"How've you been?" Velvet asks.
Yang shrugs. "I've been okay."
"Lying." Fox announces. He's carrying Coco's pack in addition to his own.
Yang turns to look at him. "W- What?"
"You're lying." Fox says. "I can tell it from your voice."
"No you can't!" Yang says. Then, to Velvet, "Can he?"
Velvet opens her mouth, but Fox cuts her off. "It's like this. Coco said you looked like crap, then you said you're not used to walking. The Yang Xiao Long I know would walk for days without complaining." Yang opens her mouth now, but Fox cuts her off as well. "Not that you were complaining." he hastens to add. "Poor choice of words on my part. I should have said 'without mentioning it at all'. Is that better?"
"I'm not that Yang any more." Yang says quietly.
"First off, I didn't say 'crap'. I said 'hell'. We're off-campus; you're allowed to swear." Coco says. Fox chuckles. "Second, that may be the most I've ever heard you say. You feeling all right?"
"Yes." Fox says.
"That's more like it." Coco says. "And third. Yang, me and you are gonna have a talk later."
Yang's stomach lurches. "Couldn't we have it now?"
"Nope. Cause here we are." Yang looks over Coco's shoulder. She's right. "Unless there's another cabin in the woods Sun forgot to tell us about."
"I wouldn't put it past him." Yatsuhashi says.
Coco sets Yang down gently. Yang tries hard not to let her legs tremble as they touch the ground, but it's no use. Velvet hurries over and offers a shoulder for her to lean on. "Thanks." Yang mumbles.
Velvet smiles and nods as Coco knocks boldly on the front door. Zwei barks from inside. When the door opens, Coco says, "We rescued your daughter from a roguish rapscallion in the forest. We brought her back to you, and humbly ask for a place to stay in return."
"Also food would be nice." Velvet adds. She carefully lets go of Yang and crouches down to say hello to Zwei.
Taiyang hardly bats an eye. "A roguish rapscallion, huh? Sun did say you'd be coming."
"He didn't tell me..." Yang says.
"He thought it might cheer you up." Taiyang says by way of explanation. "Anyway, come on in. I hope you brought some sleeping bags in those packs; we only have the one spare room, and it's been taken."
"Taken?" Coco stops by the couch. "By who?"
"Good question." Taiyang says. "It was kind of spur-of-the-moment."
Coco nods. Then suddenly, she straightens up. "Where are my manners?" she says. "Coco Adel. Guy with the red hair is Fox Alistair. Big guy's Yatsuhashi Daichi. And the little one is Velvet Scarlatina."
"Coco!" Velvet protests. "I wish you wouldn't call me that!"
"I could call you cutie, but you told me not to call you that either. Something about it being a Faunus thing? Honestly, I'm running out of nicknames."
As the two teammates argue, Taiyang looks at Yang. "Friends from school I take it?"
Yang nods. "Well, mostly Velvet. She got bullied really badly in our first semester, so I tried to keep an eye out for her ever since."
Taiyang holds out a fist. "That's my girl." he says approvingly. Yang bumps it with her own.
Soon, however, Coco looks over at her. "Xiao Long? Whenever you're ready."
Yang blinks. "What? Oh! That..." She looks up at her father. "I'll be right back. Coco wanted to have a talk."
"What kind of talk?" Taiyang asks. She's about to answer him when he laughs. "You know, like the walk which wasn't that kind of walk? I'm just kidding, Yang. Whatever it is, it's your business as long as you want it to be."
"Thanks dad." She stands on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek, then hurries over to Coco. "We can talk in my room if you want."
"Wherever, whenever." Coco says, holding up a hand airily.
If it was entirely up to Yang, she'd prefer to put it off as long as possible. But Coco's a good person, and Yang doesn't know how long she and her team will be staying. She gives Zwei a quick tummy rub and leads Coco up the stairs.
The door to the guest room is still closed. Yang eyes it thoughtfully before closing the door to her room. "What did you want to say?" she asks.
Away from her team, Coco looks different. She's not holding herself like a fashion model. She looks human. "What did I want to say?" Coco asks. She laughs a little. "Um, I'm sorry, I guess."
"Sorry? For what?"
"Everything that happened to you." Coco says. She takes off her glasses, and that's when Yang gets worried. "Velvet's right, you didn't deserve any of it. Your arm, your team..." She laughs again. "And Blake..." She looks up. There are actual tears in Coco Adel's eyes. "I'm not going to pretend I know what that's like. But Velvet took a bad hit when Beacon was falling. She's better now, but I...I keep having dreams about...what if she didn't wake up? I was the one who told her to fight those Paladins, and..."
Yang hugs Coco reflexively. Not that long ago she would have been overwhelmed by Coco's pseudo-sultry persona, but for once that's far from her mind. "Velvet's fine, Coco." she whispers. "Your team is fine. You made the right call."
