It takes a few extra lives (or maybe twenty), but Yang manages to get it all: the four of them alive and safe and off the beach. From there, they continue inland, skirting around the empty-looking Grimm pools (just in case), and taking their time as they round corners, even when the world around them is unnaturally still. It's hard to track time in the Land of Darkness (the sky always seems to hang above them in the same ominous red), but by the time they find a small outcropping of buildings, several miles inland, it feels late, like the sun should have set a while back. There's no growth on the ruins (though ruins they most certainly are), and it feels deeply wrong in a way that's hard to pinpoint. Life and decay gives everything an age, and the lack of it in this place adds to the sensation of timelessness, in the most unsettling way possible.
"Well we obviously can't go in there," Ruby says, waving towards the ruins. "First of all, they're just creepy. Second of all, everyone knows that Grimm and creepy ruins are like… cookies and milk." She pauses, eyes squinting in concentration. "But evil. There's probably about a million Grimm in there and keeping with the whole sneaky, stealthy ninja thing has really worked for us so far, right?"
Weiss ignores the chatter, as she's grown used to doing over the past day and a half. "I've never seen anything like this here. These are — people built these. How did we not know that people lived here?"
"They're older than they look," Blake murmurs, coming to the same conclusion as Yang upon first viewing the structures. "The stone's held up well, without any decay. Whoever lived here is gone. Probably centuries ago. Maybe longer. But you're right. It's… odd to think of people living in this place once. We've lost so much of our history. Sometimes it feels like all we have left are the stories of propaganda."
"The perfect bedtime story: how Ironwood saved us from the brink of collapse," Yang chimes in and gets two eyerolls (one fond, one a little less so) in response. "Anyways, it'll be fine. We need to stop and rest, and this is a better place to do it, rather than anything out in the open. All of us shattered our auras getting here, and they need time to recharge. I'd rather make the final push to the castle when we're at full strength. And that includes eating and getting a few hours of sleep."
She knows she'll get pushback, especially from a particularly disheveled Weiss (the uneven cut of her shoulder-length hair now looking less like a purposeful fashion statement and more the result of an unfortunate incident with a Grimm's claws), which is why she immediately steps into the nearest building — a former two-story with bits of the second story strewn all about — and lets herself laugh at Ruby and Weiss's collective squawk.
"Yang! We haven't — " Weiss cuts herself off with a huff. "Idiot," she hisses, instead of finishing her thought, but still dives in after Yang first, sword withdrawn, dust locked in the chamber. This, Yang had come to realize, was quintessential Weiss, and she slaps her on the back in quiet appreciation when she dips into the first room, causing the smaller woman to jump high enough that their eyes — for just a moment — meet on the same level.
"See? Nothing here. I've got like, a sixth sense for Grimm now, I swear." Weiss glowers and Yang grins and the two of them — each stubborn in their own right — hold out in this stalemate until Ruby and Blake stumble and slip (respectively) into the room. It's not much; four walls and half a ceiling, but Yang ducks into one of the adjoining ones and emerges with a worn, standard-issue UFR pack dangling from her fingers. "We're not the first either. Looks like someone made it out here before. Three years ago, I'd guess."
"That — " Weiss steps forward, takes the pack with something akin to wonder. "That seems unlikely."
"There could have been a platoon that broke off," Blake muses. "A small group that ran or wandered off and slid through the worst of it. We were a bit more spread out then, after all. The Grimm weren't quite so coordinated at the start of the fight to trap us in one location, like they did today."
Ruby's quiet, her hand pressed to the worn stone as she looks around, eyes wide. Yang knows what she's thinking, but stays silent until the words come forth naturally. "I wonder who lived here. I wonder what they were like. Or what made them come here."
"Maybe it wasn't such a bad place, early on," Yang murmurs, and can almost imagine it; grass among the purple crystals, rich soil that could hold crops better than any other, civilizations that grew along the shores. Maybe it was a beautiful place, before the Grimm flourished, and — unchecked — took hold, sucking every drop of life that'd once been here.
"I've always thought this place has always been… lifeless." When she takes the pack from Yang, Weiss looks disquieted. "It feels so much worse, knowing that something choked all the life out of it first."
"But it means it can get better too, right?" Hope is such a novel thing these days, and three sets of eyes turn towards Ruby's optimism, drawn to it instinctively. "After we finish this thing, maybe this can be a good place again." No one has the heart to argue, especially when Ruby smiles at each of them, the beam of it gliding past like a flashlight. "Let's look around. Yang's right; we should rest. And maybe we can find more stuff to help us rest easier, if it was a group of people that made it here."
"Go in pairs," Weiss adds, and a distinct crease forms in her forehead when Blake steps close to Yang, taps her on the shoulder and nods towards the outdoors. Yang knows the look well, has seen some variation of it a hundred times, and knows it's borne in surprised curiosity rather than jealousy, an attempt to sort through the meaning behind the unexpected. If she had an explanation, she would offer it, but instead she follows Blake out of the building, preferring to enjoy rather than dwell.
They're successful in their search, Yang more than the rest. She finds another bag with a portable stove and some rations, a few bedrolls, a medical kit, and — most importantly of all — three mugs and a bag of coffee beans. She scoops the finds up quickly, climbing around the ruins without much concern for her safety, while Blake mostly watches, her weapon in hand. They're back before Ruby and Weiss and set up in the main room, lining up the bedrolls along the wall and shifting stone around until they have a makeshift campfire of sorts, the small stove at the center of four large blocks that function as seats. Yang doesn't mind doing the heavy lifting when Blake watches with such clear appreciation, not shifting her gaze away even when Yang notices.
"Like what you see?" Yang asks.
"You know I do."
The quiet murmur lances through Yang's chest, pushing away the headache that's been pounding at her skull for the duration of the day, clearing room for the lightheadedness that overtakes her. Blake stands comfortably, weight shifted to her side, and there's a casual tilt to her head, an easy lift to her lips that would seem out of place if their surroundings weren't overwhelmed by it instead. Which checks out. For a while now, Yang has known and held onto this simple fact; Blake's quiet smile makes the end of the world fall in line.
