Neither of them moved. Qrow was too busy trying to look past the seemingly catatonic Weiss, who was mulling everything around in her head. "Reaper, who was really called Ruby, was his niece, even though she had no family to speak of? Either she knew nothing of him, or he wasn't her uncle, and he was an undercover cop. No, too many variables, not enough evidence. Perhaps he was her step-uncle? That's possible, but I've never heard of a step-uncle...maybe-"

She was dragged out of her thoughts by a shouting voice that could only be described as annoyed and surprised at the same time. It belonged to the same black haired girl- secretly Faunus which only Reaper, now Ruby, knew of- with Ruby on her knee. Weiss cringed as she heard how high pitched it went, and thought she could hear some sort of glass break.

Ruby, in the surprise, shot up and banged her head off of the bottom of Yang's bunk, therefore leaving her with a nasty, if bearable, headache. Weiss, then from behind her, could hear something akin to whining, as if a dog was kicked or starving.

Ruby, with Blake, was currently rubbing her head while whining and Blake was cuddling her from behind to calm her down and keep her from bursting into tears- she could already see some at the sides of her silver eyes. Blake, meanwhile hugging her and shushing her, was apologising and cursing under breath at the fact that she woke Ruby up so soon. She had barely ten minutes of sleep before waking up to the cries of shock from Blake, but simply rubbed her head and nestled it into Blake's chest- unknowingly causing the raven haired girl to blush- and whined slightly lower pitch, as if in contentment, but not quite.

Weiss just looked behind her and sighed, before looking at Blake with questioning eyes. Blake whispered something out of ear shot to Ruby, which caused her to tense up considerably and start shaking her head, which made Blake sigh and whisper something else. Whatever it was, Ruby seemed to calm down, and after a while of waiting, Weiss saw her red-tipped head bob in agreement with whatever it was. Blake simply waved her hand to show that Ruby was okay with this, and as Weiss turned to look at Yang, she shook her head as she opened the door for the people to walk in- Yang was knocked out cold on the floor, and Qrow spared her unconscious body a glance of sympathy.

"Should we wake her up?" Qrow asked, but Weiss just shook her head, her white ponytail swishing from left to right as she did so. She was wearing her pale blue combat skirt today, and instead of her white bolero jacket, she wore a simple white and red cotton button-up jacket.

Blake gave one last look to Weiss and released Ruby, holding her hands instead and squeezing them, before looking back at the figure in the room. Blake then stood up and noticed immediately that a pile of rose petals were in her hands were Ruby's hands used to be. She looked around, still remaining still as she craned her neck to search for the elusive redhead. She was about to give up before she felt movement behind her, and looked to see Ruby hiding behind her- it really wasn't that well hiding though, because Ruby was nearly Blake's height and she was craning her head over Blake's left shoulder to see the man. Once she saw him look back at her, she squeaked and went right behind Blake, hiding behind her completely. Blake just shook her head and walked towards the man, feeling Ruby shadowing every step with near- silence. Glynda, who was watching this, could see that when Ruby had told her about her skills when arriving here, she wasn't lying; she really was good at stealth, to not make a sound while walking behind someone at close range and with such heavy boots.

Blake stopped next to Qrow, and smiled as she reached out a hand and shook his heavy other one. She noted many similarities to him and Ruby, such as the red tips in the hair, the small chin and the rounded cheeks. But other than that, he didn't have many others. His eyes were a shade of burning yellow, a sharp contrast to Ruby's silver ones, and his hair was a midnight black, whereas Ruby's was auburn, almost brown.

His handshake was heavy, but kind, with a hint of softness to his calloused hands; he was a professor after all, so he must be somewhat professional in fighting, and continuously, if Blake had a guess.

As they released each other's hands, Blake smiled slightly at the man. "Sir, it's nice to meet you."

Qrow smiled. "My name's Qrow, no nee to be formal now. You must be Blake." he bowed his head slightly before looking at Weiss. "Miss Schnee, I suppose?" as Weiss nodded, he smiled and turned to look at Yang, who was now snoring. "And...This is Yang. Charming young...lady..." it seemed Qrow had a difficult time calling her a lady, since she seemed to be snoring like a rhinoceros. He shook off his stupor at the snoring girl, and turned to the black haired, bow-wearing girl and looked slightly past her.

"So..." his tone took on a friendlier, almost childish tone. "Where's Ruby? I don't see her anywhere..." he pretended to be searching for a ship, with his hands flat on his brow as he looked around the room. Ozpin and Glynda seemed to be amused at this, while Weiss just watched the reunion with melancholy, wishing her father were that nice to her- considering this was just an uncle- and Blake looked on with a soft look in her eyes, remembering when her uncle used to come around- before the White Fang- and treated her like a little princess, pretending to bow when she walked past him, and giving off a never-ending, sun-splitting smile that took her little breath away.

