Chapter 11: Let Me Out

Vale City.

The infamous thief, Jasper Dusk - better known to the tabloids as "Captain Bola" - was just in the middle of one of her best heists. She and a degenerate she'd talked into helping her were just robbing the last dust shop in the entire city after thirty previous successful robberies.

"We're gonna be rich!" Her partner laughed.

"Yeah. Yeah, you an' me, mate." She nodded, discreetly readying her weapon of choice. "Go an' get the car."

Once the hapless thug was halfway down the hall, Jasper swung her bola and hit him with the metal ball at the end, knocking him out. She grabbed his bag of dust, stepped over his body, and made her way into the car. She laughed to herself; that thug would make the perfect fall guy. But just as she drove down the streets of Vale, a storm of rose petals surrounded the vehicle. Suddenly, the wheels on her van fell off and she crashed into a nearby lamppost. Jasper crawled her way out of the wreck and looked up to see a huntress dressed in red and black with a skull-shaped mask standing above her with a rivet gun in one hand and a scythe in the other.

Ruby playfully blew on the rivet gun as if it were a smoking pistol. "No honor among thieves, eh?"

"Who the hell are you?!"

"Call me the Grimm Reaper." Ruby smirked as she proceeded to beat Jasper up and take her to the nearest police station.

It normally wasn't regulation for huntresses to involve themselves in matters that didn't involve Grimm, but ever since the fall of Salem had all but halved the Grimm population, laws were slowly changing to allow huntresses to work alongside local law enforcement. With her work done for the day, the Grimm Reaper raced off to her home in Patch. Needless to say, the beach house was soon covered in a thick layer of rose petals.

"Have a nice night out, Geliebte?" Weiss asked as she held baby Penny - not to be confused with the robot girl that died during the final battle of the Menagerie War - in her arms.

"Well it was productive: I'll give you that," Ruby declared, giving a kiss on the forehead to both of the most important women in her life before continuing. "Even with Salem gone, some of the Grimm, including the Doppelgangers, are proving to be a problem. Case in point, I ran into some people earlier tonight who were making a deal with some of Barmak's old co-workers."

Weiss merely scoffed. "So even in death that despicable shisno is still causing us problems."

"Looks like it…though fortunately, eye had the perfect tool, or rather tools, for dealing with them," Ruby said with a wink to indicate her silver eyes…before suddenly groaning out in realization of what she had just said. "I've been hanging around my sister and niece too much lately."

"It's fine, my love: no harm done," Weiss declared as she patted her wife on the back in comfort.

"Maybe not," Ruby remarked with a smile to indicate that she appreciated the gesture, "But that doesn't mean that we're out of the woods just yet. In fact, some of the evidence that I collected when I busted up their latest deal leads me to believe that their main base of operations is somewhere outside of Vale."

"What are you going to do?" Weiss couldn't help but ask.

Ruby just smiled. "I think I'm going to go pay a visit to an old friend of ours."

Later, in New Rushland.

Dr. Jean Purple felt exhausted. Between running for re-election as surgeon general, trying to manage the Penny Polendina Memorial Hospital, and losing Dr. Octavia Ember to one of Ciel Seoli's newest projects, she felt as if she would snap at any moment. Luckily, there was still one person in this city who was always looking out for her; as evident when one of the pharmacists at the hospital arrived with her medication. She examined the note and a soft smile spread over her lips.

"Svetlana Crimsonoff picked up the tab for this?" She asked.

"Yes, doctor." The pharmacist nodded. "She gave explicit instructions that the medication was to be handled with care, and no questions asked as to what it was for. So your privacy is safe."

Jean nodded to dismiss her colleague before opening the bottle of antipsychotics. "Good ol' Rachel…" She sighed, fondly reaching for a purple six-sided die she kept in her pocket. "Always looking out for me. I remember when we first met in Atlas, applying for Ironwood's huntress team. We went to town at the arcade and casino. Most fun I've ever had."

"Yes…" A familiar growling voice echoed in her mind. "It's too bad that we read in the paper that they were tearing down that arcade to put up a gaudy thrift store. Nothing good ever truly lasts."

"Well, there are some bad things that don't last, either. Speaking of which…" The surgeon general popped one of the antipsychotics in her mouth and wrote out a check to mail to Ren and Nora. "And with that, I have officially paid off my lawsuits." Jean sighed.

"You are a coward!" Paulette sneered in disgust.

"Oh, come on, Paulette! We had it coming!"

Flashback to a few weeks ago…

Jean walked into her office to see Yang, Ceil, Nora, and Ren waiting for her with a man in a suit. "Hey, guys! What a pleasant surprise! What're you all doing here?"

"Um, remember how we all agreed to share the documentary rights for what happened on Menagerie?" Yang asked.

"Yeah?"

"Well, we kind of told them about how you operated on me with rusted tools, performed a delivery on Yang with no experience, and tried to operate on Ren and Nora without a real license." Ceil explained. "And eventually, lawyers got involved."

