'Not much has happened in the past few weeks. The front lines move imperceptibly like a pond's shoreline. It is a battle of inches, but also, seconds.
'Minutes. Hours. Days- sometimes weeks go by without so much as a peep from our enemies. The only way to know they are there are the bombs they drop on us day and night. Occasionally, one of us happens to look over the berm at the same time as the other side and they just stare at one another before ducking back down like rabbits frightened of their own shadow.
'-A man can go mad in such conditions. Apart from the abject lack of hygiene, there is nothing to do. Men play cards, knit socks for the bitterly cold nights, teach themselves the harmonica to the detriment of everyone on both sides of no-man's land.
'I wonder when this is over if I will still know how to play the violin. Or, are these fingers too calloused to be good for anything but loading bullets and digging foxholes?
'In this silence, the voice is always there to answer me. It says that I do not deserve to create anything so lovely as music anymore.'
"-Blake?" The voice of her captain caused her to start like a sentry caught napping on duty, and Blake might have flown out of her seat if not for the heavy desk keeping her boxed in. "…Are you alright?"
The tone was soothing, concerned, and it finally came back to Blake that no, her captain was not a haughty, squat little Belgian man named Poirot, but the petite and social-awkward Ruby Rose.
It had already been a couple weeks and that was still taking some getting used to.
"I'm fine," Apart from the twin bruises forming where her knees knocked against oak, she truly believed this.
"You look like shit."
-But Blake's partner was just as honest as her sister, and twice as blunt. It was both easier and harder to accept being sidled with one Yang Xiao-Long for the next four years of their school life. Coincidence aside, the woman's brash personality was reminiscent of the coarse language used by the soldiers, le Poilu- an irony itself considering the blonde's devotion to her perfectly styled hair.
"You not sleep well last night or something?"
No, in fact, ever since their trial at initiation Blake had been sleeping the whole night through. It was to be expected after the exhausting ordeal of the first day, where they'd come together with their now-classmates to defeat two elder-class Grimm. Everyone had slept well after that, and Blake was especially happy to note that she did not have any nightmares about monsters or even her own less-than-pleasant past.
Yet, it was disturbing that when she woke from a dreamless sleep that seemed to last only seconds, her body felt like it had been on a forced march for days.
"She must have been asleep; her snoring went on all night."
And, lastly, there was her fourth teammate. Fate must have been especially cruel to put a Faunus like Blake on the same team as a Schnee.
'How cruel it is that the Germans in our unit are forced to fight against their countrymen. Yet, it does not seem to bother them. These soldiers who fought in Morocco and Algeria put the younger legionnaires to shame with their enthusiasm for combat. One has the sense that it is not so much to prove to us they are our allies, but to prove to themselves they are not victims of fate.'
"-What's the matter, do you have a headache?"
Blake hadn't noticed when her hands had reached up to massage her temples- there were too many voices droning on right then, including the Professor whom she might have been concerned about overhearing their conversation.
"Mm. Weiss's complaining is giving me a migraine."
"Wha- how dare-?!"
"-Ladies," Ruby and Yang's giggles quickly dried up as they came under Glynda Goodwitch's heated gaze. The woman would do well as a drill martial; face as stern as those carved into L'Arc de Triomphe, yet fair as blind lady justice. "I am going over the safety rules and there will be a quiz. You will not be eligible for spars until you get 100%, so I suggest you pay attention and do so the first time."
"Sorry Ms. Goodwitch; Blake has a headache and we just want to make sure she is okay."
While she wasn't exactly okay with being used as an excuse, all four of them appreciated the slight reprieve from the Professor's ire.
"If you need to you may leave and go to the nurse. However, your teammates might want to take notes in case you miss anything, so I would appreciate quiet."
"-I'm fine," Blake was quick to say, coming out as more of a hiss under duress. "Really."
"I have some extra chocolate if you want," The girl smiled guilelessly and pulled out a king-sized bar from who-knew-where. Blake didn't even know they had a pocket big enough in their uniforms. "It might help."
"Thanks, but-"
'In a Belgian town we had retaken, there was an old crone who offered me a bar of chocolate. I was so offended. I was a soldier! Not some child barely removed from suckling on his mother's teat. My fellow Legionnaires laughed at me, called me kinder, bébé, detka, tugged on their beards in mockery of my smooth chin. I almost slapped the wretch for the torment she caused me.
'But then I remembered the little sister I had left behind. Chocolate was a treat that we'd only been able to afford a few times after she'd been born. It was her favorite. So I gave the old woman most of the pay I had in my pocket. It was worth a great deal more than what I was given in return, but I had to remind myself that these people had nothing. The only thing left of that tiny village was the church which had all its stain glass windows broken.
'It was only after the pointed spire disappeared behind our backs that I remembered I no longer had a sister. I briefly considered sending the chocolate bar home to my mother, but quickly thought better. The sight would cause her too much grief.
'So, I ate it myself over the next few days, giving some away to those brothers who had mocked me.
'It was bitter-sweet.'
Weiss heaved a reluctant sigh which caught Blake's attention.
"I have some medicine for that back at the room, if you want me to get it."
In turn to the unprecedentedly kind offer, Blake's gaping response was downright rude. But she could hardly help it; her teammate had never shown this kind of altruism until now- at least, not that Blake had noticed. She didn't even realize her mouth was hanging open until it started to form a response.
"Uh, thanks, but actually, I think some chocolate is enough. I might just be low on blood sugar."
High as a kite at having her offer accepted, Ruby broke Blake off a way too big chunk from the dark brick and passed it to her. The others went back to feigning attention to the boiler-plate safety rules while Blake tried to use her notebook as a plate without getting too many stains on the page or her fingers. This was hard, as the confection was milky and warm from being kept so close to the energetic girl. It also turned out to be way, way too sweet.
