"Blake? I think your plan worked a little too well." Weiss commented, as she, Blake and Yang watched their team leader lying on the ground, holding her considerable swollen stomach.

~Or rather, my plan worked far too well.~ the heiress of the Schnee Dust Company thought to herself. ~I have heard of people learning algebra via hypnotism or suddenly being math geniuses after recovering from brain damage, but this?~

"She only answered about a quarter of the questions wrong." Blake voiced her thoughts. "I didn't think of her to make such headway so fast."

"Never get between my sister and her cookies." Yang chuckled, kneeling down next to her sister, who let out a moan and looked towards her sister. The older sister gently took the younger one's hand and smiled down at her.

"Cookies?" Ruby asked with a hopeful tone in her voice.

"She still wants more?" Weiss asked in disbelief.

"Nope, sorry Ruby." the blonde shook her head gently. "You ate all the cookies."

"Aww."

Yang didn't mention that there was technically still Ruby's secret (not so anymore) stash of cookies, which the rest of Team RWBY discovered the other day. They relocated it from under the floorboards to a corner in Yang and Blake's personal closet. Ruby shared one with Weiss incidentally.

"Come on, Rubes. Let's get you to the nurse's office." Yang slowly picked up Ruby in bridal style, before standing up and heading towards the door. "Hopefully they'll have something for your stomach ache."

"Nooooo~, no medicine," Ruby complained with a cute moan. "Medicine not yummy! Me wants cookies!"

"Nope," Yang emphasized the p in the word and walked out of the room, leaving Blake and Weiss behind.

"Well...that happened," Blake commented.

"You'd think I'm used to their behavior by now." Weiss shook her head. "Well, at least it looks like we don't have to worry about our leader's grades anymore. Speaking of grades, I think I'll review basic battle strategies one more time. Goodwitch' theoretical tests have always been the hardest of them all."

"Yeah, you're right." Blake nodded. "We shouldn't slack off, just because one of us needs help. I'm gonna go to the library for a bit. See you later."

Weiss simply nodded towards her sister's partner, as the hidden Faunus also left the room. The heiress of the biggest dust company in all of Remnant placed herself on the study desk, gathering her materials to study.

~Terran stomachs, weak. Storage of nutrients inefficient. Many materials wasted. Can improve.~

~Not now, Abathur.~ Weiss complained inwardly. ~I am rather busy right now, as I told you about a hundred times!~

~Queen can use swarm memory. Efficient. Infinite.~ The gene master argued.

~I know of the benefits of the swarm memory! However, as I have also told you multiple times before, I want to improve myself on my own accord.~

~Terran physiology limited. Improvement capacity limited. Swarm unlimited.~

~Urrgh, we don't have time for any physical improvements! How about you focus on your work, instead of complaining about our inferior biology?~

~Cannot create more test subjects. Essence required from source. Hair samples not enough.~

~And what exactly do you plan to do with the "essence" of my teammates?~ Weiss asked, knowing fully well how her gene master normally absorbed essence for her swarm.

~Normal absorption method results in death of subject. Found solution. Can copy strains from subject without endangering life. Process not instantaneous. Takes time.~

~...I see. And just how long would it take?~

~No reference. No experience. Need subject.~ Came the response from the gene master.

Weiss sighed at the information she was given. She had hoped that the hair samples she collected from her teammates would be enough, seeing Abathur did manage to include the semblance of her teammates in some of the Zerg units. However, for some reason, there was not enough essence in these hair strands to fully integrate the strains into the swarm. Why things were like they were was beyond Weiss' comprehension. Abathur had tried to explain it to her, but the heiress was sure that even the smartest people in Atlas would not understand a word that the worm had uttered. They'd probably be more interested in his inner workings, than his words anyways.

~I'll see what I can do. For now, use what you have and do NOT disturb me anymore, unless it is absolutely necessary!~

XXX

The rest of the week went as followed. After Ruby received her medication, she felt better the following day and the girls made sure not to overfeed her again, during their questioning sessions. Yang told the others that the nurse at first thought that Ruby was feigning her sickness, due to the upcoming tests. Apparently, a lot of students did it, in order to avoid taking part in those. Or at least they tried. Some even went as far as to injure themselves during training exercises. Luckily the nurse was kind enough to actually give Ruby the medication, after a brief check up that is.

