I fell a little bit behind so I posted two chapters this week, chapters 17 and 18. Make sure that you check them both out!
Thank you for reading.
Weiss stood by the hotel bathroom's floor-length mirror, fresh out of her second shower of the day and feeling clean and more energetic than she would have been otherwise. She felt refreshed, in a way that she hadn't in a long time. She stared at herself in it and tilted her head to the side and double checking that there had been no visible marks left behind in Blake's wake that morning.
It had been a nice morning. Much nicer than Weiss would have had should she have left when she'd been intending to.
But that didn't make up for the fact that she and Blake were now going to have to go ahead and talk about their morning at some point, and clear the air on what had happened and what it actually meant. Weiss was sure that Blake was going to have something about her journalistic integrity that she would want to address and Weiss...
Well, she didn't really know what she wanted to do. Regardless of situation or circumstance, she had her own feelings that she was going to need to sort out sooner than later. With all likelihood she would end up sharing them with Coco or Neptune later, and Weiss could only hope that they would be able to help guide her. At the very least she trusted that they would try.
Of course there was also the issue of the secrecy of it all. Weiss needed to keep this quiet, and while Neptune and Coco would try it was only a matter of time before someone came asking questions of their own. After all, it wasn't like she'd been back to the mansion in a few days, and while it was true that Klein knew where she was, Whitley or her mother were sure to notice her absence. Weiss suspected that one would come to her soon. Sooner than she would like.
"Blake?" Weiss called, picking up one of her earrings off of the countertop in front of her.
"Yes?" Blake replied, stepping into the bathroom calmly. She was in the process of tugging her shirt down her body, her hair tied back for the moment. Weiss glanced at her and couldn't help herself from getting an eyeful before taking a breath.
Weiss turned her head to face back towards the mirror. "Will you be able to drive me down to the mansion?" She asked, turning to face Blake head-on for the first time once she'd collected herself. "I think I should probably head back."
Blake paused, standing there by the bathroom door like she might have had a good idea as to what she wanted to do. Instead, she just sighed. "I don't mind." Blake said calmly. "Are you worried about something there?"
"I am." Weiss confirmed with a quiet sigh. "Whitley has no doubt noticed that I haven't been there."
"Have you told your friends that you're going back?"
"Not yet." Weiss sighed. She couldn't really pretend as though she wouldn't need to figure out what to do with Coco and Neptune sooner than later. The two of them were likely to stay there in Atlas until she gave them the sign that she wanted for them to go.
The only problem was that Weiss really didn't want to have to see her friends go at all. Not if it meant that she would be left all but alone with her family.
Blake nodded and stepped up beside Weiss. She leaned against the dresser and Weiss couldn't help but blush at the realization that she was being watched.
"Blake," Weiss said, smiling and glancing away from the journalist. "What is it?"
"Nothing." Blake replied, shaking her head. "We can go as soon as you're ready. Just let me know when that is."
"It won't be long." Weiss murmured as she brought her hands down and away from her head. The earrings were there, sure enough. Secure and beautiful. Weiss smiled at herself. "It's been a lot of fun."
"Yeah," Blake replied, blinking. "It has been. I don't really want to see it end, but..."
"But it has to." Weiss finished for Blake. "Right?"
Only for today, Weiss hoped silently.
"Yeah." Blake laughed, crossing her arms over her chest and relaxing much more than Weiss was used to seeing from her. "You know that if you need me, you can call, right?"
"I do." Weiss smiled as she walked over to the bed and pulled on the jacket that she'd laid out on top of it. She had to make a mental note to be sure to change as soon as she got the chance, and to check in with Klein before anything else could happen. He was sure to have information for her about the things that were going on.
After all, the information that Blake had given them about the fundraiser and the possible threat against it was sure to have the butler busy. At the very least, Weiss could be certain that he was checking in with all sorts of friends in all sorts of places. After she saw Klein she would have to be sure to make her presence known to her brother somehow.