But she ate the whole thing anyway.
"It's porn, isn't it?"
The library was quiet as a church, and this question was sacrilegious to Blake's ears.
"What?"
"That book you're always reading so intently. It's smut, right? Hard-core? Soft-core? Bondage- Ooh, is it interspecies? Com'on, give me some details. You won't scare me away with some kinky stuff, I'm open minded."
Blake slammed the book shut, putting her foot down.
"It's not porn!"
After a couple of seconds of Yang blinking at her owlishly Blake realized how loud her denial was. She hid her shame behind the brown leather-bound volume and glared over the top at her partner with her hawkish amber eyes.
"It is not porn," Not that she didn't have some… risqué novels in her collection. But Blake would never label such literature as mere smut, let alone the piece of art which she was using to cover her mouth like a kerchief.
"Huuuhh, then what's it about?" Disappointed that she was unable to get more of a rise out of her partner than a harsh whisper, Yang deflated and slid down into her own chair with a pout.
"I already told you-"
"-Ehhhh, you're still reading that-?"
"-Would you two please be quiet before we get in trouble again?" From across the table Weiss glared at them, the tiny scar under her left eye as visible as the semi-translucent pages of the textbook she was reading. "…If you must know, it's a war novel."
"Huh?" Yang's slack-jawed confusion earned another round of shushing from the other patrons.
"How do you know?" Blake was still reluctant to condemn her current obsession as a mere 'war novel', but at the same time she was curious as to how the Schnee knew that much.
"What? Quit looking at me so suspiciously. It was part of my sister's reading list in officer's school and she told me about it. Despite being fiction, it contains many anecdotes about combat and tactics which are still relevant. The criticism it gives about trench-warfare is what led Atlas to abandon the strategy earlier on than the other Kingdoms."
"Sounds… boring."
Weiss shrugged and seemingly delved back into her thousand-page tome whose writing was so tiny even Blake had a hard time separating lines in the dim light.
"It's not." Blake's sharp eyes skimmed over the unadorned cover before refocusing on her uncultured partner. "It's a story, written like a first-hand account about one man's trials not just with the war going on around him, but how he struggles against his own-"
"Yeah, but why are you so obsessed with it?" Another vehement denial was on her tongue before Blake bit down on it, admitting her flaw. "You've always got your nose in it. Must've read it- what, a dozen times now?"
A baker's dozen, actually; but that was just since the start of the semester so her team couldn't that number was probably closer to two-score.
"What's so special about it, anyway?"
Something unquantifiable. You couldn't judge a book's worth based on the number of pages. However…
"…It doesn't exactly end."
It was Lie Ren who filled in this blank, the stoic young man from their sister team sitting at the next table over with his back to them. He turned halfway around so that they could see the shock-pink streak in his hair, and that half of his attention was still focused on making sure his hyperactive partner didn't cause a ruckus.
"I haven't read it myself but saw an article about it one time. No one knows the author or even when it was written. It's labeled as fiction but there's a fringe group of historians who insist that it is too detailed to be made up. Unfortunately, no one can find any evidence of the battles it talks about. And even more damning, nowhere in the writing does the author mention Faunus or even Grimm."
The creatures of the damned, Grimm were such an important part of their lives on Remnant that to omit them would immediately relegate that work to the realms of fantasy. The threat those monsters posed was part of the human condition- Faunus too, that other sentient species marginalized but still irrefutable intertwined with their history.
"Still, there are those who argue it means that it was written before the existence of Grimm… but these opinions are mostly regarded as scholars desperately trying to defend their thesis."
And wasn't that what Blake was doing there? Somewhere in Beacon Academy's vast library there must have been some oblique evidence that the details of the story were more than just the fine mechanics of an author's imagination. If she could track those down, perhaps they might lead her to a conclusion.
"So… how does it end?"
So much like the first day they met, Ruby's question was sincere and insistant. She had put aside her own book (comic) and was staring at Blake with those same silver eyes as wide as dinner platters.
'Today we came upon a house that had miraculously withstood both sides' bombardment. When we went inside, the table was even still set for dinner with all the fine silverware laid out. I won't lie, some of us considered pocketing a few pieces to supplement our meager wage. But in the end, our squad simply sat down and served up whatever rations we had left onto that fine china. Only after the repast was finished, and the plates licked so clean they could be used again, did any of us remember it was Christmas eve.'
After a few seconds of solemn silence Blake handed over her precious copy to the novice captain. Ruby accepted it reverently and with unusual care for the sticky-fingered girl turned to the last page. Blake didn't need it to recite what was written.
"'March 13th, 1918. Another quiet day. They say there might be an armistice soon. Both sides are tired of fighting, and long to go home. But I do not listen to such talk; these are the same people who told us it would be over in a month, four years ago.
"'At the very least, for me it will never be over.
"'I said before that I am no longer afraid of death. But now I confess that I fear peace. For in the quiet of an easy life as a farmer back home in the province, the voice will return. It will not allow me to till the soil without reminding me of the men I buried there. Everything my hands grip will be a weapon. My scythe will shuck no wheat, but the souls of the damned. And the truth is that we are all damned.
"'Addendum: We have fresh bread for the first time in months to go with our boudin for dinner. Perhaps the war really is coming to an end.'"
By the time Blake's recital had come to an end, both tables were looking at her. Seven sets of eyes wet and sticky with fearful intrigue.
"… What the fuck?"
"Yang, swear jar."
Both responses were automatic and empty. There was no sign of the coin jar Ruby always seemed to have on her person nor even a hint of gloating from the younger girl. Blake had already forgiven her partner for the cuss which she felt was, for once, appropriate.
"Anyway…" With first reactions out of the way, Ren cleared his throat, "It could just be a metaphor, a reflection of the senselessness of combat? Or maybe representing the endlessness of war."
