Snow slowed the Dust-powered motorcycle Rose had insisted they build together for her as she neared where the whole mess with the Ursa had begun just a short while ago; the busted open armored van. She paused just long enough to see the symbol for Ice (not the Schnee Dust Company's elaborate snowflake) on the back of the truck and then sped back up, the urgency to find Rose and keep her safe still fresh in her mind. She wasn't as careful as she would be looking for someone else, but that's partly because with their bond the four of them could always point out exactly where the other 3 were, though it became less accurate beyond general direction the further they were from each other.
But even without that, all she would have needed to do was to follow the carnage. It almost reminded her of the old times.
The bike under her complained with an abnormal growl. "Hey, if she wasn't in trouble I'd have had no trouble babying you." She muttered at the bike without taking her gaze from the road ahead. Oddly enough, the growl went away, almost as if the bike was responding to her words. Snow shook her head at the thought and decided that she really needed to spend a little more time with Blake and Dragon, rather than worrying over Rose, if she were thinking so much like the brunette.
Besides which, if Rose hand't been nearly such a trouble magnet, Snow wouldn't have been pushing the bike to its absolute limits for the last 5 minutes and ignoring every suggestion of a speed limit or common road courtesy to get to the woman.
She paused in her inner rantings as she slowed down to turn, since she was getting close to where Rose was, and shook her head to clear it of all errant thought. All that mattered right now was reaching Rose. She only noticed the fleeing civilians and the property damage at the periphery of her mind. Enough to dodge if need be, but not enough to care in the slightest.
She heard a startlingly deep bang! resound from somewhere ahead, down a street in the direction Snow was in. She slowed down further as she came to that turn and her heart nearly froze at what she saw.
It was a fairly large Ursa. But if just an Ursa was enough to give her a heart attack, then she was too damn long outta the game. Unless it was the additional shock factor of seeing three people bouncing around like bouncy balls as they attempted to kill the bear-thing, one she knew by heart and the other two simply familiar as Rose was sent flying once again. She instinctively reached for the pistol on her thigh, cursing when her hand only hit leather-covered flesh. As Rose rushed back in to attack, Snow watched the three fight. It was smooth, flowing gracefully like a river that she'd found once upon a time as the Hunters traded off attacks with each other expertly, as if they'd been working together, fighting together, maybe living together, for years, something that Snow knew was impossible, unless there was a rather big something that Rose wasn't telling her. Like some sort of cloning or Life Model Decoy experiment that she'd somehow participated in. Extremely unlikely though.
After all, she felt Rose's warm body warming hers as she fell asleep at night, almost every night. Though, that set of memories combined with watching the battle's flow and Rose's ferocious figure gave her a pang of longing for the bad old days.
The days when she and her family would hunt Grimm as they lived in those highly-infested territories. When they were constantly surrounded, outmanned, outmatched, and alone with no one and no thing to rely on but what they'd brought, what they could find, and each other. When they would live, staring Death in the face, and grin.
She shook her head, clearing it of memories and suppressing the urge to kill the monster as she noticed the police officer's car as she parked. She wouldn't have to go far after all, so why drag the bike along? Besides, Rose appeared to have the situation in hand. That wall though would have to be replaced.
Besides, she needed to know exactly what had happened, and who better than the cop who'd called it in?
She walked over to the car, mindful of the fight happening not all that far away, and found the cop cowering in his car, windows thankfully already down. The man looked calm, but from the look in his eye, he was just a step away from becoming a gibbering wreck. "What's going on officer?" she asked calmly. When he didn't seem to respond, she tapped his shoulder and he looked at her, a star-struck expression suddenly coming onto his face. She sighed and snapped her fingers in front of his face to get his attention. "Hey, what's going on here?"
He seemed to snap out of his star-struck state and his face started showing a state of half-controlled panic. "The Ursa just blew right outta nowhere! And then those Huntresses showed up and people started running and screaming and I don't know what the Fuck to do, Okay?!" His voice held just as much panic as his face, though his volume didn't really get to shouting until he finished.
