4Ruby spends the elevator ride down from Ozpin's office in stunned, horrified silence. Initially she'd planned to get information out of the man once she'd regained her bearings, but had been requested to leave as he "had preparations to make" and she "should get started on her weapon".
'Secretive old wizard.'
Though despite her silence and confusion, her thoughts have been surprisingly single-minded. Focussed on one, solitary sentence. "Welcome to Beacon, miss Summer Rose." The sentence plagues her mind, rolling through her head as she makes her way from Ozpin's office towards the guest dorms, a poisonous cascade that Ruby just can't figure out.
'Was he wrong? Was I wrong? Does he think I'm mom, not me? Did he ask mom the same question? Was she a physics prodigy like I am?' It certainly made sense if he thought as much, in Ruby's mind. At seventeen she looked, according to her dad and uncle Qrow, like the mirror image of Summer Rose—it was part of the reason her dad gave her Summer's cloak.
But… 'Νο that can't be, he specifically mentioned not to use a scythe, which means he knows I did before I came back in time…'
'But... maybe mom did too—maybe the reason dad and Qrow told me mom didn't use a scythe, though looked like a natural whenever she used Qrow's, was because she came back in time and Ozpin told her not to use it?'
Ruby sighs softly, glancing up from her feet underneath her cloak for the first time in almost ten minutes—thankful for the lack of students at the school at the time. Ruby gives a soft snort at the thought—despite Blake's best efforts, while Ruby was certainly significantly more graceful and had faster reaction timings than she had at fifteen, she was still a "clumsy oaf", as Weiss put it, when distracted.
She stopped suddenly, a thought coming to her mind. If Summer Rose also came back in time, around the same time Ruby did—will she run into her mom? What sort of paradox would that cause, or really… just straight up confusion for the woman.
On that note what will Ozpin say, or what will his reaction be? His consciousness might be scattered across time, allegedly, but she knows that the man was still frequently surprised by events that Ruby feels he should've known about.
He certainly looked astonished when she'd discovered the virus that the woman at the CCTS tower infected Beacon's systems with in the second semester of her first year.
Ruby doesn't even realise she'd reached the dorms until she hears an annoyed grunt as she, quite literally, runs into someone's back. Looking up through her cloak, Ruby stills a little—'Professor Goodwitch…'
She'd been hoping for a bit more time before running into her—former—combat teacher again.
'And maybe not literally run into her.'
Glynda turns her body and head slightly to stare at the slightly smaller woman, her eyes fixed into the glare that looks so at home on the seventeen year-old woman's face that Ruby can't really be surprised that she was basically always glaring in her time.
"You know," Glynda drawls out, her voice as characterisingly authoritative as Ruby's used to, "we really do need to stop meeting each other like this." If possible, her eyes narrow further. "Not only were you incredibly impolite by running away without even a proper "goodbye", but you quite specifically ran into me."
"Uh—Guh—Buh…" Ruby stutters, much like when she'd seen the woman earlier. The confused stutter seemed to make Glynda lose all sense of seriousness on her face—her mouth tilts into a teasing grin that just did not look right on the woman's face and a giggle slips past her lips.
If Ruby's being honest, giggles sound weird coming from her.
"And what is that supposed to mean!"
'Oh crud, I didn't mean to say that out loud!'
Ruby quickly raises her hands in surrender, her head shaking violently as she tries to placate the woman. "I didn't mean that in a bad way!" she apologises, her voice much higher and squeakier than she'd intended. "I—I…" she stutters, her voice dropping back to the tone she'd grown used to as she aged. "I just meant… you look like you're super serious and I just… never expect giggles like that from that kind of person…" Even to her the excuse sounds lame and heavily like a lie.
"Oh, that makes sense… I guess."
Ruby glances up at Glynda in minor shock. She actually accepted that? 'That was such a terrible lie!'
Glynda shrugs, her lips still in that darn grin. "Tai, a… friend of mine, has told me the same thing before," she explains.
…'Tai? Dad?'
"Oh, uh…" Ruby gets out, her confused and flustered mind still finding itself incapable of forming more complex sentences. 'Were professor Goodwitch and dad friends? Did he ever mention her whenever he told Yang and I about his time in Beacon?' For the life of her Ruby can't remember—she'd always paid close attention whenever her dad talked about his days in Team STRQ and their time in Beacon, and she knew that he was good friends with professors Port and Oobleck, but she can't seem to recall him mentioning professor Goodwitch. 'Maybe they weren't actually very close friends? They could have… possibly been in different years? And just knew each other from Signal?'
It did make sense to Ruby that, if professor Ozpin had actually been expecting her mom—Summer—instead of her to travel back in time, that professor Goodwitch and her dad would've been in different academic years.
Glynda's posture seems to relax and the teasing grin fades into a much more kind one. "So, you never actually answered my question earlier." At Ruby's confused stare, she rolls her eyes. "Are you okay? You look like a stuttering and blushing mess, and if you need to go see one of the medics, it really shouldn't be an issue. Students shouldn't actually be arriving for a few more days, so the medics in the medical wing should be free to take a look at you."