"Gah! What a fucking copout!"
"SSSHHHH!"
The librarian must have been a huntress in a past life, because the shush she sent their way made all eight students feel like they were ducking under a hail of arrows.
"…But seriously."
"Nora…"
"I agree," It was more like Weiss was usurping the argument, glaring loudly at Ren's disruptive partner and daring her to say otherwise. "There is no sense trying to elucidate just what the author was thinking when he wrote it- For all we know, it could have been a she, or even a Faunus."
"Excuse me?"
Weiss completely misinterpreted Blake's indignation for an inquiry- as bad as confusing left and right in a crowded hallway, the Schnee heiress shrugged and put herself squarely in Blake's ire.
"Think about it. Ren said there were no mention of Faunus, right? Obviously that's intentional. The whole thing sounds to me like a pathetic attempt at sympathy, trying to show how bad humans are by comparing them to beasts. But if you even put a little thought into it, you can tell that whoever wrote it had a guilty conscience. It's using animal instinct as an excuse. All that talk about another personality is just eschewing the blame."
Blake was trying really hard not to blame Weiss- the heiress had no idea whom she was talking to, after all. But she also had no clue what she was talking about, sitting in her high castle and looking down at people like pawns on a chessboard was exactly what all those generals and commanding officers did when they sent battalions to their deaths.
"So, are you saying that humans are not capable of violence?"
It wasn't Blake who said it- thankfully. With the way she was feeling right now, not even the familiar finger-grooves she'd worn in the book's spine would ground her.
"Well, uh, no, obviously-"
"So, humans fight for a purpose, but Faunus out of nothing but animal instinct?"
Weiss couldn't fight against this. Not only were the questions obviously rigged, but the person she was arguing against was their regional champion. Pyrrha Nikos was a woman without parallel. Congenial in personality, generous in possessions, a formidable fighter- and not least, Weiss's not-so-secret idol.
"Then, what are you saying, Weiss?" Her tone had not strayed from a pleasant conversation, but Pyrrha's fair lips had settled into a decidedly sour frown. "All of us here right now are learning techniques not solely applicable to fighting Grimm. I cannot dismiss the fact that my own fights would have had a very different context if neither of the opponents had Aura protecting them. Like it or not, I am physically capable of taking a life and denying that fact is more than a weakness, saying that I would never hurt someone on purpose is a lie."
Weiss looked weak, like she had just gone several rounds with the Greco-Roman warrior instead of just sitting there and enduring the cool-voiced harangue. Even if no one believed that the beneficent Pyrrha could wish others harm, no one was brave enough to call her out on it.
"If the author of that book is guilty of one thing, it is omitting the fact that woman can be just as vicious as men."
No one had seen the kind-hearted champion be so ruthless before- and they likely never would again because like the snuffing of a candle it was suddenly gone.
"-Ah, I mean, not that we should be mean to one another. We're all here because we share the same desire, right? We want to improve ourselves so that we can better protect what is important to us- better protect each other. That's why we're put into teams, isn't it?"
"Yeah!"
"SSSSHHHHUUUUSSH!"
Though counter-sniped by another shush from the front of the library, Ruby was back on her feet and hovering over Blake's chair like an overly cheerful orderly the very next second.
"It's like I told you the first day, Blake. We're here to make the world better."
"…It's just a story, anyway," Weiss grouched when reluctantly roped into the team pep talk.
"Eh, even if it did happen, whoever wrote it's long dead. No sense worrying 'bout it."
Worrying her bottom lip, it didn't take Ruby long to see that relying on her other teammates for motivation wasn't going to work. This was a job for a captain!
"Look at it this way: we might not know who or how or even when, but all wars come to an end. It's gotta be over by now,
"Right?"
But that wasn't the end of it.
At the behest of her teammates and what remained of her better judgement, Blake sealed the book away at the back of her shelf behind her Ninjas of Love romance novels (again, she refused to call them smut).
Not that denying it did any good; Blake's condition gradually got worse over the next few weeks as she slept longer and longer each night, sneaking catnaps in between classes and even occasionally dozing off under the inebriating drone of Professor Port.
No surprise that her grades suffered for it. Blake went from solidly in the middle of the class (careful to never be too far at the top lest she attract attention), to elbowing for last place with Jaune Arc, whose acceptance to Beacon academy was questionable to begin with. The only thing buffering her from being right next to the lanky blond boy was her own blonde. Yang's grades had never been stellar, but they had seemingly trailed Blake's descent like a comet's tail. If she didn't know better, Blake might say that her partner was purposefully setting the curve to keep her afloat.
Truth was, she didn't actually know the blonde well enough to say.
It had been less than a month, and she wasn't exactly friends with her teammates per se… though Ruby would claim otherwise. And perhaps the girl was right, or trying very hard to be, because the other three honored her desire to keep her condition quiet. They also might have been intimidated by the manic gleam in her eyes. Although, she didn't know how long that would last before fear of getting in trouble outweighed fear of her.
Blake didn't know how long she would last. All her favorite foods had become unpalatable, tuna fish sandwiches turned to ash in her mouth and she became distinctly aware of sashimi's raw texture sliding down her throat. She was wasting away. Eventually her team wouldn't be able to stomach the silence, and then the gig would be up.
Then there were the nights when she would wake up in a cold sweat, pupils dilated as daggers and acutely aware of the other bodies in the room, counting their excruciatingly slow breaths like sheep until her heart stopped rattling like a machine gun.
'In the midst of an assault on the German trench I tripped and hit the ground. Without thinking I rolled to avoid the paintbrush sweep of a Maxim gun. From there I slipped right into a shell hole which was half-filled with icy water. My mouth opened in shock and I gasped so deeply that I thought I was going to suck in the bullets whizzing over my head like flies.
