Ruby visited Neo as soon as their airship lifted off. The mute criminal she had spent the last few months with was in one of the many cabins, leg shackled to the bed, seemingly not at all worried about her current situation. She looked just as confident as ever, and was reading on her scroll as Ruby came in.

"I'm surprised miss Goodwitch didn't take away your scroll," said Ruby with a small laugh.

Neo looked up from her scroll and smirked before typing something, a message Ruby soon received on her own scroll.

It's not like I could really talk without one

"I guess," admitted Ruby.

They stayed in silence for a while, the atmosphere just as awkward than when Glynda had tried to talk to her before. Well, Glynda was actually avoiding her right now, but it was probably because she didn't know what to say.

"This is awkward," said Ruby, "It's like, you know, those moments where people say goodbye only to leave in the same direction."

Neo lifted an eyebrow, not sure where Ruby was going with this.

"Why did you leave?" she asked, "Or well, why did you tell miss Goodwitch about where we were if you didn't want to help us?"

Neo deadpanned, completely unable to understand what was going through Ruby's mind. Did she really believe there was no difference between stupidly risking her life and asking for help?

"Did you… change your mind?" kept asking Ruby.

Neo facepalmed, and as Ruby felt bad for seemingly missing something obvious, she received another message.

I've never minded helping, just as long as it doesn't put my own life in danger.

Heck, that had been her job just before Beacon too, even if she didn't get to do it for long. Helping people by killing off the ones that were a danger to them.

"Oh…" Ruby seemed at a loss, "So, will you help us against Salem?"

Neo rolled her eyes before nodding, why did she believe she was going to Vacuo for anyway? Well, part of it was to get her job back, if Rumpole and Theodore still wanted her, but most of it was because she was smart enough to realize that if nobody stopped Salem, they would all die. She wasn't going to take a risk with her survival by leaving someone else to do the job.

"Great!" said Ruby, "I'm sorry I can't let you out though, miss Goodwitch said we were all going to talk about it when we arrive in Vacuo. Will you be alright?"

Neo stifled a chuckle, then realizing Ruby was seriously worried about her, she smiled and removed her shackles.

"Wait what?" asked Ruby, surprised, "Were they not tied correctly?"

Neo grinned and signed Ruby to come closer, which she did. When she got close enough, Neo closed the shackle around Ruby's leg, tying her up to the bed.

"Hey!" shouted Ruby, bouncing back and falling down as Neo was laughing uncontrollably, "Why did you do that?"

Ruby tried using her sembance to get out, but the shackles were stopping her leg from turning into rose petals, and she was stuck.

Neo started laughing even harder as she saw a pout form on Ruby's face, who decided to turn her back on Neo on top of it, only worsening the mute's laughter.

"Meanie," said Ruby after a while, turning back towards Neo, "Could you remove them now?"

Neo smiled and crouched over her bed to reach down to Ruby's ankle, but before she could attempt to free her from the shackle, Ruby grabbed her wrist and pulled her down.

Taken by surprise, and not being in the most stable position in the first place, Neo crashed down head first, making quite a ruckus, and it was Ruby's turn to laugh at her expense.

"You okay in there?" they heard Yang shout from outside.

The door opened the moment after, and Ruby reflexively shot up with her semblance.

"We're fine!" she shouted back at the same time, worried Yang would get the wrong idea if she saw her attached to the bed in Neo's stead.

However, as soon as she said that she realized that she had managed to use her semblance to stand up, where normally she shouldn't have been able to due to the shackles. Looking down, she noticed that Neo was back to being the one shackled to the bed, just in time as Yang came in.

"What happened?" asked Yang, seeing Neo having fallen down from the bed, "Did she try to attack you?"

"What? No!" objected Ruby, "Why do you always assume the worst?"

"She's a criminal," noted Yang.

"Well that didn't seem to worry you much back when you left the two of us alone for months," pointed out Ruby.

"That…"

"And anyway, she is going to help us against Salem, so play nice," added Ruby.

"That'll have to depend on what we all agree on when we reunite in Vacuo," corrected Yang.

Neo would have corrected her further, pointing out that either she went back to working under Theodore and Rumpole, or left to do her own thing, and that nobody was really capable of stopping her from doing so, but she didn't want to bother writing that down, nor did she want to anger the blonde brute while she wasn't really able to dodge her punches.

Oh, and she should probably warn Ruby that she might not appreciate her help, given how they did things in Vacuo… maybe.

