Halloween (2014) Special!
Submitted by aceman88

"C'mon, Weiss!" Ruby begged, putting on her best puppy eyes and staring deep into her partner's soul. "It'll be fun!"

"...No." Weiss replied, for once managing to look away from Ruby's pitiful gray gaze.

"Why not?" Ruby complained, evidently forgetting that she had been trying unsuccessfully for an entire week to get her partner to join her in on her grand idea.

"Because unlike you, I prefer to spend my evenings in a calm, normal manner" Weiss retorted, sitting down firmly at her desk. "Not going door-to-door in a costume and begging for candy."

"But Weiss..." Ruby whined, unsuccessfully trying to turn her partner around by the shoulders.

"Just forget it, Rubes" Yang broke in, seeing Weiss face beginning to set in anger. "I'm sure you and Nora will have plenty of fun, even without the ice queen."

Normally, Yang would have killed to see Weiss humiliated as she donned a costume and went trick-or-treating on Halloween, but she still vividly remembered what had happened to Cardin when he had suggested she go as an aristocrat with Blake as her pet. She shuddered slightly, remembering his screams as he had been carted off to a hospital in Vale and the cleanup crew in hazmat suits that had blockaded multiple corridors that day. Cardin still hadn't returned, even after a week of treatment. So no, even the great Yang Xiao Long, Master of Puns and Pranks, would lay off their resident Ice Queen. Just this once. For health purposes.

"Okay..." Ruby replied dejectedly, letting go of Weiss and shuffling off into the bathroom to change. The tension in the atmosphere slowly escalated as Weiss remained determinedly silent, and Yang desperately cast about for something to say that wouldn't result in an explosion. She was saved by the appearance of Blake, who quietly tapped on the window.

"Blake?" Yang and Weiss exclaimed in unison, the former staring blankly while the latter huffed and opened the window.

"Sorry" Blake apologized, hopping inside the room. "But some of the students have gone a little crazy with Halloween pranks and I decided to avoid the hallways." Weiss and Yang nodded, and Blake began to pack books into a small backpack.

"The library seemed relatively safe" she continued. "So I'm going there to catch up on some homework. Want to come, Weiss?" Weiss shook her head.

"I'm done with my work, so I was planning on staying here to clean Myrtenaster's dust chamber" she explained. "And I'm not as graceful as you when it comes to acrobatics."

"Your semblance would work just as well" Blake chuckled. "But whatever. Have fun, guys." So saying, she slipped the pack onto her back and hopped out the window, disappearing into the evening.

"At least she's doing something productive" Weiss huffed, closing the window and sitting back down. Yang opened her mouth to retort, but her opportunity was stolen by the reemergence of her sister.

"Here's Ruby!" Ruby cheered, exploding out of the bathroom in a whirlwind of rose petals. She was dressed in a black outfit with multiple patches of semi-spiky white armor with red designs. She wore a simple plastic mask, which completed her homemade beowolf costume. Weiss rolled her eyes, not really understanding her energetic leader's obsession with the beasts. Seriously, they were prey. Why glorify something you killed for a living? Yang grinned at Ruby's appearance, proud of her younger sister's industry and enthusiasm.

"C'mon Ruby, I'm sure Nora is waiting for us" Yang commented, ushering her sister out the door. Ruby happily complied, and flew over to knock politely on Team JNPR's door. It was opened immediately by Nora, who was wearing a frilly pink princess dress that went from her shoulders to her toes. The two squeed at the cuteness of the other, and immediately pulled each other into a hug.

Yang smiled a little as she closed the door to Team RWBY's dorm, her eyes widening a little at the sight of Nora's guardian. Instead of a stoic Lie Ren, Pyrrha Nikos was standing just behind Nora, awkwardly waiting for the hug in front of her to stop.

"Ren back out at the last instant or something?" Yang asked, already preparing to tease him for his cowardice.

"Well..." Pyrrha said, grinning and rubbing the back of her head in embarrassment. "I kinda managed to break his ankle during close-combat practice, so he's staying behind with Jaune..."

"Indeed" Jaune confirmed, swapping Ren's current ice pack for a fresh one. "You guys have fun out there, k?"

"You got it, Vomit-Boy" Yang smirked, nimbly dodging the spent ice pack as it sailed past her head. Pyrrha hurriedly closed the door before the situation could escalate. The last thing she needed was both of the male members of JNPR in the infirmary. Ruby and Nora separated themselves, each clutching their empty candy sacks.

