Date written:

(I) Mar. 14, 2016 – Mar. 29, 2016 (15 days) (2,413 words)

(II) Mar. 30, 2016 – Apr. 23, 2016 (24 days) (2,777 words)

(III) May 4, 2016 – June 22, 2016 (49 days) (2,463 words)

Chapter Word Count: 7,653 words

Posted on FanFiction: June 30, 2016

A/N: If anybody asks, I got a new job and it took a while for me to finish this chapter.

/ — — CHAPTER 4 — — \

Flashback

I

Time marched ever forward, Yang realized, when the tree leaves started turning red and then falling, when the air got colder and colder as the weeks passed. The autumn season had come full force in the blink of an eye. Just yesterday, while doing the grocery shopping with Tai, she spotted a row of posters announcing the date of the 34th Vytal Festival, which would be held this time in Mistral. It was a month away, and remembering how big and momentous of an event the 34th had been—this was more of an impression than outright recollection, because the most vivid festival she remembered was the 36th iteration, when it was Vale's turn again to host it, and she could exactly recall the old man's special ramen stand, 6-year-old Ruby excitedly running around the parade grounds with her classmates, and the tensest finale of the tournament when the representative of Vale, Terra Clayton, won while her Aura level was one percent away from defeat (the red zone)—she had the desire to go to Mistral and personally enjoy the festivities. It was a desire that would remain unfulfilled, she knew quite well, but there was no crime in dreaming.

For today, however, dreamland would have to be on hold as reality ensues into her little world.

"It feels odd, you know," she said to Qrow as they both waved goodbye to her younger self, who was marching to another day in kindergarten.

"What is?" her uncle asked, hands in his pockets and obviously refraining from pulling out his ever-present flask and taking a swig in full view of every impressionable child enrolled in this school.

"Seeing myself to kindergarten."

"Ah."

"I've done this for the past month, and it never seems to… you know, stop being weird."

"And it bothers you?"

She pursed her lips. "No, not really. It's like with my right hand. I can still feel it there, as if I'm being haunted by its ghost, and it's weird, but at the same time, it's not at all bad. Does that make sense?"

"I guess," he said, though she knew that was a lie. Qrow had trouble with sympathy, more so when it pertained to grievances he had no prior experience with, but at least he wasn't being blunt like his usual self. A white lie was still a lie, but right now, Yang felt that it was better this way.

Once Young Yang had entered the main school building, the two made their way back home. However, instead of using the usual route, which would take them about fifteen minutes to get there, they took a different path that led them deeper into the forest and drop another four hours into their travel time. This was the morning after Qrow returned from another long term mission, and this was their chance to not only catch up on what was going on with each other but Yang now had an escort for something her Dad was too busy and uninformed to do with her.

"Speaking of your arm," Qrow said, as they crossed the street and walked along one of the campus walls of Signal Academy, "Tai told me about your little episode last month."

She grunted. "What'd he say?"

"He hadn't been specific about it, so I'm hoping you could shed some light into it." He finally pulled out his flask and drank a generous amount of booze. He did so while they were passing by Signal's entrance gate, with many of its students still on their way to morning classes. Some stared, some tried to ignore him, some might even be too young or innocent and think that his flask was filled with just water or juice.

Set an example to little kids, but throw it all out the window on teens who haven't yet reached the legal drinking age.

Shaking her head but smiling, Yang said, "I was off jogging one early morning and midway through, the phantom pain hit me hard. Thought it was a good idea to reinforce myself with Aura, so I did, and that's when my arm appeared. It wasn't all there, though; it flickered like a broken hologram. It shined like gold and it looked so real, I thought I could actually touch it."

While explaining all of this, she did her best to ignore the stares she got. Specifically, at the arm that wasn't there. She knew, in the rational part of her brain, that these kids meant no malice in their staring, because it was just rare to see someone like her, someone physically unsymmetrical and broken. She did her best to keep moving forward, maintaining strength at a time she might need it now more than ever, and as the wave of incoming students dwindled and the two crossed another block towards the outskirts of Patch's main town, she released the heavy breath she'd been holding awhile.

"You okay?" Qrow asked.

Yang nodded, her smile coming out crooked no matter how much she tried to avoid it. "Kinda. I'm all for being the center of attention, but… not like this, ya know."

"Yeah." He pursed his lips, pondering over something, and then offered his flask to her. "Need a drink?"

She looked at the flask, then at her uncle with her one eyebrow raised and smile gone.

He retreated immediately. "Not the time?" He looked at his flask, shrugged, closed it, then pocketed it. "Guess not."

"Not everything can be solved with drinking, Qrow."

