Before we begin, a little question. I'll try to keep it short. I've come to the conclusion that this story, after the climax I'm building up to, simply isn't done. Too much has happened to simply blow it all off in an epilogue, and I have quite a bit more to tell to make everything make a bit more sense.

Now, to handle all of that, I want to use Yang and Blake as viewpoint characters as well, and I'm seriously considering switching to a present-tense stream-of-consciousness kind of narration as well, to make the more introspective parts work better.

My question, then, is as follows: should I finish up this story where I originally planned to, and make a sequel of everything else, or should I continue this one? I don't know what the best course of action is, and I feel that anyone who invested enough time to read all the way to this chapter should get a say in it.

Using Blake and Yang as viewpoint characters will also enable me to add Bumblebee to the story, which I haven't done because I know a lot of people don't really like it, and because I wanted to focus on Ruby and Weiss. But their 'arc' so to speak, will soon reach its conclusion, even though the story has more left in it.

I will give you until the next chapter is posted to decide. My plan is to do that either next week, or in two weeks, but knowing me it might be later. If you read this, and chapter 27 is not up yet, you get to vote. Sequel, or this story? For now, enjoy, and please let me know what you think.

Chapter Twenty-Six: Out of the Frying Pan and Into the Fire

"So…what do we do now?" I asked.

We were hidden in an oasis, about an hour away from Vacuo. It was unlikely that anyone would find us, at least for tonight. If we kept moving, we'd probably be able to evade capture for quite some time, but what good would that do us? We still hadn't figured out where Ruby was, and since she was probably somewhere around Vacuo, we weren't about to leave. But Blake didn't know about any White Fang hideouts that might be in the area, and the one lead we might have had was now a glassy crater. We had nothing to go on, and the authorities in Vacuo would be looking for us.

"Maybe Ruby has broken herself out by now, and then she'll find us?" Yang suggested halfheartedly. "I mean, she did that back in Mistral as well, right?"

"In Mistral, she knew where we were, and she knew the fallback point," Blake said flatly. She was staring at the floor of the airship. She'd been unwilling to meet anyone's eyes for more than a second after our escape. I felt worse for her than I did for myself.

"I've been hearing the name 'Ruby' a lot from you, but who exactly is she?" Vanta asked.

Blake, Yang, and I answered at the same time.

"Our teammate."

"My sister."

"My girlfriend."

Vanta laughed. "A very important person, then. And you're here to look for her? Because if you are, what was the point of attacking the Smuggler's Retreat? I know you said this 'Guide' influenced you in some way, but you didn't seem, you know, brainwashed or anything."

She looked at each of us in turn. I didn't answer immediately. I wanted to tell Vanta the whole story. She and the rest of Nevermore's Feather had helped us a lot thus far and with their skills, we might actually have a chance to find Ruby. Maybe we could even retain their services a bit longer and have them help us with the rest of our mission as well.

I looked at Blake and Yang, who seemed to be having similar thoughts to mine. Yang caught my eye and nodded slightly. I quickly glanced at Blake, who was still looking at the ground, and then back at Yang. She shrugged helplessly.

I sighed. This wasn't going to be easy, but at this point we really didn't have a lot of options. I told Vanta and the rest of Nevermore's Feather the whole story, beginning with our encounters with the White Fang in Vale, and then detailing our mission and what had happened to Ruby after the attack on Northern Star. I then explained my theory about the Guide in a bit more detail, ending with our attack on the Smuggler's Retreat and subsequent escape.

"So now, I guess we'll need to find the White Fang base around here and get Ruby back," I finished.

Vanta nodded slowly. "I see. Well, I hate to burst your bubble, but…I don't think Ruby is in Vacuo. And if she is, the White Fang don't know it."

She looked from me, to Yang, and then to Blake.

"You said that the White Fang had a trap prepared for you here. If that's true, then they would use anything they could to get you to walk into it. If they had Ruby, you would be aware of it. They would've made certain that that information got to you. Even if they had already killed her, they would definitely have spread the information that she was being held captive. Since they didn't, I'm fairly sure they have no idea where she is."

