A pale face looks at its own demise, crafted lovingly by its own hands. It starts into the inky pool within the pool; a swirling darkness more vile than even that darkness which spawned it. The Hunger swells. The Hunger is desperate.

The Pale Woman wonders to itself, would it miss anything once beyond the veil of death it made for itself? Or had all that it called 'loved' been so far removed that it was time?

The Hunger pierces the boundary of its birth. The Hunger swallows all. The air grows thin until it is gone, swallowed by its unrelenting.

It feels like nothing to the Pale Woman. The Hunger feels like release. It feels like the Pale Woman's suffering is at long last over.

Blake could think of a few far more pleasant ways to stare at the sweaty back of Weiss Schnee.

"Two laps to go, Blake," Weiss called back over her shoulder. "How are you holding up?"

This was probably one of the few times she preferred to see Weiss leaving her behind, at the bottom of a hill that she really, really did not want to run up again. Weiss was already halfway up the hill, still jogging in place as she looked back down on Blake.

Despite Weiss' best efforts and a frighteningly strict fitness routine, Blake was still far from being 100% again. Her limp may have eased in pain over time, but it was still there and a constant source of frustration. The doctors had told her early on that'd never truly heal and she'd tried to accept that. Weiss on the other hand, was just as stubborn as ever and insisted on putting Blake through grueling marathons, insisting that eventually they'd get easier.

"Don't give up yet," Weiss said.

"Yet?" Blake said breathlessly. "Weiss, I gave up three laps ago. I think I died during the last lap."

"Well then it's a good thing dying isn't a terminal condition."

Weiss was just as out of breath as Blake, but she was wearing her exhaustion with the same elegance she wore just about anything else. Her surprisingly casual choice of workout clothes were still a sight that Blake was trying to get used to. Without missing a single step, Weiss took her Scroll out from the strap on her arm and flicked it open. After a couple taps on the screens and a few more steps in place, Weiss joined Blake in 'giving up'.

"You don't have to stop just for me," Blake said as Weiss walked down the hill to her. "I'm sorry I couldn't make it."

"Nonsense," Weiss said. "I don't have to do anything. I'm stopping because I want to."

Blake watched Weiss take a long drink from her water bottle. She maybe watched a little too intently, in hindsight. But was she, even in her exhausted state, not supposed to be transfixed by Weiss at that moment: sparkling with sweat, chest moving with her rapid breaths under a shirt that clung wet to her skin. She followed the trickle of water down Weiss' chin and over her collarbones and joined the sweat that was turning an already revealing outfit even more so. It was all so enthralling to Blake, that she didn't realize until far too late that Weiss wasn't even drinking anymore and was instead just watching Blake watch her.

"And you don't have anything to be sorry for," Weiss said. "You did very well today. I'm very proud of you."

Blake glared at her as menacingly as she could with a blush on her cheeks. If Weiss' smirk was any indication, she wasn't doing a very good job of it.

"Don't do that," Blake said.

"Do what?" Weiss asked, letting a frown replace her smirk.

"Don't say you're proud of me like that," Blake said. "Don't patronize me."

"I'm not patronizing you. I'm expressing genuine pride at your progress. Am I not allowed to be proud of my girlfriend?"

"Not like that you're not."

"What is that supposed to mean?" Weiss asked. "What did I do wrong? Would you rather I not be supportive?"

"Actually, yes," Blake said. "I don't want you to be 'proud' of me, I just want to be better already."

"And you will be," Weiss said. "You're working very hard to-"

"Stop that!"

"Oh is that patronizing too? You know, I don't see you getting angry when Ruby says things like this to you, Blake."

"I like it when she says it," Blake said. "It's sweet when she does it. When you do it, it just feels patronizing."

"Yes, you already said that," Weiss said. "I'll be sure to remember to keep my pride to myself."

"I don't want you to be proud of me!" Blake shouted. "I want to impress you."

"Blake, I-" Weiss stopped herself. Rather, she shook her head and let out a long, deep sigh. "Fine."

