Chapter 7
Supernova
Ψ
She was nervous, oh so very nervous. It felt like the phone had been ringing for hours by now, but in all truth it had only rang twice. It was funny how such menial things could take on such an air of gravity if given the right situation. And right this was, indeed. Right enough to set Blake Belladonna, one huntress rarely given to flights of trivial terror or fancy, to fretting over a simple phone call.
It rang a third time and her grip tightened to almost that of vise. The nurse, watching her nervously from behind a simple, short counter, thought for sure the woman would break it. To her, the faunus holding the phone was one Nightshade, a true and terrifying legend that had come out of Beacon only some handful of years prior. To see such a woman in such a state was mortifying, to say the least.
"Hello?" Said a feminine voice at last, after being picked up on the fourth ring.
Blake nearly dropped the phone, so strong was the jolt that played her muscles like a simple instrument. She did lose her grip a little, but managed to quickly catch and steady herself. She then brought the phone gently, almost fearfully, to her ear once more.
"H- Hi, I'm calling for Ruby…" She said, her tone striking somewhere between timid statement and frightful question.
"Yes, this is Ruby Rose." The woman on the other end answered amicably. She sounded like she must be having an awful good time to Blake's ear; excited, enamored and giddy all registered in the woman's voice to the faunus' sleek hearing.
But, could this really be Yang's sister? It had been some time since she'd met her, long enough for the woman to change perhaps, but this much so? The woman she was speaking to hardly sounded related to the Yang she knew, much less so like a sibling that had grown up alongside her.
Yet, that was neither here nor there.
"I called for Yang…" Blake began, but thought better of it, "I mean, I'm calling for Blazing Sol's sister. I have a very important message for that Ruby Rose… is this her?"
"Yeah, that Ruby Rose. What about my sister?"
Blake's heart sank further, as though this were possible, at that very moment. Not only for the sudden pang of guilt at the change in the woman's tone, but also for knowing what it was she had to say. Why her, she wondered. Why did this fall to her, of all things?
They had been so close, so very, damnably close. They had stood before that wretched thing; Gods only knew where. To the edge of oblivion had they followed the pied piper, and for what? For Adam? For each other?
That certainly got them far, or so Blake thought to herself. It got them here, banged up and with her relegated to delivering this news. Oh, the fickle strings of fate…
"Blazing Sol, she's…" Blake tried to say, after pulling her thoughts back together, only to find her words lacking. So she took a deep breath and tried again.
"This is Nightshade, your sister's partner. We're at Saint Andrew's on the east coast of Vacuo, by the sea." She paused and grasped for the words, winning them only after a hard-fought few moments of inner anguish, "Your sister's in bad shape. She took a nasty beating and it looks like… like she…"
Now, Blake was truly struggling. The thought of it all was tearing her apart on the inside, somehow even more so than when she had first awoken. As though that day, only two days ago now, were not bad enough. To wake after skirting the edge of the void, only to find yourself still in the thick of it.
How could things have ended up this way?
"She's in critical but stable condition, Miss Rose. By the look of it, though… she won't be for long." Blake finished in a whisper.
By the Gods, it felt as though the call was dragging on half past forever. She knew, somewhere in the back of her more logical mind, that it must only have been barely over a minute or two. This was not the way it felt, however, and that was not so strange.
"That's not possible…" she heard the woman on the other line mutter.
There's was another few moments of unbearable silence, which felt more like hours to Blake. By this point, she'd had nearly enough of it all. Her leg was aching, her head was swimming and, somewhere down the long, white hallway, her partner lay in a hospital bed on her way to cash her chips.
"You're lying!" the woman suddenly screamed, and Blake did let go of the phone for all of a moment, "You're full of shit!"
And there it was, in that very juvenile, pained outburst. Blake had snatched the phone from mid-air and pulled it close enough to hear it all. It was so much like Yang, she wanted to smile and cry and vomit, all at once. But instead, she let it sink in just a bit before replying.
"I wish it were a lie, Miss Rose…" Blake whispered into the receiver, and it was true. Oh, how true it was.
There was a sudden, loud crack on the line, from something transpiring on the other end, and the thing went dead. All at once the sound cut out and the receiver began to blare a monotonous busy tone.
Blake pulled it away from her ear and stared at it absentmindedly. She wasn't entirely sure she had said what she meant to, but she had given it all she had to give at the least. Or so she would tell herself when the culmination finally came. There would be ups and downs between then and now, and the nigh-broken faunus would look back on this moment more than once in the interim, but still she would tell herself so.
And is this not, in essence, the ultimate folly of our kind as a whole? To delay and belittle the truth, until we have no recourse but to face it in full?
But this epiphany did not occur to Blake at that moment. All that went through her mind, then and there, was that it should be about time. To confirm this, she looked at a clock handily close by after carelessly placing the phone where she had gotten it. The nurse took the phone and put it on its receiver while Blake stared at the clock, looking eerily akin to a lost little girl in a woman's body.
"Should I page doctor Holmes for you, Ma'am?" the nurse asked shyly.
"Yes, please do…" Blake replied. Her tone and expression both said the lights were on but, please, try your call again later.
The nurse ignored this, as much as one could that is, and did as bade.
Blake spent the next ten or so minutes in a daze. This was not very different from her typical state of mind in the last few days, but it was a tad deeper than usual. Her head simply swam with the sorts of thoughts that would drive most of us mad. Sights and sounds and fevered memories, almost all of them centered around one thing.
That awful man and his awful words.
Maybe it wasn't blondie here that I wanted after all…
Coupled with the memories that seemed more like nightmarish dreams, it should come as little surprise that she would react so. The places they had traversed to find him. The things they had seen and done on the way. The place they finally caught him. Worst of all, the way he had overcome them so easily.
Yang seemed like little more than a broken doll before him…
"Gonna mope around all day, or did you actually have something important enough to drag me away from your partner?"
The voice was gravelly and slightly shaky, like a man who's spent a little too much time drinking.
Blake looked up and saw the eyes she had come to know very well in these recent days. Faded blue and icy cold in their intensity, they looked more like the eyes of a trained killer than those of a man of medicine. Yet, in some odd way, they were calming to look at when coupled with his long, stubbly face that likely hadn't known the touch of a razor in a few weeks.
"You, uh… got a little somethin…" the man said, with no hint of seriousness whatsoever, and motioned toward Blake's chin.
She didn't notice it at first, as she was still knee deep in her awful recollections. When the trail of spittle dripping from the corner of her mouth finally registered, however, she was quick to wipe it away. Almost as quick as the red that crept into her face.
"So, what is it this time, Nightshade?" the doctor asked, staring down at her whilst leaning against his jet-black cane.
After she regained herself, Blake looked back to him with little more than utter defeat in her golden stare.
"How is she?" she asked timidly, much unlike herself. Yes, she was a huntress of few and carefully chosen words, but she was not a huntress of timid tone. Reserved, perhaps, but not timid.
She watched the doctor, one Mister Holmes, shift around on his cane. How he could stand the thing, she truly could not fathom. It had taken only seven good steps for Blake to decide that her crutches simply would not do. The idea of cane, even if she truly needed it, was given no ground at all.
After a few moments of his odd, shifting stance, Holmes limped over and took a seat beside her. She had come to favor this spot lately, situated under a line of large windows that faced the sea between Vacuo and Vale.
When he sat, he placed the cane on the empty stretch of space to his right. He then proceeded to stretch out almost comically, crackling like his joints were full of popcorn. Almost comical, indeed, but quite a bit nasty as well, as she didn't much care for the sound of popping joints.
"Do you really want to know?" Holmes said at last, after interlacing his fingers and leaning his head onto his hands in a very relaxed manner.
Blake looked away, toward the floor, and sighed deeply.
"Yeah."
Holmes did the same, sighing like a man who has just devoured a large meal, and closed his eyes. Rarely had he ever spoken the words he was about to, and never would he get used to it. He could hardly accept it himself, after all.
