It wasn't common for the fingernails tapping on this particular tabletop to be so well manicured. The entirety of Weiss Schnee's appearance contrasted the dingy, ugly interrogation room. She was dressed in an elegant white blouse over pale blue pants. She looked like she was dressed for one of her father's campaign dinners. In truth, that was exactly where she'd planned on being tonight. But instead, she'd spent the last hour alone, with no cell phone, and no way to contact her father or the family lawyers. If she started striking her nails against the table any harder, they were bound to chip. The greatest indignity in this musty, ugly room was the handcuffs that secured her to the table via a metal loop bolted into the surface.
The door to the room opened. Weiss was shouting before she even saw who was entering.
"I have been demanding access to a telephone since I got here," She spat, "I have been mistreated! I have been bound like an animal! I-"
A police officer walked into the room. A woman with tied-back blonde hair and a pair of glasses that gave her an almost librarian-like look. She pulled the chair across from Weiss out, and sat down without ceremony. In her hand she held a folder, which she opened upon sitting down. The top page read 'Accident Report' in bold, black letters.
"Miss Schnee," She said, pushing her glasses up, "It will not improve your situation to complain."
Weiss stammered, her mouth not knowing how to form words for this situation.
"How- how dare-"
"My name is Officer Glynda Goodwitch. How long have you been aware you're Post Human?"
Weiss stopped. Her lungs seemed to deflate of their own volition. There was the slightest tremble in her bottom lip. Then, her composure came back to her in an instant.
"When my lawyers learn you've been treating me as-" She stammered, "You have no right to hold me against my..."
"Were you aware at the time of the car crash?" Goodwitch asked.
Weiss began forcing each breath in and out. Goodwitch waited a moment. She leafed through the papers within the folder. Medical reports, incident reports, even a picture of her father's wrecked car. Goodwitch seemed to take notice of Weiss squeezing her lips shut.
"Miss Schnee," Goodwitch said, "I need you to understand. There are no lawyers coming. Your father could not help you here even if he were willing. Your smartest choice is working with us."
A tear slipped out of Weiss's eye. It struck the back of her hand. Weiss looked down. The tear had split into two droplets, each held together by surface tension, resting near her wrist. Weiss squinted. One of the droplets was turned into a crystal of solid ice. The other vanished in a flash of steam.
"My father..." Weiss asked, "Does-? You've... you've already told him about me, haven't you?"
"Miss Schnee," Goodwitch said, "I imagine I don't have to tell you the consequences, if it were to get out that Senator Jacques Schnee's daughter was Aberrant."
Weiss put a head in her hands. A whole lot of planning had just gone out the window. For the past two years, she'd wondered how far her father would go, were he to find out. Now, she couldn't believe it had been in doubt.
"You're going to hang me in my cell," Weiss said, "Or make me OD. It'll be easier to sweep under the rug."
She felt a touch on her forearm and started. The cop had reached forward and placed a hand on her arm. There was something in the woman's eyes Weiss had never expected to see- something like empathy.
"Miss Schnee, I fully appreciate why you're scared," Goodwitch said, "From where you're sitting, it looks like your life is over. I can't promise you that you can ever return to... whatever the life of a billionaire politician's daughter looks like. But believe me, you have more options than you think."
Weiss could feel that more tears wanted to come. Not for the first time, she wondered if there was a way to get a message to Winter.
"But you'll need to help us help you," Goodwitch said, releasing the soft grip on Weiss's arm, "Let's get back to the car crash."
Weiss rose a trembling hand towards her face and almost touched the scar that carved its way down her left brow, and continued past her eye.
"I didn't cause the crash," She whispered.
"No. We still believe the incident was the fault of the other vehicle," Goodwitch said, "Can you tell me how the gasoline in your vehicle's fuel lines was frozen solid?"
"My... Ability," Weiss said, "Jesus. Winter and I both would have burnt alive! I froze the fuel. I put the fire out."
"Was that before or after the flames engulfed the other vehicle?" Goodwitch asked.
