Reaper's fourth day back was her third day having lunch with Neo. The scythe master found herself smiling again as the illusionist shimmered into view from the trees and sat down. She set a bottle on the table as well, a rather large one wrapped up in brown paper. Reaper thanked her friend and the two settled into their meal. Every now and then words, both spoken and written, were traded, but for the most part they ate in silence. They enjoyed the quiet, though, and because of it, it was easy for them to hear Velvet.

"Ruby!? Ruby, where are you…"

"Damn her faunus senses…" Reaper cursed. The former criminal looked her friend in her mismatched eyes and silently urged her to hide. Velvet turned the corner to see the scythe master sitting alone.

"Ruby! Finally! I haven't been able to talk to you for days… What are you doing out here?"

"Taking lunch alone. Is it wrong to need some time to myself?" Reaper tried diverted attention away from her true activity.

Blake wanted to cuss Reaper out, but knew that would reveal her presence. She and Coco snuck out after Velvet, Blake having convinced her to look for Reaper. Blake was still hoping to see sparks fly, romance play out in front of her instead of on a page. Coco still thought it would go the complete other direction, and wanted to be there for Velvet if she had to be.

"I suppose not, but… Ruby, have you been avoiding me?" Velvet asked.

Reaper looked over the rabbit girl. Finally face to face with her old girlfriend, Reaper realized how foolish she had been. She was pushing this away, telling herself she would think about this, but it took actually seeing the emotions behind Velvet's eyes to know what to do. Reaper stood slowly and approached the faunus. Blake almost squeeled with joy when Reaper kissed Velvet.

To Velvet, though, the kiss felt different, wrong somehow…"Ruby…?"

"Velvet, that's not my name." Reaper told her as she took a step back.

"But… you told me you loved me…" Velvet grieved.

"And I do love you. But you don't love me, Velv. Not the me I am now. The girl you love is a memory. I can never be her again."

Velvet's eyes began to tear up. She afraid of the direction of the conversation. "That's not true… you just need help, let me help you."

Reaper shook her head. "Even if I wanted to, I couldn't. Even if I tried, I can never be 'Ruby' again. Too much has happened. Scars that run deeper than the eye can see. I've gone through so many changes, and I'm not going to change again any time soon. Not even for you."

Velvet dropped her gaze. "But you still love me?"

"I do…"

Velvet brushed her face clean and took a deep breath. "Okay… Reaper… I suppose I can try…"

Reaper stepped back to Velvet and took the girls shoulders, drawing the rabbit's eyes to her own. "You're not listening… Velvet, I'm not asking you to learn to love the new me. I'm asking you to move on."

Velvet stared at Reaper, unsure how to feel. "How can you kiss me like that and then asked me to 'move on'?"

Reaper shrugged. "I'm selfish? Stealing one last kiss. Sounds like me to me."

"Why!?" Velvet's tears turned to frustration. She struggled for this girl, why was she pushing her away?

"Why wouldn't I want to kiss the girl I love? But what I don't want is a relationship where you're constantly trying to change me back into the girl you loved. She's gone, dead, buried, and it's long past time you finally accept that." Reaper walked back to the table to pick up her bottle, and walked away.

Damn…

"Don't you dare start in with me, Ember. I'm not in the mood."

There are some lines even I don't cross. But just… damn…

"Reaper!" Blake called out.

The scythe girl turned to her team mate. "You were watching, weren't you? I'm sure you just heard me tell Ember, I'm not in the mood."

"No, I get it." Blake told her. "You didn't do what you wanted to do. You did what you had to do. I wanted to apologize."

"Apologize?"

"Yeah… I pushed her to find you. I figured she could help you get over whatever was holding you back. I still see you as Ruby more often than not, and… I didn't take into account, well, all the things you just told Velvet." Blake confessed.

Reaper thought for a moment. "Honestly, thank you for pushing her. I don't think I was ever going to enter that confrontation willingly, but I needed it to happen. She needed it to happen…"

Blake nodded and made her way back to Velvet, who was sitting on the ground with Coco patting her shoulder. "I warned you, Velv. Come on, let's get back to the dorm. You can let it out in peace." The leader told her friend.