While Vanta was speaking, I felt a little bit of hope growing inside me. It sounded plausible, I had to admit. That meant that Ruby might actually be free. But where would she be? Back in the city? If she was there, then she would definitely have heard of our capture, and she'd have come to get us herself. But where else could she be? Hidden in the White Fang base, but still undiscovered?

"I hate to bring this up," Auburn said. "But what if she went to the Smuggler's Retreat on her own? It was the one lead I had, if I heard you correctly."

"No," Yang said flatly. "I know that you might be right, but if you even suggest that one more time, I will splatter your brains across the wall."

I nodded silently. The little bit of hope had now been replaced by a gruesome knot in my stomach. We had all known about the risk of possibly killing Ruby by attacking the Retreat. We'd known, and then went ahead anyway. The thought that we had killed her…no. Just no. We just hadn't. Until there was definitive proof, Ruby was alive, and anyone who claimed anything to the contrary was going to suffer for it.

Auburn raised his hands in surrender and said nothing, but I could see his pitying expression, as if he'd already decided that Ruby was probably dead.

"Ruby is alive," I said defiantly, challenging anyone to make a claim to the contrary so I could tear into them. Maybe it was a lingering effect from the Guide's influence, but I wanted to argue, wanted to fight, wanted to do anything that would take my mind off the possibility of Ruby being dead.

"Calm down, people, please," Vanta said. "Until we know anything, let's just operate under the assumption Ruby's alive, yeah?" She looked at me. "Your goal is to find her, and since you last saw her aboard a White Fang airship, you think they have her, right? Then, and I hate to break this to you, we'll have to get back into the city."

"Why's that?" Yang asked. "The White Fang have bases in all sorts of places, why wouldn't they have one in the middle of the desert, or an oasis?"

"Vacuo's known for being the kingdom with the fewest tensions between Humans and Faunus," Vanta said.

"So?" Yang asked.

"It means they probably never bothered to build a base," Blake said, tearing her eyes away from the floor for what seemed like the first time since our escape. "In the other kingdoms, the bases and shelters were built during and after the war, even though the rallies are mostly held within the cities. But here in Vacuo, the fighting was much less intense even back then. It's possible that it never got bad enough for the Faunus to build shelters outside the kingdom." She shook her head. "I can't be sure, of course. Like I said, I was never active around here."

"Great, so now we get to go back into the city where everyone wants to kill us. Fun times," Yang said.

"Guess you should've thought about that before starting an international diplomatic incident," Vanta said with a grin. "But don't worry. I think we'll be able to get in there."

"I doubt even you could blind the entire town while we're walking around," I said.

"I don't intend to. Cyane?"

Cyane stepped forward. Her hair, tied in a short ponytail, and eyes matched her name. She grinned at us, and as I looked at her, her appearance changed. Suddenly she was a head taller, with black hair, brown eyes, and a heavily tanned skin.

"That's useful," I admitted. "But what about the rest of us?"

Cyane looked at Vanta, who grinned and nodded. Then, she began to change as well. After a few seconds, the tall, imposing woman had been replaced by a small, thin, orange-haired woman with skin so pale it might as well have been pure white, especially when contrasted with her deep black clothing, which hadn't changed.

"I can change people's appearance for a time," Cyane said.

She changed herself and Vanta back to normal.

"If I don't maintain the transformation, it lasts for about fifteen minutes. If we move as a group, I can keep everyone 'topped up' quite easily."

"You guys never run out of surprises, do you?" Yang said appreciatively.

"If the client dies, we don't get paid," Vanta said. "And with all the stuff we've done thus far, I see a lot of lien in our future." She looked at me and grinned. "Miss Schnee."

Despite myself, I grinned back. "Don't worry about that. I'll see to it that you get paid handsomely."

I could barely see the lights on the wall in the distance. It was freezing cold, despite the long sleeves on my jacket, so I amplified my Aura a bit to keep the worst of the cold out.

My hair was now very short and brown, as were my eyes. I no longer had a scar, and instead of my combat skirt I was wearing wide, green cargo pants, a white shirt, and a blue jacket. The only thing that could identify me as Weiss Schnee was Myrtenaster, but I didn't think that aside from Ruby anyone would pay that much attention to a weapon that looked like a simple sword.