Goodwitch let the paper in her hand rest on the table. It was an autopsy report.
"It... was the crash." Weiss said, "The fuel leaked out from under his steering wheel and then-"
"And an entire line of SUVs got recalled over the story, didn't they?" Goodwitch asked, "Your father himself said to the press, let's see... 'a deplorable failure in safety standards.' Apparently, the heat fused every bone in the man's body, such that he had to be, more or less, broken out of the driver's seat-"
"It wasn't my fault!"
Her eyes, desperate to escape the plethora of damning paperwork, went to the one-way mirror. She looked away from it in a hurry.
"Miss Schnee," Goodwitch said, slowly removing her glasses, "You've already told me you did what you did to save your sister. Who could blame you?"
Weiss began chewing on the edge of one nail. As she adjusted her position, her movement was briefly obstructed by the cuff on her wrist. She looked at the chain in disgust.
"What happened?" Goodwitch asked, "You froze the fuel, and then what?"
"And I had to move the heat," Weiss said, "Gasoline burns hot. I took all of the heat out of it- the energy. It had to go somewhere. I can't hold onto it."
"You transferred the... thermal energy from your vehicle to his?" Goodwitch asked.
Weiss's last words were muffled, her face buried in crossed arms.
"I couldn't hold on to it."
"I understand," Officer Goodwitch said, "Thank you, Miss Schnee."
From the other side of the one-way mirror, Ironwood stared at the girl through a haze of nicotine smoke. He smirked. Ozpin stood next to him, ccoffee held close.
"Well, that settles it," Ozpin said, before taking a sip.
"For the record," Ironwood said, "They won't all be that easy."
"Perhaps not," Ozpin said, "They won't all have had a pampered life taken from them right before their eyes. At least, not all in one go."
The door to the room opened. Goodwitch had stepped into the hall to transfer to the observation room.
"That should suffice, yes?" She asked.
"Recorded confession of the use of Post Human Ability in the killing of a human," Ironwood said, "With the Justice Act, we own her."
"Hmm," Ozpin said, "Perhaps we should continue encouraging her cooperation with some coffee."
He excused himself from the room. Goodwitch stood at attention as he passed. Then, she took the spot where he'd been standing, next to Ironwood.
"Nice work," Ironwood said, "A little soft for my taste."
"If this precinct is going to work with your organization," Goodwitch said, "This... Atlas Initiative, then you need to understand that we are in control of this city because of how we handle these people."
"This what control looks like?" Ironwood asked.
"It is, this close to the border."
Ironwood seemed to cede the point with a shrug. He turned back to the one-way mirror, looking in at Weiss Schnee. The girl was doing something on the table top that was causing little puffs of steam to rise up occasionally.
"So, Jacques Schnee's daughter is an Abberant," Ironwood said, "How fucking funny is that?"
Yang took a deep bite of her burger, savouring the mixture of hot sauce and spewing juices from the meat. It was painful to swallow. She felt like a headache was coming on. She'd taken blows that had caused her spasms of pain. It had felt like her brain gave up on getting more oxygen and started to turn off. She wiped the corner of her mouth with one hand, and took another bite.
Beside her, Ruby sat down, her own meal on her tray. She took a sip from her drink, then opened up her burger, laying the top upside down on the lid.
"You okay, kiddo?" Yang asked.
"Ears are still ringing a bit," Ruby said, before looked up at Yang with a mischievous grin, "We won another one."
She held out her fist to Yang. Yang bumped her knuckles against her Ruby's. She glanced about the restaurant. It was in-between lunch and dinner and hours, and the place was mostly empty. They wouldn't be audible to anyone at a whisper.
"We were lucky to get out of that," Yang said, "Do not get cocky."
"I know," Ruby nodded, "It was stupid of me to get hit by that... I never actually figured out what it was."
"The flashbang grenade?"
"Oh, yeah, that's a pretty good name for it, honestly. Anyway, I won't fall for it again. I haven't seen many explosions with my Ability before."
