Yo.

So, bad news, my computer broke. I am sending it in for repairs, but in the meantime, I have no way of writing this story. So, for the time being, this story and Cinderella will be taking a few weeks off. Not terribly long, but I felt you'd rather know than not.

Cinderella's next chapter will actually be uploaded today (probably) so that I can get this message out.

Chapter 15

It was the 24th, apparently the day before some kind of winter festival in Vale, and Cinder had her mind rather occupied with, well…

"Your thoughts, then, Emerald?"

Her lieutenant pointedly avoided eye-contact.

"Ma– Cinder, I can't help but feel like I'm maybe the wrong person for this."

"And why is that?"

"Well, shouldn't you have invited someone a bit more… objective?"

Cinder let out a sigh as she stopped posing in the black dress she was trying on, rolling her eyes as she moved back into the changing room.

"I suppose what you're getting at is that you think I look good in anything?"

"I uhm… yes?"

"Mm. I understand." Cinder chimed out as she stripped away at the fabric hanging about her frame, allowing it to fall to the floor below her as she took the next dress off its hanger. "So, what did you have in mind, then?"

"Well, we could just ask the lady who works here?"

"…I suppose we could." Cinder said, sighing. "If you'd like, go ahead and call her over, we'll ask her opinion."

Emerald hummed out her agreement, before scurrying off. Once she was far enough away that Cinder was convinced she would not hear her, she let out an aching sigh, leaning against the changing room wall just beside her.

This had seemed like such a simple and straightforward idea when she'd come up with it last evening. She needed a dress for her rendezvous with Goodwitch – normally she might've simply worn her red dress that she donned often during criminal activity, but Glynda had seen her wearing that when she'd had to bail Roman out of that dust robbery, and she wasn't going to chance something that stupid being the reason this didn't go well – and she needed a second opinion.

Not that she didn't think herself capable of choosing a dress that made her look as scorching as she was, or one that accentuated herself as best she could, but…

For some reason, she was not feeling nearly as confident as she normally would've been. There was something about this little… Cinder supposed it could be called a 'date' with Glynda Goodwitch that had her stomach twisting in her chest every time she thought about it.

And so, she'd thought to simply invite Emerald, have her offer her opinion.

She'd rather pointedly not thought of the fact that Emerald had what was perhaps the most obvious crush on her, and thusly that her opinion would perhaps not be all that valuable to these proceedings.

It was just as she was considering her options on the matter, finally opening her dressing room curtain, that a voice chimed in.

"My, oh my, what do we have here?"

Cinder looked up at the rather impressively dressed woman who'd called out to her, who was, rather evidently, who Emerald had procured to act as their 'judge'. She was in what seemed to be an official outfit for this location, with coal-colored pants, a vest overtop a short-sleeved dress shirt, and a pair of dark sunglasses.

She also wore a beret.

"You work here?" Cinder opened.

The girl in front of her laughed. "You think this uniform I'm wearing is just for show, hun?"

Cinder's eye twitched.

"Yes, I work here." The woman stepped up to her, gave her entire body a once over, before looking inside the dressing room and seeing the admittedly large pile of dresses she'd already tried on. "Red's are your color, they go well with your dark hair and your golden eyes. I'd recommend blues as well, though, since they can work just as–"

"Cease this." Cinder ordered, shooting the girl an odd look. "What are you doing?"

"You're asking my opinion on dresses, are you not?" The woman raised an eyebrow Cinder's way, before giving an almost haphazard smirk."In my opinion, just about the best decision you've made all day. Congratulations, you've found yourself an expert."

"You seem awfully confident."

The woman in front of her nodded her head at that, before shaking her head with a laugh.

"Tell me, hun, do you have something that you know you're better at than everyone else in Remnant. That you know for a fact no one else can really compete with you in?"

…Actually…

"I suppose I do."

"And would you trust anyone, I mean anyone at all, to do it for you?"

Oh, Salem might make her do so, but if it were up to Cinder? If she could genuinely make the choice?

