Blake loathed sand. Absolutely loathed it. It might have been pleasant to feel it between her toes at the beach, fun even. Out here in the middle of the Vacuan desert, it was anything but. The sand here was much finer; it only took the slightest breeze for it to be carried on the wind. That was what Blake hated about it the most.
The sand got absolutely everywhere. It was bad enough when a grain got caught beneath an eyelid, especially if it happened in the middle of a fight, though wearing glasses mitigated that possibility. But there was nothing that could be done about it finding a way inside her clothes. With every movement the sand chafed her skin and no matter how many layers she wore it always managed to worm its way deeper. At the end of the day she was able to pour half the desert out from her underwear and other places that were better left unmentioned.
Desert sand was not fun, and the heat made it even worse. At the beach she might have enjoyed taking her shoes off; if she did that here her soles would be fried within heartbeats. The sand soaked up all the energy of the ever-present sun and seemed to radiate it all back at her.
She'd always thought she was able to handle most extremes of weather. She'd spent time freezing in the forests of Atlas, and time baking on the plains of Vale, but the Vacuan desert pushed those extremes to the maximum; the heat attacked her from every single side.
Strength of will didn't matter. At midday, when the sun reached its peak, the heat was so intense it was simply impossible to do anything. It sapped anybody's strength in moments. Even those who had grown up in the harsh environment sought shelter in those hours. For a foreigner, it was essential.
There were some who thought, with such hostile weather in the day, the answer would have been to move at night. They were wrong. If anything the nights were worse. After the sun went down the temperature plummeted. Within hours it was cold enough that the water in her bottle froze solid even inside her tent.
The nights would have been entirely unbearable if not for the fact she slept with her own personal heater. Yang's presence made the cold barely tolerable. Though survival guides recommended not sharing sleeping bags they didn't take into account Semblances, or just the comfort of falling asleep next to your best friend.
Still, spending the night outside was best avoided unless absolutely necessary. If possible they normally planned their patrols so they would be able to make it back to where they were staying. It was often difficult. Their days were cut into chunks in which it was safe to move and they had to make the best of those windows.
"See anything?" Yang asked as they slogged their way to the top of the dune. That was another factor that went on Blake's long list of reasons why she hated sand. It shifted under her feet. It was almost as if she had to climb to twice the height of the dune to reach the summit.
Blake scanned round. "Sand." The sea stretched from horizon to horizon.
"Ha, ha." Yang's laugh was intended to sound fake. "I think you've made that joke at least a dozen times this past week."
"It doesn't change the fact it's true." Blake was unable to keep the bitterness from her tone.
Yang picked up on it. Pausing on the summit she turned around. "We don't have to be here you know. We could move on."
Blake looked at her. Yang was almost entirely shrouded in cloth. It wasn't quite the traditional robes that the nomads wore, they would have been close to impossible to fight in, but there were similarities. The main difference, apart from the added mobility, was that both their clothes were camouflaged rather than deep black. It wouldn't be beneficial for them to stand out on the yellow dunes.
Taking the advice of the locals, Yang had wrapped a shemagh around her head. The material protected her from both the sun's rays and from breathing in sand. With the wraparound sunglasses as well her face was almost entirely obscured.
Even so, Blake could tell that Yang's words weren't empty. If she said the word Yang would move on for her sake. It was worth considering. She wasn't really enjoying her life at the moment; the desert environment was draining almost every facet of satisfaction from any job they completed. Still, thanks to her, it wasn't like they had many other options.
Blake forced herself to smile even if it would have been lost beneath her own shemagh. "No, it's just… sand."
Yang grunted. They'd both shared more than enough expletives to learn each other's opinions on it. "Here." Yang gave her a canteen. Like any skin that was exposed, Yang's wrists and hands were baked a deep dark brown. Blake favoured long sleeves and gloves, but Yang couldn't wear any thanks to the necessity of keeping Ember Celica free from any material. Both their bodies were a patchwork of heavily browned strips and much paler flesh that was kept covered; a desert was not the place to get a consistent tan.
Even kept in the insulated canteen the water tasted as if it were close to boiling. It was utterly unsatisfying despite how parched her throat was from the dry heat. Blake honestly considered dropping a blue Dust crystal into it. She was that desperate for a cool drink. It would have been worth the undoubtable case of poisoning. After taking a few measured gulps she passed the canteen back.
"Thanks." This time she got to see Yang's smile as she took off her shemagh with the intention of tying it again. In all honesty Blake didn't have all that much to be grumpy about yet. It was only a couple of hours after dawn, the heat wasn't scalding yet, she was with her best friend, and there were much worse places they could be.
She just hadn't slept well last night; her mood hadn't been improved by her alarm going off at four in the morning to get a head start on the sun. There were about a thousand things she would have preferred to be doing with her day, but unfortunately they didn't pay the bills.
"What about that over there?" Blake passed Yang the monocular as she finished her drink.
