"Stand down!" A familiar voice echoed from behind the crowd of guards. "I will not have you stand in the way of the heir of the Schnee-"

A single gunshot echoed down the hall and the voice died. The guards all shifted uncomfortably and Weiss saw her opportunity. She lunged forward, sweeping the legs out from under the front row of guards as Ren peppered the rest with his weapons. Even though they had bullet proof armour on, the impacts were enough to land most of them on the ground. Weiss stood and threw up a glyph that covered the group as a few guards recovered enough to return fire.

Weiss spotted a puddle of red with a black suited man at its center at the other end of the hall. A simple cane lay beside him as his body twitched and he coughed up blood, making the puddle grow slightly bigger.

"Kill them." Weiss growled, a fury she hadn't often felt before, coursing through her veins.

She dropped her glyph and fired explosive dust into the air in front of her. She switched to the red dust chamber and fired creating a fireball that incinerated the guards unlucky enough to be caught in its blast.

She threw up another glyph as the smoke cleared and more bullets tried to find the group. Weiss hadn't even noticed that Ren was standing still behind her, not making a move and instead simply crouching in front of Nora.

Weiss counted seven of the twenty dead and charred as she stepped forward, moving the glyph with her.

As she passed a lucky survivor, she impaled his throat on Myrenaster before continuing on. One guard at the back started to run, and Weiss caught him with another glyph, sealing off the escape route.

"Who shot Claude?" Weiss asked, her voice full of venom as she approached another guard who'd lost his leg in the explosion and was clearly close to bleeding out. "Was it you?"

The man fell dead, a small hole in his neck where Weiss had punctured his spine. She looked around and felt the weight of everything crash down on her. Words Ruby'd said on their last rescue mission flashing through her mind. If we kill them, we sink to their level. Weiss felt regret for her actions pulse through her chest and she glanced back at Ruby to see her watching Weiss. Her expression was guarded of emotion simply showing that she was paying attention to what was happening, not telling Weiss she was right or wrong.

Weiss continued to walk, this time only knocking out the guards as she passed. They were only doing their jobs, after all. If anyone was to blame, it was her father and Torchwick. She knocked the last of the guards out and approached the butler who lay dead. Looking down, she saw the bullet hole that had punctured the man's lung and caused him to suffocate. His mouth was covered in a mess of blood that he'd coughed up and his eyes stared blankly to the left.

After what felt like forever, Ruby crouched over the elderly man and bushed her hand over his eyes, closing them. "Thank you, Claude…"

Weiss felt her eyes burn as Ruby wrapped her arm around her shoulders and guided her away toward the exit. Ren followed with Nora once again in his arms. Weiss felt the world getting darker as they exited the castle to see the plane starting its engines on the runway.

"Probably from using her aura so much. But that's not the priority!" Someone said loudly.

"It might be a combination from the shock of losing her butler that way." Another voice added calmly. This one was much deeper than the first and farther away.

"Well we still need an explanation because after all this, I'm finding it hard to trust miss powder puff over there!" A third voice yelled in response to the other two. The voice was high pitched and sounded very angry.

"Look, she did find Nora and made sure they all returned saftely." The fourth voice seemed more tired than anything. "I'm going to report what happened to Ozpin. He'll probably want to talk to you too though."

"Fine!" The first voice sighed. "But not till we're back at beacon. I'm going to try to enjoy the rest of this trip. I can always worry about everything else tomorrow."

"You are impossible, you know that?" The third voice responded incredulously. "I have half a mind-"

"That's enough! Yang, I know you're a bit confused, but I can tell you that you are misdirecting your anger toward Weiss. She doesn't run the business after all. Not yet." A fifth voice chimed in, calm and cool. "Not to mention she's just lost someone obviously important to her and you are her teammate. At least try to be considerate!"

"Ughh! Fine! But if this keeps happening, I'm going to start breaking skulls! Beginning with hers!" Stomping indicated Yang had gone away.

"Just leave her to me. She's more scared of the order Weiss gave before you left. She was terrified she wouldn't see you again." The fifth voice said. "Just take it easy, Ruby. Like you said, it can all wait untill tomorrow."

"Thanks, Blake." Ruby said.

