You know, this chapter and the last were originally supposed to be fused into one. I think I like putting out more shorter ones.

Qrow yawned and sat on the floor of the Brotherhood's last little library. He sighed, closed the book and set it down on a pile on his left. Then he picked up another slim book on his right, which he opened up. A waft of dust came up from the pages, and he sneezed.

"Ugh." He shook his head and squinted back down at the books. "These are all so boring."

"Thank the Founder for that," Ozpin said from above as he looked over paperwork on his desk. He drank from his mug and didn't bother to look up from the papers. "The only things that survived were things copied down or preserved through memory and word of mouth. For centuries, fanatical inquisitors who followed the Founder's demands were ready to hunt down and destroy history preserved.

"I was originally one of them myself," Ozpin admitted. "It took a century for me to change my mind."

"Woulda been nice for you to get wise sooner."

"It's on the list with the rest of my regrets."

Qrow grunted, then kept reading through the book. It was dated to nearly four hundred years ago, making it the oldest. It was also the easiest the read.

"Kinda weird that the older things get, the more understandable it is."

"Well, the Common we adopted after the Great War is based off of the old language."

"Which we came up with in the first place," Qrow added.

"Indeed."

"You had something to do with that, didn't you?"

"Perhaps." Ozpin shrugged. "A standard means of communication has contributed well to peace on Remnant. It just so happens that our oldest history involved establishing the Knight's Speech throughout Remnant."

"Hm." Qrow nodded vaguely and read through the old tome. Eventually, he flipped over to another picture. It was a warrior with what looked like a huge saw in his hands, wielding it as if it were a sword. There was a caption at the bottom of this sketch.

"Who was the Lone Wanderer?" Qrow asked. "I remember learning about him, but I forgot most of it."

"Why don't you read? You have the book in your hands."

"You've got it all memorized," Qrow said. "Easier for me to just flip through, skim for interesting stuff and ask you for the laydown without reading it all myself."

"You read all of this when you were inducted."

"Long time ago. Like I said, I forgot pretty much all of it. Glynda was always the bookworm."

Ozpin sighed. He looked down at his papers, then glanced back over to the pit. He shook his head and spoke:

"His is an old story. The Wanderer was originally a knight in the Brotherhood, but he deserted for reasons unknown. He still fought on our side, however, against the Enclave. He even played a strong role in the War of Revelations. Supposedly, the Lone Wanderer spoke a passage of the Book of Revelations and purified a land of its plague."

"Pretty powerful stuff," Qrow said.

"Yes, and he was renown as a particularly brutal fighter, using a butcher's saw to cause as much possible pain on those he deemed evil. Though another account details he used a normal straight sword. As ever, there is no single version of an ancient story."

"Pfft, sounds like a real edgelord," Qrow said.

"Indeed," Ozpin said. "And no one ever saw his face, either, so I suppose that makes him even more mysterious." Ozpin stopped for a moment, then wracked his brain. "Actually, there was also one sentence that referenced a 'mysterious' person who sometimes helped the Brotherhood. He wasn't directly called the Wanderer, but it's certainly the same person."

"Hm." Qrow looked at the sketch, He saw the giant saw that the man used for a sword. For some reason, there was something in his mind that arose, a kind of recognition. It wavered around, barely pressing into his consciousness. He furrowed his brow and thought for a few seconds, wondering what was familiar about this.

He gave up after a minute.

"Oh," Ozpin said, "he may also have been immortal."

"What?" Qrow stood up and looked up to the headmaster. "Like you?"

Ozpin chuckled and said, "I'm joking. There are only a few passages that say anything about him. Even that text you hold is a copy of a copy of a copy of oral stories gathered by one of the knights and written down. It's certainly full of embellishments.

"One of the passages about him states that time was no obstacle for him. Given my own experience, I immediately thought of immortality, but I quickly realized that it's incredibly improbable. It was likely just a comment on his perseverance or some similar figure of speech."

Ozpin shrugged, then took another sip from his mug. He finished the liquid inside, forcing him to reach into his desk, pull out a thermos, then refill the mug with a dark beverage that could have been anything from coffee to hot chocolate. He put it away and said:

"But then there are semblances like mine, though they are beyond rare. Still, I think that over a thousand years, he would have done something we would have noticed. He is much like the Enclave: I suppose there is the slightest shred of a chance in some way that they exist still, but the prospect remains preposterous."

