An Ursa's paw took Weiss in the gut and hurled her backwards for a stout oak tree. Weiss hit the tree hard, her head cracking into the wood, one arm snapping like a twig. She dropped to the ground, taking a deep, frantic gulp of air, the wind knocked out of her by the impact. Before she could recover, a Beowolf lunged, and even as she rolled away she felt burning claws rake across her shoulder.

Flicking Myrtenaster faster than the eye could follow, the terrifyingly sharp blade sheared through it's throat and it fell with a didn't even have time to get to her feet before the next three Beowolves came. Mystenaster flashed, and a sheet of fire caught them in midair and burned them to ash. She stood hazily, dazed, as the rest of the Grimm closed around her. Weiss dropped into a shaky fencer's stance, the point of her rapier wavering as her sword hand shook with exhaustion and pain.

Too many. There were too many. At least three Ursa dens, and a particularly large pack of Beowolves. She was going to die here, alone, in a village in the middle of nowhere. And for what, a few hundred people? If she had lived, she could have saved more. If she had lived. But she was a dead woman walking. Then again, weren't all Hunters, in the end? She might as well give a decent account of herself.

Weiss exhaled slowly, trying to calm her shaky limbs as the horde of monsters surged forwards. She blocked two slashes by severing the limbs, froze a few Beowolves with Myrtenaster, and knocked two Ursi off balance by hurling one into the other with a Glyph.

The last Ursa caught her with one massive paw, smashing through a feeble protective Glyph and snapping her ribs like twigs. Weiss skidded along the forest floor, the leaves doing little to stop her, the rough ground bruising and battering her and tearing away skin. It seemed like an hour she skidded to a stop. Weiss tried to rise, but found she couldn't even move. She could only stare, strangely calm, as the Grimm tore forwards.

She mused, oddly, that they wouldn't even need to do anything to her. If they just left, right now, she would bleed out, or maybe die of starvation when her battered and broken body couldn't even move from where she lay. But instead, she was going to be torn to pieces. It was, in a way, reassuring. At least this was faster.

That was when Weiss heard the roar. It was nothing like a Beowolf's howl, or the throaty bellow of a Ursa. This was like a winter gale given a voice, a reverberating wave of sound that rolled over the forest, high and clear and so loud Weiss could feel it in her bones.

Something huge and silver flashed across her vision, and Weiss could see bright flashing scales moving like a ghost through the trees, if ghosts were twenty feet long, and terrifyingly, inhumanly fast.

With another roar it slammed into the mass of Grimm, tearing about with huge, scythe like claws, a whip of a tail smashing around and sending broken bodies flying. Weiss couldn't get a good look at the thing, the mass of Grimm and the sheer speed of whatever it was making it indistinct. In under a minute, the Grimm were very, very dead, except one, a huge Ursa Major that Weiss had assumed was the leader of the horde of Grimm.

She couldn't see what happened after that as the silver thing slammed into the Ursa Major and they both disappeared from sight. But she could hear the roaring from the Ursa, which quickly turned into cries of pain, which turned into nothing at all. Huge plodding footsteps approached where we lay, and something stopped just in front of her.

The last thing Weiss saw was a huge, scaly, creature with four clawed feet, an alligator mouth filled with wickedly sharp teeth, and batlike wings extending from it's back. Rose red eyes looked at Weiss with an unreadable expression.

In other words, it was a dragon.

Weiss blacked out.

Weiss's eyes snapped open.

That surprised her. She looked around, trying to place her surroundings. She was lying on some kind of rough, scratchy pelt. And her clothes were... um... gone... and, predictably, everything was incredibly painful. Everything hurt like she had been mauled, bruised, and battered by a horde of marauding Grimm... oh wait, that had actually happened.

But for whatever reason, the lack of clothes was what ticked Weiss off. She could feel her face heat up in a furious blush whether or not anyone was around. Weiss spied another pelt nearby, and reached for it to cover herself. Except that her arm wasn't working, it was broken. She used the other one, dragging the fur on top of herself. Okay, mildly better. Weiss looked around, craning her head. She was in a cave of some kind, with a high, rocky ceiling decorated with stalactites that looked like icicles. Somewhere, there was a fire going. And Weiss could hear someone moving.

Or something.

Abruptly, she lay very still, trying to listen in on the noise. It didn't sound very big, more of a light padding like a barefoot person then a heavy stomp like a Grimm.

Or a dragon.

Weiss had almost forgotten the dragon, but as soon as she thought the word the image came rushing back. They were extremely rare creatures, not a Grimm, but certainly not a normal animal either. And supposedly, they had some version of Aura, but nobody really knew because they almost never appeared outside of stories. Most everything Weiss knew about dragons was myth and legend.

