The Storm
It'd been a few days since he and Weiss had officially made their truce, and Adam had finally allowed himself to sink into normalcy once again. His mornings were taken up by the increasingly organized self defense club he held for his faunus students, his afternoons were unsurprisingly absorbed by school, and his evenings were spent not alone but with his team. He had even begun genuinely talking with other students beyond Velvet.
It had taken months, but finally, Adam began to feel like he truly belonged.
And he knew that could never last.
That afternoon however, there didn't appear to be any reason for his suspicions to someone looking from the outside: Weiss was all but skipping down the roads lined with balloons and ribbons, Yang and Ruby were relentlessly teasing her about her sudden happiness and how it was over something as droll as festival organization, and Adam was idly chipping into their conversation from behind them, eyes scanning across the faceless crowd. With the Vytal Festival approaching, his team—or, rather, Weiss—had decided that they should watch the docks for the arriving students of Vacuo and introduce themselves as representatives of Beacon.
In other words, she was gathering information. He thought it clever, at least. His attention was soon drawn to a crime scene down another street: another Dust shop broken into from the looks of it, and one utterly ransacked, no less. These stories had been showing up more and more often, and Adam could not figure out just who it was or what it was for. The closest thing to a 'clue' he had was Ruby once mentioning that the reason she was allowed into Beacon early was stopping another robbery by Roman Torchwick. Was this the beginnings of some sort of turf war? The train car would have set the White Fang for months to come: it couldn't have been them...
He noticed the conversation around him die down. His teammates must have followed his sight.
It was the second Dust shop that week, and they had not even touched the money.
"You, ah... you thinkin' the White Fang?" one of the police officers on scene asked the other without worry: another sign of just how common this was getting.
"I'm thinkin' we don't get paid enough," the other grumbled.
"Of course it would be them," Weiss said with a shake of her head. "Those White Fang really are just an awful bunch of degenerates."
Adam arched an eyebrow at Weiss' sudden, snide comment. "I don't exactly see how they were related to this attack," he dryly retorted.
"Please, didn't you hear the police? It was clearly them!"
"They would have no reason to have all of this Dust—"
"They don't have a reason for anything they do!" Weiss interrupted Adam outright. "They're just a bunch of ruffians, and insane ones, at that!"
He took a deep breath and prepared himself. This was going to be a long day.
"The White Fang are not insane, nor do they commit acts without reason: if anything, it is the exact opposite. It is the—" He caught himself before he could accidentally imply his former position through a slip of the tongue or speaking for them. "They believe it's the only way to achieve equality."
Weiss scoffed in a mix of disgust and disbelief. "I didn't know equality meant wiping humanity off the face of the planet."
"How unsurprising: push a group far enough and they start demanding revenge." Though he spoke without remorse, Adam knew he needed to abandon this conversation. Fast. Whether or not he was a traitor, the White Fang—especially the Vale Cell—were still his people, and all the time in the world playing student wouldn't let him take too many attacks on them lying down.
"Still, they had no reason to attack this shop. They serve faunus, they didn't jack up their prices, the money wasn't stolen when the White Fang would need that just as much and they're in the middle of Downtown Vale. Something isn't adding up." Adam turned away to hide his sigh of relief when that got Ruby's attention. Weiss, however, only appeared to be silent because she was glaring daggers at him, clearly in thought.
"Adam's got a point," Ruby said. "They never caught that Torchwick guy I fought a while ago, maybe it was him..."
"I thought about that, but what would a random criminal need with that much dust?" Adam replied, hoping to steer the conversation as far away from the White Fang as possible.
"That does not change the fact that the White Fang are a bunch of scum." Weiss yanked the topic back. As he suspected, Weiss was only quiet because she was thinking of what else to say and frankly, her tone sounded like it was implying something a little too close for comfort. "Those faunus only know how to lie, cheat and steal!"
He glared down at Weiss. She was playing with fire.
"That's not... necessarily true." Yang actually agreeing with Weiss was like a knife to the back. Adam's glare only intensified and locked onto Yang. Shame on him, he thought, for forgetting that he was still amidst humans.
"And what, pray tell, do you mean by 'those faunus'?" he growled out at them both.
"Hey! Stop that faunus!" someone shouted from the docks.
Fate had an awful sense of humor.
While the rest of the team rushed over to the docks to see what the commotion was about, Adam leisurely strolled up, taking the time to cool himself off. He had gotten to the railing just in time to see a well-built monkey faunus with blonde hair chuck a banana peel right at a police officer's face. White, open shirt, beaten up blue jeans, scuffed and ratty sneakers... either he was a stowaway, he was from Vacuo, or a combination of the two.