"Okay." Snow said calmly, considering what he'd said for a second, seemingly ignoring him completely. "Did it come out of a truck?" She asked him.
He paused in his panic as the memory came to him and training kicked in. "Actually, yeah, yeah it did." he sounded a whole lot calmer now. "And I think my roomie said something about the company he's working for doing something bad. Uh, who was he working for again?" He thought back with a lot of solid concentration while Snow thought about how similar he looked to Detective Burns. "Uh, Ice, Ice Dusk-elech, or something like that."
"Ice Dus-Tech?" Snow asked sharply.
His face brightened from confusion to confirmation. "Yeah, that's it exactly!"
"Hmm." Was all Snow responded with, absently noting that his nametag said P. Hepzibah as she thought and remembered. Ice Dus-Tech was in the news a few weeks ago because of a controversy involving their research into some theoretical applications of using Ice Dust for cold storage of live specimens. There were even rumors going around in the tabloids and coming from her customers that said they may have ignored safety guidlelines imposed upon them by the scientific community and went straight to storing live specimens without much actual planning or fact-checking, even including people in those experiments, Human and Faunus alike. If that image of Ice on the van from earlier meant that the van belonged to Ice Dus-Tech, then it would make sense, especially if they'd moved on to Grimm storage and were somewhat successful at that venture somehow.
To what purpose, Snow couldn't really find. Yet.
She froze when she first felt, then heard the rage coming from her roommate and partner. She abandoned the cop and ran over to the alleyway the scream had come from not far away, where the fight had likely moved to. She was completely unprepared for what she saw and even the comforting weights of a sword on her hip and the snub-nosed machineguns on her thighs could not stop the fear the bloomed.
No matter how many times she saw it, she would never feel comfortable with the sight of Rose going postal on a Grimm, mostly because when she fights like that ... Well, when Rose fights she is always quick and methodical except for times like this, when there is also a truly powerful level of brutality exuding from the woman that made her want to curl up in fear so powerfully that she wanted to right then and there.
She watched the bear-creature fall to the ground with a solid thump with a numb feeling in her heart. She knew it was just a part of who Rose was, but that didn't make her feel any better. Then she got a look at the girl slumping to the ground, barely conscious and bleeding out heavily from her stomach, a shiver ran down her spine. She'd been in such a situation once. It had not been pleasant.
She was still too numb to move, or even think really, so Rose got to the girl first. When Rose screamed "Oh, you are not going to fucking Die on me! Not now, not EVER!", a cold hand gripped her heart as a half-remembered pain and matching memory rose to the forefront. That was when she'd been stuck to a tree by a Beowolf. Blake had been knocked out by a highwayman before the wolf had surprised them and killed the thief, before Rose had caught back up to them.
She came back to reality as Rose was finishing up the stitches, which were well-done in Snow's opinion. And then Rose jumped back, curling into a ball with an all-too-familiar look on her face. One that scared all three of them, every time.
It was blank of everything but panic and fear, a panic attack. But in this state, Rose would not see anything. She wouldn't comprehend anything at all. She wouldn't remember, wouldn't understand, but she would act.
Snow sighed sadly as she shut her eyes to hold back the tears of seeing Rose in this state and ran her fingers through her hair to calm herself down, pulling apart the tangles in the long ivory tresses caused by the wind while unfettered by a helmet on the ride there. A ping on the emotional bond shared by the family told her that Blake and Dragon were inbound. Not far away and just as worried as she was.
She opened her eyes and saw the Huntresses-in-training beginning to stand and make their way over to see if Rose was alright. Poor girls. Teenagers that couldn't possibly be more than a year or two into their respective schools. Far too young to experience Rose and survive, especially with Rose like this. The huddled woman was now shivering violently. Someone would lose a limb if this wasn't handled delicately.