"And this guy right here…" Ren went on, pointing to the lawyer standing next to him. "... says we can sue you big time for malpractice."

"Yeah." Nora nodded. "His exact words were; 'settle for oil tycoon amounts of money.'"

End flashback.

Paulette huffed. "I still say that we should have pointed out that we should have counter-sued for leaving us by our lonesome without any intention of saving us."

"We tried, but like Ruby said back in Menagerie, we could have just used our scroll to contact the others, so that didn't really fall through," Jean declared with a sheepish expression.

"Ugh, fair point," Paulette said with a groan before suddenly blinking in realization. "Speaking of Ruby though, I wonder what she's up to right now."

Jean just smirked in response. "Well I'm sure wherever she is, she's doing just fine."

Meanwhile, Ruby couldn't help but let out a sneeze, causing her to blink in response. "Huh, I wonder who's talking about me right now. Ah well: can't let that distract me."

She was brought out of her thoughts when the familiar roar of a Warthog's engine echoed in the distance. Sure enough, she found herself racing alongside New Rushland's infamous Crimson Crusader and signaled for her to pull over. Curious, Krasnaya swerved into an alley and jumped out of her vehicle. In the blink of an eye, her pursuer appeared in front of her.

"Ruby?"

"That's the Grimm Reaper to you…Svetlana," the hooded girl replied before tapping on the skull-like mask that she had recently acquired. "What do you think? I figured that if I was going to take up Maria Calavera's old title that I should look the part."

Krasnaya just shook her head in amusement. "It suits you, though try not to say my secret identity outloud where others might be able to hear me. In any case, was there a particular reason why you're here?"

The Grimm Reaper just sighed. "I've been tracking a lead involving some rogue Doppelgangers that led me to the city, but don't worry: I won't be getting in your way."

"Glad to hear it, though for the record, if you wanted to come to my place later so we could compare notes, I won't be against it."

"I have some things I'll need to take care of first, but I'll see about taking you up on that offer later," the hooded girl said with a grin. "Be seeing you, old friend."

"You too," Krasnaya declared with a smirk…only to briefly lose it when she noted that all that was left to indicate that Ruby - or rather the Grimm Reaper - had been there were a few stray petals that were left over from her Semblance. She snorted in response. "Ah, trying to do the vanishing act on me, eh? I'll give her an 'A' for effort, but a 'B+' on execution."

A few minutes later, Krasnaya returned to her lair where the Grimm Reaper followed shortly after. Before either of them could talk shop, a familiar robin Faunus leapt down from the top of the stairs and landed on the hood of the warthog.

"Hey Aunt Ruby," Cyan called out as the Grimm Reaper entered the area.

"Well met, Azure," Ruby said with a smile. "I hear you've been helping Svetlana clean up New Rushland pretty well."

Cyan held her head up high with a prideful smirk. "Well, I try not to brag, but-"

"Have you finished your homework?" Krasnaya asked, crossing her arms.

"Uh… right. I'll be right back." Cyan backflipped off of the hood and raced back upstairs to complete her school work.

Ruby followed Svetlana over to the massive computer, noticing that her new cowl lacked the horns, and the chest piece was a lighter shade of red. "Looks like you redesigned your costume again since we introduced Penny to you."

The Crimson Crusader simply shrugged in reply. "Well, like I told your sister back then, I set out to scare criminals. Not children."

"Fair enough." Ruby shrugged.

"So, any ideas who we're dealing with?" Krasnaya asked as she entered the information into the computer.

"On the Doppelganger's side, some of Barmak's old followers. I've already contacted Jasmine about the situation and am currently waiting to hear back from her and the rest of her Shadow Alliance," Ruby remarked, using the name that she had been given regarding the situation. "As for the humans, admittedly the only thing I know for certain at the moment is that they somehow managed to get a hold of this!"

Krasnaya blinked upon seeing the item that Ruby was holding out for her to examine. "Wait, isn't that…?"

"It is indeed," Ruby said with a nod. "It's actually part of the reason that I'm currently here in New Rushland: I'm hoping that a mutual friend of ours will be able to help us end things peacefully."

At that very moment, Jean had just finished performing a life-saving surgery on a little girl and was currently washing her hands. Despite her rough start as a practicing medical student due to Project Guardsman's manipulations, she was now much more skilled at practicing medicine than she was when she first met Team RWBY. However, she still suffered from bouts of self-doubt, and would need certain means to distract herself so that she could focus on her work. One such method was randomly rolling a pair of purple dice she had kept with her since she first met Svetlana.

She was brought out of her thoughts by the sound of a familiar voice. "Hey sis."

Jean couldn't help but give a sheepish chuckle as a familiar red-hooded girl approached her. "Not going to lie: I'm still not used to you greeting me like that."

Ruby simply shrugged in reply. "Hey, you are sharing headspace with Paulette, and I did establish something of a sisterly bond with her back when we were dealing with Project Guardsman, so I feel it's appropriate."