Neo stuck close by, invisible, to watch the scene. After Reaper was left alone once more, she dared to venture out of the bushes. She wanted to be something to Reaper, and had for a while now. She knew that, but she didn't know how to act the role she craved. She racked her mind for any information from any source, and settled on a course of action. Reaper felt arms wrap around her middle and looked behind her to see Neo shimmer into view.

Reaper smiled. "It's funny… I knew you were short, but seeing you now, you don't even qualify as a cone. You're more like an ice cream cup." Neo jumped away from Reaper and glared at her angrily, her face flushing. The scythe girl laughed. "I'm sorry, I couldn't help myself. Thank you, Neo. Thank you for accepting me as I am now." The bell rang out. "Gotta go. See you tomorrow."


Reaper slaved over the studies Weiss built. Some of this seemed a little extreme, but Reaper wasn't going to argue. At least she had her drink. Just like paperwork back at Torchwick's, it made the worksheets tolerable. She took another sip and circled a few more answers. She heard the door open and figured Weiss and Blake returned from their date. "Y'know I'm really glad you two got together." She told them. "You're cute together, like a chess set."

The two partners looked over each other's chosen outfit colors and realized for the first time (from a relationship viewpoint) that Weiss's entire wardrobe was white and Blake's was filled with nothing but black. "Huh." Blake noted.

Checkmate!

"Ember is now calling you two 'Checkmate'!" Reaper announced, returning to her work.

Weiss turned on Reaper to begin scolding and saw the glass in her hand. "What are you drinking?" She asked calmly instead.

Reaper looked at the liquid. "I actually never thought to ask its name. I only know how to make it."

Weiss walked up to take an experimental drink. Blake sniffed the air, and her eyes widened. "Uh, Weiss? maybe you shouldn't-"

The faunus was too late to warn her girlfriend as Weiss took a mouthful and immediately coughed it back into the glass. Reaper wasn't even mad at the spoiled drink, as she found the scene hilarious. "Not what you expected, princess?" She asked between bouts of laughter.

"How on earth do you get alcohol on campus!?" Weiss asked.

"Revealing your sources is a good way to lose them." Reaper countered.

"Where are you even hiding it?" Blake asked, looking around the room.

Reaper sighed. She knew now that the question was out there Weiss would tear the room apart looking for it and might as well just show her. She pulled on one of the front panels of the blocky desk she was working at and it swung open like a door, revealing a hidden mini-fridge. Inside was the vodka, other necessary ingredients (that she had stolen from the cafeteria kitchens), a bag of ice and a few spare glasses. Weiss looked from the hidden fridge to her girlfriend.

"How long were we gone?" she asked incredulously, picking up the vodka from the fridge.

"Hey! I'm good with my hands!" Reaper defended. "It only took me fifteen, twenty minutes tops, to convert this thing. You're not going to start confiscating it, are you?"

Weiss gave Reaper her signature cold glare. "I should, but I'm sure it would be a futile effort. Just don't get caught with it and get us all in trouble?"

"I'll assure anyone who finds out that you two don't know." Reaper promised.

A knock at the door attracted all their attentions. Blake opened the door just enough to see who it was. Reaper noted her stiffen. "Sun?"

"Hey, Blake… I know you wanted to wait, and I'm not trying to pressure you or anything, just… how much longer…?" He asked.

Blake didn't have an answer for him. With Reaper coming back and the drama between her and Velvet, the cat girl had completely forgotten to think about her own dilemma with Sun. "Umm… maybe you better come inside." There's no time like the present to get this done.

Sun entered the room and Weiss quickly put the bottle away and slammed the hidden-fridge shut. He looked around the dorm and saw there were only two beds. "Does Ruby sleep on the couch?"

Reaper shifted uneasily for two reasons. One, she could see the way this was going to go, and two… "That's not my name." She said as an automatic reaction.

"Right, Reaper, sorry. By any name, it's good to have you back." Sun assured. He turned back to Blake. "So…?"

"Sun, I'm sorry. I've been trying to figure out how to say this nicely, but I… I'm with someone else now." Blake told him.