"…No, I would not."

"The woman drew down her shades with one finger, raising an eyebrow."

"That's what I thought. Now, let's get to work."

/

About an hour and a half later, and two dresses – one in a full, deep crimson for her 'date', another just because that woman wouldn't stop gushing about how she should really try something blue.

Cinder shook her head. Blue really wasn't her color. She'd figured that out quite a long time ago.

It was as Cinder was paying for both of those – and once again remarking on the fact that Salem really did pay quite well – that the woman she'd spent the last hour or so communicating with called out to her again.

"Y'know, It just occurred to me… you're Cinder Fall, right?"

There was a brief moment of absolute calm in her body, then. As her instincts flared, as her mind assessed the potential threats all around her. As she prepared to have to kill everyone in this room within a few moments, before the girl's next sentence cooled her proverbial flame.

"Second year at Beacon?"

The instant deflation that occurred then was rather difficult to achieve silently, especially when she now had to come up with some sort of response. Luckily, her mind actually decided to supply her some useful information for once.

"Oh, yes…" Now that Cinder thought about it, she was fairly certain she'd seen this girl before. "Is it… Adel?"

"Yeah, Coco Adel," The woman smirked her way. "Glad to hear you remembered my name. If you'd like, we could get better acquainted sometime? Perhaps over coffee?"

Perhaps it was the audacity of the woman in front of her to ask such a thing in the middle of her workplace, quite literally right in front of the cashier, who just rolled her eyes as if this was both completely expected and not at all new, that had Cinder thinking.

Still, just for a moment, Cinder allowed herself to, well…

Experiment.

Mentally, of course.

Because when she thought of it, this had all started from some idiotic 'infatuation at first sight' nonsense with Glynda Goodwitch. That meant that she was… well, at least bisexual, if the research she'd done was correct. Or, well… it should've, yes?

So, Cinder studied the girl in front of her.

She was attractive. That much was no lie, or falsehood. The woman in front of her clearly took her appearance seriously, and she had seemed like a nice woman from the brief conversation they'd had thus far, if a bit overconfident and vain, which Cinder really couldn't judge her for. But…

Cinder simply couldn't find it in herself to want to ravage the woman in front of her. To make her squeal along her hands and lips. No, the things she wanted of Goodwitch… they did not come now for this Adel.

And so Cinder simply shook her head.

"My apologies, I already have a date on for the 27th."

"Damn," Coco clicked her tongue, never losing her smile. "Ah, well. She's a lucky gal."

That, at least, drew Cinder's attention.

"Oh? And how do you know it's a woman I'm going out with?"

"Took a lucky guess, hun." Coco winked. "Have a good day, and hey, if things don't work out, you know where to find me! Oh, and put in a good word for me with greeny over there, too!"

And with that, Coco Adel moved back into the clothing shop, beginning to chat up another group of girls.

"We should probably get going."

She turned to see Emerald standing a bit awkwardly off to one side, and nodded her head, agreeing. Emerald made for the doorway, and Cinder followed with her bag of clothes in tow.

"I believe Coco Adel wishes to sleep with you."

Emerald tripped. It was honestly impressive that the girl recovered enough to not then fall face first onto the tile beneath them. Instead, she turned around with a blazing red face.

"Bwuh!?"

Cinder debated simply repeating herself, before rolling her eyes and waving the girl on.

"I believe you heard me."

Emerald nodded her head, even as she looked away, muttering something under her breath.

Still, Cinder found herself puzzled as to just why it was that she didn't find herself drawn to this woman. To someone who was, in her own way, undeniably attractive. Undeniably sexy. And who undeniably wanted Cinder.

But…

Something was missing.

"Cinder?"

She turned, saw Emerald at the door, and shook her head.

"Yes, I'll…"

She shelved such thoughts. She could further consider them later.

"I'll be right there."

/

It was the 24th, the day before the winter festival, and Mercury really wasn't sure what the fuck he was doing anymore.

