AN: Man, I am just on a roll lately! Another chapter out in only a few days. I actually think this might be one of the most dramatic chapters I've written for this story so far.

I have nothing else really to say about this except enjoy!

Also fair warning, shit gets real this chapter.

Chapter 23

"So, why couldn't Vomit Boy make it?" Yang asked as the daily group workout was coming to an end. Jaune was conspicuously absent, even thought it really didn't make much of a difference. He had stopped really trying only a few days into the year, but kept showing up for some reason.

Well, she could guess the reason, and it was a white-haired girl in a tracksuit.

Maybe he finally got the hint.

"He said he was 'too busy'," Pyrrha said in annoyance, confusing Yang. Why was she so annoyed by him having stuff to do?

"Yang!" She heard Mom call her, and turned around to see her walking towards them.

"Oh, hey, Mom," she greeted. "What's up?"

"You need to get changed and come with me to the Headmaster's office," she said.

"Why?" Yang asked.

"I'm not sure, but it sounded important."

Huh. Weird.

Yang stepped out of the elevator with Mom, only to see the absolute last person she wanted to see.

Cardin.

Next to him was a tall man in a business suit, with the same shade of red hair as Cardin, so Yang could assume he was Papa Dick Face.

Great.

"I assume this is her?" the older man asked to Ozpin, who was sitting behind his desk, Goodwitch standing off to the side.

"Yes, this is Yang Xiao Long," Ozpin confirmed.

"What's going on?" Yang asked. "Who's this?"

"This is Councilor Jayson Winchester," Ozpin said. "He is Cardin's father."

"And we are here to talk about you assaulting my son," Jayson practically spat at her.

"Excuse me?!" Yang asked. "What the hell do you mean 'assaulting'?"

"Did you forget what happened in the cafeteria?" Cardin asked. "You attacked me."

"Not only that," his father chimed in, "She grabbed him intimately in front of the entire student body!"

"You did what?!" Mom asked.

"I didn't just attack him!" Yang said in her defense. "I was defending Velvet! He wouldn't let go of her ears!"

"You've had it out for me from the start," Cardin said. "Don't hide behind the animal."

"I just didn't want to sleep with you and you can't let it go!" she fired back, and she could see her vision start to turn red. "And don't call Velvet an animal!"

"ENOUGH!" Goodwitch practically roared. "Miss Xiao Long, compose yourself. Mister Winchester, I will not have you refer to one of our students that way. Am I understood?" Both teenagers nodded, continuing to glare at each other.

"Councilor Winchester," Ozpin said, "What do you hope will happen from all of this?"

"It's simple," he answered. "I want that girl expelled."

Yang's eyes widened. Cardin seriously wanted to get back at her so badly that he was willing to try to have his father get her expelled?

"I can tell you right now that's not going to happen," Ozpin answered him, much to Yang's relief.

"And why not?" Jayson asked through grit teeth.

"Because we've had several problems with your son's behavior all year. Based on that fact alone, Miss Xiao Long's single transgression is not enough to expel her compared to Cardin's. To put it frankly, as it stands now, Miss Xiao Long deserves to be here more than Cardin."

"Excuse me?" the older man demanded. "She assaulted my son!"

"By all accounts, your son was in the midst of assaulting a Faunus student, and Miss Xiao Long was defending her. I would hardly call that assault."

"Who cares about the animals?" Jayson growled. "That hardly justifies grabbing my son in such a manner."

"You should tread carefully, Councilor," Ozpin warned. "You may not consider the Faunus as equals, but I do. What Cardin did to the student in question counts as assault, and Miss Xiao Long was hardly in the wrong by defending her. The only reason why I chose to indulge you in this meeting was to tell you in person."

"I will not stand for this!" Jayson yelled.

"You will," Ozpin retorted calmly. "You seem to forget that as the Headmaster of Beacon, I also hold a seat on the council. As such, my silence cannot be bought, nor will it be given. Your son has had multiple discussions with multiple teachers about his behavior, and he has shown no sign that he is willing to change."

"I can confirm that," Mom said. "I lost count of how many detentions I've had to issue to him for making racist and sexist comments, or going too far during spars."

"I have, as well," Goodwitch chimed in.

"Thank you, professors," Ozpin said. "This school exists for more than just indulging your ego. Yours or your son's. Miss Xiao Long will not be punished for defending another student. I am in the business of training the future defenders of mankind. If Cardin cannot grow up and become that defender, then he will fail, and that is the end of that. Miss Xiao Long, you're free to go."

