This would be the first fanfic I write. Let's hope things turn out well enough. Very important to know that I do not own anything pertaining to RWBY. The first part is mostly an interpretation of the events in RWBY, with some exceptions, so some of the storyline in this bit belongs to RWBY. It's only to kick off the setting, so fear not!

The Vytal Festival was finally at hand. After several rounds in the tournament, team RWBY had a secured a spot in the one on one matches. After a fair and honest vote, it was decided that Yang would be the one to represent their team. Ruby had expected her sister to crush the competition. And to be fair, she did just that and more. Her latest match with Mercury Black landed her pretty much under house-arrest in the dorm. Ruby couldn't believe her eyes as her sister beat on him while he was defenceless. She and her team may believe Yang when she says that she was innocent, but they might be the only ones who do. With guards positioned to ensure that she doesn't leave her room, she was cut off from anyone who might listen to her.

But Ruby wasn't one to lose hope and fall on her knees even when her sister was in such serious trouble. Besides, her friends were still in the competition. Pyrrha was still in the running to fight for team JNPR. With her team is disqualified, Ruby's next hope is for them to win.

After leaving Yang along with Blake and Weiss, Ruby made her way alone to the arena in hopes that her friend might have a match today. She found a seat at one end of the arena before the pairing was decided. But at the other end she squinted to see… Emerald? She was dumbfounded. Leaning forward in her seat, she made quite the unintentional face of shock as she stared towards the green-haired girl.

"Emerald's… here?" she asked herself. Her view was not unnoticed by Emerald, who shot daggers back to Ruby. Being the innocent, conflict-avoiding, socially-awkward girl she was, Ruby immediately averted her gaze and tried to pass it off as if she never saw her in the first place. But that only did so much. She got up from her seat and sped back into the halls leading to the tournament area, which were currently devoid of anybody. She slipped into what appeared to be a maintenance hall. Hopefully she could find someone and ask what the heck was going on. Mercury's whole team supposedly rushed back with him to be with his family. So what was Emerald, one of his team doing here at the tournament. With only questions in her mind, she bumps into the last person she thought she might see there.

As the randomization process is announced to begin, out from another hall steps Mercury, on two legs no less. With disbelief in her eyes, she calls to him:

"...Mercury?" The first person being called to battle was Penny, her secretly robot friend.

"What are you doing?" she further questions. The second contestant is called as Pyrrha, whose semblance is polarity. She goes wide-eyed at the realization of the potentially devastating lineup.

"Ooh, polarity versus metal. That could be bad," he mocks concern. Ruby was as worried now as she was confused. How did he know about Penny's secret.

"Mercury, what are you doing?" she asks again, lacking words to form more questions, "You were hurt! Why…-" she trailed off, suspicions rising. "What's going on?" she asked ultimately.

He says nothing. He shows no expression on his face. He pauses a moment to pull out his scroll and glance down at a message he got, narrowing his eyes as he reads its contents. Mercury looks up at Ruby after a few seconds now with a wide grin. Still he said no words.

"Fine," she gives in, "If you're not going to tell me…" again she trails off as she sidesteps to go around Mercury, but he just steps in front of her again. The two repeat this once or twice before Ruby's attention is drawn by the echo of the countdown. As her friends began their fight, so did Mercury. "Showtime," he readies himself for combat.

Ruby, however, didn't really want to fight. Instead, she wanted to rush past him using her semblance of speed to overwhelm him. At the attempt, though, she received a kick to the stomach blocking her and a combo blow knocking her back to the ground. She forgot that his weapon was in his shoes or something.

It was obvious now that he was an enemy, perhaps even behind the incident with Yang.

While still disadvantaged on the ground, unarmed, she pulls out her phone to call for backup, or maybe warn them of whatever conspiracy there might be. Before any call got through, her scroll was shot out of her hands with a fire of Mercury's weapon.

"Let's just keep this between us friends," again he mocked as he rushed towards her.

They exchanged blows - or more so did Mercury land his hits on Ruby, until she finally found an escape route and blurred away using her semblance.

She got out back to the halls to the arena only to witness one of her friends, Penny, cut in half in some freak accident. She didn't see any blood, but that meant nothing seeing that Penny was artificial. Penny was amazing, Ruby knew that well, but even she couldn't survive this. Penny was gone.

Now, seeing her friend dead, and another friend guilty of being the cause of it, she fell to her knees and let her stored tears fall. Her senses all but shut off in response to the trauma. She didn't even notice Mercury stepping out behind her and standing over her with his usual smug grin. Though, she won't go so far as to say she didn't feel his blow knocking her out cold.

Within minutes, Grimm have overrun the grounds and panic overtook the bystanders. Blake and Weiss were together amongst a mess of combat drones and Grimm in battle. Blake called Yang, hopefully she was with Ruby.

"Yang! Are you okay?!" she asks as soon as the call gets through.

"I'm fine! Is Ruby with you? She isn't answering her scroll," she asked hysterically.

"No, she isn't," worry grew for their missing team member.

"Yang, I'm sure she's fine! She's our leader, she can take care of herself," she tried to convince Yang, maybe even herself. While it was true that Ruby could handle mobs of Grimm without breaking a sweat, she could do nothing against an enemy while unarmed. Unbeknownst to them, their team's leader had already been emotionally and physically knocked out.