Suddenly, a girl's head popped into Weiss's field of view, bending over to look down at her. The girl had black hair highlighted in red, a perky smile, and silver eyes. That definitely wasn't a normal color. She was wearing a simple red t shirt and a black skirt.

"Hi! Man, you took forever to wake up!" Said the girl in a cheerful voice.

"Would you tell me where I am?" Weiss asked, her voice rough and scratchy.

"Oh, right. Um, this is my cave. It's in the mountains. Somewhere. I have maps!" With that declaration the girl disappeared, and Weiss could hear bare feet scampering around, and rustling paper. "Where is it where is it..." The girl muttered. "Oh!"

Weiss heard her coming back over, and then she stuck a big, yellowed piece of paper in Weiss's face. "We're right here." She said, poking a spot in the Ravensroost mountains with her finger.

Weiss looked. They were about twenty miles out from the village she had been in. "By any chance, do you have my Scroll?" She asked. She needed to contact Ozpin, tell him to send someone to get her. That was the first priority.

"This doodad? Yup!" The girl passed her the Scroll, and Weiss took it with her good arm. "Can you use it with one hand?"

"I'll manage." Weiss replied. "Thank you for saving me, Ms..."

"Ruby Rose!" Ruby said. "Nice to meet you. What's your name?"

"Weiss." Weiss replied, tapping away at the Scroll with her thumb as she held it in her palm. "Weiss Schnee." There was no signal. How could there be no signal? These things were supposed to get reception everywhere!

"Cool! So, um, how are you feeling?"

"Not very well." Weiss replied dryly. Really, what kind of question was that, given the state she was in? "How long was I unconscious."

"Oh, four days maybe."

"Four days!" Weiss demanded, setting the Scroll away in disgust. Useless thing, she needed to be able to send a message, not write notes or whatever! She needed to get medical attention, dammit! Four days was plenty of time for infection, or a bone to get out of place... dozens of medical complications lurked at the edges of Weiss's mind.

"Yeah. I kept all your cuts clean and stuff... but I can't really do much about the bones..." Ruby trailed off, sounding fairly pitiful.

"It's fine." Weiss reassured her. "You saved my life." Then Weiss got a puzzled frown. "Something odd." Weiss muttered, thinking of the dragon. Where had it disappeared to?

"Huh?"

"How did you find me?" Weiss asked. Maybe Ruby had seen it.

"Um, in a forest, with a bunch of Grimm?"

"But they were dead. Did you see anything else?"

"Uh, no they weren't. At least, not when I got there." Ruby said.

"What... yes they were. The..." Weiss trailed off, looking at Ruby with a mixture of horror and wonder. "...dragon killed them."

"Ooooooh." Ruby said. "That's right. Here, does this help?" She backed out of view for a moment, and there was a rushing sound, like wind. When Ruby stuck her head back forward it was ten times bigger and covered in scales.

Weiss cleared her throat. "Yes. Yes it does." Why had her throat just gone all dry? She really needed a drink all of a sudden.

Ruby moved back, and with another rush of air she was a girl again. "Cool. So, when are you getting out of here?" She said, as if what had happened was perfectly normal and not at all out of the ordinary.

"I can't." Weiss replied. "I don't have any way to get a message out, and they have probably assumed I'm dead." Her voice was calm, but inside she was panicking. She was trapped, helpless, in a cave with a magical, shapeshifting, murderous oversized lizard. This was even outside of her job description. And, once again, naked! This was like a nightmare.

"Well then why don't I take you!" Ruby suggested brightly, seemingly unaware for how incredibly uncomfortable that would be for so very many reasons.

"That..." Weiss trailed off. Riding into Vale on a dragon? It seemed like an incredibly stupid idea. "...I don't know." Weiss finished. "I certainly can't go anywhere yet."

"Huh, I guess not." Ruby said thoughtfully. "Um."

"Where are my clothes?" Weiss asked suddenly. The general embarrassment of not having anything to wear had been steadily building like a pressure cooker. If she had to spend one more minute in a conversation with someone while absolutely stark naked, she was going to scream. Animal skin notwithstanding.

""I have them all right over there." Ruby replied, gesturing off to the side. "Though your clothes are kinda, well, covered in blood and in teeny tiny pieces mostly." Suddenly she blushed, and stammered "And I'm really really sorry for taking them off but I needed to clean you up and stuff so yeah really really sorry and-"

"It's fine." Weiss said, fighting back a blush of her own. "Really." This Ruby was... not what she had expected. The dragon, a legendary creature of great wisdom and power, was apparently also an awkward teenage girl. Or maybe Ruby was a young dragon? What was young for a dragon? Questions flashed through Weiss's mind and vanished as soon as they came. It wouldn't be very polite to cross examine the... person who had saved her life. Though she didn't really know whether Ruby was a person or not.

