DISCLAIMER: I do not own RWBY or its characters. This will also hold for the following 12 chapters.

A/N: This was an idea BatmanRules256 and I came up with. Not this particular story, mind, but the concept of a Halloween-themed collection of 13 one-shots for the month of October. Each one will deal with something related to Halloween – ghosts, vampires, werewolves, horror, etc. – and will be self-contained unless otherwise stated.

13 Days of Team HLWN – Part 1: Ghost of a Chance

"Ruby, shut the door! Shut the door, you dolt!" Weiss screamed as the….thing came at them at a fast run. The crimsonette girl in the worn and tattered cloak slammed the oak door shut as hard as she could, turning a knob that engaged a lock. And just in time, too, as the creature slammed into the door with enough force to actually dent the three-inch-thick wooden door. The two teens lean against the strong door, panting, before sliding down it to sit on the floor against it.

"What….in Oum's name….was that?!" the white-haired girl panted, trying to get her heartrate down.

"At least it was a small one," Ruby offered helpfully, not even panting. Her remark – and her non-breathless state – earned her a glare from the other girl. "What?"

"You know…what that…thing is?" Weiss asked.

"Not a clue. But they're nothing new around here, really."

"That's the…first time…I've seen one! And it…ripped that…other thing into…bloody pieces!"

"Yeah! I mean, did you see how it just ripped it's stomach open and-" She was interrupted by Weiss turning to the opposite side of her and evacuating her stomach.

"You….ass!" the shorter girl swore after she'd finished, wiping her face and chin with the cloth proffered by her companion.

"Um, sorry," Ruby answered sheepishly. "I, uh, forgot you're new to this."

"I have to get out of here!"

"Hey, I'm trying to help with that, you know! It's not my fault you got trapped in here!"

Weiss went to argue, but stops because she knows Ruby is right. If it hadn't been for the crimsonette finding her that first day she'd gotten trapped in this place, she knew she'd have died.

"I-I'm sorry," Weiss said contritely, feeling ashamed of herself.

"It's okay. You're scared and all, so there's nothing wrong with losing it. And it's not like I'm immune to it, I just….can't vomit."

"What do you mean, you can't?"

"Is that really important at this point?"

"Well, we've been here for a few days now, and I know almost nothing about you."

"Weiss, duck!" Ruby shouts, yanking the now-yelping girl down as a massive clawed paw punches through the door where her head had once been.

"Dust!" the other girl yelped as she scrambled away, followed by her companion.

"You can say 'fuck,' you know!" the crimsonette quipped.

"That's so uncouth!"

"Un-what?"

"It means impolite, you dolt!"

"Then why didn't you just say that?"

"Aarrgghhh!" Before Weiss could say anything further, the door shattered under the weight of the creature on the other side. It stood much taller than both of the girls – they about half the height of the monster – and its head was covered with a bony plate, and various protrusions of bony spikes from its arms, shoulders, and back. Its glowing red eyes locked onto the two teenagers and it let out a soul-chilling roar. Before it leapt at them, Ruby had yanked Weiss backwards and pulled her through another door, this one showing a long and narrow hall that was bordered by windows on one side and doors on the other.

"What kind of place is this?!" the white-haired girl shrieked.

"You're better off not knowing, princess," Ruby replied.

"I am not a princess, I am an heiress," she retorted, affronted.

"Yeah, yeah, it doesn't matter in here, now come on!" The crimsonette tugged the heiress along, pulling her down the hallway as the door to the room they had just been in pretty much exploded when the creature slammed through it. It moved after them faster than they could run, and was almost upon them when Ruby yanked them both to the floor which caused it to move over them – surprisingly not stepping on them in the process. Before it could slow and turn around, Ruby had the two of them back on their feet and through a door. She didn't stop moving, either, but kept on going.

"Where….are we…..going?" Weiss asked, beginning to run out of breath again.

"We're getting you out of here," Ruby told her.

"What?! But…what about…what about….you?"

"Not everyone gets a second chance, Weiss."

"No! I won't go without you!" Ruby sighs at this, pinching the bridge of her nose.