He opened his mouth, then instantly slammed it shut. His face contorted, his thoughts more than likely heavy, but he said nothing in return.

Their path to the forest was paved in asphalt, a small road splitting the forest and leading to the next town over, but when they reached the deep rising curve that wanted to avoid the denser parts of the forest, they stepped out of the road and onto a dirt path leading deep into that denser part. Large trees, bathed in bright orange, reached out and covered the sky, but only with some success. In spring and summer, they would've done a wonderful job of simulating night in the early afternoon, but with the coming of winter and their inability to imitate their evergreen brethren, light found a way to shine in the area. In front of Yang, mini-spotlights scattered about in and out of the dirt road, and dried leaves crunched underfoot as she walked along. Her ears picked up nothing but the crispy sounds of their footsteps and the faint noises of wildlife mingling out of sight. Despite that, her and Qrow's senses were up, exercising caution all the same, because there was no telling when a Grimm would rear its ugly head as they delved deeper into the forest. Qrow even tapped his legs twice at her, a signal for synchronization. It was a small team exercise his old team started (courtesy of Summer) and passed down to her and Ruby—minimizing the frequency of noise by matching their footsteps with each other. He once told her a story about this exercise helping with detecting an Alpha Beowolf stalking them during their sophomore year, but he never went into the details all that much. She thought this exercise was useless outside of a team exercise, but regardless she decided to humor her uncle.

"About that shining arm of yours," Qrow said, not trying to be condescending but his words make it sound like he was. Yang bit back her anger. "You're sure it was real?"

She took a deep breath, nodded. "Sure as I'll ever be. Unfortunately I hadn't been able to replicate it afterwards. I know it has something to do with my Aura, but nothing works. I even tried when I have those phantom pain episodes, still nothing."

"You must be missing something, then."

She rolled her eyes. "Gee, I could've told you that weeks ago, Qrow."

"Meh."

In the small instances of silence between their synchronized footsteps, her ears picked up a twig snapping somewhere to her left. It was faint, far, and that sound alone wasn't a telltale sign of Grimm, but she readied Ember Celica anyway.

"Don't get all twitchy here," Qrow said, but one hand rested on the hilt of his sword-scythe.

"I won't. Just preparing for something."

"If you say so."

They went quiet, then, and kept on walking, listening, drowning out the rhythmic beat of crunching dried leaves that now seemed to mimic the crunching of broken glass. Yang counted forty footsteps of nothing happening, no other out-of-place sound shaking her eardrums.

"By the way," she said, her voice lower than before, "where did your last mission take you this time?"

"Atlas. Had a nice little chat with Jimmy—ah, that's James Ironwood, the General of the Tin Man Brigade."

She couldn't help snorting. "Seriously? You call General Ironwood's forces the Tin Man Brigade?"

"Hey, if the shoes fits…"

Yang shook her head, but she was sure mirth was written all over her face.

Qrow continued, "I also have a not so nice chat with the Schnee brat."

Her left hand clenched before she realized it. "Weiss?"

"Worse, her older sister, Winter."

"Oh, right. Weiss did tell us about an older sister who's in the Atlesian military."

Qrow sighed, his free hand scratching his head. "Great, a future subordinate of Jimmy Tintin. First time a kid left a bruise on my shin. That brat can sure kick hard."

She snorted again. "You probably deserved it."

"Funny. She said the same thing."

"Even the 'probably'?"

He nodded.

"I sure wish I could meet her in person. And what about Weiss?"

"Hadn't talked to her. That chat with Winter was coincidence, really. But if you're referring to your teammate, then no, my contacts had not seen or heard a trace of her. The same with Ruby and Blake."

"So they're not in Atlas, then."

"Yeah. Sorry I can't dig up anything more worthwhile."

She shook her head at him. "You're doing your best, Qrow. That's what matters."

He grunted. Going to another topic, he asked her, "Still not getting a prosthetic?"

Yang sighed, looking at her stump. "Well, we've tried, but even now, putting one on hurts like a bitch. Like immortal bees stinging me over and over."

"Is that normal?"

"Doctor Tushar said something about arm amputees having a longer time to adjust with prosthetics than leg amputees, but he hasn't been able to explain the pain."

"So it's not normal, then. Damn."

"It's bad, but not astronomically bad, you know. Dad's giving me the rundown on kick-based martial arts again."

"How does that help you, really?"

"Come on, Qrow, think positive! Otherwise I'll catch your negativity and go full-blown emo or something."

"You say that like it's a bad thing."

"For me, it is." She brushed her hand on her golden locks. "I heard emo kids tend to dye their hair black."

