Oh My Soul
Part 2 – Chapter 8
The rushing noise of panicked silence suddenly became a symphony of roaring voices that Oscar almost slammed his hands over his ears.
As if it would also stop the screaming inside his head.
"Where is she!?" Someone near yelled.
"What happened?!" Someone else yelled louder.
Oscar spared a glance at Ozpin: he hadn't even looked up from the device as he was stabbing it to work through the information he now had.
The man's expression had hardened from neutrality and Oscar wondered if they should be afraid.
Ozpin looked from the device then handed it back to Glynda.
"I can answer the where part." Ozpin started, looking from them to Glynda. "Glynda, tell whoever originated the mission, its status report that I want a full rundown and what the cause is. Come find me when they do." He ordered.
Glynda nodded, then went about carrying out her orders.
"You can do that?" Qrow asked.
Oh good, Oscar wasn't the only one confused.
Ozpin looked back to Qrow and nodded.
"It will take time. It will be faster if Glynda stays here. While that is happening: I can take you to Miss Rose." Ozpin stated, then with wasting no time: headed for the exit of the hall.
Everyone, aside from Glynda, bolted, and nearly tripped over themselves in catching up to him.
Oscar was lost as soon as the man left the grounds that he was familiar with, taking a right, instead of a left, and Oscar suddenly had no idea where they were going, or where they were heading.
"She's at Beacon's hospital?" Yang asked as they came closer to a free-standing building.
"Why didn't you get notified earlier? They must have transferred her from somewhere else?" Qrow was asking next.
"The mission, from what I can tell from the preliminary report, was logged outside of Beacon. Most likely in Mistral, seeing as that's where Miss Rose agreed to it. Her mission status came alongside it because, in all likelihood, when they transferred her, her Scroll was turned on for Identity and was hit with a closer range Wi-Fi signal." Ozpin explained as he power-walked towards the building.
Everyone was walking way faster than he was, every two steps of theirs, and he was jogging to keep up.
"How long has she been here?" Oscar asked when he thought he had the breath to do so.
Oscar frowned when everyone, but Ozpin jumped and stared at him in surprise. It was as if everyone, aside from the man he had just met, seemed to remember he was still present.
"That is something I will be finding out shortly, Oscar." Ozpin told him as they entered the building Oscar could assume was the hospital.
Oscar could sympathise with the nurses when they turned to greet them, only for them to meet a group of Huntsman, all of them armed, and most of them looked severally pissed off.
Yeah, he could get why they stalled.
But he was surprised when one nurse sighed in relief at seeing them.
"I was sure our most recent was contracted to Beacon, I swore I was sure I had seen her before." She said in relief.
Oscar thought this one nurse deserved an award when they all turned to look at her, at she didn't back down as her peers did.
"Her Scroll once powered enough to turn on again said her I.D. was Ruby Rose. Is that who you're here for?" She asked.
Oscar decided he should make the award be about being the most efficient.
Ozpin was the first to step forward. "Indeed. Can you lead us to her?" He asked politely, while the rest seemed to stare, dumbfounded.
She grinned happily. "Of course! This way!" She answered, then trotted down the hall.
She left behind her stunned workmates and made them all nearly trip over each other when she left.
As soon as the head nurse made her way down a series of halls, up an elevator, into a ward, she suddenly rounded on them, making all the children hunters nearly fall over her when they tried to abort fast pacing, it made Ozpin and Qrow halt and Oscar resorted into jumping up onto the chairs along the walls to save himself from crashing into Weiss as they all fanned out across the hallway.
"Since hospital policy only will allow three at one time until her condition is known: I'll tell you what we know so far since she came to us." She started.
They all nodded, grateful to have anything.
Oscar, seeing a space, jumped off the chair.
"We know when she was brought in that she had a mission, yet not the specifics," At that she looked to Ozpin. "I would be grateful for the full report since it could help identify causes." She asked.
Ozpin nodded. "You'll have it as soon as I do." He told her politely.
She blinked in astonishment before a look of realisation took over. "Ah, right, The CCT is down…" She muttered, then shrugged. "Still, it's hard to determine causes without it, especially with Huntsmen, since you guys seem to bounce back most times from just about anything. We are, of course, unsure if before she was brought in if she had anything major, such as old splints, sprains or breakages," She paused when she saw all of them flinch worse at each word, and even more so at the last one. "Of if she was able to heal those on her way here: she had none currently." She told them softly.
