Surprise! Long chapter right after a new chapter! Also, as embarrassed as I am to admit this, I think that I may have been calling the Bullhead airships bullpups for a while now, as my auto correct doesn't recognize Bullhead as a word, and will switch it while I'm not looking. It shouldn't happen anymore. Sorry, I'm killing the mood. Enjoy the final chapter of The Songs We'd Sing...

Ruby sat sideways on her poofy sable couch, one leg dangling off the side while the other across the seat cushion. She played the guitar on her hip left handed, which was fine as she didn't actually know how to play, and simply strummed the higher note half of the chords steadily for a peaceful yet lively ambience. In her lap sat her five year old daughter, with black hair, a red cloak and hood pooling around her whole body, and a silver eye adjacent to a black eyepatch. The linen curtains of the living room window were drawn back to let sun filter past the numerous trees onto the oakwood floor, through the empty glasses that shot rainbow reflections about the rough cut wood of the table, and struck against the pale skin of the little girl, her skin almost too bright to look at. The little Ruby sang softly, slowly, "da da daa dunn dun da, dun dun donna da daaaa~..." in a wispy voice while the older Ruby sang whatever popped into her mind.

She knew it was a dream, or at least she might've suspected. She didn't care though, and wanted to enjoy it while it lasted.

The older Ruby spoke in rhythm, and in a lower pitch than normal, "Summer time bloomin', what fantastic light~, I'd love to see you right now, I'd love to see you right now~" her voice trailing off rather nicely she thought.

Weiss, a bright white blotch in the sunlight, sat on the floor at the foot of the couch, her feet disappearing underneath the table. Her own expert voice carrying an downplayed 'o' in tune with the little Ruby. On the other side of the Ruby's Jaune perched himself on the couch frame backing, reaching down behind his back with one hand to help Ruby play. She continued, off the top of her head, "strawberry shortcakes, cool and dry breezes~, Crescent Rose bullets on sale now, I could save a whole right now~" Yang, who laid on a offset and perpendicular couch, apparently not asleep, gave a mellow laugh.

Other laughter outside drew her eye to the window, where her other friends danced around and laid about in tall lime green grass, smiles all around. Her friends outside sang her own words, though she couldn't hear or see them sing them. Dreams are dreams after all. And this was a nice dream.

"Everyone should be here, something something something~ oh, blah da buh da buh da doe, oh just think of the songs we'd sing~, oh I'd love to see you right now, I'd love to see you right now~"

The guitar didn't stop when daughter Ruby started singing, the noise coming from her mouth like it was being passed through a radio or phone line. "Happy St. David's day, and what a happy tune~, I'll see you again soon, hope to see you soon~"

That's when big Ruby stopped singing and playing, instead staring at her daughter confused. "What?" she asked, not a moment before she found herself sitting alone in a chair in the middle of a dead woods area. The brass wires of the guitar grew like branches and roots from it's hold, wrapping itself around different portions of the huntress. They slackened briefly in their local areas so that a sentient tip of wire had a clear shot to burrow straight through her body like sewing needles. One went through her right shoulder, another in her belly, one in her bootless foot, and one more on the left side of her rib cage. She grinned against the pain, her body tensing up. And like sewing needles, the wires wrapped around her portions and threaded through each spot repeatedly until she was practically dressed in weaved brass. Only getting worse, the wires tightened up as if the guitar was being tuned up. This time she let out screams of pain and flung herself from the chair onto the cold ground, her body contorted to the puppeteer strings. She looked skyward for no reason other than to distract herself from the pain, but was no longer in a grey forest. Total blackness engulfed her, and a perfect, inhuman smile beamed at her. The monster's invisible hands grabbed onto the ends of the wires and pulled outwards, the entwined patterns tearing Ruby's body apart.

Violently jerking herself awake in a cold sweat, Ruby continued to thrash around, confused by the unfamiliar hands holding her arms tightly and the sharp cuffs around her wrist behind her back. The spots of inflicted pain in her dream echoed onto her real body, notably her shoulder and ribs almost incapacitating her from hurt. The two men holding her tightened their grips and pressed into Ruby in an attempt to mitigate her room to spasm. Somewhere, a report on the incident between Ruby and Roman noted that with the exception of when first aid was applied, Ruby had not screamed or call out in agony; right now, the same girl shrieked and sobbed uncontrollably, unable to see through her tears. A man not responsible for holding the hysterical teen crossed his knuckles with her cheek, silencing her. "St. Evelyn-what-the-fuck!? Chill the fuck out!" said the man.