Blake's cat ears snapped flat against her head. Weiss closed the distance between them before she could even react. Sweat was a bother enough when it was just her own sticking to her clothes and her skin and her hair, but it was so, so much worse when it was someone else's. Wrapped in Weiss' arms, Blake felt almost ill at the amount of heat and sweat between them. Weiss' shirt clung to hers and their exposed skin slid against each other with a layer of salty moisture between them.

If there was any silver lining in it, it was that Blake couldn't see Weiss' almost certainly smug grin.

"Oh no, come on. Gross, Weiss. Disgusting!"

Blake tried to squirm out of Weiss' grasp, but to no avail. Somehow, she still managed to forget sometimes just how much muscle Weiss had put on since they stayed in Argus. There was no doubt in Blake's mind that Weiss could give even Yang a run for her money now.

"Let me go, Weiss," she said. "You are way too sweaty for this right now. That and you smell bad"

"You're hardly a spring flower yourself, Belladonna," Weiss said. "I suppose we'll just have to be sure and spend some extra time in the shower getting clean."

"Really Weiss?" Blake said, just giving up on wrestling free and wrapping her arms around Weiss' waist. "Is that all you ever think about? What if I'm not in the mood?"

"You?" Weiss scoffed. "Not in the mood?"

"You?" Blake spat back. "In the mood and smelling like this?"

Pain flared in her thigh when Weiss suddenly pushed her back. Weiss looked her up and down, making a show of sniffing the air between them, wrinkling her nose in dramatic fashion.

"You're right," Weiss said. "Maybe you are too filthy after all."

"You wanna know something interesting?" Blake asked.

Weiss nodded slowly, raising an eyebrow.

"I think the last time you called me 'filthy', it was a racist thing," Blake said with a smirk. "Look how far you've come. I'm so proud of you."

The Pale Woman is no more, but the idea of it persists in the dark.

The Hunger crushes it. It chews and it digests.

The tethers of the world to the Pale Woman are sawed at and snap one by one. Each cut thread stings the Pale Woman, until the thread to pain is cut too. The numbness of nothing leaves it with nothing more than fading memories. All the things that made it so hard to go on in its half life. Children lived and died. Friends came and went. He uttered his last proclamation of love. All those things that make immortality too hard to bear.

The tether to the last memory it had of his face tugs at it. His smile warps under the pressure of the Hunger. The disappointment in his eyes is the last the Pale Woman sees as the tether is pulled to it limit. At long last the Pale Woman is nearly set free from its living curse.

The Hunger closes its maw over the Pale Woman, but the Pale Woman does not let go of that last tether. It refuses, only now, to let go.

Just say something to me. Please.

"And you're sure it's not yours?" Farrow asked. *Just making sure. It's- Well it's a pretty big thing to just, like, remember. Or not remember. To not remember remembering it?"

She tried so hard not to meet Farrow's wide eyed gaze. Leaned forward in their seat, body bouncing with their leg's incessant tapping on the floor, they refused to take their eyes off Ruby for even a second. They may have placed their seat further from Ruby than usual, but over the course of their conversation they kept scooting closer and closer to Ruby every time she spoke. Whatever warning Cordovin must have given them must not have been stern enough to hold back their brimming curiosity.

"I just don't want to think about it right now," Ruby said. "It won't matter if I can't figure out how to use the Shadow."

She pulled up a leg onto her chair and turned away from Farrow. They may have been far from threatening, but they still made Ruby's skin crawl when they looked at her. Though it may be true, she didn't like being looked at like a weapon instead of a person.

"Did they, uh, what did you call them? The other huntsmen- the leftovers of them. What did you call them?"

"The Leftovers."

"Yes them," Farrow spoke without looking at Ruby, too busy scanning the chicken scratch on their arms. "What did you call them?"

"The Leftovers."

"Oh right, of course I remember," Farrow said. "Did they not show you how to wield your Shadow?"

"We-" Ruby paused to search for the right words. "We didn't really have that kind of communication in our, uh… Our relationship?"

Farrow's face contorted at that. They kept that look on them as they searched their body for a relevant note. Ruby only had just enough time to whip her head around and avert her eyes as Farrow lifted their shirt clean over their head.

"Uh, Dr. Farrow?" Ruby stammered out. "Is this really appropriate?"