The others looked very different from their usual selves as well. Blake was now a blonde, with blue eyes, and instead of a cat, she was now a dog Faunus. She looked grumpier than usual because of it, but Cyane couldn't remove or add body parts, merely change their appearance.

Yang had long, black hair, dark brown eyes, and a dark skin. Nevermore's Feather wasn't disguised. They hadn't been captured, and Auburn had made sure no recordings of them had been made.

Brick, Grayson, and Cobalt would stay in the airship, going from oasis to oasis to stay hidden, until Auburn called them on the small radio he carried with him. I had my doubts about the radio's range, but Auburn had given us a lengthy explanation about how it used the CCTT to boost the signal, so I decided to take him at his word.

We began to walk towards the wall in silence. There wasn't much need to talk, after all. Our plan was made, and now we just needed to execute it.

When we neared the gate, the two guards stepped forward suspiciously.

"Who are you?" the first guard asked. He was a Huntsman wearing a pauldron and armed sleeve on his right arm, but no other armor or even a shirt. His weapon seemed to be some kind of trident, the sharp tips of which were also gun barrels.

"We're survivors from the Smuggler's Retreat," Vanta said. "We've been laying low since the attack, so we'd really appreciate it if you could let us in."

The guard inspected each of us, and when he was satisfied that we didn't look like the escaped terrorists, he stepped back. He pressed a button next to the gate, which lifted up just far enough to let us all through.

"Have a good stay," he said.

Vanta thanked him, and just like that, we were back in Vacuo. The streets in this part of the city were wider, and the buildings slightly bigger. Not many people were out and about at this time of night, which was fine for us.

Getting into the city had been the easy part. Next, we'd have to look for anything that looked like the White Fang might be active in the area. Blake said that they used markings on walls to clue people in where the rallies were, but that actually finding them without anything to go on was nearly impossible, especially in a large city.

Unlike in Mistral, though, this time we didn't have any leads we could investigate. That meant that, as ridiculous as it sounded to me, we'd have to go bar-hopping.

Yang, of course, wasn't bothered by this at all, nor were the members of Nevermore's Feather.

Blake and I were nowhere nearly as enthusiastic, so we sullenly followed the rest of the group as we set off in the direction of the city center, occasionally exchanging a dark glance. Whatever else this mission might bring us in the end, Blake and I would definitely be much closer than we had been at the start.

It wasn't long before we came across the first bar, a dingy little place with lighting so bad I felt inclined to use Myrtenaster as a stick to feel my way around. The only well-lit part of the establishment was the bar itself.

The barman was a tall man with light brown hair. Like Sun, he wore an unbuttoned white jacket with nothing underneath.

"Well, I hadn't expected this many guests at this time of night," the barman said.

Despite his casual tone, I could see that he was warily eyeing each one of us as we approached the bar.

"To what do I owe this pleasure?"

Yang stepped forward and said, "We'll just have a drink, thanks. Nothing too strong, though. We've got work to do."

The barman's eyes narrowed slightly, but he made no further comment and simply asked all of us what kind of drink we wanted.

Not much later, I sat at the bar clutching a bottle of carbonated water. I sincerely hoped Yang didn't intend to order drinks at every other bar we'd enter tonight, but before I had time to have more annoyed thoughts, the barman asked, "So what kind of work are you doing, this late at night?"

"Ever heard of the name 'Redhorn'?" Yang asked.

"Redhorn? You work for him?"

The barman sounded agitated.

"Relax," Vanta said. "We don't work for him. We're just looking for him."

The barman seemed to breathe a sigh of relief.

Then he said, "I don't know why you're looking for him, but if I were you, I'd turn back."

"We can't," Yang said. "So if you know where he is, we'd really appreciate it if you told us."

The barman chuckled darkly. "You're clearly not very well-prepared, if you don't even know where you can find Redhorn. He bought out an entire apartment building in the city center and had the top floor remodeled into a private estate."

"What?! How?" I asked.

Wasn't he a wanted criminal? Sure, Tallgrass had mentioned that the White Fang activity hadn't increased since he'd taken over, but I didn't think that his indifference extended so far as to just let a known criminal live downtown.

