Chapter 4

In answer to Sun's question, Ruby said, "I'm looking for Adam, we were just talking about that." She gave Blake a friendly smile.

For a moment, she resembled the same innocent girl Blake had known at Beacon. Blake hadn't forgotten Ruby's previous outburst, but she was glad to see that Ruby still possessed the same cheerfulness as when she was younger, Blake nodded and said, "From what the lieutenant said, she's already been to the bases north of here looking for where to find him. Which means there's only a couple left."

At the mention of the lieutenant Ruby looked at his body. Without his constant gurgling noises, she had forgotten he was even there.

"That's great! We'll be done with this mission even sooner than we thought. And we'll be able to show you around Menagerie after its over." Sun directed the last part at Ruby, who had gone to retrieve her knife and was wiping it on the lieutenant's coat.

"As fun as that sounds, I can't. I need to find Adam sooner rather than later. To do that, I have to find someone that knows where he is, but that hasn't happened yet." Ruby stood up and faced Blake, sending her a subtle look. She didn't want to call her out in front of Sun because she was under the impression Blake hadn't told him about her plan to hunt down Adam.

Sun said, "I'm sure you'll find someone at the last two bases. If you don't, we can take you to their old headquarters and let you look around the database for info on him."

Ruby went back over to Sun and Blake, saying, "That would be fantastic. But I have a feeling I'll find someone who can help me soon." Ruby didn't bother gauge Blakes reaction, instead she moved the conversation to another topic.

"Sooooo, how would you guys feel about setting up camp together for the night?" Ruby was ready to get off her feet, and a chance to talk with some old friends would be a welcome change to her solitary nights, maybe she could get through to Blake and convince her to say where Adam is.

"That would give us a chance to catch-up on what's happened over the years." Sun said.

Blake had considered what would happen if she saw any of team RWBY again; Yang would hate her for obvious reasons, Blake felt she deserved it. Weiss would think her a coward for leaving while she had been forced to go. Ruby would hate her and think she was a coward. Blake was the reason that her sister could no longer be a huntress and she had run away instead of staying to help with the aftermath.

She hadn't wanted to leave them. They were the first family she had been a part of since leaving her real family. But she knew that staying with them would only put them in danger, as evidenced by what Adam did to Yang. Leaving RWBY was the hardest thing she had ever done in her life, but she still believed it had been the right thing to do. No matter how much they hated her, she would stand by her decision.

Now that Ruby was here, she wanted to try and explain all of that to her. Since Ruby had saved her from the lieutenant and she hadn't brought up Yang or how Blake ran away, she hoped that there was still a possibility of being forgiven by her.

"I'd like that."

After spending close to half an hour putting some distance between themselves and the decimated White Fang base Blake, Sun, and Ruby agreed to settle down for the night. They had pitched their tents and started a fire, which they were all seated around, eating an underwhelming dinner.

"I know you guys said a little bit about this on the way over, but how did you meet after Beacon?" Ruby had been wondering that ever since Sun showed up. What had brought them together, and why hadn't Blake fled from him.

Sun had a mouth full of food, so Blake answered, "I decided to go back to Menagerie and see my family. The last time I saw them I said some harsh things and I wanted to apologize. So, I bought a ticket for the next boat. While I was standing on the deck looking out over the ocean, a giant Sea Feilong rose up out of the water. The ship wasn't really equipped to handle a grimm of that scale, so I stared to fight it, then Sun, who had been following me in this ratty old cloak, threw it off and we beat the grimm together." Blake's mouth curled into a smile and Sun swallowed his food, "You're making it sound romantic." He looked at Ruby, "It was not romantic, we almost died, and she told me I shouldn't have come. But she couldn't run away from me because we were in the middle of the ocean." Blake tensed up slightly, but Ruby didn't seem to react at the mention of Blake running away.

"By the time we were at Menagerie she wasn't so insistent on me leaving, so I stuck around, and I've been sticking around ever since." Sun's hand crept over to Blake's.

"That's cute, and it makes sense from what I remember of you two at Beacon." She found herself genuinely glad to see Blake happy. "You also mentioned something about starting the movement against the White Fang, what made you do that?"