Weiss was lying down on a soft bed. She couldn't understand why her teammates were talking so close, but was too tired to open her eyes, never mind say anything about it. She felt the bed sag slightly as someone else got in beside her. A moment later, soft lips brushed her forehead and Ruby whispered in her ear.

"I love you, Weiss. I'm glad I'm your partner."

The girl beside her fell asleep. Her breathing slowing to a crawl. Weiss on the other hand felt like she could sleep for several days if she could only get her mind to slow down.

At first it was just wandering through her memories. Birthdays, easters, Christmas's, basically every family oriented day she could think of. Sure her parents were in a few of them. Hell, most of them were of meetings where she was simply left to her own affairs in a corner and told not to make any noise. A few more were of various locations with random staff surrounding her as she celebrated yet another year in captivity.

But it wasn't long until she started to notice the one person who seemed to be on the sidelines of most of the memories. Claude had placated her when she'd broken her toy in the middle of her father's business meeting. He'd taken the initiative to plan her vacations and as often as possible had been her accompanying guardian when she went anywhere her parents weren't. He'd always wished her a happy whatever the holiday was, and she finally realized it wasn't just because he worked for her and wanted to be promoted or get a raise. He'd been old when Weiss had finally taken notice of him and asked his name. Since that day, he'd been more of a father to her than her own sorry excuse for a father.

Weiss felt her eyes burn hot as the memories continued to wash over, along with flashes of the pool of blood, the guards she'd killed and the dead look in Ruby's eyes as she watched her kill them.

"Hey, sleepy, you need to eat." Ruby said loudly. Weiss snapped her eyes open, disoriented for a minute until she realized she was looking at the roof of a plane.

"What?" She asked, thinking she'd misheard Ruby.

"You need to eat!" Ruby laughed before leaning over her and kissing her. "I made sandwiches for everyone."

Weiss sat up, looking around at the sleeping people around the cabin. Nora occupied the other bed, Ren sitting on the floor beside it, his eyes closed as if he was meditating. Jaune and Pyrrha had fallen asleep on a chair, Jaune in the chair, Pyrrha laying across the arms of the chair and Jaune's legs as if she'd collapsed while sitting on an arm. Blake had Yang's head leaning on her shoulder as she read a book. Yang was snoring loudly as Blake took a fresh tissue from a nearby box and wiped the drool off her mouth before it landed on her shirt.

"Why did you wake me up?" Weiss grumbled as her exhaustion punched through her groggyness.

"I need to talk to you before anyone else does." Ruby said almost sadly. "I already talked to Ren, but I need to talk to you too before we're back at Beacon."

"This has to do with Nora, right?" Weiss guessed. Ruby nodded, casting a glance over at the bed she slept on.

"She was given some type of anesthetic. She should be fine till we get her to Vale. But I need to know why."

Weiss thought. There were a thousand answers she could only guess at. Why was Torchwick there? Why didn't he fight? Why did they kidnap Nora? Why was it necessary to rescue her? And why did they shoot Claude? No matter what question Weiss asked herself, she came up with the same answer. "I honestly don't know."

Ruby seemed somewhat disappointed by the answer, but didn't push it. Instead she gave Weiss a plate with a sandwich on it. Seeing the food, her stomache let out a loud growl, drawing Blake's eyes away from her book for a moment.

Weiss shovelled the sandwich into her mouth. It was probably the best thing she'd ever tasted. Her mind scolded her overindulgent opinion as her reason argued it was only because Ruby'd made it for her and she hadn't eaten since the protien bar that'd passed as lunch.

Ruby took the plate and put it away before coming to sit beside Weiss.

The two were quiet, each in their own thoughts about the previous day. And finally, Weiss broke. Her tears flowing down her face as she shook with the effort of keeping her sobs quiet.

"Shhh… it's gonna be okay…" Ruby said, gently embracing Weiss in a soft hug and rubbing her back. "It's all over now…"

"I'm so sorry, Ruby!" Weiss appologised. Again, Ruby's stony face popped into her mind and she started to cry harder. "I… I killed… all… all of those… guards… because they k… killed Claude… and… and they wanted to kill… you…"

"Shhh…" Ruby replied, giving Weiss a kiss on the neck where she knew Weiss liked it to no effect. "You only did what you had to."