The barman shrugged. "He's gotten pretty rich over the past year or two. Around the same time the White Fang began to expand, I'd say. But it's none of my business, and I'm not going to pry any further. I'd tell you it's suicide to try and get in there, but by the looks of you that won't stop you."

I didn't say anything, but part of me agreed with the barman's assessment. If Redhorn had the resources to create a penthouse suite for himself right under the noses of the Huntsmen, then we'd probably face some heavy opposition if we went in there. But I was confident the seven of us would stand a pretty good chance against most of the White Fang. I we all faced Redhorn together, then surely we'd be able to beat him and get some information out of him, right?

We finished our drinks and stepped back out into the street. The barman gave us a last, pitying look when we left.

"Well, that makes things easy," Yang said cheerfully. "Let's go and pay Redhorn a visit."

"Do you really think it'll be that simple?" Blake asked. "Redhorn is insane, and one of the strongest warriors in the White Fang. Between him and Adam, I honestly don't know who's more powerful."

She looked like she wanted to punch the nearest wall.

"Redhorn was one of the first White Fang members to embrace violence. I've never met him, but I've heard stories. My father actually sent him over to Vacuo, back when he was still the leader of the group, just to get him as far away from us as possible. My father figured that, since Vacuo has fewer tensions than the rest of the world, Redhorn's rage wouldn't reach quite as many willing ears, especially since the person who used to lead the Vacuo cell was a very pacifistic woman. Her name was Ochre, and she was married to a brilliant scientist, Dr. Amethyst. Redhorn killed him after only a few months, supposedly because he had betrayed the White Fang."

She shuddered.

"I…I heard that he'd been cut into pieces, and his head had been found impaled on a spike in front of his door. Ochre was devastated, of course, and withdrew from the White Fang. I don't even know if she's still alive. I don't know who succeeded her, but I assume that Redhorn simply kept killing or otherwise removing the new cell leaders until he was finally selected for the job."

She bitterly shook her head.

"This is not a man we can take lightly. If we just barge in there like we usually do, we're just going to end up dead."

"Don't forget about us," Vanta said. "I can use my Semblance to get us in there, I'm sure. And my crew and I have fought other Huntsmen plenty of times in the past. I think we'll be fine. Now, let's stop wasting time. Ideally, I'd like to be out of the city by dawn."

Without waiting for a response, she began to walk down the road, followed by the rest of Nevermore's Feather.

Yang, Blake, and I fell into step behind them. I saw Yang glancing at Blake from the corner of her eye, but she said nothing. Blake just stared at the ground again. What were we getting ourselves into this time?

The apartment building looked fairly normal, for the most part. Most of the windows were dark, but some people were apparently still awake despite the late hour. The top floor, however, was completely lit up. On the left side, I could see that a large terrace had been built. I could see the crown of a palm tree rising above the wall. The whole top floor seemed to have glass walls, through which I saw the warm glow of a lot of lights.

"I guess that most of the building is still normal," Ferrous said. "There don't appear to be any guards in front of the door, at any rate."

"Aren't apartment buildings usually inaccessible if you don't live there?" I asked.

"Of course they are. Their locks aren't all that good, though," Cyane said.

As casually as possible, we walked over to the door of the apartment complex. I half expected shouting and gunfire to start up before we had even gone halfway, but nothing happened.

We stopped in front of the door, and Cyane inspected the keyhole for a moment. She took out two small tools and inserted them into the keyhole.

"Nothing on one, click out of two, three is binding…" she muttered as she worked.

Only a few seconds later, the lock clicked, and the door swung open. Cyane pulled the tools out of the lock, grinned at us, then beckoned Auburn to go inside first.

He stepped into the hallway and scanned the ceiling for cameras. When he found one, he had Ferrous boost him up to it so he could touch it. I saw some small sparks coming from his hands, and a short moment later he gestured at Ferrous to let him down again.

"The cameras are down," he said. "They'll obviously realize that this isn't a regular defect, so we're on the clock as of now, but at least they won't be able to track us as easily."

"Won't they still be able to see the elevator coming?" Yang asked.

