Ruby pulled up alongside a large, rectangular building with three bulbous, bronze domes atop it in different sections, the sun beginning its descent in the late afternoon. She slowly exited her car, wearing a pair of jeans, black flip flops, and a red sleeveless shirt. She made her way towards the back of the building, circling around the left side while taking in the sight of the entire city before her. She heard a quick, 'Pst,' from her side, Ozpin overlooking the city as well, leaning against the stone rail. The smile on her face instantly drew a sigh from Ozpin, the man in green blankly stating, "Ruby."

"Ozzy, how ya doin'?" Ruby chimed, propping right up next to Ozpin.

"About as good as can be expected. But, the news is not good."

"I have no clue what you're talking about."

"I know you did that fucking dust job."

"Seriously, Ozzy, you're imagining things. Spend a little bit too much time using that yellow brick?"

"Fuck. You."

"Alright, I admit it, it was me. Arrest me," Ruby demanded, putting her hands out to be cuffed, "You know what? You'll be saving my life. Cause you called it, motherfucker."

"What?"

"You called it."

"Yang..."

"She showed up today, I just got home to drop my daughter off, she helped me with Dragon Bitch. But...we really haven't talked about it either."

"But, if, no, when she starts asking questions about why you're not feeding worms south of the Vacuo border," Ozpin paused, reflecting on the situation at hand, "Oh, we got problems."

"Yeah, no shit."

"We're definitely in shit, aren't we?"

"Yep."

"So, if your problems are my problems, then I guess that means my problems must, sort of, be your problems."

"Uh-uh, nope."

"What if I lose my job? Someone comes into my office, starts reading my files. They'll see the things I did. I know a lot of stuff, cop a plea, but you?"

"Fuck you, you ungrateful prick. I made your career."

"Well, we better go about saving it together, because you and I both know we can't let it go to shit now."

Ruby stood up straight, throwing her arms in the air in defeat, asking, "What do you need?"

Ozpin held up a picture of a man with black hair and thick mutton chops radiating down his cheeks. "His name is Tukson. The Agency claims he's dead. But we at the Bureau think it's a load of shit. We think he's being debriefed someplace."

"So?"

"Apparently, he has information that will put me and my superiors out of circulation. Those fucking Agency officers have got the coroner's office locked down. We need you to verify the body."

"And how the hell do you think I'm going to get in there?"

"Well," Ozpin began, drawing a small baton and bashing against Ruby's ahead, "you've played dead before, haven't you?"

Ruby dropped like a sac of rocks, the world slowly going black around her. "I have always kinda like you. Call me when you wake up," were the last, distant words she heard before slipping away.

A gray daze lay before her eyes, her eyes focusing on a silver zipper straight above her. The zipper flew open, revealing a bright light above her, a man in white with a blue mask inquiring, "So, what we got?"

Another responded, "A Betty Crocker. White female. Fairly decent shape. Mid-twenties. Possible O.D."

One of the men put a scalpel up to her sternum, ready to delve in before Ruby's hand shot up, grabbing his wrist as she sat upright, hooking him in the jaw. The man went spiraling to the ground, out cold, grunting, "Back from the dead, motherfucker!"

The other man ran from her, screaming hysterically as she stood on the floor, instantly reacting to the cold tile on her feet. That's when she looked down, seeing she was in nothing but her heart-covered bra and panties. Her hands instantly shot down to cover herself, her eyes darting around the room to find something to cover herself. She looked to a coat rack in the very corner of the room, a long, white robe hanging from one of the hooks. Darting for it, Ruby quickly filled into the lab coat as a light began to bound down the hall outside, Ruby taking cover behind the table she was on as a with a Glock aimed the light in, shouting, "Come out, now!"

Upon not finding anything, he turned to the room directly behind him, Ruby ramming into his lower back in a flash of rose petals, his gun skidding across the floor. Ruby scrambled for the gun, coming within inches of it before she was dragged back, the man dragging her by her ankle. Ruby spun onto her back, shooting her foot up into the man's face, sending him flopping back with a broken nose. Ruby finally grabbed the gun, turning to the man crawling at her, his mouth and chin dripping with blood, and fired, the round passing through his forehead. With a sigh of relief, Ruby slowly opened her eyes, looking around the room to find to corpses to her right, one a white woman and the other black. She checked the toe tags, finding neither of them to be named Tukson. "The fuck?"

