Ruby Rose | Team RWBY (eyesofsilver) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2018-06-14 05:54:00 |
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Entry tags: | !complete, !partner thread, lie ren, ruby rose |
Who: Ren and Ruby
What: Studying for finals, dream talk
When: Tuesday or Wednesday of Finals week
Where: UC:I Library
Warnings: Should be low
Status: Partner Thread | Complete
Finals were coming up, and Ren had been busying himself with his studies. He’d been studying more after the turn his dreams had taken, at least. He had been warned by Pyrrha and Jaune about the dark turn they took, but he hadn’t expected how bad things would get. He’d dreamed of Pyrrha’s death, and then immediately after had dreamed of how he’d lost his parents.
It was easier to bury himself in textbooks and papers than think of any of that, and so that’s what he’d done. And, he realized, once he got to the library, that he wasn’t the only one who was busy with studying. Ruby would be graduating soon, he remembered, and so it wasn’t too surprising when he found her in the library, fast asleep on her engineering books. Ren made a trip to the on campus coffee shop, bought a frappe for her and a tea for himself, and then sat down at her table, sure that she wouldn’t mind, when she woke up, if he studied at her table.
If there was one thing Ruby could understand, it was burying herself in her schoolwork to avoid thinking about all the bad and stress going on. The guilt from not getting to Pyrrha had returned tenfold after Pyrrha had dreamt of her death, then there was the fact Summer was alive but had no memory of her or the family and then everything with Blake and Yang and being stuck in the middle…. Well, studying had been a reprieve from that. And then the search for Ilia which had finally come to an end.
Okay, so maybe going to Russia right before finals week to infiltrate a super secret facility that had been kidnapping and brainwashing people hadn’t been the smartest of ideas. But she’d been invested and of course the second she had known about that there had been no other choice open to Ruby. Not really. Everything that had happened there? Well…. Studying was a great distraction from that as well.
Needing to catch up on her studying because of said side trip, Ruby had been in the library. Unfortunately apparently her body had decided she needed sleep and so she had fallen asleep on her books. Not the most uncommon occurrence when she threw herself into studying to avoid thinking about everything else going on. The moving of a chair seemed to make her wake up.
“I was only closing my eyes briefly I--” And that was when she saw Ren and smiled in greeting. “Oh! Hi Ren!”
Ren couldn’t help but smile when Ruby startled awake. “Sorry, I hope I didn’t wake you,” he said as he took his seat across from her. “It looks like you need it.”
“Nope, it’s fine. I shouldn’t have fallen asleep in the first place.” Because they both knew that was what had happened. There had just been so much going on that the need for sleep had caught up with her. And that was when she noticed the frappe that Ren seemed to be referencing. “Maybe a little bit.”
“Your body likely needs it if you’re falling asleep at school,” Ren said with a smile. “Have you been sleeping well lately?” Ren’s own sleep had been disturbed with the sudden turn the dreams had taken, and he knew that Ruby was further along than he was. He wouldn’t be surprised if they were keeping her up at night.
Had she been sleeping well lately? “No, not really.” Not because of Dreams though. Hers had seemed to pause for a few months now, though Ruby had a feeling that when they started up again, things would be getting intense as they were gearing up for what Ozcar had told them about Salem and what might happen. They couldn’t just stay in Haven forever. It was just everything else.
Ren frowned, giving Ruby a sympathetic look, assuming that her problems were mostly about the dreams. If he had a solution to the dreams, he would have offered them to her, but he had nothing that could really help much. “I’m sorry. How are your studies?” he asked.
If only it were because of the Dreams. Oh well. Smiling some, Ruby shrugged. “It’s okay, the things I could do something about, I did and the rest well….” There was only so much anyone could do even when all she wanted was for her friends not to be hurt. “They’re going okay. Stuff came up last week,” understatement and things she wasn’t thinking about, “so I’m just trying to make sure I have it all. How about you?”