Fighting classes were canceled for the week in order to give the students more study time. Weiss continued to use her psychic abilities at night on Ruby, which in return helped the girl during the day. The poor, naive child didn't suspect a thing after previously hard topics suddenly were so easy for her to pick up on. Blake and Yang suspected Ruby did have the brains to pull all of this off and just needed the right motivator, that being sweet, baked goods in this case. Weiss simply kept up her usual demeanor and played along with the reasoning of her other team members.

The day before the test was a little different, however. Mainly Teams RWBY and JNPR had to calm their leaders down, as both of them had a bad case of mental breakdown. Both Jaune and Ruby hugged each other tightly, crying literal streams of tears and rambled on and on, on how they would fail, disowned by their families, thrown to the Grimm and from there on it just became nonsensical. It took hours to break them apart and even longer to calm them down.

Thus the week of the test came by. If Weiss was honest with herself, she didn't find those tests any hard, quite the contrary actually. She didn't know what her fellow teammates were complaining about. Heck, even Blake complained every now and then about those tests and next to Weiss she was the smartest first-semester student. But then again, no one expected of the Faunus to be perfect in every way, like it was expected of a Schnee. Yang was pretty quiet through the entire week, here and there cracking the one or other terrible pun, but overall was more reserved and focused on her tests. Ruby? She "drowned" her despair in cookies, before she begged her teammates to go over the topics of the following day's test one last time with the cookie reward method. It certainly didn't get boring for Team RWBY.

After the last exam of the week on Friday, you could feel a general relief going through the entire school. The students generally were (mostly) in a better mood than they had been the past weeks. A few people were still down, thinking that they had failed spectacularly, but most students didn't even want to hear the word "test". Most however relinquished at the fact that the dreaded week of tests was finally over and talked about the plans they had for the short break they were given before the next semester would start. The same went for most members of RWBY.

"Mnngh, yeah! It's finally over!" Ruby exclaimed from the top of her makeshift bunk bed, stretching her arms all the way up to the ceiling, until her fingertips were only about half a meter or so away from it.

"Yeah…" Blake let out a sigh, flipping a page in her book. "It was certainly harder than I expected it to be."

"Dad did say that those tests are brutal, but damn." Yang rubbed her forehead, lying on top of her own bed. "I know being a huntress isn't all about beating the living shit out of Grimm, but really? Do I really need to know each and every plant that's growing in Atlas?"

"You never know. Imagine you get send on a mission in Atlas territory and get severely injured during that mission. Knowing which plant is poisonous and which accelerates your healing properties is very handy in a situation like this and similar ones." The cat Faunus explained from underneath.

"And once again, logic proves to be my greatest enemy," Yang said in a joking tone. "So, any of you got any plans now that we're free?" the blonde brawler asked.

"Not really," Ruby admitted. "Maybe we should go to Vale and have some fun."

"Heh, with our luck, we'll probably run into Torchwick again," Yang commented holding up a hand. "Is there even a Dust Shop left, which he hasn't robbed?"

Hearing the topic switching to Torchwick, Blake closed her book and sat upright on her bed. "I still don't get why the White Fang is working for him and for what they actually need that much dust?"

"Ammo? Obviously." Yang pointed out.

"No." Blake shook her head, even though only Weiss could see her. "The White Fang have not nearly enough members for such a great amount of dust. Most of it is just going to lie around in storage. Aside from not having enough members, the White Fang almost never attacks out in the open."

"It's like they're preparing for a war," Weiss commented letting out a sigh. "Something that is stupid, considering their low numbers. However, they do have an impact on the economy. Dust prices have risen, mostly in Vale, but it also has an impact on the other Kingdoms. Plus the people in Vale are distraught that the police didn't manage to catch Torchwick as of yet. Not surprising, considering he fights with the skill of a Hunter. I guess their goal is more to cause chaos and unease among the populace, rather than use the dust."

"Urgh, can we not talk about the White Fang?" Ruby complained from atop. "I'm not saying it's not a problem, but how about we relax, have some fun and work on our team attacks!"