"Thank you, Headmaster," she said, and was out of that office faster than her feet could carry her.

Jaune was heading back to his dorm room late at night when he heard his team talking to each other.

"How come Jaune's been coming back so late?" he heard Nora ask.

"He's become rather scarce since he started fraternizing with Cardin," Ren chimed in.

"That's weird," Nora said. "Doesn't he know we have a field trip tomorrow after Advanced Combat? We need our rest!"

"I'm sure our leader knows exactly what he's doing," Pyrrha said angrily.

"I guess so," Nora said uncertainly. Jaune closed the door and hung his head.

"Hey Jaune!" a voice said, causing him to jump. He turned around and saw Ruby standing behind him in her pajamas. "Long time, no see! Did you lock yourself out again?"

"Oh, uh, nope!" he said, pulling out his scroll. "Got it!"

"So, where have you been lately?" she asked.

"I, uh…" he said, trying to think of what to say. Instead he just sighed. "I messed up. I did something I shouldn't have, and now Cardin has me on a leash, and Pyrrha won't even talk to me and…" he took a second to compose himself. "I'm starting to think coming to this school was a bad idea." He pressed his back to his door and slid down it until he was sitting on the floor. "I'm a failure."

"Nope!" Ruby said.

"Nope?"

"Nope! You're a leader now, Jaune. You're not allowed to be a failure."

"But, what if I'm a failure at being a leader?" he asked.

"Hmmm, Nope!" she said, sitting down next to him.

"You know, you're not the easiest person to talk to about this kind of stuff."

"Nope!" she said again. "Jaune, maybe you were a failure when you were a kid…" he groaned and sank lower. "And you might've been a failure when we first met…" What was she trying to do, make him feel worse? "But you can't be one now. You know why?"

"Uh, because?" he asked.

"Because it's not just about you anymore. You've got a team now, Jaune. We both do. And if we fail, then we'll just be bringing them down with us." She stood up, and looked down at him. "We have to put our teammates first, and ourselves second. Your team deserves a great leader, Jaune. And I think that can be you." She walked over to her dorm and opened it, giving him a small wave. "Have a good night, Jaune!" she said as she went inside.

Jaune picked himself up off the ground, when he saw a message on his scroll. He opened it up and saw it was from Cardin.

"Hey! It's your buddy Cardin! Listen, I've got something big planned for tomorrow, so I'm gonna need you to not interfere with what I'll be doing. Thanks, pal!"

Well, that was weird. Why would he send him a message just to tell him not to do anything?

"Cardin, are you sure about this?" Russel asked.

"Yeah, this seems a little extreme," Dove added.

"I gave you orders, damn it!" Cardin yelled. "That Xiao Long bitch is going down! One way or another, this ends tomorrow! Just do as you're told!" His team relented, cowed by his anger.

They knew what happened when they disobeyed him.

"You know the plan," he said. "I'll make sure the professor won't get in the way, you take care of her sister. Then, leave everything else to me."

The next morning, Aqua was just wrapping up some reports for her class before stepping out of her office. She still couldn't believe that Cardin would go so far as to try have his father get Yang expelled.

She packed up her stuff and opened the door to leave her office.

She didn't notice the person hiding behind her door until someone grabbed her from behind and forced a sweet-smelling rag over her mouth and nose.

She lost consciousness within seconds.

"Oh, man," Ruby said, after she finished getting dressed in the locker room. "I can't find my scroll."

"Maybe you dropped it somewhere?" Weiss asked.

"Maybe. I'll go and check. Start class without me!" she called out to her team as she ran out of the room. "I'll explain later!"

She didn't get very far into the hallway when she heard someone call out to her.

"Looking for this?" one of the CRDL boys, the mohawk one, asked. He was standing outside the open door to an empty classroom.

"Oh, yeah, that's mine," she said. "Thanks for finding it."

"No problem," he said, holding it out for her. "Here."

She reached out for it, but then two more boys appeared from the classroom, grabbed her arms, and pulled her into the empty room.

"Hey! What're you-?!" She didn't get much farther than that before the hallway was filled with the sounds of ripping duct tape and muffled shouts.

Aqua's eyes slowly opened to reveal that she was in a dimly-lit room. She was still groggy, and tried to hold her hand up to her head, but realized that it wouldn't move.

Her eyes shot open, and she found herself sitting in a metal folding chair in a storage closet, illuminated by a single light hanging from the ceiling.

