The call came as a complete surprise at close to four in the morning, and as soon as she'd gotten it Weiss had readied herself for what was to come. Minutes later, Klein's car arrived outside of Blake's apartment and Weiss climbed in beside him at shotgun instead of taking the back.
He rushed the two of them across Atlas to the hospital without so much as an extra syllable, both of them much more concerned with the news that they'd just gotten.
The urgency in the call had spoken for itself.
Perhaps if it were any other night, or time, or matter, Klein would have talked to her throughout the entire ride. He would have offered his constant comforts and assurances, and it would have made things better.
Instead, he was focused. Weiss understood that. She wasn't sure that any of it would have worked anyways, all things considered.
When the two of them arrived at the hospital, Whitley was already there, along with a few members of the SchneeCorp Board of Directors that Weiss recognized, though she didn't know them all by face and name. She stepped into the waiting room, and immediately everyone's eyes were on her.
They all knew about what was wrong between her and her brother. They all knew that she had no place there on a business level. They knew exactly the same things that she did.
Weiss tried not to be hurt by the obvious absences in the room instead of focusing on the Board members.
"Sister." Whitley said, and the word rushed out of him in a way that almost sounded breathless. Like he too was worried, and he looked viscerally upset. Almost like someone had reached out and slapped him minutes before and he was afraid. "You came."
"I did." Weiss said, letting her volume drop and glancing to the members of the Board that were standing by. She kept her voice down and stepped in a little bit closer to her brother on the chance that the two of them wouldn't be overheard while they spoke. "What's going on?"
"It's father." Whitley replied, reaching out for Weiss and interlocking his arm with hers and nodding to the others as though he wasn't the younger brother and was instead playing along as an escort. There was a quiet mumbling that seemed to be the only approval that was needed for them to go.
With that, Weiss and Whitley slipped off to a more quiet area to speak. Somewhere where they couldn't be spied on or intruded on.
"What happened?" Weiss asked again, because the point that it would be their father had been obvious enough. "Did he-"
"They said that there were signs of... improvement." Whitley said, and for the first time Weiss realized that her brother looked exhausted. Even with all of the turmoil that had happened between the two of them, Weiss hadn't thought much about how her brother was handling things. The ostracization she'd felt had kept her from doing so.
It left her wonder just how much her little brother had been forced to shoulder alone. The dark circles under his eyes showed through whatever cover he'd put on to hide them.
"What sorts of improvement?" Weiss asked, looking back over her shoulder to check that nobody was trying to overhear them. She only saw Klein, looking back at her out of the corner of his eye. Always watching to keep her and her brother safe. "Was he waking up?"
"It looked like he was going to." Whitley admitted, keeping his voice down. "The doctor called me, and then it was up to me to call the other members of the Board. Then I figured that I should call you and see to it that Klein got you here."
Weiss nodded and she stepped in close to her brother for the first time, wrapping her arms around him for a hug that she felt like she needed desperately. Whitley almost jerked back from her, but he relaxed a moment later into her touch.
"Thank you." Weiss whispered, trying her best to find a way to collect her thoughts. She took a deep breath before finally allowing herself to slip away. "So everyone is here in case he wakes up then?"
"That's... correct." Whitley sighed, looking back up at her and still looking exhausted. "I don't know if that will be the case tonight, though."
Weiss nodded, still at a loss for words because there really wasn't anything that she could think of that was worth saying to him.
"I suppose that you and I will be here for a while, then." Weiss said, thinking that she needed to take a chance and call Winter if the chance arose. She deserved to know.
"That appears to be the case." Whitley mumbled, rubbing at his jaw absently.
Weiss nodded along, in the hopes that something might be able to make her feel a little bit more secure in what she was doing somewhere down the line. However as things were, she wasn't sure that was possible. She looked back to her brother.
"I don't want to be here either." Weiss said, and though those were words that she shouldn't have felt like she'd needed to say, she did anyways. It was a way to potentially clear some of the air between the two of them for the time being.
"I'm aware." Whitley murmured. He took a seat in the waiting room, and Weiss slipped down into the seat beside him. She set her hands down in her lap and did her absolute best to ignore the ringing of her phone in her pocket. She could feel the vibration, and she knew that she needed to answer it sometime-
But as things were, that just wasn't possible. Not when Weiss couldn't be sure that she would be safe regardless of who was on the other end. Whoever it was would understand once they knew what was happening.
The two of them might have sat there for hours together, both of them waiting for any sign that things were changing. At some point, Whitley had slipped off to sleep in his seat, and some of the members of the Board had left in search of a breakfast since one of them had apparently called in for a table at one of the nicer eateries nearby.
