She hit the ground running, gritting her teeth as her aura absorbed the fall. She could hear Weiss' voice grow fainter as she ran.
Crap, crap, crap!
Of course she had to out herself to a Schnee; it couldn't have been someone with a heart or any form of sympathy. To make matters worse she was stuck at Beacon till dawn; the airships were docked for the night and there was no other way to get down to the city. She ran towards the school's water gardens; she had spent the night in much worse places.
"BLAKE!" Weiss stood at the shattered window, her hands gripping the windowsill as she screamed her teammate's name. She must have heard her wrong, it wasn't possible. There was no way she had been on a team with a Faunus for several months and had never noticed. She turned away from the windowsill and left the room, running down the hall.
But it made so much sense; it was the reason why Blake would get so upset whenever she talked about the Faunus. But then why hadn't Blake tried to kill her in her sleep, or kidnap her and hold her for ransom? That's what all the Faunus Weiss had ever met back in Atlas had done to members of her family or her family's company. She shook her head as she left the dorms, her bare feet smacking against the pavement as she ran through the courtyard. She needed to find Blake and get some answers out of her.
"Blake! Where are you?" she yelled. She cupped her hands around her mouth. "Blake!" She spun around, looking for any sign of her teammate. It was too dark to see past the street lamps in the courtyard, and there was no way she would go wandering through the dark gardens without her sword or her shoes.
She sighed and slowly started to make her way back to the dorms; Blake would be back, she had nowhere else to go.
Ruby sat next to Yang on the floor between Jaune and Ren's beds. JNPR were more than happy to have Ruby and Yang over for a scary movie marathon. When they asked about Weiss and Blake, Yang just said they had some issues to settle on their own. The nearest pizza place wouldn't deliver this late so they had settled on some popcorn.
The movie was still getting started; Ruby loved horror movies, more so the one's that messed with your head than gory jump scare ones. Unfortunately, the movie they were watching was exactly the kind she disliked, but maybe laughing at the cheap effects would help brighten her mood.
She grabbed a piece of popcorn as Yang stuffed handfuls into her mouth. She still felt like it was her fault that Blake and Weiss were angry with one another; she was their team leader, she should have seen it coming and put a stop to it before it got that far.
She nibble at the popcorn and mentally counted down as the predictable jump scare slowly drew near.
The door to the room was thrown open when she reached zero, and she heard a high pitched scream though she wasn't sure if it was due to the door or the jump scare. Weiss stood in the doorway, a mixture of confusion and fear spread on her face.
"Blake's gone," Weiss said. Ruby furrowed her brow as she stood up.
"Gone, what do you mean?"
"She's gone! She left and I can't find her!" Yang stood up, the popcorn bowl falling over, causing Nora to groan in annoyance.
"What the fuck did you do Weiss?"
"Nothing! I mean," she looked at JNPR, who were all sticking their heads down from their bunks to stare at her. "I would prefer to tell you in our room."
Weiss left the doorway and Ruby followed after her.
Weiss opened the door to their dorm, allowing Ruby and Yang in. She heard Ruby suck in a breath at the sight of the broken window. Yang rounded on her, her eyes red.
"Start talking, now." Weiss closed the door, leaning her back against it.
"It wasn't my fault, she jumped out the window while we were arguing." Yang took a step towards her, the tips of her hair beginning to burn.
"What did you say to her?" Weiss looked up at the ceiling, keeping her eyes away from Yang.
"Nothing, it was something she said." Weiss looked over at Ruby, who was still looking at the window. Weiss sighed. "She isn't who you think she is," Yang narrowed her eyes at Weiss as she took another step towards her.
"Really? Because I think she is my teammate, and right now I'm wondering what this rude bitch in front of me could have done to her."
"She's a Faunus!" Weiss said. Yang looked confused.
"What?"
"We… we were arguing and I called the Faunus animals and she screamed 'We are not animals' and then she jumped out the window. I didn't do anything to her.'" Yang scowled, her eyes flickering red as she crossed her arms.
"What, you think it's my fault she jumped out?"
"Of course it's your fault!" Yang exclaimed. "You say such horrible things about the Faunus all the time, do you really think she would want to be in the same room as you if you found out she was one of them?" Weiss crossed her arms and looked away from her.