Yang nodded. She motioned for Ruby to eat. Ruby began transferring pickles, tomatoes, and lettuce from one half of her burger bun to the other.
"I think you might have actually just suplexed Weiss Schnee, by the way," Ruby said.
Yang fought the urge to grin.
"Weiss Schnee is 'on an extended vacation,'" Yang said, holding up her fingers to perform air quotes, "She's 'taking a break from the public eye'. She's in celebrity rehab, is what I'm saying. That wasn't her."
"Looked a hell of a lot like her," Ruby said, removing the small strawberry pastry from its cardboard sleeve, "She had the scar."
"There's no way that- look, we should focus," Yang said, "Things just got a lot more complicated. They're definitely not giving up on catching us again. The big guy, he told you his name was what, Ironwood?"
"James Ironwood of the Atlas Initiative."
"And whatever this Atlas Initiative is, it has something to do with capturing Post Humans," Yang said.
"And turning us against each other," Ruby said.
"Why?" Yang asked, "Haven't the drones been enough?"
"They don't want us to have power that they don't control," Ruby said.
Yang looked at her sister in surprise. Ruby placed the pastry inside her burger, closed it, and took a bite.
"So, that means Ironwood is going to be chasing us," Yang said, "Probably state to state. I was hoping some forged papers would get us to California without any more trouble, but..."
Ruby pulled a smartphone from her pocket. Yang didn't know where she'd gotten this one. She set it on the table and tapped the Google search bar. She typed in her query, and took another bite of her burger as the results loaded.
"Junior Xiong?" Yang asked.
"Hmm, doesn't seem to be anybody's legal name," Ruby mused, "Xiong crime family in Detroit..."
"Wait, what?" Yang asked.
"And apparently Hei Xiong Jr is the son of some big boss," Ruby said, "So, why give us his name?"
"The girl in black gave you that guy's name?" Yang asked.
"Yeah," Ruby said, "Ooh, cool, he runs a nightclub. You want to go to a nightclub?"
"Ruby, we're not going-" Yang began, "That girl is working for them, Rube. Why would she try to help us?"
"I don't know," Ruby said, "But, she gave us the name for a reason."
"It's obviously a trap," Yang said.
"It could be a way to free her!" Ruby insisted, getting a little louder.
Yang glanced around. When she looked back, Ruby looked a bit sheepish, and mouthed 'sorry'.
"What do you mean?" Yang asked.
"They caught her just like they want to catch us, right?" Ruby said, "We can help her. Help both of them."
"Ruby, I need to keep you safe," Yang said, "I won't risk that for anyone, least of all two people who tried to deliver us to our deaths."
"But think about it," Ruby said, "If they help us get away from Ironwood, then we help them escape, then the four of us working together?"
"There's no way, Ruby," Yang said, "We can't trust them, and we don't owe them anything."
Ruby sighed. She set her burger down and picked up her drink.
"And the smartest thing to do at this point is keep going west," Yang said, "They'll be expecting us to go for the border."
Ozpin tilted the bottle of scotch, watching the amber liquid pour into his coffee. He'd left a generous amount of space after the creamer. He returned the bottle to the bottom drawer of his desk. His nerves allowed him the slightest relief at the taste. He turned over the next page of the after-action report.
On his computer screen, drone footage was playing; a top-down view of a forest. Advancing soldiers glowed in the thermal imaging, moving in and out of view beneath the branches overhead. He heard the door to his office open, and he knew of only one person brave enough to enter without knocking.
"It wasn't necessary," he said, not looking up.
"You promised me a back-up plan," Glynda said, "I was... underwhelmed. I took some initiative."
Ozpin looked up at her. He pushed his glasses up his nose bridge.
She came to a stop next to the shelf of various awards, and photos of gathered men in suits. Her arms were crossed in front of her.
"Did you see the date on the video?" Ozpin asked, "It's pre-"
"pre-Justice Act, by about three weeks," Glynda nodded, "Which would look very bad for James if it got out. Fantastic. So Schnee News will cede that what he did was illegal before lionizing him."