Weiss and Whitley hadn't been invited along, and she wished that she was surprised by it. It was probably better that the two of them stayed anyways.
With her brother sitting and the only one playing attention to her being Klein, Weiss checked her messages and found that they were from Blake- some reporting a change in how things were going with her investigation, too many of them worried sick about where Weiss had gone.
She'd have to explain and catch up with Blake later.
Weiss sent the messages about the fundraiser along to Klein in the hopes that he would be able to do something with it all.
He looked up at her when the message got through, and the two of them made eye contact. Weiss nodded, and he understood well enough- that was something she was sure of.
Weiss relaxed back into the bench, ignoring the weight of her brother's head against her shoulder. She let her eyes slip shut herself, since it didn't seem like she could leave just yet.
Thirty minutes later, the door to the waiting room opened, and Weiss was all but startled out of her sleep. She looked up and saw that a pretty nurse had come in, her soft orange hair brushed back out of her face.
"Mister Schnee?" She asked, and Weiss shifted her shoulder. She felt Whitley jerk his head up a bit, roused to consciousness finally.
Whitley blinked and looked at the woman. "Yes?" He asked, and he sounded exactly as groggy as he looked. Weiss just sat up tall and tried to make herself look a little bit more presentable.
"Your father is awake." The woman said, looking from him to Weiss. "It may be some time before he is able to take visitors, I'm afraid."
Whitley nodded and looked to Weiss, his eyes looking sad and afraid. "That's... fine, I think." He said, sitting up tall. "If you could just let us know when that is possible, or if something changes?"
"Of course!" The nurse replied before hurrying herself out of the room and leaving Weiss, Whitley, and Klein alone once more.
The silence lingered between the three of them and Weiss let out a quiet sigh. The first of them to say anything was Klein, and that was a relief in many ways.
"You two seem exhausted." The man said. "Should I get you some coffee to enjoy while you wait?"
"Could you get us croissants with it?" Whitley asked, sounding small and exhausted. "The ones with chocolate and fruit in them?"
Klein nodded, the universal sign that he had already made a mental note of the request that had been made of him. "But of course, Master Whitley." Klein said before turning his eyes to Weiss, clearly expecting for her to make a request of her own.
"Coffee would be nice." Weiss said, keeping her voice down. "As would a croissant." In all honesty, when it came to her little brother while it was true that there were things about him that Weiss didn't like, he did have good taste, for better or for worse.
"I see." Klein said, looking between the two of them and then letting his eyes drift over towards the door. "And would you prefer that I leave you here to wait, or would you prefer to come with me?"
Weiss and Whitley looked at each other, both understanding perfectly well what Klein had decided to ask them about. It wasn't a matter of leaving them there- it was a matter of whether or not they felt like they needed to have some privacy while they waited for any sort of update on their father's status.
Whitley's eyes flickered down and he nodded. Weiss nodded along with him and was the first to get up, offering Whitley her hand because she wasn't going to go ahead and put him out when things were already hard for them both. What mattered wasn't the company in that moment- it was their family, and the shattered bits of it that they had left.
Together the three of them left the hospital, taking a moment to inform a nurse that they would be back within the hour. They walked out to the car, and Klein opened the door to the back for them both to climb in before going to the front and taking the wheel.
As soon as the door was closed behind Weiss, the conversation started.
"Do you think that we should inform mother?" Whitley asked immediately. "I suspect that it wouldn't do any good, but-"
"I think that we probably should." Weiss sighed, leaning back in her seat. It was better if the two of them didn't focus on the details of their mother's status as being away from them too much. Not when they were hurting already. If they called and only found that she was already drunk, it wouldn't end well for anyone.
But still she hesitated, because Weiss knew her family, just as Whitley did. The way that it had always gone was that Whitley was her father's favorite, while Winter was her mother's. Weiss had always fallen into an uncomfortable area in between and had never quite been able to dig herself out of it no matter how hard she tried.
Weiss nodded. "I should call Winter." She said quietly, at least partially bracing herself for her brother to say something. "She should know."
"She left."
"He's still her father." Weiss bit back, and when she noticed the bitterness that had crept into Whitley's voice over their sister's absence, she kept her back straight. It was impossible to play along like there was nothing wrong at all. "And she's still our sister. You don't have to talk to her. I'll make the call."
Whitley sighed and he looked annoyed and upset, but he did nod a moment later. That was about as good as it was going to get, Weiss figured.
She reached for her phone and went to the clock, bringing up the display for the various parts of the world. She didn't even know if she would be able to reach Winter if she were to call then and there.
It would all depend on what she was doing at work in the moment, she supposed.