Oscar saw that Nurse's words didn't seem to elevate their confusion. At all. If anything, it made it worse.
"Then explain why she is here." Ozpin asked, somehow sternly yet neutrally at the same time.
"Because she will not wake up. Even with a steady heart rate, no deformities in her brain patterns, and only slightly hindered breathing." She told him. "Hence why I would like to determine a cause to be able to seek the right treatment." She added, then swept over them all again, not unkindly.
"Now, she hasn't responded to outside stimuli. But don't let that stop you from talking to her, even vocalising your thoughts to her might even help, even if we're incapable now to know if she can here." She mentioned and smiled when she saw them nod, she turned to Ozpin.
"I assume they're all underage, even if they're Huntsmen, and I doubt they're all related? One of you," She pointed from Ozpin to Qrow. "Will need to stay with the other two. Once we know what's wrong, we might be able to let more people visit at one time." She added, as if in afterthought in a mind running five miles ahead.
Qrow nodded.
"We'll take it from here." Qrow told her.
The nurse nodded, looking grateful. "Feel free to call me if you need me." She told them, then walked back up the hall, going back to her other patients on call.
They all looked to Ozpin for direction.
"Oscar." The man called, suddenly.
Oscar looked as startled as he could before he worked his way between Jaune and Nora. "Yes?" He asked as soon as he could see Ozpin directly.
Ozpin looked at him. "I think you should be one of the first to see her." Ozpin started.
This made Oscar blink in surprise. "Seriously? But Yang—?" Oscar started as he looked at Yang and was confused as to why Yang didn't look alarmed at being excluded, or that surprised.
"Miss Xiao Long is indeed related to Miss Rose, but I think her time can be better spent currently trying to contact her father." Ozpin reminded.
Yang blinked and looked as if she just remembered something.
"Crap! With the Tower down, he won't've been notified properly! I'll go try and call him!" Yang said, then waved as she ran down the hall towards the exit.
"That'll be a first…" Qrow muttered, somewhat darkly.
Ozpin looked to him with a frown that broke through his neutral expression but safely left it alone for looking at the children.
"Qrow and I can switch out." Ozpin told them.
Oscar noted that none of them looked surprised, nor were they confused about this.
Ozpin looked back to Qrow.
"Qrow?" He questioned as he went towards the door.
Qrow nodded and gently scuffed the back of Oscar's head. "Come along, Pipsqueak. We don't have all day to sort through all the other kids." Qrow reminded as Ozpin opened the wardroom door and left it open once he disappeared into the room.
Oscar closed the door behind himself, taking note that all the other doors in the hall were closed.
Then he turned around and wholly wasn't prepared to see what he saw.
"Ruby…" He breathed quietly in worry.
She was still in her hospital bed, wearing nothing red at all.
She was never still.
She was always moving about, even in her sleep! He knew because she often woke him with a slap or a kick somewhere on his person.
The stillness she had now unnerved him, but it was seeing her hooked up to the respirator and every other monitoring system that made it even worse.
He must have stumbled because suddenly Ozpin was grasping his upper arm.
"She will be alright, Oscar." Ozpin said gently, as he made sure he moved Oscar over to a chair in the room.
"She can't even breath by herself." Oscar muttered faintly as he collapsed into the offered chair.
Qrow, by now, had retreated to the furthest wall away from Ruby and was warily watching the machines nervously.
"I guess we can say it could have been much worse." Qrow put forth.
Oscar didn't understand the meaningful glance the man gave Ozpin.
But Ozpin nodded as he lent his cane on the side of Oscar's chair then he wandered over to the other side of the room to peer out of the window.
"That much is true. She is under no medication, nor is she in any physical pain." Ozpin mentioned.
Oscar could gather Ozpin relayed this for his own benefit.
Even if Oscar could see where the adults were coming from, Ruby was still unconscious.
And that, that, left a foul taste in his mouth.
She was so still.
He couldn't get over how still she was.
"She's so still…" He repeated out loud.
Like his mind was on the verge of too much information, and on a loop.