"Special Mission: Halloween Sweets Retrieval, BEGIN!" Ruby shouted dramatically, pulling down her mask and leading a heroic charge down the hallway. Both Yang and Pyrrha sprinted to catch up, glad that they had decided to wear comfortable street clothes as they raced after the two sugar-obsessed teenagers.

"KA-BOOM!" a vividly Scottish accent roared, taunting the fallen meat chunks of yet another foolish Spy.

"You know" Jaune said, groaning as his screen freeze-framed on the laughing form of a hulking black man with an eyepatch and massive grenade launcher. "The concept of you emulating Nora's fighting style is terrifying."

"Indeed" Ren smirked, already beginning to set up another sticky-bomb trap. "Wait, scrap the fight. The Headless Horseman is spawning." Jaune quickly changed his class to the Heavy before he respawned.

"This isn't gonna work, not with just the two of us..." he commented, unloading rounds from his minigun into the terrifying axe-wielding boss.

"All we have to do is camp the resupply room" Ren asserted, baiting the Horseman through his sticky trap and dealing a decent amount of damage. "And have an escape route in case he gets too close."

"Simple enough..." Jaune replied, already planning multiple paths for them to take should the need arise.

"Thank you!" Ruby chirped, flashing the shop owner a massive grin and pulling her mask back down. She and Nora descended the few steps from the shop and rejoined Yang and Pyrrha, who were now slightly out of breath from dashing around.

"How does that make, Rubes?" Yang asked, flashing her signature grin.

"That's twenty down, just over sixty to go!" Nora answered for the two of them, and Pyrrha sighed.

"Don't you think all that candy is just a little unhealthy?" she asked plaintively.

"Nope!" Ruby responded. "I need all the extra sugar to fuel my semblance, and Nora...is Nora."

"C'mon Pyrrha!" Yang said, throwing an arm around the Mistral Champion. "Doesn't this remind you of your own childhood? Wandering around after dark, wearing a costume, making adults coo over your cuteness?"

"Actually..." Pyrrha trailed off, whatever she was about to say forgotten. "Come out now, before I consider you my enemy." They were passing by an alleyway, which Pyrrha turned to face with a stoney expression. Four thuggish looking men stepped out, grinning innocently-diabolical grins.

"Whatever do you mean?" one asked, his voice rugged and uncouth. "We're just relaxing in an alleyway, having some Halloween fun."

"Yeah" another concurred. "Collecting candy and all that. You're never too old to go trick-or-treating."

"You're going too?!" Nora exploded in happiness. "Ohhh! What's your costume? Wait, let me guess...Generic mugger?"

"Close enough" the third man shrugged, grinning. "And you're one lovely princess there, miss."

"Thank you!" Nora beamed, flashing a truly enormous grin. Yang and Pyrrha were frowning, and even the socially inept Ruby was uneasy. These four men radiated with an unpleasant aura, though their intentions were somewhat unclear.

"You must like candy, eh?" the fourth asked, as if the idea had just occurred to him. Nora and Ruby nodded. "Well, we collected rather a lot already, right lads?" The others nodded, mumbling in general agreement.

"So, why don't we share?" he continued. The others nodded again, still smiling. Nora also nodded, and traipsed off after them into the alley.

"You armed?" Yang whispered to Pyrrha, quietly tightening the straps of Ember Cecelia under the sleeves of her sweatshirt as she held Ruby back even as Nora skipped obliviously ahead.

"No" Pyrrha responded, regretting not grabbing Nora when she had the chance. "But three of them are carrying knives, the fourth has a gun."

"Your semblance can tell you that?" Yang asked, surprised.

"I'm just counting the number and relative size of objects I can affect on their person" Pyrrha explained. "It's not all that impressive."

"Hey, that isn't candy!" Nora exclaimed.

"And that's our cue" Yang muttered, flaring her aura as she flew into the alleyway, Pyrrha right on her heels.

[Five minutes later]

Flashing red and blue lights filled the alleyway as the four thugs were cuffed and hauled away by the Vale police department. Yang stood with an embarrassed grin on her face, sheepishly explaining that she had shattered the pavement with a thug's body when he had tried to grope her sister. Pyrrha was calmly informing the paramedics of various internal injuries that they may have suffered, given the force and placement of her blows. Ruby and Nora were busy ignoring the whole situation, swapping candy and trying not to get their faces covered in chocolate residue.