"Should I call mother, then?" Whitley asked, keeping his voice tight. "Because-"
"You know-" Klein started from the front of the car. "If it would be more comfortable for me to make the call for you then I would do so instead."
"That would be greatly appreciated." Whitley said, and he seemed to curl in on himself a little bit as he sat there. "Thank you, Klein."
Klein smiled back at them and continued his driving until they were at a small shop that he knew that Whitley liked to go to. Weiss didn't particularly care for it, but she knew that Klein was going to keep an eye out to make sure that nothing strange could possibly happen. Appeasing Whitley was one of the ways in which he could ensure that
But with them left to their own devices, Weiss and Whitley were able to talk once more time.
"Do you think that he'll be allowed to see us when we get back?" Whitley asked, still sounding impossibly sad. "And do you think that it will-"
"I don't know if anything will change because of it." Weiss said, keeping her voice quiet. "You're still going to be the one in line for the company." She tried her absolute best to ignore the way that she felt about the issue of where the company's control would go after. "And you're going to be able to talk to him sometime, I'm sure of it."
Whitley nodded, picking his head up and letting his gaze stray over to Weiss. He looked a little bit annoyed by the situation, but he also didn't seem like he was about to lash out or anything.
All that Weiss could concentrate on was how her family was still falling apart and how it had once felt okay.
Once it had felt like she'd actually been able to make sense of things. Once she'd thought that her family had actually loved each other, once she'd thought that she and her siblings had been all in line together. That they had loved each other.
Now there was the constant feeling that they were drifting apart, falling apart at the seams. Weiss had known it for a while, but her father's hospitalization had only torn open the wound that had been there for all too long. She missed the days when she still felt like she loved her brother.
She wished that she was able to make Whitley feel better, when she didn't know what she was supposed to say to him anymore. Not when there were practically oceans between them. Not when she and Whitley's relationship had been falling apart for so long, and it had been made worse over the course of time.
"Weiss-" Whitley started, picking his head up and locking his eyes onto hers and obviously looking for something there. "If I ask you a question, would you actually go ahead and answer it?"
Weiss flinched, and she didn't want to know whether Whitley had noticed or what he was about to ask her about. She blinked and nodded slowly, but also decided to keep herself aware of what Whitley would say. Without a way to read his mind, she was vulnerable.
"What is it?" Weiss asked, looking back over at her brother and only feeling afraid of what her brother would say.
"Why have you been avoiding us?" Whitley said the words, and he sounded... hurt. "You've been here in Atlas, but I know that you've been avoiding the mansion. I understand after the other day that the conversation we had didn't go well, but-" He looked down at his hands. "Do you realize how things have been since you left?"
"For Vale?"
"Yes."
Weiss shook her head, because while she knew the reasons that had made her run to Vale herself, she didn't necessarily know what had made her brother decided to stay in Atlas. He could have left if he'd wanted to, but Weiss had needed to be able to go for her own sake.
"I... can't say that I've thought about it." Weiss said, knowing that her voice was too quiet. It occurred to her that no matter what the two of them said, the two of them would be overheard by Klein. The good thing was that Klein was probably the one person alive that both of them could trust. "Is... there a reason that you're bringing it up?"
Whitley nodded. "You know how father is," He said, his voice dipping in volume and rather obvious anger beginning to peek through it. "When you left, he got more and more controlling over the home. He got worse to mother, and then to me, and I am certain that I'm not the only one."
Weiss shrank back, realizing what her brother was being forced to deal with for the first time. He'd always seemed happy with the way that things were, but it was too likely that it was because of her leaving that things would have turned on to him.
That's how it had been when Winter had left for her.
How could she have ignored that it would have happened to Whitley as well?
"I'm sorry." She whispered to her brother, feeling her face flush with shame the entire time because this was so far from what she would have ever wanted for him to experience. "I didn't mean to do that to you."
Whitley nodded, but Weiss was all but certain that he didn't believe her. Weiss didn't know that she would have been able to do the same had it been her in his place. It had been, once, but when that had happened Weiss had made a point of doing what she could to find her way out.
"I hope that Vale has made you happy, Weiss."
"It did." Weiss sighed, but it wasn't enough. "To some degree."
"You weren't happy there?"
"I don't know." Weiss said after a moment. "I think that I went there because I felt like I needed to get away from Atlas, and from…" Her voice trailed off, but she was sure that Whitley could fill in the blanks for the details that she so badly didn't want to have to say out loud. "It think that I went there looking for something that never could have made me happy."
"To get away from father."
"To feel free." Weiss replied, because it was an important distinction. In Vale, she had never truly been away from their father. She'd always found herself constantly worrying about how the things that she did in Vale would affect things back in Atlas. "Vale wasn't enough."