"Yeah, could be. I haven't seen anything else today that looks promising."
As much as there was truth in her statement, that all Blake could see was sand, it wasn't the whole truth. Even a sea of sand wasn't featureless. It was possible to tell the direction on the prevailing winds from the orientation of the dunes, or spot the rare tell-tale signs that hinted of a nearby oasis. It was even possible that any disparity in the near constant uniformity of the top layer of sand spoke of something having moved through it ̶ ̶ or hopefully in this case, under it.
"You lead the way," Blake said while readjusting the straps on her rucksack. Having to bring everything necessary for a mission that might include an overnight stay meant both hers and Yang's were bulging. Ideally she would have tightened all the straps, but that would have made it that much more difficult to get out of in a hurry.
"Sure," Yang started a slow and careful descent from the dune. It was all too easy to slip on the shifting surface and then get buried by the resulting avalanche. It had happened once to Blake and it was not an experience she particularly wanted to repeat.
The valley between the dunes provided little respite. The sun still beat down, heat still radiated from all around, and the hot, dry wind still blew. Still, it was better to travel along valleys rather than up and down the slopes. The pair of them made good progress, though neither dropped their guard.
"It looks like you were right," Yang said as they came upon the disturbance Blake had spied. "It's big. What do you reckon… six?"
Blake crouched down. In an almost perfectly straight line a furrow had been carved into the sand. Though time and the wind had started to fill it in, the tracks were unmistakable. "Definitely, maybe bigger." The channel was wide enough that she wouldn't have been able to cross it even with a running a leap. Predicting the size of a Falak wasn't an exact science, but the one they were chasing was a large one.
"Damn." Yang grimaced. That would make it the largest they'd dealt with and normally they weren't easy. "I was hoping you were going to tell me I was an idiot."
"Afraid not. I can if you still want me to though." Blake could see Yang's smile from the way her shemagh moved. "But I would guess these are about four hours old. We should get after it. Maybe this will be over quickly for once."
"Really? Did you really just say that? You know we're going to be chasing this thing all week now."
"Sorry." Yang wasn't being serious, but she should have known better than to tempt fate.
"Well it's said now. Come on." Yang led the way, not walking in the furrow, but alongside it. "It could be worse. At least it actually exists this time."
"There is that."
The last time they'd accepted a contract for a Falak they'd spent four days scouring the area, not finding a trace of it, before they discovered the corpse of goat which had died of dehydration. The same goat the Falak was meant to have devoured. After a bit of investigation it turned out the goatherd's son had thought up a very clever lie as to why the herd he was meant to be watching was one short. A lie clever enough that his tribe had hired two huntresses, and dispatched them into the desert. The boy had been thrashed by his father for the deception, but that didn't change the fact that they'd wasted their time. Hunter's contracts genuinely consisted of a token daily pay and the main reward when the Grimm was slain. Without an actual monster to kill, they'd barely broken even.
"It'll be hard though."
"Yeah I know." Yang sighed. The life of a professional hunter was not the glamorous one that most pictured. It was tough, laborious, and it didn't even pay all that well. Not when you considered the danger they put themselves through daily. They earned more money than most, but the majority of it went on equipment. Ammo, Dust, medical supplies, clothes. None of it was cheap. With it all subsidised at school, that was a lesson that students failed to learn.
"We going to follow the usual strategy?" Blake asked.
"Probably. We might have to adapt though. I'm not sure how well it will work if this one's as big as it looks."
"That's what I was thinking."
As they walked they made the alterations to the plan that might be necessary, though before too long they ceased their conversation to conserve their energy. The sun climbed higher into the sky and to Blake it began to feel as if she were in the middle of a blast furnace. There was worse to come. It was still a couple of hours away from the point when they'd seek refuge.
It didn't help the Falak wasn't concerned with the topology of the desert. Most Grimm would seek to go around the dunes. The Falak just went straight under them, forcing the pair of them out of valleys and up to the peaks. The constant climbing and descending was beginning to take its toll on Blake's muscles. The last two years meant she was probably fitter than at any point in her life, but in this heat it didn't seem to matter.
It was another ninety minutes before Yang stopped, breathing deeply. "I think we're going to have to call it." The frustration was evident. They'd managed to close on the Falak by several hours, but they couldn't go on.
"There's no other choice. We don't want to be fighting this thing near midday. Let's get off the tracks slightly."
After walking along the valley between two dunes for five minutes they set their packs down. Blake extracted the special pegs while Yang readied their tent. It was an expensive one, but it was most definitely worth it. With a practiced motion she threw the disk in the air and in a heartbeat it expanded into a shelter. They secured it before scrambling inside.
For the little space it took up in Yang's rucksack it was surprisingly roomy. In the nights it was perhaps too much so, but for the days both she and Yang could just about manage to stretch out on the floor. There was no instant respite from the sun though; the air inside still scolded Blake's lungs.