"You exaggerate. I believe, if released with the right timing, it can remove him," Ozpin said.
"And will the right timing be before he murders those girls, too?" Goodwitch asked.
Ozpin sighed. He took a long swig of his coffee.
"You know I'm doing everything in my power to prevent that," Ozpin said, "And by the look of things, those girls are doing an impressive job of keeping ahead of him. In the meantime, if you want another try at your own approach, I would suggest getting a bit more creative."
"Working on that."
Glynda rolled her eyes, carrying her gaze to the shelf. There was a photo of Ozpin with the mayor, a photo of Ozpin shaking hands with the previous chief. A photo of Ozpin presenting Goodwitch a medal. She studied the picture, her eyes drawn to it, for reasons she couldn't place.
"I think we should count it as a win that all four of them survived," Ozpin said.
The edges of the picture didn't fit Goodwitch's memory. There was too much of the thick blue curtain visible on the left side. The photograph's position in the frame had been adjusted slightly. Glynda stepped forward, and picked the frame up. The dust surrounding it had been disturbed recently, then allowed a few days to resettle.
"But, they're well outside the city now," Ozpin said, "And hopefully getting further as we speak. They're no longer in our jurisdiction. I imagine James will be following them once again. Any support we're still able to offer will have to-"
He had glanced up, and was struck silent by the oddness of the sight. Glynda was standing perfectly still, her lips pinched shut. In her hand she held one of the picture frames from the shelf. With her other hand, she had a pinching hold of something in the corner of the frame. A small wire, terminating in a tiny black cylinder. Goodwitch turned the back of the frame to Ozpin, so that he could see the battery pack taped to it.
Ozpin held out his hand, and lowered it down slowly. Glynda moved as gently as possible, setting the frame back where she'd found it, like she was handling a live explosive. She gently rested the wire down on the edge of the frame, where it had blended in with the dark black stage at the bottom of the picture. She winced at the tiny click it made as it touched the frame. She pulled her hands back.
"It's been a long day, Glynda," Ozpin said, "Shall we go to the break room for a coffee?"
"Thought you'd never ask, sir," Glynda said, knowing the stilt in her voice was audible.
Ozpin stood, and moved around his desk. He grabbed his coffee, and motioned Glynda towards the door. He glanced at the picture frame as he walked past, and they exited the room together. The window to Ozpin's office failed to completely muffle Glynda's immediate and colourful outburst.
Blake sat hunched over, her feet dangling off the medical cot, her eyes staring forward at the countertop scattered with medical supplies. She felt cold; exposed. The top half of her black jumpsuit was laying beside her. Behind her, she heard the click of the camera shutter, several times. Gloved hands took a gentle hold of her shoulders and adjusted her position slightly. The movement made her cracked ribs ache, but that wasn't what caused the knot to form in her throat. There were several more clicks of the camera shutter.
"I believe that will be sufficient," Arthur Watts said.
Blake immediately hopped off the cot and picked up her issued garment. She pulled it on in a hurry, without looking towards the doctor. In her periphery, she could see that Watts had given her the courtesy of turning away from her once he was finished 'gathering data' as he would put it. He was holding his clipboard, taking down notes.
"You might consider yourself lucky," Watts said, "Most of the data I have on Ruby Rose has been gathered from autopsies."
Blake didn't respond.
"Would you like painkillers?" Arthur asked.
Blake crossed her arms, and rested against the counter.
"I want a drink," Blake said.
"I'm afraid that might compromise the results of your testing," Watts chuckled, "On that subject, you can imagine I'm quite curious: The reaction between your Ability and theirs?"
Blake glanced around the backroom of the infirmary; one of the many places in the facility Blake and Weiss had been lead back and forth from for the past six months. Blake had been dreading that mission failure meant more months of training before being sent on another op. In truth, she had underestimated how much she'd missed the sight of trees.
"Why here?" She asked, "Don't you want a full video debrief?"
Watts straightened the purple tie under his lab coat. He wore a tidy pair of glasses, and sported a large moustache of extravagant grooming. There was a toothpick sticking out of the corner of his mouth.