Paulette merely gave a smile in return, as Ruby was one of the few people she couldn't truly stay angry with. "Well, you won't hear any complaints from me."

Jean nodded. "Me neither, though something tells me that this isn't entirely a friendly visit."

Ruby just sighed in response. "I just thought I'd give you a heads up about how I think that there's some sabotage and/or theft going on in your place of business."

Jean blinked in response. "What makes you say that?"

Ruby merely handed over a spent medicine cartridge - the same one that she had shown to Krasnaya earlier - to Jean before explaining. "It just so happens that the Grimm Reaper found that at a place where some rogue Doppelgangers and some gangsters were making a deal of some sort. Now admittedly I'm no expert but I feel like it should look familiar to you."

Paulette growled. "It's familiar alright: I've seen Jean use this sort of thing on some of her patients. Just say the word and I'll shake down some of her coworkers to see what they know."

"Easy Paulette," Ruby declared with a calming gesture. "As tempting as that is, we don't want the thief, or thieves as the case might be, to know that we're onto them in case you accidentally shake down the wrong person. For now, all I'm asking for you and Jean to do is keep an eye open for anything suspicious…though I'll see about giving you a piece of the action when I have something a bit more concrete to work with."

"Well in that case, we'll see what we can do…sis," Jean and Paulette simultaneously called out with a grin, with this being one of the rare times that they were on the same page about something.

"Good to know," Ruby said with a grin before losing it as she got a look at the clock. "Oh, shoot: hate to cut this meeting short, but I promised someone that I'd pick up something for them, so…"

"It's fine, Ruby," Jean interrupted with a smile. "We can always catch up later. Go ahead and take care of…whatever it is that you need to take care of. In the meantime, I'll be sure to contact you if/when we find anything later."

Ruby visibility relaxed upon hearing this. "Thanks."

"No problem," Jean declared even as she watched the hooded girl leave the room before giving an amused shake of her head. "That girl truly is too pure for this world."

Paulette simply snorted in reply. "Agreed."

Meanwhile, in New Rushland's underbelly, Whitley Schnee held a meeting with other crime families beneath his nightclub - which was closed for the day. Each crime boss had arrived with one enforcer to ensure no treachery, and they all took their seats.

"Quite the turnout tonight." The bodyguard remarked to his employer.

"Glad you approve." Whitley nodded before turning to the others. "Now are there any questions before we start?"

"Yeah, what the hell are those things that you invited here?" One boss asked, rather rudely.

"Those, my good friend, are Doppelgangers. They're humanoid sentient Grimm that have limited shapeshifting abilities, i.e. so long as you show them the proper respect, they'll be excellent allies going forward."

"Okay: just wanted to clear that up."

"Not a problem at all. Any other questions?"

"Yeah." Another mob boss spoke up. "The cops in this city are way more organized in this city than any other. Hell, they don't even ask for help from huntsmen. If they get ballsy enough, they could end up raiding all of our operations."

"I have a solution to that." Whitley offered. "We set up a place - not a bank - to pool all of our resources with an account for each of us. Far out from the police's jurisdiction. Rest assured, your money will be safe."

"What about Krasnaya?" one of the gathered goons couldn't help but ask. "After all, I get the feeling that she isn't going to make things easy for us, Boss."

"I'm well aware of that," Whitley declared. "But then again, I have no intention of making things easy for her either."

Suddenly, the group could hear the door to the room burst open, followed by slow footsteps, and a dry, sardonic laugh. "Ha. Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Hee-hee-hoo. A-ha. Ha ha ha." The Trickster lazily eyed the mob bosses as he casually strided up to the table. "And I thought my jokes were bad."

Trickster took an empty seat, placed himself at the table, and kicked his feet up to show the fresh bloodstains on the bottom of his boots.

"Give me one reason why I shouldn't have my bodyguard pull your head off." Whitley growled.

"Are the bodies in the back room not a clear indication of how that'd go?" Trickster remarked, prompting the bodyguard to reach for his weapon.

"Stop." One doppelganger held up a hand towards the others. "I want to hear what he has to say." With that, everyone silently turned their attention to the maniacal assassin.

"Let's wind the clocks back a year." Trickster smirked. "These cops and lawyers wouldn't dare cross any of you… I mean, what happened? Did your balls drop off? Y'see, a guy like me-"

"Freak." Whitley remarked, earning a chuckle from the group.

Trickster, however, was not amused. "A guy… like me- look, I know why you choose to have your little group therapy sessionsin broad daylight. I know why you're afraid to go out at night… the Krasnaya. Y'see, Krasnaya's changed things… forever. There's no going back. She's shown this city - no, this world - who the alpha dog is. And, uh, as for the college prep-boy's so-called 'plan?' Krasnaya has no jurisdiction. If you go through with this, she'll find him, and make him squeal! I know the squealers when I see one. And after he sells you all out and takes your money for himself, even his little boy-toy won't be able to get a nickel from his grandma-"

Whitley's bodyguard angrily slammed his fist on the table and reached for his gun. "Enough from the freak!"