They didn't need to communicate. They'd done this too many times before. Both of them began to strip off their many layers. Yang's hair was plastered to her scalp with sweat, and Blake knew hers wasn't much better.
Her boots went off next, she tried pouring the sand that had collected in them outside the door but there were grains everywhere regardless. It was a struggle to get her pants off, especially with Yang attempting the same. Occasionally they kicked or punched one another, but before too long they were both in their underwear. Cramming their things along the side they lay down in the middle a few inches apart.
Blake didn't have the energy to do much more than that. Now they just had to wait it out. She ran a hand over her brow and it came away dripping. The entirety of her body glistened and Yang's did too. Despite how much she didn't want to, she rummaged around in her pack for her canteen. They'd packed enough for ten days, unless something went disastrously wrong they could afford to be a little greedy. Together they drained it.
"Thanks." Yang pillowed her head with interlaced fingers as she stared at the roof.
Blake joined her. Some might have found it uncomfortable to be in their underwear next to another like this. In fact she definitely would have a few years ago. Since then things had changed. She'd changed, and it was her hope it was for the better.
Especially with her enhanced senses the smell in the tent was pungent to say the least. As gross as it was she sniffed her armpit and instantly regretted it. The odour clung to the inside of her nose. Yang laughed at the expression on her face, before doing the same to herself. "Yep, pretty ripe."
Blake put her head back. They'd both sweated profusely, but the smell wafting over from Yang's side of the tent was not exactly one she'd call unpleasant. It was just unmistakably the scent of her old partner.
They both suffered the heat in silence. Many would have paid for the luxury of lying in the near sauna; little did they know they could experience it for free. Just as the pinpricks of light through the canvas were almost exactly overhead Yang caved.
"It's probably time."
Blake barely found the energy to nod. It was Yang's turn anyway. She readied a small cylinder that had taken them multiple months of saving to afford. Yang twisted the top until it opened like a flower and then switched it on.
Both of them curled up around it. The effect wasn't instant, but when it did come it was blissful. Cold swept over them. Luxurious cold. It sank into their bodies through their exposed skin and Blake revelled in it. At that precise moment the cooler was worth a year or more of wages to her.
It worked almost exactly opposite to a heater. As it consumed the blue Dust in its base it robbed the air of its heat. To most, the inside of the tent would still have been close to unbearably hot, to the pair of them though it was almost cold enough to make them shiver.
The miracle of bliss didn't come for free though. In the extremes of the desert the cooler depleted its payload quickly, and they could only afford to use it for thirty minutes a day. They had to make the most of them.
Sitting up they took the opportunity to eat. Calories were important, but equally so was replenishing the minerals that had been lost in their sweat. Again they put their trust in local knowledge. The nomads in the region ate a traditional hard-baked bread, and though it wasn't exactly tasty, it was filling.
Yang washed hers down with some water, before speaking. "Ok, anywhere hurt?"
Blake swallowed her own meal. She might have been unfazed by being in her underwear with her friend, but this part of their routine still managed to make her uncomfortable. The two years since Vale was the amount of time it had taken for the pair of them to fix their relationship. Too many things had happened in the war for it to have been any quicker.
At this moment they were probably closer than they'd ever been. They'd experienced adversity, and through hard work, they'd come out of it all the stronger. There had been no guarantees. Especially given how it ended. Yang would have been entirely justified in abandoning her altogether. She hadn't though, and Blake knew she would never have been able to convey her gratitude. Without Yang's support she might have given up all hope entirely.
As it was, they made it through the rough patch and now they were… well Blake didn't know entirely. Partners, friends certainly, and a confusing mix of more. Yang had only grown more attractive in recent years. In moments like this, or when they were curled up together at night, Blake sometimes couldn't stop her thoughts from wandering.
Yang's underwear was designed for practicality rather than seduction, though it still achieved the latter. To be honest, Yang could probably make a sack look like lingerie if she wanted to. Sitting cross-legged and leaning slightly forward the flesh of her stomach was a series of ripples which hid the muscles beneath. Her cleavage was mostly covered by a bra, but it couldn't obscure the mounds themselves. Even with the patchwork of tan marks Yang was beautiful. Topped off by the gleam of sweat still covering her Blake's imagination ran wild.
She thought, or at least hoped, that Yang still reciprocated at least part of what she felt. Blake was pretty certain she did, but it was hard to tell. Unlike her Yang had been with someone in the last two years. She honestly didn't mind. Back then a relationship had been the least of her priorities and she'd been more concerned with trying to get back to where she'd been with Yang.
Now though, Yang was single, and that possibility was there. If Yang felt the same way she hadn't made a move either. They'd fallen into a comfortable routine and neither of them wanted to be the one to disturb it. They were both as happy as the situation would allow, and they knew how much worse it could be.
It was the uncertainty that made it so hard for Blake to allow Yang to touch her so intimately, but it was the smart thing to do. "Just my left calf," she answered Yang's question. The muscle had been aching for the past hour or so.
