Yang almost pinched herself as she stepped into the hotel lobby. After everything she'd gone through in just three days – meeting her mother; traveling through planes; fighting a woman possessed by a demon – it was hard to believe there was a place on Remnant so bright and peaceful, where people gathered like everything was normal and would forever stay normal. Was she crazy? Or was everyone else?
Qrow tapped her on the shoulder, directing her away from the doorway, and nodded towards a waiting area to the right. Yang saw her father stand up from a chair, a smile on his face that was both relieved and concerned, and she almost cried on the spot. She would have, but she'd run out of tears already.
"Hey, you two," Taiyang said, meeting them halfway. He looked at Yang. "And don't you look like a ball of sunshine tonight…"
Before she could say anything in response, he pulled her into a hug, and Yang found out she still had a couple tears left in reserve.
"You okay, kiddo? You look like you've been through a meatgrinder," Taiyang said, letting her go.
Yang looked down at herself and realized that, indeed, she looked awful. She was covered from head to toe with dirt from the collapse, and her hair was matted with sweat and blood – hers? Where was she bleeding from? Maybe it was someone else's.
"Maybe I should take you to a hospital," Taiyang said, his smile fading.
"No!" Yang exclaimed, and winced as she felt half the lobby look her way. "I mean, I'm fine. I'm not hurt or anything, just a little bruised in places."
"I'll trust you on that," Taiyang said. He looked at Qrow. "You good?"
"Eh. I'm alive and kicking, thanks for asking," Qrow said. "But I can't stay. Got some loose ends to tie up still."
"You sure someone else can't handle that?" Taiyang asked.
Qrow shrugged. "Like the kids say, them's the breaks."
He nudged Yang, and she turned to face him.
"Don't go blaming yourself, Firecracker," Qrow said. "Sometimes things go to hell, and that's just the way the universe works. Doesn't mean you're the reason it's that way."
Yang hugged him. "Be careful, Uncle Qrow."
"You know me." He patted her on the back, then turned towards the entrance. "Always am."
He stepped out into the open and walked away from the building. Taiyang passed an arm around Yang's shoulder.
"There's a lot going on tonight, huh?" he said.
Yang nodded. "You can say that again." There was a moment of silence, during which Yang could think of nothing but the reason she'd come here. "You said we had a lot to talk about?"
She almost expected him to ignore her, or to reveal he'd said that just to get her away from everything that was happening.
"Yeah," Taiyang said, and she felt her chest constrict with nervous excitement. "We should talk about your mom." He looked at the ceiling, and added, "Both of them."
He turned them around and started walking towards an elevator.
"But first we should get to our room. Grabbed one on the fifth floor, two beds – the big kind, 'cause I spoil you like that," Taiyang said. "Also, you should take a shower before I barf on the nice carpet."
They got inside the elevator, and Yang smelled her armpit as it ascended. She detested it, but her dad had a point.
"Alright, fine," Yang said. "But it'll be a quick one."
Taiyang chuckled. "Sure it'll be, sweetheart."
It didn't take long for Raven to figure out he was following her. She dove low, shifting back as she landed atop a building, and Qrow landed behind her a moment later. He'd barely gotten his senses back when he felt a hand on his chest and he was shoved back, almost tripping over the edge.
"How did you find me?" Raven said.
Qrow ventured a look at the sidewalk below, then slowly circled around Raven, getting away from the edge. "Check under your left arm."
Raven lifted her arm and ran the opposite hand along the bottom. She found the tracker he'd planted on her at the beginning of the day, invisible against the black of her sleeve, and tossed it away with a sneer.
"Wonderful," Raven said. "I can't even trust my own brother not to spy on me."
"As if you expected anything less," Qrow said. "If you didn't want me to follow, you shouldn't have dropped the bird form all those times, Sis. You made it easy on me."
Raven ignored him and started to shift again, but Qrow stepped in fast and grabbed her by the arm.
"Are you going to be difficult again, or are you gonna work with me to find Vernal?" Qrow said.
Raven grabbed his wrist and made to twist him, but Qrow took his hand back before she could.
"I can find her on my own," Raven said.
"You're flying around the city hoping to catch a trace of Vernal instead of teleporting straight to her, so I get the impression that no, you can't find her on your own," Qrow said. "Or are you going to tell me you're just making things harder on yourself for the fun of it?"
Raven stood silent for a moment, glaring daggers at him.
"Our bond is broken," she said curtly.
Qrow frowned. "What does that mean?"