"We found a flashlight!"
She and Blake aren't close, and so there's no need to spring apart, but Blake does startle, ears flattening against her head as she takes a reflexive step back. Yang only smiles, shrugging a bit. (Nothing to be done about it, she means, or maybe just, later.)
"And water," Weiss adds, wearing the same searching look as earlier, if only briefly. "Perhaps that's worth mentioning first, given we're running low on our own supplies."
Clearly, Ruby disagrees, already holding the handle of the flashlight between her teeth and laying down the foundations of what's sure to be an impressive shadow puppet.
"I'm sure we'll make good use of it all," Yang slides in, skirting around Ruby and patting Weiss on the shoulder as she collects the bundle of canteens from her arms. "Everyone sit. Enjoy the show. I'll get everything ready. Give me seventeen minutes and we'll have warm meals and drinks. Promise."
Seventeen minutes later, she's proven to be true to her word. Ruby is well into the third act of her shadow puppet play (an interesting interpretation of an incident involving a stray dog she and Ruby had once found in the middle of the Vacuan desert, wherein the dog both spoke and led them to a magical treasure, two details Yang can't quite recall from her own memories), which Weiss has fallen into with rapt attention and Blake laughs at on no less than three occasions. Yang lets the warmth the sight produces fill her up, greedy in what she takes, ignoring caution and sense. She doesn't need to ask for preference when it comes to each of her companions' meal choice, and serves them without any input (chili for Blake, veggie burger for Ruby, pesto pasta for Weiss), followed shortly by drinks (with just the right amount of sugar and cream).
It's a perfect moment in an imperfect time, frozen into place by sheer force of will. Blake cracks a wide smile as she tells the story about the first time she'd met Weiss (it involves the word 'nincompoop', Weiss tripping over a misplaced canteen, and a vicious debate over tea), Weiss flushes red, and Ruby snorts water out of her nose. Weiss surprises them all by absentmindedly spinning a napkin on the back of her hand and then attempts to teach them all the bar trick when Yang demands it. (Yang picks it up quickly, Blake and Ruby not so much.) Ruby manages to convince Weiss (and possibly Blake) that she'd won 'Lil Miss Patch' when she'd been a child, an entirely fictitious beauty pageant for toddlers that Ruby invents on the spot with far too much detail. And somewhere in the middle of it all, Blake takes her hand and massages the skin between Yang's index finger and thumb, soothing the headache Yang hadn't mentioned, with a method Ruby had only mentioned once, a hundred lifetimes ago.
(Impossible, of course. But not the first impossibility. Yang has learned not to look too closely at such things. To keep them in the corner of her eye. Have you noticed yet? the universe seems to ask, and she won't answer for fear of losing out on experiencing the signs.)
By the time they finish, the sky outside is a dark red, finally night in an observable way, and Yang has a far easier time convincing Weiss that they should all wait a few hours for things to lighten up again before heading out. After that, it's only a short while longer before Ruby and Weiss tuck into their bedrolls and Blake slips outside for the first watch she'd volunteered for and Yang follows her, because Yang will always follow Blake, wherever she goes, whenever she has the chance to do so.
"Tell me why you don't believe in fate, Blake Belladonna."
The night before, they'd discussed it on the roof, as they so often did. The night before, Blake had slipped into her lap and kissed her and tugged on Yang's hair exactly the way she liked when the person tugging on it was Blake and Blake only. The night before, Blake Belladonna had told her that she trusted herself more than she trusted fate and laughed when Yang had said that not trusting in something and not believing in something were two mutually exclusive things and then kissed her some more.
But now, when Blake turns — her smile tilted far to one side — she doesn't dodge the question.
"It's easier to not believe than the alternative," she says simply.
"To believe in it at all?"
The sky is darker than dried blood, still distinct from the grey ground in the gloom of the night. Though the moon rarely breaks through, even from behind the clouds, it provides just enough light for Yang to take in the soft features of Blake's face, the lift of her shoulders when she releases a breath. And just then (right then, right at that very moment, the one Yang knows will always come if she's careful), Blake looks up — eyes hooded and full of the whole of the universe — and steps closer. She steps closer and leans in until her lips are at Yang's ear and she presses a hand to her cheek, callus on callus on callus, but soft soft soft soft.
"Do you think the universe gets it wrong sometimes?" she asks, barely a whisper, as though she might be overheard by the notion of time, by the concept of space. But then, something new, something different: "Is that why you keep coming back here?"
Yang's surprise is such that she might pull back, if every muscle in her body hadn't been all but programmed to not even pull back from this woman in particular, not when she has a choice.
"What?"
"Is that why you keep coming back here?" Blake asks again, still only a murmur. "Not changing anything? Not telling us we've made it to this exact spot before?"
It's the first time she's been found out, and with it, paths reset, timelines refresh. She's familiar with the sensation by now and doesn't resist, only leans further into Blake's touch and sighs.
"How'd you know?"
"You didn't check for Grimm in the building, you found everything far too fast, you knew precisely the meals to give each of us to avoid any debate, and you didn't laugh nearly hard enough when I told that story about Weiss landing flat on her face in the mess hall." Blake's laugh is soft against her ear, lovely enough to make Yang shiver. "You got a bit sloppy towards the end."
"I always want to skip to the best part," Yang admits, curling her arms around Blake's hips, swaying a bit, and marveling at how Blake moves with her.
"Which is?"
She could guess — surely Blake could guess — and so she must want Yang to say it.
(So Yang does.)
"This." So simple, but the barest truths so often are. "Just this."
Blake doesn't pull away either, fingers slipping further down and curling around Yang's jaw instead, keeping them cheek to cheek.
"I know for a fact we've done this elsewhere. And much more, if last night is any indication." She can't manage to sound put out, and even if she had, the curl of her mouth against Yang's skin would have given her away. "So what makes this worry of wasting your repeat on?"
"Oh, come on. This is hardly the first time we've wasted time for this sort of thing." Her hand slides up under Blake's tactical vest, palm pressing flat against the warm skin of her back. "Do you know how many resets it took me to track down a strap earlier on? And you definitely weren't complaining about that one. It was your idea!"
