No matter where she ran, she could feel his shadow pursuing her. Every time she looked over her shoulder, she was alone, but she knew. If she stopped and caught her breath for a single moment, his spies would be upon her. It made her paranoid, fearful: every person around her could be a spy, there to take her back into his waiting arms. She was smart enough to be aware of how unhealthy such thinking was, considering that she had barely slept in two months and her paranoia had her hallucinating more than she cared to admit. Still, she had to keep to herself, and she had to keep running. That was the only way she could eventually be safe.
She ended up in Argus, hoping that being in the area of the Atlesian military would keep him and her former comrades at bay. Of course, that didn't make her feel much safer, not only because of him, but because being anywhere near Atlesians made her feel ill. Humanity had treated the Faunus poorly, but people from Atlas were the worst of the bunch. The treatment that came from those people high in the clouds was exactly why the White Fang was formed in the first place. She shook her head, trying not to think too much about them. It wasn't good for her constantly-frayed nerves.
In a store window, she peered at her reflection to make sure her bow was still fastened on properly. With everything that was going on, the last thing she needed was for anyone to find out she was a Faunus. Hatred of her kind was at its highest point since The Great War, taking the usual prejudices and mixing them with the terrible attacks the White Fang had been carrying out. Her reflection shifted in her vision, changing into an angry, feral monster: the monster that had helped carry out those attacks, and taken innocent lives. She forced herself away from the window, though the cold sweat she had broken out into remained.
Lest she try and forget what she was dealing with, her skittish eyes caught a glimpse of something she didn't want to see. Across the street were two fellow Faunus, but she could tell they weren't regular citizens of Argus. Neither of them wore the mask of the White Fang, but they were decked out in all black and were absolutely looking her way. With her bow on, they shouldn't have been able to tell that she was hiding her identity, unless they had been told to look for her. Maybe it was the paranoia talking, but seeing them both begin to cross the street at the same time, heading in her direction, seemed much more deliberate. It was time to go.
She broke out into a run, heading straight down the nearest alley. The sun was mostly swallowed up, giving her a dark and unwelcome area to be in. That was fine with her, though: she had always worked best in the dark. Up ahead, the alleyway broke off in two directions: right or left. She decided to take the right, not bothering to look behind her to see if they were actually chasing her. If they were, then she'd be wasting time she could be using to escape.
Naturally, she was running straight towards a dead end, but that hadn't deterred her before. She was already pulling out her weapon as she headed for the wall. unsheathing it and giving it a good winding. As soon as she reached the wall, she started running up it, her feet slapping against the brick as she pushed herself as far as physically possible. When she could feel gravity preparing to bring her down, she hurled Gambol Shroud up towards the roof of the building. Thankfully, it wasn't a large building, so she was able to slam the hilt against the roof's edge. The whiplash rattled her, but she was already climbing up the wall, forcing herself through the discomfort.
When she got onto the roof, she looked back down into the alleyway. The two Faunus were indeed following her, their weapons drawn. Eyes wide, she ran across the roof, peering down over the otherside. There were a few people walking down the street, but she didn't have much of a choice. She hooked Gambol Shroud onto the edge of the roof, then held on tightly and jumped. Again she felt the whiplash, but as usual her trusty weapon held. As feared, several people stopped and gawked at her, which she couldn't really blame. She just had to pop her weapon off of the roof and land down on the street, doing her best to ignore the stares as she resumed running.
Unfortunately, she only had a rudimentary knowledge of Argus, so unless she found somewhere to hide quickly, she would be caught by her pursuers. As it so happened, the several shops she was able to catch a glimpse of all appeared to be closed. That left her with very few options if she wanted to try disappearing without a trace. The only potential help was walking towards her: two girls who, naturally, were staring at her running full speed towards them. The blonde one put a hand on the raven-haired one's chest, stopping them both in place. She took up a defensive stand, staring directly at her. They must've thought she was going to attack them.
"Help me!" she gasped out, trying to appear as non-threatening as a sprinting woman with a weapon in her hands could be. She came to a halt, having to waste a few precious seconds to put her hands up. "Please!" Their eyes went from suspicious to a mixture of confusion and concern, which gave her just enough time to run around them and hide behind the blonde. She was big enough that she could actually hide behind her without looking too suspicious. With their backs together, she holstered her weapon and started praying that she wasn't about to be given away.
"Hey, have you two seen a girl with a black bow walking around? She's our friend, but I think she may have gotten lost." She held her breath, her hand shaking as it hovered over her weapon. If she had to draw it out as soon as she put it up, she would. Were the girls she was hiding behind going to rat her out? They probably would. They didn't even know who she was.
