Sunday morning Ricky, Iris, and Harper went out once more to look for Cyrus. They searched the streets the city once, twice, three times, but still no Cyrus. They finished searching for the fourth time and were regrouping, Iris arrived holding onto something. They where on top of a roof when she arrived.
"Any luck?" Ricky asked.
She put her hand out and showed him and Harper what she found, it was a grey scarf with Cyrus's emblem printed in black.
"His...scarf...but..." Harper was at a loss of words at the site. Ricky just stared at it with a blank expression.
"It doesn't mean he's dead, look again, there's no blood or cuts, all he did was take it off" Iris said.
"Or someone took it off him" Harper replied.
"No, he's out there some where, he has to be" Ricky said picking up the scarf from Iris's hand. He held it with both hands still staring at the emblem on it.
"Ricky's right, if i know my brother he's is skilled, he trained with the grandmaster assassin himself, so there is doubt in my mind that he is still alive" Iris told Harper.
"Now the question is, will he come back?" Harper said. They all stood in silence as non of them knew the answer to Harper's question.
"We'll have to wait and see, until then, we're down a member so we'll have to tell Ozpin" Ricky said clenching the scarf.
"Right" Iris agreed with him.
They headed back to Beacon and made it to Ozpin's office by mid-afternoon. They walked in to see him talking with general Ironwood. They couldn't hear what they were talking about they just heard Ozpin say "excuse me general, but i have business to attend to." Ironwood look at the three of them then made his way out of the office. As soon as he closed the door Ozpin asked "now what do you need?"
"Ozpin...we're missing a member of team RICH" Iris told him. Ricky held out the scarf as proof.
"We don't know where he is or where he could be, he left without a trace" Harper said.
"I see, this will cause problems especially since your 'first mission' is suppose to be assigned in two weeks" Ozpin said with an emphasis on 'first Mission.'
"What should we do?" Iris asked.
"I cannot tell you what action to take only your leader can do that, and its your choice to follow his orders."
Harper and Iris turned to look at Ricky still facing forward.
"But I can say that you shouldn't worry about the current situation. I'll have some people look into Cyrus's where-abouts, until then act normally, we don't want to cause panic, with team CVFY's mission being extended, there is already some distress among the first year students."
"We'll be sure to do so" Ricky said and he stuffed Cyrus's scarf in his pocket and walked out of Ozpin's office. Iris and Harper followed him.
As they were walking Iris and Harper tried to lighten Ricky's mood.
"Ozpin said not to worry, I'm sure well find him soon"
"I sure hope so Harper" Ricky answered.
"Hey we should take our minds of this whole thing and go to the dance next week" Iris suggested.
"How can you say that when your brother is gone?" Ricky said stopping in the middle of the hall.
"Believe it or not, its not the first time he's left me" Iris said.
"I'm sorry I just..." he took a deep breath and exhaled, "Ok, yeah, we'll go to the dance and get some time off."
"Great" Iris said finally showing a smile.
"So you going to ask Ruby?" Harper said patting Ricky's back.
"Wouldn't you like to know?" Ricky said giving a small punch on Harper's shoulder and also gave a smile.
They headed back to their dorm for the night and got some sleep.
"Here this should fit you nicely" Cinder said handing Cyrus his crimson trench coat.
"Its exactly the same" Cyrus said putting it on.
"To the casual eye, but it holds a secret that are unlocked by your aura."
Cyrus created a small field of his aura around him and his coat revealed a bright red pattern going vertically up his coat and down his arms.
"Here, these will compliment you well" Cinder handed Cyrus some red and silver tonfas, they clearly had pistols with silencers built into them. Cyrus grabbed them and after swinging them around they vanished and his coat returned to normal.
"I like it" he said.
"I knew you would."
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and still no sign of Cyrus. Ricky was in the ballroom helping team RWBY with the dance preparations. Ruby didn't seem in a happy mood kinda like Ricky, he started the week with a smile, but it slowly faded again since Cyrus was still gone. He sat with Ruby at a table, she had her head down. Yang walked behind her with a huge speaker, she set it down and the whole placed seemed to rattle a bit. She brushed he hands and walked over to them.
"So have you picked out a dress yet?" She asked Ruby.
"Whats the point, who cares about the dance if Blake isn't going." Ricky put his hand on her shoulder for comfort.
"Oh don't worry, she's going" Yang said. She turned to away and yelled out "Weiss! I thought we agreed. No doilies!"
Weis walked up to her and said "If I don't get doilies, you don't get fog machines."
Then the door to the hall opened, Neptune and Sun walked in. "Your dance is gonna have fog machines?" Neptune asked while he was walking in.
"We were thinking about it" Weiss said walking to stand in front of Neptune, putting her hands together in front of her.