Both men looked to him curiously.
"What do you mean?" Ozpin asked curiously.
Oscar looked at him
"Well, she's always moving or doing something. She's whacked me enough times to wake me up that I know for sure that she'd whack all those machines off their stands if she was just sleeping." Oscar told them.
Qrow didn't know whether to settle on laughing or being slightly protective over the fact Oscar knew her sleeping habits, even been close enough to her asleep to know how she would react.
Ozpin sided his head neutrally curiously. "How did this occur?" He questioned.
Oscar just groaned and slumped into his chair.
"Happened during winter because I kinda—maybe—sort of banned her from sleeping in the barn. She said it was nearest the door, I said it was a death wish in winter. Which it is, by the way, in case you've never spent a winter in Mistral's rural areas." Oscar grumbled.
Qrow settled, and he lost the tensive in his shoulders.
"She got you good, huh?" Qrow asked as he laughed.
Oscar crossed his arms in annoyance. "I'm just glad she couldn't reach her scythe in her sleep." Oscar muttered.
/
/
"Uh, Professor Ozpin?" Blake's voice asked from the door.
They all looked at her.
"Um. Goodwitch came by to give your tablet to us. She would've stayed, but there's something going on back at camp that she said she could handle on her own." Blake offered.
Ozpin nodded. "Thank you, Miss Belladonna." He told her gratefully, having some idea why the tablet was back he motioned that both Qrow and Oscar follow him back out to the hall.
He noted that Oscar didn't pick his cane up, so he made sure to take it with him on his way out.
Oscar was and still is, a curious entity he watched curiously.
He'd try again later, to see if there was a reaction to him or not.
As soon as Weiss saw Ozpin, she gave his tablet back to him.
Ozpin booted the machine up and waited for the machine to start working, as the rest spilled out around him nervously.
"Did you get word from Tai?" Qrow asked quietly.
Oscar looked up to see that Yang had come back.
Yang made a derisive-angry noise, and her nose was scrunched up.
"I left a response on his Scroll." She grumbled in annoyance.
Qrow patted her on the head. "Sorry, Firecracker." He told her sadly.
Yang angrily waved him off, glaring at her Scroll, before she even shoved that down into her pocket.
They were rightfully nervous when they saw the small frown appear on Ozpin's face.
"The mission seems very usual," Ozpin started to read. "The reason she had to put her credentials forward, and not do it anonymously was that the mission stated for Beacon I.D.'s only. Had it not asked, I can assume that Miss Rose would have done it without putting her name down. Therein we would not know of this transgression at all, had it gone any differently." Ozpin continued to think out loud.
He could assume things from what Oscar had told him about Ruby's comings and goings from his place. Her continuous need to return to Mistral – they were most likely a way for her to keep up lien when she was staying with Oscar.
And a way to retreat when things became too much for her to handle.
"Why would she be doing missions anonymously?" Weiss questioned with her side to one side.
"Most likely because she remembered every conversation they had, and she wasn't sure if it was safe to alert anyone watching to where she was, or what she was doing." Qrow pondered.
Ozpin hummed thoughtfully. "I would assume that would be her thinking, yes," Ozpin answered, then he looked up to find Oscar. "Oscar, did she take routine trips into Mistral?" He asked.
Oscar looked a little confused at all.
But he shrugged nonetheless.
"I could never ascertain a routine if she even had one: she left when she said she was about out of ammo, leave for a few days, never longer than seven, then come back as if nothing happened." Oscar summarised.
Oscar watched as the two teams looked at each other with a softer look that almost look sad.
It was the same expression Ruby had when he first met her.
The one he never understood.
"If she knew she needed to be on contract, with her I.D. out, why not contact us, if she didn't know it was safe, so we could help her?" Yang asked, her tone completely miffed.
"…Did she not think we'd help?" Blake muttered bitterly.
"Hey, no." Weiss started, putting a hand on her shoulder. "I'm sure that wasn't what was going on in Ruby's head." She insisted heatedly.
"She was admitted with her Scroll out of power." Ozpin noted from memory.
Qrow looked to Oscar.
"Did she charge her Scroll when she stayed with you?" He asked.
Oscar's nose scrunched up. "What's a Scroll?" He asked.