Blake was sitting quietly in the library, notes and textbooks spread out in front of her. She had just finished a massive paper on Grimm biology for Professor Port, and her brain ached. Trying to cobble together all such important papers from his random and embellished stories and self-study of multiple texts had finally taken its toll on her, and she pushed herself back in her chair, exhausted. Had she been in a more ready state of mind, she would have noticed the tell-tale signs of a prank beginning. As it was, she merely began to pack up her supplies, oblivious to the light footfalls behind her.

"Blake..." A rasping voice called, low and and creepy. "Blake..." As she turned her head, all the lights in the library suddenly cut out. She was left staring at a figure clothed in a torn and ragged black robe, a hood pulled low over their skeletal face.

"Blake..." the voice repeated, reaching out with boney fingers encased in rusted steel gauntlets. "Atone for your sins..." Blazing red orbs stood out through the skull's eyes, and Blake panicked. She had always had a problem with spirits and spooks, and in her current state, the phantasm unlocked a whole illogical thought process, spiraling through the faces of everyone she had robbed, harmed, or killed while she was in the White Fang. Not realizing that the dead don't come back, she bolted for the door, her eyes wide with terror.

"Repent..." another voice called just before she reached it, and another black-robed figure stepped out of the shadows. Even as it reached out to grab her, Blake ducked to the side, trying to reach a different door.

"Burning...bleeding..." A third figure moaned, jumping down from on top of a bookcase. This figure's cloak began to smolder, dark liquid dripping from his limbs. "The pain..."

Blake, now nearly sobbing from fear and memories, sprinted past the figure and dove out the window, not bothering to check if it was open first. The glass shattered spectacularly, leaving shallow cuts on her face and arms. Gasping at the sudden pain and unable to think clearly, she crashed into the ground, her sloppy roll barely breaking her fall enough to keep her from being hurt.

"Blake..." the figures converged on the broken window, their skull-like faces illuminated by the burning cloak. She scrambled to her feet, running away inelegantly with tears streaming down her face.

"Well, that was a thing" Yang commented, after the group was finally let go after an hour or two.

"Not exactly what I had in mind for Halloween" Pyrrha added, stifling a yawn. "Everyone in favor of going back to Beacon?" There was a murmured chorus of 'yes,' and they all set out for the nearest airship dock.

"Hey, Pyrrha?" Yang asked after a few minutes, a sleeping Ruby held in her arms.

"Hmm?" Pyrrha responded, keeping a watchful eye on Nora as the bubbly bomber skipped ahead of them, her candy bag swinging to and fro.

"You never answered my question about when you were younger" Yang explained.

"Oh, that..." Pyrrha said, drawing out the sentence unnaturally. "Yeah... I never really went as a kid."

"You what?!" Yang exploded, unable to comprehend why a kid wouldn't go out on Halloween.

"I was already famous as a child prodigy and a public figure by age six" Pyrrha continued. "I had too many fans, so my parents deemed it irresponsible of them to let me out at night. Thus, I never really participated in Halloween beyond watching kids pass by as they came to the house."

"You mean you never went for candy?" Pyrrha shook her head. "Never played pranks?!" Pyrrha again shook her head, an apologetic smile on her face.

"We need to fix that" Yang declared, striding forward purposefully and dragging Pyrrha by the hand. "C'mon Nora! We're giving Pyrrha an unforgettable Halloween!"

Weiss almost had a heart attack when Blake suddenly pounded on the door, sobbing and begging to be let in. She hurriedly opened the door and Blake nearly knocked her over as she sprinted inside and slammed the door behind her. Leaning against it, her legs gave way as she buried her face in her hands and sobbed. To say that Weiss was surprised would be an understatement. She had never seen Blake display such a degree of emotion, had indeed thought that the faunus girl was incapable of anything beyond slight changes in expression or tone. Blake had always given off an aura of being coldly untouchable, of being impervious to harm. To see her in such a state was both baffling and unsettling.

"Hey" Weiss finally said, kneeling down next to her teammate. "Hey, you alright?" Blake shook her head, still keeping her face hidden.

"What happened?" Weiss asked, before kicking herself at how insensitive it sounded. Blake didn't respond, but she began shaking a little harder. Weiss was not the most experienced when it came to comforting others, but that didn't mean she wasn't going to try. Doing the first thing that came to mind, she shifted herself to be next to Blake and wrapped an arm around her shoulder.

"You're going to be alright" she asserted. "You're in our dorm, noth-" Weiss was cut off suddenly when Blake threw her arms around her, hugging her tightly as she buried her head in Weiss' shoulder.