"Don't touch her." She said, her authoritative "Authority Voice" stopping them cold, the thought threatening a snort from her when she realized that she'd used one of Rose's more ridiculous names for things in personal thinking. She didn't need that while trying to give them orders to follow. When she was sure she had their undivided attention, she explained. "She's having a panic attack. If she was more or less normal, then I wouldn't interfere with this, but in this state, she'd likely tear your head off or beat you to death with your own arm. So, back off and let the professional 'monster-wrangler' bring the woman back to the surface." She advised the girls. She did have to put a little effort into not using her fingers for air-quotes around "monster-wrangler', but they complied.
Snow then crouched in front of the huddled woman, the handkerchief eyepatch threatening to fall off and her entire body showing the fear the woman so despised. Show felt her face run through the gamut of emotions that filled her in that moment; fear, sadness, kindness, apprehension, love, and regret with some pain mixed in for good measure. She sighed, letting her head droop and her face relax. "I'm gonna feel this one in the morning." She muttered to herself. Then she straightened and tapped Rose lightly on the shoulder.
Technically, her position wouldn't really mean a thing, as either way she'd be on the ground in a flash. But, in her mind, she figured that she'd at least be a little prepared and thus less likely to die.
Before she could even do so much as blink she was flying across the actually very wide alley (might as well be a whole 'nother street) and aching acll across her ribcage as she slammed into the opposite wall.
Okay, so she wasn't on the ground yet. At least she was right in that Rose was the one to hit her.
Completely on instinct alone, she used an ability she'd recently found she had which complemented her still-unfamiliar speed with stability and allowed her to meet the charging berserker as well as possible, given their power levels and current states.
Meaning, she launched from the wall only to get slammed back into the wall with a gut punch, but that short while gave her the time to deflect the oncoming right jab into the brick wall behind her and duck, which allowed her to gather her strength until she could launch the two of them, Rose first, into the wall on the opposite side of the alleyway, disorienting Rose in her non-conscious state just enough to let her spin Rose around and slam the pretty face into the wall a few times before grabbing both arms, crossing them so that they could be held by one arm behind the brunette's back and then enfold her into a highly constrictive hug, accomplished right before the woman in a berzerker state noticed this and started struggling like a wild animal.
Through all of this, Snow had avoided looking Rose in the face because that mindlessness that always appeared, it broke her heart to see it. She looked at the brunette, her sadness at what the elegant creature beside her was currently reduced to covering her face without her permission, completely oblivious of the two members of audience she'd gained just as Rose was completely oblivious of the rest of the world beyond animalistic urges and response.
Then she snuggled in closer to set her head on Rose's shoulder and began to hum. Then she began to sing.
"When all of your flaws,
And all of my flaws
Are laid out one by one.
A wonderful part of the mess that we made
We pick ourselves undone."
She closed her eyes, letting the sent of pure, unadultered Rose fill her nose and mouth, and thus her entire world as she focused on bringing the 'monster' she adored back to reality.
"All of your flaws
And all of my flaws
They lie there hand in hand.
Ones we've inherited, ones that we've learned
They pass from man to man."
Then came the chorus, and to her mild surprise, that's when Blake and Dragon showed up, singing along and using various items to add in the melody and the percussion.
"There's a hole, in my soul,
I can't fill it, I can't fill it!
There's a hole, in my soul,
Can you fill it, can you fill it?"
The hauntingly beautiful song echoed strangely off the alley walls, adding an ethereal quality to the singing that truly made it beautiful.
"You, have always worn your flaws upon your sleeve.
And I, have always buried them deep beneath the ground.
Dig them up, let's finish what we started.
Dig them up, so nothing's left unturned.
All of your flaws
And all of my flaws
When they have been exhumed,
We'll see that we need them to be who we are,
Without them we'd be doomed!
There's a hole, in my soul,
I can't fill it, I can't fill it!
There's a hole, in my soul,
Can you fill it, can you fill it?"
There was a slight pause in the singing as Dragon sang out the melody by herself before they continued as a group.
"You, have always worn your flaws upon your sleeve.
And I, have always buried them deep beneath the ground.
Dig them up, let's finish what we started.