She reached for her pocket, only getting an empty clap against her hip. "Of fucking course, it's in my pants. Where the hell are they?"

The alarms in the building went out, the lights shutting off just to further add to Ruby's misfortune. "Shit!"

She crept into hallway, trying the elevator to no avail. She turned to the opposite end of the hall and slowly made her way to the turn, peaking around to find two more IAA men charging down the short patch of the hall. Ruby quickly took aim again, popping both pistol-armed men in the head. She made her way down the short patch of hall before turning left to a longer stretch of hallway, more men filing in the door with pistols and shotguns handy. Their aim all sighted no her, but the woman disappeared in a flurry of roses. The men looked around the hall in a panic, one man with a shotgun turning around just as Ruby pulled the trigger, the round puncturing his heart. The other spun around and unleashed a flurry of rounds on yet another group of petals. Two more shots rang out from behind them, one man with a pistol and the last shotgun-armed man dropping with holes in the back of their skulls. The last man tentatively turned around to face Ruby, dropping his gun as he held up his trembling hands in surrender. "Please, I've got kids, don't do this, oh, Guh..."

Ruby jammed the gun into the man's mouth, pulling the trigger before looking at the directory above the elevator. She found what she was looking for: Evidence Room: Fourth Floor. She made her way to the stairs, going up two more flights until she found a circular room before her and, at the very center, sat a room set apart by windows and a few door. Seeing the cost was clear, Ruby snuck into the room, quickly finding a black trash bag under one of the desks. She dug into it, finding her clothes and Crescent Rose, embracing her weapon before throwing the coat aside, quickly dressing herself. Her next act was calling Ozpin, the man on the other end nonchalantly stating, "Wow, this took you longer than expect, losing your edge?"

"Fuck you, you albino asshole. I had to get to this floor to get my clothes and phone back, thanks for the warning, by the way."

"So, did you do it?"

"Only two bodies here, both of them chicks and neither of them named Tukson, you're right, it is a set-up."

"Good, the place is on lock-down at the bottom floor, so, you have to get out from your level."

"Yeah, thanks for the planning Ozzy."

"No problem. Just try to lay low and lose the cops."

"What?!"

"They're heading there now, you've got five minutes to get out of there, stay unseen, and go wherever that isn't that immediate area."

Ruby promptly hung up the phone, getting up to look around the room for some form of exit. Finally, she spotted it, a window in a room full of files. She would have sprinted had it not been for a burst of automatic fire whizzing past her head, sending her ducking for cover. "She can't get out, kill her!" a man shouted.

Ruby tossed her pistol aside, bringing her rifle-from Crescent rose up to her shoulder, ready to fight once more. The door to the room kicked open, four more men with assault rifles storming in just behind the desk Ruby was ducked under. "Where are you?! Come out now and we'll make this quick. Waste another second and we'll enjoy ourselves before we kill you."

Suddenly, the sound of a metallic object expanding preceded a round being fired from Ruby's scythe, her feet propped against the large desk that struck and pinned every man to the wall, crushing everything from the waist down. In another swing she decapitated all four effortlessly, their heads popping into the air with a fountain of blood spraying up with them. Now was her chance. She darted through the office and into the file room, putting her scythe back into its compact form before smashing the glass open. She peered over the edge and found a dumpster full of trash beneath her, growling in disgust before hoisting herself onto the ledge and jumping off the building, plummeting back-first into the garbage heap. Ruby rose from the dumpster to the sounds of more sirens piling in from the distance, putting her weapon to her back and sprinting in the opposite direction, ducking into the back alleys until she ended up in a ghetto cul-de-sac, far away from the cops' investigation. Checking around to make sure everything was clear and catching her breath, Ruby took her phone out once more and dialed a number, a woman's voice coming through, "Ruby?"

"Blake, listen, we need to talk. Now. Meet me back at my place...no, that's a terrible idea. Meet me outside of town by those old oil derricks just outside of town, they're in El Burro Heights. Make sure you're not tailed."

"I'll be there as quick as I can, is everything alright, you sound awful?"

"Just get there ASAP." Ruby ordered, ending the call before dialing another number.

"Ozpin, what the hell was that? Do you have any idea how many Agents I just ran into?"

"I'm sorry, they're not nice people, if that's a consolation."