"What's that?" she heard them say behind her. And then: "Oh, oh. Right. No, you're right. Sorry. I got distracted. Of course that's not appropriate."

The room was quiet except for the sound of Farrow's chair shaking under their erratic movements.

"Is…is your shirt back on?" Ruby asked, hearing another flurry of movement behind her. "Dr. Farrow?"

"Yep, sorry. Sure, yeah," Farrow said. "Shirt is back on. That is to say, I'm dressed. Fully dressed. Well mostly. My jacket is still by the door, but I can put that on too if you'd like."

Ruby peaked through the gaps in her fingers at a fully dressed Farrow. She mumbled a brief 'thanks' and let their conversation fall into silence again. Well, except for Farrow tapping foot.

"Now-" Farrow broke the silence. "When you say you had a relationship with the- Sorry what did you call them?"

"The Leftovers."

"Yes, exactly," Farrow said. "The Leftovers. You said you had a 'relationship' with them."

"I guess?" Ruby said.

"Relationship is a curious word choice," Farrow said. "Was this as intimate a relationship as you currently engage with Weiss Schnee and Blake Belladonna? Did you and the Leftovers ever-"

"Nope!" Ruby stood bolt upright and knocked her chair back on the floor. "Sorry. I think I wanna be done for today, Doctor."

"Oh, of course Ruby Rose," Farrow said. They quickly rolled up their sleeve and read from a portion of writing on their upper arm. "Ruby Rose, I am required to remind you that subject and contents of our conversation today are to considered confidential at the highest level by-"

Ruby had heard it before and would have to hear it every time she had to speak with Farrow like this. Whenever she was on the base, it was like she checked Ruby Rose at the door. She would only be driven around in cuffs and under constant supervision. If not for the full fury of an angry Weiss, Ruby wouldn't have been allowed to leave the base at all. For all intents and purposes, the military treated Ruby as a weapon instead of a woman. When the soldiers, Farrow, or Cordovin looked at her they didn't see Ruby Rose, they saw the Shadow. They saw not just the thing that defined her now, but the very thing she had no control of anymore.

Through all the trauma of her experience inside the maw of that awful Grimm, the thing that stuck with her most is just how little she remembered. It was mostly fragments of memories she'd managed to get back from the Grimm, mixed with the fractured memories that came out twisted and wrong. Her nights since she left the maw were spent either cradled in the arms of Blake and Weiss, or they were spent sobbing and shaking in a cold shower after waking from a nightmare of something that never happened to her.

The emptiness persisted. Sometimes she was able to forget about it with the help of Weiss and Blake, but even that had its limits. It wasn't fair, that when Ruby needed them most they were gone, but when she didn't want them, she could never feel truly alone.

The Hunger grows impatient with its meal.

The Pale Woman clings to the last of its life that it had forsaken. His crooked smile bends from pressure and grinds against the teeth of the Hunger. But the Pale Woman clings to him anyway.

Death is easy to fantasize about. The Pale Woman realizes then that it is much harder to face.

Would those two more laps have made a difference, she wondered. Blake had insisted she take a shower first, but now she thought that she could make up those two laps and just take another shower. Weiss knew that two laps around the block wouldn't make much difference, but something in her insisted that maybe it could. That constant insistence was getting harder and harder for her to fight. The workouts she used to look forward to and get so much satisfaction from were leaving her wanting after every session. No matter how much she did or how hard she worked, she couldn't stop herself from thinking that if only she could do more.

The mirror had become a trap for her. She spent so much time in front of it, trying just to look at the finer parts of herself. There was so much to be proud of, but always something to disappoint her. Just a glance was enough for her eyes to drop to the stomach that haunted her. For something that she hated about herself, she would always spend so much time by the mirror pinching and pulling her belly. She dreaded the possibility of marks being left even if she lost the extra weight. She regretted putting herself in this position in the first place.

Ruby stirred on the bed behind her. In the reflection Weiss could see her, laying on her back with her head hung over the side of the bed and staring right at Weiss. Her hair was as long as Weiss had ever seen it, getting close to as long as Blake's hair was when they first met. The red streaks curled the longer they got, dancing about the sea of black as Ruby fidgeted on the bed.