"Ah-ah-ah-ah!" Trickster opened his coat, revealing a makeshift suicide vest comprised of several grenades with all the pins tied together. The other mob bosses fearfully moved away from the former assassin, prompting his grin to grow wider. "Let's not blow this out of proportion."

"You think you can insult us and just walk away?!" The bodyguard sneered.

"I wasn't finished talking." Trickster grinned.

"Sit down." The doppelganger boss politely motioned towards the bodyguard. "I want to hear what his plan is."

Once the bodyguard was seated, Trickster closed his coat. "It's simple; we kill Krasnaya."

Everyone in the room burst out laughing. "If it's so simple, why haven't you done it already?" Another boss chortled.

"If you're good at something, never do it for free." Trickster punctuated his point by placing a jack-in-the-box on the table, winding it up, and letting it reveal a crudely-made business card on the spring. "So why don't you guys gimme a call when one of you wants to start taking things a bit more seriously?"

Whitley couldn't help but growl following Mercury's departure. "If this 'Trickster' is any indication of how Loki used to act, then it's no wonder he was so universally hated by criminals and cops alike back when he was still alive."

"Be that as it may, he does have a point." The doppelganger boss noted. "How can we trust you to handle our money when Krasnaya can thwart your every plan?"

Whitley clenched his fists in frustration but managed to contain himself. "Give me one chance." Whitley suggested. "I have a plan to put one of this city's most influential citizens under my thumb. Krasnaya will never know. If I can do that, will you consider a partnership?"

"Perhaps," the Doppelganger replied, "but you should know that Krasnaya isn't the only threat to our operation. After all, I have it on good intel that the Grimm Reaper is tracking our movements…and with the connections she has with the Shadow Alliance, we'll be in big trouble if she catches onto us."

"Let me worry about that," Whitley remarked. "After all, if this 'Grimm Reaper' is the kind of person I think she is, then I know exactly how to keep her at bay even if she does catch onto our scheme."

"That reminds me, boss." The bodyguard spoke up as he handed Whitley a manilla folder. "I think I finally found what we were looking for to get a certain surgeon general under your thumb."

At that very moment, Jean was frantically searching her office for said folder. "Hey, Paulette, do you remember where we put our psyche profile?"

"Uh, I remember virtually everything you remember, so if you don't know where it is, why would I know where it was?"

"Just wanted to be sure, I suppose." Jean declared with a shrug…before giving a blink as her scroll suddenly indicated she was being contacted by an unknown individual. Deciding she didn't have much to lose right now, she went ahead and responded. "Hello?"

"Paulette?"

Jean blinked in shock. "Uh, I think you have the wrong number. This is Dr. Jean Purple."

"Oh, no. I was hoping to talk to your other half." Whitley's smug voice replied. "Look out the window. You'll see a limo parked outside the hospital. The driver will bring you to me. And then we can discuss the safe return of your psychiatric file."

Jean couldn't help but glare at that implied threat. "Who is this?"

"All in good time, Doctor. All in good time."

With a shaky breath, Jean hung up the scroll and made her way downstairs to the limo. Little did she realize that the city's infamous Crimson Crusader had been watching over her the whole time. Keeping her distance to avoid being detected, Krasnaya followed the limo by silently gliding from rooftop to rooftop. At last, the limo stopped in front of the dye factory on the edge of town and two thugs carried a blindfolded Jean into the building.

"Hope you enjoyed your trip," a new voice called out.

"Wait, you're Whitely, right?" Jean couldn't help but ask. "I recognize your voice from some old news reels that Winter and Weiss were in."

"Ah, good you recognize me," Whitley declared as Jean's blindfold was removed. "That makes things a bit easier here."

"Stealing a woman's psychiatric file is pretty low, Mr. Schnee!" Jean politely scolded sometime later, having already pieced together that Whitley was behind the theft in question. "Even for jerks like you!"

"But it makes for such interesting reading material." Whitley grinned, mischievously, as he opened the folder. "Listen to this, boys; it says here that when Jean was just a girl, she had a little sister. But apparently, they didn't get along very well. Every day, Jean's sister would invade her privacy, tear up her room, and ruin all of her clothes. Until one day, Jean got so angry that she punched the little brat."

"Oooooooh!" The henchmen mocked the surgeon general.

"At first, Jean felt proud for finally letting out her pent-up frustrations and showing her who was boss." Whitley went on reading, much to Jean's chagrin. "Until the next day, she found out that her parents had taken her sister to the hospital, where she died."

"That must have been some punch." The bodyguard smirked, playing along.