"It means she's gone."
Raven stepped back, getting up on the edge of the roof, her silhouette dark against the lights of the city.
"I have to find what's left of her and end this," she said. "Go back to your niece, Qrow."
"Raven." Qrow stepped close to her. "You want to make this right for Vernal. I'm behind that, completely, even if that means killing her. She's your family, which makes her my family as well," he said. "You're going to get my help, Raven, even if you don't want it. That's how family works."
Raven looked down at him, her eyes cold with disdain. "You're a sentimental idiot," she said. But she did not fly away.
"Thanks, Sis," Qrow said. "Most people don't see past the gruffy disposition."
"And the rampant drinking."
"That, too."
Qrow heard a ping from his Scroll, and took it out for a quick second.
"Look, if my sentimental idiocy didn't convince you, maybe Vernal's location two minutes ago will," he said.
Raven stepped down from the edge. "Tell me where."
"No. You'll just have to follow me there."
He hopped off the ground and shifted, flying off to the east side of Haven.
A minute later, he saw Raven flying on his trail.
Yang stepped out of the bathroom clean and fresh, but feeling no less bothered than half an hour ago. As she took the towel off her head, she saw her father sitting on a chair opposite the beds, a knowing grin on his face.
"Quick littleshower, huh," he said.
"It wasn't that long," Yang said quietly. She grabbed a comb and sat down at the end of one of the beds. "And I had a lot to think about."
She started to comb her hair, only to wince as she immediately met the resistance of a knot. She pulled harder, but it was such a thick tangle she only managed to yank her whole head to the side. Groaning, Yang tossed the comb on the bed – the hotel's shampoo and conditioner were less than ideal, and she hadn't really paid any attention to what she was doing in the shower, so her hair was going to stay this way.
This was just the perfect bookend for the day, really.
"Sorry you're having a tough time, kiddo," Taiyang said. "You wanna order something from downstairs? I'll pay."
"I don't feel like eating," Yang said. "Dad, I… I don't think I should be here. This feels wrong."
Taiyang leaned forward in his chair, resting his elbows on his legs. "Wrong why?"
"Because here's more important stuff going on!" Yang said. "A woman died in my arms two hours ago, and there's a little girl still waiting for her to come back home. And Vernal's out there and maybe she'll be dead next, and Qrow's searching for her, and I'm… I'm here, all shaken up because, shocker, the woman who abandoned me twenty years ago doesn't like me." She exhaled, rubbing the corners of her eyes. "I feel like a brat."
"You're not a brat, Yang," Taiyang said. "You're upset, and you're confused, and you've got every right to feel that way. And you deserve to hear the answers to all those questions you must have." He sighed. "You deserved that a long time ago, but here we are."
Yang couldn't argue with that. Still, she couldn't stop her eyes from straying to the door. The world wasn't going to stop spinning while she dealt with her personal issues.
"Did I ever get around to telling you and Ruby how me and your mother – Summer, I mean – how we really met?" Taiyang asked.
Yang looked at him again, surprised. "Didn't you meet in high school?"
"That was our cover story. Back when you two still thought she was a… what was it you called her, a super-bodyguard?" Taiyang said.
"Man, we were really naïve," Yang mumbled.
"You were kids," Taiyang said. "But, we did meet in high school. We were in the same year, but we didn't share a lot of classes, so we didn't really know each other well. Plus, Summer was friendly, but most of us kids had a hard time approaching her – she had this mysteriousness about her, and she'd sometimes disappear for days at a time with no explanation. One time she came back with a big scar on her neck, and me and my friends thought she was in a gang." He shrugged. "So, yeah, don't feel bad about having been naïve once."
Yang frowned, connecting the odds in her head. "So wait, she was already working with Beacon during high school? Just like Ruby?"
"Yang, your sister really takes after her," Taiyang said, gesturing impotently between them. "And yeah, that's about as endearing as it is terrifying."
Yang could only imagine how that felt for him. She knew she had gotten her fair share of Ruby scares over the years.
"But if you weren't friends then and Mom was off saving the world half the time, how did you two even start dating?" Yang asked.
Taiyang leaned back and shrugged. "Blind date."
"Dad," Yang said. "Please don't pull my leg right now."
"It's the truth!" Taiyang said. "It was two years after graduation. My friends talked me into going on a blind date because I, quote unquote, needed a girlfriend. And a friend of Summer's convinced her to do the same. We met up in a restaurant, realized we already knew each other, we hit it off… And the rest is history."