Well, not so much "sitting in" the chair as "tied to it".

Her arms were tied behind the back of the chair with rope, her legs were tied together at the ankles and knees, which were then tied to one of the chair's legs, and rope was wrapped around her torso, pinning her to the chair.

"What the-?!" she immediately began struggling, but didn't make much progress before a voice spoke up.

"You're finally awake," Cardin said.

"Cardin?!" she asked. "What do you think you're doing?! Untie me right now!"

"See, that would defeat the purpose of tying you up in the first place," he said. "I need you out of the way for what I'm about to do."

"And what's that?"

"I'm gonna finally put that blonde bitch in her place."

Aqua attempted to use her Semblance to summon Qrow so he could cut her loose, but the glyph just flickered and disappeared, leaving her feeling tired.

"What's going on?" she asked.

"Oh, that's a handy little side-effect of the chloroform," he said smugly. "Even though you're awake, it leaves you just groggy enough that you can't focus on those summons of yours. Now, I can't have you calling for help, so I'd better shut you up." He picked up a roll of duct tape, and placed a few strips over her mouth. "Now, if you'll excuse me."

She tried to scream at him to let her go, but the tape did a good job keeping her quiet, and the sound of the closet door locking told her that he wasn't listening anyway.

This was weird. Class was supposed to start 10 minutes ago, and not only had Ruby not come back yet, Mom hadn't shown up for class either.

"Seriously, what's taking Ruby so long?" Yang asked out loud.

"And where is the professor?" Weiss asked.

"They won't be coming!" a loud voice announced, making everyone else in the room take notice.

Cardin was striding into the center of the room, his mace hefted over his shoulder.

"Cardin?" Jaune asked, concern in his voice.

"What do you mean, they won't be coming?" Yang asked. "Where are they?"

"The Professor is in a closet somewhere," he said. "As for your sister…" he gestured towards the door, and she saw the other members of CRDL drag Ruby into the room, her entire torso wrapped up in duct tape, with some wrapped around her head over her mouth, the mohawk one holding a dagger up against her neck. The rest of the class gasped in shock.

"RUBY!" Yang screamed, her eyes turning red. "What the fuck do you think you're doing?! Let her go!"

"No, I don't think I will," he said, pointing his mace at her. "As long as you do what I tell you, she won't get hurt."

"Why are you doing this?" Weiss asked.

"Shut up, Schnee!" he snapped. "I wasn't talking to you!"

"What do you want?" Yang asked, forcing herself to not attack him.

"For you to get your sweet ass down here into the ring," he said. "We're going to settle this, right here, right now."

"You can't win against me, so you take my sister hostage? Are you really that pathetic?"

"Stop talking, bitch!" he yelled, and the guy holding Ruby pressed his knife closer to her throat, causing her to give a muffled whimper.

"Asshole. Fine," Yang said, walking down into the arena.

"Dove, watch the door. Make sure there are no interruptions," Cardin said. "Sky, make sure no one here tries anything. Anybody makes a move, you kill the girl." The other boys looked at each other uncertainly before doing as they were told, one of them leaving the room, one of them watching the other students, and the third one still holding Ruby.

"What's this about?" Yang asked. "What's the point of all this?"

"Funny thing about that. Originally, all I wanted was to just have sex with you, but now? Now I just want to make you suffer."

"So, what, now we fight? What makes you think this'll be any different?"

"Not quite. I thought it would be fun to give you the opportunity to prove yourself right."

"What do you mean?"

"At the beginning of the year, you told me that you could kick my ass with both hands tied behind your back," he said, pulling a strand of rope out of his pocket. "You'll get the chance to prove it. Now get over here, and put your hands behind your back."

"What the hell is wrong with you?" she asked.

"Just do it!" he shouted, and Yang looked over to Ruby, who looked back at her with pleading eyes.

"Fine," she said, walking up to him and turning around, putting her hands behind her back. She felt his hands run down her sides, brushing against the exposed skin of her sides before he finally started tying her hands. After a final tug to tighten the rope, he backed up…

And then he slammed his mace into the side of Yang's head.

She fell over, landing hard on her side, unable to reach out her hands to catch herself.

"Yang!" Blake yelled, and she could hear Ruby shriek.

"You bastard!" Coco yelled from the stands. Before Yang could get her bearings, Cardin drove his leg into her stomach, knocking the air out of her. She could feel his attacks fuel her Semblance, but she couldn't use it without putting Ruby in danger.

She had no way of knowing if they were serious about killing her, but couldn't risk it.