"Weiss, you can't stay….and I can't leave."

"But why not? Ruby, I-"

"Weiss, I told you when I first saved you not to fall in love with me," the crimsonette said sadly. "I told you it wouldn't work out."

"But you never said why! Why can't we be in love?! Ruby, I've been stuck in this place for days now, with only you! I've seen….I've seen people get ripped apart! Gutted! Eaten! You've kept me safe! You've cared for me! How…how can I not fall in love with you?" That last was said quietly, her vulnerability and emotions naked and bare.

It really broke Ruby's heart. Especially as she knew it wouldn't work out.

Before she could think further on it all, or even try to explain to Weiss why it wouldn't work out for them, she found her lips occupied with the heiress's own. Her eyes widened impossibly huge as the other girl's arms came up around her neck – and her own arms naturally wrapped around Weiss's waist to pull her closer. The kiss only ended when Weiss pulled back for air. This will only end in disaster, Ruby thought, gazing into the ice blue eyes before her, for her. But she didn't say anything, instead moving to take Weiss's hand and lead her out of the room, trying to lose the creature after them.

Or, more accurately, after Weiss; since she hadn't had a problem with it until the white-haired girl had gotten trapped in the massive building. It wasn't the first time this had happened, and she was hoping to spare her the fate others had suffered. All of the people they'd seen killed over the last few days were others who had been trapped in the huge square foot area two-level building.

"Ruby?" Weiss asked, drawing the crimsonette out of her thoughts. "Where are we going?"

"To a way out of here," she answered.

"But we've tried all of the doors out of the mansion."

"On the ground floor, yes. But I have an idea, and we'll need to up to the second floor for it."

"The…second floor?" Ruby could hear the trepidation in Weiss's voice, and understood it fully; down on the first floor all they had to worry about were – strangely – the larger creatures, of which the wolf-like one was probably in the mid-range of sizes. The second floor had the smaller creatures, which were much more numerous and much more dangerous.

"We move fast, we don't stop, and you should be fine."

"What about you?"

"You don't need to worry about me; I'll be fine."

Weiss didn't get a chance to say more as Ruby ran them out to the foyer of the place, then up the wide stairway to the second floor. By this point, even though they'd avoided the second floor after the first day or so, they knew what was up there.

Suffice to say that, until this place, Weiss had never been afraid of spiders. But seeing ones with bone-like plates and spike-like protrusions and about the size of a medium dog changed that. And now she and Ruby were running through hall after hall and room after room of them – with no less than fifteen in each place. Ruby led them into what Weiss assumed was a dead end.

"This is wonderful. We come up to the one level we've avoided for days, where there are things worse than those beasts, on the chance that there's an escape, only to find nothing."

"Was that sarcasm?"

"Of course it was, you dolt! We're trapped here and about to be eaten by giant bone armor spiders!"

"Nah, we'll be fine. Well, you'll be fine." With that, Ruby reaches into a large wardrobe…..and pulls out a large scythe with a long black and red handle.

"What the Dust is that?!" Weiss shrieked in shock.

"Seriously, just say 'fuck' or 'hell,' Weissy," Ruby replied.

"You just pulled a massive staff knife thing out of a closet-"

"Wardrobe, not closet."

"-and that's what you're worried about?!"

"It's a war-scythe, not a 'staff knife thing."

"Does it really matter?!"

"Look, Weiss, there's a lot you don't know or understand, and honestly I'm more worried about getting you out of here alive than explaining everything."

"But what about-" Weiss was cut off by Ruby's lips on her own, a moan escaping her as their feelings were expressed through that kiss far more eloquently than words could ever achieve. A whine of disappointment escapes her as Ruby pulls back.

"I wish things were different, Weiss, I really do. It just won't work. But…I do love you. Goodbye."