Yang's eyes narrowed. "Is it known history, though, Dad?"
"Touché," Taiyang said, smiling wryly. "A few months after we started dating, Summer told me what she really did for a living, and what she was capable of. Neither of us could stand her keeping secrets any longer, so it just got to a point where that needed to happen, or we were done. So she told me, and she showed me to Beacon, got me a job there – because being an Agent is way cooler than being a cop, she said – introduced me to a few folks-"
"Wait wait wait, go back. What's that about being a cop?" Yang said, waving her hands.
"Oh, I forgot to mention that I was attending the academy at that time," Taiyang said. "Did I never tell you I wanted to be a cop when I was younger? I'm fairly sure I told Ruby."
"That's so unfair that I didn't know!" Yang said, and watched her father wince in dismay. "…That's so much comedic material wasted! You even love donuts!"
Taiyang sighed in relief. "Right. Sorry, kiddo," he said. "Anyway, I started working for Beacon with your Mom. That's when she introduced me to Qrow – who, by the way, was the friend who convinced her to go on that blind date."
"Darn, that's also excellent material…" Yang said.
Taiyang nodded. "And that's when she introduced me to Raven as well."
Yang fell mute, the brief joy she'd found promptly shot down as she was reminded of how she'd gotten here.
"Yeah," Taiyang said. "That's where things get complicated."
Qrow landed in an alleyway and shifted back. He looked out into the street. It looked like any regular night, the road busy with traffic as people returned home from work or went out to eat, and a few pedestrians occupied the sidewalk. He didn't feel anything in the air either.
"Shion," Raven said, landing behind him. "This is at the other end of the city relative to Oniyuri. Are you sure your contact had the right information?"
"Yes, I'm sure," Qrow said.
"Why would Vernal - the demon, flee all this way?" Raven asked impatiently.
"I don't know, Raven. You probably have a better idea than me," Qrow said. "Do you sense anything?"
Raven stepped beside him and closed her eyes. "Nothing," she said after a moment. "How long ago was she sighted?"
"Just twenty minutes. She crossed this street-" Qrow gestured at the road. "-and went into that alleyway."
"Continuing east, towards… Higanbana." Raven shook her head. "That'll just take her back around towards Oniyuri. If her objective is to leave the city, then she should be heading down."
"Maybe she's not fleeing," Qrow said, and was met with a dead silence from Raven. "We can ponder all night about what Vernal's doing, that's not gonna get us any closer to her. Unless you've got a better idea, I say we go the way she went, and hopefully we'll catch her trail."
Raven didn't dignify him with a response, stepping out of the alleyway. She barely waited for traffic to slow down before she crossed the street, and Qrow went after her, hoping his Semblance wouldn't kick in and send a truck to reduce either of them to mush.
They entered the alleyway Vernal had taken, navigating the tight space between buildings. Raven took the lead with vigor, and the longer she stayed silent, the more worried Qrow grew.
"Raven," he called, catching up to her. "We need to talk about what we're gonna do when we find Vernal."
Raven sent him a glare over her shoulder, and he nearly stumbled from the intensity of it. "Don't fucking start."
"I'm not talking about not killing her," Qrow said. "I'm saying I should be the one to do it."
Raven stopped suddenly and turned to face him, and Qrow stopped too.
"Are you serious?" she asked.
"You think I'd just throw that out there if I didn't mean it?" Qrow said. "You're too close to her, Raven. I have no doubt that you'd be able to do it, but you shouldn't have to."
"And you think you can handle that?" Raven said.
"I've done a lot of harrowing stuff over the years," Qrow said. "This is new, but it isn't unfamiliar."
Raven stared at him for a moment, before she turned away and sneered.
"What's so funny?" Qrow said.
"Nothing. I just can't believe you can say that with a straight face," Raven said. "You see, Qrow, I haven't forgotten why we left the tribe. You were too soft for that life, always sniveling like a baby, so I had to take you away from there before Father got fed up with you for good. And every day after that you clung to my leg like your life depended on it, because it did."
"That was years ago, Raven," Qrow said, gritting his teeth. "I was just a kid."
"So was I, Qrow! But you – you haven't changed." Raven spun to face him. "You just traded me for Summer. And when she was gone, you turned to Ozpin. You just do whatever you're told by whoever makes you feel safe, and then you wrap yourself in your drinks and your loneliness and your bad luck so you don't have to face the fact that you've been scared all your life."