"I don't know." He said curtly.
Ђ
It had been a little over two hours now, and her demeanor had changed not one whit. This was beginning to make Weiss nervous, of all things.
At some point on the trip back, which brought to a screeching halt what was supposed to be an evening of frolic, dark clouds had gathered in the night sky. These spared little time before opening up and drenching the land beneath. Even now they beat on the heiress' bedroom window, sounding like angry pebbles crashing onto a drum that has been drawn too taut.
The heiress herself was standing in her little kitchenette, hovering over the coffee machine she had gotten so much use out of in these last months. Between late night studies and tutoring sessions spent with her newest, and most unlikely, of friends, the little machine had certainly been put through its steps. This time, however, the brew within was not the bitter, black roast the heiress kept copious amounts of on hand.
This time it was tea.
She spared a glance toward her partner and saw exactly what she expected to. The woman sat in the same spot she'd been since they arrived. Weiss had barely the time to close her door and flip the lights on before the woman had made her way to the couch and huddled up upon it. There she'd stayed for nearly an hour, just as the heiress expected to see.
"Tea's almost ready!" Weiss called out, only to be greeted with silence. Aside from the faint bubbling of the machine and the constant blare of the rain, silence had been the primary occupant of the room besides they themselves.
She turned back to the machine and watched it toil. Many things had sat heavy on both her mind and her heart in the last half-year, not the least of which was this gnawing feeling that only seemed to grow stronger in recent weeks. To most of mankind, who have spent some small amount of their lives learning the various intricacies of socialization and emotional interaction, it might seem quaint and contrived. Weiss, however, had been given neither the opportunity nor the time to become so jaded toward and familiar with this thing that now gnawed at her.
The rain continued to pelt heavily against her window and the machine's bubbling continued to be the only other sound for the next several minutes it took to finish the task. When it was finally done, Weiss took two mugs from a nearby stand and filled them two-thirds full. Then, just before taking them to the couch, she decided to top her partner's off a tad more.
"This should help calm your mind a little, Ruby." Weiss said amiably, "It's a special blend my father sends me every winter. Very warming, very soothing and very… well, good."
Weiss nearly went to rambling before she caught herself. A tad embarrassed and a tad unnerved by her unusual bearing, she simply sat the cup down in front of her huddled partner and took a seat beside the woman. Not too close, of course, but the couch did feel awfully tiny all the same.
With her own cup steaming in her hands, which now shook just a tad for heavens knew why, Weiss tried to have a look at things in her usual manner. Calculating, logical and, most importantly, surgically detached. It was how she'd always done things, and it had served her well and taken her far indeed. She put things in order in her mind and gave them a good, hard look.
Thinking back to how Ruby had spoken of her sister, it seemed obvious that something was badly amiss. Furthermore, remembering the glances she would throw to that gaudy watch and the fanciful way she recalled those books, it seemed there could be no other conclusion. Yet, what could it be? What could go so far as to upset the seemingly unassailable, insurmountable and immutably bright demeanor of the woman?
Weiss was no fool and could certainly take a decent stab at a guess. Of course, as fate might have it, one simple glance at the huddled woman beside her, given only out of pure chance, saw every thought thrown from her mind quite fantastically.
"My God, Ruby…" Weiss whispered, shocked.
Ruby sat beside her, still huddled with knees hugged tightly to her chest. Now, though, she had looked up and was staring at the cup of tea on the table before her. Weiss could see just how far whatever it was, and it must have been something truly terrible, had taken her into the pit.
The woman's face fairly screamed distress and her eyes only called this out all the louder. Her cheeks were flushed and speckled like a child that has spent the last few hours throwing a tantrum. Her silver eyes were streaked with red and pouring tears, silent though they were, that showed no inclination to end anytime soon. Her nose, covered as it was with bandaging, had found a way to leak a thin trail of snot down the left of her upper lip and over her chin.
In no other words, the woman was an absolute mess and seemed not to even notice, much less care.
With the heiress watching in stunned, shocked silence of her own, Ruby reached one shaky hand out for the steaming cup. She took hold of its delicate handle and slowly, almost as though entranced, brought it to her snotty lip. Ruby took a sip, completely ignoring the heat of the steaming beverage, and sat it back on the table as naturally as though nothing were wrong at all. Weiss saw the blistering red it turned her lip, despite the flush in her face from the hard, silent tears.
"Ruby, I…" the heiress tried, but stopped short. The words stuck in her throat like a fishbone, which was very unlike her, and gave the heiress quite some pause.
"Why are you doing this?" Ruby muttered, almost inaudibly, her first words in hours.
Weiss blinked a few times in shock. Not only for the suddenness of her partner's voice, but for the question itself. Why had she done all this? Why had she insisted, despite only very recently becoming able to tolerate the woman, that Ruby come to her room instead of going to her own apartment? Why was she becoming so vested in something that was, in all truth and reality, none of her business and hardly any of her concern?
The answer eluded Weiss, much and more so, but this did not stop her from trying.
"I, uh… We're partners." She said, rather unsure of herself, and straightened up, "We're partners and, well, it's only polite. I mean, if you… uh…"
The heiress stuttered, sputtered and petered out, both vocally and, for a brief moment, mentally. While this transpired, Ruby took another three sips of her scalding hot tea. She continued ignoring the undoubtedly painful heat.
"I have to be sure you're well enough to keep your grades up, Ruby!" Weiss shouted after a few moments of silence.
The woman sat her tea down again and turned her silver eyes to the heiress. When they met her icy blues, Weiss got her first real look at just how dead they looked to be. It almost made her sick, the reason for which she couldn't possibly guess.
"Grades, huh?" Ruby scoffed, "Sounds about right…"
Weiss recoiled, as though Ruby had slapped her, and all but threw her own cup of tea across the room with the sudden gesture. It hit the wall by the door and shattered, giving the room its first real bit of commotion in quite some time. Yet, despite all of her nature dictating that she should care about how badly the tea might stain the carpet, the heiress neither flinched nor budged toward the mess. She only stared into her partner's hurt, reeling gaze that bespoke more than a thousand volumes of print ever could.
Even to Weiss, who had no real talent for reading emotions.
"Ruby, you're not acting like yourself…" she said, "This really isn't like you. Please, tell me what happened…"
Ruby looked away and picked her tea up again. This time, however, she took no sips. Only held it and stared off into nothing.
The rain continued to beat the window, marking a noise that had become a part of the background to the two. Though it was loud and blatantly present, its constancy had seen it become little more than another part of the silence. A silence which, though broken in the last few minutes, descended upon the room once more.
"Father or sister?" Weiss asked, breaking the awful silence, as she tried to call on something the woman beside her had taught her. A lesson the heiress had spared little thought for, but for which she now found herself grateful for having learned to even a small degree.
It almost seemed like it accomplished what the heiress had intended when the woman's silver eyes grew a tad wider. Yet, whatever it might have managed, the effect was woefully short lived.
"Doesn't matter…" Ruby muttered, staring into nothing once again, "Whenever things start going well, something always happens. Doesn't matter why or to who…"
Now, Weiss was quickly reaching her limit. So many things were fighting for a chance to voice themselves in her mind. Too many thoughts and too many ideas at once, quickly overpowering the heiress' faculties. She wasn't used to this sort of illogical, emotional flurry, after all, and was finding herself woefully unable to maintain herself against its assault.
Ruby, for her part, was in a boat much similar to Weiss'. A situation which, for all intents and purposes, may as well have been the same. Different factors lie at its root, of course, but the effect was not dissimilar.
In her mind, it was all a blur of why's and how's. Why did this always happen? How had she not foreseen it? How had she managed to become complacent, yet again? Why was it always her family, never her?
So many questions floated through Ruby's head, she found little recourse aside from spacing out. Just letting the steam of the tea, the loud patter of the rain and the relative quiet of the room take her away. As much so as the heiress, this reaction was incredibly unlike the normally cheerful and upbeat woman. Though, unlike the heiress, her introspection did not extend far enough to wonder why or to worry over this fact.