'They harried me all night. I couldn't stick my head up for fear of a stray bullet. I was sure no one knew I was there- and I aimed to keep it that way, keeping perfectly still except for the shivers which felt like they were going to shake my teeth loose. I pulled some driftwood that had fallen in over myself, both for the protection as well as camouflage.
'It was only after the sun was up and I was sure that I was still alive, that I realized the plank I had huddled up next to was in fact a frozen corpse.'
"Shut up…"
"What? I didn't say anything!"
"Weiss, quit bothering Blake."
"Uh! I haven't said a word to that maniac in days!"
'I still remember the words that German spoke when I cornered him: "Meine kamarad, meine bruder, nicht schissen bitter!" - I had no idea what he was saying, so pulled the trigger and put a bullet straight through his unshaven face. After I got back to allied trenches, I asked one of our own Germans what the man said:
'My comrade, my brother, please don't shoot.'
"-Look Sis, I don't care if you're the captain. She's my partner and I say that she needs to go to the hospital!"
'We passed by a field hospital on the way to the front. Outside the large tent was a pile of severed limbs which they proceeded to set alight as we marched by. Even after the Cpl. ordered a double time march, the wind blew east, and we couldn't outrun the smell of burning flesh.'
'You can't outrun it.'
"God- she's burning up! Professor!"
'The flamethrower is a terrible weapon-'
"No more, please, no more!"
'-sound like the screaming of banshees when you pull the trigger-'
Someone screamed. It was Blake. She was watching herself thrash and writhe against the attempts of her teammates to restrain her. Even if she could count her ribs from this perspective, she was putting up a fight.
'You can't fight it.'
She knew that voice.
'You know I'm right.'
'Adam…'
They were alone, somewhere, she and her once-best-friend turned fiend. How had he found her at Beacon? She had been so careful to cover her tracks- there were no footprints in the mud to show where either of them had come from or how they had arrived in this anti-garden together. Nothing was making sense; skeletal trees were planted in inverted colors atop hills that sunk into the ground.
'Do you see now, Blake? Man calls us animals to disguise his own beastly behavior. They will never respect us as equals until we prove that we can be just as ferocious as them.'
'We've been through this already! All that will do is lead to more hatred and destruction- look at this place!' Even the morals were twisted in this negative space, and Blake knew her argument was insubstantial the moment it left her pale lips. 'Is this the kind of world you want for our people? Where all they understand is death and destruction?'
'You talk as if you are different, as if you are better than them, than us.' Face indifferent to her pleas, Adam looked exactly how he did the last time she saw him. But it wasn't the devilishly handsome face that she'd grown up with, not the hair as red as blood or even the Grimm effigy mask which chilled her so much as his expression of disappointment. 'Do you really think your hands are clean?'
Looking down, Blake saw that her hands were caked with mud as black as her hair, and it was spreading like leprosy up her legs.
'-No! I-I haven't always done what was right- but I'm trying to now! You- you're the one that changed!' They had both been idealistic back at the beginning, joining the fight for Faunus' rights before the battles became literal. Like her descent into madness though, the escalation towards violence had been steep after their cries for fairness had been ignored time and again. Now, Adam led the charge. 'There has to be a way for humans and Faunus live together in peace!'
'There is, if you are prepared to do what is necessary.'
Blake didn't need to ask what this was, her fingernails had already sharpened into claws and were held against Adam's breast.
'No!'
Afraid of herself almost as much as her spectral tormentor, Blake tried to wrench her hand from his grip. But with a jerk she tore through his suitcoat and into flesh, spilling blood onto the parched ground.
'No, no, no…'
It continued to pool calmly as Blake fell to her knees in frantic grief. Desperate as a man delusional with dehydration, she tried to scoop the liquid essence up and put it back where it belonged. But it just kept slipping through her trembling fingers.
'I didn't- I didn't mean to-'
'Do you think that really matters?' Adam still loomed over her as if the fatal wound was nothing more than a spilled glass of wine. 'The road to hell is paved with good intentions. How many lives have already been unintentionally sacrificed for your goal? What is one more?'
'No more…'
She couldn't take it anymore. This was Hell.
'Hell has only the guilty…'
Then that was what she was. Who knew how many lives she had ruined- Blake hadn't even bothered keeping track, hadn't thought twice about stealing, sabotaging- everything short of taking a life with her two hands. But that hadn't stopped her from criminal indifference, turning a blind eye to the pain she was causing. If only she had stopped Adam when she had the chance. If only she didn't lov-
'Who could love such a wretched creature? Mother, forgive me!'
She hadn't even apologized to her father for running away from home, not even a single note back in almost half a decade. He probably thought she was dead.
'March or die. It's never really a choice.'
And now it was too late. This was it. She could feel herself slipping away.
'"Is that it? All you have? Swine!" Our instructor shouted at us, beat us with his walking stick so that we would pick our knees up over the slippery sand. Grains like embers snuck under our feet, enflaming our blisters so that they stuck out further than the hobnails on the bottom of our boots. But still- we pushed on.'
Something pushed itself into Blake's hands, and she looked down to see the crimson stains on her fingers begin to form petals. Pretty soon, she was holding a blood-red flower and struggling to remember why it was familiar like the other voice at the edge of her conscience.
'The Red Poppy,'
-The original book had been found with a flower pressed between the pages. A single, lovingly preserved relic that the publisher had replicated in limited-edition copies with a woodblock print. The page opposite had a few clinical lines explaining:
'The Red Poppy; it is often misconstrued that the color represents the blood shed on the battlefield. Where in actuality, the flower represents-'
'Perseverance.'
A hand sleeved in horizon blue* reached down in front of Blake's face. It plucked the flower from where it sprouted between cracks in earth which was hard as concrete. She was going to protest when the hand pressed the tiny blossom into her own and bid Blake rise.