Weiss managed to unfreeze herself a few seconds later, unused to such close contact. She tentatively wrapped her other arm around Blake, and kept it there when Blake pulled herself closer to her. Weiss simply held her teammate for awhile, slowly rubbing her back. Slowly, Blake managed to get her emotions somewhat under control, and her shaking and sobbing died down.

"Want to talk about it?" Weiss asked, not letting go of Blake.

"...ghosts..." Blake murmured, sounding equal parts fearful and ashamed as she kept her head in Weiss shoulder.

"Ghosts?" Weiss repeated, stunned.

"I have a problem with ghosts, okay?" Blake snapped, her emotions still close to the surface. "They bring back too many unpleasant memories..." She shuddered, still seeing the faces of those she'd hurt swimming in her vision.

"Alright..." Weiss began diplomatically, not wanting to offend the teammate most likely to hate her. "Everyone has a right to be afraid, but you do realize that the dead don't come back, right?" Blake stiffened, and for a moment Weiss thought she had said something wrong. Then Blake relaxed, slumping against Weiss.

"I know..." she said, her voice weary. "I know, but knowing doesn't change the past, stop the nightmares..."

"What nightmares?" Weiss asked.

"Tell me, Weiss" Blake said, raising her head slightly and locking her amber eyes with Weiss' sapphire ones. "Have you ever hurt someone? Intimidated them? Threatened to burn down their home or kill their family? Have you ever actually pointed your sword at someone with the intent of ending their life?" Weiss shook her head, unable to speak.

"I have" Blake continued, not wanting to continue but unable to stem the words that finally came rushing out of her mouth. "I've seen countless faces in the moments before the White Fang took everything from them. Arrogant faces, vengeful faces, pleading faces, innocent faces. But they all shared one characteristic: fear. In the final moments before their lives were ruined or taken they all expressed a deep, scarring fear. It's an expression that only a monster could love, an expression that haunts me every time I close my eyes. Because that's what I was, Weiss. A monster. A monster that saw hunting humans as the only way out of her oppression. Even though I haven't supported the Fang in years, I fear that some part of me wants to rejoin them. I want them taken down because of the threat that they pose to society, but also because of the threat that they pose to me. What would happen if I went back to the way I was, Weiss? How would I act? What would I do? What would happen to team RWBY?" Tears had again formed in Blake's eyes, her voice had broken down long ago.

Not for the first time that night, Weiss was stunned. She had known and accepted that Blake had once been part of the White Fang, had decided that she didn't care. What she hadn't known was the true depths of Blake's trauma from being in the group, of her self-doubt and lingering fears. She hadn't known of Blake's nightmares and inner turmoil, the stoic girl was simply far too skilled in hiding her true self. For her to be confessing like this, to Weiss "Ice Queen" Schnee of all people, she must have finally hit a considerable breaking point.

She looks so lost... Weiss realized, staring into Blake's tear-filled amber eyes. Even within Team RWBY, she's always been apart, alone. All she wants is acceptance, but it isn't from us that she needs it. She needs it from herself...

Weiss was not an empathetic person by nature. However, her sudden glimpse into Blake's private life had completely rewritten her perspective of the faunus girl. What she had seen before as shyness and reservedness she now recognized as depression and self-hate. What had once been the immovable pillar of Blake's stoicism was now revealed to be a thin veil, a front designed to keep unwanted outsiders away. Weiss knew that if Blake was allowed to stay her course, she could very well be led down a horrible path of self-destruction. She should know, she had briefly flirted with the idea when she was younger and less mature, seeking some closure to her family problems. Her saving grace had been her younger sister, Winter. Perhaps all Blake needed was someone to care for her, even as she cared for them?

"Shh..." Weiss muttered, pulling Blake into a closer embrace. "It'll be alright, Blake..."

"But..." Blake protested, a little surprised at the sudden warmth emanating from Weiss.

"It'll be fine" Weiss insisted, squeezing Blake slightly to shut her up. "Whatever happened in your past, Blake, is in the past. You forsook that life, right?" Blake nodded slightly.

"Then that's that" Weiss stated. "The monster you see yourself as is dead and buried, it has been ever since you left the Fang. And it's about damn time that you see that for yourself."

It was Blake's turn to be stunned. The whole situation was just too unreal for her to process all at once. In an emotional outburst, she had thrown herself at Weiss Schnee, heiress to Schnee Dust and daughter to the greatest racist of the age. But, instead of hurling her away, Weiss had embraced her with open arms. Not only that, but she was willing to forgive everything that Blake had done in the past, had apparently already forgiven her. She had been walking on eggshells around Weiss, hoping against hope to not offend her, even after Weiss had told her that she didn't care about Blake's criminal past. Blake felt a small warmth beginning to glow within her, something she hadn't felt since her former partner Adam Taurus had embraced the sadism and extremism of the new White Fang. She wasn't sure if she wanted to encourage that warmth, open up to someone else when they could so easily tear her apart. Yet she had already shared her deepest fear with the heiress, so no matter what she decided, her fate was in Weiss' hands.