"Watcha looking at?" Ruby asked.

'Nothing' was what Weiss wanted to say. She didn't want Ruby to worry, but she didn't want to lie to her either.

"Weiss?" Ruby flipped over on her stomach and lifted her head to look at Weiss. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing, Ruby." Her heart lurched as soon as she said it. "No, it's not nothing. It's just not important."

The box spring squeaked quietly as Ruby slid off the bed. Weiss watched her in the mirror when she came up behind her and wrapped her arms around Weiss' waist. Hands on that very stomach that bothered her so much made her flinch to the touch. It took some amount of restraint not to guide Ruby's hands anywhere but where they were.

"If there's something bothering you, then of course it's important," Ruby said. With her head resting on Weiss' shoulder, she felt the words vibrate against her neck. "Unless it's this-"

Ruby pinched and squeezed the fat on Weiss' stomach, same as Weiss had done moments before. But while it felt humiliating when Weiss did it herself, all she could think of when Ruby did it was how ticklish she was there.

"Stop that," Weiss said. "I'm allowed to dislike it, you know."

"Well yeah," Ruby said. "And I'm allowed to like it."

"Well, yes, I suppose so. Why would you like this?"

"Are you kidding?" Ruby asked. "You're perfect for hugging now!"

Weiss grunted as Ruby squeezed her tight to prove her point. Her body was hot against Weiss' back, something she'd noticed ever since- Well, it was new development, Weiss was sure of that. She didn't mind it much, especially on the colder nights. Though Blake was often wrestled away from them in the middle of the night and woke up barely covered by the blankets.

"Well I'm glad you can find something to enjoy about my weight issues," Weiss said. "But don't get used to it, alright? I'm determined to shake this belly fat eventually."

"Aww, but why?" Ruby whined. "I love how you look right now."

"Yes, but I'm not so thrilled as you are," Weiss said. "But…thank you."

Ruby hummed some kind of 'you're welcome' through her lips as she kiss Weiss' cheek. Her arms wrapped firmly around Weiss' belly again, but Weiss thought better of trying to fight it this time.

"Uh oh, is it Weiss versus the Mirror time already?"

Neither Weiss nor Ruby even noticed that Blake had finished her shower while they were talking. Their girlfriend was leaning against the tiny bathroom door in a bra and some shorts. It didn't escape Weiss that Blake's hair, while delightfully frizzy, was still dry.

"You didn't wash your hair?" Weiss asked. "What were you doing in there for so long?"

"Waiting for you," Blake said. "I thought you were going to join me?"

"I thought you weren't in the mood."

"Me? Not in the mood?" Blake smirked and quickly joined Ruby in pinching Weiss' stomach.

Weiss tried to squirm out from both of their grasp, but to no avail. There was no use in resisting. They wanted her and even if she could get away from them, she'd rather they have her.

"What's the big deal?" Blake asked. "Is a little chub really all it takes to bring down the great Weiss Schnee? I wish I knew that a long time ago."

"While I'm sure you have the best of intentions, my love," Weiss said. "You describing anything about my body as 'chub' is not going to do anything to repair my self-esteem."

"Sorry," Blake said. "I just wanted to tell you how beautiful you are."

"You could at least try phrasing it that way next time," Weiss said.

"I think you're beautiful too, Weiss," Ruby said. "I think you look amazing right now!"

"Thank you, Ruby."

"I mean," Blake said, pressing even closer to Weiss as she did. "You were always a smoke show, as Yang would say."

"Yang said that?" Ruby and Weiss said simultaneously.

"Not important," Blake said quickly. "What I'm trying to say, Weiss, is that you're a gorgeous woman and I'm lucky to have you in my life: fat or not."

"Blake!" Weiss wrestled from the double hug and shoved a laughing Blake away.

"Sorry sorry!" Blake managed through her giggles. She sidled up behind Weiss and brushed her hair aside. Weiss shivered as she kissed the nape of her neck and hummed against her. "Hey, I mean it though. No matter what, I'm going to love you anyway. Always."

"Hmm, me too," Ruby said.