"Team attacks?" Weiss, Yang, and Blake asked at the same time.

"Yup!" Ruby sat up on her bed and pulled a paper from under her pillow. "So far we have been mostly fighting on our own, with a few exceptions, like on the first day, when Weiss catapulted me up into the air with her semblance. So I thought to myself: "We definitely need more moves!" and came up with a few names and attacks. It's far from finished, though, so I thought we could sit together and come up with some team attacks."

"As childish as that sounds…"

"Hey!"

"...it's actually a pretty good idea," Blake commented.

"See!"

Weiss and Yang gave each other a look, the later shrugging. "Fine with me."

"...Well, I suppose it's worth giving a shot." Weiss conceded.

"YES!" Ruby jumped off her bed and landed in the middle of the room, her face beaming at everyone in her sight. "This is going to be so awesome! So, I have thought of something like White Rose, where-"

"Ruby." Weiss stood up and also walked into the middle of the room until she stood right in front of the girl. "I know I already gave my approval to the idea, however, I must ask you to stop for now."

"Aww, but why?" Ruby asked, giving Weiss her infamous puppy dog eyes. Almost instinctively, the white haired girl looked away in order to not be affected by the psychological attack.

The heiress took in a deep breath, closing her eyes for a moment, before continuing. "I'm sure you all remember, when back at the harbor I said as a Team, we shouldn't have any secrets from each other. Well, so far, I have been pretty hypocritical of this statement."

That sentence immediately got the attention of her fellow teammates. Yang rolled around in her bed, in order to get a good look at what was going on at the lower levels, while Blake disembarked from her bed, curiosity and fear equally accumulating in her stomach.

"Weiss…?" Ruby asked carefully, but the white clothed girl didn't look into her leader's eyes.

"If not for the test, which we just finished, I would have told you all sooner." She chuckled a little. "But, since we're done with those as of today, I have run out of excuses to keep my conscious calm."

"You have a conscious?" Yang asked with a chuckle. In response, her fellow teammate glared up at her.

"Calm down." the brawler held up her hands. "Just trying to lighten up the mood, before everyone gets all moody."

Multiple groans followed that statement.

"In any event" Weiss tried to keep her composure up "as you have guessed by now, Blake isn't the only one who has been hiding something from you." Weiss looked to the ground. "I don't blame any of you for being angry at me, especially you Blake, after I firstly reacted so poorly to you being a Faunus." The black and white clothed girls looked at each other.

"That's alright." the cat faunus replied. "It's not like I was any better when I first met you. Not to mention, you have a legitimate reason to hate the White Fang."

Weiss allowed herself to smile a little. "Thank you, Blake, but it still doesn't excuse my behavior for keeping a secret from you for so long, especially after I of all people said we shouldn't do exactly that."

"So...are you a secret faunus as well?" Ruby asked carefully, to which Weiss simply deadpanned at her leader.

"No."

"You're not actually a Schnee?" Yang asked.

"No."

"You're a child from outside of marriage?" Blake tried.

"If only things were that easy." Weiss sighed. "Look, this is not something I can simply tell you, this is something I need to show you."

"Show us?" Blake asked.

Weiss nodded. "Without showing you physical proof, you will just denounce me as a lunatic."

"Don't be silly, Weiss." Ruby immediately retorted. "We will never think of you like that."

"Believe me, Ruby, even you will think of me that way if I just come out like this." the heiress crossed her arms, looking down and closing her eyes. "I know I'm asking much, but I need you to wait until tomorrow, where I'll show you my secret, which is hidden around twenty miles south to Beacon."

"Twenty miles?!" the three other girls exclaimed.

Weiss nodded. "We can easily cut ten of them, by traveling by train to an outpost town, but the rest we'll need to walk the rest." She looked up to her teammates. "I know if we consider the average human walks three miles per hour and Grimm attacks, we'll need about three to five hours. But I wouldn't ask this of you if it wasn't absolutely necessary."

The other three girls looked at each other. On the one hand, this was Weiss they were talking about, the girl who is always serious and always had a reason behind whatever she was doing. On the other hand, the girls asked themselves what could be so important that they had to go on a ten-mile walk into Grimm infested territory?