"I wouldn't treat her any different, Blake is different, she's…"
"She's what? 'Civilized'? 'A person and not an animal'?" Weiss tried to push Yang away; Yang didn't move at all as Weiss struggled against her. "You have two seconds to stop that before I throw you across this room."
"That's enough!" Ruby yelled. Weiss looked around Yang at her leader. She was scowling at both of them. "Yang, leave Weiss alone! Yes, she's a jerk, and yes it's her fault but beating her up isn't going to solve anything!" Yang backed away from Weiss. "Weiss, when Blake gets back you are going to apologize to her!"
"For what? She should apologize to me for ruining our evening."
"You made her feel so bad she had to jump out a window just to get away from you. You are going to apologize to her." Weiss flicked a strand of hair away from her face.
"Fine," she said.
"Blake should be back in the morning. We're all really upset right now so let's just get some sleep and talk this all out tomorrow." Ruby said. Yang gave Weiss one final dirty look before climbing into her bed.
Blake was woken up by the rising sun and the sound of birds chirping. She jumped down from the tree branch she had spent the night in and stretched, getting several satisfying cracks and pops in response. Bee's buzzed past her as she walked out of the garden. It was still relatively early and there wasn't very many students out and about. Blake looked over at the dorms; Weiss would probably be awake already. She shook her head and made her way to the docks.
All of the airships were there, one of them had its door down. Blake looked behind her, sighed, and went over to the airship, and walked up its gangway. She took her seat and leaned her head against the metal wall. She closed her eyes and sighed.
She had kept it hidden for so long, close to a year and she had to go and mess up and out herself to a Schnee. Her ears twitched underneath her bow as she heard people start to get into the airship with her. A few minutes later she heard the door close and felt the airship take off.
Idle chatter filled the space as the ship flew to Vale. Blake kept her eyes closed and tuned them out. After a few minutes the airship landed and Blake opened her eyes. The few people in the ship with her left and she followed after them.
She left the airship depot and walked down the sidewalk. It was a tad warm and incredibly bright with the sun's ray's bouncing off the window's in the cities buildings. Cars honked as cars sat still in bumper to bumper traffic. She held onto her arms as she walked, giving the Faunus beggars on the side of the street a sympathetic look, upset that she forgot to grab her wallet.
She wandered through the streets of Vale aimlessly, stepping around people as they made their way to work. She couldn't go back home; not after what she said to her parents. She just knew that there was no way they would ever take her back in. And it would cost too much to pay for a boat ticket to get all the way to Menagarie. She could stow away. She shook her head at the thought; by now everyone back home knew what she had done, she couldn't face them.
And by now Weiss had already blabbed to Ruby, and Yang, and gods knows how many other people, and made all sorts of accusations about her. It would only be a matter of time before it got around the school, and the staff would expel her. She sighed, and rubbed her arm. Where could she go? She only had her sword and clothes, no money or anything of value. And she certainly couldn't work in a human store; dealing with so many people that think like Cardin and Weiss.
She almost didn't notice the woman when she ran into her.
"I'm sorry, I wasn't…" The woman looked familiar; her dark skin and gray hair, her mouse tail. She smiled at Blake.
"It's no problem dear, what are you doing out here this early?" Blake considered lying to her before hanging her head and sighing.
"I…I may not have a place to stay anymore."
"Why don't you come live with me until you can get back on your feet?" Blake perked up at that.
"Really?" The woman nodded.
"It's the least I can do for the young lady who stood up for my boy." The woman smiled. Blake smiled back.
"Thank you, I'm Blake, by the way."
"Honey," the woman said.
Ruby drummed her pencil against her notebook, deep in thought.
Her eyes fluttered open and she sat up, yawning and stretching her arms. She looked over. Blake's bed was empty. Ruby sighed and jumped down from her bunk. Yang was still sleeping and Weiss' bed was empty and neatly made. Ruby could hear the shower running. She shook Yang awake, who groggily swatted at her hands.
"Five more minutes," she groaned. Ruby rolled her eyes and went to the closet to get dressed. She left the closet a few minutes later and saw Weiss making her way to the closet in a towel. Yang was sitting up in her bed, giving Weiss a dirty look.
"Morning Weiss," Ruby said. Weiss nodded her greeting as she entered the closet. The door shut behind Ruby and Yang stood up, stepping onto her bed to look up at Blake's bunk. She saw Yang's shoulder's sag and heard her sigh.