"Yang!"
It's a memory Yang had forgotten to share last night; there are so many now and so little time, and she's greedy with her present, aching for new moments with Blake to add in (so eager to pretend they're both moving forward at the same pace). Next time, she'll tell Blake earlier, if only to hear the surprise in the laugh that she gets now.
"Well! It's true!"
"How many times?"
"Well, from the start I was pretty sure I'd have to track down Coco Adel, but the first time she totally brushed me off because I came on way too strong. So the second time I told her I was having an emergency with my — "
"How many times have you come back here?" Blake clarifies, digging a finger into Yang's most ticklish spot (just behind her hip), until Yang squirms, pulling Blake with her into the motion.
"Don't start that, now. You know I have an advantage. I remember what touching every part of your body does to you."
A threat and — if Yang has her way — a promise. Blake recognizes the duality contained within and gets caught on the latter, breath catching slightly, body curling further into Yang's.
"How many times, Yang?"
Yang knows the number, but the real answer doesn't involve it at all.
"Not enough."
They settle like that, twined in each other, heat radiating between them, cheek pressed to cheek. Blake's fingers stroke rather than poke and Yang scratches her nails in a tight circle at the small of Blake's back. And they sway in the still air. Quietly. Perfectly. Different but the same.
"Why not?"
It's not a truth she should tell, she's told herself this a million times. But today, Blake asks and she answers. Today, she will make room for the truth.
"It's where I knew I'd fallen in love with you," she admits, barely a whisper. "That moment you look back at me when I walk outside. I don't know why, but that was it. We've never made it any further than this — I have no idea what's beyond this building — because I don't want to change anything that makes me miss that. Because I want to have that feeling one more time."
She feels Blake's swallow (hears it too, loud against the shell of her ear). Their timelines are different, paths not quite converging, and there's nothing Blake could possibly say back that wouldn't be a lie. Not yet. Yang doesn't mind. It feels nice to say, to release, to admit, to give back to the world that'd allowed her to find it, even if the same world hadn't made it particularly easy.
"Do you think the universe gets it wrong sometimes?" Blake asks again, somehow quieter this time.
It's the sixth time she's asked, but Yang's never quite had the right response.
Today, she settles on something simple. Something true.
"Yes." She pulls back, presses her thumb to Blake's bottom lip, watches her pupils expand. "But if we keep pulling, maybe it'll eventually get it right."
Today, she pulls and Blake follows.
They'll keep trying until they get it right.
That night, Grimm flood the house.
Just as they always do, just as they always have.
Yang wakes a half hour before the assault, not to prepare, but to say goodbye. She's spent enough time here, selfish hours that have pounded against her skull in retribution, but now, she'll take another ten minutes more, staring down at the woman tangled in her arms, tucked against her shoulder, leg slung over her hip. There are so many things she has to remember, just to get them to this point, but she locks this moment away with care (if she had to replace it with another — one that might spare her life — she wouldn't let it go, this she doesn't doubt).
It's hard to wake Blake, harder still to leave the joined bedrolls to find Weiss and Ruby, the former curled up against a crumbling foundation wall, the other slumped nearby, awake but bleary.
"Grimm," she says simply. "Lots of them. Get ready."
Blake slips into the room, fully dressed in clothing and demeanor, and the weariness only hits Yang then, watching the woman she loves close herself back off.
She's tired. Tired than any man, woman, or child has even been, maybe, with the exception of the woman standing alongside her. And she knows they're doomed, just as they've always been, just as they always are.
But still, she loads her gauntlets, she gets into place, and she fights.
(She dies.)
—
Dying isn't the hardest part. Yang realizes this early on. Pain and fear fade away, numbed by repetition, until they're a chore more than a true bother.
But the emptiness in Blake's eyes when Yang finds her in the training room — reset after reset — that never seems to hurt any less.
Heartbreak, it turns out, has no limit.
It always cuts just the same.
—
201, 202, 203, 204, she wishes she would lose track, 205, 206, 207, she dies again and dies some more, 208, 209.
It's the same.
210 through 259 passes in a blur.
There isn't a single change that matters.
260, 261, 262.
She sees the castle always, superimposed on her vision, a thin screen over the rest of the world.
On 263, she spends an hour carefully marking lines into the sand with her finger, tally-marks of the lives she's lived. They stretch out as far as she can see and her headache drops her to her knees, empties her stomach.
264 to 298, she's losing sight of purpose.
299 and she's —
—
" — tired?"
The room is clear now, mist no longer obscuring its light purple walls, brass chandelier, or sturdy oak door. Yang sits with the woman on the small bench of her vanity, outer thighs pressed tight together as they share a space meant for one. The woman asks her question as she always does, as though she already knows the answer, as though it belongs to her as much as Yang. She doesn't remember the beginning of it or maybe she'd started in the middle or maybe Yang hadn't been there until now.
(Time doesn't work like it used to.)
"Yes."
Yang answers anyways, and she's rewarded by the smile that she now knows is borne in understanding rather than kindness. But this is not all; the woman stands, offers her hand and waves towards the door, a dark line of smoke underlying the movement, highlighting the destination. It's an easy choice, to leave the familiar room; Yang feels she knows every corner of it, every inch, even though it's been at least partially covered in fog before now. The woman lifts her from her seat easily, as though Yang, too, is made of the same insubstantial mist, and they both float to the door and then through it. The hallway they enter is decorated similarly; shades of purple, expertly laid stone, and tapestries of the richest silk, but there's another addition: statues of marble, each one carved into the likeness of a Grimm, the claws and teeth and limbs carefully rendered. The woman steps away to greet one with a strangely soft caress.
"Will you give up?" she asks, turning away from the figure to face Yang, though her hand remains atop its head. "Have you reached that point yet?"
A shake of her head is not answer enough; Yang speaks before she's completed the motion. "No. You already know I won't. You say your number was in the thousands, so you have to know I won't."
