CHAPTER XLVI
Every Breath I Take
"Oh, man, it's been so long since we were all together," Yang said as she pulled up beside Blake and Ruby, who rode in the same car.
"Oooh!" Ruby squealed.
"This is why you're not driving," Blake sighed.
"That's so not nice!"
"You haven't changed at all. You still get excited way too easily."
"Yeah," Yang chuckled. "Jaune must've been exhausted dealing with your energy and Lilly's when you guys were on the same team together."
Ruby growled. "Just you wait, White Rose is gonna kick Bumblebee's butt."
"Gosh," Blake said. "We're just gonna visit Weiss, not start a civil war in Team RWBY."
"Green light!" Yang said before revving and pulling away fast enough to wheelie for a while.
"There she goes," Blake said as she followed after their companion.
"I wonder what she's up to," Ruby said, looking out the window.
"Weiss, you mean?"
"Yeah. I know everybody says she gardens all day long, but what else does she do?"
"Watch movies? No, she's more the type to go listen to symphonies and concertos."
"Ugh, those words are too complicated."
"Oh, goodness."
"Hey, you go listen to those concerts nowadays, too, don't you?"
"What, just because I'm Queen of Menagerie?"
"Mm-hmm!"
"Well, I mean I do go, but it's not like that's all I listen to."
"Oooh! We should all attend a Lyon's Pride concert together!"
"Does Hollie still tour?"
"I dunno. We could always ask her."
When the trio pulled up to Weiss's house at the edge of town, they stared in disbelief.
"She really does garden all day long," Blake said, shutting the door behind her.
Yang chuckled. "I guess it can be relaxing. Although I can see Ruby getting frustrated and pruning everything with her scythe."
"Hey!" Ruby said. "I know how to take care of plants, you know!"
The front door to the house opened and Weiss gasped before running to her three best friends.
"Weiss!" Ruby yelled as they embraced. Before long, all four were locked in one big group hug. "We missed you!"
"'We'?" she said. "Why does it sound like you've all been together without me or something?"
"Cuz we have," Blake said.
"Yup," Yang said. "You're the only one missin' out."
Weiss smiled. "I'm not missing out on anything."
"Whoa," Ruby said. "What was with that super relaxed confidence just now?"
She turned to the garden, where her daughter was tending to the flowers, being overly careful with the watering can and everything else.
"Lilly!" Weiss said. "Seriously, what's the matter with you? It's not like this is your first time taking care of the garden!"
"Uh!" Lilith said. "I-I mean, it's been so long! I'm more used to swinging Myrtenaster at the Grimm instead of carefully pruning flowers!"
Weiss sighed heavily.
"Hey, wait!" she said, getting up to run to them and tripping on the way.
I told you it would be too obvious with your gardening!
"Shut! Up!" Lilith growled as she rubbed her knee.
"Are you okay, kiddo?" Yang asked her.
"Yup!" she said as she skipped to the group. "Whoa. Girl power, huh?"
"We're in a boys-free-zone right now!" Ruby said.
"Hey, I'll put some coffee on."
"That super bitter stuff?"
"Nope!" Lilith said as she led the way to the house. "Mom and I got the blend perfect. No need for blasphemous amounts of sugar or cream!"
"I'll believe it when I taste it," Blake said, joining the two. "I'll come help so Ruby doesn't burn your little house down."
"You're so mean to me today!" Ruby said as they disappeared into the house.
Yang couldn't help but chuckle. She turned to Weiss. From what she could tell, Lilly hadn't told her anything. She didn't seem to be aware of Lilith's existence either. She probably wouldn't be anywhere near as serene if she knew.
"I can't believe how similar they are," Weiss sighed.
"Huh?" Yang said. "Who's similar to who?"
"Lilly and..."
Yang waited. She couldn't assume anything and accidentally reveal something she shouldn't.
"You know."
"Tell me."
Weiss sighed again. "I still can't..."
From the pain in her eyes, Yang knew exactly what she was talking about. "Yeah. They really are similar, aren't they?"