She reached for his flask under his vest and threw it away. It bounced off a wall and fell to the ground with a deafening clank, the whiskey inside spilling in a pool.
"I know exactly who you are, Qrow," Raven said. "So you don't get to come back into my life, fuck everything up, and then act like you know what's best for me. You don't even know what's best for yourself."
She stared at him, and it took every drop of strength in him not to punch her in the face and walk away. Oh, he wanted to – he wanted to sprout wings and find the nearest bar, drown himself while she dealt with the mess she'd created. That would be only fair, with the way she treated him.
Yet somehow, he stayed.
"Goes both ways, Raven," Qrow said. "I know you too. I know you're scared just as often as I am. And I know when you're terrified, you lash out until everyone's left you." He paused. "I let you go once. I'm not making that mistake again."
Raven stood silent, a storm raging behind the cold of her eyes. A minute passed, and she turned her back to him and walked ahead. Her voice reached him - quiet, taciturn words.
"You won't touch her," she said. "Not unless I tell you."
Qrow nodded and walked after her. "I wouldn't dream of it, Sister."
For a while, her father didn't speak. He stared off into a corner, chin in hand, and the seconds ticked on in a dead silence. Yang had the urge to get up and shake him, make him say something, but she could tell he was only quiet because he didn't know how to proceed. Frustrating as that was, she couldn't blame him – if this was a simple matter to discuss, he would have spoken to her about it years ago.
Finally, he looked at her and spoke. "How much did Qrow tell you?"
They had been silent for so long, it felt weird to speak again.
"I'm not sure. I mean, he told me a bunch of stuff, but…" Yang said. "I know he and Raven ran away from the tribe when they were kids, and eventually they started working for Beacon. And then one day Raven just up and left." She pondered on what else she knew, but only one detail stuck in her mind. "She was probably pregnant with me then."
Taiyang nodded. He turned his chair to face her and took a deep breath.
"Summer joined Beacon around the same time Raven and Qrow did. They worked directly for Ozpin most of the time, so they saw a lot of each other," he said. "This was before my time, but I'm told they made a tight-knit group after a while."
"So, Mom… Summer and Raven, they were friends?" Yang said. The concept made perfect sense, she supposed, but that didn't make it any easier to swallow.
"I want to say inseparable, but that's not really true. Maybe on Summer's part, but Raven's never been that kind of person," Taiyang said. "But they were close. I'm pretty sure Summer was the only friend Raven ever made, up until we met."
"I guess Raven wasn't as... grumpy back then," Yang said, frowning.
"No, she was always like that," Taiyang said. "But they were friends anyway. That picture I gave you – that used to be Summer's before she passed. She took it herself on some vacation trip she dragged Raven into."
Yang rubbed her forehead. Magic had been easier to process than this.
"I'm not going to pretend like I understand how that dynamic worked, but," Taiyang said. "Raven has always been lonely, and she likes it that way. Or at least she pretends she does. But I think for people like her, when they do make a connection with someone – well, that bond has to be pretty strong, right?"
"I guess that makes sense," Yang said. She could think of a few other people in her life that concept applied to. Or rather, most people in her life. "And that also made you two close, I'm guessing?"
"Yeah," Taiyang said, something akin to sadness flashing across his face. "I wasn't as close to her as Summer was, but we were… good friends. I stayed in headquarters most of the time, so I guess that made me a convenient person for Raven to jump to when she was coming back from the field. We talked a lot, and I got to know her well. As well as Raven lets anyone know her, anyway."
He opened his mouth to continue speaking, but no words came out. He pursed his lips, his eyes escaping Yang's once again.
"I was hoping talking about that would help somehow," he said quietly. "Sorry, sweetheart. I really have no idea how to do this."
Yang breathed in deep. She opened her mouth to speak, her heart going like a freight train, and she almost lost her resolve before the words left her lips.
"Dad, did you cheat on Mom?"
Her father whipped his head around to look at her, eyes going wide. "No!" he exclaimed. "No," he repeated, and his expression softened somewhat. Shame, or something adjacent to that, colored his eyes.
"Then what happened?" Yang said. Every syllable took a century, and her throat burned in their wake. "Dad, please just tell me. I don't care if it's bad, I just – I just need to know."
He stared at her, and Yang had never seen him look so fragile before – not even when their house had exploded and he'd ended up in the hospital. Not even when Summer had gone.
Then in the blink of an eye, he seemed to find a resolve like steel, standing up and sitting down beside her on the bed. He met her eyes and did not look away.