Her nod counters Yang's shake; it is short and curt where Yang's had carried on in its vehemence. "I do know. There are some people we cannot leave behind, no matter the cost." She stares for a long moment. "It's terrible, what people will do for love."
Yang reaches for one of the tapestries, longs to trace along the delicate threads. Her hand passes through, but scatters the particles momentarily, a blur of purple that settles back into place when she withdraws.
"I don't know that 'terrible' is the right word."
"No?" The woman hums, stepping away from the statue to make her way to the window: thick, painted glass without a latch or means of opening it. "Are you sure? Is there anything you wouldn't do to save the ones you care for? Would you kill? Steal? Lie? Would you let the rest of the world burn?"
Outside, the world is green, lush forests and rolling hills. A golden cobblestone path winds through the fields, reflecting the sun, disappearing into the vast mountains beyond. It's beautiful until it isn't; another blink and it turns dark: violet, red, purple, black. The sky hangs too low, the ground cracks and splits into the planet's core. Viscous pools of black bubble with intent, purple crystals jut into the sky like knives. Yang jumps back, body jolting with the shock, but when she looks again, only pleasant blue skies and lush grass greet her.
"It happens gradually," the woman continues. "A small compromise here or there. You're surprised how easy it is, to sacrifice for love. You find faults in everyone else, excuses that offer comfort. And then, seemingly suddenly, you've gone too far. And all for love. At the start, at least, it's always for love."
The scene before her flickers again, a flash of blood-red.
"Do you regret it?" Yang asks, fingers pressed to the glass, question faint.
"I might if I could, but I can't." The woman is at her side, shoulder pressed against her own. "There is nothing of me left. But that's not the question you mean to ask."
It's not, and so Yang tries again.
"Would you do it again?"
It's impossible to say what the woman sees when she looks out the window, but Yang knows it doesn't particularly matter; wasteland or paradise or anything in between, the woman no longer cares.
"Of course," she says. "Every time."
—
Yang's words are strong, her resolution the same, but still her breaking point comes, only fifty lives later, at the start of her three-hundredth attempt.
She tries not to make anything of the big numbers, but does anyways, weird anniversaries that she celebrates with rewards to herself. (On her fiftieth, she'd held Blake's hand on the airship; on her hundredth, she'd brought her flowers, picked off several cacti with no small amount of care; on her hundred-and-fiftieth, she'd flirted with Weiss until the woman's face had turned an alarming shade of puce and Blake had dragged Yang into the planning room to yell at her — and then make out with her — for a solid half hour. After her two hundredth, she'd stopped, because nothing would ever be able to surpass that first night with Blake, holed up in a shitty ruin, finding out that Blake's surprising softness didn't stop at her skin.)
But on her three-hundredth life, Yang is empty, and there is nothing else. Exhaustion has taken a saw to her flesh, scooped out her innards, and filled away her bones until they've become dust. She is hollow, and she goes through the motions like a wind-up: mechanical, routine, a shell of wood and bits of metal. The beauty of it is in the simplicity, no complex mechanisms involved in continuing her existence. But there's danger in the same thing; without the redundancies that convolution offers, one broken part and she's done for. She packs her bag and nods when she should, smiles when she must, but as the base camp comes into view, she feels the weakness of the structure, and the shaking starts, a furious tremor in her left hand. She's empty, and so if the panic clawing at her sides breaks through, it will fill her completely. She sends Ruby ahead, promises of pancakes and none of the information that causes rot and rust, keeping it locked inside for the first time since her second reboot.
It's too much. It's far too much. She stumbles back — finds a corner, turns into it, presses her forehead to the cool stone — because it's a graveyard. Every soldier before her is one that she can remember seeing dead, and the present and past (still present? alternative present? past present?) superimpose on each other, each face a picture of unblemished skin overlaid with torn flesh and stretched wounds like a hologram.
She'll run. She'll run, she'll run, she'll keep on running. The layout of the base is hers, no location a mystery. She'll lie her way through to the hangar, she'll take one of the bikes, and she'll run run run run run. Her whole arm is trembling now and there's blood in her mouth or maybe that's from a past life or — no, there's blood in her mouth because she's caught the side of her tongue between her teeth and bit down hard and that's now, that's the present. The current present. But there isn't blood on her hands — not literally, not yet — or pouring out of her gut or pooling out underneath Ruby or Weiss or Blake and so she has to run because she can't see it again. Not once. Not once more.
She stares at the ground as she stumbles away, trusting her feet to take her to the hangar, muscle memory carrying her onwards. She's pulled by a riptide again, but this one's malicious, or maybe just scared. She's running, not drifting, and so she almost doesn't notice the thread, the shift of the wind that whispers at her from a quieter place. She pulls without full knowledge, trusting instinct rather than sense, and finds herself in the training hall, blinking back at the guards she's snuck past, as she has nearly three-hundred times before.
And then there's Blake, where she always is, doing as she always does, and of course.
(Yang's pulled on a thread and here she is.)
It's the same as every day except it isn't, because when Yang sees her for the first time (again, again, again, the first time again) — stretched on the mat of the training room, sweat cooling on her dark arms, back arched with her smooth movements, ignoring the holograms around her — she realizes, quite suddenly, that she'd been wrong before.
Yang's not empty, because she's because she's never been that. Even at her worst, even on the verge of collapse, there's a permanent place in her hollowed out form for the woman in front of her. When there's absolutely nothing left in her, when she feels only thin walls and the panic outside, she will still hold a fierce, terrible love. For Blake, for Ruby, even for Weiss. And it's strong, punishing in its tenacity, in its capacity to hurt — loop after loop — when she fails, when she's unrecognized, when she watches them die. But the same characteristic saves her now. She will love in the face of three hundred deaths and three hundred more, and she'll love now, when it's the only option she has left, all other emotions burned out, but one last thing clinging on.
The panic slides away in the face of that.
When she steps forward, she's calm.
(She will still run, but only for today. Today, she has space for one thing inside of herself, and — for once — she deserves her fill. The fabric of space and time will give her this because Yang will demand it. Because she must.)