"Hmph," Qrow grunted. He looked back down at the book, then sighed. "Guess I really won't find anything."

"The Founder wanted knowledge of the Enclave and the old world to die as much as possible," Ozpin said. "We may disagree with it now, but that doesn't change reality. Now we don't even know things as important as what the relics are or how they came about, much less finer details about the Envclave."

"Maybe I'll find the spring maiden, crack the riddle and ask the Relic of Knowledge about all this," Qrow said. He scoffed. "Shouldn't be too hard."

"I doubt it," Ozpin said dryly. "Even if you could find the maiden, not even I know the riddles, much less their answers. I kept well away from the gates when I added the maidens' barrier."

"Trusting no one, not even yourself," Qrow said. "Peak Brotherhood of Steel, right there."

Ozpin grinned, sipped from his mug and said, "I do believe you're right."

"Yeah, well maybe I can just go and find the Lone Wanderer and ask him what to do."

Jaune wasn't sure what to do. The situation, by all accounts, should have been an excellent one, but he had a gut-feeling that something was amiss.

She leaned against him as they ate their ice cream. He had his mint chocolate chip, and she had her strawberry. They sat on his bottom bunk in JNPR's dorm (he and Pyrrha had switched beds, given his injury). They were alone. The room smelled like lavender, thanks to Jaune's aromatic little steamer.

They'd been talking for a while, primarily about new video games that were set to come out, as well as the new season of Ruby's favorite tv show coming soon. He'd also told her about the lying game show Pyrrha had showed him, which Ruby excitedly expressed great interest in.

Everything she said, she said with a smile. Every movement she made, she made quickly. One would think that to be good things.

But Jaune had known her long enough now to know that this was not the casual positivity and care she usually exuded. This was active. Active and directed. Her old kindness was passive, and it had come from her as easily as her breath.

He'd asked her if her new hand was still comfortable.

She'd immediately responded that it was wonderful. It was fantastic, actually, better than the doctors warned it would be. But how was he? He'd be getting out of his cast soon, right? Did he want to do something to celebrate after? She would do anything he wanted to do because she really wanted to see him happy. What? Oh no, she didn't want anything special to be done. Here, I'll get you a bottle of water! No, no, no, don't stand up; I can go get that for you, not a problem. What else do you need done? Nothing? You sure? I'm totally down to help! Just let me know!

It was… odd. She sought every possible opportunity to be helpful or kind. She had always been ready and willing to help, but never before had she been so insistent, so ready to seek out and pounce upon any opportunity.

It was as if her natural kindness had now been sharpened to a razor edge, and she used it to slash at everything she could. Every attempt to ask her if she was well, to ask her about the incident, to assert that they were there for her, she cut to ribbons.

He finished his cup of ice cream, then moved to get off the bed and throw it away.

"Nope!" Ruby quickly snatched cup from his hands, literally skipped to the garbage can, mimed a basketball shot into it, then giggled and skipped back to his side. "I gotcha," she said with a smile. She excitedly hooked her arm around his.

"Yeah," Jaune said. "Thanks."

"You wanna borrow our game console again?" Ruby asked. "I can bring it over and we can play something now. Anything you want."

"Well, is there something you want to play?"

"Whatever you wanna play!"

She turned to him and smiled.

"I'm worried about her," Weiss said. "Very much so. Someone who just lost their hand shouldn't be nearly this happy. She seems to be even more oppressively positive than usual, and I'm sure I'm not the only one who's noticed the artificial-feeling tinge to it."

"You're not," Yang said. She bore heavy sigh. She sat on the edge of her bed, and the rest of RWBY and JNPR were with her in her dorm. All except for Ruby herself.

"She's got to be pretending."

The others in the room looked up, and Jaune was not alone in being surprised by who the speaker was.

"You sure?" Ren asked her.

"Yup," Nora said.

The look on her face was grave, flushed with a somber tone that Jaune had seldom seen on her. Normally, she was as peppy as could be; she, however, had given him brief glimpses into something deeper. In rare moments her obsessive positivity suddenly snapped, allowing a view of something wholly different.

"I know what it's like to pretend to be happy," Nora said. She crossed her arms and looked at the floor. "I've gotten good at it."

They all looked at her. Ren laid a hand on her shoulder. Jaune averted his eyes, knowing by now the more intricate side of his teammate's personality, knowing how hard it was for her to admit to so many.

