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Volume 3, Chapter 12, 'End of the Beginning'


Weiss was really starting to get tired of waking up in pain.

As she stirred, her hand worked its way to her forehead, only to find a large cloth wrapping in the way. Pushing herself up, she jolted when a hand came over her stomach and pushed her back down.

"Shhh. Don't move too much, Weiss."

The heiress strained to recognize the voice. The tone was sad but relieved. Anxious but calm.

She was surprised to find that she hadn't realized it was her own partner's voice immediately.

"Ruby… what… what happened?"

"Well, uh, I think that's supposed to be my line. I can't explain something I wasn't there for."

There was a twinge of humor mixed in with a little… frustration?

Was she angry that I-

Her eyes flew open.

YANG. BLAKE.

"RUBY. RUBY, WHERE ARE THEY?" Her breathing picked up quickly as her leader took her hand, silver eyes clouded with shock and worry. "WHAT HAPPENED TO YANG, RUBY? W-WHAT HAPPENED TO HER AND BLAKE?! ARE THEY-"

"Weiss, please calm down."

Something touched her shoulder and her gasping slowed. Everything numbed; the realization of that disturbed her mind. She fought to move out of her teammate's grasp as she tried to push away the force blocking her emotions but it easily won out. She screwed her eyes shut again and let out a whimper.

"It's okay, Weiss. They're going to be… well, they aren't going to die."

That's Ren's voice…

Slowly, she turned her head to look for its source, only for her eyes to ghost over Blake.

Her girlfriend was covered in dirt and blood. She was facing away, legs curled to her stomach and black hair more disheveled than usual. A massive bandage was secured around her stomach; dried blood stained the linen. Her bow twitched every now and then; evidently, her mind wasn't focusing on keeping her secret safe.

It took her a second to realize that their hands were intertwined.

"I… w-what-" The heiress's voice failed in her throat.

Craning her neck, she could just make out a sliver of gold on the other side of Blake. Tuffs of bloody hair stuck out into her view and part of her already knew what she would see.

Yang Xiao Long, probably the strongest and most powerful person that Weiss had met in her entire life, lay unconscious.

Armless.

Her remaining hand was wrapped tightly around Blake's.

Part of the heiress's mind saw her blonde friend smiling down on her only days before, giving her the encouragement she needed to find faith in herself.

And then…

Nothing but fire. A fire extinguished right before her eyes in one of the most brutal displays of savagery she could remember.

Yet everything still felt numb.

"Pyrrha and Jaune are still out there." Ren's voice returned, followed quickly by a pained groan. The noise came in conjunction with the flow of emotions back into her mind, yet she still felt somewhat calm.

"Then I'll go." Ruby stood, releasing her grip on the snow-haired girl. "I'll go and find them."

Azure shifted over to the cloaked leader. "I'm coming, too." She tried to rise, but this time several pairs of arms held her down.

"No! Weiss, please! You're still hurt!" Ruby's words became frantic, her free arm gesturing towards her older sister. "You can't just run back into the fray like this! You'll-" Her voice was caught for a second, before it warbled on, her fingers wiping away tears that had yet to fall. "You'll get hurt too! It's bad enough that Yang lost her arm and Blake got stabbed; you're probably lucky to have escaped with just a concussion! I don't know what we'd do if you-"

She was cut off by the sound of a glyph emerging. Weiss stared up at her partner, her glare daring her leader to stop her as forced herself from the ground.

"If you go alone, you'll be the one laying on down there." She pointed down at her girlfriend.

Suddenly, Blake's breath hitched.

Something clicked in Weiss's mind and she was instantly on her knees again, running her fingers over the raven-haired girl's body. A wave of shock and horror, somehow familiar, came over her.

What… what did I just…

Blake…

please be alright.

Ruby stood behind her, fists rolled up and trying to keep herself together. Silver flicked over her maimed sibling every now and then, tearing at her mind, but she held firm. She had to stand strong; that's what a leader does.

Her hand found Weiss's shoulder. "I don't know what we'd do if you got hurt too."

The heiress kneeled, frozen in place. Her gaze shifted between the two figures laying on the ground.

"I'm still going with you. And you're not gonna stop me."

There was a weak sound of protest. Followed by a sigh.

"…fine." Ruby forced out. "Just… please be careful."