Dig them up, so nothing's left unturned."
Then there was a longer pause as they all sang the melody.
"When all of your flaws, and all of my flaws are counted.
When all of your flaws, and all of my flaws are counted."
Another slight pause, and then more singing to finish the song.
"You, have always worn your flaws upon your sleeve.
And I, have always buried them deep beneath the ground.
Dig them up, let's finish what we started.
Dig them up, so nothing's left unturned.
Ohhh. Ohhh!
All of your flaws,
And all of my flaws
Are laid out one by one.
Look what a wonderful mess that we made
We pick ourselves undone."
Silence reigned as the song came to a close and the world retracted from the entire music-filled alleyway to just Snow and her beloved little monster. Snow took a deep breath to keep herself calm as she nuzzled Rose once more, an animalistic gesture that the woman always recognized, before she dared to open her eyes, not wanting to see the heartbreaking emptiness, even if the red-frosted brunette was still and had melted into the embrace after the short moment of struggling, and thus likely back to the realm of reality.
Rose was calm, a serene face with an ethereal beauty still flecked with Grimm blood that simply enhanced her beauty in that moment. She thought she'd lost all breath, but she was proven wrong when the woman she still held close opened her intelligent silver eye, and that simply took it away all over again.
Of course, the seclusion didn't last long and, as always, it was their raven-haired Faunus woman who had to be the voice of reason.
"Not that I don't mind, but you do realize that we had an audience for our little concert, right?" She asked in her normal near-deadpan voice, a hint of a smile showing through where Snow couldn't see it.
Snow sighed as she relaxed her hug. Well, the illusion had been nice while it lasted. "Yeah, I know. Didn't hear you roll up though." Which was surprising, given just how loud the darn thing was.
"Had a feeling is all." Dragon said simply, Snow seeing her shrug in her mind. "Cut the power on the bike back a block." Oh, that makes sense.
"Okay, just who are you people?!" An unfamiliar voice shouted, frustration lining her feminine qualities that somehow spoke to Snow's early training to be prim and proper, reminding her that they existed after such a long time living with the completely natural Rose.
She raised her head to look at the source of the voice and blinked, struck by just how similar the girl was to the image that always stared at her from the mirrors she looked at. Wow. No wonder Rose flipped out.
The Ice-Blue eyes staring intently at her widened in anger. "And what's that supposed to mean?"
Snow slapped the hand that had been on Rose's arms up to her mouth as her eyes widened in surprise. "Did I just say that out loud?" She asked quietly, voice muffled by her hand.
Rose nodded and Snow could just imagine the smiling roll of silver eyes as Dragon spoke up. "Yeah, pretty much." She said as she put a heavy hand on Snow's shoulder. "But don't worry, we all know you meant it in a nice way."
The girl was now nearly eye-to-eye with Snow, other than the height difference, that is, even including the rather impressive height boost given by the shorter girl's tall heels and the lack of boost afforded by Snow's more sensible Converse sneakers. "And what possible nice way is that?!" The white girl demanded in a rather snobbish way. Definitely needs to loosen up.
"Weiss." The brunette next to the girl chided gently, which made Snow take another double-take at the way the other girl looked before she refocused herself and answered.
"Well, it's just that," She began a little nervously before she just gave up and gave it to her straight. "Well, you look incredibly like me as a teen. As Rose once told me, I was the prettiest thing in the world." Snow smiled with sad remembrance as she looked down at the ground as what had happened since then came up to remind her once again. Dragon squeezed her shoulder supportively as she finished with "but that was several years and too many friends ago." She tried to keep the broken sadness out of her voice, but didn't quite manage it.
Rose squirmed inside the one-armed hug she hadn't been freed from yet so that she could give Snow a hug in support. "You know, my opinion hasn't changed, Snow White." She said, adding in the formal Snow White to make the snow-haired person feel even better as they both solidified the hug. For 'an unfeeling monster with no understanding', Rose knew just how to keep a person in good shape, emotionally and otherwise.
