Disclaimer: RWBY doesn't belong to me. It's all Rooster Teeth's.

Ruby Rose was the leader of a team that seemed to be falling apart.

The school year had started well enough. She had many fears about being moved forward two years - that she wouldn't be good enough, that she couldn't keep up with the work, and, especially, that she wouldn't be able to make any friends.

These fears would prove to be unfounded. During her initiation, she ended up partnered with Weiss Schnee - the white-haired, white-dressed, rich heiress of the Schnee Dust Company. While their initial meeting had been explosive (literally), and there was some friction to start with, the two had eventually bonded and became solid friends.

Also on her team, to her delight, was her older sister, Yang Xiao Long. Tall, blonde, and curvy, Ruby would be the first to admit that she and Yang looked nothing alike - but ever since her mother had died, Yang had been a constant rock in her life, from tucking her in at night and reading her stories, to making her lunch for school, to always being there to give her advice if she needed it. Having her around was a familiar comfort to Ruby in what had started out as an unfamiliar place.

And rounding out the team was Blake Belladonna. Dark haired and darkly attired, Blake was almost like Yang's opposite in colour and temperament - where Yang was loud, headstrong and bold, Blake was calm, reserved and cautious. She was the quietest member of the team by some distance, not quite preferring her books over human interaction, but coming close - but she had still formed a fast friendship with each of the other three girls.

A friendship that was sorely tested today.

It had started in the school's dining hall, as team RWBY, first year students of Beacon Academy, had sat down to have their evening meal. It had been decent enough, for a Monday at least, but all of her team were glad to finally be out of the classroom.

Then, they overheard one of the other groups discussing the latest news involving Team CFVY. They all knew Velvet Scarlatina, a member of the upper-year team, due to her sharing some classes with them – Ruby honestly hadn't really paid attention as to why that was, considering the other girl was an upper year, and she didn't particularly care – she liked Velvet, who was always nice to her when they spoke, and that was all Ruby felt she needed to know about the matter.

According to the rumour mill, it seemed that Team CFVY had completed a strange mission – rather than facing Grimm, they had gone out to fight the White Fang, and apparently, they had done a really good job of it.

She probably should have expected that Weiss would be happy about the news. Even Ruby, lacking in worldly knowledge as she was, knew that the Schnee Dust Company and the White Fang hated each other with even more intensity than Ruby's long-standing enmity with her nemesis, green vegetables. She hadn't quite expected just how happy Weiss would be about it, though. As in, 'talking loudly about how they might get the chance to bring those degenerate, murdering Faunus to justice' levels of happy.

She also definitely hadn't expected Blake to get so angry, and start verbally tearing into Weiss – defending the White Fang's motives, and calling Weiss a racist.

It was at this point that Ruby had brought them all back to their dorm room, so they could continue the argument in some kind of privacy, mainly out of fear for their safety. Blake's sympathising with the White Fang wouldn't go down well with many of the students at Beacon, and she was pretty sure that if Velvet's team happened by while Weiss was saying some of the things she had been, they might have actually killed her, or they would at least have settled for crippling.

That was also the point when she stopped having any kind of relevance to the situation at all. From there, Ruby, brave and bold team leader of Team RWBY, had been reduced to a mere spectator, watching helplessly as two of the members of her team viciously tore strips from each other.

"They've got the entire city living in fear," Weiss ranted, "They're stealing Dust from every store and warehouse in Vale. They're a menace!"

"It's not them!" Blake stressed, "They're an equality movement! Why would they possibly need to steal Dust?"

"Why do they need to commit any of the criminal acts they do?" Weiss retorted, "Because they're a bunch of murdering psychopaths, that's why!"

"They are not!" Blake growled, "They are a group of misguided Faunus!"

"How can you possibly defend their actions?" Weiss demanded, "You know what they've done! They've killed, stole, vandalised people's belongings – they are terrorists! They are evil!"

"They are not evil!" Blake shot back heatedly, "They were only forced to act that way because of how the Faunus are treated!"

Weiss snorted. "Oh, and you really think they're flying the flag for Faunus equality by terrorising people?"

"Their methods might be wrong, but it doesn't change the fact that it was the actions of Humans that made them that way!"

"If the White Fang want equality, they should actually work for it," the heiress shot back, "Instead, they do nothing but lie, cheat, kill, and steal! Those Faunus don't want equality, they just want us gone!"

"Woah," Yang interjected, "The White Fang don't speak for all the Faunus. Look at Velvet. She's one of the nicest people at Beacon."

"And does one good person undo everything the White Fang have done?" Weiss snapped back, "I've met one good Faunus, and I've experienced a lot of very, very bad ones. You tell me how I should interpret that!"