"It's not like I'm happy 24/7. It's not like I'm sad a lot either." She smiled tenderly and looked at Jaune, then too Pyrrha as well, before finally landing her gaze on Ren beside her. "I have people in my life I can thank for that.

"But if you think I'm always peppy on the inside, then you're wrong. I've always tried not to be a burden to the people around me. I have… a lot of energy. I don't know why, but I do. It's all just there, and I don't really know what to do with it and I know it could be annoying or tough to deal with.

"So I try to make it positive, try to look on the bright side. I try not to make other people worry about me." She brought a hand up to her throat and massaged it, feeling a clog there as she forced out the words. She took in a deep breath, then let it go before continuing. "Because I'm always so worried that I may be left alone, if I'm too much of a pain. It takes me a long time to be anything but all smiles to people.

"I know, I really, really know what it's like to feel pressured that, like, that you have to be nice and not have anybody worry about you. Because you're afraid."

"Man this is, like, so much easier now," Yang said. She looked at herself in the bathroom mirror, running a brush over her scalp. "I forgot what it was like have hair that isn't two feet long. It's just so much easier to deal with. I'll save like fifty lien a month on shampoo and conditioner and all the other product." She adjusted some of the strands of her short hair, making sure it kept up her new style perfectly. "I wasn't sure how I'd feel about it at first, but—"

"I always knew you'd look great!" Ruby said, skipping into the bathroom beside her sister. Unlike her sister, however, Ruby was simply dressed in her pajamas. The other two members of team of RWBY, like Yang, still wore their uniforms.

"You'd really have to try to look bad," Blake said.

"Oh, thanks," Yang replied. She smiled at her partner.

"Are you sure you don't want to come, Ruby?" Weiss asked. She sat on her bed with Zwei on her lap, and she idly pet the dog as it happily nuzzled its snout against one of her hands. "It won't take so long," she continued, "and this is the last chance we'll have to talk to Oobleck before the quiz."

"Gods, you'd think they'd give us more of a break from school," Yang muttered. She glanced at her sister's hand. "We've barely been back for a week."

"Because I said no! to the prospect of a break, because we don't need one!" Ruby said with a smile. "And nah I won't come; I'll just study off of your guy's notes. I'm just so…"- she yawned for a full couple seconds, then blearily blinked -"tired. Guess the gym really got to me today."

Yang looked down at her sister, examining the dark bags under her eyes.

"You've been at the gym a lot," Weiss said. "More than the rest of us. More than you ever did before."

"What can I say? You get antsy after lying in a bed for a week," Ruby said. She smiled. "I'm much happier now!"

"Well. Okay," Blake said. She put her hand on the doorknob and twisted it. "We'll make sure to be quiet coming back in." She pulled the door open.

Weiss gently picked up Zwei and set him on the bed beside her, then followed her teammate out the room, nodding at Ruby as she passed.

Yang patted her sister on the shoulder and said, "sleep tight."

"Thanks!" Ruby replied, energetically waving her robotic hand (which was still covered in the glove). Her team departed, closing the door behind them.

Behind Ruby, beyond the window and above the horizon, the sun was setting. It left a spill of warm, wet, scarlet light flowing across Beacon, splashing into her room.

The moment her team was gone, Ruby wilted. The smile fell from her face. Her posture slackened. She stooped, as if something heavy was laid upon her shoulders. She looked down at the floor.

She stood there and stared for a little while, not much going through her mind aside from a hollow kind of relief.

"Jesus Christ," she said. "I'm tired…"

She blinked.

"Guess Jaune is rubbing off on me… never used to swear."

She looked at Zwei. The dog, with its big gleaming eyes, looked back. He tilted his head.

"But nothing's the same anymore, right?" Ruby said. She sighed.

She looked back down at the floor. Then she sighed again.

"A real hero," she said. "That's what my dad called me." She dragged her feet across the carpet and reached her sister's bed, whereupon she allowed what strength she'd mustered to fade away, and she fell upon the sheets. The weakness she'd forced herself through all day was finally given respite.

"That's what everybody's called me," Ruby said.

Zwei hopped off the bed, then bounded across the room and jumped up onto the ledge of the new bed; scrambling up, he then waddled up to Ruby's face. He licked her nose.

Ruby only sighed again.

His master looked at him with a blank face. Her eyes—which normally shone like polished silver—had the flat and dull texture of worn iron just before it succumbs to rust.