"Well, I guess we'll be going on a camping trip over the weekend." Ruby declared. Weiss wasn't surprised by this one bit. Yang and Blake, however…

"You got me curious, snow queen. Besides, it's been awhile since our last camping trip." Yang crossed her arms and nodded.

Weiss turned her attention towards the final girl, Blake, who had her eyes closed, not showing any emotion. The faunus could feel the gazes of her fellow teammates resting on her but didn't let it faze her. Eventually, she opened her eyes and nodded at Weiss. "I'll go too. But we should prepare for every eventuality. That means telling the teachers where we're going for our camping trip, in case something goes wrong."

"Of course. I don't doubt they'll allow it since it's close to a settlement. Our scrolls should have no problem getting a signal, in case we need to call for help."

XXX

Surprisingly, it took an entire hour until Team RWBY got the okay from Professor Goodwitch to go to their "camping trip". The professor firstly went through the latest Grimm reports, wanting to be sure that the local Grimm activity was low enough for the first year students to handle and even then the Team was forced to make contact to Beacon every three hours. Apparently, there had been some unfortunate deaths in the past.

On the next day, Team RWBY took the earliest flight to Vale, from where they took the train for a short ride towards the outpost town Weiss mentioned. It was built next to a dust mine, so the town in itself appeared rather crude and industrialized. However, the team didn't get a good look at it, as, after a rather short night, they were more than eager to see just what the heiress could be hiding in the middle of nowhere. None of them had any real idea, but here they were, weapons loaded, backpacks packed and on the way deep into the local forest.

And as far as the wilderness was concerned, it didn't take long until the first Beowulfs showed up and attack the group without warning. Reacting quickly, the team dropped their backpacks and jumped out of the way, causing four Beowulfs to crash into each other. Due to the lack of space, Ruby fought with her weapon in "rifle mode" and shot her enemies with big calibers, while jumping out of the way of nearby Grimm.

Yang, of course, was just Yang. She punched every Grimm that came into her field of vision. When an enemy came from behind, she simply punched seemingly nothing in front of her, using the recoil to her advantage to hit the enemy behind her hard with her elbow. She would then raise her arm to ninety degrees and shoot the Grimm's chin. Her bullets easily penetrated all the way through the head of the Grimm, ending its existence immediately.

Blake used both of her blades to fend off the wolf-like Grimm. Using her semblance to dodge attacks, she immediately counterattacked and slew the beasts with ease. As a former White Fang member, she had by far the most fighting experience out of everyone. Beowulfs were in Hunter circles considered the easiest Grimm out of all of them, the once beginners struggle against. So far only the Grimm had lost their limbs and heads in this fight and Blake planned to make sure it stayed that way.

Weiss used her family's semblance for increased mobility. She jumped over the opposing Grimm and mostly stabbed them from behind, having learned where exactly she needed to point her weapon at, to kill a Beowulf with one strike. When jumping out of the way wasn't an option, Weiss sprinted ahead and stabbed the Beowulf through the heart before its claw could rip her clothes apart. Although luckily, aura not only protected the user, but also the clothes the user was wearing.

The fight was over soon enough, with no one being hurt and the final Grimm corpses disappearing. "If only they wouldn't disappear like that. Their fur looks actually pretty comfortable." Yang commented, picking up her bag.

"Studying them would be a lot easier too," Weiss stated picking up her own bag. ~Not to mention their biomass would be a nice additional resource.~ She thought to herself.

The rest of the trip was mostly the same. The girls walked, made some small talk, Grimm attacked every other hour, but nothing too special like during the initiation happened.

At one point, Blake asked Weiss a rather peculiar question. "Weiss, are you sure you don't need a map to navigate through the forest?"

"Don't worry Blake. I know the way pretty well. If no more attacks happen, we will be there for about an hour or two."

"If you say so…"

XXX

After four hours of nonstop walking and fighting, Ruby demanded they take a break and eat something. Back in Beacon, they prepared sandwiches and devoured those now eagerly. The girls sat in a circle, silently enjoying their meal, well until Yang decided to break that silence.

"Hey Weiss, can you maybe give us a hint just where are we going and what we're looking for?"