"See? This, this is what I'm talking about," Blake gestured to Weiss furiously, "'Those Faunus', 'the Faunus,' you're nothing but a bigot! You're no better than those people who categorise the Faunus as thieves and criminals, before they've even met them, just for the crime of being born a Faunus! If you keep calling them monsters for no reason, eventually, they're going to get sick of it, and give you a reason!"

"Bigot?" Weiss hissed, "I have plenty of reasons to dislike the White Fang. They attack our property. They kill our employees. My friends, my family members, they have disappeared because of them. Every day, my Father would come home, angrier and angrier because of the things the White Fang had done to us. Do you think that was a particularly enjoyable place to grow up as his daughter? Because it wasn't."

"You," Blake actually laughed. It was not one of the laughs borne of genuine amusement that Ruby had seldom heard from Blake – this laugh was cold, and harsh, "You think that your petty little problems even compare to what they go through? You had a roof over your head and enough to eat, at least. You should try growing up on the streets, or in a hovel. You should try wondering where your next meal is going to come from. You should try having to hide from humans as a child because you're worried they might attack you."

"And that gives them an excuse to be murderers? You try to paint the White Fang as some kind of noble freedom fighters, but really, that's all they are. Murderers." Weiss glared.

"But of course, you'd know all about what a murderer looks like, wouldn't you, Schnee?" Blake's voice was so cold it could have emerged from Myrtenaster.

"And what is that supposed to mean?" Weiss demanded furiously.

"It means that your family turned killing Faunus into a business practice!" Blake exploded, "They die every day in those damn mines that earn your profits! Those expensive shoes? That hand-crafted dress? They look white on the surface – but to me, they've been stained red all the way through, from the blood money that bought them!"

"That is a lie!" Weiss shouted, "My family do not treat our own workers that badly! Yes, there are problems," she allowed, "I'm not stupid enough to think that there aren't. But not to the extent that you seem to think. Not at all."

Blake glared. "You don't even know, do you, you spoiled little brat? Maybe you should go and visit one of those mines some day. See if Daddy will let you – let you see those Faunus workers slaving away, working long, hard hours for barely any pay, the conditions they work in as dangerous as the work they do – nothing resembling decent lodgings, not enough food, and you don't want to know what happens if they're unlucky enough to annoy the foreman!"

"That's false propaganda, spread by the White Fang, trying to justify their crimes," Weiss insisted, "And you bought right into it!"

Then Blake did something none of them expected.

She pulled off the small, black bow that had always been an ever-present accessory atop her head.

"TELL ME IT'S A LIE NOW!" She roared in Weiss' face, "TELL ME WHAT I'VE SEEN WITH MY OWN EYES!"

No longer hidden by the black bow, Ruby's first inclination was to think that the little pair of cat ears on Blake's head were really cute. Had the situation not been so serious, she would have expressed it.

The second thing she felt was shock, and annoyance – at herself, for not figuring it out sooner. Blake was a Faunus. That was why she was so angry at Weiss' remarks – and that was why she seemed to know so much about how they lived, and what they had been through – she had been through it herself. Ruby felt a surge of horror at the implications Blake had just given about her early life.

Blake, apparently satisfied with having stunned Weiss into silence, stormed towards the bedroom window, opening it up fully.

"Wait, Blake, what are you doing," Yang asked nervously.

"I'm leaving," Blake said simply, "I need to think. I don't know when I'll be back."

"But you can think here," Ruby pleaded. It sounded just as desperate when it came out of her mouth as it did in her head.

"No," Blake spared a glance at the still-stupefied Weiss, "I can't. Not around her."

She leapt from the window, into the night.

"Blake, wait!" Ruby cried out, alongside her elder sibling.

And like that, one of the members of Team RWBY, her team, that she was sure would last forever, was gone.

Ruby jumped up onto the window to follow her – and felt a hand pulling her back down.

It was Yang. "Ruby, wait. Remember, she can see in the dark," she sighed wearily, "We'll never catch up to her in that," she gestured to the pitch-black night sky.

"I... but..." Ruby felt like she was on the verge of crying. "But she's our team-mate," she finished in a small voice.

"I know," Yang reassured her as she pulled her into a hug, "And tomorrow morning, first thing, the two of us are going to go out and find her, and then we're going to talk this all over, okay?"

"W-wait... the two of you? What about me?" Weiss finally regained her presence of mind and spoke up. Ruby ruthlessly suppressed the little part of her currently screaming that this was Weiss' fault in the first place - after all, she did also have some perfectly good points about the White Fang.

Yang wasn't quite so restrained. "I think you've done enough," she said with a glare.

Blake was gone. The rift between her and Weiss looked almost irreparable at the moment. Yang was also at odds with Weiss – and the worst part of it all was that Ruby felt like she had no control over the situation, no way to fix it, to make things better, to set things back to the way they were.