With a devious laugh, the faunus was off, racing up the stairs and easily outpacing the police. In only a couple seconds, he was darting past them. Perhaps it said something about the mystery stowaway's personality that he found the time to flirtatiously wink at Yang as he passed.
Perhaps it said something about Yang's personality that she was quick enough to wink back.
Weiss turned to her with a confused, scandalized expression.
Yang shrugged. "... What? It was instinct!"
"Ugh, whatever, we have to catch him!" She dashed off in pursuit, leaving the rest of the team to follow, right up until Adam jogged his way to the front and started to slow down, purposefully making the team slower with him.
"Is there any particular reason we're chasing after him?" he asked.
"Well, as huntresses—and huntsman—in training, we should be helping the authorities, now pick up the pace!"
"Are you certain that's the only reason, Schnee?" That got her to stop near an intersection and spin on her heels to glare at Adam.
"And just what are you implying?" Realizing only afterwards that stopping meant the faunus was gaining ground, Weiss scoffed and started stomping forward.
"Sal-u-tations!" And fell right onto her rear as a young teen suddenly spun around the corner in front of her. She was an odd type: pale-orange hair, bright, light-green eyes full of such much innocent glee Adam could've sworn she was glowing, and a plain outfit broken up only by strange, black segments on her neck and stockings with glowing, green stripes. The three girls couldn't notice, but as a faunus, Adam could tell she smelled... strange. Metallic. Glowing attire and a scent of metal. This must have been an Atlas child.
Weiss grumbled something and pushed herself up to her feet, then tried to advance. The girl only stared at them all with a goofy smile, apparently not comprehending that she wanted her to move. Stuck at an impasse, Ruby was the first one to actually address her.
"Uh... hello?"
"My name is Penny! It is a pleasure to meet you!" Penny introduced herself loudly to the four with slightly stilted speech. Definitely Atlas. Only they would have someone so cooped up that they couldn't even talk to people correctly. The group, himself included, took a step back from her.
"Hi Penny, I'm Ruby!"
"Yang."
"Look, we are a little busy right now, so if you wouldn't mind stepping out of the way, that would be really nice." Weiss didn't give a chance for this silliness to go on any longer.
Penny stared blankly at Weiss for a moment, then suddenly jolted like she had snapped out of a trance and replied, "Wow! That's a really long name! It's a pleasure to meet you!"
Yang snorted. "Hey, look at that, she has jokes! But, uh, we really oughta be going, right now!" Adam had already begun walking in the opposite direction by the time Yang even finished saying that much. Ruby waved and followed, leaving Penny just staring ahead at them once again with that same smile.
After just a moment too long to be natural, Penny exuberantly waved them off. "Take care!"
Weiss pinched the bridge of her nose.
"Now we'll never catch that degenerate..." she grumbled.
Adam tried to bite back his response, but it was no use. "Oh, please! Does being a stowaway really warrant calling him a ruffian and a degenerate as if he were common street scum?" He pointed at Weiss, making it very clear that this was a direct challenge.
"Laws are laws! Just give him time and I bet he'll join the White Fang, like the rest of them." Now, it was Adam's turn to look scandalized.
"So ignorant, as if talk like that isn't the reason people join in the first place! Always acting so high and mighty while you stomp the weak under your shoe. You really are no different from the rest of your company!"
Weiss' eyes briefly flashed with hurt, but hardened just as quickly. When Adam attempted to march off, Weiss was right behind him.
"How dare you talk to me like that! I distinctly recall we had a truce, Adam!"
"Just because you hide how you feel about me doesn't mean I'm going to stand by and let you spout your prejudice against the faunus!"
"Prejudice implies that it isn't based on fact! Are you telling me that a criminal faunus wouldn't join the White Fang?"
"I'm telling you that saying a criminal would solely based on him being a faunus only throws your true colors out for the world to see! The colors of a Schnee!"
"That's not a denial, Adam: are you saying the White Fang are radicals, after all?"
Yang and Ruby watched helplessly: it was the two most stubborn and needlessly aggressive members of their team. Short of physical interference, there was just nothing they could do at all. They could only hope the fight ended soon.
Moonlight streamed into their dorm room over the two arguing partners. It didn't.
"I don't get this!" Weiss threw her arms up. "We had a truce! You said we were going to be friends, and now you're causing this huge problem over nothing!"
"Nothing? You're insulting my entire race!" He flung his hat onto the ground in rage. By now, the two were standing nary a foot away, glaring fiercely at one another as they argued. It hadn't become a physical altercation, but Ruby and Yang feared it was only minutes away.
"You're defending a group of terrorists who despises humanity! The faunus of the White Fang are pure evil!"