"Mine and Summer's relationship wasn't as perfect as I may have led you to think," Taiyang said. "Summer was, by all accounts, a wonderful woman, but she had a few… qualities, that made it difficult to be her partner at times. And I did not know how to handle that. I was young, and awful, and gosh I was lucky she put up with me."
"We dated for seven years. We had our difficulties, but we got through them. But the years went on, things got serious, and then Summer said she wanted to have a kid," he said. "And I completely flipped out. Not because I didn't know that about her – we'd talked about it and we both wanted to have kids, someday – but suddenly it had to be now. And we were young, and she was not going to give up her job even though she nearly died every other week, and – you get the point."
He sighed, shaking his head.
"That was too much for me, and instead of working through it, I broke up with her. And then, like an idiot, I just shut her out of my life," Taiyang said. "Those were the most miserable weeks of my life. Spent a lot of nights drowning my sorrows with Qrow. And then one night, Raven shows up instead. We talked for hours, and then one thing led to another…"
He trailed off, looking at Yang like he expected her to storm off. But she could only stare, much too absorbed in everything she was hearing to even react to it yet.
"The morning after, I woke up and suddenly - suddenly it was so painfully clear to me how stupidly I had been acting. So I made the best and worst decision of my life," Taiyang said. "I left Raven there, and I ran to Summer's place. I told her what happened, and I begged her to take me back, and I swore that we would make things work this time. And, the saint she was… she did."
Yang slipped off the bed and walked over to one of the windows, feeling like she might collapse with every other step she took. Staring off into the city lights, she couldn't begin to make sense of her emotions. Everything her father said, it wasn't the stuff of her worst nightmares – not even close – but it still shook her to her core. The only escape was to not think about it, but she couldn't have done that if she tried.
"And Raven," she said, looking over her shoulder. "What about her?"
"After that… She acted like her usual self. Stand-offish, cold. We talked, Summer and I and her, and things carried on as normal," Taiyang said. "Now, we could tell something was different about her, and we tried reaching out to her, but that was as good as useless. And then one day Raven left. She just vanished, no warning to anyone but Qrow. We didn't see her for months. And then…"
He gestured at Yang, a bittersweet smile on his face.
"And then she showed up on our doorstep," he said, "with you."
"Raven, I've got her location!" Qrow exclaimed, putting his Scroll away in a hurry. "Follow me!"
He didn't wait for a response as he ran past Raven. Jumping off a slope, he shifted and soared above the city skyline, hovering in place for a moment as he caught his bearings. Raven joined him, and they soared east as fast as they could.
The Higanbana Bridge became visible a couple minutes later, and its shape had barely become defined in Qrow's eyes when Raven shot past him towards it. He understood the hurry a moment later as he felt the unpleasantly familiar sense of the demon take hold of him, and he followed her without hesitation.
They reached the bridge and landed on the sidewalk. An endless succession of cars sped by them, coming from Shion to the bridge's namesake district, and the other way around. Suspended two hundred meters above a body of water at the base of the mountain, the bridge had little protection from the wind, and Qrow found it difficult to hear anything with it rushing in his ears.
"She's near!" Raven said, strutting onward with her hand on her sword.
"Raven, let's not hurry into something we're not prepared for!" Qrow shouted. "We don't know what to expect, and this is hardly the place for a fight!"
"We don't have much of a choice!" Raven said. "This is it, Qrow. No half-measures!"
Qrow cursed under his breath. She had a point, but that didn't make their circumstances any less terrible.
"A fight it is, then," he said, and took out his Scroll. "I need Higanbana Bridge evacuated and shut off on both ends immediately. I am engaging the target on my own – no reinforcements. Keep the local police away at all costs!"
Raven unsheathed her sword and looked back at him. "This isn't going to be pretty. You saw what the demon did in the body of a regular woman – imagine what it'll be capable of using Vernal's," she said. "I'm going to need your help, Qrow."
"I'm following your lead," Qrow said. He wished he had packed his sword with him, but he hadn't expected to be fighting Grimm or anything close. That had been a mistake and a half. "Don't let it grab you."
"I won't," she said, looking ahead. She spun her sword in her hand, her fingers white around the handle. "We don't know how resilient that thing will be with Vernal's Aura. We'll have to wear it down, keep its attention split between the two of us. I'll strike when the time is right, and if that doesn't work-"
Qrow nearly crashed into Raven as she stopped dead in her tracks in the middle of the sidewalk, her sword slowly lowering as she stared in shock. Qrow followed her line of sight, and felt his heart sink like a rock.
