A/N: Hey all! Sorry this is a day late, yesterday was kind of insane. Not quite as insane as the days these poor girls are having, but you know ;3

HUGS,
D

Evening snuck up on the valley. By the time Yang looked up, the sun was already half-hidden behind the mountain ridges, bathing the area in shadow. The darkness of night was swift to follow. Digging up the scattered pieces of an utterly destroyed town helped pass the time more quickly than the brawler expected... not that it helped the toxic pit of dread slowly eating away at her from the inside out.

Blake was late, the town where they were supposed to have resupplied had been wrecked by... something, and there were only ruins remaining. Granted, thanks to the enormous slab of concrete they'd found, likely once the foundation of a house, they had a fantastically solid level area for Ruby to cobble together a surprisingly respectable spit-roasting mechanism using the scrap wood and metal they'd unearthed.

Currently, Yang sat next to their tiny Faunus charge, quietly holding one of her hands as the little girl used a damp stick to poke at the low flames of the fire pit they'd built together. Ruby and Weiss sat together on the other side of the fire, poring over the map again. They were discussing something - Yang wasn't really listening though. Mostly she was trying to avoid thinking about Blake being out in the forest alone, amethyst eyes slowly trailing up and down the treeline her partner had vanished into.

"It's too far out of the way. We don't even know if it still exists," Weiss waved a hand to their immediate surroundings, "What if it's just this place all over again?"

"Then at least we can tell somebody," Ruby looked the map over again. "It would only take a day. Maybe two days. And if it is a village, we can stock up and find someone to look after..." she tipped her head towards the little girl.

"Robin," Weiss said. She straightened her coat when Ruby looked at her funny. "It was sewn in the back of her shirt collar."

That finally caught Yang's attention. "What's that? Cutie here's got a name after all?" The brawler was halfway to patting the little girl's head when a rustle came from somewhere behind them. Yang whipped around, relief washing her fears away upon seeing Blake, unharmed, jogging towards them out of the treeline, clearly out of breath. Of course, she must have realized she was late and was running back... but where was Drei and what on Remnant was that thing?!

Raw, skinless, headless, dripping a trail of blood, a freakish creature had bounded out of the treeline, loping awkwardly after Blake, chasing her. Yang was on her feet in a split second, sprinting towards her partner, Ember Celica cocked and ready to fire. "Blake! Behind y-"

Blake glanced behind her and stopped short, holding her hands out. "Yang, stop."

Surprised by the sudden command, the brawler did her best to skid to a halt and failed miserably, crashing into Blake's outstretched arms. The thing caught up to them... and licked Yang's hand, woofing in triumph.

Yang blanched, realizing upon closer inspection that the thing was actually Drei, wearing the skinned and gutted carcass of an enormous... deer? Moose? Something. It was really hard to tell without a head. Blake had secured it to the dog with her ribbon, complete with a cute little bow around his neck. It almost made up for his hideous new coat of bloodied pinkish-red fur.

Blake smirked. "Sorry I'm late."

Ruby's jaw had dropped. She snapped her mouth shut and tried to de-tangle the little Faunus girl from her cloak, where she'd scurried to hide when Yang got up.

"What in the world," Weiss approached the dog, throwing her hands out at the entire bloody-meat-on-fur situation before her, "Could you possibly have found a more unsanitary way to transport this?"

Blake shrugged, "I could have dragged it through the dirt."

"You could have left the skin on. And it's snow," in the twilight Weiss gestured to the entire frozen valley, "It's been snow for days. Why could you not drag it in snow?!"

"Weiss, it's..." Ruby managed to get the little girl in her arms and joined the others, grimacing at the long, no-longer-white hairs that were probably going to be in all of their food from now on. "It's... fine. I'm sure it was the fastest way to go, or something."

She glanced at Blake for confirmation while Weiss whined, crouching by Drei's head (but not touching him), "He's a mess! It's going to freeze in his fur," sighing, she addressed the dog despairingly, "We'll never get you clean..."

"Aw c'mon Weiss, I can clean these guys up no sweat! Just melt up some of this endless snow and-"

"Weiss," Blake briefly placed a hand on Yang's shoulder to stop her, then crossed her arms, allowing herself the barest hint of a smirk, "Have you ever dragged a dead body through the snow?"

"Oh, I have!" Yang raised a hand.

Blake stared openly at her partner.

The brawler's enthusiasm took a hard curb at Blake's wide-eyed look. "Well, I guess technically not a dead body, just Ruby's dead weight - she really did not want to come inside from making snow-weapons this one time-"

"I put up much more of a fight than a dead body, thank you very much," Ruby hiked the little girl in her arms up a bit. The tiny Faunus stared at the meat covered dog with wide eyes.

Weiss straightened up from examining the bloody, messy Drei and shot Blake a low level glare before turning and storming through the snow back to the campfire.

Blake took that chilling response as a no, but she wouldn't let herself chuckle, not when she actually felt kind of bad about not being strong enough to drag the stupid thing through the snow like she'd planned. Her smirk faded a bit as she turned to face Yang, eyes darting to Drei and their catch. "I hope you weren't kidding about being able to clean them..."

She honestly hadn't expected to take down such a large deer, which, more food was better of course, but bringing someone with her to help her get it back to camp would have been nice. Except that she didn't exactly like to have company on hunts. There was something about killing living things (other than fish for some reason) that she didn't want others to see... So, strapping the thing to Drei was the only alternative she'd been able to come up with.