The figure remained a blur as she tried to focus on them- but as soon as she looked beyond, Blake saw that the desolate landscape was now populated by budding red flowers as far as the eye could see.
'The Poppy is the first thing to appear over the remnants of a battlefield. It shows that even when one thinks that everything is ruined and nothing good can ever take root again…' She thought they were smiling; that's the way she pictured them even though they continued to be merely a sky-blue silhouette. It was with the same certainty that she knew the speaker even if she'd never heard their voice; their cadence and careful choice of words was as if they'd had nothing but time to kill, and she could even recognize some of the scars and callouses which caressed her own. '…Life goes on.'
'Some day the fighting will end. Trenches filled, rows of barbed wire twisted into wreathes, and brass shells melted down into pipes with which to herald the return of our Savior.
'I only fear I will not live to see this day.'
Things gradually came into focus.
The field of red flowers shrunk and solidified into a humble bouquet, stems cut and shoved into a vase which was placed on a bedside table just out of reach. A single, fallen petal lay in Blake's outstretched palm in place of the Poppy, no sign of the other pair of hands or the figure- either figure. No ghastly muck nor vibrant lifeblood either, which in a way was a relief.
It was a relief to note that her fever had disappeared, clarity arriving with a gentle breeze that came in from the open window. It was laden with industrial scents of exhaust and asphalt, concrete dust tempered by a heavy whiff of salt and sea.
There were other smells too now that she was looking for them, ones that she recognized from their description more than experience. That antiseptic burn was especially rousing, and not in a good way. But along with the whitewashed décor and distant but unmistakable sound of school bells and shuffling feet, it confirmed one thing. She was back ho- at Beacon.
"Well, welcome back to the land of the living."
Ever the contrarian, Blake nearly had a heart- attack at the unexpected greeting. The slow return to consciousness was expedited by a jolt of adrenaline like an officer's whistle urging her to charge- she was able to sit up, but this was as far as she got and nearly fell back into the hospital bed as her back muscles were almost unable to support her.
"Woah, jumpy, are we?" There was a humorous lilt to the woman's tone as she glided measuredly over to Blake's bedside. "Sorry, I really didn't mean to startle you. But I saw that you were awake, and you'd been staring at the arrangement for like fifteen minutes straight…"
"How long have I been out?"
This lapse of time suddenly became more important to her than the stranger who was almost certainly a medical professional if her sterile garments and official-looking clipboard were anything to go by. Although, there was a subtle mischievousness to the strawberry blonde's smile which left something to be desired.
"What's the last thing you remember?" Skepticism had Blake trying to remember the last time she'd had an actual checkup, trying to see if the supposed nurse's routine of checking her pulse, blood pressure and pupil dilation was normal.
"I… passed out." It was a safe bet, though she was hesitant to say whether the last thing she remembered was reality or fever-induced hallucination.
"In the middle of class, apparently. Gave old Glynda quite the scare." The mention of Goodwitch was almost reassuring if not for the eventuality that Blake would have to face the stern woman again sometime. "Your- captain, was it? Speedy little girl- anyway, she was the one who carried you here. Nearly broke some very expensive medical equipment before we got her to slow down."
Where before this sort of news would bring discomfiture, Blake found herself smiling for the first time since awaking- for the first time in months, as far as she could recall.
"She also dropped off those flowers yesterday when it looked like you wouldn't wake up for a while. Smart girl. The red geranium is supposed to be good for health and protection**." Though she must have noticed her surprise while she attached a blood-oxygen meter to Blake's ring finger because she amended, "…Either that, or she's just well-meaning and lucky."
"That sounds more like Ruby." Looking back at the arrangement which still looked reasonably fresh, Blake noticed a folded card balanced next to it. The combination of an obvious patience for embellishment, along with the fact that it was done in crayon, was clear as any signature.
"You're lucky; you clearly have a team that cares for you."
There was something almost threatening about this observation, a half-accusation in the nurse's eyes which strayed from her measurements to look Blake in the face. She suddenly felt extremely self-conscious, more than the stereotypical hospital gown would normally account for-
Blake's face turned the color of the sheets which almost ripped under her white-knuckle grip.
"I take it you're probably looking for this?"
From a pocket of her scrubs, the woman pulled out a tight velvety roll that Blake immediately recognized as her bow. Her disguise. Her one defense against the endemic prejudice of her species- devoid of this, Blake now recognized her other deficiencies, lack of weapons sending a shiver up her spine that was exposed by the paper-thin dress.
"Not to worry," The contrast with the nurse's prior expressions made what would be an erstwhile average smile reassuring. "We had to take it off to run some tests. But when your team came to visit, we gave you the shower cap we use for surgeries. I only removed it now because I wanted to run a comb through your hair."
A decompressing sigh escaped Blake when the nurse leaned over to place the bundle in her lap, and the student saw the fine-tooth utensil sticking out of her breast pocket. No reason to assume she was lying.
"Now, what aren't you telling me?"
Whatever comfortability had been building between her and the nurse was thrown violently out the window without bothering to open it more than its current crack.
"…I mean, I only assume that you know more about what's going on than you've told your team, considering you haven't even told them who you really are yet." In her current state, Blake's glare had less effect on the woman than a cat freshly out of a bath. "Don't give me that; exhaustion, loss of appetite, corresponding drop in grades and obsessive behavior… can't you see why I might have to ask?"
Evidently, Blake had needed it to be spelled out for her. But she had read enough books, and not to mention, had seen first-hand the symptoms of addiction withdrawal in some of her former comrades in the White Fang.
"It's not drugs."
"Didn't think so, but had to check." Like just another box on her clipboard, as if this interrogation was part of her daily routine. "But it remains a fact that you were still involved with the White Fang, regardless of what activities you participated in… what, you didn't think Ozpin knew?"