Eh, she'll figure that for herself later.

It didn't take too long for them to reach Vacuo. A day, at worst, probably closer to a dozen hours or so. When RWBY and a couple of Valean Huntsmen escorted Neo out of the airship, they realized just how many people had joined in for this final battle in Vacuo.

There were hundreds of Huntsmen and Huntresses busying themselves unloading the airships, and that was only the ones from Vale. In fact, that was probably nearly the entire population of Vale's Hunters that had come to Vacuo's help.

Glynda Goodwitch joined them soon enough, her nose still in the paperwork she was holding. For some reason, she had flown here on another airship than the one they were on.

"Thank you for your work, I'll take it from here," she said to the two Huntsmen around Neo. Once they left, she turned towards team RWBY, "Follow me, we'll go directly to headmaster Theodore's office."

"Is she coming with us as well?" asked Weiss, pointing at Neo.

"Yes, headmaster Theodore wishes for her to be there," answered Glynda.

Neo felt a cold sweat dripping down her neck. She wasn't really all that sure if that was a good news. She did disappear for nearly over a year after Beacon.

In fact, the closer they got to Theodore's office, the more Neo was having second thoughts about her idea of getting her job back. Maybe that was too risky after all.

Before she could change her mind and run though, they arrived at their destination, Theodore waiting behind his desk with Rumpole by his side. Next to them was Oscar, Ozpin? Ozcar? Well, whoever he was right now, along with Jaune, Ren, Nora, Penny and Winter.

"Sister!" shouted Weiss as she rushed to hug Winter.

Winter didn't even hesitate to hug Weiss, while Penny dashed in and tackled the rest of team RBY to the ground.

"You're all alright!" she shouted.

"Penny!" shouted back Ruby in tears, "Guys!"

JNR were a lot colder than Winter and Penny though, the bad glares they sent Neo maybe explaining part of why they had a hard time being fully happy in this situation.

Neo ignored them, of course, and simply waved at Theodore and Rumpole with her hands still being cuffed.

"Why is she here?" venomously asked Jaune.

"To help us," answered Theodore, "Once we finish settling a few matters about her recent actions."

This exchange quickly froze the reunion, and everyone quickly went back to their place, understanding that they'd have time to catch up later, but now they needed to do this first.

"Help us?" asked Jaune, "She helped Beacon fall! It's her fault if…"

"We take responsibility for her actions in Vale," cut off Rumpole, "She was to eliminate the threat looming over Vale, which we believed was linked to whoever was coercing Roman Torchwick into his most recent strike of criminal activity, before his… demise."

Neo stiffened a bit at being reminded of Roman's death, but Rumpole continued uninterrupted.

"We understood after a while that she was not in any capacity of eliminating the threat, given the situation, and since we considered her part in Cinder's plan not to be essential to Vale's downfall, we allowed her to stay to protect Roman Torchwick and gather any additional information we could get. That being said, we are not responsible for her actions after the fall of Beacon. This is what we're expecting to hear about here."

"You knew?" shouted Jaune, "You knew about Vale being about to fall and you did nothing? You…"

"Wrong," interrupted Theodore, "We knew, yes, but we did do something. We warned Ozpin, who didn't heed our warnings, and thus we brought our students back home before the Kingdom had any chance to fall."

All heads turned towards Oscar, who felt really small right now.

"I don't get it, if Theodore warned you about it, why didn't you do anything?" asked Nora.

Oscar seemed to wonder with himself for a moment, then his eyes flashes briefly, indicating Ozpin was taking control.

"Just like how Ironwood had a tendency to… solve everything with brute force," he explained, "Theodore has a tendency to accuse without proof. The warning came to us when miss Xiao Long was accused of maiming Mercury Black, and since we had reports saying he and his team had gone back to Mistral, we assumed he was wrong. Moreover, at the time we didn't know who the traitor was, and our suspicions fell on the only one I didn't bring in myself."

"Who was it?" asked Blake.

"Me," answered Rumpole, "My history is solely with Theodore, I never really interacted much with the other members of our group, I can understand why I was the most suspicious one."

While they were talking, Jaune looked like he was on the verge of a panic attack, while Nora stepped by his side to support him.

"What about what she did afterwards then?" asked Ren, "When she stole the Relic from us, was it you who told her to do so as well?"