Weiss wiped a few tears away before they could fall. "Goodness. It's been twenty years and I still can't say his name out loud. I'm a total wreck."
"I dunno. You've been doing pretty good. Your kid's proof of it, I think."
They watched as the youngest of the bunch went back out into the garden, fumbling with a trowel.
"I thought you taught her how to garden and shit," Yang said.
"I did," Weiss sighed. "I have no idea what the heck is wrong with her. Oh, but she did learn something new. I guess piano took all the brain space gardening once filled."
Yang chuckled, an effort to hide her knowledge of the fact that the girl in the distance was most likely Lilith and not Lilly. They had yet to meet in person, but Ruby had given her quite the detailed report on the matter. The standout element was the fact that Lilith was nothing like a certain other Wraith they had known in the past. Even now, Lilith was more of an innocent, but mischievous girl than an outright malevolent entity.
"Piano?" Yang said. "Didn't you teach her when she was only seven or something?"
"I did," Weiss began, "but she never really got any farther than, like, Chopin's Prelude Number 7 or Ave Maria. And those are really easy in the repertoire."
"God, you're speaking in a foreign language again."
Weiss laughed. "The point is, those are really easy pieces to learn. Even beginning students can pick them up and play them really well. But today she played Rachmaninoff Opus 33, Number 2."
"Again with the foreign language."
"Here," she said as she pulled out her scroll and navigated to a video sharing site. "Listen to this." She played a video of Ave Maria. "And now listen to Rachmaninoff."
"Shit," Yang said, her eyes wide open. "You're right. Those are completely different songs."
"They're pieces," Weiss said with sarcasm dripping off every letter.
"Yeah. Sure. Anyway, maybe you raised a child prodigy and didn't even know it."
She sighed. "I never realized how much can change in just two years."
"You're tellin' me."
They were both silent for a moment, watching as the youngest continued to fumble with the gardening tools. The smell of brewing coffee wafted over to them. Yang couldn't believe the scent. She was never one for coffee given how bitter it tended to be, but this aroma reaching her now was sweet, almost floral.
"So," Yang said. "Have you been able to say goodbye yet?"
Weiss turned to her without a word. Her friend said nothing, but no words were needed. She knew exactly what she was trying to say.
"I...don't really have to," she broke her own silence.
"Huh?"
"Goodbye is for when they're gone. But he isn't gone. He's still here. And always will be."
Yang looked over to her friend's daughter, who was no longer struggling as she tended to the flowers. "In her."
"Not just her. All of us. He touched every single one of us."
"Oh, he touched you all right."
Weiss looked at her dryly. "Really, Yang?"
"Mm-hmm."
"You're right, though. He did touch me. He changed me. I wouldn't be who I am today if it weren't for him."
"So, what now?"
"I don't know. I'm guessing you three are here to try and recruit me, too, right?"
"'Too'? Wait, don't tell me the SS already got to you first."
"That's giving them too much credit."
Yang grinned. "Tell me you gave them the shit-stomping they deserved."
"It didn't get that far, but let's just say they know their place." Her eyes glowed with golden light for a brief moment before returning to blue.
"Heh. You haven't grown soft at all."
"I dunno. I garden all day long. The last time I was in battle was at the exhibition match with everyone. Before that, it was at the close of the war."
"Believe me, Weiss, you of all people deserve the rest."
"What about you?"
"I think I enjoy it too much. Got a lot of pent up aggression to let out on the Grimm, you know?"
"Yeah. I do know. So, I noticed you're not traveling with your mom this time."
"Woulda been awkward riding with her and Ruby and Blake. She's at the Knight Academy with the others. Over on Vytal."
"They're really going ahead with it, then, huh?"
"There's always a place for you there if you ever decide gardening's gotten boring."
She looked over at her daughter, who looked to be arguing with herself as she fumbled with a pruning shear. "She's been so weird lately," she said.
"Gets it from you, prolly," Yang chuckled.