"She's not running," Raven muttered.
Twenty meters ahead of them, Vernal climbed onto the side of the bridge and stepped atop the edge.
"With me," Yang said, her voice ringing hollow in her ears.
Her father nodded. "With you," he said. "You were just days old. So small, but you already had so much hair… And the giggles! I've never met a baby gigglier than you used to be. Oh, and the crying!"
He chuckled, his smile fading as he saw the helpless look on her face.
"We figured out what was going on pretty quickly. I mean, it was obvious – she didn't have to say much," Taiyang said. "Raven… She asked, practically begged us to take you and raise you, because she didn't know how. Because she couldn't. A bunch of reasons, and she was so distraught, I can't really remember exactly what she said."
"And I was going to help her. Obviously, I was going to. And Summer felt the same way," he said. "We tried to get Raven to stay, work out some way that she could raise you as well, but there was no getting through to her. She put you in Summer's arms and she left. And that's the last time I saw her."
Yang turned around. She leaned against the wall behind her and took a deep breath.
"Is there anything else I should know?" she asked.
"If I knew anything more, I'd tell you, but I'm afraid that's it for me," Taiyang said. "Sweetheart, I'm sorry I kept this from you for so long. I should have told you all of this much sooner."
"Why didn't you?" Yang said, anger breaking through the exhaustion and confusion. "Twenty years, Dad. I didn't even know her name until I was eighteen! I mean, at that point, why even tell me Summer wasn't my biological mom? What was even the point if you were going to keep me in the dark all my life?"
"Because I thought I was doing what was best for you," Taiyang said.
"Oh gee, and that worked wonders, didn't it?" Yang said, throwing her hands up. "Look at me, I'm so well-adjusted I traveled halfway around the world just so I could get told I'd be more appreciated if I didn't exist in the first place! I'm all sunshine and rainbows over here!"
Taiyang sighed.
"The plan was to tell you the full story when you got older. And I should have stuck to that," Taiyang said. "But then we lost Summer, and suddenly I had to raise two girls all on my own. And I don't say this as an excuse, Yang, because it's not. But I was so scared I was going to screw everything up. I was scared you'd hate me and you'd have no one to look up to. I thought I had to be the perfect role model, because that's what you deserved." He shook his head. "I know now that I was protecting myself as much as I was protecting you."
"You told me you loved her," Yang said. "Who were you protecting when you said that, Dad?"
"I… Maybe I shouldn't have said that. But I wasn't lying. I never loved Raven like I loved Summer, but..." Taiyang said. "I never blamed her for leaving you with me. First because, well, that was the best gift anyone's ever given me. And also… I never believed she did that out of selfishness. I think she truly believed she was only doing the best for you then, and that doing that hurt her deeply."
"Hurt her? I'm sorry, but your memory must be failing you," Yang said. "She told me to my face that she never wanted me. She couldn't have been clearer about that."
"But she had you anyway, didn't she? And she could have just left you on our doorstep," Taiyang said. "If she didn't want you, she definitely wouldn't have bothered to name you."
Yang flinched. Raven had named her? That couldn't possibly be true, but looking at her father's face, there was no denying it was.
"That-" she said, sucking in a big gulp of air. "That doesn't matter. So what, she gave a name to a baby. What an excruciating ordeal. She didn't do anything else!"
"You're right, of course. But maybe that means something anyway," Taiyang said. "That's up to you to decide."
"Awesome. It's great that you think I'm enough of an adult now to make those decisions. That's really very thoughtful of you, Dad."
He shrunk, and Yang felt like screaming her head off. She didn't want to hurt his feelings, but she was in no place to be protecting them at the moment.
"This is too much," Yang said. "I need some fresh air."
She pushed off the wall and made for the door, hearing a faint apology from her father as she walked past him. She stopped for a moment, torn between accepting that apology or brushing it off with another heated retort. In the end, she just left the room, the door shutting behind her with a loud click.
"-down. This doesn't have to end this way."
Raven only caught the end of what Qrow was saying. She blinked, the shock of seeing Vernal fading and being replaced instantly by a cold hand around her heart. She walked forward, quicker with every step, until she stood beside her brother before Vernal.
She looked up, and froze again. Eyes of black stared down at her, darker than the night itself, but with every sway, the faintest shade of blue seemed to color them, before it vanished again. Vernal was anything but still, her body jerking back and forth, as if it were being piloted by two opposing beings, and Raven flinched every time Vernal went backwards. Just a couple centimeters more, and she'd go past by the edge and plummet to the water below.