Weiss looked back into the mirror again, having nearly forgotten it was there between all the loving smothering. She had to admit, she did look better to herself then. With Ruby holding her and Blake smiling against her skin, she almost had to wonder what it was she was even upset about before. In the reflection she saw Blake's hand come up from behind and ever so gently pull her chin around to face her. Blake kissed Weiss just once, before pulling back smiling down at her.

"You already know," Blake said.

"I do," Weiss said.

With one last kiss, Blake went to get dressed while Ruby stayed with Weiss. Ruby dragged her fingers along Weiss waist again, but hesitated this time. A look of concern flashed on her face.

"Hey, Weiss?"

"Yes?"

"I understand," Ruby said. "Why you don't like it, I mean. I understand. I won't bring it up again if you don't want me to."

Weiss looked away from the mirror and met Ruby eyes directly. Something was there that she didn't quite recognize, at least not in Ruby. All at once the guilt of complaining about something so mundane as 'chub' came rushing into her. But as much as she wanted to apologize, she knew already that it wouldn't be what Ruby wanted to hear.

"Thank you," she said instead. "But that won't be necessary. I'll be okay."

Ruby smiled and that thing in eyes washed away. Those silver rings shined bright again, unburdened by the thing that Weiss would never truly understand.

The sound of the door clicking open made them both jump and turn. Blake was checking her pockets by the door, dressed in black and ready to go. She shivered after a moment, suddenly aware that she was being stared at.

"Where are you going?" Weiss asked.

"Me?" Blake said. "I'm going to get my job back."

The Hunger does not have the capacity for listening. It can't be reasoned with. It can't understand.

With its meal caught in its throat, it did begin to learn just one feeling other than hunger.

Anger.

The Pale Woman would not die even when it made the Hunger to kill it. It's not that Pale Woman failed in its quest and it's not that the Hunger is incapable. The Pale Woman simply does not wish to die.

The Hunger starts to hate the taste of the Pale Woman, but continues to eat despite it. It continues to eat to spite it.

The smell of salt and dead fish may as well have been fresh fruit and flowers to Blake. A smile creeps across her face as she takes it all in. Orange light sparkles on the sea as evening begins to fall. The humid heat that bothered her before suddenly feels right to her. This was where it belonged, by the docks and the markets. Everywhere she looked, she caught glimpses of home and felt a different warmth fill her full up.

It was nice, she thought. It was nice to be in love. To be happy and alive. And to be gainfully employed again. AND to be holding a handful of fresh cut fish in wax paper.

Weiss and Ruby might be waiting for her at home, but Blake wasn't quite ready for that yet. Not that she didn't love them both dearly, but she too loved being alone with herself. Their constant presence in her life was fantastic, she fully admitted. To wake up to their drooling faces each morning was as great a gift as any.

That said, as she took another piece of fish from the wax sheet and ate it savoring its salty taste, she loved this too. Two girlfriends had one major bonus for her: they could keep each other company when she needed to be alone. And being alone had become more of a joy to her than it had ever been. Her time alone was so much nicer and calming when she knew that she'd be going home to two people who loved her very much.

She was already sorting through the remaining slices of fish, choosing her next victim, when her cat ears stood at attention. At the dock, there were plenty of things to splash in the water, but she was used to most of them. Something else had her at alert, a rhythmic splashing that shouldn't have been there.

The was wrapped in the paper in an instant, set aside as Blake got to her feet. Her ears swiveled and followed the noise while crept dead silent along the dock. Tall fishing boats bobbed and knocked against the dock on either side of her. She couldn't see the source of her mystery sound from behind them, but she knew it was there.

And then: it stopped.

Blake froze. She strained to hear, but she heard nothing that shouldn't be there. So she waited and waited, until there was knew noise. A quiet grunt and a curse muttered under someone's breath. Then a fainting rubbing of something right next to her. The robe along the side of the boat on her left slid along the hooks, pulling tight against its knots. It quivered and shook occasionally, and Blake could tell someone was climbing on it.