"And neither has mine, Red Riding Hood." Snow said softly in return. A soft sound reached Snow's ears and she looked up at it through her eyelashes without moving her head.
"Guys?" Blake asked, still deadpan but with a note of warning in her voice, while Dragon squeezed Snow's shoulder tightlyu once, then let go. They saw it too. Sigh. Pull Rose in for a tighter hug, letting her know too.
"Yeah, I know." She said. She contemplated her life for a moment as she tensed invisibly and the two children in front of her family stayed blissfully ignorant of the danger. She decided that, while painful, dangerous, and vastly annoying pretty much all the time when Rose was there, and worrying when she wasn't, it had been worth it all the way.
Then it finished rising and she let go of Rose to reach for her heavy longsword. When it roared, she lunged at the formerly dead Grimm that had just stood up again, whose ripped-apart stomach was now actively dripping blood and innards as it roared at them, surprising the teens, but not the adults who'd seen, and thus prepared. Before the Ursa had even finished its roar, three separate swords had pierced its brain, one of which was Snow's longsword, one was Blake's thinner fencing foil, and one was Dragon's wider broadsword, while Rose came up from underneath to pierce the still exposed and newly beating heart. After a final moment of defiance where the beast tried to stay standing and strike, the body sagged and the paw fell limply to its side, the mass of bloody black fur now supported only by their weapons. Then Rose pushed it away as they retracted their weapons for cleaning in near unison, which this time was just a quick flick to the side (which caused Blake to turn to her and give her a quick "Hey.", which prompted a shrug and a sheepish smile from Snow) before they pulled handkerchiefs from various places to clean off what was left. Rose's was picked up off the ground and then retied around her head to cover her eye.
"I have had enough!" A young voice shouted, once again reminding them of their audience as Weiss' prissy little face shoved itself next to hers, which was rather impressive, considering how much taller she was than the girl. "I demand to know who you are!"
Snow gave the girl a sad and amused smile that she knew the others also had on their faces as she looked the girl in the eye. "Nothing special. Just a bunch of old, concussed and traumatized batty old Hunters who never really got used to living around people after so long around Grimm. That's all we really are. Anything beyond that you either don't need to know or is too much for your young mind to comprehend." She patted Weiss' shoulder, trying to comfort the obviously terrified girl who was clearly at the end of her rope.
Weiss opened her mouth to speak again, but Rose cut her off. "We're being deadly serious here. You think it's hard to deal with 3 heavy combat classes a week up in your castle at the top of the cliff?" Rose asked pointedly as Snow looked over to see Rose's slightly pensive look. "Well, Mr. Crowly says you two don't actually struggle with them, but the point is that plenty others in Beacon do. For us, those classes would be nothing more than a workout, rather than seeming life-or-death survival, regardless of how hellish it is. And when you start getting sent on missions, the absolute worst you'll likely get is a deep hunting mission where you'll have quality camping gear, plenty of food and drink, and lots of good bandages. What we lived through was worse than just hunting Beowolves and Ursai or the occaisional Death Stalker or Taijitu. We lived in those areas filled with Grimm of all shapes and sizes, wearing scavenged scraps for clothing, bandages, and armor." She paused.
"Using old or sub-par, easily broken weaponry if we didn't forge them ourselves." Dragon chimed in.
"Only having the barest essentials that we could forage in our one or two meals a day if we didn't catch game or give in and eat Grimm meat, if we had any, which almost always tasted terrible." Blake added in her wonderful monotone. "Especially Hydra." She quietly finished with a shudder.
"Though, that roast Nevermore we had that one time was pretty good." Rose added as an aside.
"Actually, we smoked it, not roasted." Blake corrected gently. "And it still tasted terrible. You just have weird taste buds."
Ignoring Rose's "Hey, I am not weird." and Blake's "Yes, you are.", Snow finished their list of how bad things were during the good old times compared to what the two students in front of them had to deal with, trying to get her inconscient family members back on track. "And for creature comforts, we usually had a blanket or pelt or two per person for bedrolls and we almost never got a shower or bath that didn't include a hot spring or a waterfall."