"Raven," Vernal spoke. Her voice was strained, only barely discernible from the grunts of an animal. "I… was hoping you wouldn't find me."
It took Raven a second to find her voice. "But I did." She stepped forward. "Vernal. Step down from the edge."
"I can't," Vernal said, shaking her head. "I have to do this."
"Why, Vernal?" Qrow asked. "Why do you have to jump off?"
With the bridge closed off, the road slowly emptied of all vehicles. That only left the wind to pierce the silence, and as loud as it was, Raven could hear nothing but the beat of her own heart.
Vernal lifted her right hand, and raised two fingers to show she was gripping the crystal. She held it so tight it was cutting into her palm, the blood spilling down her arm and dripping off her elbow.
"I jump off. I hit the water. I die," she said, shuddering at the last word. "It goes back into the crystal. The crystal sinks to the bottom. No one ever touches it again."
"That sounds a little extreme, Vernal," Qrow said. "We have ways to secure the crystal. Ways that don't involve you killing yourself."
"But I'd still have to die," Vernal said, looking at him. "Right?"
Qrow grimaced. He looked to Raven for help, but she had no eyes for him.
"You don't understand," Vernal said. "This thing… It's dying. With every second, it's fading away. The only way for it to survive is to take someone's else strength. But no one – no one could ever be strong enough."
She lunged forward, almost falling onto the sidewalk, only to stop and pull back.
"Even now… It's fighting me," Vernal said. "It doesn't wanna go back. And it really, really doesn't wanna die."
"Maybe you don't have to die," Raven said, her voice startling even her.
Vernal turned her head to stare at her, her face twisting in confusion and surprise. Raven dropped her sword in front of her, and raised her open hands.
"You don't have to die," Raven repeated. "Qrow can help you. Beacon can. You just have to come with us. Look at you, you've resisted its influence so far. You can keep doing that until we get you to a safe space."
Slowly, Vernal's lips curled in a pained smile. "That's not what you were preaching before, Raven."
"Yes, well, it wasn't you before!" Raven shouted.
Vernal didn't speak. Her smile faded, and she took a step back, swaying as half her foot hung off the edge.
"You don't have to do this, Vernal," Raven said, shaking. "Please. At least… Let me do it for you."
She wouldn't. She'd never. But if Vernal believed her and stepped down, she and Qrow could subdue her before she caught on to their intentions.
But Vernal saw through her ruse, because how couldn't she?
"Vernal." Raven stepped forward, reaching out. "Take my…"
"…hand."
The girl stared up at her, teeth bared and gritted like a wild animal's. The storm poured onto her, leaving her hair plastered to her forehead. Mud and blood ran down her arms and under her shirt.
Raven saw her tense, and moved well in advance. The girl lunged at her, flashing a knife, but a simple push sent her back to the bottom of the ditch. She stepped over the knife and took it, turning it in her hands with mock interest.
"That was foolish. Even if I hadn't seen that coming, what would you have done once you stabbed me?" Raven said. "A simple bleed wouldn't have put me out. How were you planning to overpower an opponent twice your size, hmm?"
"Give it back!" the girl screeched. "It's mine!"
"I don't think it is anymore," Raven said, and put the knife away behind her.
The girl lunged at her again, screaming something about how she was going to kill her. Raven shoved her down once more.
"Keep doing that, and you'll end up hurt," Raven said, and the girl, about to charge at her again, stopped immediately. "Good. Maybe you're not as dim-witted as I first thought."
She nodded for the girl to stand up straight, and hesitantly the girl obeyed. Raven looked her up and down. Scrawny, but she had some muscle in her. And scars. Too many scars for her age.
"The people who left you here," Raven said. "Are they coming back for you?"
The girl scowled. "That's none of your business."
"Normally I'd agree with you, but if I'm going to bring you with me, I want to know what trouble that'll cause me," Raven said.
"Bring me with you? Where?" the girl said, drawing back.
"My tribe is not far from here. The food is awful, and the company isn't what I'd call stellar," Raven said. "But it's better than dying on the side of the road."
"Why are you doing this?" the girl asked. "What do you want from me?"
Raven pursed her lips. She didn't know why she'd stopped to help this girl. She wasn't in the custom of rescuing children from their sorry fate. She wasn't a saint, and if she were one, she'd die old before she made any difference.
"I don't know," she said. "Maybe you'll give me a reason."