Sun looked at Blake, "That was all her, like I said, I just hang around. Blake made all of that happen." Blake looked slightly abashed, Sun continued, "Once we got to Menagerie, Blake wanted to see her parents first. While we were talking to them" Sun interrupted himself to say how great Blake's parents are and that Ruby had to meet them, "Anyway, these guys from the White Fang show up. We found out Blake's parents didn't know what the White Fang had been doing in the rest of the world. After we filled her parents in, they told them to leave. From there we had a few encounters with Illia." He interrupted himself again to say that Ruby needed to meet her too, "Blake and me tried to get the faunus to fight against the White Fang but it didn't work. Eventually Corsac and Fener, they're the guys from the beginning, they show up and tried to kill Blake's family and me, but Illia stopped them. When all the faunus were gathered outside her house after the battle, Blake convinced them to fight for a better representation of the faunus, and that was the start of taking the White Fang back." Sun stopped to think for a second, "Yeah that's everything." He nodded to himself.

"Really, that's how you're telling the story." Blake almost couldn't believe the utter casualness with which Sun recounted nearly being killed and inspiring a revolution.

"Well yeah, that's what happened, right?"

Blake rolled her eyes and felt her mouth form a grin, she momentarily forgot about everything else going on in the world, the nervousness at seeing Ruby again. For the first time in a long time she didn't feel the weight of Menagerie's uncertain future and all her past decisions bearing down upon her. Tonight, she was just talking with old friends.

"That's enough about us, what have you been doing since Beacon?" Sun asked. Ruby was still very much the cheerful, resolute girl he'd known but she had gained a battle-hardened undertone, he was curios as to what had brought that on.

"Where should I start?" Ruby asked herself, she looked upward and thought on it. Moments later, her gaze shifted back to Sun and Blake, "The winter after Beacon fell, Jaune, Nora, Ren, my uncle Qrow and I left for Haven. That could be its own story, but it took a long time and it wasn't easy, eventually we got to Haven. And we were surprised by how nice it was, it kind of felt like Beacon." A bittersweet smile had snuck onto her face.

Ruby looked into the fire and took a breath, "After we saw the campus and talked with some of the students and professors, we started to think about finishing training there. My uncle said it was a good idea, and that was the last push we needed, although I don't know what else we would have done." Ruby had a far-off look in her eyes and her voice had lost its usual cadence.

"It was nice." Not the same as team RWBY, she didn't let herself say that, "We learned a lot about being hunters and each other. Things started to feel normal again. As the years went by, we improved a lot and became great friends." She stopped talking and only the fires crackling interrupted the stillness.

"One night in our last year, the White Fang attacked. It was like Beacon all over again. I don't like to talk about the details, but Jaune, Nora, and Ren died. A lot of people did." Blake and Sun stared at Ruby with rapt attention. This was the first time they had heard about another school being attacked.

A flurry of thoughts and emotions whirled around inside Blake. She was outraged to learn that the White Fang had attacked another school. At the same time, she felt a deep sadness thinking about all of those lives lost due to the actions of some misguided faunus. Intermingled with the first sadness was another, for Ruby. Her first team had broken apart, and her second team had been crushed before they even got a chance to be huntsman.

"A few days later, headmaster Lionheart said that anyone who was in their last year and survived would be made an official huntsman. Since then I've been going around Remnant hunting grimm and doing a few missions for Qrow." Ruby nibbled at the last bit of her food While Blake and Sun tried to think of a response.

"That's…that's awful." Was all Sun could say.

"I'm so sorry." Came Blake's quiet apology.

The crackling of the fire did its best to fight off the silence that had settled over the group.

"How long ago?" Blake asked quietly.

Ruby focused on the fire, "Three years ago."

"Does that mean you've been wandering around Remnant fighting grimm by yourself for three years." Blake asked.

"Mostly. Sometimes I find groups of people who need protection and I'll go with them for a while, occasionally I work with other huntsman teams when the opportunity presents itself." Sun noticed Blake's ears curl inward slightly, he asked Ruby, "I don't mean to sound insensitive, but have you thought about finding another team?"