Whitley nodded. "I truly do miss you."
"I'm sorry." Weiss whispered as Klein finally pulled up in front of the shop that they'd been going to. She watched as the butler climbed out and began on his way inside, while Weiss and Whitley were left behind. Weiss couldn't help that she felt some relief over the fact that the two of them were going to finally have a little bit of time alone.
Whitley nodded bad let out a breath, one that it seemed like he had been trying to hold for a while. The heaviness in his motions and in his sounds was enough to tell Weiss everything- he was hurting, and he'd been abandoned. Weiss didn't know that she was going to be able to do anything to comfort him. "If he wakes up, he is going to want to speak to us both."
"I would expect as much..." Weiss said, letting her voice go quiet. "But he's been comatose for weeks. What if he wakes up and he isn't... what if he isn't the same?"
"Then the company would go to me, I suppose." Whitley mumbled. "I think that I am ready to take over SchneeCorp, but I don't know that I'm going to be able to do as much as father or our grandfather ever did for it." Whitley held his head up high, but still he seemed stressed and afraid. He was just better at hiding it, by the looks of things. "Do you think that I can do it?"
And that- that more than anything else was one of the questions that Weiss didn't have a good answer for. She had spent so much of her time and energy doing what she could to improve her own worth for the position. When she had been far from Atlas, what was going on with her brother had remained on a low priority level for her. It wasn't as though either of them had made many efforts to call the other and check in.
Weiss had only even come to Atlas because Klein had gone ahead and called her about her father's heart attack. If he hadn't, she would have had to find out through the news or social media. There were still seeds of resentment in Weiss' chest that she couldn't just ignore over that. Her brother had all but left her to fare for herself alone.
But she was going to need an answer, when Weiss didn't know that she had one that she could really give.
"I think you could." Weiss told a bitter lie, and hated all of it.
It seemed to have the desired effect though, if the way that Whitley perked up just slightly as any indication. There was a quiet for a moment which lasted only as long as it took for Klein to make it back into the car. With that, he just started it and began the drive back to the hospital.
Weiss felt terrible for every moment that she spent there with the others, never with even the slightest idea as to what she wanted to say.
They sat in the hospital for six more hours once they'd made it back. Only after then were either her or Whitley allowed in.
Weiss braced herself.
Blake looked over her things and her notes, over and over again, always looking for something new that she could write on. She had been doing her best to follow some of the leads that she'd been given, but had only managed to get so far on them alone. She was too worried and distracted to be able to make any headway.
Weiss was usually helpful, but it was the first time where she was trying to get ahold of the heiress all day and hadn't been able to get so much as a word out of her. It left Blake itching, both with worry and also a feeling that there was something that she should have been getting ready to report on. Knowing that Weiss had left in the middle of the night without a word didn't help.
Late that night, at close to eleven, Blake's phone rang while she sat on her bed. She'd opened up an old notebook or two which she had used back when she was still working closely with Adam. In a way, it was almost enlightening to look back on some of the things that she'd done with him when they were younger.
Blake reached over and picked up the phone without even checking who it was that had decided to call her.
"Hello?"
"Blake." Weiss' voice came through the other end, and she sounded exhausted and broken. "I didn't wake you up, did I?"
That was an... interesting question, Blake thought. She looked up at the clock and frowned, because it really wasn't all that late.
"You didn't." She said quietly, looking back down at the notebook in front of her. She found a page that looked like it was what she had used to keep track of her work schedule on back when she and Adam had been working in the Mantle SchneeCorp plant, looking for their story and to sabotage it. Blake let a finger travel down the page almost lovingly. "Is something going on?"
"I just... needed someone to talk to." Weiss replied, her voice too quiet. "Today's been stressful."
"What do you mean?" Blake asked. She made sure to toss her pen away, since Weiss saying that she needed to talk to someone was all but surely going to mean that whatever they talked about would be of the record.
"My father woke up and I had to go and-." Weiss said, her voice still quiet and sad. "And now I don't know what to think of things because-" Blake heard her cut herself off, and then the ensuing silence seemed to say too much. Like Weiss was at risk of being overheard and she knew it entirely too well. She was possibly even hiding, Blake thought. Maybe even in a place that was public. "I talked to Whitley."
"What happened?" Blake asked, blinking because that was something that she really hadn't been expecting to hear out of Weiss at all. In a way, she'd thought that Weiss would have cut off all ties to her brother at around the same time that she and him had last spoken. Clearly that hadn't been the case.