No, in her admittedly delusional state Blake had not, in fact, made that leap. Still convinced perhaps that her attempts to disappear were flawless, now she had to stop herself from running away again with the knowledge that it would probably be just as ineffective to those who really wanted to find her.
"It's not in your record, however, and the headmaster does not hold it against you." She must have seen the panic in Blake's eyes, but this still did not keep her from pressing. "Though we can't overlook if you break any laws while under the school's administration, you understand."
This time, Blake knew it was not a question and so nodded as much as her stiff body allowed her.
"So, any idea why your health might be going to pot? Your profile paints you as a fighter, and you don't scream 'my-boyfriend-dumped-me-so-I'm-going-to-start-cutting-my-wrists-hoping-he-notices' kind of person to me."
Blake might have screamed if her throat weren't so parched. And, if she even had a clue what it would be for: Anger at this woman's harrying the minute she wakes up. Frustration that she didn't have control or even a clue what was going on. Horror with it all as her life took a sudden and uncertain plunge like a rollercoaster.
"So we're clear, I'm not gonna torture you for it." This relentless psychological assault Blake already considered cruel and unusual punishment, but the woman sighed as if she were already bored of it. "I won't even press you to tell me. However. You will have to tell that attentive team of yours why they'll be down a member."
The message was clear: whether she was in hospital or in prison, Blake wouldn't be completing the semester. And either of those options was somehow made worse with the knowledge that she would have to look that too-honest girl in the eye and see her letdown. Blake had been prepared for disappointment when applying for the prestigious Beacon Academy. She was prepared for death when protesting for Faunus rights.
But it was all well and good to say that you were ready to be a martyr when the rest of the world everywhere was dying, or when you thought that no one anywhere cared. Quite another to tell someone young and hopeful to go on without you.
"…If I told you, you'd think I'm crazy, anyway."
"Bit of a mad world we live in," The woman said with another one of her smiles that made Blake slightly uneasy. "Why don't you give it a shot? Couldn't hurt."
It was painful merely existing now. Though she'd felt fine upon first waking up, Blake was beginning to experience the same sorts of pareidolia that preluded her episode. The fluorescent lamps overhead gave way to flies buzzing around a corpse; the jacket draped over a chair was shroud adorning a grave marker, and the woman in front of her was literally dying for an answer, her strawberry blonde hair molding like unpicked grapes on the vine. Blake had to do something; she had to stop this.
She started from the beginning.
Several glasses of water later, a pack of graham crackers, two new IVs, one less lab coat that the woman discarded like a marathon runner shedding layers from the frosty early morning to the midday sun, a couple of breaks where said woman ducked out to use the restroom herself (and in one embarrassing case helped Blake hobble over to the one in the corner for her own needs), several stops where she'd asked for more background or details, and finally, too many reluctant pauses to count, she was done.
If it was late morning when she'd woke, it was now well past that in the afternoon and into the evening. The woman's hair was more red than yellow now, and the bags under Blake's eyes were longer than the shadows in the room.
"…Well?" Blake asked after she felt she had waited long enough for the woman to give her opinion-diagnosis- answer- anything. "Am I dying? Am I insane? Am I just imagining all of it?"
"I think…"
It could have been the light in the room, or maybe just her imagination, but Blake thought that the woman looked almost as shellshocked as she herself felt. Daunted, at the very least.
"I think we're going to need Ozpin."
"I might have a theory,"
The headmaster had a smile of the 'I know something more' variety. But this was a given. He always carried a flavor of omniscience around him like his ubiquitous mug of mystery liquid. This was Ozpin, the- formerly- Great and Terrible. Although he had since abdicated this title, the man could not quite so easily erase the shadow it had left like the unfaded patch of uniform underneath a stripped rank.
He also couldn't quite get rid of his humanity, a hint of childish pleasure in his expression which made Blake think of someone who'd splurged on a toy and finally had a chance to use it.
Neither of these made her feel any better.
Twenty-four hours of uninterrupted rest and a couple of meals she'd actually been able to stomach down made Blake feel better. Enough that she could once again walk on her own thanks to the regenerative properties of Aura. She'd been discharged but stayed in the infirmary, not quite up to her team giving her a second round of questioning. Thankfully, she also wasn't bothered further by the woman whom she found out was Professor Peach who taught battle psychology and health to second years. Someone she would have had the 'pleasure' of meeting in due course… if she stuck around, that is.
But during that time, she'd also mostly been left alone with her thoughts which were caught between past and future, dreading this upcoming meeting and regretting having ever picked up that book on a whim. Perhaps there had been a reason it was on such deep discount.
'It is only in periods of rest where I experience regret. During the throes of combat, there is no opportunity to think. Just live, fight for the next second. This is the only future we have left.'
Sighing, Blake accepted the truth of unbidden advice. The narrator was right, people could get used to just about anything, including war. Including rampant internal monologues which invoked vicarious experiences of violence and grief.
In fact, ironically, she knew the voice was her own interpretation of what the author sounded like. And this second opinion which was hers and yet not, became a comfort. She was still self-aware, scrutinizing, not insane- not yet.
Though the continued silence as she accompanied the headmaster on the excruciatingly long elevator ride down from his office threatened to change this. What was this theory he seemed so confident in?
"Ms. Belladonna, have you ever heard of transmigration?"
Questioning if she'd heard right, Blake hesitated on her answer. This was not how she expected the conversation to go- she had never anticipated meeting one-on-one with the headmaster at all. Any scenario which resulted in such a meeting wasn't likely to go well for her. Since her ignominious exit from the White Fang, Blake had planned on never doing anything to warrant attention from higher powers again- good or ill.
"In the context of… reincarnation?"
Talk of higher powers… Where exactly was this going? Where were they going? Based on the illuminated panel above the door, the elevator had already descended past the ground floor and they weren't slowing down. Going down, down, down, all while the headmaster's dramatic pause made Blake think the man was going to deliver her to Hell personally.
