Mistress.

Speak freely.

Ozma's group is assembled, we do not know their objectives.

I am not worried. Continued aggression between Humans and Geina should turn the tide in our favor. Facilitate that.

Yes, Mistress...

Do you doubt me? Continue searching for the Orb and Tome. Neo. Please assure Emerald that her powers will be necessary in the near future. Assist her with finding Mercury.

Yes, Mistress.

Pyrrha lead the march, their destination close enough that Ozma would not take them, which eased some and irked others, Yang taking joy in the road despite her claiming a headache. "These things are not easy...I'm so-" A flower hit her in the head. "I think that we will be seeing them all again."

"Of course ," Raven reached for something in her brother's bag. "does someone want to explain what just happened?" It was granola.

"Earned more followers. Earned more respect. Sorry Qrow." Ren held Nora's hand, their eyes dull and ringed with purple.

"It doesn't matter now." He refilled his flask. "More shit to deal with than I ever asked for. There goes retiring."

"There's no rest for the wicked-where's Blake?" Ironwood stopped to turn around. She was lagging behind.

"OHMYFUCKINGGODS." Weiss marched back a few paces and dragged her by the hair. "It's like dragging a dead body."

"If it wasn't deeply offensive, I would have thrown a chain about your neck." Pyrrha snarled. "For all that you're acting feral." She reached for Yang and by the same token, Adam, pushing them to the front as they lagged behind, still sleepless. Qrow ran a hand over the old wound.

"Are you two okay? You're reserved and silent in ways that I don't remember you being. Especially you, Yang." Pyrrha held the other's girl hand.

Yang wouldn't look her in the eye. She looked up at him and got silence as usual.

'I don't like this. People are acting out of character. Vindictive. Silent. Powerless.' She looked up at Jaune. '...Heartless.'

A day's travel later, they made it over the gorge. Adam and Yang kept going, and nobody stopped them either as they sat farther away, the soil underneath growing stony and tortured, sand beginning to catch in eyelashes.

Glynda added another log to the low fire. "Okay. We're stuck with each other. I get it. However, if we sit here and push each other's buttons on purpose, we're going to die out here again, and again, and again. Blake!" She looked up from her book, ears droopy.

"As I was saying, were that I were in charge, you'd be dead for treason. But, since Sir Ozma requires your presence, you're going to listen to me. What is your problem? Because, 'I don't want to be here', 'I was happy being mayor', 'my friends want nothing to do with me', or 'I want to go home', doesn't work for us. Because nobody wants to be here, you would have ran as soon as famine hit, your friends with good reason want nothing to do with you, and home is where your family is, amiright, boys?" She raised her flask. A toast went up, Winter a bit late and a bit drunk.

"I just need some time to think. I'm sorry." She turned a page.

"Someone take Winter's drink." Ruby did, with little protest. "All of us here are together, but we remain divided. There's factions among us. Mistrust. A level of codependency that I am not comfortable with."

"Okay, Glitter, we'll pretend you're scot free."

"Shut up Qrow. We need to refocus from the past and into the future if we're to get through this. Get some sleep. We'll start experiments soon."

-.-.-.-. * -.-.-.-.

They put leagues underneath them the destination nowhere but "that way," according to the seers, white streaks in both of their hair.

"Okay." Glynda sat down with her book, skirts traded for black pants like the rest of them, the stony soil holding some blooms and grasses, the sky crystal clear, the beginnings of the desert rolling and bending for leagues around them. The cloaks were folded as they was nobody but them, and the flatlands would betray any ambush.

"Are you going to explain how you're using my Semblance?" Ren frowned, hair skidding his thighs.

"Haven't you noticed all of us are using each other's Semblances?" She spared her hands to weave her hair into a plait. "We're all...accelerated. Which explains why I can't keep my hair cut. And why I can drink and feel nothing, I don't know if it's taking years off our lives, but quite frankly that's a blessing at this point. And Oscar," He looked up, Ruby braiding wildflowers into his hair. "is more useful than you all are thinking."

"I don't get it." He pulled Ruby's fingers from his scalp, accidentally knocking them into his antlers, their growth finally halted at half a foot off his head.

"Flare your aura."

Green spread across the clay and with it, life, flowers springing up, each to everyone's taste. Ruby wasted no time braiding her roses into her waist length hair. It snapped after a stretch. The flowers remained.

"If I were to apply that to Adam, Ruby or Ren, flowers grow because that's them, that's as far as it can go." Adam snorted, Ruby at her work in his hair, Yang hiding in her infinity scarf. "If I were to say, apply that to Ironwood." She stared at him, the older man scoffed, waved the brunette over close enough to touch, and stomped at the ground. A short wall sprung forth, but this time, a purple haze seeped from its cracks, corroding the stone until it crumbled. "It...has different uses."