"And your kin aren't? Don't make me laugh! They fight fire with fire, to make sure people like Cardin, people like Jacques"—Weiss took a sharp breath at the direct mention of her father, and her eyes flickered with rage—"people like you can't step on them with impunity!" He slammed his foot down onto his hat, and it wasted away into wilting petals.
Weiss looked like she'd been slapped. Being called hateful and racist? She was a Schnee, she was used to that. But to be compared directly to him, to Jacques, by someone who actually knew her? Who spoke to her? Who she at least tried to consider a friend? That was a knife to the back, even from Adam.
Hurt gave way to indignation.
"They stepped on my family all the time! I'm the victim, here!" The two silently glared at one another, emerald and ice boring into each other in a terrible desire to see the other crack, and the silent wish that the other would just relent. When Adam did not, Weiss continued.
"You want to know why I hate the White Fang?" She jabbed his chest with her finger. "Why I can't trust other faunus?" Another jab. A part of Weiss hoped Adam caught that he wasn't included in that. She just couldn't understand why he was getting so upset over this all of the sudden.
She slowly stepped away from him and turned to the window. Adam did not follow. Instead, he stepped back, and reached for something in his travel bag.
"They've been at war with my family since the beginning. A real war, as in actual bloodshed." She turned back to face him. "Can you even imagine having a target painted on your family's back since before you were even alive? Seeing your friends, your family, disappear, and show up in an obituary the next day, even as a child? Knowing that the people under you are marked for death for things they never even touched, never could touch?" Weiss' eyes stayed locked onto his: she had meant to be more kind, or at least to just give context, but to hear her be compared to her father so casually... it was then that she understood that he never knew, and never would know what it was like.
"Have you ever seen people you know executed, knowing there are people out there who cheered? I've lost seven board members and I knew every last one of them. How about seeing entire chunks of your livelihood stolen in a flash like the entire train worth of dust that just so happened to vanish?" So enraptured in her cold tirade, Weiss was, that she never saw Adam's fist clenching, nor did she recognize the building fury in his eyes.
"Have you ever had to sit in a house surrounded and filled with hate, from the parents to your own siblings?" She didn't notice him walking forward, either.
"Have you ever... ever had to wonder if people would cheer if you died, too?" Weiss' gaze fell to the ground for only a moment. When she brought it back up to face her opponent in this verbal duel however, she found Adam looming over her, not even two inches away with eyes of glowing crimson. Yet, this time, she could not see that same hatred and bloodlust she had before their truce. No, this time, Weiss saw...
Frustration.
"Yes."
Out of sight, Ruby's shoulders slumped, and her optimism finally began to crumble. Was this what was going on in her group the entire time? Her team was falling apart behind her back and she never even noticed. She was a terrible leader. She summoned up her courage and, for the first time, tried to step between the two. Ruby placed a hand on Weiss' shoulder.
"Weiss, maybe we should..."
Weiss only threw Ruby's hand back and shoved Adam a step away. Yang reached for Adam, but paused when she saw a glimpse of something pale in his hand.
"No! Then you should know, Adam! You should know why I hate the White Fang! You should know why I can never trust the other faunus: because their methods of murder and terrorism ruins everyone's lives—" Adam forced something into Weiss' arms hard enough to throw her against her bed.
"MY METHODS WERE WORKING!" He bellowed.
And then there was silence.
.
.
.
"A-Adam?" Ruby's soft voice, so fragile and confused, slipped through the air. Her silver eyes—no, all of their eyes—were on Weiss.
The custom Grimm mask of a White Fang commander stared back at them from her lap.
Weiss was the first one to dare look up at the man—the monster—standing in front of them. All of that hate in his eyes had burned out, leaving only a cold, watchful shell. If Weiss didn't know any better, in fact, she would've thought they looked hollow, but right now, the only thing that was important to her were the other two girls in this room. After all, their actions would determine their fates... and if what he was implicating wasn't just some sick joke, their lives.
"Who are you?" Ruby's voice cracked.
Adam closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and confirmed their worst fears. "I am Adam Taurus, ex-major and former commander of the White Fang's Vale Cell."
Yang's fist collided with his jaw. In a blur of red and rose petals, Ruby jumped in between them before it could get worse.
"Wait! Wait! W-we should hear him out!" she shouted. Were it anyone else, Yang would have struck them all the same. Her eyes were a vivid red, flames licking at her hair.
"What's there to hear, Rubes? He's not just a terrorist, he's leading them! He was lying to us!" Ember Celica deployed itself around her hands.
"Led. Past tense."