The chance that there would be a dinner that night would be in her favor though, and so Weiss wasn't too concerned.
She shook the thought from her mind and focused on dressing herself the rest of the way before Blake drove her across the city on her motorcycle and the two of them were stopping outside of the Schnee Manor gates.
Weiss kissed Blake goodbye, making sure that they were hidden behind the walls at the entrance before hurrying inside. Almost immediately after she stepped into the mansion, she was stopped.
"Why hello, sister." Whitley said, staring her down. It almost felt like he'd been waiting for her to arrive, but Weiss was sure that wasn't the case. If anything, he'd noticed her coming down the drive while he'd sat by the window and had decided to greet her.
The fact that Blake usually waited until Weiss was a safe distance into the family estate didn't make that any better. The chance was all too high that Blake had been seen and that was something that Weiss didn't know that she'd be able to deal with if that were the case.
"Hello, Whitley." Weiss responded, holding her head up high and hoping that there was nothing showing. Blake had been careful, but that didn't mean that Weiss was completely without anything to worry about. "How are you?"
"I was going to ask you the same." Whitley said, standing up tall and looking away from her in that wistful way of his before his gaze snapped back onto her. "It has been some time since we last saw you. You know that mother must be missing you."
Weiss frowned. It was an easy card to pull out. That didn't change that Weiss had only heard whispers of her mother in passing since she'd arrived back in Atlas. "I was busy." She admitted, because if she had a cover in the forms of Coco and Neptune, she wanted to use it. "Is that a problem?"
Whitley's face screwed up for a moment as he tried to figure out what he wanted to say. Weiss couldn't help that her face acted similarly, though the quirk of her lips came mostly from a place of frustration.
"No." Whitley started, his voice sounding like it was surprisingly far away all things considered. Weiss blinked, because she didn't really know what to make of it. But she wouldn't get a chance to say anything, because her brother would just blow past her in speaking. "I've just been missing my sister as of late. Is that so wrong?"
And really, Weiss couldn't exactly act like there was anything wrong with it. She let out a sigh. "No." Weiss admitted calmly as she shifted from one foot to the other. The fact that neither of them were touching on how she'd gotten there was comforting.
Whitley smiled and fell into step beside Weiss. He was clearly hesitating, and Weiss just sighed and began on the way up to her bedroom. Unsurprisingly, Whitley just followed after her. "Have you gone in to see father today?" Whitley asked, and Weiss sighed as she began to pull her bedroom door open.
"I can't say that I have." Weiss explained as she allowed herself to take a seat on her own bed. "Like I said, I was a little busy."
"But of course." Whitley said, pacing in the space in front of Weiss' bed and looking at himself and his sister in the mirror. "I was going to be going to see him rather soon. I suppose that it wouldn't be too much to invite you along, would it sister?"
And if Weiss were being honest with herself, it was a very easy conclusion for her to reach that just about the last thing that she wanted to do that day was go to see her father with Whitley of all people. But, Weiss had to admit, if she wanted to be able to go ahead and avoid any extra scrutiny, the best way to do that would be to go with her brother.
At the very least it had the chance of feeling like the way that things had been when the two of them had been young children and things had been simple and made sense. Back before their father had finally managed to drive their mother away almost entirely, and back before Winter had left.
The thought was actually enough to make Weiss want to go with her brother.
"What time were you planning to go?" Weiss asked, blinking and watching her brother. Ideally, she would be able to change before the two of them left. At the very least, she wasn't exactly expecting for Whitley to stay glued to her side constantly for the rest of their day.
"In an hour." Whitley responded calmly. He reached out for something on Weiss' dresser and she had to crane her neck to try and figure out what it was. Finally, he turned towards her and Weiss was able to recognize what was resting there in her brother's hand.