"That doesn't explain us." Ren sighed, Nora busy asking Raven for cookies.

"Semblances change with us. Before, mine's was simple telekinesis. Now?" She got up. "Tai, hit me." She threw Oz her glasses, they knocked his off.

"No!" He shirked back.

"Hit me, I can take it!" She crouched down as if to catch a ball.

"Absolutely not!" A grimace split his face.

"HIT ME!" He sucked it up, wound up his fist, and hit her in the chest. She spun, orange bleeding across her form, with a swipe of her own hand, a fireball careened through the air, exploding a league away. The chorus raised their approval, Oz too late to catch the hoot.

"Given the correct Semblance, I can translate it." She wiped sweat from her brow. "It doesn't work for everybody."

"Wait, will it work for me?" Nora skidded over, "Hit me!"

"Yours requires outside influence. I'm-"

Taiyang rolled his shoulders. "You ready?!"

"YEAH!"

So Taiyang punched Nora. She skidded around, thunder striking the ground as she ran, her legs blurring with speed, howling with laughter before she fell into the grass, exhausted.

"As I was saying..." Glynda got her glasses back. "Before we go thundering into the unknown," Yang giggled "perhaps we stop and reconsider our Semblances and their synchronizations? Especially you," Glynda picked Blake up and plopped her dead center. "Who went from copy cat to illusionist." Ruby looked at her, then at Yang who looked away with sunken eyes, then her again.

'I should try to talk to Yang.' Jaune walked over to Blake, healing the bruised tailbone in a instant. 'She doesn't seem well. But it's hard to do when Adam is always there.' Pyrrha leant against him as he returned, catching the jolt as she made contact. 'There's nothing? There's silence now?' A sun browned hand patted his face, mouthing 'are you okay, honey?'

"That doesn't explain you." Winter poked Qrow. "How did you choose who to kill like that?"

"I didn't like them. I...don't want to talk about it."

"Semblances can evolve too. Like we do." Glynda got her glasses back. "How unfortunate that they crossed your path, Harbinger." Qrow grumbled under his breath.

So bags fell to the ground, everyone agreeing to friendly spars. A whole lot of near misses and scrapes. Even more dragging Blake back into things.

Oscar swallowed his fear and took on Taiyang, who started things off with a hello to the face. Nora took on Yang for the twenty-fifth rematch. Neither won. Winter challenged Oz to a glyph fight. Ren and Adam were at even speed...though the bull could eat more hits. Glynda finally won against Qrow; he wasn't really trying and neither was she.

Jaune stood against Ironwood for a good ol' fashioned unarmed brawl. "Okay, old man, don't kill me." He said, the two of them circling each other. Ironwood threw the first punch. Jaune diving underneath, landing a hit into his back, James spinning quickly and getting him in the ribs. Jaune fell over, wheezing. "I just said, 'don't kill me'."

"You left yourself wide open." He helped him up. "Try that again and this time, don't focus on getting at me. Move with me."

So he tried again. And again. He got it on the fourth try, James clapping him on the back. "Good job, son."

Blue bled into white and back again, the ground shook, and the earth sprung up beneath them, a stone riot shield emerging from the soil, smooth and edged with glass, large enough to block all of them from siege.

Everyone craned to look. "Oh..." Ironwood hopped off. Jaune fell on his ass. "Wow. You...how'd you do that, Jaune?"

Pyrrha helped him up, navy eyes staring at nothingness. The shield collapsed into dust without its masters.

"Jaune." He straightened up, jolting at his name, hands pressing into his chest, eyes darting between James and his hands. "Jaune?" James watched Glynda pace ecstatic laps around the group, talking about about great successes. "Is he well? Do we need to stop for a break?"

"I'm okay." The smile was half assed. "I'll be okay, I need to think for a bit, maybe sit by myself."

"Okay, I'm trusting you here." Pyrrha lead Jaune out of dodge, before running off to try to take down Qrow, Weiss struggling to keep up. Ironwood pulled sidearms off of his person without contest.

Yang, unsurprisingly, was with Adam, standing at the far edge, watching Ruby carrying her father with her Semblance mid-fight, a smoldering ball of coal wreathed in petals. She wrapped her hands in his, dodging a shot from Weiss trying to pin Qrow to a tree. A blank grenade went whizzing by his ear, the thousand league stare still there. He didn't even flinch.

"ADAM!" A pile of roses landed on his shoulders. "LET ME PICK YOU UP! I TRIED PICKING EVERYONE ELSE UP BUT YOU!" Blake fell on her ass, Raven hiding a smirk before helping her to her feet.

"You can't, pipsqueak." Yang let him go, taking on Ironwood, shaking out her muscles as she approached. "I'm twice your weight on a good day."