"If you say so. But still, kick-based martial arts?"

She sighed, conceding. "I've been kind of neglecting that part of my training for some years. Figured it's time to expand my repertoire, so to speak."

"With your shotgun gauntlets, I figured that was the case, too. You going to switch to shotgun greaves?"

She pursed her lips. "I… don't know. At the moment I'm just training to be as strong as I had been, but there's still some balancing issues, training my left hand to be dominant, corkscrewing during sit-ups, stuff like that."

"Don't forget your kicking exercises."

"Of course," she said, while rolling her eyes, "how can I forget that. One of these days, I'm gonna be the girl who puts the 'kick' in asskicking. Just you see."

"Uh-huh, good luck with that, Sunshine." Qrow hummed for a while, staring at the forest canopy. "You know," he said, pausing, licking his lips, breathing in, "I think I know a guy who's an expert in kick-based martial arts. Even uses shotgun greaves the last time we—well, had a friendly spar."

"Oh? Define friendly."

He sighed. "We were drunk, okay?"

"When are you not drunk, uncle?"

"Do you wanna hear about the guy or not?"

"You aren't presenting him in the most desirable light, though."

He sighed again. "Just hear me out. Anyway, this guy owes me a few favors. Hopefully it's enough to cash in for some lessons with him."

"I don't deal well with teachers who're strangers, Qrow."

"Don't worry, I'll be there with you. He might be a drinking buddy, but that don't mean I trust the guy."

"Okay."

After another ten minutes of walking—and nothing dangerous happening, a part of Yang's mind lamented—they arrived at a crossroad, where it all began. Looking to their right flank, the abandoned house loomed above them. She saw the broken porch railing, recalled the danger-seeking Beowolf thought it better to go through the wood than vault over it. The phantom pains returned and she did her best to suppress the wince.

Qrow walked forward towards the intersecting path and took the hairpin turn right that led to the house, only for a few steps before stopping and… just staring at the place. Yang followed his lead, but stayed right at the middle of the crossroads, deciding to stay quiet and let her uncle have his moment. This was the house she saw in one of the hidden pictures (and probably the only picture) of the Branwen siblings together and happy. They had been younger, all smiles and zero cynicism, comfortable to be close to each other, like true siblings were. This place held a lot of memories for Qrow.

And it's the main reason why he never went back here without a valid reason, she thought and realized. One was to save me and Ruby. The other is to help me solve the mystery of my being here.

She clenched her hand, feeling like she had to say something—anything, really—but her mouth stayed shut. Qrow took one big sigh, murmuring something, and turned around, looking at the road behind her with those dull crimson eyes conveying a sense of conviction that he was done with the memories and didn't wish to revisit them anytime soon. She lost her opportunity to speak out, and huge part of her was okay with that. Her hand clenched harder.

"Well," Qrow said, walking down the slope and back to the intersection, hands in his pockets, "we're back to the scene of the crime. Shall we start?"

II

Yang nodded, though she couldn't be sure where to start. Still, she tried and fixated on the spot she stood on.

"Okay," she said, stomping on the ground, sounding off a cacophony of crunching dried leaves. "This is where little Yang and Ruby were when I saw them."

Qrow hummed in response and walked farther away from the house, onto the crossroad, and kept on going. About five paces away from it, he stopped, grabbed his sword, and swiped it on the ground to his left like a tennis racket. An instant gust blew away the dead leaves, and amongst the yellow- and red-colored ground now lay a small spot of dark green and brown.

He said, "And this is where I found them when I got here."

It took a bit of time for her to understand what he meant, but once she did—

Start of fall

Power

Fear

Desperation

Shoot

Explosion

Fall

PAIN

—her hand clenched and her eyes looked away. The two sisters survived, of course, but they came away lucky. If Yang's aim hadn't gone in that trajectory, they either would've been in a Beowolf's stomach or in the morgue. Or maybe even be crippled as her. Maybe one limb, maybe both, maybe all.

She shivered, then started walking.

Yang wanted to go inside the house and look around it, but knowing that Qrow would disapprove, after that silent reminisce of simpler times earlier, she refrained from doing so and instead walked along the path to where she had come from. Just ten steps away—twice the distance Qrow covered—there was another crossroads, one straight, the other veering a little to the left and descending. Yang hadn't seen this other path at the time, too focused yet tired as she had been, but the distant memory of her own childhood journey to the abandoned house was slowly coming back to her.

Yes, she did remember climbing a small slope before coming to the crossroads that split towards a shortcut to town and the house in the picture. Clarity of memory came back like a swipe of a hand on a steamed mirror. That meant—

Yang pointed to the path going straight and forward. "I came from that way." Her pointing arm panned to the other path. "And this is where I came from, back when I was in little Yang's shoes."