"Can I help you?" Blake asks, like she always does.
And like Yang always does, she watches as Blake slides to her feet, graceful and lithe. She watches and wants and remembers, just as she had for the first time and every time since. That first moment will never lose its effect, not just on Yang, but on everything around her.
In that moment, both Yang and the universe will always hold their breath.
"Yeah," she rasps.
She'll tilt her head next, Yang thinks, and Blake does. Except that she smiles too — small and curious more than anything else, but still clear — and this is entirely new.
(Did you know I needed this? Yang thinks. Could you tell I was falling apart?)
(Maybe. Maybe maybe maybe. In the midst of this particular moment, it's easy to believe.)
"You can get a drink with me," Yang continues, like she never has.
She has come to find that the smallest actions can have the largest effect, that a minor change can turn the course of a fight. Today that change is in Blake's smile, coming earlier than it should, lodging deep in Yang's chest and making her ache. It cracks her open, spills everything within her out of the floor. (Which is love, of course. Right now, it's just love.)
But there's no explanation for what follows, for Blake's long blink, for the tongue that darts out to wet her lips, for her eventual response:
"I have a few hours. Where would you like to go?"
It's a rhetorical question, really, because there's only one place within a hundred miles that can offer what Yang's promised. Years ago, at the start of construction for the forward base, a small town had sprung into being as well, tucked into the northern peninsula of Vacuo. Its inhabitants — the mechanics, cooks, builders, and various other staff that declined to live on the base with the soldiers — had done what Vacuo citizens rarely did, and built permanent buildings. One of these (certainly the most popular among those given leave or the Huntsmen who were not beholden to the military) was a bar, and this is what Yang speeds towards now, on a bike borrowed from base. (Acquiring it had been simple with Blake Belladonna in tow; she'd merely asked, and those on duty at the hangar had hurried to obey.)
The hum of the vehicle, the rush of wind through her curling strands, and the warmth of the motor against her thighs all feel good (freeing), but not nearly as much as the sensation of Blake pressed to her back, a single arm curled low around her hips, the point of her chin rubbing against the anterior of Yang's shoulder. She doesn't try to talk over the rush of wind, and Yang follows suit; she's learned to be content with moments of silence, learned — over the past three hundred resets — to gather as much from them as she might in full conversations. She's also learned that Blake, in particular, never fears leaning into it, that when she speaks, it's never without point, never the aimless chatter of Yang herself, Ruby, or even Weiss. So when the silence continues — all throughout the drive and up to the moment they dismount in front of the bar — she's hardly concerned, content to watch from the seat of the bike as Blake removes her helmet and shakes out the dark curls that fall just below her jaw, messy and tangled and falling into her eyes until she runs her fingers through the strands, lips parting and neck bending as she combs it all back into place.
In every reset, there are things that usually change and things that typically stay the same, but the one constant in all three-hundred of them is that Yang always wants Blake with a blinding intensity that verges on dangerous (the urge to jump off the ledge of the tallest buildings, to roll back the throttle on a sharp curve, to look at the sun in the midst of an eclipse). There's a comfort in that familiarity, and she feels at home in that want now, watching Blake with something that might be akin to awe (reverence, maybe). Blake catches her looking, of course — it's not something she's particularly trying to hide and wouldn't be able to if she were — and one corner of her lips lifts, a crooked and questioning smile.
"Something to say?" she asks.
There's the honest answer, which is yes. (Yes - and - you're gorgeous - and - I've known you for three hundred lives - and - our love has found its way into our mouths before - and - I want to grow old again - and - I want to grow old with you - and - do you remember me? do you? do you? do you?) But the honest answer holds too much underneath, traps lying in wait, things that will keep her from having drinks with a pretty girl and ignoring everything else. So she smiles instead, slides off the bike and rolls out her shoulders as she stands.
"I bet you're a whiskey kind of girl."
(It's not a guess. It's never a guess anymore. Yang knows Blake's a whiskey kind of girl because the night before the 167th attempt, Weiss had brought out her own reserves and told the story of the time she'd forced Blake into a blind taste test of liquors where she proved, once and for all, that her favored brand was truly, unequivocally superior to any of the off-brands Blake claimed tasted just as good. After, Blake had admitted to Yang that she and Weiss had played the same game many times before the one Weiss still remembers, that she could have altered the ending but didn't, because there was something perfect about remaking a memory that would have otherwise been lost.)
"I bet you're a tequila kind of girl."
(This has to be a guess, if the carefully laid out rules of looping — outlined by Weiss Schnee in a holographic presentation on at least twelve occasions — are to be believed. But maybe Blake knows Yang's a tequila kind of girl because on the night before the 187th attempt, that's what Yang had used for the body shots she'd taken off of her, licking salt from Blake's skin.)
"There's an easy way to find out," Yang says, nodding towards the door of the bar, and Blake doesn't waste any further time, heading towards it with long strides that demand to be appreciated. And so Yang does exactly that.
She's not the only one. Every stare finds Blake as she enters and while this is probably less to do with the sway of her hips than the fact that every person in Remnant knows her name and story, Yang thinks maybe there's a bit to the hips part as well. She picks up her own pace, just in case, presses a hand to the small of Blake's back before she can stop herself. It fits there well, and Blake doesn't slow her pace or look back, ignoring the eyes on her and Yang's hand, though there's a hint of a smile on her lips (Yang's pretty sure she knows which one it can be attributed to).
"Whiskey neat, please. Evernight, if you have it."
"Two shots of tequila. Whatever brand's easiest for you to reach."
Blake makes a face at Yang's choice, but can't know it's the reason Yang does it in the first place. She has her preferences, but teasing Blake trumps all of them. (You're as bad as Weiss with her whiskey, she'd normally say, but can't now.)
"Really? About to face fifty million Grimm and you think now's the time to be picky about which kind of tequila I throw back in less than a second?"
"Better than any other time, wouldn't you think?"
The bartender doesn't comment on their selections or banter or anything else, merely places their drinks on the table with a soft 'on the house' and drifts further down the bar. Yang resolves to leave every lien in her pockets on the table when they leave.