"Get up!" he yelled, grabbing her roughly by the back of her jacket and lifting her to her feet. He gave her a few seconds to catch her breath before attacking her again, making her stumble backwards.

"Stop it, Cardin!" Pyrrha yelled.

He ignored her.

"HMMMMMM!" Aqua screamed, hoping that somebody, anybody, would hear her, while she struggled furiously in her chair. She had tried over the past several minutes to use her Semblance, but the chloroform still hadn't worked its way out of her system, so it wasn't working yet. There were shelves all around her, but from what she could see, there was nothing sharp on any of the shelves that she could use to cut the ropes. Besides, even if there were, she was physically tied to the chair and couldn't get up. She gave all of her limbs another good tug, but she didn't get very far before the ropes were pulled taut. She relaxed her muscles after a second or two, breathing through her nose to try to catch her breath.

She didn't have the physical strength to break the ropes, especially with the chloroform still affecting her, and the Keyblade lacked an actual sharp edge, so she couldn't use it to cut the ropes. She took another look around the closet to see if there was anything she missed.

Looking up, she remembered the closet's singular lightbulb.

Would that work?

If she could break it, she might be able to use a shard of glass to cut herself free. It was a long shot, but the only other alternative was to wait until she regained all of her senses.

She doubted she had that kind of time.

She started rocking herself back and forth, moving the chair at the same time. After a few seconds, she had shifted her weight enough that she made the entire chair fall over with her in it, letting out a muffled grunt as she hit the ground. She summoned the Master Keeper to her hands, and did her best to point the tip at the light bulb.

She tried to call on her magic, but it fizzled out at the last second.

Come on! She thought. Yang needs my help! She tried again, and felt the magic building up again, and then felt it start to weaken.

No you don't! She screamed out loud, and forced herself to stay focused.

Thunder! She yelled in her head, and a small bolt of lightning struck the light bulb, shattering it instantly. The glass fell on her, and she felt that there was at least one shard big enough for her to hold.

Jaune watched on in horror as Cardin kept wailing on a helpless Yang, while her own sister was forced to watch with tears in her eyes.

This was what he was supposed to not interfere with? He had to just stand there while his friend got the living daylights beaten out of her? There had to be something he could do!

Except there wasn't. He knew there wasn't.

He wasn't strong like the others. He didn't belong here. This was why he was in this mess in the first place.

Why was he such a failure?!

"You can't afford to be a failure," Jaune remembered Ruby's words from the previous night. "Your team needs a strong leader, and I think that can be you."

She was right. He needed to lead. His friends needed him. He turned to his team.

"Guys, I need your help."

They looked among themselves, and nodded.

"What do you need?" Pyrrha asked.

Aqua finally got the door unlocked, having finally freed herself of all of her bindings. She pulled out her scroll, and dialed Glynda.

"Glynda, I need you in my classroom right now!" she shouted as soon as she picked up.

"Aqua?" Glynda asked. "What's wrong?"

"What's wrong is that Cardin Winchester tied me to a chair in a broom closet!"

"What?!"

"He's got something planned for Yang! Meet me in my classroom!" she hung up and ran towards the classroom. Thanks to still being a little woozy, she stumbled for a second. She kicked off her heeled shoes, and kept moving.

Yang knew she couldn't last much longer. Her Aura was running dangerously low, and Cardin just kept attacking. She stood across from him, panting heavily, feeling a burning in her chest. Her Semblance was dying to be unleashed, but she couldn't let it. Not if it put Ruby in harm's way.

She could tell that even if her Aura didn't break soon, she was still going to end up with several bruises, at the worst.

"Why are you still standing?!" Cardin roared angrily. "Just stay down already!"

"Come on," she said, smirking despite the situation. "You think this'll be enough to take me down? Is this the best you've got?"

"Just die already!" he yelled, and charged at her, mace raised high. She braced herself, knowing that this next attack would probably break her aura, and with it, she would lose any chance of using her Semblance.

There was a sudden clang of metal on metal, and Yang saw a white shield block Cardin's attack.

"Jaune?" she asked the boy holding the shield.

"What do you think you're doing, Jaune?" Cardin asked.

"Stopping you," he said. "I won't let you keep doing this to my friends." Cardin could only start laughing. "What's so funny?"

"Oh, Jauney boy, this was probably the dumbest thing you could have done," he said. "Did you forget about your little secret? Cuz I sure haven't."

"I don't care."