Weiss let out a quiet, shaking breath and then finally let herself explain. "Klein was called this morning." She began to explain. "We got to the hospital and Whitley was there with members of the board. Apparently they'd been called immediately, but..." She went quiet. "We were both afraid, Blake. Of what would happen if he didn't wake up."
"But he did wake up, didn't he?" Blake asked, letting herself lean back against her headboard.
"He did."
It was obvious to Blake that there was something else wrong, dancing beneath the surface of Weiss' words. Her father had woken up, but there was clearly something wrong that Weiss didn't want to say out loud.
Blake took a deep breath and tried her bvest to relax herself for whatever was to come, since she had a feeling that she wasn't going to like anything that Weiss was about to say. Not when there was something wrong.
"So tell me about it." Blake said calmly, since that was going to be all of the lead in that she could have possibly needed. Weiss was open with her- usually. That was something that Blake was mostly sure of.
Weiss was mostly silent but finally she began to speak. "He... wasn't himself." She explained quietly, still sounding like she was just afraid that she would be overheard by someone. "I mean, he was awake and he recognized us but I've never seen him so... quiet. I don't know that he's going to be anything like he'd been before. Whitley is scared, and so am I. Klein agreed to help us with some things like calling our mother, but..." Her voice trailed off.
"I'm sorry." Blake said quietly. "I'm going to guess that you aren't allowed to talk about any of this?"
"I'm not." Weiss confirmed. "I'm at the mansion and in my room, but I... don't really trust that the entire place isn't on high alert right now. Klein does what he can to look after us, but I can't attest for how things go with the other housekeepers. I just needed for you to know what's happening. I'm sorry I ran off like that."
"I get it. I'm not mad." Blake said hurriedly. "What do you mean about the other housekeepers?"
Weiss was quiet again and Blake heard her sigh, then the quiet creak of a bed as Weiss laid back into it. "I don't know who I can trust when I'm here." She said, far too quiet. "I don't know that Whitley isn't putting people up to things. I want to believe in him, but it isn't that easy. Not when we've been practically raised to compete."
Blake nodded, though she knew that Weiss wasn't going to be able to see it for herself. "I understand." She said quietly, and her mind wanted to rocket back to her own situation and all of the things that she was concerned with. She knew that she couldn't exactly trust anyone that she was working with, but...
It was going to be for the best if she made sure to make sure that Weiss knew exactly what was going on with her.
"So..." Weiss sighed, clearly looking for some sort of change in topic. "What is going on for you, Blake?"
"I've been getting ready to do things for work." Blake said calmly, blinking and looking back down at the notes that were still sitting in front of her. She reached out and closed the notebook because she didn't want to focus on them any longer. "And I'm going to be... involved with some things that are going to be a problem for you later."
"What do you mean?"
"I'm going to work with Adam from the inside to see if I can derail his plans." Blake said, looking over her shoulder at the door to double check that she wasn't going to have company. She didn't know why she was so worried about it, but she needed to double check that she was going to be left alone for some time. "I don't know if there will be trouble from it, but... you needed to know."
Weiss was silent for a long time, and Blake couldn't blame her for it. She would have needed some time to be able to digest that information herself. But it was also just the tip of the iceberg in terms of the things that Blake really needed to talk about.
"Okay." Weiss said, and once Blake was sure, she went forward.
"I handed off the article about our interview to my editor." Blake explained. "She's only going to let it be posted after I give her the approval to do so."
"Alright." Weiss sighed, and she didn't sound like she was confident about what that wa going to mean at all. Blake couldn't exactly blame her for it, all things considered. "Do you have any plans for when that is going to be?"
"It's only going to happen if you are okay with the timing." Blake replied. "You said that you wanted this to come out on your terms, right?"
"I did."
"So it's on your terms." Blake finished. "When you think that the time is right, I will give Ilia a call, and it'll go up. Only when that happens will it happen."
"Right." Weiss was quiet for too long once more. Her voice came in, and she sounded like she was broken. "I just don't know what I feel right now."
"Nobody is expecting you to." Blake mumbled. "Especially not right now." She took a quick look at the clock- it was late, and she had reason to believe that both she and Weiss were going to be busy in the morning. "If you want you and I can get together sometime." Blake offered, even though it wasn't going to be much and it wasn't exactly going to offer many comforts.
"I think I'd like that." Weiss murmured. "I'll let you know when I can."
"Of course." Blake responded calmly. "Take care, Weiss."
"Thank you, Blake."
Blake listened as the phone hung off, Weiss' voice disappearing behind a quiet click. There was a certain sort of guilt that ended up stirring down low in her stomach because things weren't going to be getting better anytime soon for either of them.
All that she could do at that point was be there when Weiss needed her, and do her job.