"Oh, alright, I get it. The end of the world's the time to be picky. Time to make the most of things." She winks. "That's why you're here with me. Hottest woman on the base, right?"
She's surprised by Blake's blush, delighted by the way she leans in, just a little further.
"And how about you, then? You somehow make your way into my training room and then just ask me out for a drink?" She raises a brow, jutting up into her messy bangs. "That's a lot of trouble to go to for a couple shots of tequila."
Yang's grin turns crooked, half of it pulled by the same force that has her nearly falling off her stool as she watches Blake's lips. "Eh, I dunno. I was kind of just looking for a distraction."
Blake's eyes widen and then narrow, but she barely pulls back. "That's not the compliment you think it is."
"Who says I meant it to be one?" The grin that breaks out on Yang's face has an interesting effect on Blake's expression; it tightens further and then pulls apart completely into something that verges on affection. "It was only supposed to be the truth. Isn't that what you asked for?"
"Haven't you ever heard that people never ask for what they truly want?"
"Sure," Yang returns easily. "People. But not you."
"And you know me so well?"
Better than anyone, Yang thinks to say. Instead, she shrugs, and goes for something far less direct. Sometimes she tires of the repetition, of getting people up to speed and answering the same questions, but with Blake, she delights in the intricacies, the similarities, the differences of every first conversation. It never seems to grow old or awkward, like a familiar dance that one half of the pairing swears they can't remember, but pick up the steps easily enough (muscle memory kicking in).
"Well enough to say that you were just looking for a distraction too."
Blake makes a face. (It's one of Yang's favorites; an adorable scrunch of her nose that makes her look her age — younger than you'd think, looking into her eyes.)
"That doesn't sound like me."
"No?" Yang tilts her head. "Then how come you came all the way out here without even asking my name?"
Blake opens her mouth, finger raised with a rebuttal, but then she falls back, deflates slightly, creases appearing in her brow as she grapples with this truth.
"I — thought I had. Somehow."
Yang hums, and takes a sip of her drink, watching the curious play of emotions that skate across Blake's face until she remembers to shut them down.
"It's Yang, by the way," she says, before Blake can ask.
"Well, Yang," Blake drawls, and lifts her glass, rim steady enough to not spill a drop. "Here's to distractions."
It's not a surprise that they end up in one of the dingy upstairs bedrooms after that.
Because ending up here — Yang's hands under Blake's shirt, Blake's fingers tangled in her hair — never takes much (not time, alcohol, or effort), and it'd never been a question to Yang (or Blake, she's guessing) that this particular outing was destined to follow the same basic chain of events. If there's a desperation to it — to the way Yang presses Blake to the door as soon as they lock it — neither mentions it, though neither mentions much of anything at all. It's a comfort in constants, Yang thinks, and Blake is her main one (the only one that matters).
Except.
Except that there's a slight difference — a small thing, really — one she only notices as she takes Blake's bottom lip between her own and nips, teeth scraping at the light ridges. She knows every line of Blake, even the small ones, even the tiny scar that clips into her upper lip, so small that she discovered it by touch rather than sight, some hundred lives ago. But today there's something off, a hint of something different, something missing, something…
"Why do you taste different?" Yang murmurs.
"What?" Blake gasps as Yang's lips move away from her own, slide down to kiss along her jaw and hit the spot on the neck that always makes her squirm (the patch of skin behind her ear, further back than anyone might expect).
"The vanilla. Must come later in the day. It's earlier than usual."
Stupid, really. Stupid to get lost in it just as she'd planned, enough to forget everything and the need to be careful. Blake doesn't know and that's why this has worked so well, why they were both allowed to neglect duty and sense and make their way here, where they could pretend everything was different. But now Blake jerks away, now her body is tense, now Yang is left with explanations she should have given before.
"What are you — who are you?"
Yang licks her lips. (There's still the slightest trace of the taste that's become so familiar.) "I already told you," she says, calmly.
"No. You didn't."
Blake's always been clever. Always caught on before Yang's been able to finish her explanation in full. That's always been a relief, but now, when she longs for ignorance for the both of them, it's an obstacle, one that breaks her intentions in two. The disappointment that rushes through her isn't logical and it isn't fair, but Yang — only just pulled back from the brink — feels it anyways.
"I know I shouldn't be here," she says lowly. "I know I should have gone about it like I always do. You were better at it when it was you — Weiss always says so and it's obviously true — because you've told me how hard it was. You've told me how you got sick of it and how you wanted to give up, but you didn't and I — " The breath she draws in feels shaky, far too insatiable to do much good. "Gods, you must be a thousand times stronger than me because I couldn't go another minute without — I needed something new. I needed you. Fuck, Blake. I'm so sorry. But I just needed you."
"Oh," Blake breathes, and her fingers slide up Yang's neck, curl around her jaw, cup her cheek.
"I just — " Her eyes burn and her heart aches and Blake looking at her like this — like she understands — is about as much as she can take. "I'm so tired, Blake."
"Oh, Yang," she murmurs, soft and full of regret, but none of the judgement Yang might deserve. "You're repeating."
She's lived so many days, seen so many deaths, watched so many cracks appear (ill-prepared clay after firing); Yang had thought she'd cried herself out, had thought she had nothing left to give, but she'd been wrong. (She always seems to be wrong. Every day she's wrong. And then dead.) When the tears fall now, shaken loose by her nod, they're silent, and Blake catches most of them — her other hand coming up to frame Yang's face — before Yang can taste the salt.
"How many days?" she asks, maybe as gentle as Yang's ever seen her, after all the first days and last days they've spent together.
"Three hundred," Yang's voice cracks somewhere in the middle, and Blake knows.
"You have people helping you."
"Yes."
"People you care about."
"Yes."
"People you — " (The hesitation is slight, but it's there.) " — love."
"Yes."
Blake knows. She knows for sure. She must see it in the pooling tears reddening Yang's eyes. Must hear it in the break of her voice. Must feel it in the desperation with which Yang presses her cheek into Blake's touch, as though the more skin she can feel, the more sanity she'll soak up.