She turned over, facing her back to him. She looked up and out the window, seeing darkness quickly engulfing the sky. The light became darker in hue, more malicious.

"I'm glad that at least I don't have to pretend with you," Ruby said. "A dog can't be disappointed in me."

Zwei whined.

Ruby's scroll buzzed on her desk. She glanced in that direction, but she quickly resigned herself to ignoring it. Jaune had texted her about twenty minutes ago, asking if she wanted to hang out. She'd told him she was just tired. Maybe it was Jaune now asking if she was sure. Or maybe it was her dad or her uncle. She didn't know. She couldn't find a will within herself to care.

She sighed again.

Then she felt it. It was an odd sensation, as if someone was poking her hand with pins and needles. Her robotic hand.

She looked at it, hidden in the glove. Suddenly, it felt as if some of her fingers had flexed.

The hand that she saw hadn't move. She grasped it into a fist, and a pang of unnatural confusion came upon her. She, consciously, knew what was happening, but the inner, natural part of her psyche couldn't process it. It couldn't understand how she had two hands in the same spot.

They'd warned her of it, but nothing could have prepared Ruby for these sensations. She grit her teeth as the bizarre sensation of flexing, twitching fingers in her right hand persisted. Her real hand. The one she'd lost. The one her brain thought might still be there.

Atlas had installed a tiny chip into her spine, which was connected by signal to a chip in her metallic stump. When her hand was locked in, then she could control it with her thoughts, as if it were the real thing.

Her brain didn't recognize that. Her brain still wanted there to be a construct of flesh, blood and bones to control.

Ruby scowled, and her gloved hand shook. She slowly unfurled her fingers, then reached around and pulled off the glove. Something flipped in her stomach when she saw the lifeless metal fingers, plain and white and sterile in typical Atlas fashion, the same color as the beds and walls and floors and uniforms in that cold, lonely clinic aboard the battleship. It contrasted with the pink skin of her remaining natural hand. It was a soulless color.

She gripped and wrenched her prosthetic, simultaneously thinking about how she wanted it to detach, just as the doctors had told her. It popped off easily. Then there was nothing there at all.

It still felt like she had fingers that were trembling, a hand that was twitching.

"No…" Her breathing picked up pace. Her scowl deepened. A sick feeling bubbled in her stomach, but as she bit down and glared at her metallic stump… she felt anger, as well.

She shot bolt upright in bed, growling as she looked down at the spot where her hand used to be. Zwei yelped and jumped back.

Ruby kicked off of the bed, glaring at the robotic hand.

"Stupid," she said, with a fierce, hateful look in her eyes that would have surprised anyone who knew her. "Stupid thing," she repeated again, seething.

"You worthless, stupid, stupid piece of trash!" she yelled down at the robotic hand. "You're trash!"

She hurled the hand away from her, at the window. It hit the glass and cracked it, then bounced back and landed limply on the floor.

Ruby's legs trembled. All strength in her evaporated as a sudden weight dragged her down to her knees. Tears flowed down her face. "Useless… trash… worthless…" Her breath hitched, and a sob was lodged in her throat. She shivered all over. Tears dribbled over the dark bags under her eyes, then ran down her cheeks.

Zwei whined, then jumped off the bed, bounded for his master and tried to nuzzle against her—

"Get away from me!" Ruby shouted, swiping a hand to her side and roughly shoving the little dog away.

Instantly, Ruby's eyes widened in horror. Her crying ceased for a moment as she stared in disbelief at her dog, who looked back with fear in those shiny, innocent eyes.

"No…" She choked up, and she had to fight through another bout of sobs to speak: "No… I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!" She covered her face with her hands, only to realize that one of them wasn't there. She stared at her stump, and her arm shook even more.

Zwei, ever loyal, cautiously crawled by his master's side.

This time, when Ruby noticed him, she quickly scooped him up and held him close to her chest.

"I'm sorry," she said, burying her face in his fur. "I'm so sorry…

"So useless..."

She was wracked by sobs as the sensation of her phantom hand intensified, such that it felt like it was on fire. She stifled a cry of pain.

The sunset neared its end, and the light that now haunted her room was blood-red.

:(

Sad Ruby is sad, and Brotherhood knights be clueless. I'm pretty sure I've never had Jaune say anything about the Lone Wanderer, but in case I messed up and he did, just ignore that. He certainly doesn't want to even say the name to anyone, given it was his alias during the time of his life that was his darkest, when he did the things he most wants to hide from the others.