"Something like that."
The lift's doors scissored open upon a large room. Cavern, more like it, with stalactites hanging ominously like chandeliers in a grand gallery. Blake followed a few steps after the headmaster who evidently trusted her not to turn tail and bolt. Not that there was anywhere to run to here, the elongate platform under their feet giving way to an abyssal drop on either side. Not only did she not want to contemplate running away, Blake didn't want to think too hard about how this bridge didn't seem to be supported by anything at all.
'The command sent wave after wave of men into the enemy trench. When it came our turn, the bodies had been piled so high that one could walk across them like a bridge.'
"Not helping…" Screwing her eyes shut, Blake tried not to think about the mental image and concentrated on putting one foot in front of the other in a straight line as if she were just on Beacon's front promenade and not several leagues below it.
"I'm sorry Ms. Belladonna, I suppose you do deserve a more thorough explanation," His hearing must have been almost as acute as hers. And Blake also figured that the man had been purposefully withholding his reason until now, until they were alone.
"You might say that it has been a… pursuant hobby of mine," This time his smug smile betrayed him, telling more than what Ozpin might otherwise provide with words, or their absence. "And what would yousay, Ms. Belladonna, if I told you it was actually possible?"
At the headmaster's mercy, Blake had little choice but to answer, but to believe that the man knew what he was talking about.
"Cases are rare, however. And truth be, I hadn't picked you as a likely candidate."
But the man had selected her profile out of a plethora of others, all the while knowing about her checkered past. Chances were that he knew more about her than she herself did.
And what of the others? It wasn't the first time Blake had thought about them, just the first time she admitted there might be more than meets the eye.
Catlike eyes caught distinct shapes forming out of the darkness ahead of them. Nothing that Blake could identify, though the headmaster seemed to know what he was doing as he approached and pulled the dust covers off the assemblage of strange machines, flicked hidden switches and punched in access codes on a central terminal.
"Well, maybe it is more than a little hobby…"
Blake had seen less elaborate setups in theater lighting for full-scale operas. The tech reminded her of operating rooms in medical dramas and the same sort of dread as going to see the dentist when one knows they have a cavity gripped her.
'I remember gripping the guardrail of the fishing vessel with which I had secured passage, hands rubbing off paint chips that fell into the black water like snow. Proper ocean liners loomed over us in the harbor like icebergs- the infamous Titanic came to mind, but our dingy was too small to make a such comparison.
'Instead I found myself a pilgrim, one of the huddled masses that the Americans sing about- And there was beautiful Lady Liberty, a gift from France to see me off. Her torch glinted in the early morning light, saluting my mission.'
"No need to be nervous. It is all quite non-invasive, basically your old-style television array designed to pick up on brain waves… and a few others, merging them into an image we can understand."
A dumbed-down picture of the procedure to be sure, but Blake was partially assured by this explanation. Her brain took care of the rest, reminding her that this was still the school's headmaster, and he wouldn't be prone to playing doctor- or god- with his students.
Right?
'-They betrayed us, the ones we trusted to lead. They told us it would be a quick victory, then that it was a just war and one worth fighting, later, a War to End All Wars.
'They lied.'
No, no, no! Things weren't like that here, not now. Not for her, because she wasn't so special as to be participant to history. Just a minor character, doing her bit part to make the world a better place.
"If you would, please," Indicating her place in this process, Blake reluctantly stepped up to the coffin-like pod. While the other equipment seemed homemade and jerry-rigged- at the very least a rough prototype- at the very least this had some concession in the form of padding. And it was clean, no ominous stains or anything to indicate it had ever been used for something nefarious. No indication that it had ever been used. She recognized the fresh welds from the book's description of a shipyard, like icing on a cake.
And she was this vessel's maiden voyage.
"Ah, I'm also going to need you to remove that," The man didn't bother to look up from what appeared to be meticulous calculations- for which Blake was grateful he was concentrating on. However, Ozpin gestured for her to remove her bow, for which she was less obliged.
But, she had come this far.
'When we first received our helmets, I scoffed at them along with the others. We looked like firefighters*** with them on our heads, and anyone caught wearing one in place of the Kepi Blanc was considered a coward.'
'But after a few weeks of seeing the horrific wounds sustained by shrapnel and concussion, we were reluctant to remove them even in sleep.'
A clear, domed helmet like a microwave cover lowered over Blake's scalp, stopping right at her twitching eyebrows. The hairs on the back of her neck were raising, and she had the feeling it wasn't just due to nervousness. There was an energetic surge above her head akin to when one heard the ocean by pressing an ear up to a seashell.
"Hmmm, I'm getting something, but it's a bit blurred. I'd like to increase the output."
This certainly wasn't a request, seeing as he had already started without giving Blake a head's-up. His head was already immersed in its task, tuning knobs with an intense concentration like a survivor lost on a deserted island trying to get the radio to work.
She was about to protest all the same when a shock traveled up her spine, making her weakened muscles clench so much they hurt. To her horror, Ozpin didn't seem to notice- or worse, didn't care as he stared concentratedly at the viewing screen, sipping his coffee as if reading the Sunday paper.
It was like she was being electrocuted, her teeth throbbing and bones rattling like tuning forks as something passed through her. The sensation was physical, more than the existential notion of death she'd felt in the dream- this was the real deal! And it was forceful rather than coercive so that Blake saw it coming and tried to resist. Though she wasn't ready to give up the ghost, it was being ripped from her.
"Getting closer, just a little bit more I think…"
Having a brush with death just the other day didn't make Blake any more prepared for this one. Even though she wanted to this time, there was nothing she could do. Or, even if there was, her mind was occupied by an overload of information and she couldn't think of it. Thankfully, the part of her brain which processed written language shut off for the first time in weeks and her grim narrator finally shut up.
