"These violent delights have violent ends

And in their triumph die, like fire and powder."

- Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 6.

~0~

It wasn't supposed to end like this. It wasn't. Regardless of what happened to Beacon, the three of them were supposed to make a clean getaway, to run from this war zone free and unscathed.

Emerald hadn't anticipated this ending at all. She had been pacing on the rooftop behind Mercury, just waiting and hoping for the command that would bring this whole thing to a close. Now that she had no further role in this plan to focus on, there was nothing to take her mind off the chaos they'd unleashed, and it was making her stomach turn to watch it all.

Noticing her discomfort, Mercury smirked. "Hey, Emerald, how do you like this? I've never seen a snuff film before, but I think I'm doing okay for my first time making one, right?"

Emerald narrowed her eyes. "It's not like it's hard."

"Exactly. This is nothing. So just relax and enjoy the show."

She sighed, and turned to look away from the massacre below them to the tower above, to the Grimm Dragon growling and twisting in the air, to the flashes of fiery red and orange she could see every so often near the very top of the tower.

Cinder...

"Who do you think she's fighting?" she asked softly, thinking out loud. "Should...Should we go back her up?"

Mercury just laughed. "Nah. She's got this. Besides, she told us to stay here and - "

But at that exact moment, there was a loud rush of air like a hurricane's wind from above them, and they both turned around just in time to be momentarily blinded by overwhelming white light.

"Agh, what the hell?!" Mercury bellowed, holding his arms up to shield his eyes from the light washing over them, while Emerald, despite her own eyes stinging and watering, tried to see through it. She couldn't be sure, but it seemed like the light had a form...A moving form? It looked like...Wings? Giant silver wings?

After a few moments that seemed to stretch on for much longer, the light slowly dissipated, and at first, nothing seemed to have changed. But then Emerald noticed that the dragon had gone completely rigid, its body wound around the top of the tower like an oversized gargoyle on a castle wall. From here, she couldn't tell if the monster was alive or dead, but that wasn't the thought that made her stomach drop.

If that huge Grimm was stopped by that light...Then...!

"Cinder could be in trouble!" Emerald shouted, already sprinting for the edge of the roof. "I don't care if you want to stay, but I'm going!"

"Relax, I'm coming too," Mercury said, stuffing his scroll into his jacket and following behind her. "Broadcast until the end, she said? Well, our big guns dragon getting taken out sure feels like the end to me, so I figure we'd be pulling out soon anyway."

They jumped from rooftop to rooftop, and hit the ground running for the tower from the last one. "Do you think that anyone's still inside?" Mercury called. "Or that the elevator's still working?"

"There's no way, everything's destroyed! We'll have to climb!"

At that, Mercury almost tripped on a loose chunk of pavement. "Climb?! Are you serious?!"

"Do you have a better idea?" Emerald snapped, and looked up at the destroyed tower again. "Look, the thing's completely broken down. You can see where the dragon stuck its claws in crawling all over it. There's plenty of places where we can get footing. I think we can do it!"

"Ugh...This is not worth it," Mercury groaned, but leapt at the tower and rocketed himself up anyway. He scrabbled at the surface for a moment, then found cracks in the stone to dig his fingers into, and turned to glare at his partner. "What are you waiting for? Come on!"

"I'm coming!" Emerald snapped, jumping up after him. "This was my idea, wasn't it?"

Despite the fissures in the smooth surface and the scattered debris that they could use to make their way up, the climb was long and arduous. Before they were halfway up, Emerald's arms were shaking and burning with exhaustion, her fingers and palms were scraped raw by the stone, and sweat ran in rivulets down her face. It was all right for Mercury, whose body was stronger and who could use his boots to propel himself up, but every movement she made had her muscles screaming at her to stop, to give this up and get away from here. Only the terror and adrenaline coursing through her veins kept her climbing.

I'm coming, Cinder. I'm coming. Just hold on, just please be okay! Please, please, please be okay...

It took every last bit of strength they had (and, for Emerald, a brief ride on Mercury's back for the last few minutes or so, when that strength ran out), but they finally pulled themselves up onto the roof of the tower. While Mercury caught his breath, Emerald looked frantically around the destroyed place. There was the dragon, with a thick, stony casing holding it in place, its jaws still open in a frozen roar of rage. Wreckage and debris were strewn everywhere, with something gold glinting in the center. The only other person in sight was little Ruby Rose, flat on her face in the dust. Emerald didn't even spare a thought as to what on earth the girl was doing here.