She nodded, "I have, but it wouldn't feel right." She had also thought about getting team RWBY back together, never seriously. It was always a nice daydream, but it never got to be more than that. Mainly because she thought she would never see Blake or Weiss again. And even if she did, there was no guarantee they would want to be a team again.

The conversation ended with that. Ruby said that she was going to sleep, Blake and Sun bid her goodnight.

A strong breeze was blowing against Ruby's tent when she woke up. She rubbed her eyes and rolled onto her back. She wanted to sleep a little longer, but the empty feeling in her stomach and her own dedication to finishing her mission won. Opening her tent and looking out she was greeted by the sight of another tent and Sun eating nearby the remains of the fire from last night.

Ruby was happy to have found some of her old friends, regardless of how she felt about Blake, it had been nice to talk with her again. Though she had gotten so caught up in the memories of Haven that she hadn't tried to convince Blake to give up where to find Adam.

Ruby left her tent to go sit with Sun, grabbing one of her own rations on the way out.

"Morning, are you as sick of eating rations as I am." Sun said as she approached.

"Oh Yeah, I brought some junk food with me, but it didn't last long. I thought this would be a much shorter mission than it turned out to be." Ruby seated herself nearby.

"I would love some junk food right now. I don't remember the last time I ate something that was bad for me." After a pause, his tail perked up and he said, "What if, the next time we go to a White Fang compound we look around and help ourselves to their junk food?"

Ruby liked the sound of that, "I like the sound of that, and If we find any cookies, they're mine."

"Deal, now I kind of want to get going. But Blake's still sleeping."

"Well I'm not ready to go yet."

They went back to eating for a moment, then Sun said, "So, is it weird for you to see Blake after so long?" Over the years, Sun had tried to assuage Blake's certainty that her friends hated her for leaving. No amount of assurances or gently spoken words that made logical sense would convince Blake that her friends would forgive her. But after Ruby had gone to sleep, Blake had brought up how Ruby's non-hostile welcome had made her hope there was a chance for forgiveness.

Ruby glanced at Sun, "Yeah, its weird." She didn't say anything for a while after that. At first Sun thought that was all she was going to say, when she did speak, he realized she had been carefully thinking about what to add, "Sometimes I hoped I would never see her again, other times I wanted to see her just so that I could yell at her."

That wasn't quite what Sun had wanted to hear, but he couldn't fault Ruby for it.

"What about now?"

Ruby let out a sigh, "I haven't decided yet. Somewhere in between, I guess."

Setting his food aside, Sun turned to face Ruby, "Look, I'm not gonna tell you to forgive her or say that what she did was okay. That's up to you. But I am going to tell you that Blake genuinely believes what she did was the best thing for you guys. She didn't run away to protect herself. It was because she knew that being around anyone would make them a target to Adam. She told me that's why he cut Yang's arm off and he would have done worse."

Ruby had been expecting some kind of confrontation about Blake's departure from team RWBY, but she had imagined it would be with Blake, not Sun.

"I believe you, but I would rather hear that from Blake. And there are some things I need to say to her."

"Fair enough, I just needed to say that for Blake's sake. Speaking of which, I should wake her up, she'll be mad I didn't do it sooner." Sun got up and went over to his and Blake's tent.

With the conversation over, Ruby couldn't help but think about what her relationship with Blake should be going forward. It was like she told Sun: she couldn't figure out how to feel about Blake. She hadn't forgiven her for running away, but she couldn't pretend Blake was a bad person, especially after what Sun said.

After waking Blake, she and Sun joined Ruby around the ashes of the fire. While she ate, Sun brought her up to speed with the plan to commandeer the White Fangs snacks. Blake thought it was a good idea, she looked forward to eating something that tasted good. A few minutes later, they were all packed and ready to move on to the second to last base.

I'm not crazy about how this chapter turned out, and it took me way too long to finish. I had every intention to post this sooner but I underestimated how much trouble I would have with it.

Thanks for reading, sorry it takes me so long to make updates. As always, feedback is appreciated.