Qrow made a derisive noise. "There's your answer kiddos, she was probably only using hers limitedly, and it probably only lasted long enough to accept the contract and its location." Qrow told them.
It was a terrible way to live.
"What was the mission for?" Jaune asked curiously.
"A standard Grimm clear out in nearby surrounding Vale. Why they only asked for one Huntsman in the current climate, I intend to find out. Aside from that, it was standard and routine. And with Miss Rose's prowess with Grimm: she would have well returned with the timeframe she gave herself to return to Mistral." Ozpin said, having gone back to reading over the report.
They all looked at each other.
"Okay, so if it was …standard, and routine, or whatever, why is she in a coma?" Oscar asked, his tone strung and confused.
"That is a good point…" Ren conceded.
Looking to Ozpin, told them he wasn't finished reading the entire report, seeing as they could see his eyes still reading through the text.
"It seems that she was able to clear out the amount specified for the village who made the contract. But it seems she caught the attention of bandits." Ozpin read.
With how flashy Crescent Rose could be, it was no doubt it caught someone's eye.
Even with how trained Ruby was, she still wasn't a full-fledged Huntress.
At the bandit comment, several flinched.
"Raven's?" Yang was quicker to ask first in an angered hiss.
"The offered description of them does not match the Branwen's clan," Ozpin ignored Qrow's flinch. "However, you would not be incorrect in your assumption at first." Ozpin replied.
They waited for further information when his eyes stalled at whatever came up next in the report.
"Oz?" Qrow questioned in slight worry.
"Well? How'd she fight the bandits off?" Yang asked hurriedly.
They paused when Ozpin looked up to look at them. "The report describes her fight leading to her emitting a bright silver light and the bandits fleeing." Ozpin explained.
"Silver eyes." Oscar blurted out, not having any thought to mouth filter, then blinked in embarrassment when they all looked at him in surprise.
"Sorry, it was literally the first thing I noticed that was her weapon being pointed at my head." Oscar muttered.
They all looked at each other, with varying amounts of surprise and amazement showing.
"…He is correct in that matter. It does seem that she has unlocked that certain ability. And with Miss Rose having no aptitude over her abilities, or her ability to control or use it correctly, it certainly could be the cause of her sudden stasis." Ozpin continued.
"So…You're saying she put herself to sleep? …Again?!" Yang asked incredulously.
Qrow chuckled at Yang. "Seems so." He muttered.
Ozpin was looking back towards Ruby's ward door. "Though it should not be this severe…" He voiced in confusion.
Qrow blinked, then after a second, looked as if he understood what Ozpin was meaning.
"True. At worst she should've just fainted. Now, Ruby's not even able to fully breathe on her own." Qrow worried.
"I will go find her nurse to give this report to, perhaps she can enlighten us to other medical reasons," Ozpin noted, then looked to Qrow. "Qrow." He said in warning.
Qrow nodded seriously when he saw Ozpin motion scarcely to Oscar before he left down the hall.
Then he looked back to Oscar. "You can go back to Ruby, if you want. I'll be along shortly." Qrow said.
Oscar really wasn't about to argue, so he nodded and slipped back into Ruby's wardroom.
As if closing the door behind him would help keep the confusion out.
/
/
Oscar noted that aside from immediate family, that being Yang and Qrow. …He heard Yang yelling into her Scroll, to whom he could assume was her and Ruby's dad, something about the man needed to be here, and the man arguing the opposite. …Yeah, fathers were weird like that.
Not that Oscar knew much about them, since his died protecting him and his mother from Grimm. But he doubted their father was going to turn up the next day if the shouting match was much to go on.
Aside from the shouting match that went on, outside of Yang and Qrow, it was only him and Ozpin that had unlimited access. He assumed anyway since her teammates and friends seemed to be on a five-minute turnaround in the room that they spent rotating every so often, per hospital rule.
No one seemed to be about to ask Oscar to step out to allow another person to come in for a few minutes.
He really did wonder why they allowed him to stay since he was literally a stranger to all of them, and he certainly wasn't family.
He was just some farm boy Ruby decided to stick with.
Why she decided on him of all people, he had no clue.
Oscar was thrown out of his mind when he suddenly heard rain hitting the window hard.