"Cinder!" she called out, as loud as her dry throat would allow. "Cinder, where are you?!"

"You even here?" Mercury joined in.

"Where are you?! Cind - !"

She couldn't be sure, but she thought she heard something, a small sound just barely audible under her yelling. She broke off, listening harder, Mercury doing the same. Though the moaning was low and weak, and they had never once heard their leader make such pained noises before, Emerald could still recognize the voice. She glanced around again, and for the first time noticed the scrap of red poking out from behind a large gear near the edge of the roof, just next to the dragon's back leg.

"Over there!"

Emerald ran up to the gear a good second before Mercury, and her horrified gasp almost drowned out Mercury's soft, "Oh, shit," at what they found lying in the rubble behind it.

For a moment, she was sure that Cinder was dead. The heavy, acrid scent of frying meat, the charred skin and lurid red burns spreading from scalp to legs, one eye closed and the other destroyed, running messily down her twisted cheek...Surely no one could walk away like that alive. But while Emerald was frozen in shock, Mercury pushed past his partner and bent down to heft Cinder's limp body into his arms, and a faint whine of protest escaped her at the sudden movement, blood dripping from her mouth.

"Hey, take it easy, it's just us," Mercury muttered, not gently, but not unkindly either. "Hang on, we're getting you out of here."

"I...I'll cover you," Emerald said, shaking herself back into reality. With all the Grimm running wild, the Huntsmen and Huntresses likely wouldn't bother with them, but if they did, it would be no trouble for her to blur their bodies out of sight. "Let's go!"

"There's still her," Mercury pointed out, narrowing his eyes at Ruby's unconscious form. "It'd only take a second to go over and kick her off the roof."

But before Emerald could consider the idea, hearing a distant screech and looking up to catch sight of a red-eyed black bird hurtling through the sky towards them decided for her. "No, there's no time, we just need to go, now!"

Mercury didn't look happy about it, but nodded assent, and promptly jumped off the edge of the tower to rock-hop back down. Emerald did the same, as she fell just barely catching a glimpse of gray, black, and red as Qrow Branwen transformed and dropped onto the roof. This marked the second time that this Huntsman had gotten in their way, she thought bitterly. Both he and Ruby Rose would have particularly large targets on their backs after tonight.

But that wasn't what they had to focus on right now, she reminded herself, glancing to the side at the mangled body in Mercury's arms and turning back away immediately, her stomach churning.

There would be time enough for revenge later.

~0~

Hazel had known even before their youngest teammate returned that something had gone wrong.

While the footage of Beacon's destruction proved that their plan for Vale had come to fruition, Cinder had failed to report in to them as she was expected to do after each completed mission. With the CCT down, it wasn't concerning that they hadn't received the usual call, but when hours upon hours passed and there was no sign of her, they had started to wonder whether something hadn't gone awry after all...And now here Hazel was in the middle of the night, stationed at the border of his mistress' realm, his scroll in his pocket, waiting for the girl to either make contact or return. Watts or Tyrian would have complained about such orders, but he didn't care. He had spent far longer than this alone on tedious assignments.

However, he couldn't say he wasn't somewhat pleased when the monotony was broken, by the vaguely familiar figures of Cinder's two subordinates sprinting across the flat red ground like their lives depended on it.

Hazel raised a hand and waved them over, and they immediately wheeled around and ran even faster. As they got closer, he could see that they were both soaked in sweat and struggling for breath. Mercury dropped to his knees in front of him as if hit in the back, panting hard, the ruined body he carried slipping into his lap.

"D-Don't drop her!" Emerald cried, scandalized.

"I didn't!" Mercury snapped.

Emerald just glared, bent over with her hands on her knees. "Why...Why are you so eh-exhausted? M-Metal legs don't get...get tired."

"I-I don't have...metal lungs, do I?"

Hazel stepped forward, and both of them went instantly quiet. "What happened?"

"We...We don't know," Mercury said. "She...We just - "

"She was fighting and something hurt her and she needs help!" Emerald burst out in one breath, looking at him with wide eyes. "You...You will help her, right?"