Whitley laughed. "Ha ha, that's what Jean thought! Except her sister died from a tumor growing on her spine! But poor little Jeanie felt so guilty, she swore never to let her anger out again. So she dedicated her life to studying medicine, which led her to Atlas where she joined Team CPPR as their field medic. But on one fateful day, she had a run in with a rogue A.I. from Project Guardsman who invaded her mind, fed off her buried rage, and brought it all to the surface as a split personality. And that was the start of 'Paulette Purple.'"

Jean broke out into a cold sweat. If word of her mental health got out to the public, it would completely demolish her reputation. She would lose her medical license and never atone for her past sins. She got up from her seat and glared at the crime lord. "What do you want?" She sneered.

"There's a few prescription drugs my operations need to get on its feet." Whitley suggested.

Jean merely huffed as she crossed her arms. "Let me guess: you also want me to lend you those bits of medicine that you've been stealing from the hospital I work at."

Whitley blinked in surprise upon hearing this. "How do you know about that?"

"I mean, a friend clued me into the possibility, but I didn't know for certain until you just told me," Jean said with a teasing grin even as she silently thanked Ruby for the heads up.

Whitley merely chuckled, actually finding the whole thing to be a bit humorous. "Touche. Regardless, you aren't wrong about that…but it also wouldn't hurt if a few patients that may or may not arrive at your place of business were to…disappear every now and then."

"You're dreaming!" Jean scoffed having heard just about enough now.

"Otherwise, as a concerned citizen, I'd feel obliged to give this to the press!" Whitley held up the file, taking delight in watching the woman squirm. "After all, the good people of New Rushland have the right to know the kind of person… or should I say 'persons' they've elected as surgeon general."

Jean clenched her fists and shut her eyes to keep herself from crying. She could feel the henchmen surrounding her, laughing at her expense. These people knew that they were taking advantage of a vulnerable woman, but they simply didn't care. The former field medic felt her blood boiling as a familiar voice in her head whispered in her ear like the devil on her shoulder that it was. At last, she opened her eyes and smiled.

"... there's just one problem." She declared, casually.

Whitley, while slightly put off by her sudden change in demeanor, maintained his smug composition. "What's that?"

Jean leaned in close and spoke with a deeper voice. "You're not talking to Jean anymore!"

Whitley's eyes widened in shock as Paulette grabbed him by the scruff of his coat and threw him at his hired goons. Everyone shuddered in terror as the doctor's eyes changed from blue to dark purple and she slowly marched towards them with a wicked grin. But before Paulette could touch anyone else, Krasnaya burst through the skylight and landed in the center of the room.

"Dr. Purple, stand down!" The Crimson Crusader shouted. "Let me handle this!"

"He's mine!" Paulette sneered.

"Get them!" Whitley ordered. While Krasnaya fought off his henchmen, the aspiring crime boss grabbed the file and ran out of the room, only to be chased by Paulette.

"Give me that file!" She snarled, following him over a vat of purple dye.

One of the henchmen recovered and grabbed a machine gun and stumbled towards the door. "I'll get her!"

"Look out, Purple!" Krasnaya shouted as she elbowed the thug aside.

But it was too late, a round of bullets had already been fired and took out a nearby circuit box, causing two live wires to land in a nearby vat of dye. An explosion shot up from the platform just as Paulette ran across it, knocking her unconscious.

"JEAN!" Krasnaya called out and ran to her friend's side. When she carefully turned her over to get a look at the damage, her eyes widened in shock. "Jean… no…"

A few minutes later, Krasnaya had rushed her friend to the hospital for immediate treatment. Having shed her disguise, Svetlana returned to the hospital a few hours later. By the time she arrived, the doctors had bandaged her face and put her on an I.V. drip to keep her stabilized. With a solemn frown, Svetlana reached into her pocket and placed the purple die on the nightstand next to her bed.

"I'm sorry, Jean." She whispered before leaving.

Mikhail was waiting for his wife in their car and gently pat her shoulder once she entered. "It's not your fault." He said, assuringly.

"Then who's fault is it, Mikhail?" She sighed. "I was the one who invited Jean to live in New Rushland. I was the one who gave her the idea to continue studying medicine here to become surgeon general. I was the one who couldn't protect her from Whitley."

"Then you'll make sure Whitley can't hurt her anymore." He promised as he started the car.

Meanwhile, inside the hospital, Jean finally woke up to find herself in darkness.

"Wha…where am I?" the scared woman whimpered out before grabbing her head. "Ugh, too much noise. Too…too many conflicting thoughts."

"Oh, you're awake." One of the nurses called out as she approached. "You've been out for a while now. I imagine you have a lot of questions, but first let me ask you something: how are you feeling right now?"

"...Angry."

"That's perfectly natural considering what you've been through." Another doctor remarked as he entered the room and grabbed a pair of scissors to cut off the bandages. "You were splashed with an experimental dye that caused severe burns. Now, there's going to be some scarring, but I've already scheduled a plastic surgeon to come in from Anima."