It was the still-wrapped gift that Neptune had given her just before she'd had to leave Vale. Weiss had all but forgotten that it was there, and now that her brother was holding it she didn't really know what to do. The good thing was that she could continue to use it as a cover for her and Neptune dating, but-
Well, that was the problem, Weiss thought to herself. For her to have a gift from an alleged beau that she hadn't even bothered to open was a little more conspicuous than she would have liked. Especially when she knew for a fact that this wasn't the first time that her brother had seen it.
"I'll be sure to be ready for that." Weiss said, blinking and letting her hands rest together in her lap. Her brother was turning the box over in his hands, a curious look having crossed his face. Like he was doing his best to decode what anyone would have decided to give her. "Is that all?"
"No." Whitley said, tilting his gaze up so that it met Weiss', "But I am curious about this-" He held the box up for Weiss to see, and she let out a quiet sigh before getting up and crossing the room to meet her brother.
"It's a gift." Weiss explained calmly, keeping her voice as even as she could manage. "From Neptune."
Whitley frowned and offered the box to Weiss. She took it and held it carefully, calmly. She looked down at it, and couldn't help but think that whatever was inside was probably delicate, at least on some level. Neptune had good taste and Weiss knew that. It partially left her wondering about why she hadn't bothered to go ahead and open the box for herself and find out what was inside.
Mostly, she just felt like she had gotten to Atlas and had been so immediately caught up in her own business that the thought that she might have had other things to do hadn't even occurred to her at the time.
"I see." Whitley commented, frowning just slightly. "Why haven't you bothered to open it yet, if it's from your boyfriend?"
Weiss paused, because she knew that if he did know anything about her involvement with someone other than Neptune, this was going to be where it would come to light. Once that happened, Weiss had absolutely no clue as to how she was supposed to keep going or explain herself.
Mostly, she really, really didn't want to hear what her brother would have to say. She wanted to know what other members of their family would have to say even less, and should her father wake and the news get to him...
The thought was threatening enough on its own. And she really didn't want to have to face what fate it might bring further down the line. There was absolutely no part of Weiss that was able to act like she had no fear for what could happen in her too-near future.
"I've been saving it in case I feel like I need it." Weiss reached out and took the package from her brother's hand. "And I haven't felt like I needed it yet." Really, Weiss had no idea whether or not that was a story that her brother would buy into, but she could give it a try.
Whitley raised an eyebrow, telling her all too easily that he didn't believe a word that she had just said. Really, Weiss couldn't exactly blame him for it. Not when it was pretty obvious that she had been avoiding the mansion for days. Weiss just tried to ignore it as she moved to set the box back down where she had left it originally.
"I know that you are lying to me, sister." Whitley said, in a way that was entirely too calmly and too smooth. In a way that said rather clearly to Weiss that there was absolutely no way that he was lying to her. "And now I am just wondering what you're so afraid of that you can't share it with your family."
Weiss sighed and stared down at her hand, at where it was resting on top of the box and couldn't help but think about how far away it felt like she was. How was she supposed to be able to live there and exist there in Atlas when she had to keep up so many lies about herself? How was she supposed to get by when it felt like she had to tuck herself away at every chance just to stay safe?
A dangerous thought occurred to Weiss for just a second, that she could just go ahead and tell her brother the truth, but she banished it just as quickly as it had arisen. It only would have caused trouble and Weiss knew that.
"It isn't any of your business." Weiss said, shooting her brother a glare that wasn't enough to make him waver.
"Oh, I'm sure that it isn't," Whitley said, beginning to walk to the door to the bedroom so that he could leave. He was checking his watch on his wrist, so obviously more occupied with his own thoughts than he ever would be with Weiss in truth. "But you do know that keeping secrets won't get us anywhere."
And suddenly, Weiss felt a chance coming. She picked her head up and approached her brother, standing a few feet to his back.
"Then why hadn't you told me about the fact that you're helping to organize a benefit?" Weiss asked, trying her best to put as much venom into her tone as she could. "Or about your meetings with SchneeCorp's Board of Directors?"