Yang yanked Ruby out of the way at the sound of the terrorist's voice and held her sister behind her. Ruby must have gotten through to Yang: she only took up a defensive stance. Yet, Adam did not take up a fighting stance of his own, only collapsing onto his bed and leaning forward on his knees. He dragged a hand through his hair and horns, not bringing his eyes to meet theirs. His aura did not even activate itself.
"A... friend of mine had shown me what I'd done. What I'd become. It was hard for me to accept at the time, but I should have known even back then that I was staring into the abyss for too long. So, I left. I left what I'd been building for the past three years and everyone I'd met with it, all to follow her. She would return to her home to try and change the White Fang at its roots, and I would come here to..." Blake had said it was to learn to coexist with humans and wait for her to start the next step in retaking the White Fang, but he knew now what her true mission for him was.
"Cleanse myself of the hatred in my heart." He was met with only more silence, Adam dragged his sight up to the three girls. While Adam knew he might've appeared aloof, the truth was that he'd simply accepted whatever was about to occur. He had no plans of going without a fight, however.
Ruby nudged past Yang's arm. "... Is it working?"
Adam turned to the innocent one of the four, and a quiet chuckle escaped him. "I consider three humans to be my friends and haven't had the urge to set fire to a Dust shop in two days: I'd call that progress."
"O-oh, well, uh... two days is kinda long..." Ruby fumbled and tried to make something nice out of it. Yang narrowed his eyes at him.
"It was a joke. A poor one, sorry. However, for what it's worth, I did enjoy being here. My word may not mean much, I know, but I can assure you that I had no plans on 'regressing' any time soon. I doubt I can ever be forgiven for the acts of my past, but that doesn't mean I can't try to at least be remembered for something pleasant." As Adam spoke, Yang's eyes pierced through him like an x-ray, searching for everything from flaws in his story to his tone. She could sense a little venom in there, alright, yet it wasn't aimed at them. If anything, sounded like it was directed solely at himself.
And so they remained there, silently arguing with and within themselves on what to do, if anything. He was a terrorist leader, but he'd left. He'd killed who knows how many, now he wanted to save many more. He was a beast, but he was trying to restore his humanity.
He was their enemy, but he was also their friend.
Ruby steeled herself and stood tall. She knew exactly how she felt about this. Her lips parted to speak.
"I-It was you..." Weiss spoke first, and the three suddenly remembered that she had been sitting there the entire time, eyes wide and bearing a storm of emotions as she stared into the mask. When she finally, shakily, stood up, those ice-blue eyes had finally settled on one thing to bear to the world: betrayal. The mask trembled in her grip.
"It was you, that entire time? You were the one leading a war on my family? A-all of my friends in Vale who disappeared, all... all of my family members who perished, all that stolen Dust and Lien? You? A-and you just sat there, like nothing had happened?" She took a few, slow steps forward. Ruby and Yang glanced nervously between one another, but did nothing. Weiss' breath quickened as rage tried so hard to fight against the feelings of betrayal and sorrow, only to be thrown back beneath the waves as soon as it breached the surface. Her throat grew tight and her eyes burned. She felt like she was going to be sick.
"You called yourself my teammate, my friend, when you killed my loved ones yourself? How... how can you sit there and do that! How can you be so despicable! You expect me to believe that you're nothing more than... than monstrous, villainous scum? Do you really think I'd believe that you aren't waiting to stab me in the back and enjoy it? I bet you were cheering just like the rest of your damned group when my cousins were executed! I-I bet you brought the blade against their neck yourself." The heiress caught herself sniffling as she advanced. This was all his fault. Her partner, the one who had the nerve to sit beside her every day, was the one who ruined her life and laughed about it.
Adam said nothing.
A hysteric, broken laugh slipped from her. "I knew it! If I went and found their final moments that you broadcasted, I'd find you there, wouldn't I?! I'd hear your voice! See your wretched face!" She stood only a foot away from him, now.
Adam said nothing.
It was all the confirmation she needed. Her fury breached the surface of her sadness, dragging out all the spite and fire right with it. She hurled the mask at him, rage blinding her and instead sending it clattering against the wall.
"You disgust me!" She slapped him. There was no guilt, this time.
"You're worse than a Grimm!" Another slap. He wasn't her teammate. Not anymore.
"I despise you!" Her nails raked across aura.
Adam didn't react. Her anger soared higher.
"I-I... I'll kill you!" Weiss shrieked and lunged at him with tears of rage in her eyes. Her hands never reached Adam's throat.