He looked between Blake and Weiss, who had stepped close. "Oh."

"I'm sorry, Sun." She said again.

"It's fine. If she makes you happy, I'm happy for you." He said. Reaper and Blake had picked up how to read people from their respective criminal careers, and could tell he was anything but fine. Even after having waited for so long, it seemed he thought this was going another direction. But with nothing else to say, Sun simply let himself out, and the girls simply let him.

Reaper tossed the contents of the ruined drink out the window and opened the hidden fridge back up. Grabbing a clean glass, she set about making two drinks. She handed the fresh glass to Blake. "You look like you could use this." Blake was hesitant. "Just one to relax you, I'm not going to get you drunk." The cat girl nodded and accepted the glass.

Reaper raised her own drink. "What a day for broken hearts, huh?"

"Yeah…" Blake clinked the drinks together and they shared a moment for their respective exes.

"Where did you pick up how to make those?" Weiss asked. She wasn't going to join in, but she figured she could help by steering their thoughts away from 'broken hearts'.

Oh man that was a night to remember, and to forget.

"Neo showed me." Reaper answered. "Actually, the next morning was my first hangover. Never had more than two glasses a night since then."

Blake chuckled. "You learned quickly, then. Good for you." The shared a silence until Blake spoke again. "Do you regret it? Leaving I mean. Being… that."

Reaper expected this conversation much sooner. The 'are you still evil' talk. Not that she was ever evil, but she supposed no one was the villain in their own eyes. "There are things I regret here and there. I didn't miss Velvet's new scar when I saw her earlier. I regret not taking Ozpin's first offer, during my infiltration here. And Winter… But the life as a whole? I really don't. I don't want to return to it, don't get me wrong. But so much of it crafted who I am now, and I can't go back in time and change the choices I made. All I can do is try to make up for what I do regret." She looked to Weiss as she said the last sentence.

Blake nodded. "I regret not seeing the change in the White Fang sooner. I regret not stopping Adam before he could make those changes. But even after everything, I regret letting you kill him. The White Fang was once an organization of peace and progress. Despite what they became, I'm proud to be a part of that history."

"I'm sorry, Blake, but I don't regret killing him. I think it's fair you know that." Reaper informed her friend.

"I know, Reaper. Just know you're a huntress now. Not a criminal." Blake told her.

Reaper nodded. She and Ember already realized that meant they had to keep from killing. They just hoped it didn't turn out to be a difficult thing to keep from doing.


The Creature shambled through alleyways in the darkness of Vale. He had to find a way to get to Reaper. The woman dominated his mind as an obsession. The beast would refuse food and sleep, and simply ponder on how to get to Reaper. It was as if his utter hatred for the woman was the only sustenance he needed to survive, to move forward. Some days he would even forget why he hated her so much, only remembering that he did. But then the memory would come rushing back, fueling the fire behind his eye.

Another figure made its way into the alley. Next to the freakishly tall Creature, the newcomer, who was short by normal standards, may as well have been an ant. They looked at each other for some time, each waiting for the other react. If there was one thing they both understood, it was that no one took these paths if they wanted to be seen. They silently agreed to ignore each other and the kept on their separate paths. The pink and brown figure almost looked familiar to Creature, but she was no Reaper.

As the behemoth passed a rowdy back door, he ventured a look inside the establishment beyond it. It was a Hunter Bar. There was one or two of these in each kingdom, a place by and for huntsmen and huntresses. A place for them to rest, swap self-bragging stories, and pick up new missions. You couldn't even enter these places if you weren't a certified huntsmen or huntress. Missions. Beacon. The students take missions. She'll have to take one, eventually. I can wait a little longer…

"Rrhee… Rreeap-eeerrr…"

Neo stopped at the other end of the alley and turned. The large figure… did he say 'Reaper'? Was it her Reaper? Why would this thing be mentioning her Reaper? She had been all but a constant companion ever since 'Reaper' started, and she didn't recognize anything about this beast. She couldn't settle the uneasy feeling the Creature gave her

The man continued his shamble to nowhere, taking him away from Neo. "Beeeeeeee… Beeeeeacoonn…"

Beacon? Reaper? I don't like this at all…