Since I've been having a lot of trouble with the next chapter of Convergence, here's something comparatively light and fluffy to tide you over. It's not intended to be serious, but maybe kind of meta.

I can't actually remember when Winter and Qrow were revealed. So if I botched the timing, just call it a point of divergence from reality.

Author: XCVG
Canon: Yes
Context: Convergence - First Interlude

Emergence: Aside
The Picture

"Hey Weiss," Ruby called, from a position irritatingly close to her shoulder. The suddenness of the declaration would have startled the whitehead if she hadn't been completely desensitized by that point.

With a deft flick of her fingers, she minimized all her windows and locked her computer. "Yes, Ruby?"

"Did you see Winter's new design?" the crimsonette asked excitedly, bouncing on to the couch beside her. "Ooh! And they did Uncle Qrow, too!"

It took Weiss a moment to figure out what her partner was talking about. Not her sister, not Ruby's uncle, but the graphical fictionalized representations of the people the knew and loved. "No, I haven't. Why?"

Ruby poked her fingers together, slightly deflated. "Well, they did a really good job on Uncle Qrow- he's super lifelike and awesome, but... well..."

"Christ, what did they do to Winter?" she breathed, quickly typing in her password and logging in again. Before she could even ask, Ruby reached over, opened Firefox, and typed in a URL at inhuman speed.

She recoiled visibly when she saw the image on the screen. "The fuck? She looks like she's thirty! I gave them a picture. It's not rocket science!"

"Yeah, um, I guess there was a misunderstanding or something," Ruby suggested. "Or maybe they saw that Winter was younger and they didn't want to be weird so they made her older?"

"Maybe." Weiss deftly alt-tabbed into an open file window and browsed to her photos folder. She opened one and skipped past a few before finding the one she was looking for. Then she let out a sharp, biting laugh. "Oh, wow."

"Huh?" Ruby leaned over to see, completely violating any personal space the older girl might have had. "Hey, that's Winter! And... Winter?"

The picture showed the two Schnee sisters, Weiss perhaps a year or two younger and Winter in her early teens. Weiss wore an outfit very similar to the one she fought in at Beacon, and Winter had a simpler dress complimented with cobalt blue instead of deep red. Despite the fact that only Weiss wore heels, they were about the same height. Both of them were smiling, Winter more broadly than her older sister. They stood side by side, close enough to barely touch.

Behind them and to the left was a woman in the white and grey uniform of the Atlasian military. Her hair was perhaps a shade darker than the Schnees, and tied up into a bun. Unlike the smiling sisters, her look was almost completely serious, with maybe the thinnest of smiles poking out.

Ruby pointed. "Who's that?"

"Specialist Frost," Weiss answered after a pause. She grimaced. "For a while, there was a credible and specific threat from the White Fang against myself and my sister. Security was tightened up. Wherever we went, there would always be at least one guard with us. Frost was one of these guards."

"That didn't sound like a happy time," Ruby commented.

"We managed," Weiss replied, managing a smile. "I remember this picture. It was supposed to be a publicity shot of me and Winter. I'm not sure exactly what happened, but I remember Frost was with us all day and she was nice to us. I remember her saying we should just have some fun like normal teenagers. So we invited her into the shoot for some reason. Maybe I was trying to spite my father."

"I don't think anyone ever saw the uncropped version of this picture," she continued, the smile becoming wistful. "My father was not happy. He said that it gave the opposite message of what he intended. That the White Fang was such a dire threat that we could not go anywhere without an army. I told him that I had only done as he had instructed."

"Whoa..."

"You know what? Oh well. I think this is easier to look at," Weiss said quietly. "I just wish I could see Winter again."

Ruby gently wrapped her in a one-armed hug. "Don't worry, Weiss. We'll find a way home."