Maybe, a little voice in her head whispered, You aren't fit to be the team leader after all.

What Blake didn't know, was that a person who certainly could see her in the dark had spotted her running out.

"Guys... I'm heading out for a moment. I won't be long."

"What, now? It's pitch-black out there."

"I know. I've just spotted something I want to check out. Don't worry, I'll be fine."

Blake's self control finally slipped as she made it to the fountain in front of the school. Tears started streaming down her face as she came to a stop, and considered everything that had just happened.

She had expected this. From the moment she had been put on a team with Weiss Schnee, she knew, with absolute certainty, that this would have happened. They were always going to end up at odds with each other over the issue of the White Fang and Faunus rights – she was just surprised it had taken as long as it had for the spark to catch fire.

So why did it hurt so much?

At least, she thought to herself as she silently sobbed into the fountain, They don't know about my past with the White Fang, yet.

"I always thought you would look nice without the bow, you know."

Velvet frowned as she took in the current state of Blake Belladonna. Every time she had spoken to the first-year girl prior to now, she had been calm, collected and cool - playing her emotions very close to her chest.

That was demonstrably not what she could see here. Blake was openly crying – while nobody else could have picked it out, Velvet could see just as clearly in the dark as any Faunus - and she seemed to be on the verge of an outright panic.

"Velvet?" Blake asked quietly.

"Come on," Velvet said with the gentlest smile she could manage, "Whatever it is, you look like you need to talk about it."

Blake hesitated. For a moment, Velvet was worried she would run off. After a short moment, she nodded.

Velvet lead her over to one of the benches nearest to the fountain. They were silent for a moment, as she awkwardly tried to think about how to broach the question. She didn't have to.

"How can you stand it?" Blake asked quietly, looking at the ground.

Velvet sighed sadly, as she then made an educated guess as to what the problem was. "You've finally had trouble with your team-mate, I imagine."

Blake's eyes snapped to her. "How -"

"If it was just some random person you didn't know, I doubt it would have affected you this much," Velvet said simply, "And I can imagine that Weiss Schnee doesn't have particularly... pleasant, feelings about our people."

"No," Blake sighed, "That's putting it lightly. She really hates the White Fang – and the Faunus by association."

"Understandable," Velvet said. At the surprised look she got from the other girl, she clarified, "Not agreeable, but understandable. There's a lot of bad blood between her family and the Faunus, she's probably been raised from birth to dislike us."

"We got into a big argument," Blake continued, "It got really vicious. She was talking like all Faunus were nothing but thieves and liars, I called her a bigot and told her that her family are murderers. She said I was lying about the mines," she clenched her fist, "So I pulled off my bow, shouted in her face, and ran. Like I always run."

"And your other team-mates?" Velvet asked intently, filing away the last statement for later, "What did they do? Did they agree with her?"

"They... no," Blake thought about it, "Yang actually stuck up for me at one point. When Weiss was starting to get onto the Faunus, she said the White Fang weren't the same as all of us. She gave you as an example."

Well. Velvet felt earnestly touched – she had barely spoken to Yang Xaio Long. She tried her best to stop the embarrassed blush from creeping up her face.

"Ruby didn't say anything," Blake recalled, "She just... stood there, like she didn't really know what to do. I don't know who she agreed with."

Velvet thought over what she knew of the other girl. "Maybe she just didn't want to pick sides."

"But she should have picked a side," Blake scowled, "When one side was obviously wrong."

"Maybe," Velvet allowed, "But it takes a special kind of bravery to go against your friends, even if you know they're wrong, Blake. You shouldn't judge her too harshly for not wanting to pick sides between you."

"...I suppose." Blake was silent for another moment. "You didn't answer my first question," she said, "How do you stand it? How do you take the insults, the abuse, the bullying?"

Velvet thought about it. "All right. I'll let you in on my big secret," she leaned in conspiratorially, "I can't."

"You can't?" Blake sounded confused.

"I can't stand it," Velvet confided, "There are days when I just want to snap and start raging against the entire world. Days when I want to turn around after Cardin Winchester pulls on my ears and kick him so hard his teeth fly out – and then do the same to the rest of his team. I could do it, too," she said modestly, "I don't like to brag, but I have the skill."

"So what stops you?" Blake asked, "Is it not wanting to sink to their level?"

Velvet shook her head. "No. You are not sinking to their level merely by defending yourself, Blake. You should never think that. You would only be sinking to their level if you attacked them first."

Blake looked puzzled. "Then why?"

"Well," Velvet sat back on the bench and looked up at the stars, "Whenever I feel the urge to hit back, I ask myself a simple question. I think to myself, 'If you start this, Velvet... do you think you'll be able to stop?'"