The heiress resisted the urge to roll her eyes and simply answered: "We will be there when we'll be there. There's nothing specific in the area, so-" Weiss cut herself off for no apparent reason and looked around frantically.

The others were confused by her sudden behavior.

"What's wrong?" Ruby asked concerned, to which the older girl quickly shushed the younger one. Understanding the behavior, Blake listened intently with her increased sense of hearing, but couldn't make out any suspicious noises. "I don't hear anything." the faunus stated after some time. Weiss looked at her fellow teammate, before relaxing and sitting back down. "Sorry. It must have been my imagination."

"In that case, you were saying?" Yang asked.

"Right. As I was saying, there are no obvious clues to the location I'm leading you all. Unless you know what to look for, you'll just think of it as another patch of land."

"And you know what to look for," Blake stated. "Come to think of it, how will you be able to recognize it? I mean, when did you have the time to come here in the first place? How do you know it is still hidden there?"

"...I have a way of keeping this place in check from afar."

"You're being awfully secretive." Ruby pointed out.

"Please bear with me for a little longer." the heiress sighed. "I promise your patience will pay off in the end."

Although not satisfied with the explanation, Weiss' fellow teammates respected her wishes and didn't press on.

After finishing with their meal, Team RWBY continued on their trip with Weiss in the lead and the others following from behind. Ruby was practically skipping through the forest, humming a little tune to herself. Yang kept her eyes open, expecting another Grimm attack any moment since it had been a while since the last one. Blake did the same, however, her actual focus was somewhere else. She had been worried from the very beginning, but now that they were getting close to the reveal, the faunus wondered more and more just what the heiress could be hiding. If she didn't know better, the faunus would think that the heiress was leading them to an Atlas ambush, in order to get Blake arrested. But that thought was just ridiculous.

Eventually, Weiss stopped dead in her tracks, causing Ruby to bump into her back.

"We're here." The clad white girl announced.

"Huh?" Ruby and the rest looked around, yet there was literally nothing outstanding. Trees, moss, dirt, a few leaves on the ground, but nothing special.

"There's...nothing here." Yang pointed out lamely, to which Weiss only scoffed.

"I told you, no one would notice this place, unlike you know what to look for."

"And what exactly are we looking for here?" the brawler inquired.

"You'll see soon enough." the heiress replied. "Also, do me a favor and don't kill any of them."

"Kill?" Ruby asked.

"Any of them?" Blake echoed.

As soon as those two finished, a rumble could be heard coming from the ground. Cracks began to appear on the surface of the earth. Out of instinct Ruby, Blake and Yang readied their weapons, however, Weiss stretched her arm in front of her teammates, which prevented them from shooting the three Zerglings that appeared out of the ground. Three out of four members of Team RWBY immediately took on fighting stands. Weiss was the only exception, for she had her weapon sheathed and was approaching the Zerglings at a leisure pace.

"Weiss, what the heck are you doing?!" Yang shouted, but the heiress already stood in front of her troops. The heiress of the Schnee Dust Company stretched out her hand and slowly stroked the middle Zergling's head. It let out a low growl, which was pretty similar to a purring cat, only more aggressive. The other two Zerglings came near Weiss and slowly rubbed their heads against the girl's legs.

"Uh...Weiss?" Ruby spoke up carefully. "What. Are. Those. Things?" Ruby pointed a finger at the Zerglings, speaking each word carefully. The white haired girl turned around and found her teammates staring at her with wide eyes.

"Are those...what you were talking about?" Yang asked, still keeping her arms up.

"Well…" Weiss put a finger under her chin. "They're...part of it."

"Part of it." Blake echoed with her usual deadpan voice.

"A very small part of it," Weiss emphasized each word in the sentence. She then pointed towards the hole where the Zerglings came from, which revealed a huge tunnel going underground. "The rest is waiting underground."

"The rest?" the trio of teammates inquired.

Just as soon as they said that, more creatures appeared from underground. Not only were there more Zerglings, but also Roaches and Hydralisks. Ruby, Blake and Yang stood now back to back to each other. Weiss sighed at their reaction. At least none of them had shot one of her children yet.