Yang brightened up in an instant. "You bet I can," she crushed her partner to her in a brief hug, "Leave it to me, Blakey! C'mon boy," the brawler led the dog away, snatching up the pot sitting by their fire on the way to a large white drift of untouched snow.

For a while, Blake allowed herself a half-smile, simply watching Yang easily lift the carcass from Drei's back, set it in the snowbank, and shower the dog with praise. She then turned to Ruby and the little Faunus girl in her arms, smile slipping a few notches. "I ran across a den of Ursa out near that ridge." She motioned with her head to an outcropping of rock jutting up over the treeline in the distance, but wasn't sure if Ruby could see if in the dark, so she clarified, "It's a few miles east. They didn't see me, but I saw them."

Ruby hummed in acknowledgement as she looked toward the ridge she thought Blake was indicating. Ursa were usually a little less active in the winter- probably the team would be fine camping just overnight. They'd just keep a careful eye out on watch.

"Oh!" Ruby perked up. Her arms were full so she put her chin on top of the little Faunus girl's head, "Her name's Robin! We found out right before you got back."

Blake's eyes lit up. Hands on her knees, she bent to reach eye level with the little girl... with Robin. It was an unusual name, not because she was a fox Faunus, but because surnames aside, most Faunus tended to avoid naming their children after animals in general - anything to help distance themselves from association with the very animals people assumed them to be.

Then again, she supposed some parents might do so intentionally in defiance of such ridiculous prejudices... Regardless, the little girl now had a name she could use, and Blake smiled. "Robin... what a lovely name. It suits you." She noticed her shivering a bit, holding tight to the edge of Ruby's cloak and attempting to pull around herself, "You want to go back to the fire where it's warm?"

The girl, Robin, abandoned the cloak and squirmed to get down from Ruby's arms.

"Whoa, okay!" Ruby let her go and she climbed through the knee-deep (to a tiny Faunus) snow to cling to Blake's legs.

Eyes flashing a brief apology to Ruby, Blake scooped Robin up out of the snow and into her arms, nuzzling between her Faunus ears. This was one hundred percent worth subjecting herself to a biting cold spot-cleaning with snow to wash away the blood and grime stuck to her from the hunt.

Together, she and Ruby trudged back through Weiss's path in the snow to the concrete slab, which took a second to register with Blake. Sparing a glance at Yang to check her progress - the brawler had cranked her semblance and was currently wrestling Drei down into a rapidly melting sinkhole of snow - Blake turned to Ruby with a questioning tilt of her head as they stepped down onto the very level and very obviously man-made surface. "So... it looks like we found the town after all?"

"Yeah..." Ruby looked around again at what they had thought were square-ish boulders, but were actually corners of buildings, thrown everywhere, like they'd been blown apart. Firelight flickered over the lichen-covered slabs. Ruby smiled at the way Robin had snuggled up in Blake's arms, and nudged her with her shoulder, "Looks like we'll have our passenger a little longer."

Weiss ignored them, jabbing a broken spar of wood at the fire so it sent up sparks.

Blake's arms tightened around the girl in her lap. Part of her realized it was foolish to be getting attached to someone she would ultimately have to part ways with... but at this point there was no helping it. With a sigh, she rested her chin between the girl's fox ears and watched Yang from afar.

After what felt like an eternity, Yang somehow managed to clean up Blake's kill to a level that she assumed even Weiss might be pleased with, and with great pride, she brought the beast over for the heiress to examine. "How about that huh? Not even a single hair left!"

A very clean, dry, and permanently-stained-pinkish-red Drei came up behind her with a cheerful bark, wanting to play more.

"It still seems like a lot of work that could easily have been avoided by not half-butchering it out in the woods," Weiss got up and turned her back on the raw carcass as she went to the sled to make sure all their gear was strapped down properly.

Ruby frowned at her partner and watched her refuse to touch the newly pink Drei. She passed Blake a cup of weak but warm tea, "I think she's just mad his fur got messed up."

Little Robin tipped her head back to see Blake's face.

The older Faunus watched Weiss leave, expression bearing an insoluble mixture of concern and irritation.

"Or she's just mad at everything like always," Yang supplied, almost pouting.

"That... could also be true," Ruby admitted. She gestured to Blake's kill, "That's huge though. I forgot to say but Blake we should be set for like a week. Do you need any help... er...?"

She made motions with both hands to indicate slicing the carcass up.

Blake pursed her lips, finally looking away from Weiss to her other teammates. To Yang, she flashed a warm smile of thanks, prompting a megawatt smile from the brawler in return. To Ruby, she offered a smile more apologetic in nature. "Actually, if you two could get it started for me... It's easiest to cut up after it's cooked." She briefly squeezed Robin to her chest, nuzzling between the little girl's Faunus ears before handing her off to Ruby, idly tucking a strand of hair behind one of her human ears before speaking softly to her, "I'll be right back. Keep an eye on Ruby and Yang for me." Without leaving room for refusal, Blake stood and followed Weiss towards the sled.

Ruby and Yang watched Blake go. They shared a look.

"... well, maybe there won't be too much yelling," Ruby sighed, slumping down on the broken chunk of stone with Robin in her lap.