"What ever."
β
"That was a nightmare," Lilith said as she let herself fall down on her bed. "I don't get how you and mom find gardening so easy."
And I don't get how you were able to play that super complicated piece earlier!
"Psh. Rach's 33-2 isn't hard. It sounds hard, but it's nothing like Chopin 25-11. Or fucking anything by Liszt."
All I know how to play is Ave Maria.
"Dummy. You learned more than that, you know."
Yeah, but it's all I remember!
Lilith couldn't help but chuckle. "You're filling your head with other crap, that's why. Look, if I have the finger technique on the keyboard, that means you've got it, too. It's just locked away or something."
How does that make any sense?
"Duh, I'm basically your subconscious. If I know it, it's because on some deep level you know it, too."
Oh. Right. So, then, why can't you garden?
"That's beside the point! Anyway, how long do we plan on staying here? And are you seriously okay with me taking the wheel all day long?"
We can stay for as long as you wanna stay with mom.
She sighed. "I kinda do wanna stay forever."
Is that why you asked her what you did?
"You mean graduating from Beacon and then staying here? Yeah. I kinda did mean that. Even though it's total bullshit. We're probably expelled from Beacon since we haven't even been in Vale for more than a year now."
Yeah. But it's okay.
"Because you're fighting a more important fight now."
We are. I still believe. Even after all we've seen.
"And done."
Lilly didn't respond.
"Wasn't it you who told me that no one is beyond salvation? That includes you, you know."
But...
"I'm not having any of that. If I'm worth forgiving, who more than you of all people?"
Still. I condemned those children. And I murdered those men and women.
"I still say that was self-defense. As for the kids, they were dicks, yeah, and maybe that one guy didn't really deserve to get sucked into the Rune of Atonement, but I saw how defiant he was to the end. At that point, it wasn't even your call anymore. It was a Primal Rune's call."
A Primal Rune I summoned into this world.
"Maybe. Maybe not. Who knows? It's not uncommon for Primal Runes to use human beings to fulfill their will. For all you know, that thing was fated to enter this world. You were nothing more than the express highway."
Thanks. For trying to make me feel better.
"'Trying'? You sayin' I'm not succeeding?"
Well, I mean, kinda, I guess.
"Hmm. Anyway, you sure you wanna stay bottom bunk for now?"
Yeah.
"I guess it is safer this way. You do fall from the top bunk a lot."
Hey! You do it, too, you know!
"That was one time."
β
"I can't believe how good this coffee is," Blake said.
"Still kinda bitter and gross," Ruby said. "But yeah, you're right. It doesn't really need all that sugar and cream."
"You said the beans were from Menagerie?"
Weiss nodded. "The other beans in the blend are from Patch."
"Huh," Yang said. "You took coffee beans from our hometowns. Neat."
"So this is the RWBY Blend!" Ruby said.
Blake chuckled. "That's not so bad."
"But it sounds like the name of a person who doesn't even like coffee," Weiss said.
"Hey!" Ruby whined.
"Team RWBY Blend, then," Yang said.
"That works better," Blake said.
"So," Ruby began, setting her mug down. "You really plan on staying here, don't you?"
"Hmm?" Weiss said. "Oh. Yeah, I do."
"You're not lonely?"
"No, not really."
"Lilly only just came back," Blake said. "She's been gone for two years now."
"And like you said, she's back. So I'm not lonely. And it's not like she hasn't been calling me every other weekend. She says she's doing great in her classes, but her strength seems to be the practical exercises."
"That ain't an exaggeration," Yang said. "I've never seen anyone fight like your kid does."
"I have," Ruby said.
They all looked to her. Weiss's eyes went sullen while Yang and Blake were staring daggers.
"We've all thought it," Ruby continued. "From that day at the Vytal Festival Tournament, when she first used those runes against Ivory, and even when she summoned a projection of that knight in the middle of Beacon's quad. Like this coffee, her combat style is a perfect blend. Of Weiss's, andβ"
Blake sneezed.