So, he'd come to Domremy to… what, to relax? And instead, he'd gotten more stress out of this fucking 'vacation' than he'd experienced since he'd flatlined his dad. Fuck, but it felt like the universe just had it out for him.

It was while he was in his own headspace, his face down in the pink and sparkly pillows of the room he'd been given, that he realized he certainly wasn't going to get anywhere sat around here. His father had always taught him to face his problems, to not simply sit on his ass and let them fester.

An unattended wound became infected, and it didn't matter if you'd been shot, or just gotten a small scratch from a papercut, if the wound got infected, it could lead to serious problems regardless.

And to Mercury, at least, what he was going through right now certainly didn't feel like a papercut.

He oozed off the bed, groaning as he stood and took to the door, pushing it open and stepping out into the upstairs hallway of the Arc family home.

He… didn't want to be around anyone right now.

There was only one spot he could try that might let him accomplish that.

Mercury made his way to the laundry room in no real hurry. It was late in the evening, like, two o'clock in the morning late, which meant that theoretically, he wasn't going to be running into anyone on the way. Of course, the universe also thought of him as a punching bag, so he wasn't all that confident in that.

But no, somehow he managed to make it to the only place of silence in the entire building un-accosted.

He should've known it wouldn't be that easy.

"Hey." Blake spoke to him as he let out a low sigh and shut the door behind him. "You're up late."

"And you're not?"

"The pot calling the kettle black–"

"Isn't wrong, right." Mercury shook his head. "Listen… I'm just…"

"Looking for silence?"

"Mm."

Blake went silent for just a second, and Mercury initially thought she got him, that she was actually not going to push him for once.

"I don't think you are."

"…And how do you figure that?"

"Look on your face. I've worn it myself. It says you're dealing with something that you yourself don't know how to handle."

"And the fact that I didn't say shit to you somehow equates to me wanting you to question me?"

Blake eyed him over the rim of her book, before she let out a quiet breath and shut the pages, but not before folding down the corner of the page she'd been reading. Then, she set the book down at her side, before looking back over to him with a quizzical expression.

"I watched you the other day."

"Huh?"

"Your conversation with Jaune's dad. I was listening in."

Mercury took a moment to process that information, drawing him to sneer and shake his head as he leaned back against the wall behind him.

Honestly, this whole fucking place was getting to him. Somehow he'd been spied on by this little huntress in training? Sure, she was former White Fang, but he'd been practically born and raised to do this shit.

Wasn't it supposed to be Mercury's job to watch her? Tracking Blake and making sure she wasn't getting up to anything that might involve their plans? That had been his initial reaction when they'd arrived, and yet the moment he'd met those damned kids, it'd all fallen apart.

Everything had begun unraveling. Everything.

"Cool of you to do that." He muttered.

"My apologies." Blake said. "But I had initially exited to go and talk with you. You seemed… distant. Not all there emotionally. I wanted to make sure you were alright."

He shook his head again, sighing as he nodded, accepting that maybe what she'd done hadn't been her fault entirely.

Even still, he somehow doubted the girl was going to leave things there, like he wanted her too.

"What you spoke to him about… The abuse from your father…"

"I'd really rather not discuss this."

"I'd sort of assumed there was something like that going on, especially when the others were so guarded about it when I asked. They refused to give anything up on you, y'know? Not a one of JNPR told a lick."

He looked away. "That supposed to make me feel better or some shit?"

"Maybe, maybe not."

He scoffed.

"So I'm going to ask… the abuse you sufferered under your father isn't the only thing that haunts you, is it?"

Mercury's blood ran cold, even as he looked away from the girl, down at the washer below him.

It had one of those glass covers, so ones could see inside of it. He looked at how full it was, probably past its capacity. He observed the way that clothes inside were of all different shapes, colors, sizes.

He felt empty.

Blake sighed. "Feel free to ignore me if you'd like. I'll just keep talking."