"Can I have something to eat?" Weiss asked. Something else, please talk about something else... this was just too confusing.

"Yeah! Yeah sure." Ruby said, disappearing from view. Weiss really wished she could move. It was extremely annoying the just lie here looking at the ceiling.

"White meat or dark meat?" Ruby called. "It's duck."

Weiss's mouth watered involuntarily. "Dark please."

Ruby came back with a handful of freshly cooked dark meat, dripping with juices. "Open wide!" Ruby caroled.

Weiss gave her a glare. "I can feed myself." Dragon or no dragon, Weiss had limits. She would not be treated like an invalid, whether or not she was one.

"But it would be easier to-"

"No." Weiss replied, snatching a piece with her good hand.

"Man, you're cranky." Ruby muttered, sitting cross legged and holding her hand out for Weiss to take scraps of meat. Soon it was gone, along with another handful. Weiss felt like a bit of a pig, but she couldn't help it. Whether she wanted to be polite or not, she was starving.

Ruby giggled. "Wow, you really were hungry."

"It seems like it." Weiss replied, chewing on her lip. Staying here until she healed was out of the question. She needed to report back, and probably get some proper medical care, and prevent her family from doing something rash whenever they heard of her supposed death. If only she wasn't completely crippled at the moment. While her Aura would get her back into top condition within a matter of weeks, she didn't have weeks to be sitting around in a cave.

"Hey, um, not to bother you 'cuz you're obviously thinking about something, but, shouldn't you tell someone you aren't dead?" Ruby asked. "Because everyone who thinks you are is probably freaking out."

"Well, I obviously can't, because the only thing I can move is one of my arms." Weiss snapped. "What do you expect me to do, drag myself down a mountain?"

"I was just gonna say I could do something!" Ruby said, flinching. "I mean, I walk into town all the time. Not looking like a dragon of course. But people think I'm just a crazy girl living in the mountains. So..."

Weiss winced. She hadn't even considered asking Ruby for help. Then again, she didn't really want to. But, practicality over pride.

"That would be very helpful." Weiss replied.

Ruby returned about an hour later. "So, they're all kinda gone. I guess they haven't gotten the word that the Grimm are dead yet."

Weiss silently cursed. She was forced to go for the last resort. "Then I suppose you will have to carry me." She said, furious at her own helplessness.

Ruby gave her a critical look. "Hmm. Well, I don't think I can do it like you are now... ooh! Idea!" She came back with several coils of rope and a long knife. "I'll make like, a carrying pouch thing!" She said, cutting holes in each of the four corners of the skin Weiss was lying on and looping coils of ropes through the holes.

Weiss had to admit, it was a clever idea. It took Ruby about fifteen minutes to do everything. She stood up, put the knife back where it belonged, and changed. The silver dragon ambled back, carefully picking up one rope in each claw. Weiss was left to uncomfortably stare at those claws, and the shining silver scales of Ruby's underbelly.

The dragon ambled slowly forward, dragging Weiss with it. Then, when they got to the mouth of the cave, the huge legs coiled.

Weiss barely managed not to scream as the dragon sprang like a cat, wings beating incredibly fast as Ruby gained altitude. Fortunately, Ruby had the sense to hold the skin slightly forward, otherwise Weiss would probably have slid off the back to an extremely embarrassing death.

Weiss squeezed her eyes shut and firmly held her covering skin in place with her good arm. "I hate heights." She muttered, teeth gritted. This was going to get very awkward when they arrived in Vale.

The flight was mostly uneventful until Ruby decided to go in for a landing on the campus of Beacon Academy, Weiss's school. Naturally, the people below were not just going to continue about their business while a dragon landed in the middle of them. So when Ruby swooped in and alighted on the ground, it was in the middle of very well armed, very nervous students and teachers with weapons drawn and aimed.

They were probably about to attack when Weiss yelled "Stop it immediately!"

Everyone stood in stunned silence, most likely wondering how the dragon had talked and what the little furry ball beneath it was. None of them had actually seen Weiss yet under the furs. She gritted her teeth in fury. "Would someone get Headmaster Ozpin?" She demanded.

"Ms. Schnee, is that you?" Professor Goodwitch asked from somewhere in the group.

"Yes, professor. And yes, it is a very long story, and no, I am not in the mood to tell it. Also, I require medical attention, if you wouldn't mind." Weiss snapped, firing off commands.