Hazel glanced down, eying the raw scarlet burns. "She's still alive?"

"Y-Yeah, felt her breathing," Mercury confirmed.

"And she obtained the Fall Maiden's full power?"

The two exchanged an uncertain glance, but then said in unison, "Yes!"

Hazel nodded, deciding that now was not the time to grill them over the possible lie. "Give her to me," he said, reaching down, and Mercury was only too eager to pass his burden up to the older man. "Go on ahead, and inform Salem of what's happened. Tell her to make sure Watts has the lab ready to receive her."

Though they both looked about ready to collapse, Emerald and Mercury bolted off again, towards the fortress looming in the distance. Hazel took a moment to assess the damage done to the barely breathing teammate lying in his arms. Cinder's dress, choker, and anklet were stuck into the burnt and twisted flesh - stuck, but unlike their owner, completely undamaged. One arm dangled in the air, charred to the bone. The one intact eye had opened a fraction, and stared up at him so vacantly that he supposed she wasn't seeing him at all. Her lips were moving slightly, mumbling one unintelligible thing over and over. He narrowed his eyes: he hadn't seen injuries like this in years, but still, where they had come from was unmistakable.

So Beacon had been hiding another set of silver eyes this whole time...This could complicate things.

Quiet, now. You'll make it, he thought, setting off at a run for the fortress himself. They would ensure their new Maiden's survival, and then move forward from there. This is nothing we haven't seen before.

~0~

Whenever they were forced to be here, Emerald and Mercury never liked to wander around this fortress. Despite Salem and Cinder's promises that the roving Grimm would not harm them, so long as they remained faithful to this cause, they didn't like to take any chances. But still, it wasn't as if waiting in this musty, candlelit hallway, with the smell of burnt hair and flesh still clinging to them, was any less stressful.

Mercury leaned against the wall with his arms crossed, glaring at the floor. Cinder's blood still streaked his arms and front, but he had no motivation to go and change his clothes just yet. They had neither seen nor heard from anyone else in the castle since Cinder had gone into surgery. Hazel had asked them a few more questions about what had happened at Beacon and then left them alone, Watts was the one performing the surgery with Salem close by, and Tyrian (unnerving as the thought was) could be anywhere.

Meanwhile, Emerald paced anxiously back and forth, across the length of the huge double doors to the wing that was half laboratory and half infirmary. Mercury had tried to tune out the sound of her heels clicking against the stone floor, steadily going faster and faster as time went by. But after hours of the repetitive noise, that was proving impossible.

"Will you cut that out?" Mercury snapped, finally lifting his head. "I'm surprised you're not wearing a path into the floor."

Emerald stopped, glaring at him over her shoulder. "I have every reason to be stressed at the moment, I think I'll handle it however I want."

"You're really going to be annoying now? Listen, they said - "

"No, they didn't say anything!" Emerald shouted, whirling on him. "They never tell us anything!"

Mercury gritted his teeth. "Lower your voice."

"They didn't say what was going on, or if she'd be okay, or what'll happen to us if she dies, or - !"

"Fuck's sake, she's not going to die!"

"How do you know?! You saw her, didn't you? What do you think they'll do with us if Cinder - "

"Shut up! We'll figure something out!"

"Is bickering like this all you two ever do?"

They spun around to see an unsmiling Hazel coming around the corner, scroll in hand. "Because if so, then I wonder whether you were more of a liability than a help to Cinder." When the pair's only response was silent glaring, he continued. "Don't take offense. I dislike infighting, not you personally. Now..."

He held out his scroll, showing them an ID picture of a young, smiling girl dressed in red. "You told us that there was someone else on the tower with Cinder. Was this her?"

Their eyes widened when they recognized the picture. "Y-Yeah," Mercury said. "How did you know?"

"Your report of what happened and Cinder's condition seemed familiar, so I took a closer look through the documents you three obtained. It seems we overlooked this girl's silver eyes."

"What's that got to do with anything?" Emerald asked irritably. "She's just a stupid kid. Who cares about her eyes?"

"A silver-eyed warrior presents a different sort of danger than an average Huntsman or Huntress. Their powers cause devastation to any Grimm in their path, and it would appear that a Maiden can suffer the same fate."

"Then...You...This is exactly what I mean!" Emerald shouted. "Why didn't we know about this going in?!"

