She Has Company

Ruby laid there, eyes closed, the grass beneath her embracing her back while her cloak draped over her front. Her chest steadily rose and fell as she tried to regain her breath. As soon as she caught her breath, Ruby planned to get back to the task at hand: finding the rest of her clothes. She had a feeling things would go a lot smoother for her now that she had her cloak back. At the very least, she wouldn't be running around completely naked anymore, which she considered a major win. Mentally, she was praising herself for how well she handled herself there, not letting a little setback like a large, unscalable tree keep her from her beloved cloak.

That stopped the moment she heard a twig snap. Her blood ran cold. Yet, it seemed there was nothing she could do. It seemed to take all the energy she could muster just to open her eyes and sit up. And even then, she hadn't really gotten her eyes all the way open, they were half-lidded at best. Her cloak was clutched to her chest, the rest of it draped down her middle and pooled over her lap, Ruby's free hand holding it there, covering everything important. Even still, she was sure it was blatantly clear that she was naked, which gave her a harrowing thought. If that sound really was another round of Grimm, there was no way she would be able to defend herself. Visions of her body being found naked in the woods, made a spectacle of because no one knew her story, maybe even made into a fairytale - the naked spirit of the forest - or something... She felt her face heat up, her breath still wild. The bushes before her rustled, and Ruby couldn't help herself, letting out a weak, quiet squeal, expecting the worst. Instead, she was greeted by the visage of Nora Valkyrie.

"Hhheeey, Ruby," Nora said, a grin spreading across her face. With a flurry of movement that could rival Ruby's semblance, Nora had her scroll in her hand in a second flat, her finger quickly hitting a button rapidly, while Ruby just sat there dumbfounded, unsure of what Nora could be doing. After all, since the CCT tower fell, the scrolls were more or less useless. They were pretty much only glorified cameras anymore... When that thought dawned on her, Ruby's blush deepened, and her face seemed to resemble a deer in headlights. Ruby was about to open her mouth, tell Nora to stop, when she seemed to do it of her own volition, dropping the hand that held her scroll to her side. Nora had a look on her face that seemed to scream "I know what you are doing," like she had just caught her friend with her hand in the cookie jar. "Did I interrupt something?" Nora laughed a little.

If possible, Ruby's face felt like it grew even hotter. She was sure if someone tried, they could cook something on her face in just a couple minutes. "It- it's not," Ruby tried, stumbling over her words. "It's not what it looks like!" She practically screamed the last part. The beaming look on Nora's face told her that she didn't believe her, it was too much to look at. Ruby couldn't look her friend in the eye, not while her friend was so gleefully focused on her, not while she was essentially naked before her friend in a more-than-a-little compromising position.

Feeling her friend's eyes drinking in her essence, committing this scene to memory, Ruby felt like she was drowning in her own embarrassment. So much so that she couldn't help what came out of her mouth or how it sounded, "Why are you even here?" It came out almost inaudible, sounding grumbled and disappointed.

Nora's incandescent glow lessened as she considered the question, cupping her chin in her hand as if straining to remember. "Oh yeah! When you started taking too long to get back, Ren said that one of us should go check on you. I tried to make Jaune do it, but then Jaune was all like 'What if it's a lady-thing that's making her take so long?' So then Ren said I had to do it. I tried to argue that you were fine, and then Ren said if I didn't go looking for you he wouldn't make me any pancakes for the next month! Can you believe that - crazy talk, right?" Nora said, voice practically pleading for Ruby to agree.

"Yeah... uh, that sounds... terrible," Ruby managed to get out, her voice only a little louder than before.

"I know, right?" Nora said, beaming again. A smile plastered back on her face. "But, I guess it is a good thing Ren sent me and not Jaune." Nora laughed, loud and heartily. "This probably would've melted his brain." Ruby wasn't too sure where her thoughts on the matter laid. On one hand, she knew she didn't want Jaune to see her like this. But on the other, she wasn't too sure Jaune finding her like this would be any worse than Nora finding her like this, after all Jaune probably would've been just as shocked as she was, and he definitely wouldn't have taken a picture like Nora just had...

"You know, I didn't think anything was wrong when I went looking for you," Nora said, suddenly much more serious. "But a little while ago, I heard a bunch of gunshots and I got kind of worried you were being attacked. Especially when I saw you weren't at the lake back there, but then I heard another gunshot, and I saw a shadow fly across the sky, and when I looked up at what it was - I saw you!" Nora said excitedly. "I saw you all nekkid and happily soaring in the sky. Look, I even managed to get a picture of you!" Ruby felt her heart drop into the pit of her stomach as her friend swiped through the pictures on her phone finding the exact one she wanted to show before turning the scroll around so Ruby could see. Sure enough, she saw herself. Judging by how her hair was flying above her head, Nora must have taken the picture while she was descending. The scroll had captured Ruby in all her glory. The shattered moon was in the background, while Ruby made up the foreground. Her eyes were closed, a light smile dancing across her face, as her assets were subject to the **** of the air current washing over her. The moon's light had covered her like a spotlight in the picture, making sure not an inch of her went unseen, from her precious rubies to her hidden valley. It was all right there, her in all her glory, perfectly captured on display in astoundingly high definition. She could even spot the goosebumps that washed over her skin and the rigidness of her nipples... Ruby's mouth opened and closed many times but words eluded her. Finally after what felt like years to her, she managed to **** her voice to work. "You have to delete all those!" Ruby yelled, clutching her cloak even tighter to her skin, hoping to preserve what dignity she still had in front of her friend. She thought her request would work, after all Nora was reasonable, wasn't she?

"Nope!" Nora declared, holding her scroll protectively, as if Ruby was about to jump her for it.

Ruby's mouth dropped open. "Wha- why not?"

"Because," Nora said proudly, "it's going to be my new background Ruby's heart started to pound so loud, she almost couldn't hear Nora's explanation. "Or, to be more specific, the one of you in the sky is going to be my background, I mean, you saw it didn't you? It looks a-may-zing." She said. "The other one," Nora said, sliding through a couple more pictures, all various shots of her in differing quality, to show her the one she had just taken, also in high definition and seemingly depicting her caught in a rather... intimate act, "will be my lock screen!" Nora's pointer touched her chin again in deep thought. "Or maybe the other way around? I don't know yet, but they're too good to just delete!"