Auburn smirked. "I turned off the displays," he said. "I can use my Semblance to affect any electronics in the same grid. But again, I only turned off the displays. If someone is monitoring the cameras — and they should be — then it won't be long until they realize the elevator displays are off as well. They will know we're coming sooner rather than later, so let's get moving."

We walked over to the elevators, and when Auburn pressed the button, I again saw a couple of sparks.

"I'm sending it straight over to us. I doubt anyone else would be calling an elevator at this time of night, but I'd prefer not to take any chances," he explained.

It was pretty cramped in the elevator, with all seven of us there, but most of my discomfort came from the uncertainty of what we were getting into. Would Redhorn even know where the airship from Northern Star had gone? And even if he did, would we be able to make him tell us?

As the elevator rose, Cyane returned all of us to our normal appearances. The disguises had served their purpose. I wished I was wearing my regular clothes, but this would have to do.

It took a surprisingly long time for the elevator to reach the top floor, but when I felt it slow down, I wished it had taken even longer. I didn't feel ready at all. I wasn't really afraid of fighting, or even of getting hurt. What I was afraid of was that Redhorn wouldn't know anything about Ruby's whereabouts. If he didn't know, who did? I bit back my doubts. It didn't matter how I felt. First, we had to deal with Redhorn.

The elevator came to a stop, and I drew Myrtenaster from my belt. The others readied their weapons as well. The doors slid open and revealed a large, expensively-furnished room…but there was no one there.

A large, wooden table stood to our right, surrounded by fancy, non-matching chairs.

Directly in front of us was a wall with a door, forming a sort of room within the room. The large living room simply curved around it on both sides.

There were multiple couches, bookcases, and even TVs spread across the side of the room we'd emerged into. Nothing seemed to go well with anything else. It had evidently just been chosen because it was expensive.

Cautiously, we began crossing the room. Part of me wanted to go into the central room — rooms? — but doing so would probably not be smart until we knew what was on the other side of the massive penthouse.

We walked past the inner room, which must have been bigger than some of the apartment buildings on the other floors, past the lines of tables, couches and bookshelves. The white wall of the inner room was decorated by paintings in all shapes and sizes.

The room was positively cavernous, but the odd assortments of furniture and decorations gave it an oddly cramped atmosphere.

We reached the other side of the room. A bar was built against the wall of the inner room, lit by a cool, blue light. The far wall was a glass sliding door, beyond which lay the terrace I'd seen from the street.

A man stood in front of it, staring out of the window. He wore a white suit, and from his messy brown hair protruded two small gazelle horns. Their tips had been painted red. It looked fairly ridiculous, really, but I wasn't about to say anything.

The man turned around. To my surprise, he wasn't wearing a mask. He had a short, scruffy beard, and his amber eyes exuded hatred.

In his left hand, he had a glass of what seemed to be whiskey. In his right, he held a sword. It looked like a rapier with a gun barrel protruding from the guard.

"You've got some nerve," he said. His voice was low, guttural, but it sounded forced, as if his natural voice was much higher. "First you destroy my Smuggler's Retreat, and now you think you can come into my home to kill me?"

He clenched his jaw, and I saw his hand tightening around the grip of his weapon. He glanced at all of us. His eyes lingered on Blake for a moment, but when he saw me, his rage seemed to explode. He threw his glass of whiskey on the floor where it shattered into hundreds of pieces. We all raised our weapons, ready to intercept him when he launched his attack, but he calmed himself down.

"Schnee," he growled. "For so long I've wanted to kill one of you. But that bastard Jacques is too hard to get to, and his whore daughter is in too deep with Ironwood."

"Don't you dare talk about my sister like…"

"Shut up!" he roared.

His eyes widened now, and he looked absolutely maniacal. I felt a cold chill run down my spine.

"You don't get to speak here, little girl. Stepping into my house was the last mistake you've ever made. But your death won't be quick. No. It will be painful. It will be extended."

He switched his glance from me to Blake.

"And you are going to get the same treatment, Blake Belladonna."

He grinned, still with his eyes wide and glittering.

"I think I have some uses for you two whores. I have some…friends, you see. I'm sure they'll be thrilled if I give you to them for a while."

"Yeah, I think we've heard enough," Yang said.