Her head hung low, longish black wet bangs from a year with no hair cuts covered her face. Sanity came back to her along with a more organized take on her current conditions. She was being transported in a bullhead towards nighttime Vale it seemed, four helm-less men plus a pilot accompanying her. Cold air rushed in, nothing new, causing her to shiver in her soaked and muddy clothing, now noticeably torn too. Her boot was still missing, and the cloth over her right shoulder was just barely holding on, bruised and bloodied skin showing very clearly. Deathly hunger clenched at her belly, and right behind it was aching bones. In fact, her whole body ached, especially her shoulder. She leaned into the young man on her left, feebly trying to get pressure off of her shoulder. It did not go unnoticed by either party that her modest bust was pressing into his chest, and Ruby could see him blush brightly regardless of the dim cabin lights. She didn't care.

"Getting friendly now?" question skeptically the other man holding her, a bit more advanced in years than his partner.

With shaky breath, she rasped "my shoulder... it hurts..."

"Yeah," said the man who punched her, "I had a look at it, besides the bite marks your shoulder blade might be fractured or something."

Pain was something Ruby was more or less accustomed to, but the thought of broken bones and torn muscle (on her own body specifically) had a way of making her sick. "Oh" she whispered, her eye dilating and chest heaving for air, "shit." On the word her legs gave out and she fell to her knees, and a moment later, stomach acid and blood fell from her mouth. There was nothing in the acid, as she had not eaten for a whole day and a third. The younger of the men reached down and helped her back up gently. He was a nice enough boy, and very obviously found the young huntress attractive, forgetting all the blood, mud, and tears.

As the bullhead flew over the city, circling around the central prison, the passengers cringed at the sound of sirens and rioter's war cries. She had asked how the condition of Vale was, but was ignored. Her judgment told her that they were as uncomfortable with confirming to themselves something was wrong as they were uncomfortable with holding her prisoner. The ship touched down on one of four landing pads on the roof level of the prison where four guards in dark blue regalia representing Vale's Council awaited Ruby. She traded hands from one captor to the other, and immediately was put into a metal straight jacket of weaved bands of steel weighing in around sixty pounds all told, and it caused her aching body to scream out some more. Ruby recognized the jacket as what they put on Huntsmen and Huntresses they find too dangerous to leave free handed and alone when in containment.

The guards, whom were trusted hunters of great age with wrinkles and stone face expressions to show, surrounded Ruby as they lead her inside the prison, down a large grated elevator, and into a regular looking jail cell that let the blue and gray light of the city feebly sift through a single foot square window. Ruby tripped over her own feet all the way down. The barred door rattled open, and the bounded girl was shoved inside. Without so much a word in any manner, the four guards left once the cage was locked.

"Thanks for the hospitality" she mumbled faintly, defeated. Memories of her first time in jail kept rerunning in her head, a small glimmer of hope presenting itself in how she was acquitted last time. Problem was, she thought, she knew why she was in trouble in the first time, what she was even being accused of. Did the massacre have anything to do with her? What about the monster? Last time she didn't even get to attend her trial, so what about this time? The jacket she wore was a bad omen of things to come, as it was a serious item to resort to in legal settings. Exhausted, she fell with a too hard thud on her tiny bed rack, regretting the decision instantly. Ruby shook her head to clear the bangs from her face and stared at the toilet stationed at the foot of the bed, curious to how they expected her to use it with her hands glued to her body. Silver lining, she was dehydrated and starving, so no need to use the toilet. She tried to grin, but her mouth muscles refused to. The fluorescent lights to the cell block, noticeably empty she noticed, flickered off with a clank, and all that remained was a dim blue light that fused with the shadows.

For the rest of the night she tried to fall asleep, her body perfectly willing regardless of the countless discomforts but her mind not. Anytime she felt her consciousness slipping, the hint of a smile appeared in the pitch black recesses of her mind, and a cold sweat broke out and her arms writhed within their binding of their own accord. Ruby took several breaks from trying to sleep and cried for some time, her nose running with snot she couldn't wipe off unless she ran her face over her stained bed sheets. She wanted her father, her mother, her sister, her uncle, her friends, she wanted company, or rather just someone to tell her what was going on, maybe that she'd be alright, or maybe just a hug, whatever. But right now, she was alone, and that nothingness and vulnerability weighed on her as much as all the other bleak factors. It made her remember her dream, at least the part before it went bad. A sunny respite in the middle of a distressing situation. But thoughts returned to the monster, an entity which made all other existences seem irrelevant. Just what was it that Ruby saw for those brief five seconds that lasted far too long? She couldn't begin to piece together her knowledge to even guess what it was, a fact that terrified her beyond reason. It was not human or faunus. It was not an animal. It didn't resemble any assortment of creature, had no shape, had no red eyes, no fur, no scales, no white mask... it couldn't have been a Grimm. Ruby choked a little, forgetting to breathe. It smiled. That damn smile. She already figured Grimm could feel primal emotions, and had some animal intellect, but this... monster, it smiled when it vaporized that child. Her heartbeat pounded in her ears.

In the same night, far up north, a council in Atlas was being held.