Now, Mercury felt himself growing angry. "…You're not giving me much of an option to ignore you."

"Wow, it's almost like that's on purpose."

Ok, yeah, he was angry now.

"Y'know, you're a real bitch."

"Yeah. I've been told that before." Blake said, entirely unphased. "In quite a more vitriolic manner."

"Hah."

Silence reigned for a moment, and Mercury silent hoped that was the end of it, even knowing it couldn't be.

"Listen," Blake spoke, even as she slung her legs off of the drier, and dismounted it, standing beside him on the cool tile of the laundry room floor. "You need help. I'm going to give it to you. Whether or not you want it."

"Why the hell do you care?

Blake actually had the nerve to look offended. "Do you think I joined the White Fang to sit around on my ass and allow injustices to happen? No. I joined the White Fang because I couldn't bear to watch the world's abuses occur in front of me while I sat back and did nothing. I won't allow myself to regress just because I've left them. So, tell me."

"What, I'm a victim of the world's abuses?"

"Tell me."

Mercury let out a great big sigh, then, even as he broke away from the wall, and squatted down right in front of the washing machine. He pressed his face right up against the glass, and just… stared inside.

All the different kinds. All the different shapes. All the different colors.

Oh, how his head shrieked.

"My father was a man named Marcus Black."

He couldn't see Blake, but he heard as the girl behind him let out a near silent gasp, which confirmed, at least, that Blake really was who he thought. Marcus Black wasn't a known name to the world at large, but if one was in and around a terrorist group, perchance, well…

You might require someone offering his services from time to time.

"I've… heard that name." She needlessly confirmed."He was an…"

"…Yeah."

Blake didn't say anything. It took Mercury a while to realize she was waiting on him. That she actually expected him to continue speaking, to keep the conversation going.

And how fucking stupid was it that he actually did?

"So, you can see how I might feel a little uneasy around Arc's huntsman dad."

Blake hummed in acknowledgement, before she let out a low sigh.

"That's not all of it, though, is it?"

Mercury bit down on his bottom lip, mostly because as annoying as it was, the girl was right.

"I… being around these people… these… kids, it's…"

"You don't feel like you should be?"

"No, I know I shouldn't be." Mercury professed as he turned back towards Blake, eyes hard. "That's the difference."

The girl standing there just nodded her head, before, with an almost final sounding tone, she spoke again.

"You've killed before."

It was like the air was sapped from Mercury's lungs. Yet again he found himself speechless. Oh, the things this place had done to him. This accursed home in the middle of nowhere.

Just like his own had been. A little house on a hill away from prying eyes. Where a father could beat his son half to death, could turn him into a killing machine without a heart or a soul. Where, when Mercury had been injured, his father had sawed his own legs off and grafted on better ones.

To fully actualize his weapon. Not his son. Just another tool.

It had also been a place where a son could murder his father. Could set their house ablaze and wander off to die.

Where he could be found by a wicked witch and whisked away.

"…Yeah."

Blake didn't seem surprised.

"I… have too."

"Mm." He nodded his head. "White Fang, right?"

"Hah, am I that obvious now?"

He smirked. "Something like that."

The woman in front of him slowly slid down the wall behind her, until she was eye-level with Mercury, still squatting against the washing machine. A normal person might not have been able to hold the pose he was for as long as he had, but then again, he didn't have calve muscles to ache, or ankles to whine and complain.

Just cold, unfeeling steel.

"I like to think we were different when I was a member. That we… I don't know… drew the line differently? We certainly wouldn't have worked with a bigot like Torchwick, that's for sure."

Mercury just nodded his head.

"I just… I don't want to think that I aided in creating what we've become." Blake said, before sighing, and running both hands down her face. "What they became."

"Still feel like a part of it?"

"Hard not to, when it was a cause I once supported with my life. A cause I gave up everything for."

Another bout of silence.

"…When did you first kill someone?"

Admittedly, that caught Mercury by surprise. "Is this the conversation we're having, now?"

