still not know what a simple word like titration means when you're in Advanced Dust Mechanics?" Weiss sighed, rolling her eyes and crossing her arms as she flounced slightly whilst turning to Ruby instead of watching Yang's yoga pants clad butt disappear around a corner. "Anyway, what do you need me to do? I can't help with the actual baking, but I suppose I can retrieve basic supplies."

"I need you to go to Atlas Imports 39 and pick out the best fudge you can find. Lots of it. Also, pick up some Atlesian strawberries? I know they're not native but for some reason Cinder prefers the Atlas cultivars most," Ruby answered, pointing for a moment before shaking her head and sending the map coordinates to Weiss' GPS instead because gods knew the heiress had an absolutely trash sense of direction if she wasn't being guided every step of the way. Good thing it hadn't resulted in any unfortunate situations yet. "Oh, and a couple boxes of meal biscuits- the sweet crumbly kind… and the fanciest cream cheese and vanilla extract you can find! I need a lot of cream cheese, actually."

"... Aren't you not allowed to eat excessive amounts of cheese?" Blake pointed out dryly, vaguely motioning in the direction that Yang left in with a dry raise of her eyebrow. 

"Pshaw, what Yang doesn't know won't hurt her."

"But your grimm toots will, apparently," Blake deadpanned.

"... shush. Anyway, you have your mission Weiss! And a grocery list! Do not fail me!" Ruby turned her attention back to Weiss, crossing her arms as she redid her drill sergeant persona and motioned for Weiss to be off.

"Fine, but only because I like going to Atlas Imports 39… " Weiss sighed as she walked away casually… and then cleared her throat as she looked at her scroll and instead lightly jogged the exact opposite direction.

"And that just leaves me," Blake murmured once Weiss was out of sight, turning to face Ruby with a passively neutral expression- her default "resting bitch face" as it were. "What do I have to pick up?"

"Oh, just some confectioner's sugar… and a bunch of bowls and cake making equipment. I could grimmify it myself but it's hard keeping up that many constructs so I'd really rather not, y'know?" Ruby shrugged, sending the exact list and a GPS location to Duskway Cookware to Blake's scroll. "I'm gonna go get the rest of the stuff I didn't mention to everyone else. Do you think you can get it?"

"I'll probably need to borrow a wagon or something, but yeah," Blake nodded, then hummed and looked down at her list a little closer. "Why is there also the address to a craft store here?"

"I need ribbons, duh! Cinder's coming home tomorrow so I wanna make sure her cake is in a pretty box. Oh, and I need a cake box too, but you can get those at Duskway," Ruby shrugged, idly fixing up her own shopping list before spinning around and pointing a little closer to the industrial district- slightly more west than where Weiss had gone north and Yang had gone east. "It's… thataway! Both of 'em. I think? I remember one of them was by the river next to one of the cruise liner docks and the other was… closer to the industrial docks? Something like that. Honestly, if you can't find 'em at Duskway there's a bunch of shops in the area so it's whatever."

"Right… thanks for the tip. What time are we all meeting up again?" Blake asked, tapping at her scroll as she committed her list to memory (and thanked her lucky stars that Ruby added a bunch of pictures to help figure out what she needed because sometimes the wording on packaging was so unnecessarily stupid and chock full of buzzwords to get people to buy them) and lightly tapped her heel against the ground. "Three, right?"

"Mhmm! That leaves us all a solid five hours, and if you finish early then you can do whatever you want with the time remaining!" Ruby answered with a wide grin, hands on her hips and cape fluttering in the wind… that wasn't there for anyone except for her weird, possibly alive cape. 

"Oh great, we're going to have to drag Weiss out of the nearest Valeburger," Blake deadpanned, palming her face slightly and chuckling at the memory of the last time they'd taken Weiss out for fast food, because the heiress had accidentally gotten obsessed with the stuff after she'd tasted proper Valean pizza for the first time (and not that Atlesian under-spiced, tasteless, flaccid garbage that cost six thousand times what it was actually worth). Blake hadn't taken Weiss to be a foodie but… well… after seeing her absolutely scarf down two entire buckets of spicy Menagerie style chicken wings and then ask for more before passing out from the pain, anything seemed possible now.

[I'm not drawing a full picture of Weiss going ham on a fast food burger, so have a bunch of doodle sketches instead.]

"Don't be so dramatic, she'll be fiiiiine," Ruby huffed, waving off Blake's concern with good old fashioned casual denial.

"She got kicked out of the northside Valeburger two weeks ago because she ate their entire stock of chicken nuggets. And then got kicked out of the eastside Valeburger because she tried to order fifty Big Vales at once."

"... She'll be fine."

"She got kicked out of the Vacuo Bell on Almond Street because she felt 'peckish' and that justified her ordering literally a hundred soft tacos at once. If I hadn't felt firsthand the insane workouts we all do for team training, I'd have to wonder how the hells she can eat so much garbage without gaining a single pound. Or destroying our bathroom." 

"... Okay that one was a lot, not gonna lie. Still, it's Weiss- she's responsible!" Ruby protested, then buckled under Blake's doubt-filled stare until she cleared her throat and looked away in shame. "... I'll get Yang to check on her in a few hours."

"Probably for the best."

And with that, Blake promptly left in the proper direction, leaving Ruby to sigh and start her trip south so she could pick up the last bits of stuff she needed to make Cinder's cake and get it ready for tomorrow.

And that was the point when she walked down an alleyway as a shortcut… and found herself staring down the point of a thin, elegant sword wielded by a very serious looking girl with bright orange hair.

Uh oh.