"I can help, Ruby, if you'll let me." Weiss said, unsure why she did.
The woman did not answer, only kept up her silent vigil over the bed and wall beyond.
"I will help you." Weiss tried again, "But I have to know what's wrong, first…"
Now, as is all too often the case in our lives, something occurred for a reason that neither woman would be able to pinpoint for the entirety of their lives. It bloomed from a combination of impulse and simple exhaustion. Ironically, whether any are willing to admit so or not, it transpired in the manner that is most common of carefully laid plans. One reaches the zenith, where things are made or broken, and is suddenly faced with the fact that control is only an illusion we feed ourselves. Control over situations, or over circumstances or, perhaps most of all, true control over ourselves.
Ruby was overcome by something in the back of her mind, spurred by the way Weiss had delivered her plea, and turned back to the icy eyes that so mournfully beheld her. Then, without having the vaguest of clues why, she simply lost it. Her eyes flooded over, her voice would be held no more and her muscles acted with a will of their own. Ruby threw herself toward Weiss, wrapped her arms about the woman's waist and began to wail, loud and painfully, into her abdomen.
Acting without thought herself, Weiss put her own arms around Ruby's head.
"Get it out." She said as compassionately as she could manage, "Get it out and tell me what's wrong…"
Ђ
"I'm sorry, Weiss…" Ruby choked out between sobs. It had been almost twenty minutes since her half-hour cry had ended, but the hiccups that oft accompany such extended bawling were not yet out of her system.
"You're alright here." Weiss said softly, "Don't force yourself. Just let it out and talk only when you're ready…"
The entire time she held the quivering, wailing Ruby in her lap, until the violent cry had wound down to little more than shivering mewling, Weiss had wondered why. She wondered why she was doing so, why Ruby was acting so and, most of all, why it felt almost correct. The answer, which might seem obvious to an outside observer, eluded her. Yet, to her further amazement, this fact did little to bother Weiss either.
"This… this has all been so much…" Ruby went on, her voice broken up by sobs and hiccups, "It's been over half a year, but all this new stuff… this new place…"
"After my first impression of you, I'm surprised you held it together this long." Weiss said with an unusually jovial, friendly tone.
Ruby snorted a bit of laughter. It was short-lived and almost choked out by a subsequent cough, but Weiss clearly heard it. The miniscule gesture was oddly comforting to hear.
"I guess I am a bit of a mess, huh?" Ruby mused.
"Which one was it, Ruby?" Weiss asked lamentingly, trying to keep things on track. She felt Ruby stiffen up suddenly, but force herself to relax a moment after.
"I said to talk when you're ready." Weiss went on, "I didn't mean to talk about just any old thing. I meant for you to tell me what's got you so upset. I'm not an eavesdropper, but after seeing your face when you were on the phone, the way it looked like a candle going out in the dark, I tried to hear what was being said. I only caught the last bit, which told me next to nothing, so you're going to have to fill me in if I'm going to help..."
How long had it been since she had said so much at once? Off the top of her head, Weiss couldn't recall. Even if given a month or a year, the heiress would have been hard-pressed to say, honestly, just how long.
"Yang…" Ruby whispered, and it was enough. This was good as she grew silent immediately after, which Weiss had expected.
The heiress mulled it over in her head for a moment. Just as she had thought, it was the sister after all. As for what it could be, though she could venture an undoubtedly accurate guess, 'twas best to hear it from the horse's mouth. Or, in this case, the thoroughly unsettled, upended and distraught woman's mouth.
"What about her?" Weiss asked, perhaps a minute later, and instantly regretted her choice of wording.
Again Ruby stiffened, and again it was a thankfully short lived motion. The woman recovered quickly and sat up, pawing at her misty eyes, to look the heiress in the eye. The face she made, which fell somewhere between defeated and empty, sent a chill down Weiss' spine and through her heart. The heiress was quickly discovering, in a manner she would never have expected to, just how little books could truly teach one.
They shared a psychology class which, though Ruby was inexplicably better in the performance of, the heiress believed she had learned much from. The basics were long behind them now, despite having only passed through the first half of the year. Now they were on to more subtle things, such as micro expressions and genetic allocation of memory. Things that bore little on the current situation, admittedly, but that bore much on both the transpiring events as well as the heiress' reactions. Or, more accurately, her lack of knowledge over the reason for.
One precise example, one which Weiss found herself faced with many times recently, was the way she had become inclined to sudden bouts of deep introspection and recollection.
"The call I got…" Ruby muttered morosely, breaking Weiss from another of those recent bouts, "It was from Nightshade, my sister's partner. She said Yang was hurt, badly, and that they're at this hospital in Vacuo…"
Ruby trailed off then, but Weiss was beginning to feel her assumptions were more than likely correct.
"It's a big jump, moving so far from home and going to such a demanding university." Weiss said, "I'd imagine the pressure to make the most of it would be pretty awful, all alone. Trying to figure out how to manage, and how to pay for it all without a scholarship, must have been grueling."
The heiress stopped with a sudden hitch of breath. A shooting pain flashed through her chest and was gone the next instant. Without realizing, she lightly touched her chest, directly over her sternum, and took a deep breath.
"The pressure to make someone proud of you is pretty intense at times." Weiss went on, "Heaven forbid if something happens to them before you can…"
"Yeah…" Ruby sighed.
"So, are you going tomorrow?" Weiss asked abruptly, "Or, I guess that would be later today…"
The raven-headed woman's face twisted again, but to a much more alarming posture. This time it plainly read one thing, and that was helplessness.
"I can't." Ruby stated flatly, almost sounding like an echo.
"Why not?" Weiss asked, "Are you afraid to? Or, and I'm sure this couldn't possibly be, do you not want to?"
The heiress' normally icy stare, though it still retained the icy color, had melted to shock and concern. Ruby saw this and, to a miniscule degree, Weiss felt it within herself.
"No." Ruby reiterated, "I just… can't..."
Weiss stopped herself from blurting out the obvious questions, for it would have accomplished little as she well knew. The woman was in a shocked, volatile state, which would lend little to the effectiveness of a brute method of conversation in trying to ascertain her answer. So, despite having been mostly abandoned by the former efficacy of her logical ways, the heiress decided to give one more shot at an analytical approach.
It only took a moment of clearer, more astute observation for her to find the all too obvious answer.
"You don't have a way there, do you?" Weiss asked, herself sounding eerily like an echo.
The look in those hurt, reeling silver eyes told her all she needed to know. And, in another moment of uncharacteristic, scarcely considered impulsiveness, Weiss decided exactly what she would do about it. Maybe she was losing herself part and parcel, but this gradually building change felt little like the frightening calamity that it probably should have. In fact, one could accurately venture that it felt right to her, which was a fright in and of itself.
"I said I'd help, so let's get that straightened out." Weiss said, and so she did.
Ψ
Two more days passed by at Saint Andrew's. Two more days of the same show, wherein Blake would spend her morning reading a book and having breakfast. This was followed by a pre-noon trip to the physical therapy department, where a series of nurses would assist her in working on the injured leg that all claimed was healing far too fast. After that, lunch was coupled with another hours-long bout of reading. Then, around four in the afternoon, Blake was once more stolen away for the therapy that felt more and more unnecessary.
Two days of this, and the sun now dawned on the third. Yet, this day did not go quite as the faunus had come to expect.
Oh, she ate her breakfast in the same early morning silence, occupied only with the bleeps and blips of the machines. And she did read as well, unperturbed by these selfsame noises while her mind traveled to other places. When the time finally crawled around for her to be off for the therapy, that also went just as it had been.
It was after the first ten minutes of the therapy that things went odd, to say the least.
"I'm amazed at how well the wound has done, Miss Nightshade." The nurse mused while observing Blake's ridiculously fluid motions.