The doctor carefully snipped one bandage and cautiously began to peel the rest off. Once Jean's bare skin was exposed to the cold air, the doctor recoiled in horror and the nurse dropped her tray to cover her mouth. Jean felt worried.

"Give me a mirror." She demanded.

"Dr. Purple, please-"

"I said give me a mirror!" She growled and got up from her bed to push him aside. "NOW!"

"I…okay, but just remember: I'm only doing as you asked," the nurse proclaimed as she brought out a hand mirror from her purse, hoping to calm Jean down and keep the doctor safe.

"Ah, come on: how bad could it be?" Jean asked as she took the mirror out of the nurse's hands…only to nearly drop it upon seeing her reflection, not quite comprehending how her face had nearly been split in two by the scars that were present there. Then she let out a deafening wail of despair.

"I know you're upset," the nurse declared, "but like I said, I was only doing as you asked."

In response, Paulette grabbed the nurse by the collar of her shirt and threw her into the TV hanging on the wall. Then, she snatched the scissors away from the doctor and stabbed them through his hand to pin him to the wall. She ran out of the room, beat a security guard unconscious, stole his gun, and shot anyone in her way as she made her way downstairs to steal a car.

Unknown to her at the time, an amateur photographer had taken her picture and reported it to the police. In less than an hour, the story was all over the news. And Svetlana and Ruby quickly discovered the whole thing.

"Was that…Jean?!" Ruby couldn't help but ask with a touch of concern in her voice at what they'd seen on the news.

"Well, things just got a lot more interesting," Svetlana declared with an equal amount of concern in her voice. She pulled her cowl over her head and made her way towards her workbench to gather her equipment. "She needs to be stopped before she hurts someone."

"If you're going after Jean, then I'm coming with you," Ruby declared. "After all, part of the reason that this happened was due to how she got caught in the crossfire of some of my enemies: I have to do something to make things up to her."

"Ruby, no offense, but I've known Jean far longer than you." Svetlana reasoned. "Even if Paulette does consider you her sister, she's too unstable to be reasoned with. I need to get through to Jean."

"Well, I can still help!" Ruby insisted. "Besides, you need me!"

"Why do I need you?"

"Because we're partners." Ruby grinned.

Svetlana could only arch an eyebrow. "Uh, we are not partners."

"Of course we are!" Ruby nodded. "I know your code name. You know mine. We're both red. We both knew Penny. You have a car. I can run fast. So we're obviously peers."

Svetlana tiredly pinched the bridge of her nose in frustration. "I'm not getting rid of you, am I?"

"Nope!"

"Fine." She rolled her eyes and made her way to her lair's computer, bringing up a map of multiple hot spots on the screen. "These are all areas where acts of extreme violence were committed. Let's split up and investigate to see if they had anything to do with Paulette."

"I'm cool with that: any preferences to which of those areas you'd want to search?" the Grimm Reaper felt the need to ask.

"Hmm, perhaps you should take the North end of town while I take the South end before meeting in the middle or something like that," Krasnaya said with a shrug.

"Sounds good to me."

Meanwhile, Whitley and his men had gone underground after the fiasco Paulette had caused. Many of them had spread out over the city with orders to lay low until further notice. One of his goons decided to take advantage of the unexpected downtime and hired an escort for the night named Jane. But when she arrived, he found himself face-to-face with a giant purple scar before getting injected with a sedative. "What the…?"

"Heh: not what you were expecting?"

"Dr. Purple?!" Whitely's goon couldn't help but ask, panic and surprise clear in his voice upon realizing who he was dealing with.

"Not right now, I'm not," Jean declared. "After all, a doctor is a person who has taken an oath to do no harm, and suffice to say, I'm thinking of doing a lot of harm to you and your friends for what you did to me earlier."

"What do you want with me?"

"Jane" merely gave Whitley's goon a hard glare. "I merely want to send a message to your boss about targeting those he views as weak."

Meanwhile, Krasnaya and the Grimm Reaper hastily sped through the streets of New Rushland in search of their mutual friend. The latter used her semblance to quickly check the entire perimeter of the city while the former searched within the vicious underbelly.

"Come on, Jean… where are you…?" Krasnaya thought to herself. Her guilt forced her to pull over and try to grapple with her conscience. With a heavy sigh, she gazed through the plexiglass windscreen of her warthog's canopy, drinking in the sights of her city. The neon lights reminded her of one of the arcades she and Jean would drag Ciel and Penny to when the quartet needed to unwind. Suddenly, she realized where Jean must have been hiding out and tore down the street once more.

Meanwhile, Jean kicked the doors to a certain arcade open before dragging her bound hostage through the doorway into the establishment. "You know, back before…all of this, I used to come here all the time," "Jean" remarked as she looked around the area even as the thug that she had taken captive whimpered in fear. "The games did a good job of letting me blow off some steam in a healthy manner, so it's almost poetic that I return here when my anger is at an all time high."

"What…what do you plan on doing here?"