"Fine, then," Cardin said, lowering his mace and turning around to look at the other students. "Jaune here is a cheat! He used fake transcripts to cheat his way into Beacon! He's a faker! A pretend Huntsman! The reason he's so weak is because he never belonged here to begin with!"

"Who cares?!" Nora yelled.

"What was that?"

"At this point, do you really think it matters that Jaune lied?" Ren asked. "He's already proven himself."

"Besides, do you really think you're in any position to judge anybody, Cardin?" Pyrrha asked.

"And just what the hell is that supposed to mean?" Cardin growled.

"Guys," Jaune said.

"Jaune isn't the one that kidnapped a classmate so he could beat her sister," Blake chimed in.

"From where we're sitting, Cardin, the one who doesn't belong here is you," Weiss added.

"How can you side with a spineless, weak little cheat like him?!" Cardin roared.

"He has something you never will," Yang said. "Something we all have: Heart."

"Fat load of good heart's gonna do when I'm done with him!" Cardin yelled, swinging his mace right at Jaune's face.

Right when the mace connected, there was a bright flash of light. When the light faded, Cardin was holding his wrist in pain, his mace halfway across the arena.

"You think you're so damn smart," Cardin growled. "You forget I have all the power! Russel! Kill her!"

"Ruby!" Yang yelled.

"Pyrrha, now!" Jaune yelled.

Pyrrha reached out her hand, and the knife at Ruby's throat was suddenly surrounded by a black glow, and pulled out of Russel's hand.

"Ruby! Over here!" Ren called, and Ruby used her Semblance to speed into Ren's waiting arms. Sky tried to use his axe to stop her, but Nora shot him in the face with her grenade launcher, forcing him to abandon it. After Ren caught her, he immediately used the blades attached to his pistols to cut the tape binding her. Weiss, Blake, and Team CFVY sprung into action as well, doing what they could to subdue Team CRDL.

"Hey! Cardin!" Yang yelled, her eyes turning red and her hair catching ablaze. In an instant, she had snapped the rope tying her wrists and expanded Ember Celica. Cardin turned to look at her, and his eyes widened at seeing her free. "CATCH!" She screamed, and drove the force of every blow he had struck her with directly into his chest.

His aura instantly shattered. She could hear bones crunching as his ribs broke. She practically impaled him on her fist, and blood burst from his mouth before the kinetic energy finally carried over and sent him flying across the room, slamming into the wall before unceremoniously falling to the ground.

The remaining students had all surrounded the other two members of Team CRDL, pointing their weapons at the boys. Blake, Weiss, and the newly freed Ruby headed right for Yang.

Yang began to collapse, her Aura finally expelled, but Jaune caught her before she could hit the ground.

"You okay?" he asked.

"I will be," she answered. There was a loud noise, and they saw Dove come flying through the door to the classroom, followed by Mom and Goodwitch, their weapons drawn.

"Well, I can see we weren't needed," Mom said, examining the carnage before her.

"What happened here?" Goodwitch demanded.

"Team CRDL took Ruby captive and forced Yang to let Cardin beat her," Coco explained. Goodwitch glared at the boys.

"We've put up with a lot from you four, but you absolutely crossed the line today. Rest assured, all four of you will be expelled from Beacon, and we will be getting the police involved."

They suddenly heard a growling sound.

"Why won't you people just die?" Cardin groaned, a black fog beginning to cover his body. "You all think you're so much better than me. You're not, do you hear me?"

"Oh, no," Yang said. "All this Darkness."

"Cardin!" Ruby said. "You need to snap out of it! Your Heart can't handle this much Darkness!"

"SHUT UP!" he roared, before his body was completely swallowed up in a ball of pure darkness.

"No!" Mom yelled, raising her Keyblade and running towards him. "Everybody stay away from him!"

"What's going on?!" Weiss yelled.

"He's becoming a Heartless!"

AN: I just want to throw out there that I don't think the other members of Team CRDL would actually be able to go through with this, especially Russel, who's job was to literally kill Ruby. Cardin was the only one that went insane. His father's failure to get results drove him to take extreme measures to get back at her, with Darkness taking a grip over his Heart also influencing him.

As I said, I think this was the most dramatic chapter yet, and I really loved writing it. Now sadly, the next chapter probably won't come out this fast, since it's an action chapter, and those always take a long time.

So, next time, we've got the fight against Heartless Cardin, and maybe some resolution to Weiss's little problem with Aqua.

As always, thanks for reading, and I'll see you all next time!