"Me," she says.
"You," Yang agrees, as simple as that.
"You love me."
"Desperately." The word is an exhale, expelled like it's her last.
"And I — I don't know you at all."
"No." She's shaking her head, slowly at first, before Blake finishes her thought, and then faster, a little frantic. "No! You do. You know me. Blake, you know me. We're all there is. When everything's gone, when everything's fading, you're — " Her fingers press into Blake's hips, too tight to be an embrace. "Sometimes you're all I know. So you have to know me. You have to or I'll — "
Blake kisses her, then.
It doesn't occur to Yang that it might be borne from pity, that it might be the way Blake has chosen to shut her up. It doesn't occur to Yang that the kiss is anything other than what it is; Blake knowing her, seeing her, and loving her, right from the start. Some memories are deeper, Yang thinks. Some memories are so deep, they can't be brought forth to the surface at all. But every time Yang resets, every time she sees Blake for the first time again — her short hair dropping into her face, her gold eyes narrowed in concentration, her black vest tight against her dark skin — every time, a new string forms between them, pulled from the fabric of the universe and tied tight. Some are barely there and some are thick and knotted and strong. But all three hundred of them tie her to Blake, and Yang knows, she knows that Blake feels every one of them right now, when Yang pulls her close and presses their hips together, when she slides her lips across Blake's, when she opens herself (mouth, heart, whatever she has left to give) completely.
There's so much to be said in the silence, and Blake uses her hands (and mouth — though not with words) to fill it. Yang hadn't bothered with armor that morning, and so Blake has far less to remove than normal; she pulls Yang's tank off with a practiced motion, doesn't fumble with the tricky snap of her shorts, and pushes her toward the bed (not gentle, not hesitant, exactly the way Yang likes it) until Yang falls back, legs spread in anticipation. Maybe she should be used to this by now, like she's used to everything else, but she's not; Blake is a particular type of beautiful like this — eyes glinting with something predatory, too close to those of a hunter to not be considered some kind of dangerous — and when she drops onto her knees at the foot of the bed, Yang's groan holds half a gasp in it. She looks up as she removes Yang's underwear, grasping the band and pulling down without a single hitch in the movement, without breaking eye contact (not even a blink). This doesn't change as she reaches back up to swipe two fingers between Yang's legs, slowly enough to come away with them coated in the wetness that's been building since Blake's hand had drifted a bit too low while on the back of Yang's bike, since she'd taken off her helmet and raked a hand through her short curls.
Even then, it'd already been nearly too much, in the way Blake always is. And now, again — taking her fingers into her mouth and licking them clean, on her knees but more in control than anyone's ever been — Blake pushes on the walls of Yang's chest, expanding the limit on the emotions she can possibly contain. She reaches out, intending to sink her fingers into Blake's hair, to tighten her grasp and pull Blake's face closer, until the feelings give way to other, more familiar options. But Blake leans back, dodges the touch, and shakes her head.
"No," she says quietly. "Hands on the bed."
"Blake — "
Her palms settle on Yang's thighs, pushing against the inside of them until Yang's legs spread further.
"I know what you need. Hands on the bed." Blake blinks for what feels like the first time in five minutes and Yang lets out the breath she'd been holding in. "Let go. I'll take care of you."
One hand after the other, she obeys, fingers curling around the edge of the mattress, and Blake nudges her further apart, until her thighs overlap the whitening knuckles of each. Blake presses down on her knees, traps Yang's hands in place with her own flesh, and Yang swallows hard. Instinct fights against it, but then Blake leans in — no trace of hesitation — and licks up along Yang's cunt, and instinct shifts away from gaining control and towards getting more.
"Oh, fuck, Blake," she breathes.
She could pull out of the pin if she wanted too; her metal arm, especially, is stronger than even the full weight of Blake's body pressed atop Yang's knees, and she's not using that, not even close. Her leverage is all wrong for that particular purpose, but then, that's hardly her intent at all. As she grows more involved in the task of making Yang absolutely lose her mind — sucking Yang's clit between her lips and flicking her tongue against it — the weight lessens further, hands eventually resting along the skin, rather than pushing. Certainly, if Yang wanted to turn the tables, now would be the time; her hands itch with the desire to grab, to hold, to find grip on something (Blake's hair, her shoulder, her neck) and steer.
"Don't," Blake says, pulling back enough to sound firm, and Yang whines at the loss of her mouth rather than the apparent reading of her mind (the latter she's come to expect, in the smallest of ways, the former, she never will). "Listen to me, and I'll make you come."
She nips at the inside of Yang's thigh when Yang gives no indication of agreement, and then simply waits until Yang finally nods, once and then — after a pause — again, repeatedly. This proves to be enough for Blake to resume her ministrations, and Yang's fingers curl into the sheets to keep herself from falling into old habits that will cause the sensations to stop once again. Instead, she focuses on Blake's lips, her hands, the dark (dark) gold of her eyes when she looks up and finds Yang watching. Her hips fall into an easy roll, matching the movement of Blake's tongue, pressing to all the right places. It'd be hypnotic if it weren't so pleasurable, far too hot to be placating in the traditional sense. But she does fall into it; Blake slides around a particular spot and Yang forgets to breathe, sees spots in her vision, cants her hips so hard she falls back, hands sliding away but only so she can catch herself on her elbows.
"Good." It's barely a murmur, but Yang catches the soft praise and feels warm, hot, on fire. She can feel the build within her, the pressure rising, and instead of pushing back the tide, she sinks into it, Blake's name on her lips, blurring into the groans and pleads that she barely recognizes as coming from herself. There's no particular rush to Blake's movements, even then, just the gradual, perfect, steadiness that works best for Yang, each circle of her tongue adding to it in exponents rather than multiples. There's an art to it, one that Blake's mastered, and Yang knows this, knows it more than she ever has.
