"What happened out there?" Jaune asks when they're out of range, in a makeshift shelter on a hillside overlooking another valley. This valley is green, with a small village in its center, and it's easy to forget the situation not far away. The robot that all their firepower couldn't even dent, still lying in wait. The worst part is that they don't know what it's waiting for.
Nora doesn't speak up. She's been tight-lipped and shaky ever since the fight, and that worries Ruby. Nora doesn't get nervous, or if she does she never lets it show. She never lets it show to Ruby, at least. Maybe she talks to Ren when she gets scared and he calms her down, or Pyrrha builds her confidence back up with a kind word or two.
But Pyrrha's dead and Ren is still standing, staring out towards the horizon where the robot is with glassy unseeing eyes.
"We need a better strategy," Ruby says. "If we could concentrate our firepower on the torso, or on one arm, we might be able to do some damage."
Ruby doesn't know what happened. She doesn't know how they failed. She doesn't know how to deal with the fact that Ren, always the calmest and most reasonable among them, has apparently snapped. She doesn't know how to be a leader.
"Some damage isn't good enough," Ren says, not turning to look back at them.
"I'm aware!" Ruby snaps. It comes out a little harsher than she intended, and she winces. "I just – I'm not sure what to do."
"We'll work out something," Jaune says, moving a little closer and putting a hand on her arm. It's not much comfort.
They wait in silence, Ruby occasionally checking her map. Any real assistance is too far away to have any effect, but this is an industrial area. There are large storage spaces with flammable materials. That's potentially a help, even if nothing has close to the same impact as Dust.
Ruby conveys her plan to the team in a low voice even though there's nothing around to hear. It's not a great plan, and it's barely even a good plan, but it's a crazy plan, and crazy plans have a way of working out.
Jaune nods and stands up, nervously tugging at Ren's arm to get him to follow him over the top of the hill and out of sight. Nora snaps open the canister of Fire Dust like it's nothing, and a ghost of her usual grin appears as she steps forward.
Ruby doesn't have time to enjoy the plan finally coming together. She has to crawl up the slope behind Nora and find a sheltered spot high up in a tree, but once she's settled and checking the sights she still feels the warm glow of something finally working out.
Nora steps out into the clearing, glowing with traces of fire. The robot detects her quickly, and unfurls one limb slowly, almost casually. Ruby keeps the sights trained on the joints and the scars, anywhere she might do a little damage.
Portions of the robot's arm unfold, so smoothly that Ruby has to squint to see any mechanisms. The woman in red steps out, and Ruby trains the sights on her, although she doubts a bullet will do much good against her.
"What do I do?" Nora asks, and Ruby doesn't have a good answer.
"Stick to the plan," she says. And she prays, even though she stopped believing the night Pyrrha fell, because she needs a hope.
…
"I still don't like this plan," Blake says again, disassembling her gun to clean it again. It helps a little when she's nervous.
"What other option do we have?" Sienna asks, and although Blake knows she's not expecting an answer, she tries anyway.
"We could wait. We could gather more data, involve the police, see if your contacts respond."
"My contacts are either dead or too frightened to provide any assistance. The White Fang haven't located us yet, but they're closer to it every day. We don't have time to wait, Blake."
"We'll both be shot on sight, and that won't help anyone. I don't like saying this any more than you like hearing it, but we need to retreat." Blake keeps her eyes trained on her boots, waiting for Sienna to respond, or kill her, or simply leave and continue the fight on her own. "We need to get out of Vale, to somewhere we won't be found, and we need to build up a force capable of actually taking on the White Fang."
"You can do that once this mission succeeds," Sienna says. She doesn't say we, and Blake understands.
Sienna's already dead. She's given up hope of living; all she wants is to win. She has the riskier part of their mission, that has virtually no hope of success. Sienna never belonged in the web of elaborate lies that made up the criminal world, never understood the smoke and mirrors. She's a fighter, and she can't live like this any longer.
Blake accepts.
She walks across cracked asphalt to the nondescript door. Slowly pushes her hood back. Waits for the camera mounted above the door to focus on her face, then speaks.
"I surrender."
The door opens. Blake is manhandled inside by faceless men in white masks, handcuffs snapped onto her wrists. Although she's long been an expert at keeping her thoughts from showing in her face or heart rate, she controls her thoughts too, until her mind is nothing but a blank mirror. She doesn't track her movement or pay attention to the hands pushing at her back and shoulders.
When Adam Taurus stands in front of her, she feels nothing. She can feel later, when their mission is done.
"Why?" he asks her, and she doesn't look at him, watches guards accumulate in the doorways. "Why come back now?"
Blake doesn't answer. She waits.
"Why come back now?" Adam repeats. "Why come back and just stand here? Did you think we'd let you back in without a thought, let you work as a double agent?"
Blake waits.
"Answer me," Adam snarls, and the light flashes off his teeth, and Blake still feels nothing. Thinks nothing. Waits. Sienna should be past the initial guards by now. It wouldn't be a long fight.
Adam turns, suddenly, anger turned on his subordinates.
"Get back to your posts!" he snarls. "This was a distraction, you fools. While we were busy with some robot, we've been attacked. I know we have. Find the intruders!"
They disperse quickly, and Blake falls as the men holding her step away, mechanically. Eyes staying open and blank. She stills even the rise and fall of her chest as she breathes, until there is no one left.
It's an old trick, really. The enemy know they're being tricked, but don't know what the trick is, and that's the crucial advantage.
Handcuffs can't hold someone who grew up in the streets. They should have been more careful; a rope knot would have taken a bit longer, at least.
Blake shoots the guards still at the doors carefully, one bullet for each one. Conserving ammunition is another old instinct. And she starts moving.