"Wait, how?" Jet asked. Ruby felt her heart sink as he asked. She knew that this would have been a tough subject to broach.

"Jet, come with me. Izzet, you too." Lilac instructed with an unusually commanding tone. Ruby was even more surprised as Jet and Izzet obeyed. It seemed that, in Jet's absence, Lilac was the next in command.

As they left the small cave and the warm light of the campfire, Ruby closed her eyes. She remembered what had happened.

As Ruby got up, she realised that Jet was now unconscious. She screamed out as the dragon raised a claw, smoking with vapours from the melted snow covering it. Ruby rolled to one side as the colossal talons raked the ground where she'd just been. Getting up, she looked behind her and dived to the side again as the massive maw of the beast snapped at the air where she'd just been.

She had to defend Jet while he was down! She would not let it end it here!

All tiredness gone, she turned and faced the gigantic Grimm still baring down on her, putting Jet's body behind her. She would make this thing PAY for what it had done!

"Transcend!" Ruby yelled with her entire being, and her own purple flames flared into life, crackling around her, covering her like an aura. She channelled it around Crescent Rose, which unfurled at once. Raising the glowing scythe, she spotted the drake spinning on the spot, its spiked tail swinging their way. She slashed, slicing the enormous appendage off, causing a flood of sludge-like blood to pour out of the stump in a torrent, painting the snow crimson.

The Grimm howled with rage and turned to face her. She saw that orb on its head, the crimson glow it emitted making her dizzy, wobbly, unsteady. She fell, hitting the icy ground next to Jet. Now there was no escape. Her fires vanished, her strength fading.

It roared again, and was about to snap at them again when a flaming bullet nailed it on the side of the head. Ruby turned her head to see Yang, Weiss, Blake, Lilac, Izzet, and Nouvelle charge from the treeline. Words failed her. How on Remnant had they found her and Jet that quickly?

Yang punched the massive neck of the beast as Lilac and Nouvelle swept them up in their arms and dragged them to the treeline. Ruby glanced over at Jet to see him still unconscious. What had that thing done?

She looked out just in time to see Weiss and Blake dodge a large swathe of neon green fire that erupted from the dragon's maw, and Yang flying backwards having just been hit by the sweeping stub of a tail. Izzet was on the thing's back, though as soon as Ruby noticed her, the dragon did as well, and shook itself. She flew off it, and landed hard in the snow.

Nouvelle crouched next to her as Lilac immediately went to help Izzet and Yang.

"Say sorry to zem for me." she said, with a grave expression on her face, clasping Ruby's left hand with her right, the one not holding Burning Meteor. "And tell Jet, when he wakes up, I should have seem eet sooner. 'E will understand."

"What do you mean? Nouvelle?" Ruby yelled over a deafening roar by their enemy. Nouvelle did not reply, but instead drew a knife and shrouded it in bright red flames, before thrusting it through her own wrist and holding it aloft for all to see, including the dragon, which now focussed on her.

Nouvelle ran deep into the forest, though Ruby could still see a trail of flames indicating her presence. The dragon took flight at once, and Ruby stood up and immediately picked up Jet. Yang was running her way, gesturing for her to run, and as Ruby did, following Lilac and Izzet who lead the way to shelter, she heard Nouvelle's scream, before a horrible snapping sound and a sharp end to her last voice.

Ruby remembered it. That terrible 'crunch' that could only mean one thing. Nouvelle had sacrificed herself to save them from the dragon-like Grimm.

Jet entered back through the cave entrance, flanked by Izzet and Lilac. Team RWBY all met their gaze. It wasn't long before Ruby realized Jet was steeling himself, and she knew why. As leader of LIJN, Jet had lost a team member. She wondered if he would say something.

"Nouvelle wasn't truly known by many." Jet said, slowly, calmly. Ruby found herself being enveloped in his voice. "Many of her achievements remain unsung, and unremembered save for the few who knew." At this, the remaining members of LIJN placed a hand on their hearts. Ruby found her hand inching up to her own, steadily beating heart, and stayed her hand.

"She was an invaluable asset to our team. She maintained the structural integrity of LIJN, and showed us a shining example of not just embracing the change of day to day life, but thriving in it." Lilac said, a sombre tone that seemed alien to her normally cheerful voice.

'Even to those who barely knew her,' Izzet sent, 'she was kind and strong, and protected those weaker than herself in the end. Her fire still burns in our hearts.'

"Nouvelle." Jet concluded, keeping very calm. Ruby could feel tears springing again. She barely knew her, but she hated this feeling of mourning. It always made her so sad. "You'll always be a member of LIJN. Fare thee well."

At this, all three of them closed their eyes and bowed their heads. Each held out a hand, and in each, a fire crackles, small but fierce. Izzet's was a red and blue conflagration, fires of violet were in Lilac's, and a black flame was in Jet's hand. A green flame hung in the center of the cave, and as Ruby watched, it slowly died, until it was gone.

Their task done, the three teammates sat down, extinguishing their flames. As Ruby ventured over to join Jet, she noticed tears in the eyes of all her teammates, even Weiss, who was normally much more staunch in her demeanour.

All in a similar sense of loss.

They had never had a teammate die before.

Jet looked upon her team, and as the silence stretched on, Ruby felt it time to ask, finally.

"So why did we have to run, Jet?" Ruby asked. "Were we caught?"

She could almost feel the stares of her teammates. Jet closed his eyes, and bowed his head.

"Yes, we were." Jet replied. "One stupid mistake of mine."

"Care to share?" Blake asked, joining them. Slowly, the others followed.

"I suffered another Reversion." Jet admitted. "I went out of the pub not knowing at the time. I only really realised when I was in that alleyway that Ruby found me in. Before you, two other people found me while I was suffering that pain. A man and an old woman." He slapped his own forehead. "The woman realised what I was from the flames, and I knocked them both out immediately. My guess is that one of them immediately called the police upon getting their consciousness back, though I'm not exactly sure how that they had proof that I was an Angel of Darkness."

"Probably from the security camera that filmed you in that alleyway." Yang commented. It took Ruby a second to process that, and clearly from Jet's reaction, he was the same.

"There was a security camera?" Jet asked, incredulously. Yang nodded.

"We were told by Ozpin." Weiss added. "He helped us out in getting us to you."

Ruby felt stunned. OZPIN had done that? Weiss glanced her way before continuing.

"He loaned us an aircraft, and we saw you guys, but that dragon thing you saw before shot us down." she explained. "We crashed not far from where you were, then you disappeared for a bit and then next thing we knew, you were flying up to meet that dragon."

"Well, that explains things." Jet replied, as he stood up. "We should get moving soon."