I could hear the waver in her voice. I couldn't recall ever hearing her being afraid, but I couldn't blame her. This man was insane, just like Blake had said.

"You won't be the first creep we've taken down," Vanta said. Unlike Yang, she sounded thoroughly unimpressed by Redhorn's ranting. "Let's see how you do without your eyes for a while."

Redhorn's eyes clouded over when Vanta used her Semblance, but rather than backing down because of the sudden blindness, Redhorn just laughed.

"I can still hear you. I can still smell you. I can still feel your Aura. I don't need my eyes to kill you."

He raised his weapon. "It's time for you all to die."

He pulled the trigger, and a massive gout of flame burst from the barrel. I dove backwards, summoning up a wall of ice as I did so.

The flames flash-vaporized the ice, filling the room with a cloud of steam. Redhorn was already blind, so it wouldn't bother him, but I wasn't that good at fighting blind. Damn!

I summoned a glyph and launched myself forward, hoping that Redhorn would still be in the same position as he'd been before.

He easily deflected my strike and raised his blade to counter, only to be forced back by Yang, who leapt over me and began punching at him. He dodged her wild swings without much difficulty, grinning maniacally as she kept missing.

After Yang threw a wild punch, Redhorn swung his left fist at her head, but Gambol Shroud's ribbon wrapped around his wrist and pulled him to the side.

Redhorn stumbled, but used the momentum of the pull to point his weapon at Blake and fire an ice spike at her, but the only thing the spike hit was Blake's shadow clone.

Vanta leapt in, using the blades on her arms to strike at Redhorn. Unlike Yang, Vanta wasn't just angrily punching. She tracked his movements and he was forced to actively block the blows. I summoned a time dilation glyph and focused it on Vanta, enabling her to hit much faster, but Redhorn managed to leap over her, swinging his blade at her in the process, which she deflected with one of her own weapons.

Now Ferrous leapt into action, swinging his massive axe as if it were weightless. Whenever the axe made contact with anything, there was an explosion.

It didn't seem to bother Redhorn, who sidestepped the attacks and elbowed Ferrous between the shoulder blades.

He didn't get to go for the kill, however, because Auburn leapt into the battle. He was brandishing a knife that I'd never seen before, which arced with electricity as he swung it.

Redhorn deflected it and kicked Auburn in the chest, forcing him backwards.

Right at that moment, a bottle came whizzing by, missing Redhorn's head by a hair.

I looked at the bar, and saw Cyane standing there, twirling her chain and using it to grab bottles to launch at Redhorn. Redhorn blocked the second bottle with his weapon, and the booze splashed all over him.

Auburn, who'd recovered from the kick, didn't miss a beat and threw a small vial of Fire Dust at Redhorn.

The vial exploded, and the alcohol caught fire. Redhorn roared and tore his jacket off. His Aura hadn't been broken, so he wasn't hurt, but he looked angrier than ever before.

I raised Myrtenaster and focused my Aura as much as I could, casting time dilation glyphs on every single one of us. If we all attacked together, we'd surely be able to take him down.

I blurred forward, not waiting to see what the others would do. It was risky; since we weren't used to fighting in tandem with Nevermore's Feather there was a good chance we could get in each other's way, but there wasn't time to make any deep battle plans.

I thrust Myrtenaster right at Redhorn's chest, but even with my enhanced speed he was able to lift his weapon up in time to block me, using the motion of his arm to twist in a vicious kick with his left leg.

The force of the kick, while not enough to break my Aura, was easily strong enough to send me flying through the glass sliding door.

I rolled with the blow and stood up, ready to run back in to rejoin the fight, but to my great surprise Redhorn had sprinted after me.

I was just in time to raise Myrtenaster and deflect his flurry of attacks. Suddenly, he stopped attacking, so I took my chance and thrust forward — but Redhorn twisted to the side, and I had to throw my arm to the left to stop myself from skewering Yang.

She did the same, throwing her punch off line to stop herself from blasting my face off. She barreled into me, and I fell backwards onto the wooden planks.

"Sorry," I muttered as we untangled ourselves.

"Yeah, me too," Yang said tersely. "You okay?" she added after getting back up.