With a kiss on the Faunus girl's cheek and the brushing of golden locks from the brawler's face, Weiss slowly stood. Without thought, her hand drew back to the cloths still hanging from the back of her hair, dancing in the wind. Despite the small, worn tears in it, the fabric held strong.

"I will. I promise."


Dark clouds were forming over the city, though Blake couldn't tell if it had something to do with the Grimm's presence or not. Either way, it painted Vale's smoking skyline in a far more melancholy feeling than it had only the night before, even if morning was approaching.

Her bow shifted as she heard footsteps approach from behind her. Amber disappeared and she let out a small breath as arms drew around her stomach, her girlfriend pushing her face into the white ribbon tied behind her head.

"Are you really going to leave without saying goodbye?" Weiss pleaded, her devastated tone only lightly muffled by the black strands falling over her face.

There was silence for a moment, as the breeze picked up a little.

"…it would be too painful."

"It's more painful that you have to leave at all."

"I know." The façade Blake had been building broke, her head turning to the side as she tried and failed to keep her voice level. She forced back a hiccup, though the rest of her words still cracked with her voice. "But I have to."

"I know."

The wind hollowed, a faint screech as it blasted through the two girls, neither phased by its sudden force.

"I know that now isn't really the time for this…" Blake could practically hear the tears in her lover's voice, each word a struggle to get out. "…but I want you to know that I'm so glad that I met you. I'm so glad that I had the chance to learn more about the world than what I'd been forced to think since I was a kid. I'm glad that, after all of our struggles, we were still able to have a few moments last night where we made each other happier than we did throughout the rest of the year. Through everything I've suffered, I'd gladly do it all over again if it meant being with you."

Finally, the taller girl turned fully. Her eyes were glazed and she couldn't see well anymore but her vision was good enough to notice that the same clouds were forming in her girlfriend's beautiful eyes.

"…should we kiss?" If she wasn't feeling so awful, Blake's mind would've probably smacked itself for thinking up such a stupid thing to say.

"…no. That would make it feel like we're never going to see each other again." A small, sad smile crossed her lips. "But I'll wait for you. All of us will. When you're ready, when you've done whatever it is you needed to, when you've sorted out your thoughts, all of us will be there with open arms."

An estranged sound escaped Blake's throat. The heiress brought up her hand to wipe away a tear that ran down her companion's face.

"Come down here for a second."

The cat Faunus sat down on her knees, her shimmering eyes squeezed shut, no longer able to look her lover in the eye.

There was movement above her, the ruffling of her bow as fingers spread the fabric apart and the snow-haired girl leaned over. For a few seconds, she pressed a kiss to one of the velvety ears hidden atop her girlfriend's head, pinning the small appendage against her skull.

A glimpsing memory ran through Blake's mind; one of her mother leaning over her and kissing her ear in just the same way when she was still a young child.

Blake's limbs buckled and she collapsed into the other girl, wrapping her arms around Weiss's waist as she fought the urge to cry by digging her nails into the white skirt. She wanted to stay. She really did. But she wanted them to be safe, too. And they couldn't be as long as they were near her, so she had to leave. Leave and make sure the rest of the parts of her life that she cared about were still alright.

Even so, she wanted to stay.

I want to stay with you forever.


"…Yang?"

The girl in question couldn't bring herself to budge, knowing fully well of the sight of her scared little sister that would greet her from the single word alone. A testament to her own failure; even if it wasn't as permanent as the more obvious one, it hurt just as much.

She would bear no amount of comfort from her younger sibling's pity.

"…yeah?"

The only response she could form.

The blonde didn't look up as arms wrapped around her head, choosing instead to bury her face in Ruby's shoulder. Perhaps it would not help her, but she still had to make sure this kid wasn't suffering too; it was her job as a big sister.

"I'm glad you're okay."

"I'm not okay, Ruby. You know that!"

Though she held back her tone, the red-haired girl still flinched. Maybe it wasn't the best way she could have put it, but…

DAMN IT! Haven't I been through enough already?

"I… I know. But, you're here. That's all I can ask for."

"Maybe. But it doesn't make anything hurt any less."

"Then do you need me to get you some-"

"Stop it."

The words silenced the young leader as she gave her sister the space she felt she needed. A lump forming in her throat, she brought up a hand, brushing lightly over the three colored roses perched on her pajama shirt.