"Why are we still bringing her down here?" Asked another, equally awed by the sight.
There would have been another twenty minutes of this, were it not for what came next. Not the quiet slide of the door, of course, for that was nothing unusual. Doctors and nurses and patients alike came in and out while the room was occupied, and why wouldn't they? It was who came in and what he said that set the entire thing into motion.
He hobbled over the padded floor of the therapy room on his jet-black cane, scratching at his stubbly neck all the while. He even stopped for a moment, to observe the miraculous sight for himself, before walking clear up to the nearly dancing faunus. Then, with no time for any save Blake to react, he lifted his cane, put his weight on the good leg and swung, hard, at her back.
Blake's ears twitched, turned toward him and, in the blink of an eye, she did a flip. It was flawless, seamless and beautiful to behold. But more than that, it served to further the assaulting doctor's disquiet.
"Why are huntresses such freaks of nature?" Holmes mused, now leaning on his cane again after the performance.
Blake spun around, huffing with both anger and some small exhaustion, and leveled an angry glare at him. Holmes' eyes, those faded blue killer's eyes, didn't flinch.
"Are you trying to make my injuries worse?!" Blake yelled.
"No." Holmes replied, truthfully and flatly, "Just wanted to see if you were both having the same run of miraculous recovery is all."
She gave him only the same angry stare, colored now with a hint of curiosity, for his trouble.
"What are you talking about?" she asked.
Holmes smiled, a nearly sinister grin he often wore after proving his point to one of his peers, and turned as if to leave the room. He took four hobbling steps before stopping and peering back over his shoulder.
"Wanna see?" he asked before walking out the door.
Blake was intrigued, to say the least, and did indeed follow with little hesitation. One of the nurses moved to stop her, being that the therapy session was only half done, but another grabbed the nurse's shoulder. The look he gave her said all that needed to be said.
The doctor hobbled through the short hallway with the faunus in tow, headed straight for a pair of elevators on the corner. Now, Blake was not one with an incredible talent for reading others, and the events of the near past had left her more than a little blunted in this skill, but even she could tell something was off about the man. The gait of his hobble, thrown wide and long like he was overly excited, coupled with the fact that he spoke very little along the way said plenty.
They reached the elevators and he pushed the up arrow. It was there that he finally spoke.
"You know, I think it's something they feed you at that school." Holmes said while watching the light descend the markers above the elevator doors.
"What are you talking about?" Blake asked in reply, understandably lost. Though she had learned more than a few things about the man, his penchant for cryptic, sometimes even flat-out lunatic speech was something she couldn't quite acclimate to.
"Well, not many people, human or faunus, can boast the ability to recover from wounds like the two of you." He said, and it finally clicked to Blake, "To put it simply, I'm just a bit shocked is all. I mean, look at you! You're up and walking, hardly a week after coming in nearly dead. Even doing flips!"
"I didn't exactly want that cane of yours smacking me in the back…" Blake muttered with annoyance, though her mood was already beginning to make a turn for the better. She hardly dared to hope, but with the way he was going on it was hard not to.
The elevator reached them and opened up with a muted whoosh. The two stepped in, Holmes first as though there weren't a lady present, and the thing began its ascent after he pressed the proper button.
"Don't know if they taught you this at Beacon, or if they taught you biology at all, but few living things walk off an infection when they're half-starved and dehydrated." He went on while the machine took them up, "That wound of yours was pretty damn infected, at that. I was fairly certain we'd have to amputate when you first got here."
Blake flashed him a surprised look, to which he gave another of his victorious, nearly sinister grins.
"Well, obviously I wasn't going to after you started showing signs of recovery. Still, it's kind of weird, isn't it?"
"Uh… sure, I guess." Blake stuttered.
"But, that's not the weirdest part." Holmes said, "Do you know what is?"
"Actually, I think I might." Blake said with a cheeky smile, small and uninvited.
"Oh?"
"The weirdest part is probably that you have no idea why, right?"
Holmes' smile faded for a moment but quickly flared back to life. He broke his gaze from Blake's just as the doors opened and both stepped out.
Once again, they walked the hallway in silence. Now they were on the floor where the critical care center was housed, headed down a path Blake could likely navigate while blindfolded at this point. Though it had not quite been an entire week for her, she had traveled the stretch of fluorescent-lit hall well over fifty times. And she knew well exactly where they were headed.
"Are you going to tell me what this is all about or not?" She asked, growing more impatient with every passing moment.
Holmes only continued on with his hobbling in silence. One might've even assumed he had not heard her at all with the way he simply kept up the pace, missing not a step and giving not even so much as a shrug. Then, when they finally came to the door Blake recognized all too well, he finally gave a sign he had heard her. He grabbed the handle and twisted, but did not open it. Instead, he peered over his shoulder again and leveled his faded blue eyes on her.
"I figured I'd just let you see for yourself." He said, eyes alight with an odd mix of excitement and befuddlement, before tossing the door wide open.
Blake stood in shocked silence for the sight she beheld within. There was little else she could do, after all. With the constant news and the constant lack of change to it, she had nearly come to the verge of giving up hope. But, with the emotion kindled anew by Holmes' words in the therapy room, it now flared bright and full once more.
"Knock, knock!" Holmes shouted, "Visitor for Blazing Sol!"
Blake ignored him and staggered into the room, her eyes already welling up with tears she would not be able to hold back for long. Could it be? Surely not, but there it was…
"I'll just leave you both to it."
Blake heard Holmes' words, even felt the air when he shut the door, and realized she was already in front of Yang's bed. Time felt warped again, for her at least, and the reason was clear. The reason was presently sitting up in bed, staring wistfully out the window at the sea below. The reason was alive, awake and, most unbelievably of all, looked none the worse for the wear.
"Y- Ya-…" Blake stuttered, falling just short of true speech when the first tears fell. The first of many…
The woman on the bed turned her gaze from its mournful watch over the sea. Her lavender eyes met Blake's tear-riddled golden. She flashed a weak but warm smile, and Blake lost it completely.
"Yang!" the faunus screamed before flinging herself onto the blonde.
In the moment before she did, however, there was something vaguely amiss. Something that seemed incredibly important somewhere in the back of her mind. It was dark, a sort of queerly glowing black, and shaped in a most disquieting fashion. But she missed it, and would likely not have cared even if she had fully seen it.
Ђ
How long had it been since last calling on the more caring side of her aptly named sister? At a moment's thought, Weiss could not remember. Surely long enough that both had felt strange about it, undoubtedly so, but Winter certainly seemed amiable enough. It was no secret that Winter sympathized with Weiss' contempt over their father's constant machinations for his daughters. A miserable truth that Winter had broken free of the moment she could, by joining Atlas' vaunted military no less. Weiss was thankful to have at least that much in kind with her sister.
"See to it that your endeavor…" Winter droned over the scroll before stopping with an annoyed cluck of her tongue.
"Make sure you're not gone too long, Weiss." She finished after a lengthy pause.
The way she finished the statement, Weiss might've believed her sister was actually worried about her. Nonsense, surely, but the tone was definitely there. She simply brushed this off and sucked a deep lungful of the salty sea breeze coming from a nearby open window.
"I'll be back before the End of Year Finals, Winter." The heiress said as respectfully as she could.
"That gives you one week on the mark." Winter said skeptically.
"That gives me more than I'll need." Weiss replied with a slight huff, only vaguely feeling guilty for her choice of words. It was not as though she were lying outright, per se, but it also was not that she absolutely knew a week was all that would be needed. One bridge at a time, though.
"Be safe, sister." Winter said after another moment's pause.
The heiress almost couldn't believe her ears. How long had it been since the stoic, solitary and cold Winter Schnee had referred to her baby sister in such a manner? Long enough to leave said sister momentarily lost for words.
"I will…" Weiss said at last, pausing in her shock before adding, with awkward emphasis, "Sister."