"I get the feeling that's going to get a little confusing," Qrow said, heading to her right side, his sword still out and resting on his shoulder. He gestured to the straight path with his chin. "So… we goin' that way?"

"Beats staying here," she replied, and her mind flashed a few thoughts—beats looking at tombs, beats looking at a place where you could've failed, beats having to look at the place where you got mauled.

Her uncle's eyebrows knitted together, eyes on the ground, sighing, but he grunted a response. "I hear ya."

"Do you know where this road leads to?"

"Needle Point, about five or six miles away."

Yang knew of the place—a small village with a population of three nuclear Huntsman families—but never went there. Her lips pursed.

"Six miles doesn't sound right," she said.

"What do you mean?"

She shook her head. "I, I don't know if it was the exhaustion, but I'm pretty sure I walked at least twice that distance before getting here. I hadn't encountered any village at all."

"Could be the exhaustion," he said, shrugging, "could be not, but that's why we're here, right? To figure it out?"

She sighed through her nose, looking between her uncle and the path. "Yeah. Let's get going."

They started walking without another word.

A twig snapped behind them, but neither heard it.

"Hey, you ever thought about going back to school?" Qrow asked, about a minute after silence occurred between them.

She arched an eyebrow. "What, Beacon? With how I am right now?" She shook her head, frowning. "I'll be lucky if I didn't get disqualified before the initiation. But that's not stopping me."

"The next academic year is less than six months away, though. That's a pretty tight time frame."

She knew it was, but like she said, that wasn't stopping her. If anything, it motivated her to do better. "Think I can't do it?"

"With you being this determined, I'd be stupid to think so."

A sigh passed through her lips, and she looked up towards the forest canopy, the gaps in its cover looking like holes on a shack's roof. The frown returned—this one more out of confusion than annoyance—and she blinked a few times. Something looked wrong, but she couldn't really pinpoint the what of it.

Must be nothing, she thought and returned her gaze to the front, the path looking like it was never-ending, like a perspective painting where the whole picture seemed to look like it was being sucked into the center. Needle Point seemed farther than six miles right now.

"What I'd do for a bionic arm," she said. "That'll definitely even the odds for me."

"Is that another future tech invention, like selfie cameras?"

She rolled her eyes. Leave it to the grumpy uncle to complain about what he thinks to be 'useless gimmicky things.' "It's an Atlesian invention. Real high-tech stuff for amputees. Like, you lost a limb, then you recovered that limb, except it's now all made of nuts and bolts."

"But why call it a bionic arm if it's a prosthetic?"

"Advanced prosthetic, uncle. I heard Atlas dumped a shit-ton of money to fund their robotics project for years and this is just one of the things they refined to almost perfection. I mean, if I had one"—she wiggled her fingers, made a peace sign, a gun sign, a fig sign, a rockstar sign—"I could do this with it. Pretty handy for crippled Huntsman, you know."

A look of dawning came to his features. "So that's what they've been cooking up back there. I've seen Jimmy with that bionic arm thing, actually."

"Really? Odd. I was sure it hadn't been invented until, like, five years from now."

"Military property, I'd wager. Like you said, those Atlesians pour insane amounts of funding on several Tin Man projects. Hell, I even heard rumors of a scientist trying to convince the council that he can build a robot that would look, sound, and feel human." He arched an eyebrow at her.

Getting the meaning, she shook her head. "No robots looking like humans where I'm from." The latest robot model Atlas was shipping still looked more metal than a rock band and was as expressive as an actual rock. Well, at least their AI programming wasn't rocky (badum tss, hehe).

"I guess it didn't fall through," Qrow said. "Speaking of future stuff, you wouldn't happen to remember lottery numbers, would you?"

She sighed, rolled her eyes. "Funny how you and Dad think alike sometimes."

"No shit. Tai actually asked you that?"

"In jest," Yang retorted, emphasizing her words while cocking one eyebrow and lopsidedly smiling. "I'm not so sure about you, though."

"Hey, whatever pays the bills."

"Right," she drawled. "And no. Seriously, why would I bother with remembering lottery numbers? That'd mean I actually expected to return to the past or something."

"Yeah, yeah, I hear—"

He stopped abruptly. Not knowing the cause, Yang stopped as well and asked him what was wrong.