"Wha-" The snow-haired girl didn't get a chance to finish as she suddenly found herself being shoved backwards with surprising force. Stumbling over her suddenly off-balance feet, she managed to see Ruby whirling around, bringing her war-scythe into a ready position, as a horde of those bone-spider-things burst through the door. She didn't get to see more as she tripped over something and felt herself falling over backwards and down a long way…

~Team HLWN~

Weiss groaned and shifted, her head feeling like someone had been using it to play Griffball with. As she turned over onto her side, she felt a tug on her arm. Her eyes snapped open and she bolted upright, almost shrieking in fear until her eyes registered that she was in a hospital room.

"Weiss, you're awake," a relieved-sounding voice said from her right. Looking over, Weiss saw her sister, Winter, standing up from a chair that was next to the hospital bed she was in.

"Winter?" she asked, confusion lacing her voice. "What….what happened? What am I doing here? Where….where is Ruby?"

"You're in the hospital, Weiss. You were found in some kind of….well, old dump area. The kind that were used for the houses of the rich and wealthy about a hundred years ago or so."

"I don't understand. And…why can't I see well?"

"There's a bandage over your left eye, Weiss. No one really knows what happened to you, or how you got hurt, but the doctors examined your eye while you were unconscious and said that you'll only be dealing with a minor loss of vision in that eye."

"But where's Ruby?" Weiss asked.

"Ruby who?" Winter inquired.

"Ruby Rose is what she said her name was. I can't….I can't really remember much, but I remember being trapped someplace with her. There were these….creatures around, trying to kill us," she replied, her mind feeling fuzzy.

"Well, you were unconscious for several days, and-"

"Days?! Winter, we have to go back for-"

"You aren't going anywhere, sister dear. It seems as though you had a rather vivid dream – or nightmare, rather – while you were unconscious, and-"

"It wasn't a dream! It really happened!"

"Calm down, Weiss. Take a deep breath, alright?" Weiss nods and does so, more than once, and exhales with a sigh.

"It really happened, though, Winter. I didn't imagine it."

"If it will help, I will investigate that name you gave me. Honestly, I am not arguing that you are imagining those events, but they do defy reality." Winter leaned over and hugged her sister. "Truly, though, I am glad you are awake. I could not stand losing the only family I have left."

~Team HLWN~

Weiss was released from the Vale Memorial Hospital a couple of days later, the bandages replaced with a white eye-patch bearing the Schnee family crest; the medication she had been on had dilated her pupils so she also had darkened shades, the eye-patch being necessary to protect her injured eye further. Winter assisted her sister into the car, somewhat surprised that she wasn't putting up a fuss about being helped. As they drove away, Weiss noticed that they weren't taking the route home. She looked at her sister, curious.

"As I said a few days ago, I researched that name you told me," Winter responded to her unspoken question. She picked up a file from the space between them and handed it to Weiss. "That contains everything I learned," she continued, "but to summarize it: Ruby Rose was, indeed, a real person…approximately one hundred fifty years ago." She felt her sister's shocked gaze on her. "It was back during the Grimm Wars, which our own ancestors also fought in. She was killed in one of the last battles. From the description you gave me yesterday, I determined the location was an old palatial mansion outside of Vale City. It was precisely the kind of structure that had a series of garbage chutes that led to exactly where you were found."

"Are you saying that-"

"What happened to you wasn't a dream. Nor was it some sort of temporal relocation. And what is left of the mansion is still there. Far more than unsafe for anyone living to go into, but still standing for the most part. What were you doing there, anyway?"

Weiss frowned. "I….don't remember." She looked up as they neared approached the mansion and stopped. She saw, for herself, that it was both the place she'd been trapped in for days and yet not. "Whatever you do, Weiss, just…don't fall in love with me, okay?" Ruby's words echoed through her mind, as did that last kiss.

"Apparently, this place has also been the source of more than a few deaths over the decades since the war ended," Winter said, intruding into her sister's thoughts. "Evidence over those same decades showed that those deaths were caused by vicious creatures of some kind – or some kind of psychotic monster that isn't much better than the extinct Grimm."

Weiss wasn't listening any longer; her eyes and attention were completely locked onto the photo in the file Winter had given her. The photo, made with an ancient camera and having been digitally restored based on historic records, showed the exact person that Weiss had spent several days with, had fallen in love with and kissed.

"I kissed a ghost."

THE END?