"Huh. Now I'm kinda glad Ruby's out of it." Oscar said.
Yang, who was in mid-conversation with Qrow, paused and looked at him.
"Why's that?" She questioned in confusion.
Oscar looked away from the window to look at Yang, then to Ruby, who hadn't moved an inch, not even a flinch at the rain.
"She hates storms," Oscar explained, over the lashing of hard rain, and saw that this time both Yang and Qrow flinched at the meaning. They probably knew why. "She always seemed to have nightmares when it stormed, always yelling out for someone she couldn't find or reach." Oscar said.
He hated when Ruby had nightmares because it tore at something inside him that he didn't know he had before Ruby came into his life, and it made his eyes water and his heartache. "But she never cried. …I'm not entirely sure if it's because she ran out of tears, or she got over it." Oscar explained to them.
"Believe me, Kiddo," Qrow started, his tone sad and it made Oscar look to him. "She never got over it." Qrow said sadly.
"Oh…" Oscar muttered nearly inaudibly.
Qrow had that odd look about him again, while Yang was clutching her opposite arm with a sort of displaced sadness, he couldn't place its reason.
Hearing that she never got over it, whatever it was, tore at him just that little bit more.
And he knew he wasn't okay.
None of these people were.
Ruby most of all.
./.
Ozpin looked up from his tablet to look across the wardroom: he took in Ruby's stillness, and he took in Oscar's whole demeanour screaming out dejection.
He recalled speaking to the nurse, recounting the mission she had been on, on what he surmised what Ruby did, should not have caused the rate of comatose Ruby suddenly found herself in.
"Was she at the Battle of Beacon?" She had asked at the time.
Ozpin found himself blinking at the question.
Ruby? Naturally, she had been. Two of them had been there.
Ozpin nodded, rather than answer the question truthfully with words that would have confused her.
"If that's the case, did she see someone die? Perhaps in front of her…? Or someone that was close to her?" She had continued to ask.
"She lost someone." Ozpin had said to her.
He looked from Oscar's hunched over form, and Ruby's unnatural stillness.
Neither of them should be like that.
"Where they close?" She questioned gently.
"Miss Ruby!"
"Oscar!"
He looked from his cane that was leaning against his chair, back to Oscar across the room.
"They should have been."
And now he feared, they never would again.
They should have been.
And now? Now they were running out of time.
Ozpin mentally shook his head and got up, taking his cane with him when he was suddenly filled with agitated energy.
"Oscar." He called, urgently.
Oscar looked up at him immediately.
"Yes?" He asked.
"How about we go and get some air? This can't be good for us," Ozpin paused seeing the conflicted look return over the boy's — he was too young for this! — face. "Be rest assured, we will return. We won't stay away long." Ozpin told him gently.
Oscar relented, nodded, and followed Ozpin out of the room.
./.
Oscar let Ozpin lead the way since the Professor probably knew the place better than he did. Oscar's knowledge of the hospital pertained to Ruby's wardroom, the nearest bathroom and when the staff came around to offer him food and drink. Something of which he didn't need to pay for, since when he asked it was "taken care of.", whatever that meant. Heaven forbid Ruby needed it anytime soon since Oscar wasn't exactly sure he could validate it as food, or even where it came from. If she ever woke up, it would be one of the first things he did, find its source.
Oscar followed Ozpin into what he assumed was the break room for the nurses, where off to the side of the room full of couches was a kettle and some wrapped biscuits on a plate. Seeing Ozpin walk over to the kettle and start to use it, Oscar followed as well. He noted the man probably ran on whatever he filled his cup with.
Oscar had never seen Ozpin sleep, or even think to say he was going to retire in any form: he just always had that neutral calm facial expression that gave way to nothing that on more than one occasion he overheard the Huntsman he now knew wish they could punch off.
Oscar wasn't so sure even if they went about their threat could they wipe away the expression.
Oscar blared back in alarm when Ozpin held out his cane at him.
"Could you hold this?" Ozpin asked as the kettle started to whistle.
Oscar blinked, but it made sense Ozpin probably needed both his hands to finish what he was doing.
"Sure." He noted and took the cane to hold for him as he watched astonishingly the man went for the hot chocolate then looked back to him with a sort of perplexed-lost look that broke through the neutrality.