His eyes darted about, blinking profusely, and she half-remembered a similar face he made after she kicked him awake when he was sleeping on the foyer, smelling like he'd been swimming in a pool of alcohol. He had even the audacity to leave the front door wide open, letting the cold of winter creep in and around the foyer like air desperate to occupy a vacuum. In the here and now, his relaxed stance disappeared. His gaze, once out of focus, was now in the midst of searching for a threat. He shrugged his sword off his shoulder and revved up the gears. He looked at her right in the eyes, crimson to lilac, and then a grimace formed.

"Ready yourself, kiddo," he said. "I don't remember there being a mist here."

Her eyes widened. Her phantom arm started itching.

Ice cold air flowed around her, and the memory of that cold foyer with the opened door flashed by her again, more vivid than the last. The appearance of the mist came without warning, instantly switching clarity with obscurity, and bearable cold with glacial temperatures that'd leave a normal person freezing up on the spot in seconds. There was no interval in the mist's appearance, no gradual formation of gray enveloping the red; it was all instant, all in the literal blink of an eye—before blink, everything was red and clear; after blink, everything was gray and cold and murky, like watching a show with poor transitioning.

This ain't no Gilligan Cut.

Confusion was at the forefront of her thoughts. It was a natural reaction, but as a Huntress-in-training, that moment of confusion could be the difference between dying and staying alive, so another blink was all she warranted her confusion before instincts took over and had her taking a defensive stance. Instincts, however, lacked some thought, because missing one arm for a stance meant for two was akin to prepping up a gun while out of bullets.

She adjusted her stance, more closed off, and she felt like a hot-blooded cartoon character just seconds away from swinging her arm to the front, palm out, and declaring something outrageous with a loud voice. Her fist clenched. The joints popped.

"Stick close," Qrow said, slowly sliding till his shoulder bumped with hers, their gazes on opposite sides of the dirt road.

"Any idea what this is?"

"Nope. Can't see shit past three feet from myself. This mist is unnaturally thick."

Other than having her vision limited by this mist, her right arm started stinging again, a slow buildup of tiny little pinpricks akin to the feeling of having a tourniquet removed.

Except the pain and the pinpricks are all in your head, because there's nothing there, nothing but phantoms, she thought, doing her best to ignore the nuisance. Whoever said ghosts can't hurt you is full of utter shit.

"Could it be Grimm?" she asked, but somehow she already knew the answer to that.

"Nope," Qrow said, voicing her thought. "I don't think this is their handiwork. But—"

A chill slithering up her spine. Senses sharpening as the signs of danger closed in.

Qrow jumped high, while she stayed on the ground, grinning, Ember Celica loaded with Dust rounds and hungry for a beatdown. Three Beowolves, their growls muffled by the thick mist, came into view. All were pouncing for a swift kill, so all weren't expecting an immediate counterattack. Qrow used the blunt of his sword to deliver a downward slash on the highest Grimm, sending it down and dropping on top of its brethren. Both hit the ground with a loud thud and an intense scattering of dried leaves. Like a ball, the force of the blow bounced them back up high enough to reach Yang's chest level, dazed, stuck together, and very, very vulnerable. She took the opportunity. She dashed straight to them, her arm cocked back, and let strength, power, and Dust rounds do the rest, sending the Grimm duo towards the third Beowolf, which was still in mid-air and had pounced a second after the first two, and all three disappeared into the mist. The only result of their exit was the satisfying crack of a falling tree.

"They sure know how to take advantage of it," Qrow continued, landing next to Yang and revving his sword again.

She snorted, pumped a new round into her gauntlet, and returned to their back-to-back positions. "Yeah, but they picked the wrong people to attack."

He eyed her through the corner of his eye. "Sure you're up for this?"

"Does it look like we have a choice?"

He grunted. "Point. Sunshine, two at your nine o'clock!"

She turned to that direction, expecting a pair of silhouettes shooting through the gray. They came in full speed at her, red eyes glowing, with one going high, the other low. "Going high!" she said to Qrow before dashing towards them, unmindful of her uncle's fading warning. She leaped high and dropkicked the top Beowolf and then fired a Dust round at the bottom Beowolf's head, point blank. The momentum carried her higher, cold air whipping around her face, her hair, and looking up at the peak of her ascension, she saw the coming-noon sky, grayed out and murky despite how thin the mist's presence was here, an almost-escape that felt like reaching the other end of a dark tunnel. She blinked, instinctively pumping another round into her gauntlet, and gravity started pulling her back down, into the mist, into the dark tunnel once more. At her descent, another Beowolf pounced from her right flank. The attack was too sudden and out of her reach, so she opted for dodging it, swerving her body mid-air to escape the sharp claws, her hand grabbing her long hair in a protective hold next to her chest.