"And?" Blake leaned in.

"It's always the same answer," Velvet gave a sad smile, "I don't know. So... it's better not to risk it, really."

Blake looked down again. "I don't think I could stop," she finally said, "But I don't want to become a monster," she finished in a quiet voice, "Not again."

Not again? What did – oh. Oh.

Well, if she had just implied what Velvet thought she had, that certainly made things a bit more complicated.

"More than anything, though," she began, trying to steer things back toward safer ground, "What helps me get through it all are my team-mates. Knowing that they have my back, that they'll be there for me no matter what, can make me feel like I could brush off all the insults in the world."

"I'm not sure if I have that any more," Blake said miserably.

"That's not what you just told me," Velvet pointed out gently, "I remember you said Yang defended your position. And while Ruby might not have said anything," she thought about what she knew of Ruby again, "Does she really strike you as someone who would hate you over your species?"

Blake shook her head. "No," she said, almost dryly, "I'm not sure I could ever picture Ruby hating anyone for anything. But that doesn't change the huge problem with Weiss."

Velvet mulled it over. "Well, Coco always says, 'Every problem has a solution'," she decided it wouldn't be very helpful to describe just what Coco's solution to the problem would likely be.

"And what's the solution here?" Blake asked desperately, "Because I can't see it."

"Well," Velvet nearly panicked as she was put on the spot, "Prove her wrong?"

"Prove her wrong?"

"Yes," Velvet said, gaining some more confidence, "She has her opinions on the Faunus – prove to her that she's wrong."

"I see," Blake hummed thoughtfully.

"Honestly... I don't know exactly what you should do," Velvet admitted, "I only came out here on a hunch. I don't have all the answers. I don't even think I have many of them. But I'd still suggest you speak to your friends, if you're ready for it."

"I don't think I am," Blake said after a moment of thought.

"Well, our door is open," Velvet offered, "Even if you don't want to go back to your team, I don't want you running off into the night alone. At the very least, sleep in our room for the night, and decide what you want to do in the morning."

Blake seemed to consider it.

"I'm not sure," she muttered, "Velvet... do you think the White Fang are really behind all of these robberies everyone is talking about?"

Velvet blinked at the sudden change in subject. "I'm not sure," she replied cautiously, "It certainly seems like something they're capable of, but we didn't find any hidden stockpiles of dust at the base we raided."

"The base you raided?" Blake perked up "I heard about that. That's what started our argument."

Velvet winced. "Well, sorry... but yes, that was our mission. We raided one of their bases, an old abandoned warehouse."

"They were in the city?" Blake sounded worried. Velvet, given her earlier suspicions, had a feeling she knew why.

"Just at the outskirts," Velvet tried to reassure her, "They had a base over in the old industrial district, but don't worry, it's gone."

Blake seemed deep in thought. Her eyes narrowed, then suddenly, she stood up, "Thank you for your offer, Velvet, but I've got something I need to do."

"Blake," Velvet said in concern, "What are you thinking."

"It's like you said," Blake's voice hardened with resolve, "If I want to make this better, I need to prove her wrong. So that's what I'll do. Thank you for speaking to me, Velvet. You were a great help."

"Blake, wait," Velvet began hastily, "At least stay the-" Blake's form seemed to flicker away, leaving a still copy in her place, that then flickered out of existence, "-night," she sighed, "Oh, dear. I'm not sure she took that in quite the way I intended it."

She mulled over her options. She could try going after her – but catching her, even as a Faunus, was unlikely, considering Blake was apparently adept at staying hidden when she wanted to, and she had a head start. On top of that, Velver had a rough idea of where she was going to be heading anyway. She decided to head back to her room and sleep on it.

When she made it back to her room and opened the door, the rest of her team was sitting, waiting for her.

Yatsuhashi broke the silence. "Well? Did you accomplish what you intended?"

Velvet frowned. "I'm not sure," she admitted, "But I hope so."

Blake's thoughts were racing as she traversed through the darkness, via the rooftops of Vale, towards the old industrial district.

She knew what she had to do. She would prove Weiss wrong, one way or the other. She would either prove that the White Fang weren't the ones committing the huge crime spree... or, if it turned out they were... she would prove that not all Faunus were like them, that there were Faunus who were willing to do what was right.

No matter what.

A/N: My respect goes out to any author who has re-written that argument between Blake and Weiss. It's seriously difficult to do so, stay close to canon characterisation and motivations, and not seem like you're bashing Weiss. I hope I struck the right balance, here.

Edited the argument between Blake and Weiss, after getting some feedback. I made Weiss too racist, oh dear. Hopefully, things look a bit better now.