"Hmm... Yeah, I think I saw her go that way, over to the park." The blonde pointed to the right, getting a nod of thanks from the two Faunus before they started running in that direction. Once they were committed to that direction, she whispered over her shoulder, "We should get going. Keep running and we'll follow until they can't see you anymore." She couldn't believe that two random humans were helping her out, even if they didn't know she wasn't one of them. However, she wasn't one to look a gift horse in the mouth, so she just started running again. The two girls, true to their word, followed behind her.
"Why were those two following you?" They only stopped when they had gotten a good distance away, the three of them panting and leaning against the wall of another alleyway. It was the shorter girl who asked the question, and she needed to figure out how much to tell them without revealing the entire truth.
"They were friends of my ex. He, uh, hasn't gotten over the break-up." In a way, she wasn't lying. At worst, one could say she was lying by omission, but it wasn't that bad. Besides, they were complete strangers, and didn't deserve to get mixed up in her terrible affairs. "Thanks for helping me out there. I know I must've seemed a bit crazy."
"Nah, I get it. Your ex sounds like a real nutjob." The blonde laughed, then thought about what she'd said for a second. "Err, sorry if you were planning on getting back with him."
"I hope not." That would be the disaster to end all disasters. "Well, I guess I'd better get going. Thanks again for the help." Where exactly was she going? She paused, realizing that there wasn't a place in Argus that was safe anymore. Once the two White Fang members realized she wasn't there, they'd continue to hunt her until they caught her. She needed to get out, but she knew better than to head straight for the docks. It was best to lie low for a couple days, since they'd likely anticipate her doing that. "Uhm, hey, I don't have a place to stay right now, with the whole ex thing. Do you know somewhere I could stay for a couple days?"
The two girls looked at each other, then nodded in unison. "We might be able to convince our host to let you stay. It's not our place, but we're staying there for a couple days ourselves. Then we could take you to the docks to make sure that bum of an ex doesn't try anything funny." The blonde punched her fist into her palm, grinning. "I can be very persuasive."
"Really? Thank you. I don't want to impose..." She didn't want to impose, but she didn't have much of a choice, unless she wanted to stay outside and risk getting caught again.
"It's okay. Pyrrha's really nice, so I'm sure she'll let you stay with us." Pyrrha? Did she mean Pyrrha Nikos? Today was just going to be strange, wasn't it? Regardless, she followed the two girls, always keeping an eye out for the White Fang members' potential return. For the girls, with the threats no longer in sight, they seemed to be fine with bringing up normal conversation. As little prepared as she was to deal with that, she reluctantly swapped names with them. That wouldn't come back to bite her, right?
"Alrighty Blake, we're here!" Yang dramatically knocked on the door, getting an eyeroll from Blake. The door was opened, and a young blonde man was about to allow them inside when he stopped, noticing that Blake was there. That... didn't look like Pyrrha. He looked more like one of Yang's relatives. "Oh, this is Blake. Her shitty ex is being a bitch and chasing her around the city. Any chance she could shack up with us for a couple days? We'll get her out of here after that, promise."
"Well, I'll have to ask Pyrrha, but I'm sure it should be fine. You can at least stay here until she gets back." He smiled at Blake, offering his hand. "I'm Jaune, Pyrrha's husband."
"Blake. I didn't know that Pyrrha was married." She knew of the world-famous athlete and huntress, but she didn't actually know anything about her personal life. It was just surprising that she would marry so young, and to someone who didn't seem like he was particularly famous. She had always thought famous people married other famous people. Apparently she had been wrong, unless Jaune was some super famous... something.
"Yeah, I get that a lot," he laughed awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck. "Well, come in. Pyrrha told me you were staying for a couple days. The guest room is set up for you two. We, uh, didn't expect a third." He laughed again, just as awkward as before. "I'm sure we can figure something out."
"Don't worry about me. I'll make due." She was used to camping, so 'roughing' it in a house wasn't going to be a problem. Sleeping on the floor was better than what was waiting for her out there. "Is it okay if I use your shower?" When was the last time she'd been able to take a proper shower? It hadn't been that long, but she was sure she didn't smell like daisies.
"Yeah, it's upstairs, second door on your right." She nodded in thanks, about to head upstairs before she was stopped by Yang.
"Woah, wait. Don't you have a change of clothes?"
"Uh, no?" She didn't have time or space to carry around a ton of clothes. When she got the time to wash herself, she'd usually wash her clothes as well and dry them as best she could. It wasn't that comfortable, but being on the run wasn't exactly high living.
"Blake, that's filthy. At least take my spare clothing. You can wear it until you get your own clothes washed." Blake wanted to argue, but Yang was already fishing in her bag for a change of clothes. "Here ya go!" A full change of clothes was shoved into her hands, which she looked at with a quirked eyebrow. This girl was very... friendly, huh? She put the clothing under her arm, pulling out the black bra and panties that had been mixed in with the pile.
"I'd prefer not wearing your underwear, thanks. I'll just wear nothing." She handed it back to Yang, who had a big, dumb grin on her face.