Underneath the tallest tower of the concrete jungle, inside a secret chamber room that few knew existed, two dozen bodies discussed the course of action for the future. Twelve rostrums lit by spot lights spaced evenly around a large circular room of grey marble overlooked a central podium, at it was a black suited woman with no mercy to be found in the lines of her face. On one of the rostrums stood Ironwood along with his most trusted professor, Combat Instructor Cowlin. Like his, on each platform stood two people each, one of import and the other a trusted witness of sorts, twenty five people in all. Though Atlas had a democratically voted council of peers, this secret group was what made the real decisions, as much as it irked more noble people such as Ironwood.

He glanced to his left. Going clockwise around the undecorated room starting with him, it then went to two chief engineers in charge of the Penny project, Mr. Polendina absent due to his sudden disappearance. After them was the city superintendent and his secretary, then each of the seven council people each with their own assistant, then another top ranking general and his lieutenant, and finally Mr. Schnee accompanied by his daughter Winter. He was a man of youthful features even in his mid fifties, looking almost as young as his daughter. But beneath his looks laid an uncaring, and some say genius man, thought Ironwood. His mines up north were ran on faunus manpower, their night vision helping greatly in the dim lighting of the deep caves. Paid poorly and put in poorer conditions, it was one of the driving forces of the White Fang's complaints, but some how like his fathers before him, he managed to keep the faunus working, and somehow kept the far off mines protected from wild Grimm. At times, his word was law.

The speaker of the council, the lady in the middle, jutted out her gavel to the council people. She shouted concisely and tersely, "knowing all the current facts available to us, a response has been demanded by all kingdoms. What say you?"

Anyone who wanted to be heard had to shout, given the size of the room, and shout they did. "Obviously we declare war on the faunus too, and assist our Vale Councilmen's decision" said one man across the ways from Ironwood.

"Agreed" said a woman, "but a distinction should be made; is it the White Fang we chase, or do we persecute all non-governmental affiliated faunus?"

"What's to say we don't have agents in the ranks, hmm?" spoke another.

The first man continued, "after all, Ozpin himself being arrested by our sister group should provide us signs of warning of treason."

Ironwood argued "Ozpin is no traitor, and his trial shall see to it that he is proven with the best intentions towards the state of the kingdoms."

"Ozpin-" the second woman spoke, "has been a thorn in Vale's council side for decades. His incarceration is neither here nor there to the current predicament, as we all know his verdict will depend solely on the graces of the council overseas. Our main concern should be our efforts to stamp out the anarchy sown by the faunus."

This time the superintendent raised his rather bored voice. He was a tall, lanky man in a charcoal pinstripe suit with thin glasses and silver hair, all stress induced and age ridden. "I believe I should point out some finer details. Legal pursuit of non humans will birth consequences dependent on the severity of our scope. Luckily, Atlas's population, not counting the workers of the Schnee corporations, is over ninety seven percent pure human. If we attack the White Fang exclusively with self evidential association protocols, we won't invoke the wrath of anyone bottom line, but as much as I hate to say it, we personally wouldn't suffer much in repercussions on domestic grounds were we to take a more radical approach. Most of the population is anti-faunus bias as is."

"Vacuo won't like it" thought the other general out loud.

"Their military has suffered lately, and are likely to shy from entering any conflicts" said a new councilman.

The council continued on, throwing out bits of information and opinion, with little disagreements on approach here and there, but mostly on the same page, the page belonging to the rulebook of engagements of war. Cowlin, a balding man of average height, thick build, and haggard face hugged by a thick black beard whispered to his employer, similar to all the other aids in the room who whispered between themselves and their boss. "I wasn't aware Vacuo was under armed."

"If the reports are to be believed, they are. However, misinformation is a well known tactic that must be taken into consideration" Ironwood spoke back to him.

"You know I know that much, I just haven't seen Vacuo or the reports in a good while. Anyways, it's looks like we're going to war..."

The general sighed. "That much is certain. The question is rather on how we go about it, and if there are any consequences we're not seeing."

"It's rash is what it is. Rather than starting the next faunus war, we should be hunting down the perpetrators of the massacre. This is how a lot a people will die."

"No doubt" Ironwood agreed, "but as much as the logical thing to do would be to investigate the problem carefully, we need to take action. If we don't say big words and make movements, the enemy sees it as inaction, our people too. Civil unrest is obviously a serious concern, and when the people can't see us taking action, all they hear from us in their heads is 'yeah, we think there's like bad things over there maybe, but we haven't really taken any precautions against that really important thing that happened where a lot of people died that we really haven't seemed to acknowledge.' Nothing scares a citizen more than the indecision and lack of conviction of their leader. Not only that, but the other kingdoms will judge us harshly based off our presentation. Everyone here knows those facts well."

"Damned if we do, damned if we don't. This whole council is pointless anyways though, you know the final decision comes down to whatever Schnee says in the end." Cowlin eyed the stoic white clad man a little ways from him. Winter shot him a questionable look back at him.

"It's pains me to say it, but if I know anything about that man, then we are painting the snow red with the blood of his enemies."