"You can't hate yourself forever, Blake" Weiss said, her voice mirroring Winter's sisterly concern and love when she had said the same thing to the heiress. That was the last straw for Blake. All the pent-up self-hate and doubt within her came rushing out, and she hugged Weiss tighter than ever, struggling not to cry.

"It'll be alright" Weiss said, stroking Blake's onyx tresses with one hand as she reciprocated Blake's hug. "Everything will be alright..."

"Are you sure this is alright?" Pyrrha asked, looking uncertainly at the small horde of hastily-forged metal bats in front of her.

"Of course!" Yang declared, patting Pyrrha on the shoulder. "All you have to do is lay there and look dead. When some poor shmuck comes along, I'll play the spooky music, you cause the bats to fly with your semblance, and stare at them while sitting up."

"It still sounds like a bad idea..." Pyrrha muttered, glancing at herself in a mirror.

Yang had raided her makeup supply, apologizing to Ren and Jaune as she interrupted their game. Now she looked like an undead version of herself, with extremely pale skin, her hair messy, and a trickle of fake blood running down her chin. She was dressed in black fabric that Yang and Ruby had haphazardly sewn into a torn and sinister black dress. The whole idea was to make herself look like a vampire, hence all the bats. Still, Pyrrha was new and unused to the whole idea of pranks, and wasn't quite sold on the whole idea. She wasn't given a choice however, when Yang threw her bodily to the floor and hid in a nearby classroom. All that was left was to play the waiting game...

"Did you see her face?" a male voice asked, sounding a little high-pitched and arrogant.

"Yeah!" another replied, happily cruel. "She was beyond terrified!"

"That'll teach her to put our leader in the hospital" a third chimed in, seeming to be more interested in going with the flow than actually interested in vengeance. Pyrrha's mind turned these voices over a few times and realized that they belonged to the remainder of Team CRDL.

"All we have to do now is prank Weiss" the first voice continued, confirming her suspicion. "And our revenge will be complete." Footsteps turned the corner, and Pyrrha smirked into the ground, now determined to put on quite the show. Yang cued the music, which was rather eerie, and Ruby cut the lights. Though this was an unexpected addition, Pyrrha knew that it would add to the creepy ambience.

"Oi..." one of the boys muttered, stumbling. "Who...?"

"Hello...boys..." Pyrrha rasped, using her semblance to carefully repel the pins still in the back of her dress, giving her the appearance of being pulled up by puppet strings. She rolled her head to the side, gazing at the boys with the creepiest smile she could muster. With her eyes glowing a vibrant green, her teeth showing in an unnatural grin, and her messy red hair cascading down across her shoulders and back like a stream of fire, the effect was rather impressive.

"What the..." one of the boys, Bronzewig, if Pyrrha remembered his name correctly, started to squint, as if he almost recognized her.

"Beautiful night" Pyrrha continued, her rasp now slightly playful. "To die, that is." With a flick of her wrist, she sent the metallic bats flying in a spiral around her. The boys stumbled back in shock, then in pain as the bats closed in on them.

"Screw this!" one of them exclaimed, ditching his comrades as he ran in the opposite direction. He was followed soon after by the two others, who were swearing profusely as they vainly attempted to beat back the bats. Pyrrha maintained her demonic appearance until she was certain that they were out of earshot, then burst out giggling. She'd have to ask Yang to include her in future Halloween pranks.

"You know what, Ren?" Jaune asked, lounging on his bed as the two hunters continued to play their game.

"What, Jaune?" Ren replied, his face a blank mask as he escorted the bomb for the final few meters, ending the match with a resounding explosion and the announcer screaming 'You Win!'

"This is just a hunch..." Jaune continued, swapping his class to the Pyro before the next match began. "And as fun as videogames are and all, I'm pretty sure we just missed out on a pretty significant evening."

Author's Note:

Hey guys! Another oneshot this weekend! I know it's a little early for halloween proper, but it's never too early to get in the mood! Anyway, this is a community-driven story, so if you like what you read, drop me a PM or Review with an idea or story you'd like to see and I'll type it up for you. As always, have a great week guys:)