Whitley stopped dead in his tracks, there in the doorway. He turned slowly so that he could face Weiss again, and when he did there was something on his face that Weiss registered as being unadulterated rage. Like he was preparing himself to lash out at her or something.
"How did you find out about that?" Whitley asked. "And why are you accusing me of lying when you didn't even try to find that information out for yourself?"
"Because nobody has ever reached out to me about this." Weiss snarled back at her brother. "Ever. Nobody from the company, nobody from the family, nobody that would have had an in with what is going on. I know what's happening, Whitley."
Whitley paused, his eyes widening for just a second like he was almost surprised before he decided to charge forward in the conversation. "Then you understand that our father had chosen his successor before you even arrived back in Atlas." All of the ice crept back into his voice, and Weiss was struck by the realization that she was staring not at her brother, but at the shadow of her father. A twisted, wretched shade of the brother she had once loved. "And that wasn't you."
"Yes."
Whitley blinked, still keeping his eyes on Weiss. "There is nothing that you don't know that you wouldn't have needed to know. Nothing that you, or our sister, or even our dear mother would have needed to know."
Weiss' eyes narrowed and she took a final step in towards her brother. This was going to be the last thing that she would say to him that day, she was willing to bet on it. She wouldn't go to see her father with him, and she was more likely to call her sister for help than anything else. She might spend some hours with Klein just looking for a chance to vent to someone.
"Then I suppose that you and I have nothing to talk about." Weiss bit the words out with as much venom as she could muster, because that was all that her brother deserved at that point. "Thank you for gracing me with your presence, Whitley, but you're not exactly wanted here right now."
"Hmmm." Whitley responded, still holding his head up high as he stood there, straight backed with his hands behind his back. The perfect mirror of their father, just many years younger and possibly a bit less cruel. "Then I suppose that I will be seeing you later." He said calmly with a sigh. Weiss tore the door open with more force than she strictly needed.
Weiss watched her brother disappear through the door, which she allowed to slam shut as a true sign of her needing the distance from him. She closed her eyes and sighed, glad to finally be alone but unable to feel anything but hurt and upset.
She walked back to her bed, and landed on it. She bounced as she sat down, reaching for her phone in her pocket. Weiss turned it on, because the least that she could do was try to make a call and try to find some comfort wherever it would be able to be found.
Somehow she didn't feel like things were going to be okay.
Even if things had come to the conclusion that she had been waiting to hear properly, nothing felt like it would be alright. Not when she didn't know where she fit in the world all of a sudden because something that she had worked her entire life for had been ripped out from under her feet.
If there was a way to make it all feel okay, Weiss would have gone for it.
But nothing would. Not for some time. Weiss was sure of that.
The world crashed around her, and it burned.
"Last night was pretty crazy, huh?" Yang asked, poking at the eggs that were cooking in the skillet in front of her. Blake wasn't entirely sure what was driving her roommate to want to make eggs at seven o'clock in the evening, but it was happening and she was willing to deal with it. "You know, I think I might like your girlfriend's friends. They seem cool."
Blake rolled her eyes because she didn't exactly know where the conversation was coming from either. She mostly knew that she had been promised scrambled eggs and that she had a chance to spend some of her time with her roommate- something which had felt excessively scarce lately. She just drummed her fingers on the countertop instead and shrugged.
"Coco and Neptune are nice." Blake said, letting her eyes flicker away from Yang for just a moment. "I know that Weiss wanted the two of them around for a reason."
"Yeah, well those two definitely know how to party." Yang reached over for a clean plate, and began to shake the scrambled eggs that were inside of her skillet onto it. "I definitely wouldn't mind hanging out with them again. You think Coco would like Junior's?"
"I have absolutely no idea." Blake replied, keeping her eyes down and not wanting to look up at her roommate because she was beginning to get an idea as to where this conversation was going to go. If she was correct, then this was something that she definitely didn't want to think about. Blake hadn't gotten a chance to really process her thoughts with regards to the morning she had spent with Weiss just yet. "I like them though."