"Gesundheit!" Yang said. "Wait, that's not gonna summon a rune into the air, is it?"
The four women shared a laugh together, but nothing could completely erase the melancholy in Weiss. After all, just as she had said to Yang earlier, he truly was in all of them, but especially in their child together.
The other three watched as she reached for her locket and opened it. She stared at the picture for some time, silent as her companions drank from their mugs.
"You two are so pretty together," Ruby said, looking at the photograph over her shoulder. "Ooh! This was when his hair was still brown!"
"Ruby!" Blake said.
"No, look! Remember? It wasn't until later on that his hair went all silver like Weiss's hair!"
"This was the first photograph ever taken of us," Weiss recalled. "A random young boy from a village we had just saved snapped this picture and gave us the printout."
"I think it's the perfect picture of you two," Ruby said before leaning her head on her best friend's shoulder.
"Ruby," Yang said as her younger sister began to sob.
"Sorry," Ruby said. "I dunno why the heck I'm crying."
Weiss reached over and took her best friend by the hand as she closed her locket. "I miss him, too, Ruby," she said.
Ruby began crying harder, embracing her best friend from behind. She tried her best to keep her voice muffled so that Lilly and Lilith wouldn't hear, but all she managed to do was get Weiss's shirt drenched.
"I've been meaning to ask," Blake said, "what the heck are you wearing?"
"Jeans and a t-shirt," Weiss answered factually.
"Yeah, we can see that," Yang said. "You don't wear jeans and t-shirts."
"I do now."
"What, are you rebelling against yourself or something?"
"I'm just starting to understand why Lilly likes to dress this way. It's quite comfortable while still being utilitarian."
"No!" Ruby said. "You can't leave me! I can't be the only one left in a combat skirt!"
"I'll wear one over my jeans, then."
"Ew!" Blake said.
"Gross!" Yang said.
Ruby's face twisted in disgust. "Uh, if that's the alternative, I don't mind being the last of the Combat Skirt Wearers."
The quartet shared a quiet laugh together.
β
Lilith stared at the ceiling as night fell. Her mother's friends were going to stay the night, but instead of socializing with them, she decided to isolate herself. It wasn't out of anti-social reasons. She was just drained by the events of the whole day. Having felt her mother's touch for the first time, being able to interact with her, it was all so emotionally overwhelming.
So I guess they haven't told mom about us.
"Yeah," Lilith replied. "Seems like it."
Why do you think there aren't any pictures of dad around?
She sighed. "Beats me. I know I said it's because he's a deadbeat, but..."
It hurts too much.
"Yeah. Any reminder of him hurts too much." She scoffed. "I guess we cause her the most pain, then. I mean, half our DNA is his."
I wish I could take that away from her. More than anyone else. Hey, do you think mom has a Labyrinth?
"Nope. I've already looked, back in the day. She doesn't have one, even with all the pain she carries with her."
Why do you think that is?
Lilith shrugged. "Could have something to do with her power. Might also be because it doesn't completely hinder her day to day life. Most of the guys with Fourth Layers are basically dysfunctional in the real world."
I wish we could do something for her.
"This one's out of our league. Believe me."
They were silent for a while. Lilith's eyes were starting to get heavy, but she was still too restless to get any sleep. Even with her eyes closed, her mind continued to race. But it wasn't just the events of the day. There was something tugging at her, like a part of her was missing.
"Hey, you there?"
Yeah.
"Um, is it just me, or do you get the feeling that we're forgetting something?"
Hmm. Now that you mention it, yeah, I've been getting a nagging feeling lately. Ever since we stepped out of the shower.
Lilith opened her eyes to stare at the ceiling. After a few minutes, she got up and headed to the window to watch the moon. It showed both its broken and unbroken sides today.
"Wait a minute," she said as her eyes opened wide. "Wait just a fucking minute."
Ivory!
"Yeah! Shit, what the hell happened to her?"
I didn't see her when we crossed over into Oasis from the Labyrinth.