Ruby, behind Blake, was watching by peeking her head over Blake's shoulder, and wore a slightly amused smile, her eyes still showing fear, but not as much as originally when she first saw him enter the room.

He then spotted her dramatically as if a searchlight spotter had seen an object in the dark and stopped their continuous search, and smiled a wide, toothy, pristine white grin, which caused Ruby to look at him with a slightly bigger smile of amusement.

She tentatively questioned. "Who are y-you?" it wasn't laced with fear as her usual words were, but she still stuttered.

Qrow simply smiled again and looked into her silver eyes with his fiery yellow.

"Hello, Ruby." Qrow took a bow, and smiled again as he rose; it seemed that this man never lost a smile...until Yang interrupted him with her snoring.

"H-Hello." Ruby said meekly, before edging her way out of Blake's back and clutching onto her arm, as a child would do its' mother.

"I...well... Damnit! I imagined this would go smoother... and easier..." he sighed, ruffling a hand through his red and grey hair as he looked back at Ruby, a serious expression on his face.

Ruby didn't like that expression and clutched tighter to Blake.

He knelt down on one knee, with his hand on each one and smiled sadly. "Ruby, I'm ...I'm you uncle, Qrow."

(^^^^^^)

She had been planning this for a while now, and her plans were finally reaching the end of stage one. She had heard from her informants that her step-brother, Qrow, had entered the vicinity of Beacon, and from what she heard, it had to do with a red clad girl with a scythe and hood.

It sounded too familiar, too painfully familiar...

She sighed, rubbing a hand through her ebony tresses and smile sadly at the thought of the one who she loved; the one who hadn't got to see that little miracle she produced fifteen years ago... and now that same miracle was lost to her. But she saw the extra ears on the child's head, and she knew what the nurses had done...or she thought she did. So she razed the entire hospital to the ground, every single nurse and doctor perishing and every single patient being put to a fiery respite.

Sighing, she looked over to a photograph of the one in white and the one in red holding their hands together, a swell in one woman's stomach and a ring on each hand binding them both. She had scratched out the man on the edges of the photo, rage compelling her to do so at the time, but now she felt only sorrow. Her oldest friend and she had done that without a thought for food. No matter, Beacon was soon to join the fires the world would soon be engulfed in for taking that one small gift she brought into the world.

She heard the door to her small 'throne room' open and saw a familiar bowler hat, white jacket and orange hair walk over to her, swinging his cane melodramatically, as he always did.

He came to a stop in front of her just as she hid the photo, smiling and placing his cane out in front of him.

"Well, no 'hello'?" She absolutely hated this man, but he got the job done, and he was rather amusing... and annoying. His jokes were terrible, but he could be funny when he was sarcastic or melancholy. All in all, he was good enough for her to allow to work for her.

She just stared at him, her fiery orange eyes looking at him blankly. "What's the status on Qrow Rose, Roman?" she asked bored, but on the inside she was jumping for information. Whatever the reason he had for visiting Beacon, it had to involve her in some way, and she would find out.

Roman just sighed. "No hello then..." he cringed as the woman in red sparked her hands with flames in them, and he hurried along with his news. "Well, Qrow arrived, say, two hours ago, but he's still there, and from what I heard, he's visiting that new criminal they got there."

This was news. "Criminal? Do tell."

Roman sighed, and looked at her as she flicked her wrist and the flames vanished. Now sensing he was out of danger, he carried on with his report. "You know that new criminal, the wolf Faunus one, Reaper?" the crimson dressed woman just nodded ever so slightly that Roman would've had to strain his eyes to see the movement. "Well, she's apparently been accepted into Beacon, despite that little witch's crimes." A fireball landed next to his feet, and he immediately scampered backwards, rubbing his singed shoes.

"Do not call her a witch. She's someone we need, Roman, and you're going to get her for me." She flashed a wicked smile, but Roman was bristling with irritation.

"And how am I to do that? Everyone there knows my face! I'll be arrested or killed on sight."

She gave a sweet look and smiled wickedly. "Then we do it ourselves. We're moving onto phase two."

Roman looked at her with no longer anger or irritation, but curiosity. "And what, pray tell, is phase two?" he inquire, expectantly tapping his foot.

Behind him, two people moved out from their shadowed covers, and walked past him, speaking.

"It's a need to know thing..." Emerald, the green haired girl with calculating red eyes, started off.

Mercury, the silver haired boy, finished. "...And you definitely are not going to know."

Roman just sighed as the two people took their places at the side of the red dressed woman. He took a drag of the cigar between his lips and puffed out smoke as he talked. "Well, what exactly are you going to do? You can tell me that, at least."

Cinder shook her head and stood from her throne, the two followers following her out the room. She stopped just short of the door and smiled over her shoulder.

"Observation and recon, Roman, observation and recon."