She could almost hear Professor Goodwitch's eyebrows arch. "Very well. Umber, Storm, please carry Ms. Schnee to the medical ward. And someone, incapacitate that... beast."

Weiss knew who they were referring to. "Do. Not." She said coldly.

"Ms. Schnee, you are in no position to be telling anyone what to do lying under a blanket. Students, if you please?"

Ruby backed away, hissing faintly. While Weiss couldn't see exactly what was going on, she knew this would get ugly very quickly, and she didn't really know for which side.

"Professor Goodwitch." A calm, smooth voice murmured, somehow managing to carry across the scene. "May I ask exactly why our students are preparing to attack a mythical creature while one of our best students is seemingly lying naked under an Ursa skin?" Headmaster Ozpin had somehow appeared, coffee cup in hand.

"Ah, Headmaster, I was just going to-" Glynda started to say.

Weiss cut her off. "She was trying to completely ignore anything I was saying out of some bizarre decision to attack Ruby!"

"Ruby?" Ozpin asked. "The creature has a name?"

"Yes sir. In fact, she's quite smart. I think she's more intelligent than most of the people here." Weiss said, her tone frosty and pointed.

Ruby, meanwhile, had backed away into the tree cover. Huddling down low, there was a rush of noise and she stepped out, once more looking like a girl. She waved shyly, understandably nervous after having a large assortment of high tech weaponry waved at her.

"Weiss?" She called. "Uh, your friends are kinda, well, absolutely terrifying. And well armed. Should I run or something?"

Professor Ozpin strode over, his cane tapping on the cobblestones. "Someone get Ms. Schnee to the infirmary. Preferably someone who's standing around like an idiot instead of going to class." He stopped in front of Ruby, giving her an odd look. "And shall you and I go to Ms. Schnee's sick room? I would love for the two of us to chat while Ms. Schnee rests. I promise certain... over eager people will leave you alone."

Ruby looked lost, but relieved. "Um... okay? I just really wanna make sure she's alright..."

"And you will, my dear." Ozpin said, taking her by the hand and leading her the assortment of students carrying Weiss.

As soon as they got Weiss settled in a bed, a nurse gave her a shot that caused her to fall asleep almost immediately. The other two sat down in a pair of chairs next to the bed, one sipping a cup of coffee and one shifting nervously.

Ozpin gave the sleeping Weiss a raised eyebrow. "The little idiot. Her body is still near death and yet stubbornly she uses her aura to numb the pain. Much more and she wouldn't have made it, and for what? Well, she may have saved your life I suppose. Or possibly that of Professor Goodwitch and her students. Who can say?" He took a sip of coffee.

"Oh. So that's why." Ruby said. "It was kinda weird how as soon as she woke up she seemed fine."

"Yes, our dear Weiss is quite possibly the most stubborn person on the face of this planet. We've had this happen many times. I believe the nurses keep a vial of Ursa tranquilizer on hand with her name on it as a little joke. But she is so dedicated to not feeling her own weakness that she will drive herself to the brink of death to keep up the fantasy that she is fine." He turned his gaze to Ruby, his eyes intent and searching. "So, Ms. Rose. I do believe you and I need to have a little chat."

"Um, what about?" Ruby said hesitantly. Ozpin was kinda scary and intimidating, and she didn't like how he said 'chat.'

"Your presence here, my dear. Weiss was about to die in that forest, from what I've gathered. So why precisely did you decide to play the hero?"

Ruby shrank in her chair a bit. "I just like helping people?" She ventured, somehow feeling like it was the wrong answer.

"Hmm." Ozpin mused, leaning back in his chair. "You know, I've only ever known one other dragon in my life, which means that I likely know two more than most people on this planet. A dusty old crow..."

"Oh! That's my uncle Qrow!" Ruby exclaimed. "Man, I haven't seen him in ages..."

"Hmm." Ozpin said again. "Well, Ms. Rose, as a show of gratitude I will allow you to stay here as long as you wish. But eventually, you will tell me what you are doing here. I do not just take no for an answer. If the dragons are returning, I am going to know why."

With that, he got up and left.

Ruby sat and looked at Weiss, thinking hard. Ozpin was a scary, scary man. She hadn't just come here to save this girl beside her, though it had been a convenient excuse to arrive. No, she had her reasons. But who could she trust with them? She had no idea how to get the help she- well, the help they all needed. But the one person she might be able to trust was basically in a coma.

Ruby sighed. This was just too complicated. She really needed her sister to get here, or she was definitely going to screw something up. Hopefully she would be here before anything too bad happened, since she did say she would be here as soon as possible. But knowing Yang, she was probably going to be late.