The scroll clicked audibly and the line went dead. Weiss would likely never know that, on the other end, Winter's face had turned the deep scarlet of one who has said exactly what they meant, only with a boldness they had not intended. Yet that was neither here nor there, and Weiss had other matters on hand to attend to.
The heiress looked at the blinking, beeping device for a moment before laying it on a nearby table. The small surface was almost painfully low to the floor and tucked into a corner by her bunk, but it would do well enough. She then turned around to leave the tiny sleeping quarters and was momentarily struck with dizziness.
With the call to her sister and the intoxicating sent of the air to distract her, the heiress had nearly forgotten where she was for a time. A time enough for her sea legs to make a speedy exit, at least. When the gentle rock of the small vessel, which was not much larger than a medium fishing boat, came back to her, it returned with all the expected force of nature itself.
Weiss swayed with the brief vertigo and caught hold of the door frame. She reeled for a moment, got hold of herself and huffed in disgust.
"Twenty-Thousand Lien and two beautiful women." She sighed angrily, "One would think the young captain might at least feel the need to impress his guests with better piloting…"
Of course, being one of only two children born to one of the wealthiest families across all of Remnant, and sheltered as she had been until the last handful of years, Weiss did not actually know the first thing about boating. To say she was unprepared for the sway of the sea would be only a half truth, but to say she would know that nothing could be done about this unavoidable feature of seafaring would simply be giving her too much credit.
While the heiress spent the next few minutes below deck trying to get regain herself, and not ruin another outfit with the contents of her stomach, Ruby remained up top. The raven-headed woman had never been so bold as to think she might one day be a passenger on a privately charted boat, miniscule or otherwise. Because of this, and despite the looming specter of the bad-news she'd received only two days earlier, she was utterly entranced.
Yes, her heart was still heavy with the onslaught of emotions. Yes, her mind was still enfeebled by the menagerie of compounded problems. And yes, perhaps most of all, she was still incredibly worried over the welfare of her sister.
But even so, the picture of the sun setting into the infinite blue, with its cavalcade of bright oranges and fiery reds and blazing yellows painted across the sky…
"Damn…" Ruby muttered, almost fully stolen by her awe.
"S'quite the perty sight, idn'it?" mused a gruff yet oddly inviting voice from behind her.
She turned to see one Cerus Lean, captain of the hastily chartered vessel, standing with his arms crossed over his barrel chest. His long, incredulously clean beard wafted in the breeze that carried by. In his mouth there sat an old hickory pipe, burning away with heavens knew what smoldering in the bell. The hazel eyes that sat sunken into his baggy sockets clearly regarded the same image that had stolen Ruby away, reflecting the fiery sky of the setting sun as he watched.
"You get to see this a lot, don't you?" she mused after turning away to admire the ethereal view once more.
"Yar, an right perty 'tis er'time I lays eyes on't." Cerus replied in his gruff, half-spoken and half-eaten speech.
Ruby's eyes welled over with tears while she stared. Mostly for the salty breeze that blew without cease, but amply also for the emotions brought on both by the sight before her and the thoughts within her. She sniffled.
"How long did you say the trip should take?" she asked morosely.
"By good winds and gooder seas, shern't be mer'n two days, aye." He grizzled, "'Course, ats c'nsider'n ere's no detours at white lass ants ta make…"
Ruby turned her gaze to him and regarded the man with waxing curiosity. Things were stirred and crazed in her mind, and even more so in her heart, but Cerus' statement still struck an off cord. It wasn't as though she assumed she knew the heiress part and parcel, of course, but she did feel she knew her somewhat well. Enough to feel off about the captain's statement at the least.
"What do you mean by 'detours', huh?"
"Kips like er's as like ta hide sumfin as 'ey are to fink ta sun shines out their bleedin' arse." Cerus observed in reply, followed with a hearty laugh that sounded oddly like thunder.
Ruby was not one given to judging thoughts, not by any stretch of the imagination, but, with his salty demeanor and oddly jaded tone, thirty seemed like an awfully young age for the man.
"Speak o' the white'n!" he bellowed suddenly just as Weiss stepped onto the deck, "Thar she blows!"
The heiress was quick to shoot him an icy, contemptuous glance. Unmoved by the gesture, Cerus understood that his antics were not presently welcome all the same. In a rare exercise of human restraint, he made for the bridge without another peep. For this, Weiss couldn't have been more grateful.
"Still enjoying the view?" she asked, approaching Ruby while simultaneously fighting another bout of nausea.
"As much as I can, I guess…" Ruby replied with lackluster tone.
Weiss managed to stagger close enough to stand beside her partner and grabbed hold of the railing before them both with undue vigor. She steadied herself and tried to beckon her sea legs to return, setting her own gaze out toward the horizon while fighting the inner battle. It didn't take long for the heiress to realize exactly why her partner found it so mesmerizing.
"Things look… boundless out here, don't they?" Weiss said with unhidden awe. She had seen many sights of grandeur in her pampered life, but rarely had she stopped to truly consider any of them. Here though, with partner in tow and life all but put on hold, there was little else to do but let the grandiose surroundings take you.
"I've never seen the sea from this view." Ruby said dreamily.
"Oh?" Weiss sighed.
Ruby just shook her head, up and down once, in reply. It was an awfully childish gesture, one that Weiss only caught from the corner of her eye, which spoke volumes of the woman's inner workings.
"How are you feeling, Ruby?" The heiress asked in a far off tone.
"Better, I think." Ruby said, then sighed heavily, "You were right, Weiss. I think it was just everything coming down at once, and I just kinda panicked…"
Weiss turned her icy eyes and settled them on Ruby. She watched as the woman crouched on her heels, holding the rail tightly with outstretched arms, and peered at the infinite blue through the shiny bars. Her puffy, silver eyes, worn and marked with the crying that had only recently ceased, held an emotion the heiress was glad to see returned.
Their silver surface gleamed as much with their given color as they did with sheer wonder, giving a much needed look of happiness, however partial or weak, back to Ruby's mien.
"You really are a strong one." Weiss said with just the barest hint of envy.
"Nah." Ruby blurted in reply.
The heiress tilted her head quizzically, a gesture Ruby must have caught from the corner of her eye. She turned to face the heiress and flashed her a friendly, almost thankful grin. It was weak, and even looked a bit forced, but it was good to see all the same.
"It's Yang." She said very matter-of-factly, "I know my sister, and I know she's not the kind of fire to just poof out like this."
Ruby broke her gaze from the heiress' and looked back to the ocean.
"Maybe she is pretty badly hurt, and maybe she is worse off than I'd like to think… But this is Yang, Weiss. She can't go out like this."
She stopped and took a deep breath, filling herself with the tangy, salty air that carried on the breeze. After holding it for a moment, Ruby let it go with a very mournful sigh; a sigh that said, though her words were brave and she wanted to believe them, she was quite afraid that she might be lying. Not only to the heiress, but even more so to herself.
"She won't go out like this." Ruby said gravely, "I'm sure of it."
Ђ
The dawn of the second day of their trip brought the rise of another beautiful sun. Its golden rays hit the surface of the sky and scattered into a plethora of blazing hues. All colors of the rainbow it seemed, the light scored ravines of purples and oranges and even pinks, leaving a cosmic trail that could only be called humbling.
And humbling was indeed one of the many feelings evoked in Ruby's heart as she watched that dawn skyline. Humbling and nostalgic, harkening to recollections of similar skies viewed as a kid-sister in tow with her older sibling. Times of camping, times of exploration, and even times of simple loitering after a morning jog. Good times and good memories, in no other words.
While she watched, the ocean waves beat relentlessly on the hull of the small boat. They came and crashed, spraying seafoam and plucking a deep melody into the air. Each soft plat brought another wave of the recollective feeling into her, despite such a sound being relatively new. Ruby might never have experienced the ocean in such a manner, so close and intimate with its unending blue, but nostalgia has a way of altering these things. For when we recall one with whom we hold infinitely strong bonds of kinship, all things around are colored to their image and memory.