"Seems like it."

"Hah. Bitch."

"Is that the best you've got?"

"Seems like it." He parroted.

"Touché." Blake muttered, before letting out a harsh breath and shaking her head. "Forget it. I shouldn't have asked."

"Nah, you shouldn't have."

Blake didn't say anything, just tapped her hand along the tile floor beside her. Mercury listened to that rhythm, heard it as it droned on and on and on, and eventually, perhaps after too much time, he spoke.

"The first person I ever killed was a gambler."

Blake looked up, seeming both surprised and not.

"He was… pretty horribly in debt. To the kinds of people you don't want to be indebted to. My father had tracked him down to a little town in southern Mistral. And he took me along. Because it was an easy job. He was training me to replace him, or work alongside him, or to fucking kill him, I don't know. He never told me all that much. But…"

He took a breath, and it came out shuddering, harsh against his throat.

"The guy couldn't fight. He… knew less than I did at eight years old. All he could do was beg. He begged for his life, pleaded on his hands and knees, and… and my father put a gun and my hands and told me to pull the trigger. And I did. Because if I hadn't, my dad just woulda' done it, and then he'd have beaten me until I wished it was me who was shot, and then he'd have just taken me to kill some other poor sap."

Blake didn't say anything as he spoke, which he was grateful for. He could pretend like he wasn't spilling his deepest, darkest secrets to someone he had no reason at all to trust. Could pretend like he was spitting rain into the ocean, and not…

"He made me a meal that night. Didn't… take me out, just… cooked something. It was venison stew off of a deer he'd caught and killed. I can still remember the taste of it. It was… delicious. Well, up until I threw it all up. I don't think I'll ever be able to get that taste out of my head, or the smell, or…"

He stopped, and just sat there a while in silence as he tried to get his beating heart back under control. Eventually, once he'd managed, he looked back up at Blake, and muttered, "So yeah, what about you?"

Blake nodded her head, clearly having expected as much.

"The first person I killed was a guard on a Schnee Dust transport." She began, her eyes already glazing over somewhat, and idly, Mercury wondered if he'd looked like that, too. "He… was just doing his job. There'd been an uptick of people like him. Our efforts, I suppose. We'd blown our stealth at that point, but our mission commander at the time didn't want to give up on the cargo. It was a big haul of dust. Would sell for quite a lot and wouldn't be traceable back to us with some of the methods for moving it that we had."

To Mercury, it was pretty clear the girl was stalling for as long as she could to avoid speaking the harsher parts of her story, but then again… he couldn't really blame her for that.

"It was a tense firefight. We'd… already had a few of our own guys downed. I was stressed, more than I think I'd ever been. I managed to corner a guard, knocked him down, and had his back. I went for a fairly routine chokehold maneuver, but… it's routine when used on someone with aura armed and active. This man was… he must've been injured before I'd fought him, or not using his aura, or just not… not as ready as I thought he was. I…"

The girl took a shaky breath.

"I squeezed too hard on someone without aura. Maybe it… maybe it was the heat of combat, or… or something else, but… I collapsed his esophagus. He died of asphyxiation right in front of me, his hand reaching for me, and… gods, I'll never forget the look on his face. The light leaving his eyes, his hand falling to the ground. His body just… shutting down… and I just sat there through it all, staring right at him. Ada– an associate of mine had to come and grab me after the operation had finished. He… helped me bury the man, despite his own hang-ups about them. Because it was important to me."

Mercury nodded, subtly marking that his supposed connection between Blake and Adam had been confirmed, given she'd just about said the man's name.

"I… I didn't stop shaking for what felt like months. I think it must've only been a week or so, but… that week, it was like… I was just in my own head. And nothing else really existed. I… I think it was around then when I first thought about leaving. When I first realized that that life… that a life like that just… I couldn't do it."

Mercury found himself envying the girl that she'd had such an option, whether or not that was fair to her.

"What about you?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean… when did you decide to leave your father?"