"But you weren't there. You didn't have to hear that sound when she got hit-"
Yang pulls back, holding Coco at arm's length. "Velvet's not the type to hold it against you. And you shouldn't be either. Blame whoever corrupted the robots, not yourself."
Coco sniffs. "We don't even know who they are. But...you're right." She puts a hand on Yang's left shoulder. "Thank you Yang. You always know what to say."
It's Yang's turn to laugh. "Not to me." she says harshly. "I've been home for, what, months now? And I just keep going in circles."
"You see, that? That's what I meant when I said we needed to have a talk." Coco says, sounding more like her normal self. "That's not like you Yang."
Yang sighs. "Coco, I don't mean to be rude, but do you know me? When was the last time we hung out, did 'girl things'? Or any kind of things? I have so much in my head, and- I used to be good at keeping it under wraps, but now..." She looks at the stump of her arm.
To her credit, Coco looks somewhat abashed. "I'm sorry." she says. "I like to think of myself as a people person, but you...you must have been really good at keeping it under wraps." She moves her hand to Yang's and squeezes gently. "Do you want to talk about it?"
"No." Yang says. "I just want to be alone."
"But you've been alone." Coco says. "Yeah, Sun's here off and on, but he's not exactly a good person to talk to." Yang doesn't budge. Coco sighs. "Okay. It's up to you. Remember what I said, though: wherever, whenever." She puts on her glasses and asks, "Which one's the door to the bathroom?"
"Second one on the right." Yang says.
"Thanks." Coco says. She sounds like she means it. "Gotta make sure my makeup's okay. Don't get up; I'll see myself out."
Yang stares at the wall.
"You should have talked to her."
Yang looks up. "What?" That voice is impossible.
She is sitting by the window, curled up against the glass, arms around her knees. "You can't keep going like this."
Yang has to fight to think her name, let alone say it out loud. "Blake?"
Blake looks at her. "Not exactly." she says. She gets up and comes over to sit on the edge of the bed. "Look at you. You're running, Yang, just like I did."
"I'm not running." Yang says. "I can barely even walk."
Blake laughs, that rich sound that sends shivers down Yang's spine. "Sweetheart, you're hallucinating. Your own brain has decided you're more likely to listen to me than you are to it."
Yang tries to look away, but she can't take her eyes off Blake for an instant, even if it is just a fake. "Now I know you're not the real thing. Blake never used words like that."
"She wanted to." Blake says. "You know she did. And you know why she couldn't."
"Adam." The word turns to ashes in her mouth. She sees that mask, just for a moment, and she starts to shiver.
"Shh." The imaginary Blake strokes her cheek. It feels so real... "He can't hurt you right now. But you can."
Yang reaches for her hand. "What do you mean?" But she blinks, and Blake is gone.
Her lip trembles. Even after all this time, I still... I still...
The door opens. The pink-haired girl stands there. "What?" Yang chokes out.
The girl makes the universal symbol for jabbering with one hand and points at Yang with the other.
"Yes, I know! I was talking to myself, all right? Why do you care?"
The pink-haired girl shrugs flippantly. She points with her thumb towards the stairs and tilts her head to the side.
"They're- They're just some friends. From school. The same one you and your crew worked so hard to destroy."
The pink-haired girl shakes her head angrily. She puts two fingers close to her head and lowers them as if that's supposed to mean something.
Yang makes a fist under the sheets. "Listen, you. I'm really not in the mood to try and figure out what you're saying, so could you please just get out of my room?"
The pink-haired girl pouts prettily, but closes the door. A little while later, something slides under it. Yang tries to ignore it. She tries her breathing exercises, but the very thought of that thing being there makes it feel like something's burning inside her brain. Finally she can't take any more. She gets out of bed and makes her way over to the door to pick it up. It's a note, handwritten in a painfully cutesy manner.
I have a name, it says. Neo. Neopolitan. If you laugh at it, I will hurt you.
Nice to meet you. 3
Yang crumples it up and hurls it at the trash basket. She's too upset even to notice that she made it in on her first try.
As she's going down the stairs, Yang is almost bowled over by a flustered Neo going the other way. She has her hands clamped firmly over her ears, and her eyes are wild. Yang doesn't even look after her. She knows something's wrong with herself too. There's a buzzing in her ears, and everything seems to be happening in slow motion. She sees Zwei watching Yatsuhashi and Yatsuhashi watching Zwei with an odd look on his face. It takes her a while to realize that he's smiling. Coco, Velvet and Fox are on the couch, Coco watching TV, Fox not seeming to do much of anything, while Velvet writes something down on the table. Taiyang reads the mail in a corner. Somewhere there's music playing, a rock song that only allows the words 'breakdown, breakdown' to be discerned. It has a pulsing beat to it, the kind she might have liked on another day. She latches onto the beat, draws it inside her along with a deep breath.
And she screams.