Ren wondered exactly what stuff was, though he was sure that if Ruby wanted to, or was able to talk about it, she would. There was no sense in asking prying question. “Studying is going well,” Ren assured her. Other than when Nora had been acting strange in January, he’d always made his studies a priority. “The dreams are another matter. I’ve dreamed of the fall of Beacon,” and, subsequently, the fall of Pyrrha. He’d also dreamed of becoming orphaned, but as Ruby was likely to never dream of Kuroyuri, he didn’t think it was worth mentioning.
This was definitely not one of those situations she could talk about. Ilia being taken and the rescue mission to Russia to the top secret facility? Yeah. Somehow Ruby had a feeling she shouldn’t be talking about it, even vaguely so she was thankful for the lack of prying questions. She nodded some at the comment on studying and then her gaze fell at the mention of the Fall of Beacon and all that entailed.
“Oh….” Because the scars from that remained even as they had moved forward. “How far have you gotten after that?” She figured she should probably give Ren a heads up about them going to Kuroyuri as she had with Weiss and the fact she’d end up returning to Atlas. She hadn’t warned Pyrrha about what was to come (nor would she have known the words to use) and had filled Jaune in briefly with all that had happened… but she was getting a bit better at recognizing the things she should mention. Then again, her traveling with team RNJR meant that she knew more about that than what had been happening with her own team.
“Not very,” Ren said. “Jaune, Nora and I met you at your house, and we’re going to Haven.” It was going to be a long, and dangerous walk, but he hoped that it would pay off at the end. “And then… strangely, I dreamed of the past. Back when I was still a child. Has anything like that ever happened to you?”
Ruby gave a small nod at that. It tended to be hard to know who was where in the Dreams and she never knew quite what to say or if she should say anything. But that at least gave her an idea on where Ren was.
“No.. not really. But that kind of makes sense. On the way to Haven, we end up in Kuroyuri.” And again with dropping her gaze. She might not have known the details but it had been clear that it had been a place of pain for Ren. Though it was totally awesome the way he went after the Nuckavee in a fighting sense though she could tell it had been an emotional release as well. Not to mention they’d gone through Kuroyuri because Qrow had been poisoned saving her.
With the destruction of Kuroyuri still fresh on his mind, he didn’t not relish the idea of dreaming of going back there any time soon, and while he tried to keep how much he hated the idea from his face, he wasn’t quite able to. “I see,” Ren said, a little shortly. But it wasn’t Ruby’s fault, and so he took a deep breath in through his nose and released it through his mouth. “I suppose you must have gotten the rundown of what happened there,” he said.
While Ruby was not the best at handling people and didn’t understand social cues to save her life, she at least knew that not all short replies were because someone was mad at her. It wasn’t always easy to remember that but… she figured a warning would be appreciated later on even if right now not so much.
“A basic idea, yeah. There was… a lot going on then and we initially split up so you and Nora went up the mountain to try and see if you could find a path but…” Well, things never really went as planned. “I’m sorry.” For that, for what had happened. Even if it turned out Summer was alive here, she had gone most her life thinking her mother dead and now her mother just...didn’t even know who she was. And who even knew in the Dreams. So that was all she could say. That she was sorry.
“You have nothing to apologize for,” Ren assured her. It wasn’t as if Ruby could control the dreams. In fact, Ren appreciated the fact that she had mentioned it, so that he wouldn’t be blindsided in the same way he had been when he’d dreamed of Kuroyuri. As much as he regretted being behind everyone else in the dreams, he did appreciate the fact that he generally had some warning for the big things, like when Pyrrha had been killed. “Thank you.”
It seemed that Ruby was always giving vague warnings in weird places…. Telling Weiss about how she’d be sent back to Atlas while they were fighting giant animals. Warning Ren about Kuroyuri while they were supposed to be studying for finals. But that seemed to be the way of Orange County if she even brought it up. It never had come up with Pyrrha and that was one of the things she struggled more to talk about.
“You’re welcome.”