"Thats pretty cool" Neptune pointed while saying.
"You ladies all excited for dress up?" Sun asked.
"Ladies and one guy" Richard pointed out.
"Pft yeah right" Ruby said.
"Laugh all you want, I'll be turning heads tomorrow night" Yang said crossing her arms.
"What are you two wearing?" Weiss asked them.
"Uhh, this"
"Ignore him, for he knows not what he say" Neptune said putting his arm in front of Sun.
"Hey I may have moved to Mistral, but i grew up in Vacuo, its not exactly a shirt and tie kinda place" Sun said moving in front of Neptune.
"Yeah we noticed" Yang said.
"So what does Blake think of all this? She still being all, you know, Blakey."
"Obviously" Weiss said to Sun.
"I still can't think of a way to change her mind" Ruby said.
"Guys, trust me Blake will be at the dance tomorrow." Yang said and she walked out of the hall.
"I wish your sister could do the same with Cyrus" Ricky said sitting back in his chair.
"That dude's still gone, its been like a month" Sun said.
"Yeah I know, you don't need to remind me" Ricky said looking away. Ruby put her hand on his shoulder this time, it was her turn to comfort him. Ricky turned back to look at her and gave a slight smile.
"Well we need to go get our suits" Neptune said motioning Sun.
"We'll see you later" Sun said looking back while they walked out.
"I better go too" Ricky said getting up.
"Are you coming to the dance tomorrow?" Weiss asked.
Ricky sighed and said "I don't know" and he walked out.
He went to the library to try and think about something else, something other than Cyrus. He couldn't get the thought out of his mind, he remembered their fight just the way it happened.
"Then Leave! No one's keeping you here!"
"Fine! I'm done with you and this so called 'team RICH' good luck fighting the white fang without me."
His anger got the best of him and he hated himself for it. He sat at one of the computer terminals just staring at the screen. He heard someone bang the table, he turned to see Blake stand up and walk with her head facing down. Ricky was curious as to what was going on so he followed at a distance watching where she went. She eventually bumped into Yang, She grabbed Blake's arm and scurried away. Ricky continued to follow them. They went into a class room and closed the door behind them. Ricky thought for a while and then went to the outside of the same class. He climbed up to one of the widows, he slowly opened it to see Blake pacing back and forth while Yang sat on the desk. He climbed inside, quietly, making sure they didn't hear him. He stayed up on the rafters and listened in to their conversation.
"The necessity is stopping Torchwick" Blake said to Yang.
"And we're going to, but first you have to sit down and listen to what I have to say" Yang said patting the desk she sat on.
Blake took a seat and Yang continued.
"Ruby and I grew up in Patch, an island just off the coast of Vale. Our parents were Huntsmen, our dad taught at Signal and our mom would take on missions around the kingdom. Her name was Summer Rose and she was like, super mom, baker of cookies and slayer of giant monsters, and then, one day she left for a mission and never came back. It was tough, Ruby was really torn up but, I still think she was too young to really get what was going on you know. My dad just kinda, shut down, it wasn't long before I learned why, Summer wasn't the first love he'd lost, she was his second, the first was my mom. He wouldn't tell me everything, but I learned that the two of them had been on a team together with Summer and Qrow, and that she left me with him just after I was born. No one had seen her since."
"Why did she leave you?"
"That question, why? I didn't know the answer but I was determined to find out. Its was all I thought about, I would ask anyone I could what they knew about her. Then, one day, I found something, what I thought could lead me to answers or maybe even my mother. I waited for dad to leave the house, put Ruby in a wagon and headed out." Yang began to draw something on the chalk board. "I must have walked for hours. I had cuts and bruises, was totally exhausted, but I wasn't gonna let anything stop me. When we finally got there I could barely stand, but I didn't care I had made it. And then I saw them, those burning red eyes. There we were, a toddler asleep in the back of a wagon and a stupid girl too exhausted to even cry for help. We might as well have been served on a silver plater, but as luck would have it our uncle showed up just in time." She finished what she was drawing on the board. "My stubbornness should've gotten us killed that night."
Blake stood up from the desk and said "Yang I'm sorry that happened to you, and I understand what you're trying to tell me but this is different. I'm not a child and this isn't just a search for answers i can't just-"
"I told you, I'm not telling you to stop, I haven't, to this day I still want to know what happen to my mother and why she left me, but I will never let that search control me. We're going to find the answers we're looking for Blake, but if we destroy ourselves in the process then what good are we?"
"You don't understand! Im the only one who can do this!"
"No! You don't understand!" Yang turned away from the board to face Blake. "If Roman Torchwick walked through that door what would you do?"
"I'd fight him!"