She landed feet first, going down on one knee and pushing out a lungful of breath. She scanned her surroundings—not much help, what with the mist and all—and realized she was alone.

"Qrow!" she shouted, the judgment between sticking together and not draw attention to yourself going in full favor with the former. Rationality would argue that making noise would draw Grimm almost as effectively as the negative emotions cradled in her heart, and with how unfit she was at the moment for a group battle, she had to play it safe. On the other hand, getting separated from Qrow—the only one who could handle multiple engagements in these conditions—was a bad omen. Vulnerable and alone, a stroke of fear had helped with her judgment. "Qrow, where are you?!"

A growl from her flank. She swerved, left leg rising, heel impacting with the jaw of an Alpha Beowolf, which took the blow like the foam bullet of a nerf gun. Its golden eyes honed in on her widening lilacs, and her heartbeat sprang up. There was no room or time to dodge; the Grimm's claws were already upon her. She flared up her Aura, instincts and muscle memory already preparing for a fall recovery, but the sudden release included dire consequences. Her right arm delivered an onslaught of pain, as if it were being chewed off again.

Yang screamed, if only for half of a second before the Grimm's attack sent her flying off the path and towards the trees. Her shoulder hit one trunk, and she still kept flying, bark exploding. Her right shin hit another, kept flying. Her back hit a wider tree, and there she stopped and dropped to the ground, head hitting a root. She only had time to think, What happened to my—, before the Alpha tore its way through the woods and towards its now defenseless prey. Yang sat up, both knees kissing her chest, and dodged to her left just as the Alpha went for a pounce. Bark and dirt flew about like water droplets after a splat. She rolled to her feet, her teeth gritting as her insides continued to send pain as if they were on fire. It hurt to move, it hurt to think, but she was no stranger to pain.

No stranger at all.

The Alpha was regaining its bearings after slamming headfirst into a tree, but that gave her four or five seconds at best to catch her breath and take stock of her odds. It did not at all look good for her, now more than ever, what with her Aura going haywire again. Like that one time when her right arm returned…

The Alpha Grimm's eyes found her in an instant, the rage within left her feeling a chill crawl up her spine, and she no longer had time to venture through that thought. The essentials were there, though. Ideas, fragmented like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, were connecting together to form a newer, more concrete idea. She could do it; it was now or never. She could do it. It was enough. Maybe. But… but, but, but, but—

Was it safe? No time to think that.

Would it work? No time.

What if it didn't work? No time.

Could she survive? No time.

What about Qrow? No time.

Would her right arm come back?

…

The Alpha dashed towards her, and she flared up her Aura once more.

III

A wide range of colors burst into sight, random and without form, like the psychedelic circle in your vision after staring at the sun for too long. It came in a blink, and what followed it was insurmountable pain. It worked its way from her stump towards her shoulder, towards her neck, towards her cheeks, towards her eyes. The roar of the approaching Beowolf was still there, loud and unwavering, and though in her state a part of her understood that she shouldn't be moving because of the pain, she thrusted her right arm forward, hand clenched into a fist, empowered with every bit of kinetic force her protective Aura had accumulated.

She felt something touch her knuckles (her right knuckles!). It was hard as rock, but it cracked like an eggshell. Amidst the rushings of the wind, the crackle of the earth, the mass swaying and crunching of dead leaves, and the dwindling roar of a would-be predator, that cracking—sounding so much like fragile eggshells—was the most prominent sound that came to her ears.

She blinked once—as ineffective as that was, what with her eyes still seeming to be looking inside a murky kaleidoscope—and through the pain, she managed a bloodthirsty grin. And then something hit her in the left shoulder. She was off the ground again, oncoming trees providing a second round of indirect abuse to her head and torso. Compared to her currently sizzling nerves, her pinball imitation against the trees felt like lovetaps. The colors in her vision did not go away; her vision was shot and she could not control her eventual descent.

Soft dirt, covered in dried leaves, became her cushion. A rough cushion, perhaps, as she continued skidding and tumbling upon it like a runaway basketball. Her momentum ended eventually, stopping with her belly kissing the ground and a plethora of aches all over her body sauntered to the forefront like scavengers after the departure of the big hunter.

Yang blinked a couple of times, at first unsure of where she was or what was going on, just that she was in pain and really, really tired.

It hurt to move, now more than ever before, but Yang did her best to get her feet under her. She tried to push her torso up with her right arm, belatedly realizing about the stump. She crashed to the ground, any and all progress made crashing with her.

You'd think losing it a month ago would hammer in that fact by now.

But then what the hell did she feel earlier? Did she just imagine her arm returning as a shining light of badassery because she was so desperate for it?