"I'm sure we'll see her at the cafeteria." Ruby said. Yang said nothing but went to the closet and waited at the door. Weiss exited and walked past Yang, not even giving her a second glance. Yang entered the closet without a word and exited without a word as well. Ruby eyed both of them as they got their shoes on.
"So, uh, how'd you guys sleep?" she asked.
"Splendidly, thank you for asking." Weiss said. Yang side eyed her.
"Fine, Ruby," she said. She rubbed the back of her head.
"So why don't we head to the cafeteria and meet up with Blake?" Weiss stood up and left the room, grabbing her book-bag first. Yang watched her go, her expression that of disgust.
"Sounds like a good idea, Ruby." Yang mumbled as she stood up and left as well. Ruby looked down at her boots and sighed before following after them.
"Ms. Rose, were you paying attention?" Professor Verde asked. Ruby looked up from her notebook.
"I wasn't, sorry," she said. Verde flicked a stand of green hair out of her face and looked at a different student.
"Would anyone care to fill Ms. Rose in on the chemical properties of elemental Dust?" Ruby tuned the student out as he went on and on about the different chemical reactions required for types of Dust. Ruby honestly didn't care, as long as she could light stuff on fire with a bullet she didn't really didn't need to know the how.
Ruby took her seat at the usual table her team, JNPR, and SDVJ ate at. Weiss had already taken her seat and was silently eating her yogurt. Nora was going on one of her dream tangents. She unwrapped her muffin and started to nibble on it, not really tasting it. Yang sat down next to her and started to tear into her ham and eggs. Ruby looked from Yang to Weiss, and sighed.
Pyrrha looked at the three of them before cocking her head to the side.
"Where's Blake?" she asked. Ruby chewed her lip.
"She isn't feeling well," she said. Pyrrha furrowed her brow.
"Didn't Weiss say she was missing?"
"Woah, what? Blake's missing?" Sterling said.
"Uhh..." Ruby looked from Weiss to Yang.
"We found her, and she wasn't feeling well so she's resting back in the dorm." Weiss said, not looking up from her yogurt.
"What's wrong with her?" Jaune asked.
"She's just really tired. Probably from dealing with certain people's bullshit all the time." Yang said. Weiss scowled and angrily stirred her yogurt.
"Or maybe her nerves are fried from hiding important things from everyone all the time." Yang scoffed and bit into her ham, messily tearing it apart with her teeth. Ren stared at them, an eyebrow cocked.
"Do I need to go take care of her? I know some good recipes for dealing with stress." He offered. Ruby vigorously shook her head.
"No, no, she just needs some rest."
"You sure?" Jet asked.
"Yeah, she'll be back up on her feet before you know it!" Ruby offered them a smile and laughed weakly. Pyrrha didn't look convinced.
"Yes, well, if you need help taking care of her, we're right across the hall encase you need us." Ruby smiled at her, hoping it seemed genuine.
"Ms. Rose." Verde said.
"Huh?" Ruby looked up to see Verde standing in front of her desk.
"I asked you to turn in your homework. Class is over."
"Oh. Sure, my bad." Ruby reached into her bag and pulled out the crumpled paper. Verde cocked an eyebrow at the paper but took it none the less.
"Ms. Rose, where is your teammate?" Ruby fidgeted in her seat.
"Which one?"
"Ms. Belladonna. She usually isn't one to skip class. Is she sick?" Ruby nodded her head. Verde crossed her arms. "She should see Doctor Sorrel if that's the case." Ruby rubbed the back of her head.
"I'll let her know when I see her again." She stood up, slung her bag over her shoulder and left the classroom.
Blake followed Honey into her house. She lived in one of the poorer parts but far from the worst part of the city. The house was a faded blue color and made out of wood. It had a charm to it that Blake found endearing. The furnishing had the same kind of charm to it and the house smelled pleasant; like a thousand home cooked meals.
"Hey Honey, you back already?" a male voice shouted from what Blake guessed was the dining room. Honey started to head back out.
"I'll be heading back out, I just need to bring someone home."
"Aight, cool!" a different male voice said. Honey left and closed the door behind her. Blake started to walk through the house, heading towards the room where the male voices were coming from.