I nodded, then turned my attention back to Redhorn, who was now battling Blake, Vanta, and Ferrous at the same time, leaping around them and easily dodging or blocking all of their attacks.

I was already beginning to feel a bit tired, and the battle had only just begun. What kind of man was Redhorn, to be able to fight off seven Huntsmen and Huntresses so easily? Even if Blake, Yang, and I were students, Nevermore's Feather were a group of experienced mercenaries. And right now, Redhorn couldn't even see. And he was still fighting all of us equally, without any sign of fatigue.

I squeezed Myrtenaster's hilt. There was no time to stand around complaining. If we wanted to find Ruby, we'd have to defeat this guy.

I launched myself back into the battle, striking and blocking and dodging and striking some more, but failing every single time to make any real headway.

Redhorn leapt back and flipped in midair, swinging down his blade and sending another huge burst of flame down at us. We scattered, and the flames slammed into the wooden floor, setting it ablaze.

The dry wood had apparently not been treated, because the flames began to spread across the rest of the terrace, sending thick, black clouds into the air. Worse, the wall of flames was between us and the inside of the penthouse, meaning there was no way for us to get back inside.

From the thick black smoke, Redhorn leapt at me. I deflected his attacks as best I could. The one small advantage I had was my fencing training, and my left-handedness.

I vaguely recalled Ruby once telling me that she liked that I was a lefty, like her, and at that moment, I heartily agreed with her.

Using quick sixth-second beats, I angered Redhorn, who finally made a furious lunge.

Even though I wasn't under the effect of a time dilation glyph, his attack seemed to come at me in slow motion. I moved my blade across my chest into fourth, then twisted my hand into my regular stance, crossing my right foot behind my left in an in quartata, deflecting his blade past me, and using his own forward momentum to run him onto the tip of my blade.

I felt the shock going through my arm, but I knew that this wouldn't be enough to defeat Redhorn yet. Rotating from my hips, I pushed Myrtenaster's tip forward as hard as I could.

Redhorn roared in pain and retreated a couple of steps.

I could only barely see him; the clouds of smoke were now obscuring everything. I fervently hoped everyone else was safe, but I couldn't afford to take my eyes off of Redhorn right then.

He was bleeding, a clear sign that I had managed to break his Aura, but I didn't have much left myself. I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to defeat him...

I heard the sound of engines roaring above my head, and without thinking about it I looked up. Our airship hung low above the flames, and to my surprise I saw that the others were already on board.

"Weiss! Get up here!" Yang shouted.

She reached down from the ramp, extending her hand. I quickly took it, allowing Yang to hoist me up into the airship, but Redhorn clearly wasn't done with us yet.

He ran over and jumped, firing his weapon to recoil-boost up at us…but that left him out of position, and Yang's Semblance flared into life when she threw a punch with every last bit of strength she had left. It caught Redhorn full in the face and sent him flying into the inferno that had once been his terrace.

For a moment, all I could do was stare in horror. His Aura had been depleted. If Yang's last attack hadn't killed him, the fire certainly would.

In the streets below, I could already see firefighters gathering, and I saw that the other residents of the apartment were already evacuating. I hoped that no one had gotten hurt. We'd caused enough damage to Vacuo already…but with Redhorn's death, we'd lost our final lead to locate Ruby.

Yang and I walked into the passenger area of the airship, and the door closed behind us, sealing us off from the carnage below.

"Now, what's going on?" Yang asked Grayson, who stood outside the cockpit door. "I mean, I'm very glad that you guys showed up, but why did you?" She looked at Auburn. "Did you call them?"

Auburn shook his head. "We came to get you because something big is happening," Grayson said.

Something about the way he said it gave me a very bad feeling. "What is it?" I asked.

"We've only just received the news," Grayson said, apparently still very reluctant to tell us.

"Well, tell us!" Yang said angrily. "We haven't found Ruby, I just punched our only lead into a fire, and we've caused massive chaos in Vacuo again. What could possibly be worse than that?!"

Grayson took a deep breath, then finally steeled himself and said, "The Vytal Festival finals were attacked last night. Vale is at war."

And now, everyone is finally on the way back to Vale. See you next time, and please let me know what you think!