"I'm interested in a preview," Watts shrugged, "And I thought you might take the chance for a minute or two more in one of the few places the guards cannot accompany you."
Blake looked away from him. She wondered at how long it would be before she returned to the relative privacy of her holding cell. Maybe this was genuine; maybe she should pretend she believed it was.
"Well, our little theory-crafting session wasn't completely worthless," Blake said, "And yes, the flashbang was a good idea. Only thing that let us get the upper hand."
"A point for the pop star, or whatever that girl is famous for," Watts mused.
"Xiao Long was about what I figured," Blake said, "I could dodge her, counter her. I saw ways of doing Judo shit I've never trained to do, so I did them. I had her in a hold, and she was almost out. I mean, I was doing it. But the longer the fight went on..."
Watts kept writing for a few seconds, catching up to her. He paused, and after a moment, looked up.
"You throw a meathead at me in the gym," Blake said, "I see every single way I can dodge his punches. I also see what happens if I don't."
"And you simply follow the most advantageous path, yes," Watts said, "And this was different?"
"There's a difference between seeing myself getting knocked cold, and seeing a fist go straight through my chest. Or knock my fucking head off. I'd hurt her sister. Xiao Long meant to kill with every strike."
"Did it cause any additional strain on your Ability?" Watts asked.
"No," Blake said, "But it was distracting."
"Hmm," Watts noted, not looking up from his writing, "And Rose?"
"That was worse than I thought it could possibly be," Blake said, shaking her head.
Blake thought back to the moment in of the last six months that had been burned most deeply in her mind. In a single moment, she had seen her own grisly death a hundred times over, and almost no way of avoiding it.
"When I... tried to escape..."
"Which attempt?" Watts asked.
"The second one," Blake replied, after a moment's thought.
She put a hand to her chest. The tiny capsule had been implanted via syringe just above her heart. It could be activated remotely, regardless of her location. What Ruby had done hadn't been like the escape attempt, not really. That night, she'd seen two paths that didn't end with a gram of C4 liquefying her vital organs. She only had seconds to pick between them, but they stood out amongst the very different results of any other action.
"Rose was the first time I ever saw zero options," Blake said, "There was nothing to do or not do. I could see what was coming, and I could see it was inevitable."
"I suspected Rose's Ability might be something of a strong counter to yours," Watts said.
"Yeah, no shit."
"And yet the flashbang worked, so you say," Watts noted, "To my mind, you're only the second person to successfully land a hit on that girl. And to do it while her Ability is active..."
Blake pushed herself up onto the counter, letting her bare feet dangle.
"So maybe that asshole running this show can be convinced Schnee and I didn't completely fuck this up?" She offered, deliberately adding a slight waiver.
Watts smiled. It was a smile by most description warm, but with an intangible edge. Maybe it was the slight tilt of the head, or how the moustache curled around the curve of his lips. Blake had never quite accepted the smile as genuine.
"I assure you," He said, "On this stage, the show is mine. That 'asshole' is... he's more of a travelling act. Like a street juggler, or a homeless pedophile."
Blake let out a snorting half-chuckle.
"And if being sent on another suicide mission is your objective, for oh so mysterious reasons, it is not his call. The higher-ups will most likely decide you're still more useful as an expendable weapon than as a subject of scientific study. I can't convince those fools- least of all the fool at the top- otherwise, but I wouldn't need to. The one who decides whether you are fit for future missions is me."
Blake was looking at him with her eyes squinted. He grinned as she searched his face, the majority of what he had said a haze after the first few words. There was no mistaking this smile as genuine satisfaction.
"What?" Asked Watts, "That I know you intend to use these missions to escape? How could I possibly have deduced your brilliant plan?"
Blake threw up her hands in a half-shrug, and looked away. Early on, Watts hadn't seemed the type to harshly punish her escape efforts. Over time, Blake had realized that his means of discipline were rather subtle, and not to be taken lightly. She couldn't imagine what she would have to endure in the next round of tests on her Ability. Last time it was dodging rubber bullets, blindfolded.