"Nice." Rolling her eyes, Blake chose to ignore that and head upstairs to the bathroom. Second door on her right... She opened up the door, revealing a nice-looking bathroom with a standing shower. Thank goodness. She was so sick of seedy motel showers that doubled as bathtubs. Making sure to lock the door, she turned on the water and stripped out of her clothes. She made sure to keep her own dirty clothes separate from Yang's clean ones, then removed her ribbon and stepped into the shower.
A certain degree of calm washed over her as she stood beneath the shower head, running her fingers through her hair and working out any of the tangles that had formed since the last time she'd gotten to bathe. Having warm water flowing over her body was what she needed: it was nothing more than a reprieve from what was happening in her life, but she appreciated it all the same. Of course, there was the thing that she least liked about being naked. Closing her eyes, she dragged her fingers down her stomach, wincing at the feeling of scarred skin.
'You're hurting me!' 'No, you hurt me.' She pressed her forehead against the front shower wall, her breathing becoming shallower. No, she wasn't supposed to be thinking of that right now. It was going to make things tougher on her. 'I do these things because I love you, Blake. You know that, right?' No, no... He didn't. That was a lie. It was a lie. She didn't realize she had started crying until her cheeks were feeling a different wetness mixed in with the shower water. She wiped her tears away and forced herself to get back under the water.
She spent time in the bathroom just to have some 'me' time without the threat of immint death or worse, capture. Sitting on the floor with a towel wrapped around her body, she hugged her knees to her chest and sighed deeply. How long could she keep running for? The rest of her life? What was even the point? When she grew tired, he would only grow stronger. He would never stop pursuing her. Maybe she just needed to give up and go back to him. If she stroked his ego enough, maybe she could escape with minimal damage to her body and psyche. She didn't want to go back, though. She was never going to go back.
Eventually she picked herself off the floor, hanging the towel up to dry before putting on the tank top and shorts Yang had let her borrow. They were a bit loose on her, since Yang was a bit... mmm... bigger in certain areas. At least she didn't have to keep wearing her dirty clothes. She was grateful for that. "Well, time to go spend time with humans, I guess." Sighing, she opened the door and made her way downstairs. She was going to keep running: she just needed a new place to run to.
He was sitting in his office, staring at the wall through his mask. Plans were scattered across his desk, which he scratched at with a red marker. There were many things he needed to work on, but there was one thing he was focused on more than the others. All of the plans that had been drawn up to bring fear to the humans were going well, to the point where Faunus rights were actually improving. There were some people aghast and furious at what the White Fang had done, but those people would be taken care of in time. They would be made examples of. Just like the example he would have to make of Blake.
He picked up a photo of Blake, his eyes narrowed as he stared at it. His poor, misguided girlfriend. She had been so loyal to their cause, but somehow she had lost her nerve and escaped under his nose. It was a mistake he would never make again. As much as it pained him to do so, all deserters had to be punished, and Blake could not escape that just because of her relationship with him. He would take her back, though. She was his one weakness, and he would walk to the ends of Remnant to bring her back.
There was a knock on his door. "Enter!" The door opened, and Ilia stepped in, dropping down to one knee and bowing her head. "Rise, Sister Ilia. Do you have information on our runaway?"
"Yes, Brother Adam. Brother Brennan has reported in from Argus, saying they have spotted her in the city. They attempted to pursue, but she escaped over the buildings. They remain vigilant for her, though." So she was in Argus, huh? That was clever, believing that he wouldn't send any members of the White Fang so close to an Atlesian military port. She was wrong, though: the White Fang had nothing to fear from those elitist scum, and soon they and everyone would know exactly why.
"Send a corrospondance back. Tell them to check the ship logs at the docks." She knew they were following her, so she wouldn't be there for long. Blake had always been a runner, but he had never taken her for a coward. It was disappointing, but all could be forgiven once she had served her just punishment.
"Brother Adam, may I go after her? I want to be the one to bring her back" Ilia stood up, and he could see the passion burning in her eyes, even through her mask. "She betrayed us, and I cannot forgive that. I want to bring her back and make her face justice for what she did." Seeing her passion made him smile, happy to see it in his fellow White Fang members. It reminded him of Blake, back when they first met. She was so passionate for their cause, willing to do whatever it took to bring justice to their people. Perhaps it would take someone with just as much passion to reign her in.
"Your passion speaks to me, Sister Ilia. Once you get the correspondance from Brother Brennan, you will lead the pursuit of her. I expect great things from you." Ilia smiled, then it went away quickly as she nodded and bowed once more before exiting the room. Once the door closed, he pressed his fingers together, peering over them with a grin on his face. Ilia would be the perfect member to bring Blake home. It wouldn't be long now until she was where she belonged: right in his strong, protective, righteous arms.
"I'll be waiting for you, Blake."