Raven offered her hand again, but the girl didn't move. There was hope in her eyes, but more than that there was fear – the kind that only someone who had been burned too many times before could know.
"I'll make this simple for you. You have two options," Raven said. "Option number one, you can stay afraid, and refuse. I'll leave you here, where you'll either die of starvation or sickness, or maybe someone less indifferent than me will come along and you'll die of that instead. Or, option number two… You can be strong, and take my hand."
The girl stared at her, tears mixed in with the raindrops on her cheeks. Trembling, she stumbled forward and took Raven's hand.
A memory came to Raven, of stubby fingers curling around her own, and lilac eyes staring at her with the warmth of a sun. And another memory, a painfully recent one, of the same eyes staring with sadness and quiet conviction as a coffin was lowered into the ground.
"Why are you staring at me like that?" the girl asked, bringing Raven back to the present.
"Raven," she answered. "My name's Raven."
"Okay." The girl frowned. "Mine's-"
"It doesn't matter," Raven said. "Where we're going, you can choose a new one."
Raven held her hand out. She stared at Vernal, pleading with her eyes, hoping that somehow that would get through to her.
"Vernal," she whispered. "Please don't leave me."
She saw a tear stream down Vernal's face, and she nearly broke herself.
Suddenly, like a switch had been turned off, Vernal's body went slack – except for her hand, which gripped the crystal even tighter. She gasped, bowing her head, and looked at Raven.
"I can do this," Vernal said.
Her lips moved in a silent thank you, and she stepped back and fell.
Raven dashed forward, jumping over the edge and reaching out with her hand, but Vernal was far below her, plummeting fast towards the water. Raven shifted, flying towards Vernal with a burst of speed, and as she closed in, she shifted back and reached out with her hand-
Vernal hit the water, and Raven hit it a moment later. Her Aura protected her from the impact, but it did nothing for the dizziness it caused. As her eyes adjusted, she saw bubbles all around her, and red, so much red, and a broken silhouette sinking past.
Raven grabbed Vernal and swum to the surface. She gasped for air, and looked down at Vernal. Lifeless eyes stared back at her. Raven pressed their foreheads together, a sob wracking her body.
"I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry…"
Vernal's hand opened, releasing black shards into the water. Unnoticed, they sunk towards the bottom…
The front of the hotel was noisy, and even though it was past ten, there were still a few people passing by or entering and leaving the building. Still, just the open air felt like a wonder to Yang. She was a little embarrassed that the hotel staff could see what a wreck she was, but that couldn't be helped.
"Yang?"
She looked behind her and sighed as she saw her father exit the building. "Dad. I know you're worried, but I just need some time to think. Please?"
"It's important," Taiyang said, and raised his hand to show her Scroll, its screen flashing red. "You left this in your room. That's still the emergency signal, right?"
"Yeah? But, uhm, that's for Beacon stuff. Not my jurisdiction, or whatever they call it," she said.
"I'm pretty sure your uncle's in trouble," Taiyang said. "Probably your mother too."
Yang took the Scroll and unlocked it. She stared at it for a moment, her face paling.
"Well?" her father asked.
She looked at him. "How far is Higanbana Bridge from here?"
Qrow ran his hand through his hair and sighed. He leaned on the side of the bridge, staring down at the water. He couldn't make anything out from such a height, not even specks, but he didn't have to see to know.
He pushed away from the edge, wincing as his hand scraped against something. He shook it and looked at his palm, seeing a tiny black shard embedded in it. Frowning, he looked at the place where Vernal had just stood, and atop the blood which had spilled from her hand, he saw dozens more of the same black shards. He hadn't gotten a good look, but add them all together, and they might account for half the-
Realization hit him like lightning. He fished out his Scroll and typed out the emergency code, and just as his finger left the last digit, a red light shone over him from behind.
Qrow turned, and saw Raven standing in the middle of the road, veins spreading across her face. Red eyes turned black, and she lunged.
Angriest Birb Mom.
You know, this chapter turned out a lot shorter than I expected it. Still, it was quite an experience to write. Explaining Yang's, uh... origins, is a task and a half. And the Raven and Qrow stuff too.
Once more I must apologize, this time to the Vernal fans. I grew fond of her myself as I wrote her, but the story must stay its course, even when it's painful. And I'm super proud of that little Raven-Vernal flashback, so that helps me cope, at least!
Anyway, next week we shall have the last chapter, so see you then for an exciting, and surely painless ending!
-Zeroan