"OH, you don't know the fucking half of it, I'm pretty sure I got threatened with rape. What the fuck is going on? Tell me, right...fucking...now."

"There's a big target out there, Ruby. We can't let the news that we know the truth get out. We have to hit the Agency when they least expect it. They have someone that can give them or us a big bump in funding, depending on who gets his information first."

"I could give a fiddler's fuck about your funding, I'm out, Ozpin."

"You're not, I need you to meet my boss. We'll be downtown tomorrow in the between the FIB and IAA buildings."

"The IAA building?! Are you fucking me?! After that firefight I just had with those Agency fuckers?!"

"Relax, they won't be there. They'll never expect an inside job." Ozpin reassured, ending the call.

Ruby pulled just up the dirt road and parked next to a pumping rig, the last hour of daylight beginning to dwindle. No sooner had she exited her car when Blake pulled up beside her in the green Bagger, Ruby quipping, "You ever got any different outfits?"

"Where the hell are your shoes?" Blake responded sarcastically.

"Touche."

"So, what's the issue?"

"You gotta get out of town."

"What?"

"Leave, get out of Vale, go anywhere but here."

"I don't exactly have many other places to go."

"Well, then take a trip, I'll fund it, and make it as long as possible."

"Ruby, what's going on?"

"Alright, you know when I told you I know people? Feds who looked after me when I retired?"

"You did?"

"Yeah, I did, I mean, I think I did...shit, I don't know! Fuck's sake, Blake, I got so many stories I can't keep 'em straight. I'm full of shit."

"Well, you being full of shit got me more in one day than I've made in my whole life."

"Yeah, I'm a great thief, but it's the other shit that I don't have figured out yet."

"So, what's the deal with these Bureau guys then?"

"This pretentious asshole...well, he's a good guy, fucking cocksucker! We did a deal, a long time ago. It didn't go the way it was supposed to go. Wrong person got killed and, long story short, I got put in an informal witness protection agency. He helped me and I didn't reveal any of his secrets, and it worked really well. Problem started when recently I became unretired. He starts showing up, asking me favors, telling me to do shit, and I'm pretty sure he'll use some bullshit to get me to bend over backwards for him. Look, Blake, I'm working for the Feds."

"Oh, shit." Blake groaned, throwing her head back.

"That's not even the worst part! Did I ever tell you about Yang?"

"I think so, maybe."

"Well, if you aren't so sure then I wasn't completely honest. She's...I don't...Hell, walking on Earth. That's what she is."

"Well, why don't we just kill her?"

"Oh, good luck with that, an entire army of armed men can't take her down, I'm sure we don't stand a chance. Besides, me and my sister...yeah, you heard me right, Yang is my sister, we have a very long history together. Long, complicated, and fucked history. Look, this is saying something from me, I've done a lot of things I'm not proud of. I never claimed to be an angel, but, Blake, you meet Yang, and you'll swear I am."

Blake paused for moment, dragging her hands down her face before saying, "So, what's our next move?"

"I don't know. Fuck! I'm just gonna, you know, try to play both sides, you know? Until I can find a way out of this shit."

"Look, Ruby, you came through in a time when I really needed it. I owe you a lot, the least I can do is stick with you until we get through this shitstorm."

"It's a death sentence, Blake."

"I've grown up in some tough shit, Ruby. I really wish you wouldn't underestimate me. The way I see it, these guys aren't doing anything for what you did, they're no better than me when I was hustling for Cinder. I may be part cat, but I'm not letting another big dog chase me up a tree while I wrap my tail around myself for comfort. No, Ruby, we're going to bury these fuckers."

"Hey, you're a good kid, Blake. This means a lot to me. Like I said, I'm a terrific thief, I'll find you some more work to get you a more luxurious lifestyle than what you've had. Alright, let's get out of here."

The girls exchanged a quick embrace before Blake departed on her motorcycle. Ruby stared at the darkening sky, throwing her head back in exhaustion before sliding her hands down her face. "What the fuck have I gotten myself into?"

Hey guys, DAM here with a quick update I'm posting on all foreseeabley-finite stories, including this one. I have a pole up on my profile for which stories you would like me to finish first. I encourage you all to go read other stuff I've posted so you can see your favorite stories wrapped up. I just need your guys' opinion on this so I can pin down each project at a time and not just jump all over the place. Thanks so much guys, keep up the support for me and my friends on FanFiction, and cite your DAM sources!