"We didn't think you needed to. I personally eliminated Beacon's last recorded warrior of their kind, over ten years ago."

"But still - !" Emerald jumped and broke off at the sound of her partner's fist slamming against the wall. "M-Mercury?"

"This is bullshit," Mercury snarled through clenched teeth. "That little brat...I had her! I fought her under the stadium, but I didn't think I needed to really try...I could have killed her right there and I wasted time just toying with her!"

"Breathe, boy," Hazel ordered. "That wasn't our only chance. We need to - "

At that moment, the double doors ground open, and the three of them turned to see Watts step out of the blindingly bright white wing, peeling off bloodstained surgical gloves and dropping them in a trash bin just inside the entryway.

"You two are still here?" he asked, raising an eyebrow at Emerald and Mercury. "It's been all night; you really don't have anything better to do with yourselves?"

Mercury glared and looked as if he were about to snap back, but Emerald beat him to it. "Is Cinder okay?"

"Well, she's sustained extensive third-degree burns on the entire left side of her body, as well as less severe burns in her mouth and throat, she may or may not lose the use of her left arm, her ear was burnt off, and her eye seems to have been melted right out of her head," Watts said, as casually as if he were reading a grocery list. "Decidedly not okay. So, what happened to her? She couldn't handle the Maiden's full power and blew herself up?"

"Of course not!" Emerald yelled, but Hazel stepped forward and put an arm in front of both her and Mercury.

"You know as well as I do that this situation is serious," he said, fixing his teammate with a stern glare. "If you could focus on that..."

"I've been focusing on that girl's repulsive body for hours now, but it appears I can't be allowed even a moment of levity. So appreciative of you," Watts replied curtly. "Even so, I did recognize the abnormality of her injuries. I assume you did, too, Hazel?"

Hazel nodded. "This will need to be discussed further at some point."

"Indeed."

"Okay, fine," Emerald said, knowing full well that they weren't going to be let into the loop about this, either. "She's going to live, at least, isn't she? Can I see her?"

"Yes, she's in stable condition, albeit heavily sedated and intubated from her surgery. But no, you can't see her now. Salem is watching over her in the recovery room, and has ordered that nobody disturb them."

"She may summon you there at some point later, however. I recall that you were given a room next to Cinder's to stay in while you're here. So I suggest," Hazel told the distraught thief, in a tone that made it clear that it was not a suggestion, "that you and your partner rest there and stay out of the way until then."

"Fine," Mercury growled, turning on his heel to go. "Just looking at you two pisses me off. Come on, Em."

"What?! No, you can't just shut us out!" Emerald protested.

"Such insolence," Watts said with a smirk. "Cinder told us that she had you two well trained, but clearly she failed at that, too."

Emerald whirled on him, clenching her fists. "She's not - !"

But at that moment, she was interrupted by a clatter in the rafters above, that made them all look up. A second later, Tyrian leaped down from the ceiling, his boots slamming hard on the flat stone floor as he landed right in the middle of the group, Emerald and Mercury hastily backpedaling a few feet. He lifted his head and looked at them all with an elated grin, oblivious to the tension in the air.

"I've just finished watching all the footage of Beacon's destruction!" he announced gleefully. "What a wonderful show you put on! It looked like such fun, I had to play it over and over again! Now, where's our little lady of the hour? I think some celebrations are in order, don't you?"

There was a long moment of silence and staring. Tyrian blinked, not quite understanding the lack of agreement.

Emerald let out a wordless yell of frustration, and stormed out of the hall, Mercury on her heels. The grin dropped from Tyrian's face as they brushed past him, and he turned to look at his teammates with a completely baffled expression. "Was it something I said?"

Hazel took a deep, slow, steadying breath, and got the sense that he'd be doing that a lot more than usual in the weeks to come. "Tyrian. How many times do we need to tell you, think before you do something?"

"Yes, have you no concept of tact?" Watts put in, pointedly ignoring the glare Hazel sent his way.

"Well, what's going on?!" Tyrian snapped defensively. "I thought we had just completed our victory in Vale! Was I wrong?"

Hazel could feel a headache coming on already. He supposed it had only been a matter of time, anyway. "I'm getting to that. Now, listen, both of you. This is how it's going to be..."

~0~