It was an odd look, even on Ozpin. Maybe whatever he was looking for, wasn't there anymore.
Ozpin mentally grumbled in annoyance.
Not that he would admit that he was annoyed it hadn't worked.
But, well, he was annoyed that giving the boy Memoria Pertuli hadn't worked like he'd envisioned it would.
Not that the boy knew it now, but they were both going to run out of time.
For her sake, they couldn't.
/
/
"Did the nurses tell you what they named her condition as?" Ozpin was suddenly asking.
Both Oscar and Qrow looked to him, from their usual spots in the room, Oscar in his chair with Ozpin's cane leaning against it, and Qrow was against the furthest wall away from any machine he could inflict harm upon.
Both shook their heads mutely.
"They have named her condition as an emotionally induced comatose state: and determined the cause to have developed from her inability to process through what she went through at the Battle of Beacon." Herein Qrow flinched badly.
Oscar thought that was fair since a dragon wasn't normal for anyone's day.
He had asked.
"As such, due to their referral of her case to a specialist in comas, I have been assured that once she has come to terms with what happened, she will wake. Her using her abilities was just the catalyst to send her under." Ozpin explained.
Qrow came off his wall, looking alarmed. "How—how do we even…? If! If us being here hasn't helped—?" Qrow lost his words in trying to explain, suddenly looking as pained as his words sounded.
Ozpin nodded gently. "Then we need to figure out a way to bring her back that thus far we have not tried. And quickly, mind you." Ozpin warned.
This caught Qrow's attention. "Why?" He asked worriedly.
Their alarm shot through the roof when they saw Ozpin uncharacteristically twitch.
"Due to the referral of the coma, the ruling is now in effect in policy that should a patient reliant on life support not improve within two weeks, are evaluated ineffectual, and shut off, if not without familial monetary support." Ozpin explained with a note of finality disapproval.
Qrow nearly put his hand through the wall trying to grasp it when he faltered in panic.
"Can't you—?!" Qrow exploded, then stalled in surprise seeing the glare Ozpin suddenly threw in his direction.
"If I could, I would. We cannot afford to intervene with Miss Rose. It would lead her to come under scrutiny she is better off not having put on her. If I knew I could, without consequence befalling her, help her, I would. Qrow, know and understand this, please." Ozpin said heatedly. "We are running out of time — we will be breaking our promise to both of them if we're forced to let her go before, we can get the chance to repay our debts." Ozpin added urgently.
Oscar looked between the two men in complete confusion for just about every single word they used made no sense to him.
Qrow suddenly looked calculative. "Yang finally got through to Tai. He's on his way here." Qrow noted.
Ozpin blinked in surprise that it took so long, to begin with. "Did Miss Xiao Long manage to relay when Taiyang would arrive?" He questioned.
"Before two weeks, I know that much." Qrow answered bitterly at the amount of wasted time.
Ozpin managed an exhausted sigh. "Then, perhaps, it might be best that when he does get here, to assume some favours from him. Then we can act without scrutiny." Ozpin put forth.
Qrow was suddenly laughing.
Wait, who was coming?
Oscar had lost track at this point.
But it was probably another Huntsmen.
Which meant another gun he needed to keep track of, yay.
By now, Oscar was starting to believe that Ozpin just randomly left his cane insight, and sometimes probably even forgot where he put it. Most times the man entered, came over to Oscar to ask some inquiry about Ruby's health since Oscar never left her side.
Since the nurses scamped as soon as they saw a Huntsmen coming down the hall, then proceeded to leave said cane by Oscar's side; no matter if Ozpin chose to stand by the bed or sit in the other chair across the room.
Like clockwork.
"What do you do while you're not here?" Oscar bravely asked, his curiosity finally getting the better of him.
Ozpin blinked at him.
It was like the man couldn't comprehend Oscar didn't know the answer to the question.
"Aside from being Beacon Academy's headmaster — I also now run the safety for Beacon's, and Vale's Safe Zones: I need to check in on it every now and again to make sure the Huntsmen there are looked after. No matter my wishes otherwise." Ozpin told him.
Oscar scrunched his nose up.
Yeah, he didn't know why he bothered. It made no sense.