Watts stepped around the cot, and walked up to her. He stopped, surely deliberately, so that her right foot hung just beneath his crotch. He stared her directly in the eye as she recoiled in discomfort, as if his breath might be foul. He transferred the toothpick from one corner of his mouth to the other. She could see a hundred different ways of breaking him to pieces in seconds, but nothing beyond that. It was never more than a few seconds.
"But we both know what keeps undoing your escape plans, don't we, Miss Belladonna? No matter what, they all end when a very important button is pressed."
Forcing tears was a trick Blake had picked up in Quebec. It was a handy tool. She let the droplets fall, then gave a sniff of what felt like appropriate length.
"We don't have to be enemies," Watts said, "We could be colleagues, solving the mysteries of Post Human Abilities together."
"It's mine," Blake said, "It doesn't belong to you."
"And you don't, either?" Watts asked, with a despicable smirk, "If I hadn't implanted that little contingency, you would have died in that field, to a hail of bullets from all sides, that no one could have evaded. You were given the chance to surrender only because I was standing at the ready."
"Go fuck yourself."
"And given the nature of your Ability," Watts said, "I'm sure you've no need to ponder whether I would actually do it. I'm prescribing you ibuprofen for the pain. The guards will escort you to the debriefing room."
He took a step back and allowed her to drop to the floor again. She wondered if hurrying away with her eyes squeezed shut and a hand over her mouth would be too much, but did it anyway. Watts watched her leave, and once the door was swung shut, he revealed the same stretched, incomplete smile that had bothered Blake. He walked over to his clipboard and immediately began taking notes. After a few jots of scribbled, barely legible shorthand, he shook his head with a chuckle.
"Just shoot her sister in front of her. That'll break her spirit," He mused, "What a fucking moron."
They'd taken another car. Now they were rolling west down the highway, on their way out of the city. Ruby was in the passenger seat, turning a road map about in her hands. Yang was looking about at all the other cars, all moving in a flowing river of metal and fiberglass. Other vehicles would pull alongside her for a moment, pause just long enough for her breath to catch in her throat, then pull out ahead of her, leaving her behind. Sometimes she'd end up with a transport truck on either side of her, and she imagined two more blocking her from the front and behind. She wondered if they were willing to drone strike a highway. They'd just say it was Ruby and her who killed all those innocent motorists.
Yang clicked on the radio, and scrolled through the stations. Pop music, country music, advertisements. She landed on a station giving a local news report.
"-increasing efforts to apprehend those involved," The DJ reported, "However, unusual weather activity continues to make pursuing fugitives across the Detroit River difficult for Border Security on both sides."
Yang thought about Ironwood. She thought about the feeling of his ribcage on her knuckles. She'd felt them crack. She hadn't had time to wonder why he'd stayed in one piece. He'd hit that wall and there was no question whether it was survivable. And he was still after them, and for all Yang knew, still aiming to
"How far until the state border?" Yang asked.
"Around 70 miles, I guess," Ruby said, "You want to pull further South in Indiana, right?"
"That's one option," Yang said. She was eyeing each turn-off sign they passed.
"And the other?" Ruby asked.
"Well, they'll be expecting us to keep going West, won't they?" Yang asked, "They've connected us to California, by this point."
"Uh huh..."
"And if we were heading for the border from the start, we'd have gone to Buffalo."
Ruby looked down at the map. She traced a hypothetical path along the lines of the highways.
"Are you saying...?"
"Even if it shakes them off our trail for... just a day or two," Yang suggested, "We can be hard to find in Detroit."
Ruby's eyes lit up. She opened her mouth to speak.
"Now, hold on," Yang said, "If we're going to follow that lead, I'll be going into the club. Alone, got it? Figure out who Xiong is, and why he matters. Could be a dead end, but right now, maybe a chance of help is worth the risk."
Ruby sat back in her seat, a satisfied grin on her face.
"Give me the best turn North to make," Yang said, "And congratulations on being the first person in history to want to go to Detroit."