"Roll over then."
Blake did as instructed and with practiced movements Yang massaged the offending area. Inside the tent they had the opportunity to tend to any minor annoyances before they became much bigger problems.
Yang's strong fingers on her flesh might have resulted in a warmth entirely independent from the sun, but she could only grit her teeth. Out here there was no safety net. They couldn't just press a button on their scrolls and have an airship from Beacon extract them within the hour. They were all alone. If that twinge turned into a full-on strain, or even a cramp in the middle of a fight, it might well threaten both their lives. When that was the possible outcome, she could suffer through a little intimacy.
Yang was thorough, kneading deeply into her calf and then moving up her leg. "Anywhere else?"
Blake snapped out of her near-trance. "No. I'm good." She rolled away and sat up. "What about you?"
"Just my shoulder." Yang rolled it and grimaced slightly. It had been acting up for a couple of weeks, ever since she'd taken a bad hit on a previous hunt.
"Sure." Blake crawled around behind her and set about gathering up her blonde mane. It was even more unruly than usual as she draped it over Yang's opposite shoulder. With a clear view Blake was free to inspect the troubled flesh. The bruising had faded, but some muscle injuries took longer to heal fully.
"Stretch your arm out." With Blake's guidance Yang did as instructed. The joint cracked. The sound gave a target for her thumbs. They must have worked wonders for Yang let out a rapturous groan.
Blake settled into a steady rhythm. Closing her eyes she used touch to sense where her thumbs would be better used next. Yang's flesh was unlike anyone else's. Even in a desert she hadn't entirely abandoned her moisturising routine and the result was her skin had a texture comparable to the softest velvet. But Yang hadn't abandoned the gym either; just beneath the velvet were bands of iron. Blake had seen Yang bench-pressing and she put bodybuilders to shame. Yang's physique was one most aspired to but didn't have the determination to achieve.
The cooler sputtered and the wave of cold emanating from it died. Blake paused. She always enjoyed making Yang feel good, and Yang had evidently lost track of time too. They both knew what would happen next. Their blissful respite had come to an end.
"Damn." As they always did they considered putting just a little bit more blue Dust into the cooler, before acknowledging they couldn't afford it. The real world was just as unforgiving as the desert.
"We should probably get after it anyway." Blake began to pull on her pants.
"Yeah," Yang sighed. The worst of the heat had passed. It was still hotter than almost anywhere on the planet out there, but they didn't have much choice. The tent would only offer the slightest bit of protection anyway.
It only took them five minutes to get ready and as Blake unzipped the canvas door she was reminded of opening an oven. She physically recoiled from the blast of air before forcing herself through it. Thankfully the sky was still a startling blue and entirely devoid of clouds. Getting caught up in a sandstorm when they were so close would be infuriating.
Their enforced stop had cost them almost two hours and they both knew they would have to push themselves if they wanted to catch up with the Falak before dark. It would have been suicide to jog, but Blake led than at a brisk pace.
It wasn't exactly an exciting chase. Even without the near-crippling heat, there just wasn't anything to look at. One sand dune appeared just like the dozens in every direction. The only sign that they were catching up was that the furrow they were chasing was getting steadily larger as the wind had less time to erode it.
Ten minutes later Blake came to a stop.
"What the hell?" Yang said from behind her. The ground ahead was covered by a criss-cross of the tracks. Passing over one another they looped back and forth.
"I don't know. Make sure to ̶ ̶ "
Blake's feet shifted under her. Both of them reacted with a speed that was only achieved through long hard training and copious amounts of experience. Blake dived out of the way, shrugging off her rucksack halfway through her roll.
A plume of sand erupted from where they'd been standing just a heartbeat before. As it cascaded downwards, covering Blake it revealed the shape in its midst. The Falak was enormous. Normally the sandworms were big, but their earlier estimate had been off. This one must have had a body almost eight feet in diameter. It could swallow her whole and with room to spare.
Blake stood perfectly still, not even daring to breath. Spending most of their lives under the sand, Falaks didn't even have eyes. They relied on tremors and sounds to navigate. It cast around for them. Half of its body was probably still beneath the ground, but it towered over her.
This was the largest Falak she'd ever seen, larger than the majority she'd even heard about in tales. It was probably close to forty feet long. It was enough to consider retreating. Not that they'd get far. Falaks usually moved slowly, but when roused to anger they were able to outpace fleeing prey.
At this moment, staring down the Falak's maw, that was exactly what she felt like. It had teeth all the way down. Rows and rows of them. They ground against each other in its gut like a thousand nails being drawn against a chalkboard.
From its other side came the distinctive sound of Ember Celica cocking moments before a bang. The Falk flopped over backwards, diving down towards the source of the noise. Yang had evidently decided to distract it.
Blake made best use of the opportunity. She ran in, ripping Gambol Shrouds sheath off her back. She didn't draw it. The added mass would be beneficial. Unlike most Grimm, Falaks lacked armoured plates, their rubbery skin was as hard as toughened leather, but it was vulnerable.