Oscar also found out while waiting for Ruby to wake up that her two teams had shorthand names — RWBY and JNPR. Out of the two, he interacted more with RWBY, who seemed to confer with JNPR outside of the hospital, so they didn't crowd it. Something that they still did, even after the lax in ruling around how many could visit Ruby at one time.
He also found out with them coming and going that they all took shifts patrolling Beacon and Vale's Safe Zones, since the school wasn't even close to starting, something that Nora took great lengths to gloat about.
Oscar wasn't sure that it was a good idea to gloat about a dragon atop their school. But he wasn't a Huntsmen in any right.
If they confused him sometimes, then Ozpin with his most of the time neutrality-give-nothing-away attitude surely did. How he managed to run a school successfully, then in a manner of minutes forget where he put his cane was beyond Oscar's ability to understand. Sure, Oscar lost things, but he wasn't a Huntsman! And how the man never minded that he left the object anywhere astounded him!
/
/
"Can I ask a question?" Oscar asked.
It made Qrow and Yang look at him.
"Sure can, Kiddo." Qrow told him from his usual spot against the far wall.
"When I first met Ruby, she was sad," Oscar paused when he saw Qrow flinch loud enough that even Yang frowned questionably at him. "I asked her about it once. Because I wanted to know what I was doing that was making her sad, and you know, not do it. Maybe I asked too many questions, or maybe I was too similar. So, I asked her so I could avoid it." Oscar continued.
He looked between the two, Yang was still looking at her uncle silently yet loudly questioningly. Qrow had that look Oscar was coming to term as his kicking-himself-for-his-luck look.
Oscar could only assume that Qrow knew why she was sad, and most likely hadn't been able to do anything to help her.
"I asked if she lost someone." Oscar added and tried not to flinch when they both zeroed in on him in a second flat.
"Did she answer?" Qrow questioned, his tone was self-depreciatory.
Even Yang scrunched her nose up at his tone.
Oscar just nodded and looked back to Ruby. "She said she did," He stalled when Qrow let out a low breathy curse. "Ruby said it was recent. I don't think she realised I caught her looking sad, but it's kinda hard not to notice when she just kinda, you know, shuts down." Oscar explained.
Yang's look of self-loathing was back. The same with Qrow's bad luck look.
"I just…" Oscar failed to voice and looked down at his hands. "I just wanted to know why I was making her sad…" He tried to explain.
He hadn't meant to hurt her when he questioned her. He just wanted to avoid it, forever.
Qrow felt his shoulders slump as he sighed dejectedly then pulled himself away from the wall, taking in Oscar's depressed face.
"It's not something you could've avoided, Oscar," Qrow said, making Oscar look up from his hands, to stare at him. "And it's not something you could have changed, either." Qrow told him and couldn't help when Oscar's expression broke into so much pain, he half expected the boy to tear up.
With how much this Oscar looked like…
Well, himself.
This Oscar wasn't going to be able to change why Ruby looked at him sadly half the time.
He looked too much like himself.
/
/
"May I ask a favour of you?" Ozpin suddenly asked one day dangerously close to the end of the first week.
It wasn't that much later after Ozpin came in, dropping his cane by him, choosing this day to stand by Ruby's bedside, the one closest to Oscar this time around.
It was just the two of them this day, with Ruby not improving in the slightest.
"Sure…?" Oscar asked.
"Do you speak to her?" Ozpin asked curiously.
Oscar blinked as he sided his head. "Sometimes. I just repeat what the nurses tell me. Nothing seems to help though." Oscar added in a mutter, gesturing to Ruby, to the fact she was still as still as ever.
Ozpin was close enough to hear him.
"How do you address her?" He continued to ask.
Oscar frowned. "By…her name? Should I not be calling her by name?" He questioned, panic slowly rising in his gut.
Was that why everyone looked at him questioningly when he said her name? Was it some type of unspoken rule to call Huntsmen by their last name?! Was it more polite?! Was he being rude to her calling her by her given name?!
"The person that she lost referred to her by title, then by name. Perhaps you should try it." Ozpin suggested.
Oscar just felt his shoulders slump in defeat. "…Am I that similar to the person she lost?" He asked sadly.
"Do you really wish to know the answer to that?" Ozpin questioned him.