"Did you sleep?" called a familiar voice, one that had gradually dug its way ever further into Ruby's heart over the recent months.
"Enough." Ruby said flatly but happily.
From her position, leaned against the mizzenmast at the rear of the vessel and staring over the knee-high railing before her, she looked like a forlorn soul awaiting a sailor lost at sea. Weiss observed this with some passing fancy, recalling a time when poetic prose had once stirred her heart, and approached with an unexpected flutter beneath her breast. Unusual, considering the way she had been until the last half of a year.
Now, though, such throbs seemed less and less foreign in her bosom where the silver eyed Ruby was concerned.
"The captain's up too, and said he would have us some breakfast soon." Weiss said while settling beside her partner.
Still staring off into the beauty rising in the east, Ruby's gaze was brought to the heiress when she felt a warm sensation nudge her arm. She looked over and saw the cup of steaming blackness, and was immediately reminded how thankful she was. For many things, but, at this very moment, keenly so for her friend.
"Thank you." She said sweetly, taking the offered cup and having a sip. She considered the beverage and its bitterness for a moment, then said, as if far off in a dream, "You didn't have to do all of this, you know?"
Weiss was in the middle of a sip herself. A slow and savoring drinker, the heiress preferred to taste every drop of the few things she deigned to grace her palate with. But, with the unexpected statement, her eyes grew wide and her present half-sip nearly choked her. Embarrassment was the most likely factor in this reaction.
"Why do you say that?" she managed to choke out between stymied coughs.
Ruby looked to her cup, stared at the black surface and took another taste. She let it warm her, mouth and chest and soul, and looked back to the sunrise. When she did, the image was blurry and distorted. Her eyes were tearing over, and she knew not why.
"You just…" she tried, grasping blindly for her words, "You didn't have to, is all I mean. There was nothing forcing your hand, or really any reason for you to do it…"
She trailed off. After a moment of silent thought, Ruby pawed the tears from her eyes and took a deep breath. The early morning air seemed to have a convalescent flavor, somehow charged by the rising beauty on the horizon, that soothed whatever had her eyes tearing over so.
"I guess I'm really asking, 'Why did you do this?' is all…" Ruby finished with a sigh.
The heiress looked to her own cup, but did not take another taste. She simply stared at the churning blackness, tossed gently with the soft motions of the vessel beneath. The gaze she gave it almost said she expected to find an answer within, as though there were tea leaves to be read. Almost, but not quite.
She looked into the coffee with her eyes, but looked for the question's answer with her mind and in her soul.
"I guess it's my own way of saying thank you." Weiss muttered at last, after remaining in silence for nearly a minute, "For reaching out, for not selling me out, and for just… well, being you."
Her face had begun to shade red from the first phrase out of her barely pink lips. With each subsequent word, it felt as though her cheeks were readying a bonfire beneath the surface. This wasn't helped by the fact that she could feel Ruby's wide-eyed and befuddled stare on her, without having to look.
"Weiss, I…" Ruby stuttered, a tad embarrassed herself, "I, um… I didn't know it meant so much to you…"
"Me either." The heiress agreed quickly.
Both stood in silence for a few minutes, engrossing themselves in the sounds of the sea and the bitterness of their drinks while the mutual embarrassment ran its course. Then, as though out of nowhere, something struck Ruby.
"What was there for me to sell you out for?" she blurted out suddenly.
Weiss leveled a nakedly shocked glare at her, which quickly turned into an adoring and soft smile.
"No one is that innocent, Ruby." The heiress mused with a giggle, "Especially not someone who dances their way through university."
Ruby's face turned deep scarlet almost all at once. She opened her mouth as if to reply, but was stopped by a loud chirping. Without a thought, and without hesitation, the woman drew something from her right pocket with such speed as to leave the heiress wondering what had happened at all.
There was a rush of wind and a scroll simply appeared in Ruby's hand, so far as Weiss could tell.
"Hello?" the woman answered, her voice almost in full panic. Or maybe sheer surprise.
"This is Ruby, right?" The voice on the other end said, sounding equally excited or panicky. Much to the heiress' own surprise, she could make it out despite the sounds of the ocean surrounding them.
"Uh huh, Ruby Rose here. And this is Nightshade, right?" Ruby replied quickly.
"Yes. It's about your sister again…"
The woman swallowed hard and loudly, a nervous gesture the heiress had read of once or twice but never actually witnessed.
"She's made a full recovery and the doctors are talking about releasing her in the next couple of days." Nightshade went on, "She wanted me to tell you not to worry, and don't go out of your way to come out here. She's coming to see you once she's cleared to go."
A thousand questions rolled through Ruby's mind at once. They ran the gambit from shocked pleas for more information to disbelieving requests for repetition. In the end, what might be the most expected won out.
"How?" Ruby whispered.
"No one knows." Nightshade replied, her own skepticism clear but suppressed, "She just got better, pretty much overnight. Even the doctor in charge hasn't given a single guess why…"
"But she is better, right?" Ruby pressed anxiously.
"Yes. Better like a miracle."
"Then why hasn't she called me yet?"
There was a pause for a moment, and Ruby's heart picked up the pace by nearly thirty beats. The taxed organ raced and her mind went to the four corners with raving thoughts until Nightshade's voice piped up again.
"She wanted to, but they wouldn't let her." She said, though her words seemed off somehow, "But she will call you as soon as they clear her. She told me to tell you that."
"That's ok, we're almost there anyway!" Ruby nearly shouted in her growing excitement.
"I'm sorry?"
"We're about a day out, me and a friend! So tell Yang not to worry, I'll be there sometime tomorrow!"
There was another pause, in which Ruby could have sworn she heard a remorseful sigh. Had her mind not been on overload with elation, she might have wondered why Nightshade would do such a thing. As it was, however, she did not. One thing and one thing only had her thoughts, and that was the miraculous update about her sister.
All was right and all was well with Ruby's world.
"Tell Yang I said hi, ok?!" she squealed with joy.
"I- I'll do that." Nightshade agreed reservedly, "She said to tell you the same. Be safe on your way, alright?"
"I will!" Ruby yelled before sliding the scroll shut. With hardly a moment in between, she pocketed the thing and spun around to face Weiss, who had managed to overhear the entire exchange.
"Guess what?!" Ruby all but screamed, "My sister's fine! Yang is ok!"
She leapt like a spring and bounced around as though an ecstatic child. The heiress could hardly suppress the warmth growing inside her at the sight, which gave way to a natural and serene smile.
"I told you!" she yelled, as much to the sky as to the heiress, "That's Yang! Nothing can keep her down!"
While Weiss watched her partner's sudden about-face, and while the captain walked out the breakfasts he had just finished, there stood a fourth among them. Unseen, unknown and unfelt, he watched with cruel intrigue and a wicked grin cut across his rotted features.
Charyou Tree
Ψ
"Bloodwork is good, EEG reads fine…" Holmes muttered to himself while looking over the various machines hooked up to Yang, "Nothing's out of the ordinary, however impossible that may be."
Blake looked from her partner, lying on her new bed in the outpatient wing, to the hobbled doctor, staring with unhidden disgust at a continuous sheet of paper coming from one of the devices. Her own gaze displayed blatant, almost puerile alleviation. To say she was relieved would be an understatement of the highest order.
"So, how much longer are you going to hold me here?" Yang asked.
Holmes leveled his faded blue gaze onto her, his eyes even more sunken than Blake had seen them when her partner lie on the brink only some few days earlier. The stubble on his cheeks was now well on its way to becoming a full, shaggy beard.
"Until I can figure out what's caused this unreal recovery…" He muttered, pinching the flesh between his eyebrows and closing his eyes with blatant irritation, "Or so I'd like to say. But, you're well enough that I have no authority to hold you. It's your call."