"Me neither. But I'm a hundred percent certain she was pulled into the big light ball thing along with us when we did that, well, whatever the hell it was we did."
Okay, so, we were thinking about home when that thing happened and now we're here in Oasis.
"Where would 'home' be for Ivory?"
The manor?
"I think that's the most likely spot. There are other possible options, but I think that's our best bet."
Yeah, she does have a pretty strong allegiance to Atlas. And she grew up in that house.
"This is assuming that our magic affected her the same way it affected us."
You're the expert!
"Dude, I told you before, everything about our magic in this world is completely bonkers! I'm just going by what we can piece together, okay?"
So, should we go to the capital?
"Fuck." She paced left. "Shit." She paced right. "Hang on, we can't just barge in through the front door. Those SS dicks were able to operate in the Labyrinth. They've gotta be prepared for magic shenanigans."
Mantle, then?
"Hell no. We just got clean. We're not about to jump into another city-sized dumpster."
Wait a minute. I mean, we were able to get around the Labyrinth and stuff down in Mantle. Do you think we could navigate through the Labyrinth again? The SS patrols seemed to be a lot less frequent there.
"You're right. Hell, we could always go deeper and roam around the Second Layer. God, I can't believe I just suggested that."
I mean, it does sound safer than trying to get around SS patrols and stuff. Plus, I'm pretty sure the fog affects everyone, not just us. It'll keep us obscured while we go around.
"Yeah. Okay, that might be our only way in."
Let's go say 'bye' to mom, then.
Mom. Lilith hesitated for a moment, but she was resolute in only seconds. Lilly noticed the difference in her other half. Merely being in their mother's presence was enough to change her on a fundamental level. It wasn't long ago that she probably couldn't even be bothered to save Ivory, but now here she was, spearheading the operation, even at the cost of leaving her mother, whom she had just had the chance to interact with for the first time in her whole existence.
Don't worry. This won't be the last time we see her.
"I know," Lilith said before marching out into the living room, where Team RWBY was still in lively conversation.
"Lilly!" Ruby said. "You here to have some tea with us? It isn't as gross as coffee!"
"Ugh, sacrilege," Lilith mumbled. Her mother held out a hand and they high-fived.
Yang laughed. "That was an awesome mommy-daughter moment!"
"Anyway," Lilith began, "I just remembered something. I can't really stay."
"Huh?" Weiss said. "I thought you were planning on staying home for winter break."
"Yeah, I know. But I just realized I do have a winter project going on."
"Winter project?" Blake said.
Yang and Ruby exchanged glances before giving Blake a quick glance as well.
"Oh, wait!" Ruby said, backing her up. "You're talking about that thing with the thing and the thing!"
"Really?" Blake said dryly. "Did Leon really get that from you?"
Yang chuckled.
"School comes first, young lady," Weiss said. "If you've got a special project going on, you should've just stayed at the dorms instead of flying all the way here."
Lilith shrank. "Yeah, I know. I guess, I really wanted to see you. That's all."
Weiss smiled. "You know there's video calls and stuff, don't you? I mean, you call every other weekend."
Yang looked at the girl she figured must have been Lilith and not Lilly. "Video's not the same as in person." Lilith looked over at her. "Am I right, kiddo?"
Does she know it's you? Lilly said.
"Yeah," Lilith said. "Video's not the same."
Weiss stood up and hugged her daughter. "Stay the night. Get some sleep first. Tomorrow you can catch a flight to Vale."
She nodded. "'Kay, mom."
"Don't worry, Lilly!" Ruby said, hugging her. "We'll keep her company while you're away!"
Lilith made eye contact with her. She was certain at least Ruby and Yang knew it was her and not Lilly, and yet they continued to provide cover for her. Why?
"Go get some sleep," Blake said. "You'll stay short forever if you don't get any sleep."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Weiss and Ruby growled together before sharing a high five.
"There was nothing high about that five just now," Yang chuckled.
"Oh, can it!" Weiss said.