"Buuuuut-" She whirled around, taking Pyrrha for a ride, she disappeared into a wailing mess of blood red lilies and shards of metal, Ruby dropping her off near Jaune before coming back. "I can pick you up!"

He rolled his eyes.

"Please? Or I'll tel-"

"Let's go." The smaller rose squeaked with delight, hopping and dancing around him. "I don't like the idea of this." He went to push his eyes back into his skull, Ironwood reaching over to grab his hands.

"Stop that. Please." He circled around to his front, hair stuck into a severe bun. "You're worrying me." Ruby booped the both of them, catching Oscar as he got thrown out of his scrap with Tai, swinging him right back in there. "You need to talk? We'll talk."

He looked down at the pipsqueak, a toothy grin on her face. "Go for it." Ruby got a running start, cackling with glee as she shot herself into the air with Crescent Rose.

Ozpin looked up from his spot with Winter, picking through his pill cases. "Oh, finally done brooding? I see where Yang gets it from."

He went to debate the older man as he dissolved into rose petals, Ruby whirling him around in a lazy circle, one bunch brighter with sparkles and stained glass, the other thick with leaves and thorns.

They both fell out of suspension onto their asses, petals following after, staring at each other like they discovered a secret, a smile splitting both their faces. "WE NEED TO GO FASTER!" They scrambled to their feet, Adam running for Blush, retrofitted with explosive rounds.

"Holy shit." Raven pulled her quills off her neck, the rest of her hair stuck in a braid, watching the smaller rose run farther into the dust. "A emotion besides broody, angry, or hungry. I was getting worried about him." Ironwood guffawed. "Yang, keep it up, you're doing something right." Her daughter hid in her scarf, Pyrrha slapping her shoulder, a grin on her face, a wave of chuckling rising and falling. "Keep going, he might sing for next solstice."

"JAMES! HIT ME!" Adam skidded over, hair falling out of its weave, petals still stuck in the turns, Qrow choked on squawks of laughter. Glynda was busy taking notes.

"I am not your godsdamned battery!" Ironwood folded his arms. Oscar's eyes were ready to roll into the grass, Ruby fumbling to load high powered shots into Crescent Rose.

"Fine, Ren, h-" He did, pink bleeding into crimson, Adam's hair smoldering, Blush in hand. "READY?!"

"YEAH!" She ran meters away, scythe ready to propel her forward. Yang and Oscar watched between fingers, as they shot themselves towards each other, screaming the whole way, bursting into petals that spun themselves into a cyclone, shrinking tighter and tighter until they faded away.

A branch fell off a nearby palm tree.

"Um...what the actual fuck?" Nora wiped sweat from her brow. "Where..."

'...I mean, it takes the weirdest shit to get this guy to crack a smile, but it's better than that stare'. A ice cold protein shake appeared in front of her face, it was over with in three long gulps. Clawed hands pulled her into a hug. 'This is affecting him more than it should, but at the same time, how much of this am I ignoring? Watching two friends murdered.' She glared at Blake, who was sitting off in the distance, but still in earshot, reading a book. 'And being unable to seek revenge.'

"THATWASAWESOME!" The two of them came back up the dunes, everyone spinning or craning to look, Adam preoccupied with a bag of carrot cake cookies, the smile still on his face, Ruby holding shopping bags, grinning just as wide. "YOU GUYS! IT WAS WICKED!"

"Where did you go?" Qrow picked his niece up, shopping bags heavier than she was, checking her for injuries.

"Argus." Adam dug more of the same cookies out of the bag, having had finished the first one, tossing Oscar two of his own, handing Yang a cake, the bag still heavy with sweets. Pyrrha quickly digging into one of his bags, holding a still hot platter of moussaka, the sausages given to Jaune, the rest of the treats distributed just as fast, everyone accounted for, even Blake, who took the fresh tuna with seven thank you's. Ruby displayed the clothes she got, including friendship bracelets. "Don't worry, we left money. It's not that hard."

"...oh, you two get to break all kinds of laws of physics?" Ironwood pulled sand out of Oz' hair. "How'd I get stuck with a boring wall?"

"A shield!" Jaune quipped, pulling Pyrrha's braid into a bun, while she burned her mouth on her food.

"FUCK PHYSICS!" Roses fell on Ironwood's shoulders. "I got you this!" It was a blue shirt that matched Oz's, Glynda's and Qrow's and Winter's and Raven's and Tai's, in the colors that mattered. "When you want to go again?"

"When it proves necessary?" Yang patted his face, the brand still covered by a wave of hair. "It's fun, but...it's nauseating. Like a roller coaster on steroids."

"Does this mean that you're okay?" Blake asked from behind her book.