Her visual cortex, however, was lit up like Ozpin's face as he continued to stare fixatedly on images and numbers scrolling by. Whatever he saw there must have been better than the haphazard scrapbook Blake was forced to endure. Pictures of random times in her past flashed before her eyes, boring days in elementary school were brought back for a do-over, summer days flicked by just as quickly as the first time, and the faces of people she only met once were resurrected only to fade to black as the home movie started coming to an end…
That was it? This had been her life as seen in hindsight, her 20/40 vision making it seem even shorter than it was, her agility letting her sprint through the bad times and skip over the rest.
And what of her warrior's strength? What good were those ears on the top of her head if they were always closed? This wasn't a scenario she could shrug onto her clones- no running away anymore.
No nothing. Blake was powerless even to control her own eulogy. Where were the good moments? Where were the family outings? The schoolyard games and first crushes? Where were all those books she had devoured and grilled mackerel she had savored? The times she spent with her friends, just hanging out with her comrades on those rare, lazy afternoons where Julian would pull out his accordion and Hubert would start to hum while trying not to let Stas and Tomislav see the cards up his sleeve-
Fuck! That wasn't her life. What about her friends- her good moments? Think, think, THINK, FOCUS!
Ruby. She popped up first, and Blake was never happier to see the silver-eyed girl- this thought almost made her cry, but she pushed on.
Yang. Okay, her partner worked, and Blake would admit she could have done worse.
Weiss. Well. There was no denying the haughty woman held an important place in her life, but a little disappointing that it couldn't have been better. No chance now.
Next was…
That was it? Mother and father flew by along with a few others, her friend Ilia blowing a kiss farewell from the caboose of a train that was quickly pulling away.
There had been another train, hadn't there? Another goodbye to a period in her life before she started anew at Beacon.
'The Legion is a menagerie, peoples from all over the world with just as many personalities. Some are adventurers, others are crooks, scoundrels and professional soldiers. Ask why they joined, and you'll get a different answer each time.
'But overall, I believe that those who seek the Legion are looking for a fresh start.'
At least this one was partly uplifting, just as Blake felt her mind slip into nothingness. The devil-may-care attitude finally suited her. What was that other phrase? She could really use a few more good one-liners for where she was going.
Oh yeah. That one. Vive la morte.
Long live death.
The screen went black.
That had never happened before, not while the power was on. Even when there was no one in the machine, it was always picking up thoughtful threads from the cosmos like black clothes attracting cat hair.
But nothing else was dark; the lights were still on overhead and the keyboard was still glowing gently under Ozpin's fingertips. The power was still on, machine still humming away.
Apart from that, though, there was only the sound of Ozpin's steady breathing.
"Blake?"
His voice cracked as if he hadn't used it in months, not noticing when he used his student's first name. Hardly noticing when there came another sharp sound.
The pod was as empty as his mug which hit the floor and shattered.
"Well… that was unexpected."
It almost felt like she was expected, a door opening for her to step through and leave the blackness and pain of the other world behind.
Even though she stood upon a grassy green hill, in front of her was a desolate wasteland. The transition was as sharp as a cut from a razor, and the scent of iron wafted in from where she looked westward.
Still, Blake felt compelled to step over that threshold, walk out into a land where no man would willing tread.
Her foot came down at an awkward angle. Something had caught her eye at the last second and she'd tried to avoid stepping on it. When she'd looked down, the tender stalk stuck out from underneath the arch of her stiletto heels.
A Red Poppy.
"Okay, I just have a few questions,"
"Yang…"
"Where the fuck-"
"Yang,"
"Who the fuck-"
"Yang…"
"Why the fuck would they even-"
"Yang!"
"What the fuck, Ruby? I really don't care about the swear jar right now. In case you haven't noticed, we've somehow ended up back at the same place where we were at initiation, yet none of us can recall how we got here, how it's suddenly night, or why we can't see the path back to Beacon or even the bloody castle itself! So unless you happen to have grown a sense of direction in the past twenty-four hours and somehow know the way back to school where I would be happy to spend the rest of my life paying off a debt to that dumb-ass swear jar, I don't-"
"Yang!" Weiss snapped, amused at first by her partner's suffering, until it became her own. "Getting angry and yelling isn't going to do anything. We need to form a plan before we indulge ourselves in what happened-"
"Guys,"
"What, Ruby?" Having tolerated the younger girl as captain and her sister as a teammate for the better part of a month now, Weiss could no longer tolerate either one's childish outbursts. "Can't you see that we're discussing something important?"
Their situation was indeed serious, but no more so than the look leveled at her by the normally lighthearted girl.
"When."
"Huh?"
"The question you're both looking for is: when."
Indulging the look more than the girl, Weiss followed Ruby as she pointed into the heavens.
Her mouth opened as wide as the full, unbroken moon overhead.
"Fuck."
For once, both sisters were right.
*The color of the French Uniform during the latter half of WWI was dubbed 'Horizon Blue' and replaced the older red and blue uniform of the previous century. It was adopted by the entire armed forces except for colonial troops and the French Foreign Legion who settled on a mustard-brown uniform of the same style in wool for temperate climates. However, there was a brief period during the transition where some Legion units on the western front were issued Horizon Blue.
** According to Wicca beliefs, a red geranium planted near the door will warn the occupants of approaching strangers by facing the direction of the stranger. They are also considered a protective flower that symbolizes good health.
*** The 1915 Adrian helmet was indeed based off fireman's helmets of the time period. However, it was the first helmet issued to any modern army and was readily adopted by several other nations, proving itself to be an extremely effective design against concussive blasts and shrapnel which were the main sources of injury in the trenches (in fact, in recent tests, the Adrian actually outperformed modern composite helmets in blast diffusion).