She was greeted with the smell of bacon and eggs and the sight of the two stowaways from yesterday eating breakfast at the table. The monkey Faunus looked over at her and tipped his cup of coffee in her direction.
"Morning," he said. Blake waved at them in response.
"What are you two doing here?" Blake asked. The one with blue hair leaned back in his chair.
"The lovely Miss Honey is letting us stay here till the cops stop looking for us. Shouldn't take very long."
"Gotta love people who are willing to help out world travelers like us." The one with blue hair grabbed a piece of bacon and started to eat it.
"World travelers?" The monkey Faunus did a mock bow.
"Sun Wukong, traveler of Remnant, at your service." The one with blue hair laughed.
"And Neptune Vasilias, his partner." Blake raised her hand in greeting.
"So what's your name?" Sun asked.
"I'm Blake. Blake Belladonna." Sun took a bite of his eggs before saying.
"So what are you doing here?"
"I could ask you two the same thing," Neptune took a sip from his mug of coffee.
"We spend our days traveling the far corners of the habitable world, enjoying what pleasures Remnant has to offer us."
"And what brought you to Vale?"
"Vytal Festival is coming up in a couple of months. Figured we could spend between now and then exploring what this grand kingdom has to offer." Sun said. Blake smiled.
"And you're going to be doing that by spending your time in an old woman's house." Neptune laughed. "By partners do you mean you two were in a team before?" she asked. Sun grinned and looked over at Neptune.
"Nope, picked his sweet ass up while I was in Mistral and we've been inseparable ever since." Neptune winked and blew him a kiss.
"You know you would have ended up in prison by now if I wasn't around." Sun threw a bit of his eggs at him with a laugh.
"So how 'bout you Blake? What's your story?" Blake rubbed her arm before opening her mouth.
Ruby stepped out of the bathroom, dressed in her pajamas. Weiss was at her desk studying and Yang lay on her bed, blaring music. Blake hadn't shown up and they quickly realized that Blake had left her scroll in the room. Ruby climbed into her bunk before pulling out her scroll and starting to read.
She had a hard time concentrating and found herself rereading the same passage several times over. She groaned and sat up, her legs dangling off her bunk.
"We're going to go look for her tomorrow." She said.
"Great," Yang said. Weiss looked up from her textbook.
"What about our classes?" she asked.
"What about them?" Yang said.
"I know you don't care about your academics but I would rather not have it on my record that I skipped an entire day of classes." Yang scoffed.
"Yeah, how dare you take a day off to find one of your fucking team mates." Weiss spun around in her seat to glare at Yang.
"Blake's a big girl, she can make it back here when she wants to." Yang sat up.
"And what if she is hurt in some shitty part of Vale?"
"She has Gambol Shroud with her. And she grew up outside the kingdoms, I'm pretty sure some ruffians aren't going to be enough to stop her."
"Whatever Weiss," Yang said. Weiss glared at her.
"Don't 'whatever' me; Blake can handle herself she doesn't need us to go save her."
"That's a convenient way of saying that you don't wanna look for her."
"I want to find her just as much as you do; I just think we should give her some space, she clearly doesn't want to be around us right now."
"Doesn't want to be around you more like," Yang said.
"Didn't she threaten to kill you when you first met?" Yang stood up.
"We got past that you smart mouthed bitch."
"Stop it, both of you." Ruby said. They both looked at her. "We're a team, and we're supposed to look out for each other." She sighed and lay down on her bed. "Let's get some sleep, we have a long day ahead of us."
Yang weaved in an out of traffic, ignoring the honking horns and rude gesture's people were giving her. She didn't believe Weiss; there had to be more to it than just Blake blurting out that she was a Faunus. Weiss must have said something else or done something else and just wouldn't own up to it. People don't just run away without a good reason.
She took a turn and drove down a near empty rode; this place wasn't busy during the day. She stopped in front of a club, the neon lights turned off and the bouncer missing. She parked her bike and put her helmet on the seat.
She strode up the stairs and pushed open the doors. The club looked different without the flashing neon lights; the puke stains on the floor were much more noticeable. And the crystal pillars looked a lot less impressive without the naked women on top of them. She saw a group of men in black suits cleaning and restocking the bar. The man she was looking for had his back to her.