"No." He stared her down, a tremor creeping down his leg. "But it can't be all work..." A round of cheers went around, Ironwood clapping him on the shoulder, catching his hands as he went to dig at his eyes.

Two fires later, Blake sat with everyone.

"I..." She looked into her cup, hair up and braided. "I'm sorry." She ignored the glare of thirty-two eyes. "I've been acting selfishly. I...killed two of you. And I've been thinking about this for a long time."

"Are you going to look us in the eye while you say this or are you going to lie by proxy?" She looked up to Jaune staring at her, Ruby at his side. the rest of her squad, and the rest of the Cavalry behind them.

"I apologize for leaving you at the dance. For leaving you at the battlefield. For leaving you at...wherever Ozma takes us. I apologize for hoping that you hated me. I apologize for being useless." She finished the cup of broth, sand coating the edge.

"I had someone very dear to me change. It wasn't in an instant, it was gradual - little choices that began to pile up. At first, it was accidental, then it was self defense, and then I couldn't tell right from wrong. But that was the past. And, in holding on to the past, I've done more damage than he had ever done to me." Adam looked away. "This is the present. It's what we're fighting for. So... I want to trust you. I will trust you. But first, I need you to look me in the eyes and tell me that bygones will be bygones. That we can move on. Together."

"I dream of arrows at night." Nora swirled her cup. "Felling us all. Do you think that it's enough for you to sit here and ask to be forgiven, in the most backhanded fashion possible?"

Pyrrha huffed. "We owe you teamwork, we don't owe you forgiveness-" She reached behind her to grab Adam's hands, Yang at Ruby's side, tiny hands wrapped around her bandaged arms. "We will forgive you when it's readily apparent that you are worth it."

She looked into her cup, ears flat.

"No secrets, no bullshit." Oz sat in Ironwood's arms. "Tell the truth before I rip it out of you." She said nothing.

In a blink, Oz had her by the neck, her mouth pried open by white light. "Speak." Jaune flinched, curling into a ball, hands pressed against his ears, Winter sat up,

"I left you to join Black Claw, to try to bring it down once and for all. I put the bounty on your heads. I wanted you both dead. I knew you were together. You showed up as I was paying it off..." The light faded from her mouth. Oz crumbled, Ironwood scooping him up.

Adam retreated to the further edge of camp. "I told you she weaponizes secrets."

Ruby pulled Yang closer as tears rolled down her face. Weiss loading rubber rounds.

"This cannot persist, covering lies with half-truths." Ironwood spoke up, laying Oz to sleep. "Whenever we can trust you to tell the truth, freely and without lies, we'll let you know."

"You're looking for gaslighting. You're gaslighting us, Blake." Qrow laid in the sand, holding the old wound, Winter loading Magnolien with Dust. "Every single one of us."

Nora shrieked, unfurling Magnhild, swinging for Blake's head, her eyes bloodshot and wide, Ren screaming after her to stop, hands reaching to grab her. She stopped mid swing, mid step, her hammer falling, hands pressed against her head. "I'm losing it. I'm sorry. I'm sorry..." She sat by Adam, tearing out her hair.

Ruby stopped Yang from scraping off scales with her side dagger, Glynda running to hold Nora's hands, Ren too busy shattering a side dagger under fist.

"...okay." Raven circled camp, pacing mad, her shadow darker than black. "I don't know what's happening, but we have to stop driving each other crazy." Oscar threw a handful of lavender into the fireplace as well as white headed flowers, crossing camp to stand by Jaune.

Ironwood hopped the firepit to grab Adam's hands before he dug out his eyes. "Blake, if I had a free hand, I would kill you. But since Cosmic Sugar Daddy is a cruel master, I'm stuck with you. Keep your secrets, since nothing you say matters and nothing you do counts." She stammered over a sentence. "And before you open your mouth, really think about whatever bull-Jaune, can you please heal them, bring Ren- whatever bullshit is about to tumble out of your mouth, on how you didn't mean to hurt anybody. You keep backstabbing us, putting bandages over the wounds and stabbing us again. Who else is having nightmares about this?"

Six others raised their hands.

'I can't...touch them right now.' He stood nearby and flared his own Aura, the wounds soothed all the same.

Glynda scanned him up and down, before returning her gaze to Blake. "You vowed to suffer. How long until you regret it? How long are you going to let your Aura seep like that?" Blake looked down, purple energy pooling at her feet. It dissipated, Nora pulled her hands from her head, eyes watering. "Qrow, Pyrrha, how long until we need to be there?"

"Soon." Pyrrha wrapped up in Jaune's jacket, white streaks worsening by the day. "Very soon. Remember that Remnant is relying on us. Not you. All of us. If all you're planning to do is undermine us, then you should have said so, and we all could have gone on. Now, I see Ruby's objection. Nobody here is a hero."

The seers' eyes flared gold.