With both her hands on the hilt, she swung at the body that was rapidly sliding from the ground. Her blade bit. It wasn't a particularly deep wound, but it was a long one, and white ichor began to leak from the gash. She leapt backwards. Nature hadn't seen fit to equip the Falak with armour, but it was still a Grimm. In response to her attack dozens of spines blossomed from their holes. Venom dripped from them.
Blake attempted to withdraw. It was hard. With the Falak carving tunnels beneath, the sand at her feet shifted unpredictably. With some distance between them, she drew Gambol Shroud and fired a couple of shots.
Her intent wasn't to do any damage ̶ ̶ her bullets bounced from its hide regardless ̶ ̶ no she shot at it because the report was loud. Yang had chosen that exact moment to freeze and the Falak came straight for her.
With literal tonnes of monster bearing down on her it was hard to keep her nerve, but Blake managed it. The worm didn't really slither like a snake; it propelled itself with ridges of undulating muscle. Blake stared into its cavernous mouth, yelling her opposition, and the instant before it hit she disappeared.
The Falak swallowed the stone Shadow she'd left in her wake. It spasmed in a way Blake could only liken to a cough. It might have been able to pass sand without trouble, but the rock was a different proposition.
As it convulsed both she and Yang ran in. This wasn't their preferred strategy of hunting the worms. Normally they preferred to stack the odds heavily in their favour. A network of ropes on the sand and a lure was enough to entangle the smaller ones. That method would have been useless against a Falak this size even if it hadn't turned the tables and ambushed them instead.
With no time for preparation they'd fallen back on the simplest plan imaginable. Keep on attacking until it stopped moving. It wasn't a particularly good plan. Even in the short moments since the beginning Blake could feel that her core temperature had skyrocketed. In heat like this they would lose a battle of endurance.
So she concentrated on doing as much damage as possible. With both swords now she hacked at the section nearest her. Her blades sinking deeper with every swing. It wasn't easy. In its panic and pain the worm thrashed chaotically. Drops of venom sprayed out, blackening the sand where they landed. Blake did her best to avoid the spines, but she could almost smell the burning of her clothes.
Yang did likewise. Her weapon was less suited to this work, so she had to make up for it in other ways. Her fists slammed against the worm's side repeatedly; whenever a bone cracked she moved on.
The worm's tail whipped from beneath the surface and in a shower of sand slammed into Yang. The blow sent her flying. A myriad of scenarios passed through Blake's mind. She imagined Yang broken, begging for help; she imagined her still; she imagined her vulnerable; but in the middle of combat her imagination couldn't rule her. Only logic could. Even if Yang was hurt she had to continue fighting. It was what had been drilled into her by all her teachers.
"Hey!"
Ignoring her protective instincts she used her Semblance to jump to the opposite side of the Falak. It had choked out the rock and zeroed in on her shout. Its keening cry rose above the desert as its teeth undulated furiously. The pain had worked it up into a fury.
It propelled itself upwards until it was twenty feet or more above the ground, then it plunged downwards. She dodged, but it tracked. Blake escaped its mouth by scant inches. She didn't escape the spine that ripped into her. The impact and the burning venom drained her Aura.
The Falak burrowed downwards, the roiling sand almost dragging Blake down with it. Her breaths were ragged, but she still took the opportunity to strike at it. Yang arrived moments later fire trailing in her wake. Her Semblance-fuelled punches caused ichor to erupt with every blow.
They narrowly avoided the whipping tail. As the sand settled in the hole the battlefield went silent. The ground had been thoroughly torn up, white ichor and black venom provided a collage of contrast to the yellow, but of the Falak there was no sign.
They knew better than to speak. There was no way it had run, not when they'd enraged it to such a degree. It was simply biding its time. Blake raised a finger to her lips before gingerly tiptoeing away from Yang. She was about to do something that could either be described as incredibly heroic or incredibly stupid. Currently her money was on the latter.
Confident that Yang wouldn't be caught up, she aimed near her feet and fired. A tiny plume of sand blossomed where her bullet struck. That was it. There was no erupting monster. No movement. Nothing.
She glanced at Yang who could only answer with a shrug of shoulders. Maybe it had run. It wouldn't have been able to grow to that size if it wasn't smarter than most. Resolved to try again Blake squeezed her trigger.
There was no warning. The sand under her shifted an instant before blackness swallowed her. Actually swallowed. The impact lifted her into the air and all around was only darkness punctuated by the white of teeth. Her mind howled in terror, but not before the part that didn't need to think focused on the rapidly shrinking patch of light.
Falling she hit the side of the worm's gut and felt a tooth sink into her. It hurt. A lot. But it also arrested her downwards momentum. Panicked she flared her Semblance. The leap took her ten yards closer to safety, and she vanished again the moment she could.