Yang looked to Blake, and Blake to Yang. Both shared a questioning regard, as if asking the other's permission. It was now barely over a week since the hollow city, the man in the mask, and the chase to the end of the world. Nine days had passed and here they stood, after having both been beaten and battered, fit as fiddles and right as rain. No trace of the experience left, save for the shared memories between them that neither had divulged to any others.
"I'll stay for one more day." Yang said to Holmes after breaking her gaze away, "Run some more tests if you like. Never know, you might just find that answer you've got such a hard-on for."
She punctuated the statement with a sly wink, to which Holmes quickly reacted with understandable, albeit well hidden, anger. Blake turned away to hide a snicker as best she could, which was not all that well. The heartwarming sound echoed through the mostly silent room, unimpeded by the various beeps of the machines.
"Maybe just one more lumbar puncture." Holmes said, "See if there's anything we missed in the spinal fluid."
The look in his eye just before he left told Yang the joke was on her, but she cared little. The sun was rising and sending its first motherly rays through her window, painting her tanned skin with a reddish-golden hue. She could hear birds chirping and the light wisp of the sea breeze just beyond the thin panes. Best of all, Blake had already informed her the previous night of her sister's imminent arrival.
All was well and all was good.
"Did she say what kind of boat she was coming in?" Yang asked with a shimmer in her lavender eyes.
"Nope." Blake responded, her own gaze peering out the window with Yang's.
"Think she's here yet?"
"Maybe?"
Yang took a deep, almost despondent breath and sighed with a nearly forced effort. Everything was fine, but her chest did feel oddly tight. A quick glance to the monitor which displayed her heartrate told her nothing was amiss. So she ignored it and simply looked back out the window, thinking briefly she might spot her sister. Maybe, if she looked hard enough…
"Hey, Blake dear…" Yang whispered in an oddly calm, serene voice.
"Uh huh?" the faunus responded.
"You ready to get back after him?"
It wasn't for the question itself, but for the suddenness of it, that Blake visibly jumped. Her ears folded flat to her head and the hairs on the nape of her neck stood tall, despite the flowing locks atop them. Heart racing, skin suddenly sweating, eyes thinned to mere slits, and mouth going dry, Blake turned to level a bemused glare at the blonde.
"Are you insane?!" She hissed in mixed disgust and shock.
"Probably." Yang replied flatly, "But I'm not letting this go, either way. Something like that can't just be left to roam across Remnant, unknown and unchecked."
Yang's gaze remained affixed on the seafront some few miles off, watching the boats drift lazily around the harbor as the sun painted them all the colors of early morning fire. She gave not one indicator that Blake's distressed stare either bothered or even registered to her. For this, and a few other reasons, the faunus felt a sudden sinking in her stomach.
"I'm not going to lose you, Yang." She whispered with tears welling in her eyes, "Not like that, not until old age comes to get us."
At this, Yang finally turned her lavender gaze to meet Blake's golden. When she did, the sight that greeted her faunus lover was utterly shattering.
Her eyes seemed hollow, almost dead, and looked as if they peered into the ether. Her face, which had been left tanned in the wake of their pursuit, was ashy pale and streaked with blue veins. Worst of all, Blake finally saw the image that she had sensed some few times since waking in the critical care wing of Saint Andrew's. She saw it in full, and her heart let go of every good feeling that had occupied it in the last three days.
The upside-down cross glowed bright and black and proud on her love's forehead as the room was filled with the blare of alarms from the various machines monitoring the blonde.
Ђ
For once in quite some time, much to the heiress' chagrin over such a truth, things were finally going as planned. Hastily planned, yes and thank you, but as planned all the same.
The captain, salty loudmouth that he was, had made fantastic time just as he'd sworn to do. They even arrived nearly a full day earlier than Weiss had planned for, and that was only icing on the cake. For this reason, as well as his otherwise professional demeanor, if one ignored his rather brusque manner of speech, she had tipped him well. Ten-thousand more on top of his commission rate, to which Ruby had nearly fainted at the sight of.
What's more, there had not even been a need to scramble for the hotel room she had reserved upon their departure. The check-in time was still hours off and the day was only just beginning, which meant there would be time to go see her friend's ailing sister and even stay for most of the morning. Oh, how wonderful it felt to have things finally settling into place. Even more so, perhaps, when she thought of how this would surely improve Ruby's grades, though this seemed less and less important for reasons the heiress was only just coming to suspect, and even understand on a rudimentary level.
"Oh, I can't wait to tell Yang all about the university!" Ruby nearly squealed in her building excitement, "All the neat things I've seen, all the cool places I've been, and all the awesome things I've learned! Ah, she's going to be so proud!"
"When you put your head to it, you're quite the quick study." Weiss observed with some small admiration.
"Most of that's thanks to you, Weiss." Ruby added quickly, skipping along the sidewalk in front of Saint Andrew's as though she were twelve years younger.
Weiss didn't respond to this, only turned her gaze to the concrete and blushed. She had no present idea why, of course, but she was beginning to suspect. Surely not, but it would explain a lot…
"Race you there!" Ruby blurted suddenly before tearing off.
The heiress looked up only just in time to see a veritable cloud of rose petals. Her partner was gone, now somewhere off ahead. Weiss strained her gaze and barely managed to pick the woman out, heading for the front lobby like a bullet.
"Wait up, you dolt!" Weiss shouted before taking off as well.
Ђ
A storm had pulled up seemingly from nowhere almost the moment the two women stepped over Saint Andrew's threshold. The sky darkened, the clouds gathered and greyed, and rain poured as though some celestial dam had broken. Lightning flashed and thunder boomed when they stepped into the grand lobby of the hospital, eliciting a squeaking jump from Ruby and a short giggle from Weiss at the sight.
They crossed the tiled floor like echoing specters, jolly but oddly muted in their movements. Weiss was in high spirits for the recovery of her partner's mood, and for some few other reasons forming slowly beneath her icy surface. Ruby, as well, was in a fantastic mood, despite the storm and despite her embarrassing display.
Even still, a pallor had consumed they and their immediate vicinity like a malevolent fog.
"How can I help you, ladies?" greeted a friendly nurse as the two approached the front desk.
"I'm here to see my sister!" Ruby all but shouted in reply.
"Alright then. Can you tell me her name so I can direct you?"
Ruby grinned from ear to ear and gave her reply with an almost infectious energy, saying, "Blazing Sol!" as though it were a most glorious title.
And to her, it quite was.
"Ah, Miss Sol." The nurse repeated before turning and thumbing through a nearby binder, "She's been all anyone's talking about for the last few days. Supposedly came in on death's doorstep, then made an impossible recovery overnight. I hear even our brightest, doctor Holmes, can't figure it out."
"That's my sister, alright!" Ruby said with all the pride in her being.
The nurse continued to thumb through the binder, checking name after name, until she came across the one. With a satisfied huff, she looked back to the beaming Ruby and could not help but to give a genuine smile in return.
"She's on floor three in the outpatient wing." She said, "Take the elevator directly behind me to the third floor, head straight down the hall after exiting, and turn left at the first intersection. From there, follow the green line to room two-twenty-one."
Weiss bowed politely and Ruby followed suit, almost comically in her excitement, before the two headed for the elevator. They crossed the last stretch of the lobby and reached it, thumbing the button for up the moment they did. The thing whirred to life and began its descent, showcasing this on the gilded display above the silver doors.
"This is a really nice place." Weiss mused before giving an approving whistle.
"Yeah, it is." Ruby agreed, "I read it was built as a memorial after the war, to commemorate the doctors that served without allegiance to either side. The ones that faced execution from both sides for treason…"
They continued to watch the descending elevator in silence after that. It only took roughly a minute all in all, opening with a muted whoosh upon reaching them. Both stepped in and Ruby nearly smashed the button for floor three. The heiress thought she might even have jammed her finger, but the woman gave no sign if she did.
"Are you going to tell her all about your experience at the university?" Weiss asked.
"Mmhm." Ruby hummed her simple reply.
The heiress considered pushing the subject for only a moment.
"Even the dancing?"
"Yup!"