By his tone of voice, Oscar really didn't want a confirmation, so he shook his head, feeling suddenly defeated by someone he didn't even know.
"What…What did they call her?" He questioned sullenly.
"Mostly by single title and her first name," Ozpin explained in a roundabout way of not actually saying it.
Oscar sighed tiredly and warily, looking to Ozpin, who was still as neutral as ever, right now it was something Oscar wished he could possess instead of wearing his heart on his sleeve, like always.
He gave a small despairing nod.
"I will be refilling my mug, should you need me." Ozpin said gently and left him alone.
Oscar immediately groaned when he moved to rest his arms on his knees that he knocked into the hilt of Ozpin's cane.
Seriously, where was the rest of it?
He would need to return it to the man as soon as he made a fool of himself.
Anything to get her back, right?
Which apparently, didn't exclude him turning into someone else.
Oscar took the hilt in hand and stood up to walk closer to her bed.
He took a large, staggered breath in.
"Miss, then your first name, huh?" He pondered out loud for no one's benefit. His voice was riddled with so much sadness and pain he hardly recognised it. "Am I…? Am I really that similar? In…In that case… Miss Ruby? I must apologise." He took another breath in.
"I apologise for being so similar to the person you lost." He knew he was struggling when his eyes started to prickle with tears.
"But I won't believe you stuck around just for me to replace him. And I won't apologise for the time I was able to spend with you, Miss Ruby." He had to clear his throat when his voice failed him.
"You do need to wake up and tell me if you want me around though. I'd hate to cause you any more pain than I already have. If—If I have? Then I apologise again, so much." Oscar said quietly, quickly wiping his eyes when the tears tried to escape down his face.
He paused again to struggle to breathe in again.
"Maybe you're wondering if you've ever caused me pain? If so, you don't need to worry, you've never done it." Oscar tore his eyes from her form to the hilt he was grasping onto as if his life depended on it at that moment.
"I need…to give this back to Ozpin now. …I'll, I'll see you soon." Oscar told her, then retreated out of her room as quietly as he could.
He told himself he wasn't sobbing as he lent against the wardroom door as one arm came up to fold over his eyes, the other hand limp against his side as he clutched Ozpin's cane painfully.
But as his emotions ran away from him, he could definitely hear himself sobbing, lacking in oxygen.
It was too hard to keep inside.
Oscar sniffed, shook his head, and found the remaining strength he had to push away from the door, desolately, then left down the hallway to find Ozpin to return his cane to.
It hurt.
It hurt so much.
Why did it hurt so much?
Why did it hurt so much to be compared to someone else he had never met?
First with his aunt, with her trying to find his father in him, only to give up.
Now with Ruby, trying to find the person she lost through him, did she give up to?
His feet felt more and more like led as he moved away from her.
His eyes prickled from phantom pain from that area just behind his eyes that always seemed to throb painfully when she was in as much pain as he was in.
He found through all of this, that he wasn't okay, either.
He wasn't surprised that he met Ozpin halfway in the hallway, he couldn't bear himself to actually be surprised the man was without his mug.
Ozpin noted his expression and patted his shoulder gently, consolingly.
Oscar didn't bear to look up from staring at the clutched hilt, his fingers absentmindedly running through the motif engravings.
"Do you wish to go back?" Ozpin asked gently.
They looked like rose vines.
His fingers etched into an indent just under the pull mechanism that didn't belong there.
Oscar nodded as he sniffed, he could spare a wish to hope that he wasn't loud enough for Ozpin to hear him.
"I tried—I tried doing what you said, and, and…" Oscar failed to even attempt to get out as he hiccupped and brought his spare hand up to wipe his eyes again.
Oscar felt Ozpin pat his shoulder again, and gently turn him back around so he could walk in the right direction.
It would never be Ruby's fault.
He then heard Ozpin's gasp of surprise.
Oscar was only barely able to look up before he was swamped so suddenly by someone just a little taller than him, wearing all white.
Someone with black and red-tipped hair.
Someone who was crying just as much as he was.
It felt as if the broken universe had gone still as her arms wrapped around his neck, then corrected itself just as fast as her body was crashing into his.
"Oscar!" That someone was yelling out.
"—Miss Ruby!"