Ruby furiously shakes her head and tries to collect her thoughts, keep herself from sounding too panicked. "N… No I'm alright, actually I uh…" she trails off, a faint blush dusting her cheeks. "I'd… actually just left the medical wing when we first bumped into each other, gravity Dust accident."
Glynda tilts a brow but decides to let her next question go. "So, you a new, homeless student like me or a returning student that had to come early?" she asks instead, and Ruby mentally curses herself. She'd forgotten all about Beacon's hosting free room for the time between a student's graduation from an entry combat school and their initiation at Beacon.
"Uh, yeah… the former."
"Oh! What primary school did you go to? Ι imagine I'd remember you from Signal and you certainly look Valean…"
"Uh... well…" Her response comes slow, trying to rack her brain for whatever info about her mom's pre-Beacon life she'd been told. Taiyang and Qrow didn't tell her or Yang about it a lot—their dad was the most open about his pre-Beacon life. But she does remember… "My parents and aunt are nomads, I uh… actually grew up outside the Kingdoms—I never went to a combat school."
She giggles softly at Glynda's shocked expression. 'To be fair,' Ruby thinks with a small grin, 'it's not very often you meet someone from outside the Kingdoms attending a secondary combat school.'
"Well…" Ruby hums, trying to shift her attention from Glynda. "I need to get to my room, so talk to you later G—"
"Oh Heavens me!" Glynda suddenly shouts, personal horror tinting her voice. "I never introduced myself! Oh I'm so sorry!"
She curtsies slightly, her head bowed. "My name is Glynda Goodwitch, upcoming first year at Beacon Academy. It's been nice meeting you, miss…?"
"Ru—" Ruby has to stop herself, blushing beneath her cloak when realising how awkward it'd be for her mom when she finally showed up if this woman thought her name was something it wasn't. She bows her head slightly and finally answers. "Summer Rose, pleased to meet you Glynda."
Ruby hums softly as she walks down the halls of the guest dorms, mentally counting them as she heads towards hers—'124, coincidentally the same room Em and her team stayed in for the Vytal Festival.'
She'd been truly grateful for the distraction Glynda had given her earlier—prior to running into the woman she'd walked for almost twenty minutes completely absentmindedly, her thoughts too focussed on the whole… 'Summer' issue. But thanks to Glynda, Ruby had needed to actually focus on something long enough for her to subconsciously remember Ozpin's words on how 'Time will make sure what needs to happen, happens'.
And really, now that she wasn't worrying too much on the 'Summer' issue, Ruby found herself smiling while opening her door and walking into her guest room. She gets to plan and forge a new weapon! It won't be Crescent Rose, sure—but Qrow had gotten her to learn how to use a scythe because physical combat wise it was similar in essence to what he remembered her mom's style to be. Medium range with quick close-range strikes before jumping back to act as ranged support.
If she's being honest, the only reason she'd even designed a sniper scythe was because of that last bit of information. She never knew what her mom's weapons were, Qrow and her dad never talked about 'em, but Ruby just… knew she could design something absolutely devastating using what Qrow had told her and what she herself knew.
And so, after sliding off her boots and hanging her cloak on the coat hook next to the door, Ruby slides into the chair at the desk and pulls a notebook and pencil that were… 'coincidentally' in her drawers to start her planning.
"Summer was always quick" Ruby idly remembers Qrow mentioning to her one day after he'd accepted her as an apprentice. "Speed semblance like yours, I think it actually might be hereditary, she said her mom had a speed semblance too."
'So something that would benefit from speed… short sword, maybe?'
"Scythe, huh? Well, it shouldn't be too surprising—Sum and I were the mid-range fighters of the team, though where I preferred to get in close when I needed to her close range combat was pretty hit and run."
'So not short swords' she concedes, grimacing slightly. 'Mid-range combat focus that allows for single strike close-range attacks… Bo-staff?'
"Sum was a demon when she was fighting Grimm" the memory of her dad mentioning rushes to her head. "She'd cleave her way through hoards within seconds, it was actually kind of terrifying!"
'"Cleave" he said… so, still a blade… hmm…'
Ruby sighs and glances down at the paper on her desk and stills, her eyes widening slightly. She'd not noticed that she had been doodling with her right hand, her Aura leaving marks in the paper.
Kusarigama.
'Are they… are they far enough away from being a scythe?' she ponders, glancing at the notes she'd written on the other side of the paper. 'A pair of swords that could connect to become a staff could work well en—'
Her right hand flew to her forehead and gripped it tightly as a sharp, sudden pain spiked through her being.
And as sudden as the pain came, it disappeared, leaving Ruby's vision a little blurry.
'Could that… could that have been what Ozpin meant?' she wonders, looking at her hand in confusion and back to the sheet of paper. But…
'What could I have been planning that would mess with time? I was just thinking of how to make these kusarigama…' Ruby shrugs slightly, sighing and grabbing a couple other sheets of paper from her desk—schematic sheets.
'Guess I should work on these plans… Only a week until initiation, and I'd really like to be at least familiar with the weapons in case mom doesn't show up until after initiation.'