"Why?"
Now, Ruby looked to her friend and locked gaze with her. The sight of her silver eyes was both intense and unusually lucid, giving the woman an air the heiress had not yet seen about her.
"Because, when someone is important to you, you don't keep secrets. You don't keep secrets, you don't lie, and you certainly don't hold back something they might find important."
She paused then, with her mouth open as though she had more to say, and cast her gaze to the floor for a moment. It looked as though she were admiring the velvet carpet, but this couldn't be further from the case. She was practicing exactly what she had just preached, but searching for the words with which to do so properly.
"I've realized, in a way I really should've earlier, just how precious family and friends are, Weiss." Ruby said at last, "My sister is a huntress, just like I wanted to be. I've always idolized them, and her even more so for becoming one, but I never realized how suddenly they can just be… gone."
Ruby lifted her gaze back to Weiss' and gave a weak smile, entirely different from what she had worn until now. Her spirit was just as high as it had been, but the grave matter of which she spoke elicited an instinctually grave expression.
"I'm going to thank her for giving me this chance, tell her everything I've done since I got there, and ask her to forgive me for doing it the way I am. I know she will, she's my sister after all, but I'm still going to ask."
Weiss couldn't help but smile, warm and wide, in return. It had been almost too long to remember since she last smiled this way, but it came just as naturally as if she had never stopped.
"You are a good person, you know?" the heiress mused with open admiration, "Yang's lucky to have a sibling like you."
With those words, and just as the door opened, a pain fired through the heiress' heart. It simultaneously hurt and felt utterly exalting. She briefly thought of her own sister while stepping into the bright hallway of the third floor, and hoped, in some unconscious part of herself, she might one day be as close.
But the feeling did not last, for upon entering the third floor hallway they were greeted by pandemonium. Nurses flitted this way and that, doctors skittered like roaches fleeing the light, and alarms were ringing from all directions.
"I've got a code blue in four-o-two!" shouted one, a younger doctor.
"Multiple organ failure in five-o-nine!" screamed a panicking nurse, leaning out of the mentioned room's doorway, "Need immediate intervention here!"
"I've got a patient seizing!" yelled another doctor, this one middle-aged and more unnerved than his veteran years would usually allow for.
Weiss, for her part, remained reasonably calm amidst the chaos. She looked across the room with observant eyes, trying to piece together what they might have just stepped into. Ruby, on the other hand, fell apart almost instantly. Her mind went to one place, in the blink of an eye, and shut all else out.
"Yang…" Ruby whispered before bolting off through the hall.
The heiress had never seen anything like it. It was as though a human tornado, turned sideways and spouting rose petals like dust, had formed and taken off down the hall. Doctors and nurses were tossed aside like straw, papers flung into the air like snow. All in an instant, Ruby was gone and out of sight, speeding in madness for her sister's room.
When Ruby arrived at the door, Weiss had only just set off to follow.
The first thing that greeted Ruby's arrival was an aura like nothing she had ever felt. It was putrid and corrupt and debilitating in its presence. It fair screamed of death and torture and sent her heart immediately back to where it was when she received her first morose call from Nightshade. Back to that pit, where truth was an infinite expanse of dark.
She grabbed the handle before her and twisted it slowly, wanting nothing more than to wake up and see this had been a nightmare. Even if she discovered she had wet the bed from the intensity of it, such a turnabout would be a relief. A relief that, sadly, she would not receive.
Λ
"Blake?" Yang called in a choked whisper.
The faunus tried for her words, gripping her lover's hand like a vise, but could only wheeze at first. All around her were the blaring alarms from the various machines, each reporting a drastic emergency that required immediate attention. But no attention came, for, unknown to Blake, the rest of the entire floor was absolute bedlam.
"Blake, are you still there?" Yang managed to choke out further, a whisper weak as before.
"Yes!" Blake screamed, pushing her mind and lungs and voice to their limits, "Yes, Yang! I'm here! I'm still here, and I'm not going anywhere!"
Her eyes were hot, so very hot, and stung like fire. She could feel the heat coursing down her cheeks, soaking her shirt and falling on the hand she clutched so tightly. Her teeth were throbbing as well, hard as she clenched them between her mostly failed attempts to speak. Her nose had nearly quit on her entirely, now clogged as it was from the torrential weeping.
"Blake… are you there?" Yang echoed again, the heart monitor nearly overpowering her whispered speech.
"I am, I am!" Blake shouted in reply, then leaned across the woman and whispered, "I'm here, Yang… Please, can't you hear me?"
The blonde coughed, hard and ragged. Flecks of blood spattered from her mouth and covered her blanket, her shirt and the faunus' cheek. Blake might have recoiled under other circumstances, but her own mind was so far gone as to not even notice the warm crimson on her cheek. With all the tears, it was indistinguishable anyway.
After the bout of coughing, Yang sucked in a ragged breath and tried to speak. Had Blake been any further from her face, she would not have heard the words that were barely words at all.
"It is you… You are still there, aren't you?" Yang said in a wheezing, sighing whisper.
"I am." Blake nearly chanted, "I am, I am, I am. I'm right here, Yang…"
Another wheezing, ragged breath, and Yang spoke her last.
"Did I… ever…" she spoke, coughed, then went on, "Did I ever tell you… about…" another rattling cough, another few specks of blood on Blake's cheek, and the blonde finished, "My wonderful kid-sister?"
"Yes, you have, but tell me again." Blake pleaded between quiet sobs, "Tell me as many times as you can, Yang."
She waited, watching her lover's face. Blake waited and watched and, after almost a minute, shook the blonde's hand lightly. It was limp and, upon looking to her face, she saw the lavender eyes she so adored were wide and staring into nothing.
"Yang?" softly at first, "Yang, come on. Stay awake, Yang!"
She shook the hand held tight in her own some more, gradually becoming nearly violent with the motion. Her tongue became heavy and dry and her throat started to feel as if it would close. Again, Blake spoke, her words becoming closer to animal cries and barks.
"Yang!" she screamed, "Wake up, Yang! Ruby's going to be here any minute, you have to wake up!"
When it finally began to sink in, a sudden noise called Blake's attention away. She spun her head so quick one might've worried it would pop off and saw someone in the doorway. Someone she had not seen in years but faintly recognized all the same, whose silver eyes grew wide as saucers within an instant.
The familiar woman stepped closer, on wobbly and unsure legs, until she stood beside Blake. It was clear from her posture that the woman saw only the one on the bed, and not the faunus knelt beside her.
"Y-…" the woman muttered as she fell to her knees, "Yang…?"
Blake watched her lean over and press her head against the woman's bosom, as though listening for her heart. The look that came across her face, of unadulterated terror and disbelief, told her it could not be heard, and she knew it then. His words had come as delivered.
The familiar woman stood up, her face blank and her posture empty, and looked the blonde over. Her crawling gaze said she both could and could not comprehend it. She then took two large steps back, nearly falling on the second, and screamed at the top of her lungs. A pained, terrible wail that pierced Blake like a knife.
"I'm sorry!" the woman screamed, stamping her feet like a toddler throwing a tantrum, "I'm sorry, Yang! I tried! I came as fast as I could! You can't just go, they said you were better! SHE said you were better! You can't just lie like that and leave, not now!"
Blake's heart broke a little more at this sight, though there was little left to break.
The familiar woman continued to scream, her words eventually becoming gibberish, while Blake slipped further into something akin to a trance. It was all coming to pieces, every bit of it, and there was nothing left that she could do.
The faunus turned her gaze back to her lover, who she was now certain had passed, and she saw it again. The upside-down black cross, glowing brilliantly like a dying star before it turned to ash and blew away.
Weiss caught up at the very moment that Ruby, completely stripped of all senses, gave one final, banshee yell. She watched in horror, putting two and two together instantly, as Ruby simply collapsed altogether and passed out like a light.
And observing all of this, unseen from his ethereal vantage in a corner of the room…
Death smiled.