Quickly, Blake shot to the front of the boat and heard the now clearly feminine voice on the other side of the bow. She only had to wait a few seconds before a hand finally reached around the front. Without hesitation, Blake gripped their wrist and pulled them harshly to the dock. Their head knocked hard against the wooden surface and they cried out in pain. Blake pulled Gambol Shroud out and pressed the barrel of the gun to their forward, parting mint green hair as she did so.

Red eyes blinked at her, dizzy from the collision, but after a moment the person said, "Blake?"

"Emerald?"

"Blake!" Emerald face lit up with relief.

She pushed the barrel of her weapon even harder against Emerald's forehead. While baring her teeth, she growled, "Emerald."

"Waitwaitwait, nononono," Emerald cried. "Please no, please don't shoot me!"

"Why shouldn't I?" Blake growled.

"Because I have something you're really gonna wanna see."

The Hunger falls into itself. It consumes itself in desperation. The part of it that eats the Pale Woman is eaten instead. It eats until there is nothing left of what Pale Woman made of it and all that remains is its anger.

What of the Pale Woman?

The Hunger does not care. The Hunger is untethered from the Pale Woman. It eats and it grows. It will always eat and it will always grow. It remembers every meal and how they digest. Memories of the lives it ends swirl in its depths. The memory of the Pale Woman's refusal lives deeper. That memory lives within the third of its feelings-

Revenge.

Ruby thought she knew Weiss as well as anyone. She knew the things she liked, the things that frightened her, her insecurities, and her strengths. The two could coordinate without a single word exchanged in the heat of battle. Weiss had favorite drinks and foods and Ruby knew them all.

She knew exactly how Weiss cleaned and maintained Myrtenaster. She could see each and every motion in her mind as clear as day. The way she glided her hands so confidently along the silver metal, holding it firmly in the hands it was made to be held by. There was never any question to it; no surprises held behind its chrome shine. That silver was as truthful and honest as it always had been. It doesn't change without intention and it never stays what it originally was.

Her silver wasn't the same silver Weiss looked into the first time.

Did Weiss just not know? Maybe it didn't occur to her, whenever she stared at Ruby over a steaming mug of tea with that giddy smile on her face. Weiss may just be in denial of it, intertwining her fingers with Ruby's and placing kisses on the back of her hand. Ignorance wouldn't make that back that Weiss would hum tunes through her lips onto the same that belonged to the Ruby she loved.

Sweat dripped from one of them to the other and the smell of salt crept through the window. Ruby's shirt clung to her skin in the spring heat. It was the first truly hot day of the year and Ruby was feeling the full effect of it. The sticky sweat made her all the more aware of the body she lived in. Not just her sweat, but Weiss and Blake's too. Too often she woke in the middle of the night, both of them soaked from holding her close despite the unnatural heat of the body. It was all she could think about, yet Weiss and Blake didn't seem to care at all. That frustrated Ruby more than anything else.

There wasn't even a single moment of hesitation then, as Weiss ran her hands along the body. Her hands were always so cautious and considerate since they'd finally gotten their chance at Ruby. Blake didn't even touch her at all, but Ruby could see the envy in her eyes whenever Weiss ventured where she could.

But caution and care didn't make the sensation of Weiss' hand running up and under her shirt along sticky skin any less wrong. She didn't stop her at first because she so badly didn't want to. The further those hands went up her back, the harder it got to choke back the guilt welling up inside her.

It wasn't the same. She wasn't the same. Those fingers dancing along the ridges of her spine deserved more than that dreadful body beneath them. Weiss deserved to kiss the lips of anyone that didn't lie to her like Ruby did. It wasn't right, the way Ruby accepted those kisses and embraces and looks and whatever else she'd tricked Weiss and Blake into giving to her.

She shivered despite the heat as Weiss' fingers traced a rib from her back to her chest. For the briefest moment, Ruby nearly forgot her concerns. The gentle pressure against her ribs, a soft pale palm to her chest, it was all she could think of. It wasn't something she'd allowed before and never really wanted to either. And yet, a simple stilled hand pressing under the weight of the woman it belonged to was enough to send an idea bouncing around in Ruby's mind: more. What 'more' even meant to her, she didn't know but she wanted it anyway. She was eating up all these new feelings like her favorite dessert, let the taste of it melt in her mouth and warm her to her already molten core.