"You'd loose" Yang said pushing Blake back.
"I can stop him!" Blake said trying to push Yang back, but failing.
"You can't even stop me!" Yang once again pushed Blake. She fell back onto the desk, she got up and Yang hugged her.
"I'm not asking you to stop, just please, get some rest, not just for you, but for the people you care about."
Yang was walking out when she turned back and said "And if you feel like coming out tomorrow, I'll save you a dance" then she walked out.
The door closed and Blake slammed her fist on the desk and put her head down.
"You still don't get it do you?" Ricky said from the rafters.
"Who's there?" Blake said unsheathing her Gambol Shroud.
"Relax" Ricky jumped down from the rafters in front of the desk.
"What do you want?"
"So Ruby tried, Weiss tried, Yang tried, and still its not getting to you."
"What are trying to say?"
"I'm saying its my turn to confess something, something I know I shouldn't, but its better if you knew."
"What is it?" Blake sheathed Gambol Shroud.
"Blake, you and I come from similar backgrounds, you grew up in a village just outside of Vale, you're a faunus, and you were once part of am organization that killed people."
"What?"
"Blake, I am in an organization that kills people" She put her hand on Gambol Shroud. "Not people like you." She put her hand down.
"People who treat you and others like, like minions, they want to rule over everyone and the worse part is, they already have the power to do so."
"Who are you talking about?"
"I'm talking about an group known as the Templars."
"Templars, didn't they disperse a long time ago?"
"Thats what they want you to think, really there everywhere that has power, and they intend to abuse that power, to gain absolute control."
"You, kill then?"
"The ones we can find."
"And who's we?"
"The Assassins."
"Your gonna tell me they also still exist."
"I am, and that I'm one of them."
"What the point in telling me this?"
"My point is that being an Assassin, you don't make friends, or be part of a family, you learn to live on your own. Most people like that have joined, like me, don't have a family anymore, they fight to avenge them and in the process learn about the reality of the world, that not all stories have a happy ending. Even before i became a member, I didn't have friends all I had were my parents, and once they were gone, all I had was my mentor's training, the cloths on my back, and the weapons I carry with me. That is until I came to Beacon and became part of your team. I wasn't the most social person at first, but that didn't stop Ruby, she got me to actually be part of the team and when I did I made friends. Friends that didn't care about what I was or the way I am, they just wanted me with them. I even made more friends after that, Iris, Harper...Cyrus... but when you start to push away your friends, after a while...they won't come back. What I'm trying to say is, you have good friends Blake, friends that care about you and that will be there for you, but keep ignoring them, push them away, and they'll stop being there for you, I know, its happened to me, and I regret every part of it. So listen to me when even I say, go to the dance tomorrow, spend time with friends, and enjoy yourself, its not something you'll get to do everyday, trust me."
"Okay...I guess."
"Good and don't tell anyone about me being an Assassin, like I said I wasn't suppose to tell you."
"Your secret's safe with me."
"Thank you, now if you'll excuse me, there something I need to do."
Ricky was outside team RWBY's dorm, he had a red rose behind his back. He put his hand up to knock but kept it up there re-thinking his idea. He went through with it and knocked on the door.
"Coming" he heard inside. Weiss opened the door.
"Oh, hello Richard."
"Hi Weiss is Ruby here?"
"I'm here" Weiss moved out of the way and Ruby was now in the door way "Whats up?"
"Can I, talk to you, in private?"
"Oh sure" she closed the door behind her.
"Ruby I was wondering,"
"Mhm"
"Well, we've been friends for a while and uhh"
"Yes?"
"Well I was uh wondering umm"
"Are you asking me to the dance"
Ricky looked down to see he had moved the rose from behind him to in front of him.
"Y-yes, will you go to the dance with me?"
Ruby put her arms around him and placed a kiss on his cheek.
"Does that answer your question?"
Ricky gave a smile and said "Yes, it does, one thing though."
"What is it?"
"Please tell me your not wearing you cape to the dance."
Ruby gave a small laugh "Only if you don't wear you hood."
"aw man, Okay then" he replied jokingly "now there's one last thing I need from you."
"What's that?"
Ricky kissed Ruby on the lips. She blushed a little, but didn't pull back.
"Does that answer your question?"
Ruby nodded and Ricky placed the rose in Ruby's hair.
"Okay, I'll see you tomorrow"
"See ya" and Ruby entered her dorm.
Ricky was about to walk back when he heard screams and Yang's voice ask "What did you say!?" There was a pause and then more screams. Ricky gave a smile and turned to walk back to his dorm. Harper came out of nowhere and said "Thats the spirit." Iris also came out and said "don't worry, we'll make sure you have fun tomorrow."
Ricky replied "thanks, you guys are real friends."