"You've done this before," she rasps, because Blake has, because she remembers, because there's little in the universe that could erase this exact sensation from her mind: Blake's tongue tracing along her clit and pushing her further, further, higher, higher, to the brink, to the edge, to anywhere Blake wants to take her. It doesn't matter that Blake will take the words in the general sense rather than the specific; Yang knows, and Blake knows enough, and these are the things that matter. Especially when Blake, grasping the exact moment when Yang hangs on the precipice and knowing exactly what she needs to fall off, slides three fingers into Yang's cunt.
Let go let go let go, Blake might be whispering it or maybe Yang is — it's a blur of guttural sounds and breathless moans and the creak of the bed frame — but either way, she listens. Yang's back arches, her world falls apart, she lets go, and Blake is there — fingers thrusting, curling, coaxing — pushing her off the ledge and catching her in one. She's blissful, she's blank; if this is a kind of death, she'll die a million times more.
Afterwards, Yang's head throbs.
It's still bearable, but only just, a sharp, stabbing pain into the base of her brain. During the worst of it, even the fading daylight that escapes through the cracks in the dingy curtains is too much, and Yang buries her face into the crook of Blake's neck. Tries not to cry again, whether from relief or otherwise. They're hours past Blake's deadline, but neither mentions it. Blake runs her hands through Yang's curls, scrapes at the scalp and twists strands of gold around her fingers, winding and unwinding in a repetitive, slow motion. It's about as still as Yang's ever seen her, though it's not the same metric for her as it is for others; the top of her foot rubs up and down Yang's calf, she shifts her hips often, and her free hand runs along Yang's bare right arm, nails lightly tracing the lines of the muscles in her bicep, down to her elbow, and the metal underneath. (She does not change her touch as flesh turns to steel, doesn't seem startled at the transition; it's because you've touched me like this over and over and over, Yang wants to point out again, but doesn't.) Yang understands why; it's difficult to stay still, after so many lives spent dodging threats, old and new.
"Do you really believe that?" Blake asks softly, and Yang waits for her to clarify, warm from her own breath hitting against Blake's throat. "That I know you from your repeats? Even though I… don't?"
"Who says you don't?"
Blake laughs, the soft one that feels more like a puff of air than anything. "I do."
"Oh, like you'd know." Another laugh, this time more of a giggle, and Yang smiles against her skin. "Okay, okay. Yeah, I really believe it. But not like — it's not like I think you're lying and you've remembered looping just like I have. It's like — didn't you ever feel like you left an imprint on someone? Maybe… Weiss. Didn't you ever feel like explaining the same stuff to her again and again got easier each time? And not because you just got better at it, that's not what I mean. I mean, like, she got better at it too. Somehow. Like every time you had a conversation, you left a tiny indent, and each time pressed it a little further in, until eventually — even if she wasn't conscious of it — you left the ghost of a muscle memory, right on her brain."
To her credit, Blake thinks about this for a considerable length of time, running over her own loops with the precision Yang's come to expect from her way of thinking. "No. You don't realize how lucky you've had it, finding Weiss after she's already gone through this experience with me. She was absolutely horrible to convince, even with irrefutable proof. For a woman who can summon dead monsters and shoot fire out of thin air, she's remarkably against the notion of anything she sees as magic."
"Idiot," Yang scoffs fondly.
"Have you felt that way with Weiss? Or Ruby, even?"
This, Yang takes the same time to consider, but she doesn't particularly need it, she knows the answer as soon as Blake asks. "Not exactly. It's not the same as it is with you."
"But… not for me."
"Are you sure?"
Yang pulls back enough to brush her lips against the hollow of Blake's throat, to run a hand along her side and push against the sensitive notch in her hip; she jerks, and holds back a moan, but takes a deep breath rather than responding the way Yang knows she'd like to.
"I'm — I don't remember you, Yang." She works to sound soft, pushes against any rising want. "I wish I did. I know I always wanted that for me. I always desperately wanted to not be so alone."
"See, you say that, but let's look at this logically." She lifts her head, squints into the light to make sure she can see the gold of Blake's eyes, which never failed to tell the truths that even Blake herself couldn't yet grasp. "You're telling me you'd just get up and leave the morning before the battle that's meant to end the war? You'd just go off with any random stranger and get drinks and then take her upstairs to fuck on questionably clean sheets?"
"If she looked like you," Blake murmurs, and Yang, flattered but impatient, rolls her eyes.
"Come on, Blake. Really."
The lines that appear in Blake's forehead are deep and straight; Yang follows the shape of them and then drops her gaze to trace other lines, the curve of Blake's jaw, the faint scar along it, the press of her lips against each other. It's natural that her fingers come up to do the same, thumb dipping into the space at the corner of her mouth. Blake sighs and absentmindedly kisses the side of the digit, and then stops, shoulders tensing mid-action.
"I — I don't know. I don't know you. I can't remember a single detail. I don't even know your last name. If you asked me your favorite color or your semblance or how old you were or where you grew up, I wouldn't know any of those things. I wouldn't have a clue."
"But?" Yang asks, barely a whisper, and Blake responds in kind.
"But I — " Her throat bobs with the force of her swallow. "No, I wouldn't go off with anyone like that. I don't know why I went with you. You were standing there and you seemed so sure, like you belonged there, like you were meant to be there and I just — " She shakes her head, dislodges Yang's finger, but doesn't object when it slides down to curl around her jaw instead. "You looked beautiful. You looked lost. You looked like you were for me. I wanted to go with you and so I did."
Yang makes a sound somewhere low in her chest. Her headache is gone. Her earlier panic long past. She's settled again, found something warm, deep within herself, a molten core than Blake always seems to breathe life into, blowing onto a fire with her own exhale, not the gas it needs, exactly, but pulling along the ones it does.
"But I don't — there isn't any way I could possibly — "
She kisses her, just as Blake had done earlier, a mercy for a spiraling brain, yes, but something else as well; a reminder or a promise or perhaps both. Blake surges upwards into it without question, seeking relief and it's an answer in itself, one she's not able to voice (or even accept). Yang — peeling away the clothing Blake has yet to remove, finding the spots on Blake's body she's memorized with more reverence than anything she's witnessed in any of her loops — will take it.
With Blake, she'll take anything the woman can give and it will be enough.