"I want this place spotless before we open up tonight fella's." Junior said. His employees gave him dismissive responses.
"Junior!" Yang shouted. Junior spun around, a look of terror plastered on his face.
"Oh shit!" Yang strode towards him as he backed away; raising his hands in front of him. "Look I don't know what you want but I'm still paying off the damages you caused last year, so please don't do anything drastic!" He backed into a wall. Yang stood in front of him.
"I'm not going to hurt you Junior," she said. He sighed in relief; his breath smelled like garlic.
"Well that's a relief. So why are you down here sweet cheeks? The bar doesn't open for a couple more hours." Yang pulled out her scroll, Blake's contact picture took up the screen.
"I'm looking for someone; you seen her?" Junior looked at her picture. He cocked an eyebrow.
"People running away from you seems to be a problem in your life huh sweet cheeks?" Yang narrowed her eyes and kneed him in the crotch. He crumpled to the floor, letting out a squeak of pain.
"I thought you said you weren't gonna hurt me!" Yang grabbed him by the shoulder and dragged him back to a standing position; his hands resting over his crotch.
"I wasn't but you pissed me off. Have you seen her or not?"
"I haven't seen her. I would've remembered a pretty face like that."
Yang pocketed her scroll and left.
Ruby walked through the forests on Patch. She figured it was the best place to look for Blake; a small island with lots of places to hide and relatively close to Beacon.
"Blake! Where are you?" Ruby shouted. She cupped her hands around her mouth. "I don't care if you're a Faunus, come out Blake!" The wind blowing through the trees was her only response. She sighed before continuing to wander around the forests aimlessly.
She found herself at the cliff where her mother's grave was. Her cape fluttered around her as the wind blew.
"Hey mom, you haven't seen a Faunus girl around here have you?" she laughed. Silence was her answer. Ruby sighed and sat down at the grave, resting her forehead on her knees.
"One of my teammates, Blake, well it turns out she's a Faunus and she's run away." She looked up at the grave. "Blake and Weiss got in a fight and that's why she ran. And now Weiss and Yang are fighting."
"What am I supposed to do mom? I'm their leader and I don't know how to fix this. I should have been able to see this coming; prevent all this from happening. I should have, I could have," she felt tears began to roll down her cheeks.
"This is all my fault. My team is falling apart and there isn't a thing I can do about it." She wiped away the tears. "Even if we find her how am I going to fix all of this? They're supposed to like each other, be willing to die for each other, not fighting and running away from each other." The wind blew, rustling her hair; it felt like fingers running through her hair. She sighed and stood up.
"Sorry for dumping all that on you mom." She turned and left, maybe Blake was somewhere at the docks.
Weiss walked down the streets of Vale, a small hand held mirror in her hand. The streets were mostly empty, only a few people were out and about. She passed by an alleyway, looked around, and entered the alley. She brought the mirror up to her face.
"Mirror, mirror in my hand… what am I going to do about Blake." Her reflection stayed the same. She furrowed her brow and shook the mirror. "Hello, I'm trying to talk to you." She said. Her reflection appeared, sticking out its tongue.
"That was for ignoring me the other night." Weiss rolled her eyes.
"Oh grow up. What am I supposed to do about Blake; she's a Faunus."
"I'm aware. I mean, what can we do?"
"But she isn't like the other Faunus; she never tried to hurt me and she…"
"She what?" Her reflection asked. Weiss leant back, resting her head against the bricks.
"And Yang was right; she is civilized. She hasn't given me a headache like Ruby and Yang have." Her reflection tapped her finger on her chin.
"But she's a Faunus, she's the mortal enemy of our family; she should be pure evil."
"You think I don't know that? But, maybe Father was wrong about the Faunus; maybe they're not all like the White Fang." Her reflection feigned surprise.
"Father be wrong about something? Oh the humanity." Her reflection cackled.
"Maybe I do need to apologize to Blake when we find her; if other Faunus are like her then maybe-"
"Yo Schnee!" A male voice shouted. She gasped in surprise and straightened up, pocketing her mirror. A group of men were in the alley; they were all Faunus. The one in front had a wicked grin plastered across his face. "You came to the wrong part of town," They started to walk towards her and she drew her sword, taking the stance she had been taught for years.
"Maybe Blake is the exception," she thought.