Penny Polendina

Penny Polendina was a character who first appeared in the episode "The Stray". She was originally an android created by her father, Pietro Polendina, when he somehow gave her a part of his own Aura to grant her a soul. In "PvP", Penny was destroyed by her own weapons during her fight with Pyrrha Nikos. She returned in "The Greatest Kingdom" with a new look made by her father, who rebuilt her after the Fall of Beacon. Penny became the official protector of Mantle and eliminated Grimm that invaded the city. In "The Enemy of Trust" after a grueling battle with Cinder Fall, she became the Winter Maiden. In "Creation", she was transformed into a Human by Ambrosius when he created an exact replica of her using her robotic parts and blueprints. In "The Final Word", she was mortally wounded by Cinder and, upon requesting it, was killed by Jaune Arc so she could transfer the Maiden powers to Winter Schnee. Penny had short, rather curly orange hair that came down to her chin with a small cowlick on top, and she wore a pink bow on the back of her head. She also had bright green eyes, light skin, and freckles. She wore an off white old-fashioned styled off the shoulder blouse with frill detailed trim and frill flared cuffs that half covered her hands alongside copper button detailing on the lower parts of her sleeves. She also sported a short gray pinafore dress with golden trim on the hem alongside four light green stalagmite styled stripes on the lower half of the dress, two on the front and two on the back, accompanied by two matching colored circles above the tips that had a stripe that ran around her waistline, with golden outlines, and a detachable black and light green collar. She also wore a pair of black thigh-high leg pieces that seemingly were attached to black shoes. The leg pieces had a single green stripe up the sides that appeared to light up. She had a layer of synthetic skin that concealed her metallic structure and spherical joints, and her irises bore similarities to the shutter of a camera. The skin wasn’t strong and could be damaged revealing the metal under it as shown in A Minor Hiccup. She also wore a silver backpack that contained Floating Array, her weapon. During the Beacon Dance, Penny wore a short, light green, short-sleeved dress with a narrow black detailing around her waist, white collar alongside a pair of light green heels. After the Fall of Beacon, Penny was rebuilt by her father. Her hair was significantly longer and curled inwards at the tips and she wore a black fabric bow under a pink metal bow that had a golden outlined green power symbol. The ahoge remained and was more prominent. Penny wore an olive green German styled dress with a black hem that was striped with emerald green. The abdominal region was black with four golden buttons with matching buckles on her shoulder straps. She also wore an off white blouse with puffy shoulders, frilled flared cuffs and vertical black lining down the front centre. Her collar piece did away with the green accents and was instead finished with a black ribbon, another power button at its center that switched on and off when Penny was inactive or active as shown in "Out in the Open". Penny had black metal leg pieces that ran up to her thighs, both having a green stripe that ran down the sides, with a large green circle at the top and a small one at the bottom, both outlined with gold and capable of lighting up too. The knee pieces of her legs were heavily defined to look separate from the rest of the leg pieces. She had a trio of jets in the lower rear part of her leg pieces that granted Penny the ability of flight. She also wore a pair of black low heeled metal boots with the tops hidden by the lower part of her leg pieces. In addition she also wore a pair of black lacy cuffed gloves with golden stud detailing on the knuckles. She also retained her silver backpack on her back carrying Floating Array. In Volume 8, the palm of her gloves were spray painted black to conceal her metallic structure after her fight with Cinder. Later when she was damaged after being hacked for the first time, Penny was shown to bleed green coolant in the place of blood. Penny was amiable, excitable, kind and curious. It was stated that Penny got a lot of her attitude from her father. She often showed a distinct lack of social awareness, likely due to not having a lot of experience with Human nature. When Ruby made an unconditional offer of friendship, Penny seemed both immensely pleased and somewhat surprised. Another small quirk was that Penny hiccuped whenever she told a lie. She was also really excited when Ruby Rose offered her a fist-bump in A Night Off, an action that nobody had ever offered to her and wanted to do it perfectly. She also seemed to place great value on friendship, for she was greatly angered at the sight of Ruby being knocked down by Roman Torchwick's flare in "Black and White". She also placed trust in Ruby based on the latter promising that she was her friend in "A Minor Hiccup". Furthermore, Penny seemed to be immensely curious. Upon hearing that Blake Belladonna had run away, she proceeded to ask Ruby numerous questions, all related to Blake and friendship in general. Despite being told not to wander off, Penny still wandered Vale on her own. Penny occasionally showed insecurities about her artificial nature. Upon confiding in Ruby that she was a synthetic being, Penny was worried about how she would take the news. However, after seeing Ruby took it rather well, she was glad that Ruby did not seem to care that she was really a machine, for what truly mattered was her heart and soul. In "Dance Dance Infiltration", Penny was shown to enjoy dancing as she danced by herself between two Atlas Soldiers. Later that night, she did "the Robot" with one of the soldiers. Penny's most notable trait was her kindness. Upon meeting Team RWBY, she greeted them with a jovial "Salutations!", complimented Weiss' hair, and offered to help Ruby track down Blake. In addition, she once saved Ruby from a truck before she asked the driver if he was okay, thanked Team CRDL during the Vytal Festival for the time she had, and told Pyrrha in the finals that it was a pleasure to finally meet her. Despite Atlas and Mantle originally being hesitant of Penny, she still worked as their proud protector. Penny's more peculiar social quirks appeared to tone down as the series progressed. While earlier appearances had her depicted as cheery, curious, and unfamiliar with many aspects of social interaction, these aspects appeared to diminish with each subsequent appearance; by the time of the Vytal Festival, Penny was barely distinguishable from her former self's naivete and volatile emotional state, sharing a conversation with Ruby about both her plans to stay at Beacon, despite her teammate Ciel Soleil objecting due to running short on time. Penny was apparently very perceptive, for she saw through Blake's disguise and recognized that she was a Faunus while most people did not. She could also spot both Joanna Greenleaf and May Marigold in "Sparks", even though the latter was using her Semblance to hide them. After she learned that James Ironwood planned to leave Mantle to die in "Gravity", she started to question if what the military was doing was actually right and was horrified that she and Winter Schnee had to kill the current Winter Maiden for Ironwood's plan to work. In "Refuge", she confided to Ruby about her worries, telling her that she was going through an identity crisis since becoming the Winter Maiden. Penny stated that she was content simply being the protector of Mantle and regretted having taken the powers. In "Amity", Penny had become slightly more insecure when it came to her own nature as a synthetic Human. This was seen from Cinder Fall's attempts to hurt her by prying on her insecurities and fears. After Penny convinced her father to let her hold up Amity Communications Tower to help get Ruby's message to the rest of Remnant, Penny gained her own autonomy and was able to make her own decisions unhindered. After she ended up getting hacked, she attempted to fight against the virus corrupting her until she asked Ruby and her friends to kill her so that they would get her powers instead and prevent Ironwood from completing his plans. However, after Nora told her that the virus is only a part of her and Jaune boosts her Aura, she managed to suppress the virus until she was given a Human body by Ambrosius. After she was mortally wounded fighting Cinder in "The Final Word" she asked Jaune to kill her so her powers wouldn't go to her and because she wanted to make her final choice herself. After he reluctantly agreed, she revealed to Winter that she thought about her and that she wouldn’t be completely gone, but now a part of her. Penny and her personality operated under an AI before she was turned into a Human.