Weiss paused and caught her breath. Ruby didn't see it but she heard. Eyes still clenched shut, she waited in her own darkness for what would come next. The hand on her ribs was bigger, stronger than she remembered. Maybe it was gentler too, but then she wouldn't know that. Only Blake would know that.

Her breath hitched as Weiss moved again. The ceiling fan breeze sent a chill through her body as it brushed over her exposed stomach. By now her heart would have betrayed her, lashing out against her chest in its desperation to reach to Weiss. A gasp left her when Weiss thumbed the elastic band around her ribs, toying with the idea of something that made Ruby's chest pound all the harder.

And what if Weiss did keep going? Ruby's mind raced as hard and fast as her heart, rushing to fill in the gaps in memories she hadn't made yet. Memories of Weiss lifting that shirt that didn't belong to her higher and higher, then letting it join the rest of Blake's things on the floor. And then where would Ruby let her own hands wander? Would she be peeling back the already thin and revealing layers that Weiss wore? Could she hold Weiss in her arms and return the favor of everything Weiss did to her?

Would they be watching the entire time?

Panic filled Ruby as she felt Weiss pull the elastic band further up and start to push her hand underneath. Her body lurched and she roughly grabbed Weiss hand pulled out under her bra and her shirt. She shouted as she did, "Stop!"

"Ruby?!" Weiss didn't fight her at all. She sat bolt upright and sat back on Ruby's lap, both hands held up in front of her as if to clearly show she wouldn't touch her. "Oh no, Ruby I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry. I shouldn't- Oh I'm sorry, Ruby."

Tears were already welling up in Weiss' eyes. She stayed deathly still over Ruby, like trying not to frighten her away. Mumbled apologies continued to pour from the lips that had been kissing Ruby only moments before.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I- I didn't mean to-"

"No no, it's-" Ruby choked on her words, practically gasping for air after forgetting just to breathe. "It's not- You didn't do anything Weiss. It's okay. You're okay."

"Are you certain?" Weiss asked. "Ruby, if I went too far you can tell me. I should have been more considerate."

"No, that's not it," Ruby mumbled. "It's just… I don't think I'm ready to talk about it."

Weiss dropped her hands slowly. She reached out to Ruby, but stopped short of touching her. The words were already evident on the tip of her tongue, being held back despite the desperate desire to ask. Ruby grabbed Weiss' shaking hand and pressed it to her cheek. Just that gesture alone made Weiss' weight shift and relax on Ruby's waist.

"I love you," Weiss said. "And I will be here whenever you want to talk about it."

"Thanks Weiss," Ruby said. "I promise: someday. Just… not right now."

"I understand." She couldn't actually, but she said it anyway. Ruby didn't fault her for it.

For a moment they just stayed there, looking into each other's eyes. Weiss dragged her thumb back and forth on Ruby's cheek and Ruby leaned into it. It was a nice moment, Ruby thought. One that could only be made better by-

The footsteps thudding up the stairs to their room sounded like the manifestation of Ruby's wish. Her cheek felt suddenly naked without Weiss' hand on it. Weiss leaned back on Ruby's lap again, turning to face the door to their room. It was only a minor disappointment, what with Blake coming up the steps at that very moment. Excitement replaced her disappointment in a flash, but it too lasted just as long.

Weiss didn't seem to notice, but Ruby certainly did. The cadence and echo of the steps was all wrong. Heavy boots stomped up those stairs instead of being left by the door downstairs. Blake would never.

Instincts kicked in and Ruby felt the Shadow stir inside her. Weiss shivered when Ruby sucked the heat from the room. It was only then that Weiss realized something was wrong too. It was too late when she realized.

The door slammed open and Ruby was ready for anything or anyone to come through it. Anything at all, except for who it actually was. The Shadow's electric buzz was immediately replaced by a different, warmer feeling that collected in her cheeks when she remembered her shirt was still hiked up from before.

Lilac eyes locked on hers, before falling to her state of undress and then rising to the woman still sitting on her lap. They blinked once and crimson replaced lilac.

"What the hell are you doing with my sister, Weiss?"