Weiss was unable to reply as she continued to cry into Ruby's shoulder, the other girl rubbing her back. Something about the moment felt to Weiss like how she imagined a mother would hold her daughter, never having the chance to experience that type of relationship.

"And I'm sorry about Claude. I know he meant a lot to you." Ruby mumbled as she pulled Weiss down onto the bed. Through her sobbing, Weiss heard Ruby start to sing softly so only she'd hear. "So long, light of dawn… darkness take me in, soundlessly holding on… in the depths, silent world, long ago… all that will remain, broken heart, farewell… memories of better days… locked within in hopes that we will remember… someday we may wake to find sunrise."

Weiss stopped crying and Ruby stopped singing. "Thanks, Ruby." She croaked out of her tired and sore throat. She felt like Ruby'd taken all her sadness and put it somewhere where it couldn't harm her anymore.

"I love you Weiss. Goodnight." Ruby kissed Weiss slowly and Weiss felt a feeling of calm steal over her.

"Love you too…" She responded as her eyes fluttered closed. She fell asleep wrapped in Ruby's arms, the warm body pressed up against her in a way that seemed as if it was completely natural.

"You let her escape?"

"What did you expect me to do? I'm not getting a hole blown in me by the crazy 'I blow holes through meter thick cement' heiress!" Torchwick spat in response.

"You over-estimate her, Roman." The voice responded pityingly.

"And you underestimate her!" Roman almost yelled in response. "Do you even know what happened? She levelled the tower! Sixty were killed, mostly guards that couldn't escape along with a few scientists that were stupid enough to try running though the collapsing power crystal!"

"Well, it is of little importance. It is simply a matter that we will deal with later." The voice said smoothly.

"And what's this 'we'? I thought we were done after today!" Roman argued.

"We are only done when our plan is carried through. You don't want to fail me, Roman. Not again." Roman flinched at the unspoken threat.

"Whatever… I captured the main objective anyway. I sent it to your scroll. I'll expect my payment sometime today." Roman said, wanting nothing more than to end the conversation.

"We'll be in contact again soon." The voice responded as Roman clicked the hang up button on his scroll.

"How did I get roped into this in the first place?" Roman asked himself shaking his head and walking into the bar. The bartender looked up at him as he sat down on the stool. He knew he looked like he'd gone through a battle and the fact was that he had. His white jacket had specs of blood here and there with massive smears of dirt and dust everywhere. His once black hat looked closer to gray. "Vodka. Leave the bottle."

The bartender nodded, placed a shot glass on the counter and opened a bottle of the clear liquid and filled the shot. He passed both items to Roman before walking over to take another mans order.

The man sat down beside Roman as the bartender served him a pint of imported beer.

Roman took his shot and refilled the glass. He repeated the process twice more before he started to feel a bit better from the long day he'd had.

"Long day, huh?" The man asked before he took a large swig from his glass.

"Something of the sort, yes." Roman responded. "Probably worse than yours."

"Oh, I very much doubt that!" The man laughed sardonically, taking another swig.

The two men stayed silent Roman took shot after shot, emptying the bottle. He tossed some lien on the bar and got up. The man sitting beside him had finished his beer and was half way through a bottle of whisky but didn't even have a tinge of red on his cleanly shaven face.

Roman turned to leave when the man's hand caught his arm. "You're going to have to pick a side in this, and you don't want to pick the losing one."

Roman's brain snapped through the fog of the alcohol and focused intently on the man before him. "O-kay." He drew out the word, not wanting to let on that the man had spoken what he'd been thinking not an hour ago.

"It's like flipping a coin. The winner will be determined by those who support them. Just don't underestimate those you'd think of as small or weak. If anything, that will be your downfall."

The man turned back to his whisky, forgoing the shot glass and chugging the remaining half of the bottle in one go. He left Roman standing in the bar, his thoughts racing. Below them all, one question persisted. Who was that?

Author's Note:

The song Ruby sings is taken from the song Silver Sky by ナノ (Nano). As usual, the rights to this song belong to whoever owns them, because I sure don't.