Yang nodded, approaching Blake slowly in a sort of calm way that Blake was entirely too used to seeing from her. She set the plate down in front of Blake, and for a second Blake couldn't help but wish that Ruby were there to join the conversation. Ruby would be sure to derail it away from where Blake was sure that it was about to go.
But the best way for Blake too approach it was for her to take it as calmly as possible, and so she was willing to try that. She picked up a fork that she'd set on the table when she had sat down and looked up at Yang.
And Yang just smirked down at her with that expression that meant that she knew that Blake was keeping some sort of secret. "I'm going to make more." Yang said calmly, turning slowly back to the stove. "But I want to actually catch up with you. It feels like I haven't seen you in days even though we were literally out last night."
Just like that, Blake felt a swath of shame wash over her because Yang was right. It did feel like the two of them were growing apart quite a bit, and with their specific arrangement that wasn't a good thing, because Blake and Yang had decided to move in together for a reason. They had been friends before the agreement to live together had been made, partially out of necessity and partially because the freedom of a shared apartment had been appealing.
It made Blake dip her head and an uncomfortable feeling began to settle down in her stomach that she really didn't want to dwell on for too long. Her hair fell in front of her face, a curtain that could almost keep her safe from Yang, and from what the story that they would be sharing was about to entail.
But this was Yang, and Yang knew about everything.
Finally, Blake allowed for herself to begin to explain.
"I spent a few nights with Weiss at a hotel in the city." Blake started, letting her gaze focus on the yellow eggs that were there on the plate in front of her. "She has been having a hard time with her family lately with her father in the hospital and all of that. The rest of her family hasn't made it much easier for her."
"So you're having sleepovers with your girlfriend out of charity?" Yang asked, a fair amount of skepticism creeping into her voice at the prospect. The mischievous raise of her eyebrow managed to punctuate the question.
"No." Blake breathed the word out. She felt her grip on the fork that she had in her hand begin to tighten, and her heart began to beat a little too hard and a little too fast in her chest as the anxiety began to rise in her. "Adam found me."
Those three words were all that had ever been needed for her to be able to completely change the atmosphere of the apartment in seconds. Yang froze dead in her tracks, still standing at the stove and with the wooden spatula still in her hand. There was a characteristic tensing to her shoulders, an anger that was welling up and preparing to break as soon as Blake said another word.
"What did he want?" Yang asked. "Because you know that I will-"
"I know." Blake cut off Yang before she could continue saying what she was, because there was so much more that she needed to explain about Adam and how he had found her. "I don't know the exact details," Blake began. She poked at her eggs with her fork and glanced up at Yang's turned back. Her shoulders were stiff and angry. "But he made it sound like he harassed Ilia into getting her to tell him about what I've been up to. He found me when I went out to meet Weiss for coffee, and..."
"Does he know that you're shacking up with Weiss Schnee?" Yang asked. There was a quiet click, and when Blake looked up she watched as Yang poured the remaining skillet of scrambled eggs onto her own place. "Or is he just trying to make your life hell again, like he isn't already an expert at that?"
Blake paused, because that was something that she really didn't know an answer to. Not when she had been so immediately caught up with everything else that Adam's reappearance had introduced into her life.
"I don't know." Blake finally answered, deciding to set her fork down. "But he wanted me to come out with him on a job or something. There's a Schnee Fundraiser for the hospital coming up that he wants to… interfere with."
Yang nodded along as Blake talked, clearly taking her time to parse out everything that Blake said. Finally, she took a breath, turned with her plate in her hand, and crossed the room before taking a seat just across from Blake. "Does Weiss know about it?"
"She does." Blake replied, balling her hands into fists, because she had been so close to being able to leave this part of her past behind her. Weiss and her had talked things over, they had smoothed out some of the more difficult parts of their shared history.
Because of Adam, it felt like everything that Blake had worked so hard to get for herself was gone, and she didn't like that feeling at all.