Emerald had managed to slip away from the crowd unnoticed. The plan was to meet back with Mercury in one of the maintenance halls and wait for orders from Cinder. The White Fang should know not to invade that area, but she never could trust them with how much they hated people like her. When she turned a corner and passed the doorway to the meeting place, she was taken aback to see two people there instead of just one.

"Woah, hey, what's she doing here?" she asked.

"There's been a slight change of plans," he began to inform her, "And by that I mean we're throwing most of it out the window."

"Hold on, when did you get any sort of order from Cinder?" she asked, since Cinder usually keeps her in the loop as well whenever there's a change of plans. He tosses his scroll her way and she snatches it out of the air. On it was a message telling him to forget about laying low and to go after a young huntress named Ruby Rose while everyone panics from the chaos. She places the scroll on a table that was in the room and looks down towards the unconscious girl lying at the side of the room, then back to Mercury.

"Well we've got her. What do we do with her now? We can't keep her here for long," Emerald goes on.

"We bring her to the ports. Neo should already be breaking Roman out and seizing the airship," he explains, "Board the ship and sail to safety. Simple." He picks Ruby up and carries her over his shoulder and starts to walk out of the room.

"Shouldn't we, I dunno, tie her up or something?" she asks before he's out of earshot.

"Nah, she's out cold. I knocked her pretty hard. Might even be dead for all I care," he shrugs and turns to Emerald only to meet a death glare, "Okay, okay. I hit her with half strength." She kept shooting daggers at him.

"A quarter?" he pleaded, "L-look she's fine, but we don't have time for this. The ship's landing soon."

"Alright, but what if someone sees us with her?" Emerald asks, giving in. Mercury turns his head her way and gave a cold grin with narrowed eyes. He didn't say anything, but his point got across. She followed him down the hall and further out into the chaos around them. The airship had landed at the port just as he said, but it was obvious they were in a rush. The ships carrying the White Fang weren't around. That must be part of the 'slight change of plans'. They boarded quickly and saw Roman standing before a terminal. Emerald went ahead to him and stood behind the glowing board.

"There's been a-"

"-Change in plans, yes, I know. Why else would you be here?" he retorted.

"Well you still look like you're having fun," Emerald noticed.

"I feel like a kid in a candy store. Seriously, this is amazing! You should try it. Ooh! This one's my favorite," he says, pushing it. The ship's weapons fired towards a brick building it was facing. He let out a childish laugh at the sight of its destruction.

"You're right, that is quite fun," she agreed, "but I think I got something for you that'll make your day."

"Oh-ho-ho, and what might that be?" he asked curiously. Emerald nodded her head behind him and he turned in response to see. Mercury was walking towards him with a girl in a red hood in tow. And there's only one person who wears a red hood that he can think of. The girl before him, Ruby Rose, was now stirring and beginning to open her eyes.

"Ngh… Yang what happened?" she must have thought she was with her sister. Her eyes flew wide to see the most wanted criminal standing in front of her.

"Why hello, Little Red. Have a nice nap?" he laughed, mocking her.

"Torchwick! So you were behind this?!" she accused as she got up and tried to lunge at him, only to be restrained by Mercury who she hadn't noticed was behind her.

"No need to be so harsh! I feel the name 'Roman' has a much nicer ring to it," he mocks, "but pleasantries aside, I need you to go back to sleep!"

His voice rose as he put his strength behind a punch into Ruby's abdomen. She fell limp from the full force of it. He walked back to the main room and yelled to the cockpit.

"Neo! What's taking so long? We're sitting here like a giant target saying 'Oh hey, we're the bad guys'! We gotta go!" he told Neo.

The ship rose into the air and shot through the sky as they made their getaway. Roman pulled out a cigar and put it up to his lips. Emerald flicked open his lighter - stealing it without him noticing never got old - and lit it for him. He sighed a puff of smoke and ordered them to cuff her arms and legs with some cuffs they found near the cell Roman was kept in and locked her in there. He knew she could get away easily using her speed, so extra precautions were needed to keep her from getting away. He sat in the comfortable cockpit seats next to Neo and again sighed, closing his eyes as though he were exhausted. Neo gave him a concerned look.

"Relax, I didn't hit her as hard as it sounded," he reassured her after making sure the others wouldn't hear. She didn't seem to feel any better about it.

"If it's me you're worried about, I'm fine. I'm quite the actor, if I do say so myself," he jokes, "They still believe this little charade, so there's nothing to worry about. Acting like you're the bad guy… well, it just takes a lot outa you."

At this time, the other three members of team RWBY were just finishing off the last of the Grimm and hacked drones along with the other hunters and huntresses. It was some sort of miracle, really. Casualties had been low, considering the extreme threat level. The night had started to die down as repairs started being made and people started to fill the streets again. Yang hadn't settled down, though, and Weiss and Blake had been following her around just as worried. Ruby hadn't been able to meet up with them and they couldn't reach her scroll.

As the morning came, the three were exhausted. They hadn't slept very well knowing that their leader was still missing. Yang had been up all night trying to call Ruby or anyone who might know where she was. Her contacts were short, though, since very few people associated themselves with her after what the saw her do to Mercury. Ironwood again came to their dorm and questioned Yang if she had any involvement with the incident yesterday. After the questioning, he answered their questions. There was no trace of Ruby from the night before and she was still missing. Before he left, he informed Yang that she should be extra careful not to do anything to worsen everyone else's view of her. He went so far as to advise her to stay in her dorm for a while until things were sorted.

Ruby was gone, and Yang had no one to go to for help.