"And those waterfalls were always damn cold." Dragon added with a shiver Snow felt from three feet away. Rose tried to sneak away, and while Snow let her at first, she yanked the brunette back when she saw where the handkerchiefed woman was focused on. "No Rose, you promised me good takeout tonight." She said with as stern a face and voice as possible for her current gentleness.
Said woman turned her face to show her sparkling left eye with her face in the most adorable and wall-breakingly powerful pout Snow had seen in some time since she'd last seen a pitiful cat and dog that she'd really wanted to bring home, but was afraid they'd die too quickly from lack of care and food. And maybe Rose.
Snow's resolve started to crumble, and then even more when Rose said in this absolutely sad voice, "But, it's right there. It's been too long since I had Ursa. Pleeeease?" And even more when the lower lip on Rose's face slipped out and her face began to wobble as if it was about to cry. She stiffened her spine as she reminded herself of a few things about the woman in front of her and did her best to glare, rather than smile or give in, as she said, "No." As firmly as possible.
Dragon put a hand on Rose's shoulder that Snow could've sworn was gauntleted for a second before she only saw the metal-plated leather that the woman actually wore. Both women turned to the blacksmith to see what wisdom she could bestow. The blonde smiled. "Don't worry Rose. I'm sure you'll get some Grimm meat soon. Just not tonight." As if to punctuate this point, she then stalked over to the corpse and struck a flaming fist deep into the mass of black fur and set it alight. It did resist for a few seconds more than most dry things would resist, even given the extreme temperatures of that fire, but it did light like kindling, leaving the Grimm no further chance to revive.
That was a lesson they'd learned the hard way.
"I've never seen a Grimm leave a corpse before. Why didn't the body simply dissolve?" Ruby asked, morbidly curious as they stood there in the heat of the dead and flaming Ursa. "That's what Grimm do when they die, which is why scientists have such trouble learning about them."
"Well, that's because you were never in Vermilion." Rose said quietly.
"It was in Quarry Town that I saw my first." Snow added in an equally quiet tone. It had been a nice town before the Grimm had attacked, a short week after the two of them had entered.
"The Wilds to the north of El Barron's Keep." Blake said, a sadness to her tone that wasn't as easily identified.
"Garreth's Keep for me." Dragon added.
"As for why?" Snow sighed as memories assaulted her. Memories of friends asking that question and dying for the answer at the hands of the Grimm they'd 'killed' just moments before. "It was Blooded. They tend to live longer after that."
"The Bloodless ones that you're used to are just fakers." Rose added acidly. "No fun at all. They die when a sickly tree branch hits them."
"You know they take a bit more effort than that." Snow chided. "Usually, just an actual blade and a few lucky or strong strokes, but I can agree that they are sometimes no fun. Like that time in Patch."
"You were on Patch?" Ruby asked curiously.
Snow nodded. "It was well before you were born, but yes. A young man by the name of Oz helped out, as did a girl named Summer and another trio named Tai, Raven, and Corn, if I remember right."
"His name isn't Cornelius, he just looks like one." Rose corrected with an aggrieved tone. "Now, if you won't let me eat the Ursa, then let's get going." She said, slipping out of Snow's grip and heading over to the mouth of the alley. "Besides, the girls need their rest as they have school tomorrow. From what I've heard, Beacon isn't going to simply hand them good grades for showing up. Which, I approve of." Rose added as a simple declaration of approval.
"She's right." Dragon said, a shudder going through her after saying that. "You know, I don't think I'll ever get used to saying that."
"I already did a long time ago." Snow said simply as she moved to follow her roommate. She declined to mention the shiver that still runs through her spine, to this day, whenever she says it.
"I don't know what's scarier: my statement or yours." Dragon said as she followed along.
"Ditto." Was all Blake said.
Then they mounted their rides, two to a bike (Snow and Rose, Blake and Dragon) and rode off into the night.