"Don't know yet, but then again, if there's one thing that these games and especially what happened earlier have taught me it's that life's full of surprises so I'm sure that I'll be able to think of something to help me let out all of my anger, one way or another."

"Please, just let me go." He whimpered. "I only worked for Schnee to feed my family. Please, let me go."

The angry scared woman merely scoffed at the bound employee's declaration as she drew her dice out of her pocket. "Let's see what fate has to say about that possibility. Even number, I let you go. Odd number, you stay right here."

She blew on the dice, put them in a cup and shook it, gently. She slammed the cup down on the nearby table and slightly lifted it to read the number. "Ha! Fortune smiles upon thee." She snickered as she roughly grabbed his hair and pulled him to show him the dice landed on two sixes. "Let's go to the roof."

"W-what?!" The thug screamed in fear as she pulled him to the elevator by the hair. "B-b-but you said if it was even you'd let me go!"

"Too true! And so I shall!" She laughed. "But I never said where I'd let you go!"

Jean dragged the thug all the way to the roof with every intention of throwing him to his doom, only to have her path blocked by a familiar Crimson Crusader. "Let him go, Dr. Purple." She ordered, gently.

"Not gonna happen." The scarred doctor growled. "Now get out of my way."

"Come on, Jean: just calm down." Krasnaya asked, pleading. "Let me help you. Don't give in to Paulette."

"There is no more Jean, and no more Paulette either: there is only RAGE!" With that, the traumatized doctor threw the man off of the roof, only to watch as a cyclone of rose petals flew through the air and gently set him on the ground.

"Are you alright?" The Grimm Reaper asked.

"Uh-huh." He whimpered.

"What are you doing here?!" Rage yelled out, not quite registering who the Grimm Reaper was due to her mask obscuring her face.

"Stopping you before you make a mistake."

"Then you too shall feel my wrath, Grimm Reaper," the former doctor snarled out before taking a gun that she had taken from Whitley's hideout and opening fire on the hooded figure, too angry to recognize that the girl that she'd gladly call a sister and the masked figure were one and the same.

Time seemed to slow down as the Grimm Reaper as the bullets drew nearer. She rushed forward, skidding on her knees as she leaned back to dodge the rounds of dust. Once the last bullet passed over her face, she quickly stood back up and continued moving at superspeed as she gingerly plucked the gun out of Rage's hand, moved her hands behind her back, and tied them up. At last, she stopped running and her perception of time returned to normal.

Rage had no idea how she was suddenly incapacitated, but screamed in fury regardless. "Let me go!"

"Yeah, that's not going to happen," the Grimm Reaper declared before looking towards Krasnaya. "Any chance you know any cops who could collect our mutual frenemy here that won't try and arrest us?"

Krasnaya nodded. "I think I might know someone." She tapped on the side of her cowl, activating her two-way radio back to the cave. "Cat Burglar, send an anonymous tip to Commissioner Maroon. Tell her Jean's been neutralized and is waiting to be taken to Ironwood."

"Got it. Making the call now." Her husband replied.

"I can help you," Krasnaya said as she knelt down to her friend after she turned her two-way radio back off.

Rage merely scoffed here. "Appreciate the offer, but odds are that I'll need to do this on my own."

"Doesn't mean that we won't try and help you regardless."

Rage looked as a certain hooded girl approached them, feeling themselves calming down for a brief moment as she did. "You still aren't giving up on us, huh?"

Ruby - having ditched her mask after they had captured the woman before her - just smiled. "You should know me - know us - better than that by now…sis."

The woman who stood before the Grimm Reaper in her civilian form merely gave a bitter chuckle in response. "We've said it before and we'll say it again: you truly are too pure for this world…sis."

"Regardless, know that I'll be visiting you whenever I can." Ruby declared with a grin.

"I appreciate that." And that was the last thing Rage was heard saying before she was led away by the authorities, who ended up arriving some time later.

"I'm sorry, Ruby," Krasnaya declared once Rage was out of sight.

The girl in the hood just blinked. "For what?"

Krasnaya just sighed. "I couldn't save her."

Ruby merely shook her head. "This isn't the first time that Paulette felt that she didn't deserve to be saved, and Jean clearly has some issues that she's struggling with…but I know that deep down, beneath all the Rage, are the girls that I'd gladly call my sisters in all but blood. All I can do for now is hope that those at the Asylum will help me to see them again someday. In the meantime, and just for the record, if Whitley or the Doppelgangers cause trouble in Rushland again, know that Krasnaya can count on the Grimm Reaper to help out."

Krasnaya merely smiled. "I'll keep that in mind."

The next morning, Jean was transferred from the Penny Polendina Memorial hospital to Ironwood Asylum. The press desperately tried to get a picture of her scarred face, but Detective Cash led a squad to keep everyone back. All except for one red-haired woman and her ward who went over to send her friend off.

"Svetlana…?" Jean gasped, quietly. "You came? Even after everything I did?"