"W-what? Ruby? Yang?" The former had stepped between the two, the latter grabbing onto Weiss' shoulder to hold her in place. Her eyes bounced between the three in a panic that only grew when she saw Adam clutching Wilt and Blush. Her eyes burned again, but this time it was in rage both at herself for nearly throwing herself into what could've been her death, and her supposed friends from keeping her away from rightful revenge.
"Look, Weiss, I know he's done some crazy things, but..." Yang began.
Weiss' eyes widened in shock. "Crazy..." she repeated in total disbelief. "He's a murderer! You... you aren't actually taking his side, are you?!"
"Yes! Well, no! There's another way around this!"
"I can't believe you, Yang! Ruby, talk some sense into her! This is ridiculous! You know what this barbarian's done!"
Ruby winced under Weiss' gaze; even if the two hated each other, Weiss and Adam certainly had at least one thing in common: that positively withering glare. She nervously rubbed her wrist and looked around the room, searching for anything but her feuding friends.
"W-Weiss, he looks pretty serious about this! I mean, can't we at least give him a chance?"
Weiss' glare stayed locked onto Ruby for an eternity, then began to fade. Her eyes dull, she finally appeared to relax at Ruby's words, and Yang sighed in relief. One step at a time.
"Don't touch me," her frozen, quiet voice surprised even Adam.
Yang blinked. "What?"
"I said don't touch me!" she screamed and pushed the shocked blonde away from her before storming off to the door and throwing it open. JNPR stood on the other side and were nearly bowled over as Weiss forced her way past them.
"Weiss! Weiss, wait, come back!" Ruby called after her, but it was too late. She was gone.
JNPR awkwardly stared at the members of R_AY for a few moments: Ruby staring disbelievingly at the door, Yang hunched over the window, gripping the windowsill hard enough for it to strain in her hands, and Adam sitting on his bed, looking like he was trying to bore a hole through the floor to Mistral with his gaze alone, black stripes through his hair looking just a little too much like horns in the moonlight.
Jaune finally broke the tension. "We, uh, heard a big commotion, over here. Is everything alright?"
"It's complicated," Adam murmured.
"We'll, um... we'll be fine, Jaune, don't worry! We just had a little fight, that's all..." Ruby tried to explain. While none of JNPR looked like they bought it, they respected their privacy enough to back away.
Weiss didn't know for how long she'd been walking. The sky was dark, but she heard the birds already awakening from their slumber. Normally, she loved the songs of those whimsical creatures, yet tonight, they sounded like the jeering of crows. Her friends had betrayed her. They'd taken the side of some terrorist, someone whose hands were soaked in blood, instead of hers! She thought they were friends!
She thought they cared about her.
The fleeing girl barely thought to wipe the tears from her cheeks as she wandered through the empty streets of Vale. Weiss didn't know where she could go now. There was no way she was going to go back to school with that creature, but it wasn't like she could just walk around Vale forever. She'd need a place to stay, food to eat, clothes to wear. The cost wasn't a problem, it was that her father would no doubt notice the sudden drain of funds. He'd want answers. He'd demand answers... and if he knew she wasn't at Beacon, the demand to return to that home would follow.
It wasn't fair! It just wasn't fair! Why! She did everything she could, she was the best teammate she could be, and they'd just thrown her away! And that wasn't even the worst part!
Her breath caught in her throat as she saw a cop car lingering near one of the few shops that was still open. Weiss turned and hurried off the other way.
The worst part was that every time she wanted to just tell the authorities what was happening, her mind would reel and she'd find herself racing somewhere else. The worst part was that she didn't want to see Ruby and Yang get in trouble for harboring some criminal.
The worst part was that Weiss knew, somewhere in there, she considered Adam a friend, too. A murderer. A terrorist. A faunus. A White Fang member. An enemy. A friend.
She let out a quiet scream of frustration as she spun around a corner, only to find herself toppling over onto someone. Great. Just great.
"O-oh, sorry!" Weiss looked down to see just who she'd struck.
"Sal-u-tations, 'Look We Are A Little Busy Right Now So If You Wouldn't Mind Stepping Out Of The Way That Would Be Really Nice'!"
A/N: And so some of the bigger changes begin! Don't worry, Sun(and Neptune) will show up eventually, but without Blake to attract him, he doesn't have much of a reason to stalk schools at night and cheer up dashing Schnees. Speaking of Schnees, while I admit I might be straddling the line between IC and OOC, I'm aiming to get across that Weiss and Adam are not all that different, both from parallels between Weiss and canon Blake, and in that they're both worrying so much about being abandoned or betrayed that they aren't letting anyone get close. A very Hedgehog's Dilemma kind of deal. In a way, Weiss sees herself as the stray: at best, she has Winter and, well, that doesn't look like the most healthy relationship either.
Comment and criticism always welcome.