She gritted her teeth and started again. Eyesight began to return to her in intervals—blurring colors of red and brown that looked like her fingerpainting masterpiece she made at two years old, then it began to soften and clarify almost as if she were looking into a camera finding focus. She ignored the pain and ignored the tears trickling down her dirty cheeks. She leveraged her torso up with her left arm this time, succeeding as far as sitting between her calves. The breath came out of her shakily. She sat in the middle of a small clearing about the size of her room, lower in level, with tree roots jutting out around her like prison bars bent outwards.

She looked left, right, finding nothing but mossy roots, dirt, leaves, and the cold mist as company. She raised her right arm up, glaring coldly at the missing half whose phantom continued to haunt her. Pain still pulsed through it, taunting her and her blind faith.

Dammit all. Fuck, fuck, FUCK!

Left hand on the ground between her knees, she pushed herself up, teeth grinding in her closed mouth, her breath coming in and out of her nose very audibly. It took just two blinks for her to realize that mud, twigs, and leaves had clung to her precious hair, and she no longer bothered to keep her mouth closed as she ground her teeth harder, no longer even cared that her exhalation morphed into a very dangerous-sounding growl.

Her rise was short-lived, too tired out already. Her bum hit dirt again, and the growl came out of her mouth more shaken than before. She bowed her head down, clenched her fist, and punched the ground. Her Aura did not protect her knuckles. She tried standing one more time, lifting her right knee till the sole of her boot touched soft soil.

It almost seemed useless to keep resisting, though. Who was she kidding, anyway? Despite having only one arm, she believed herself to be capable of handling herself against a threat, uncaring of the many disadvantages—obvious and subtle—the amputation had left her in. She still had her left fist; she could still deliver a mean left hook if she wanted. She was unstoppable—no, she had been unstoppable. That word was reserved only to the Yang who was whole, to the Yang who could do anything and everything. And to make matters worse, something was going on with her Aura, unable to help her in this crisis. Crippled times two or something like it. Pain was constant, and there was a building ache at the back of her head as if someone were slowly drilling a hole to her brain there.

She felt, more than heard, the approach of the predator in the woods, its pack following closely behind. Their overbearing presence was akin to a—as begrudging as Yang felt about the comparison despite the pun—sheep sensing the hungry gaze of the stalking wolf. That said something about their power over her now—and her growing fear, no matter how much she'd want to deny it—when the cacophony of heavy footsteps crunched the dried and stiff leaves underfoot was as loud as popping fireworks. In the small clearing she had been unceremoniously thrown into, the Beowolves formed a circle around her, all of them growling and scowling, and her mind had remaining energy to wonder if they were either mad because she had done in a few of their packmates… or because they were just perpetually mad.

And there standing right in front of her was the Alpha, the big bad wolf whose skull she thought she crushed like an eggshell. The Grimm didn't even look damaged. She clenched her right hand, but of course, it was a fucking phantom sensation, an evil reminder of what she lost and could never regain.

The Alpha took its time moving towards her, and Yang calculated her odds of escaping this tightly closed encirclement. Each pair of red eyes watched her, unblinking, and she could swear the glint in them were like they were gloating their victory at her. Like they wanted her to try and escape, like they much preferred a running target.

You can run, but you'll only die tired.

Damn mind quote. She wished it didn't hammer the fact home. Or didn't make it seem like these were the unspoken words of the approaching Alpha. She looked at her left and right, making do with the corners of her eyes as she kept her head looking forward. No openings she could see. It seemed almost odd to consider that such mindless killing machines could be coordinated enough to box her in efficiently. Maybe it was because they were wolves? Well, the only way out would probably be up, but even that had its own claim to perilous danger. She could do it, too, even with just one gauntlet. It was doable. But pain was spreading everywhere, as if she were being slowly burned alive. Her nerves sounded off like a choir entering the climax of a song.

Stop being a pussy and fucking MOVE!

With a scream clamped inside her throat, Yang fought the pain head-on and pumped a new round into her gauntlet. The Alpha quickened its approach, hovering atop her in a second and grabbing ahold of her arm before she could plunge it to the ground. Its grip was tight, and it felt like it intended to squeeze her bones.

A new wave of fear overcame her. All her mind could see now was a possible future, where on one side, an arm was absent, and on the other, an arm forever broken and defiled. Fear called for desperation. Fear demanded immediate action no matter the consequences. Fear did not, would not, let her go.