Yang finally met her eyes. Her semblance hadn't activated but it was obvious she was holding her temper down.

"Stop trying to make me feel better; it's not going to work." She broke their held gazes as she squeezed her eyes shut before continuing on, her voice breaking. "You saw what happened at Beacon! The school's destroyed and everyone's hurt! We lost some of our closest friends and…"

Her tone faded as she turned towards the window, the late fall having already stripped most of the trees bare; the forest that she and Ruby had played in for years now somehow seemed more haunting than ever before.

She allowed herself to picture her and Ruby, back when they were just barely considered kids, sitting at the cliff where Summer was buried.

"But we still have t-"

"THERE IS NO 'BUT', RUBY!"

This time, the younger girl took a full step back. The glare her sister shot her was unlike anything she'd experienced. There was no love and kindness that Yang had always treated her with within the blazing red eyes; only rage and impatience.

"'BUT' NOTHING! Weiss's father took her back to Atlas; I doubt we'll ever see her again! We have no way to contact her with Beacon's communications down and we have no way of getting to Atlas since the military closed their borders! And even if we could reach her, what's the point? We talk to her about how awful everything is now? Is that all you want to do? Make everyone feel even worse than they already do?!"

It was clear that the brawler wasn't focusing on her words anymore; she threw out her arm in front of her, trying in vain to express the fury engulfing her.

"And what about Blake? She just up and left us! We don't even know where we could start looking for her because she never told us anything about her past! She never even told Weiss and they were fucking pining after each other for most of the school year! If she can't even trust that kind of information with someone like her girlfriend, then what's the point of considering her if she wants to leave us in the dirt?! We didn't really matter to her, so why should we even bother?!"

Ruby couldn't bring herself to reply. She simply stared on, not wanting the shouting to return.

Furious tears brimmed the blonde's eyes as they faded back to lilac. She let out a snuffle, not able to retain even her frustration after such an outburst.

"Sometimes bad things just happen, Ruby. Sometimes people do the wrong thing and we just have to accept that and move on from them."

It was clear that, despite her awful tone, the blonde didn't want to believe her own words.

"That doesn't mean you should let those things stop you."

There was a second where Yang didn't move before she turned back to her younger sister.

"Bad things may happen, Yang, but they ALWAYS happen for a reason. We just don't always know what that reason is." There was a fault in her voice, something suggesting that she was also trying to convince herself of the words, but she forged on. "The fact that we don't always know what we'll encounter never stopped us before; it just made us go even further! We'll find Weiss and Blake and all of our friends and…"

She took a step back into the room, only to realize she didn't quite know what else they need to do.

Yang shook her head, clearly struggling to accept anything she was hearing.

"And what kind of teammate am I without my arm?" She let a wary eye wander over her sister, taking in the three roses still pinned to her chest, before moving over to the bandaged stump at her side. "I even lost our promise ribbons, Ruby! I feel like I've lost even more than just my arm without them."

"But those pieces of cloth aren't as important as what they represent!" Her younger sibling countered, hand clutching at her chest. "They're only symbols of the bonds that actually exist. I know you lost them, but you have to realize that that shouldn't be enough to break the real connections."

Yang's gaze returned to her red-haired leader. "You're sure?"

The smile that was returned wasn't pitying but still emotional. "Of course." There was a small dip in the tone as Ruby fought back more tears, but she held herself up. "Because that's what love is. It's companionship; knowledge that those who we trust will trust us in return, so that we can work together and bring ourselves further despite everything. So that we can keep moving forward. I know because it's what I felt about you three since the first days at Beacon."

This time, the brawler didn't reply. She simply sat back in her bed, head turning until she faced the window again.

The younger girl's expression fell. Part of her wanted to say something but she thought better of it and turned to leave. Before she left the room, she uttered back, "I love you, sis."

Again, there was no reply.

After a few seconds, Yang turned back, staring at the empty spot in the doorway.


One more chapter to go. Think of it as an epilogue; I ended up axing the sequel to this because I felt I should wait until I have more talent writing villains (and more writing talent in general) before I delve into Volumes 4 and 5. And because I had issues with what I was planning on writing.

Plus, it would've been two volumes of Weiss and Blake lamenting over not being able to see each other, which I felt could be more easily conveyed in an epilogue format.