It wasn't enough. The worm's jaws snapped closed plunging her into complete darkness that not even her eyes could penetrate. Some might have lost hope, but not Blake. Not while she was still breathing. She owed it to Yang to keep trying.
She kept moving upwards. Her blind leap earned her more wounds as she slammed into the tooth-laden wall, but her Shadow blossomed into fire. If it could have the Falak would have screamed. The heat seared its insides and its jaws snapped open.
Blake aligned herself on the target. She had a few last surprises for the Grimm. The fire might have hurt it, but it lived in furnace. The icy figurine of herself plunged downwards as she flew upwards. It took one more leap for her to reach its mouth. She careened off it, but didn't care. After being inside a Grimm even the boiling air was nectar.
Her relief wasn't long lived. The desert stretched out below her in a way that shouldn't have been possible. The Falak's attack had carried the pair of them at least fifty feet into the air and in the featureless terrain she didn't have much of a landing strategy.
The worm didn't either. The ice in its gut drove it mad. Falaks burrowed deep beneath the surface at night. It had likely never experienced anything that cold. Rather than a graceful dive it plummeted downwards.
So did Blake. She cycled her Semblance a couple of times, but her panicked usage had drained most her Aura. It only retarded her descent. Yang caught her. The impact still hurt, Yang's arms would leave bruises for days, but it was a lot less unpleasant than it would have been to slam directly into the desert floor.
The Falak was testament to that. Bones crunched as the ground trembled. The two huntresses trembled too. They'd been through two horrific ordeals that neither would like to relive, but they still had work to do. The Falak was severely injured, but it wasn't dead.
Yang set her down carefully, noting her injuries. "Stay here."
Blake couldn't just sit there. It wasn't her nature to allow one of her friends to go into danger by themselves, not if she still had a modicum of strength in her limbs. She pushed herself up. It hurt, but the pain told her she was alive. After seeing the inside of a Falak, most would not have been.
Yang showed the injured worm no mercy. She hammered punches into its skull. It tried to fight her, to stop her, but it just didn't seem able to. One after another Yang struck the same spot and before too long even the thick bone began to fracture.
Blake tottered towards them. Her head spun, partly due to the heat and partly due to the blood staining her clothes. It was because of her laborious approach that she was able to see what Yang could not. The Grimm's tail ripped free of the ground and whipped towards Yang's back.
There was a split-second for Blake to make up her mind. She flared her Semblance leapt forwards. It didn't quite work like she imagined. Her feet caught in the sand and when she reappeared she stumbled into her partner.
The impact failed to carry them both clear. Though the tail whistled over Yang's head it struck Blake in the side. Her mind went blank. Yang screamed a curse and rushed at the Grimm. Her attacks reached a new level of ferocity. Nothing would have been able to withstand them. The Falak's skull gave way and Yang unleashed a slew of buckshot directly into its brain. It didn't go entirely still, but its twitches no longer had a consciousness directing them.
The soft sand was like a mattress to Blake. It was nice. It supported her body perfectly and she couldn't quite understand why part of her told her to move. It would be better to just lie down for a bit.
"Blake!" Yang shook her shoulder. She couldn't understand why Yang was hurting her… or why she began undressing her. "Fuck." Yang found the traces of black sizzling in the gash along her side.
Yang left her in peace, but it didn't last. She came running back, a box in her arms. Blake shivered. She didn't know why. Deserts were meant to be hot.
"One of its spines caught you."
Oh… that was probably bad. She should do something about it. Just after she'd had a little sleep.
Yang slapped her. "Stay with me! I've got the anti-venom." Blake shook her head weakly. Despite, or maybe because of, growing up in a surgery she didn't like needles. Yang ignored her feeble protestations, grabbing her arm she slid the syringe into her vein.
"Sorry, this is going to hurt." Yang hadn't lied. Whatever she was doing to the wound brought tears to Blake's eyes. It robbed her of strength completely. Blackness engulfed her.
Hours had passed before Blake's eyelids finally fluttered open again. Even in the low lamplight, Yang could see the confusion and almost childlike fear in her eyes.
"Hey." She lay a fresh cool cloth over Blake's forehead.
It took Blake much longer than it should have to work out who the voice belonged to. Her thoughts were undoubtedly clouded and slow, her eyes rapidly darting around.
Blake tried to answer, but the only sound that came out of her throat was a dry crackle. She winced with pain, panic growing in her face.
"Don't." Yang said firmly, carefully dribbled water onto her cracked lips. "Go slowly." Blake did. She struggled to swallow, but after a few mouthfuls her panic faded. "Good." Yang took the canteen away.
Blake's eyes became just a little more focussed, but the confusion was still present. Yang was tired. She'd spent hours tending to Blake, fighting to keep her from dying. Now Blake's fevered head was pillowed in her lap. It wasn't the first time or even the second. Blake was always the one who got hurt, never her. It was exhausting, but Yang knew she would always there for her.