"I believe in second chances." Svetlana smiled, softly, as she patted Jean on the shoulder. "But more importantly, I believe in my friends. I'll see to it that you're taken care of."

Jean couldn't help but let a few tears roll down her cheeks as she smiled. "Good ol' Rachael…" She mused as she was led away. "Always there for me… always there."

Cyan hugged her foster mother's arm to comfort her. "So what happens now?"

Svetlana sighed. "All that we can do for the moment is track down Whitley and the rest of the criminals that were involved: make sure that this injustice doesn't go unpunished."

"It never gets any easier, does it?" Cyan couldn't help but ask.

"No, no it doesn't." With that, the Crimson Crusader and Girl Wonder headed back home.

To Be Continued!

Epilogue:

The doctor of Ironwood Asylum stepped into the ward with a morphine syringe when he noticed an orderly standing over his latest patient. "Who are you? I didn't authorize anyone to watch over Dr. Purple-"

In response, the orderly kicked his leg at the doctor, firing a blast of dust through his chest and killing him in an instant. The Trickster shed his disguise and moved to lock the door. Grabbing a chair, he sat down next to the bed and began snapping his fingers in front of Jean's face to wake her up. At last, she opened her eyes and immediately tried to run away, but of course, her restraints wouldn't let her. But the Trickster just leaned back in his chair and smiled a wicked smile.

"Hiiiiiii…"

"What…do you want?"

Trickster merely grinned in response. "I just want to talk…and see if you have an idea of what you'd do once you get out of this place."

Jean merely shrugged. "Being honest, I'm not sure, though hopefully I'll still be welcome in Ruby's home when that time comes."

"Yeah, it's always nice to have allies, but that wasn't what I meant." Trickster remarked. "I was actually asking what you planned to do about the society that this 'Ruby' lives in."

Jean blinked. "Wha…what do you mean?"

"I mean do you really think that they'll just let this go? Oh, don't get me wrong: I have no doubt that that 'Ruby' girl will certainly try and help you out - she genuinely seems like that sort of girl - but I think we both know that her support will only go so far, what with how the rest of the world feels about you." Trickster called out.

Jean sneered. "And what's your plan, tough guy?" She asked, trying to sound brave.

Trickster gave a bored frown. "Do I look like a guy with a plan? Y'know what I am? I'm a dog chasing cars, okay? I don't know what I'd do with one if I… caught it, y'know? I just… do things. Y'see, Svetlana's got plans. Whitley's got plans. Maroon's got plans. Krasnaya's got plans. Ruby's got plans… they're schemers. You were a schemer, you had plans, and, uh, look where that got you."

Paulette struggled against her restraints, but Trickster held her down. "You let Whitley take your little plan and turn it on itself. And now…well, let's face it, there's no going back. You've let them see the darkness that's inside you. And now, to them you're just a freak." Trickster took out his gun and smiled, maniacally, as he pressed it against his head. "Like me."

"What do you want?" Paulette growled. "If you're going to kill me, then kill me and spare me the sight of your hideous face once and for all!"

"Kill you?" Trickster giggled and tapped the gun against his chin in thought. "Ha ha ha ha, no, no, no, no, no. I don't wanna kill you. We're two of a kind, you and me. Krasnaya thinks she's one of us, but she's a coward. And dishonest! Hiding her face behind a fright mask! Well, no masks for us! We have nothing to hide! We can laugh at the cruel absurdity of the world! But Krasnaya… and the Grimm Reaper… they've got the whole world fooled. They think they can actually make a difference! That there's a certain order to this world! They've got us trapped! Think about it; everyone loved you until they learned about Paulette. But now that she's out, you've been kicked out of your fancy hospital, and sent to this place. And now, you'll sit through hours and hours of mind-numbing mumbo-jumbo all because some people want to 'fix' you… or, at least, profit off of you. Because it's all… part of the plan."

Jean tried to argue, but Paulette wouldn't let her. Something about the way this Trickster spoke seemed to resonate with her. This was a man who truly understood her. It was true; everyone treated Jean like their weak and frail little friend, while she was always seen as some sort of disease that needed to be cured. Even the way Ruby spoke to her made it obvious that the hooded huntress didn't fully trust her.

Trickster giggled with glee as he placed his gun in Paulette's hand and loosened the restraints around her wrists. "Upset the established order… introduce a little anarchy… and everything becomes… chaos." The deranged former assassin placed the barrel of the gun against his forehead. "I'm an agent of chaos. Oh, and you know the best part about chaos? It's fair."

Paulette considered the madman's words for a few moments before glancing over at the six-sided die resting on her nightstand. She picked it up and held it in front of the Trickster. "Evens you live…" She declared. "Odds you die."

"Oh, now we're talkin'." Trickster chuckled.

Paulette shared the Trickster's sinister grin, blew on the die, shook it in her fist and let it fall back on the nightstand.

R.I.P. Kevin Conroy