Mercury's face blanched, and for a moment, he thought the girl across from him could read his every thought, knew what he'd done, why he'd come to Vale, why he was in Beacon…

But no, in the next moment, she grew this sad little expression, and he realized she'd parsed something entirely different.

"Oh. You…"

"…I killed him." Mercury said, unable to meet the girl's eyes. "But not… not until I was already… this." He spoke, gesturing to himself. "Until I was far too gone. Until it was far too late."

To his surprise, Blake just shook her head.

"It's not too late."

"What?"

"It's never too late to change who you are. Believe me, I once thought the same. But…" Blake took a deep breath, this time it came out smooth and calm. "More than anything, Ozpin gave us a second chance. To be better than we once were. We can't waste it. Otherwise… why are we here?"

Ozpin had…

Ozpin…

No… No. The girl in front of him seemed to think he was as free as she was. That he could simply choose another life. A life without the killing, and the agony, and the guilt that raged inside of him. That he could, what, simply choose to run away from it all? To be a better person?

No, his fate had been sealed the moment he'd walked out of his burning home. The moment he'd locked eyes with that flaming witch who'd come to collect her prize.

Not even for him. He'd just been a proxy.

No, ever since that day… he'd already been dead.

Any dreams of a different life, of making something of himself aside from the path his father had chosen for him…

They'd died with him.

"Yeah. …I guess you're right."

Blake smiled.

Mercury felt sick.

/

Emerald really wasn't all that sure why she was currently mimicking her boss, which was to say that she was curled up in a little angst ball on her bed as the two of them lied down to rest in their dormitory later that night.

Cinder had gone straight to bed, sleeping like a newborn babe… actually that was a pretty shitty comparison, given newborns babes slept rather fitfully. She was sleeping… well?

…Okay, it wasn't like Emerald had no idea why she was currently rolled up in a little ball of angst. She in fact had a pretty decent idea.

She'd been hit on.

Not even directly. She'd been indirectly hit on thanks to Cinder. But she'd been the one who'd gone and gotten Adel, brought her over to Cinder, had her help them out.

And apparently Adel thought she was… cute? Hot? Sexy? Had a nice ass?

Emerald really wished she knew how this all worked.

What she did know was that it couldn't work out. Obviously. She was fully committed to Cinder. She was in love with Cinder. That meant she wasn't going to be accepting any weird summons from some random girl in a clothing store.

…

But it wasn't like Cinder was committed to her, was it? And given she was pining after Goodwitch at this point, and had already laid her master plan to get Ironwood out of the picture… then…

Emerald whined under her breath, burying her face even further into the pile of blankets and pillows that surrounded her.

Honestly, what she really needed right now, more than anything, was a second opinion. Someone who could tell her in no uncertain terms what she should be doing. She could certainly ask Cinder if she wanted to, but then again, Cinder was far from being unbiased in these matters.

In fact, she'd likely tell her to take this Adel up on her offer to get Emerald out of her hair… and wasn't that another shining example of the many things wrong with the woman she pursued?

No… no, if she wanted an honest to gods second opinion, then she needed to go to someone who was on her side but would give it to her straight. Someone who didn't have a vested interest one way or another. Someone who'd support her, and…

…

And Emerald already knew who she was going to be going to, didn't she?

Because there was only one woman who could help her. Only one woman who'd take the time out of their day to talk to Emerald about, of all things, teenaged relationship issues.

…Who was also the source of an awful lot of her problems, not the least of which was cucking the ever-loving shit out of her…

…

Oh, gods damnit, why was Emerald's life so endlessly complicated!?

End Chapter 15

As per usual, being Emerald Sustrai is suffering.

Well, perhaps suffering from success in this case.

Anyways, like I said in the preword, my computer is broken at the moment, so I have no way of writing up new chapters. So for the next few weeks this story and Cinderella will be taking a break. It probably won't be too long (think like a week or two) but I felt I should probably let you all know.

See you all then!