"How…" Blake had to cough. "How long?"
"It doesn't matter. You scared me today." Yang continued to mop her brow. Blake's skin was on fire. In the cold of the desert the fever was only more damaging. Just another thing that had almost robbed her of her best friend.
"Sorry," Blake whispered, the mewling apology reminiscent of a child caught stealing from a cookie jar.
"That's not good enough!" Yang spat. She hadn't meant to get angry. It was just her frustration and terror boiling over. Blake's eyes widened with fear, her entire body tensing.
With a deliberate effort Yang forced herself to calm down and went back to mopping Blake's forehead with some of their precious water. "What were you thinking? I told you to stay back."
Blake frowned, the lines of confusion etched in her forehead as she tried to remember. "You needed help."
"I didn't. And even if I did you weren't in a position to give it. You only succeeded in getting yourself hurt."
"Sor ̶ ̶ "
Yang sighed heavily. Just how many times had she had this conversation before? A dozen? More? Too many to count. "I don't want to hear it. You always do this. Put yourself in danger. Give yourself the most dangerous role. Pick up the most difficult contract. I know you think it's for the best, but it's not. I get that you don't want to see someone else get hurt, but I don't want to see you get hurt either, and that's the way it usually ends up.
"There's a bit of me that thinks you do it deliberately. That you want to get hurt. That you think you deserve it. I get why Blake, I really do, but you need to take a long hard look in the mirror. You need to think about who you see there, because they're not a bad person. No matter what you might think of yourself."
Blake pouted. "I don't."
"You do." Under different circumstances Yang might have found the childlike petulance cute. "I know you do. And deep down you have to admit it. I know why you do as well. It's not right Blake. You can't keep blaming yourself for everything that happened."
They'd had this specific argument a hundred times, though usually not when Blake was heavily medicated. Blake always insisted that, though she might have once blamed herself, she didn't anymore. That she'd got over it. "Why are you… I don't want to talk about it." Blake's body might have been weak, but she still managed to find the strength for anger.
"Blake," Yang brushed a lock of damp hair from her forehead, "Listen to me, please. I almost lost you today. Again. It was that close Blake, and you must know it. I'm sick of it. How many times have I had to patch you up? It's not fair on me and it's not fair on you either. You don't have to keep putting yourself in these situations. You have nothing to atone for."
"You're talking crap." Blake tried to rise. It only took one hand for Yang to stop her.
"I'm not. You think if you sacrifice yourself enough it will even the scales. Well guess what Blake? It won't, because they're already even. All these things you torture yourself over, and don't even try telling me you don't; I share a tent with you. I bet you don't even know what you talk about in your sleep?"
Over and over again, night after night, Blake muttered in her sleep, cried out. Yang had been forced to listen to so many of her nightmares, of her fears, of the regrets that continued to haunt her. Yang understood Blake's subconscious, possibly more than Blake did herself.
"What Ozpin did, that is not on you. Not on any of us. Don't you think I've thought the same thing? I worked for it as well, but he kept us in the dark. No one could have predicted that."
Blake's face contorted in pain, her usual stoicism replaced by every emotion she felt. She gave a harsh laugh which quickly turned into a coughing fit. Blake blamed herself for not seeing what would happen. Not working it out. Not preventing the massacre. She felt responsible.
In the aftermath Yang had as well. She'd worked towards allowing the city to be retaken and it had resulted in that. But unlike Blake she'd come to the realisation that it was inevitable. Her actions might have sped up the schedule of the invasion, but it would have happened anyway. That particular burden of guilt did not rest on her shoulders.
With great care Yang wiped the phlegm from her lips and then continued as if uninterrupted. "What you did before in the White Fang. You were a kid Blake. You made some bad decisions, but they weren't just yours. You can't keep blaming yourself for them. You've got to put it behind you. And as for the pregnancy ̶ ̶ "
"Stop!" Blake hissed. Yang recoiled slightly. Blake might have been sick and heavily drugged, but it did nothing to dull her anger. In the last two years that was the one subject that they had never spoken about. The one subject that Blake had kept bottled and festering inside of her. It wasn't healthy, but Yang could understand. She wouldn't rush Blake, but she hoped one day she would be able to talk about it.
"Fair enough. I won't mention it, but if you ever want to, I'll be here." Yang paused for a moment gathering her thoughts for a different tactic. "You've got to see it from my point of view. I see you throw yourself into the most dangerous situations time and time again and half the time I can't even get you out. That pisses me off. I've told you before how much I hate being powerless. That's how I feel when I see you do all this. I just want to help."
"There's nothing to help." She was doing everything she could not to look at Yang.
Blake's dismissal of her nearly dying stoked the embers of her anger. "Fine. There's nothing to help. I'm just imagining all of this. You're not currently lying there with a dozen different wounds."
"It was just a hunt."
"Yeah it was, but I'm not hurt. I recognise that's partly because of you, but there has got to a middle ground Blake. You've got to trust me." Trust was the foundation of any partnership.