Neither would the Alpha as Yang tried to pull back, and when the Alpha's grip refused to budge, she started kicking. Her sitting position did little in providing… well, a kick to her kick, but she didn't care. She refused to have the Grimm take away anything from her again. All the while, the Alpha's grip got tighter. There was this incessant noise coming from somewhere, like a banshee's wail she remembered hearing from an old horror movie. A banshee's cry that came more out of pure fear than overwhelming sadness. The noise resonated in her ears as she pulled and kicked, pulled and kicked, new tears streaming down her muddy cheeks.

The Alpha looked at her with its giant golden eyes, and she saw joy in them. She saw fucking joy in those eyes, but fear made her ignore her anger. It was deeply rooted in her, she was realizing in some small part of her. Every action she took now was done out of a desperate desire to get away from the source of the fear.

Those teeth—

The pain—

The claws as they rip and tear, rip and tear—

Its grip got tighter again, and she screamed "NO!" with all her might, over and over. She could feel the bones in her arm being slowly crushed.

But then a deafening sound of thunder reverberated in the clearing. It made the Grimm close their ears and their eyes for but a moment.

For Qrow Branwen, that was more than enough for his needs.

Yang watched her uncle cleave through the pack with a grace and speed she could only compare to Ruby, but more refined, more efficient. Stronger.

Deadlier.

If Ruby could be slashing through the next target within the blink of an eye, then Qrow blurred the moments inside one blink that you'd never know if he had gone through two, three or four Grimm while your eyes were closed.

The surrounding Beowolves dropped to the ground in pieces, the look in their eyes conveying a feeling (if Grimm could even feel) of bewilderment, as if wanting to ask, "What the hell just happened?" before their bodies began decomposing instantly into the void.

Qrow's mow-down was as fast as it was brutal, and Yang only had maybe a second or two to see what was happening before it was all over and she was on her back, with a severed Beowolf arm still clinging to her own. She blinked, hearing the rising roar of the Alpha, the sound of it so guttural that the phantom pain coming from her stump cried as if it were sympathizing with the loss.

She saw the Alpha turn away, growling, teeth grinding against each other as its whole body shook in rage, but it just had time to move halfway before Qrow swiped his blade across its neck. The growl stopped abruptly, and Yang watched the Alpha's head shoot out of its body. She'd seen more than a few Grimm fall with their heads chopped off, and though it was gruesome to look at the first few times, never were they as messy as this one. Black ichor burst out of the hole in its neck, almost propelling the severed head even higher, and her mind reached into a small, old memory of her and her elementary school friends launching a water rocket. The Grimm's body shook as if it were having a seizure, went on its knees, and dropped to the ground, dead.

Yang lay there, breathing in and out, tired on so many levels she was amazed she hadn't been pulled into the sweet lull of sleep yet. No more growls filled her ears, no more red eyes flooded her vision, but one blink later she was staring at glowing red eyes once more and she felt like screaming—

"Yang," Qrow said, closing his eyes as he took a deep breath. When he opened them again, his eyes lost the odd glow. "You all right?"

No, she still felt like screaming. Out of fear, out of anger, out of fuck-reasons-I-just-wanna-scream, she wasn't sure which one held top spot, but her mouth articulated no more than a slow release of the breath she'd been holding for something louder, and she closed her eyes in pure relief.

"I'll take that as a yes," Qrow said, and when Yang opened her eyes again, her uncle was looking around for any looming threat, but the action, she knew, was done more out of instinct than rationality. The mist was still around them, cold, thick, and ominous. Feeling that the coast was clear, he put one hand on her back and the other grabbed her left bicep. "Can you stand?"

She had one second to provide a response before Qrow forcibly yanked her up till she was standing and wrapped her left arm over his shoulder. Something akin to vertigo hit her senses. Her vision blurred, drained of color, and her breath hitched, now becoming hard to breathe. Qrow noticed right away, because she saw the colorless blob she knew to be her uncle was moving his mouth (or at least where she thought his mouth was), saying something to her, maybe asking a question, but she couldn't make sense of the words, as if her uncle were speaking in gibberish. She wanted to sleep so badly.

She shook her head, which brought a pin-sized stab within her brain. The immortal bees got inside, she thought, unsure where exactly that came from. Her legs gave out, and Qrow put more strength into carrying her. He said more gibberish in her ears. Did she respond? She didn't know. Everywhere had hurt.

Had.

The relief was all-consuming, and if she could smile, she would've done so. She could no longer move her body, as if every part of it was weighed down in lead, but that was a small nuisance to what was more important. The pain was gone now. All gone. Sweet, sweet relief.

Her eyes closed for a moment. She needed to rest them. A part of her felt that things were not yet over and that she needed to fight the drowsiness. But she needed rest more than anything. She'd just rest her eyes for a second. Just for a second. Just… for a…