Yang nodded and allowed for herself to relax as comfortable as she could. Blake watched her, keeping her eyes open and trying to figure out what she was supposed to do next now that the cat was out of the bag on what Adam wanted from her. At the very least, if she talked to Yang about everything, it could make both of their lives easier soon.
"So the creep wants to mess with the Schnees this time... because...?"
"He thinks their charity is corrupt. Just like how he thinks everything about them is corrupt." Blake explained sitting up properly. "And to be honest, I don't know that it isn't, but he wanted for me to help him. Break into the offices at their headquarters and find their books." She paused, staring back down at her hands against because it was entirely too likely that Adam had wanted something else besides her time.
It was Adam, after all. If he wanted something from her, he would take absolutely no hesitation to try and get it out of her. Blake had known him as a man once, but these days Adam was more like a monster than anything else.
"And you think that he found you through Ilia?" Yang asked, and that was the question that Blake really hadn't wanting to breach at all because of how much it would mean for her.
"I can't say either way for sure." Blake began, thinking back to that troubled day where Adam had gone after her in the hopes that she would go along with him. "He said that Ilia said hi, and I know that the two of them are still... I suppose you could call them friends, for better or for worse. I just don't know if she would have sold me out like that."
"Then how would he have been able to find you in person?" Yang asked, her frustrating rising rather obviously in the way that she talked and in the tone of her voice. "Because it sounds like we should start getting ready for you to move again or something."
"He saw my bike on the street." Blake responded, blinking. "I'm sure that's what happened. I just hope that he doesn't know about Weiss because..." Her voice trailed off and the anxiety that she had been feeling only grew to be much more intense, and the worries that she had about what was happening only grew louder.
"Do you think that he would do something to her?" Yang leaned in towards the table, placing her fingertips on the table in front of her.
"I don't know." Blake admitted as she gave up on her meal. She pushed her plate away from her and towards the middle of the table. "But I don't like the things that he could do to me through work if he knew." She leaned forward and brought her elbows up to rest on the table. Blake leaned into them, resting her head in her hands as she did her absolute best to control her breathing. "If he knew and he wanted to, he could just out the entire thing, and then-"
"I don't even want to think about how deep it would go." Yang sighed, poking at her food herself. "I mean, it would be your job-"
"And probably any chances of being able to report in the future would be gone." Blake charged forward in the explanation, because this was the first time that she was really letting herself think about all of the consequences that she was going to face. "So that's my income, if he outed what is going on with me and Weiss, he would cause a lot of problems for her, and honestly-" She let out a huff and leaned forward, tensing up entirely to much. "I can't imagine that Adam wouldn't love to do all of that. Just to see it happen."
Yang nodded, sighing and leaning forward in her seat. "Yeah." She muttered, sounding entirely too frustrated and definitely angry over everything. "You're probably right about that after everything." Blake nodded wordlessly and squeezed her eyes shut because she needed to come up with a plan or something, and she couldn't even begin to think of one.
She had absolutely no way of figuring out just how much Adam knew about what she was doing, and she had serious doubts that she was going to be given a chance to find any of that information out for herself.
"I told Weiss and her butler about it." Blake said, focusing on a single spot on the table as she tried to concentrate. "So there is something being done to help with the security there to my knowledge, but..." Her voice trailed off. "I haven't heard much of anything on how things are going on their end."
"So maybe you should call them?" Yang suggested, shoveling some of her food into her mouth. "Because if you do that-"
"I'm planning to." Blake said calmly, deciding to get up and at the very least figure out what she was going to do with the rest of her food that she hadn't bothered to finish eating. "I'm just afraid of what will happen when I make a call and find out what is going on."
Yang shrugged. "Do you think it'll be that bad?"
Blake thought back to that morning, and how well it had gone and how much there was still left that the two of them needed to discuss.
"I don't know." She said finally, sighing. "If I did, I would tell you but right now-"
She paused and glanced to the door to their apartment. "I just don't know."
Blake couldn't think of anything else she wanted to say.