"I do." Her words were surprisingly forceful as she tried, and failed, to sit up again.
"It doesn't much feel like that at the moment. You didn't need to save me. I could have got out of the way of the tail, and even if I didn't I still had most of my Aura left. I can take hits with the best of them. All you did was put yourself in danger for nothing and it almost cost both of us.
"Say we didn't have any anti-venom, or we'd already used it all up. Do you think I would have just left you to die? Because you know I wouldn't have. I would have tried to carry you to the nearest settlement and I probably wouldn't have made it. You would have only succeeded in killing us both."
It was a guilt trip, pure and simple, but that didn't stop it from working.
"I'm sorry."
"Blake, I told you before I don't want to hear it. You can say it a million times and it doesn't matter in the slightest if you're just going to keep doing the same thing. I don't want to keep having to stitch you, bandage you, and I don't want to lose you either."
The truth was Blake had said it a million times, or at least it felt that way. They'd had this conversation a million times. In the aftermath of their hunts, with Blake's mind clouded with her injuries and medication, she was actually open to her. Yang could have a conversation with the person behind the façade Blake usually wore. It was an ultimately futile exercise. Blake never remembered. Never remembered her sorrow or her promises.
Despite the futility Yang ploughed on. With the sluice gates of her heart open, there was no stopping the outpouring torrent. "You're the most special person I have left. What we have… it's all kind of messed up. We've been through too much for it to be simple. But we're still together, still partners. That's incredible really. I'm not going to ask you to promise. We both know that isn't worth much. You've promised me before. All I'm going to ask is that next time you decide to risk yourself, just spare a second and think of me. Of what you'd be putting me through."
Yang saw the daggers of her words sink home. Blake might not have remembered when she was injured or drunk, but they weren't the only times Yang had told her to be careful. Blake never was.
"This definitely isn't the time, but I'm seriously beginning to doubt we'll ever have a good one." She brushed a stray hair from Blake's cheek. "I like you Blake. You know that. I told you before. I also have a pretty good idea as to how you feel towards me. I've seen you looking." Yang smirked and Blake's cheeks grew just a little redder. "So how about I give you a little extra incentive?
"You once blackmailed me. I'm going to return the favour. It's honestly something I'm nervous about. I don't want to ruin what we have now, but I don't want to lose you even more. So here it is. We can make a go of this, if you want to, but only if you start treating me as an equal. Not as someone you need to protect. From now on we share the risks fully, as we should have been doing. It's up to you."
This was not how Yang had imagined this scene playing out. She'd had plenty of time. Ever since that mistake three years ago, and Blake's proposition afterwards, there'd been times when they'd both had urges. But they'd never acted on them. Never thought the time was right. It definitely wasn't at the moment.
With Blake lying shivering and wounded in the middle of a desert, it wasn't exactly like a scene from one of her books. Blake was her captive; she couldn't just get up and say no. They would be trapped together for days whatever her answer.
It might not have been a romantic location, and Yang knew she could have been more eloquent with her words, but her tone was sincere. It came straight from the heart. Yang wanted this, and she hoped Blake did too.
Blake tried to rise only to find herself collapsing back into Yang's lap. "I do want to." Yang's heart contracted, the unknown breath she'd been holding escaping her.
"Nothing would make me happier, but I'm not accepting your answer." Blake attempted to pull away from her. No doubt believing she'd been tricked. Yang held her firm. "Not yet anyway. I don't want this decision to be affected by meds. In all honesty, I'm sure you won't remember this come morning." Yang smiled sadly. As it had before this confession would likely slip into eternity.
"I will," Blake said with a certainty Yang knew she couldn't back up.
"I hope so." Yang's fingers had found their way to the feline ears. Blake didn't often let anyone touch her there, despite people's inquisitiveness, but Yang was among the few who had prior experience. Her kneading fingers sent shivers down Blake's spine. "You must be tired."
It was as if the words had flipped a switch. Blake had appeared alert before, but the instant they were said the strain on her body took precedence. Her eyelids fluttered.
Carefully Yang set Blake's head down on the ground. The fevered skin was warm on her lips as Yang kissed her forehead just like her mum had done whenever she'd been sick. "Sleep well."
Blake lost her fight against unconsciousness. It was possible that she'd believed their entire discussion and the kiss that had ended it had been nothing more than a dream. Yang could only hope that she would consider it a good dream.
A/N: So we now have an idea of just what Yang and Blake have been up to. This story isn't entirely doom and gloom (just the majority of it). I bet most of you were expecting a lot worse after the first two chapters. And you can now see this story is going global. Vacuo offers the chance to build another chunk of the world. It's very different from what we've seen so far.
As usual a big thanks to my editor rebkos for going above and beyond on this chapter. Let me know what parts of this you enjoyed (or bits you didn't).
Please remember to follow/favourite if you want updates or are enjoying the story. It really helps me out.