"As I said, we are not responsible for her actions after the fall of Beacon," answered Rumpole before turning towards Neo, "Would you explain them?"

Neo turned towards Ruby and signed her to answer for her. There was too much to say, and she really didn't want to write it down.

"Uhm… Well, when Neo stole the Relic, she said it was for insurance," explained Ruby, "She was planning to kill Cinder to get revenge for Torchwick, and she stole it to make sure she could stay by her side if we failed to kill her at that time."

"For how long have you known about her?" asked Penny.

"Not too long after Beacon fell, when we were on our way to Haven, Neo gathered a grimm horde and attacked us, well me. She wanted revenge for Torchwick," explained Ruby, "We… talked it out, and she changed her mind?"

Neo stopped a chuckle. Talking it out was a very nice way of putting it.

"She's been following us ever since," admitted Ruby.

"And you never told us?" shouted Jaune.

"She threatened to kill us if I said anything, and I didn't think we could take her on," said Ruby, "I almost told it to uncle Qrow, but then he was poisoned, and by the time he recovered I got to know Neo a bit more and I figured that it wasn't a problem if I didn't tell you if it meant we could count on her to fight Salem too."

Silence filled the room for a moment, and Rumpole decided to intervene.

"Is this everything, or is there something you forgot to tell us?" she asked.

"Well, just at the end, Neo may have… caused us to lose the Relic of Creation and ruined our plan to save the people of Atlas by using the last question to bait Cinder into attacking us," added Ruby, "But… she's not the only one responsible there."

"What do you mean?" asked Theodore.

"She means she didn't kill Cinder on purpose," said Yang.

"You what?!" shouted Jaune, "Why would you do that?! She destroyed Beacon, she killed Penny once, she… she killed Pyrrha! Why would you let her live?!"

"I… I'm sorry," started Ruby, "But I couldn't do it… I can't."

"You!" started Jaune.

"Stop," said Rumpole, with all the authority of an experience teacher, "I suggest you all leave and take some time to think about what we talked about calmly, before you do anything you might regret."

Jaune calmed down a bit, and he and his team left the room shortly after, RWBY following after a while.

"What about her?" asked Winter, pointing at Neo, "What are you planning to do with her?"

"Given that she was working for us before Beacon," explained Rumpole, "We're going to talk for a bit to decide whether we keep her or not. After that, should we decide to not have her work for us, you'll be brought in again to offer your opinion on what happens to her."

"What?" asked Winter, at the limit of outrage.

"In Vacuo, do as the Vacuans do," said Theodore, "Until we decide to formally fire her, she is one of ours, and I refuse to let a stranger decide on her fate before we do."

Winter lingered for a moment, but soon left, followed closely by Penny. The only ones that remained were Oscar and Glynda, along with Neo, Theodore and Rumpole.

"Is there anything else?" asked Theodore.

Glynda, who had stayed silent until now, finally spoke up.

"I… have a few things to ask."

I may or may not have forgotten that Neo had still been carrying the Relic of Knowledge here. Oops, we'll just assume Glynda took it off her when Neo fainted.

No chapter next week, my cousin is getting a PACS (think administrative marriage, but not really).

Coming up is a long argument between Glynda and Theodore/Rumpole, and more reactions to Neo having worked and potentially working for one of the four Headmasters.

To be continued on January 29th

Name : Neo Politan

Age : 18

Level : 21 (37%)

Class : Illusionist [You add both your Intelligence and Dexterity modifiers to your AC and to Dexterity or Intelligence based attacks as long as you can still cast illusions]

Path : Me, myself and I [You live for yourself first and foremost, no matter what pain you might cause others]

Destiny : All for one [Everyone can die, if it means you get to survive]

Title : The Gamer

HP : 11/11

AP : 110/110

STR : 12

CON : 11

DEX : 20

INT : 23

WIS : 13

CHA : 17

Semblance : The Gamer

Status effects :

Gamer's body [Your body follows game-like mechanics. You can restore 1/4th of your total HP (rounded down) by resting 15 minutes. You can only die if your HP reach 0 and you fail your last breath]

Child of Remnant [You are from Remnant and follow different rules than other worlds. Your HP is always equal to your constitution and any bonuses that would normally improve it are transferred to your aura]

Words that shouldn't be said [Your last words almost caused you to lose your life. You cannot talk until you overcome your trauma]

Defenses:

AC : 29(34)

For : 22

Ref : 28

Will : 25