AUTHOR'S NOTES: Well, I said I'd update once a week, but that's too long to wait. (At least for now. Hopefully I don't burn myself out here!) In any case, here's the next chapter. This is Weiss' chapter. Most of it is infodump, getting us caught up with what's been happening in Europe and some of the surviving characters-Weiss, Pyrrha, Harriet, Elm, Marrow, and Whitley.

This chapter also resolves what happened to Jacques Schnee. In canon RWBY, Ironwood turned him into a grease spot, but in ORW, Jacques was still alive at the end of ORW VI. And he's still alive here...

Near Wioska Myszy

Poland Dead Zone

15 April 2002

Weiss Schnee dipped the wing of Arma Gigas as she made a low pass over Wioska Myszy. The evacuation was proceeding well, she thought. Parked on the snowy farmlands outside the village were six Luftwaffe Sikorsky CH-53GS Sea Stallion helicopters—more than enough to evacuate the villagers, plus a limited amount of luggage. When Weiss had spoken to Jan, he had been adamant that the people of Wioska Myszy would return very soon, so they were boarding up the village to prevent it from being looted. Weiss hoped that would be true. It was bad enough that the proud Poles were finally forced to give in to the inevitable: the ground had been simply too irradiated to farm in. Facing starvation, they had accepted General Theodore Gale's invitation to be evacuated. Many other Poles had done the same; all had vowed to return someday.

Weiss climbed back to altitude. "Ace Lead, Ace Two. Operation is proceeding. Any contacts?" She took up position on Pyrrha Nikos' right wing.

"Negative, Ace Two. Break. Top Hat, Ace Lead. Any contacts our AO?" Pyrrha radioed the AWACS.

"Negative, Ace. Clear skies. We thought we had a bogey 30 miles east of Bullseye, but it didn't stay long." Bullseye was code for the ruins of Warsaw.

"Altitude and heading of bogey?" Pyrrha asked.

"Angels 75 and heading zero-seven-one." 75,000 feet and heading northeast, Weiss translated. That high, it's either one of those Sphinx GRIMM or it's Cinder and that damn Night Raven. Either way, it was very far away and much higher than even Arma Gigas could fly—and far out of range of even the four Meteor missiles nestled under the Eurofighter Typhoon's wings.

"Roger, Top Hat. Ace Three, alpha check."

"Ace Lead, Ace Three," Elm Ederne radioed back. "Negative contacts. Fuel is joker plus two." Elm and Harriet Bree were well to the south of Pyrrha and Weiss. Their F-35A Lighting IIs had radar even better than the Typhoons, and Pyrrha had thought that the F-35s might be able to pick up low-flying GRIMM that the E-3 couldn't. There was also the Mark 1 Eyeball. The GRIMM that had hit Phoenix the day before had actually been detected by ground observers at the Colorado River Barrier. Elm and Harriet flew their aircraft low and slow, using up a lot of fuel.

"Ace Three, Lead. Give it another few minutes and then head for the barn. We'll cover the operation until Dragon Flight arrives." Elm acknowledged, and Pyrrha began a long left turn, keeping her and Weiss near the evacuation zone.

Weiss resisted the urge to relax, but it was hard not to. The last major fight with GRIMM had taken place in December, just before Christmas. Weiss had missed that one, but she had heard that it was a short but exciting battle. The GRIMM had not been in numbers, nor had they been particularly aggressive; none had chased NATO aircraft past the Vistula River. It was, General Gale had observed, almost as if Salem wanted to reassure NATO that she was still alive. Since then, there had been nothing. NATO had sent up combat air patrols every day, but all they did was burn fuel. They had even tried trolling for GRIMM: Weiss and Pyrrha had flown fingertip formation, presenting one blip on the GRIMM's radar, and used the same callsigns as the EC-130 Commando Solo. Nothing had taken the bait. Gale forbade anything but the SR-71 going east of the Vistula, and even the mighty Blackbird was allowed only as far as the Pripyet Marshes—the Night Raven could catch it.

They made a lazy orbit three more times before the last helicopter lifted off and headed north. The people of Wioska Myszy would settle in northwest Poland, where there was no radiation and where a rump Poland still existed; Jan had said he would be damned if he would accept hospitality from the Germans. Weiss smiled at that memory. At least some things never changed.

Ace Flight flew to Laage once the evacuation was completed. The Luftwaffe base, on the Baltic Sea north of Berlin, was the flight's new base—it was closer to Poland than Ramstein, and close to Berlin. Gale had said that he wanted his best pilots close to where he could quickly order them on special missions, but Weiss wondered if it was just because all five members of Ace Flight—Pyrrha, Weiss, Elm, Harriet and Marrow Amin—were all known to disobey orders on occasion. Gale was just keeping an eye on them.

Weiss taxied towards her revetment, following the ground crewman's light wands. She looked beyond him to the tarmac, and saw an Alpha Jet parked there with Happy Huntress sigils on the tail. Oh ho, she smiled. Fiona Thyme's here. Weiss parked the Typhoon and switched off the engine, raising the canopy as it wound down. A blast of cool air entered the cockpit, which felt good now, but Weiss knew there was only so much of that she could take. Europe was experiencing a late winter, and the air was right off the Baltic. Once Feldwebel Jung Freud had safetied the ejection seat, Weiss unstrapped and climbed down. "Irgendetwas?" Freud asked. Anything?

"Nichts," Weiss replied to her crew chief. "Gar nichts." Nothing. Nothing at all. Freud shrugged. The two women did a quick postflight—the wind was starting to cut through Weiss' flight suit—and then Weiss signed over the aircraft to the crew chief. She joined Pyrrha, who headed towards the equipment shack. "Where's Elm and Harriet?" Weiss asked. The F-35s had arrived twenty minutes before the rest of Ace Flight.

"Gale gave us a 48-hour pass, so Elm said she was taking Harriet to Legoland in Denmark. They wanted to get there before the snow hits." Pyrrha laughed. "I wouldn't have guessed Elm would go to a place like that, much less Harriet."

"Nothing wrong with Legoland. I haven't been there since I was a little girl." Weiss followed Pyrrha into the small building, where they stripped off their G-suits, survival vests, and lifejackets. "I'm actually glad to see Harriet loosen up some."

"About time." When Pyrrha had taken command of Ace Flight, Marrow had been overjoyed, Elm guarded but accepting, and Harriet sullen and hostile. She blamed Pyrrha and Weiss for Ironwood's death, though she blamed herself more, to the point that Weiss wondered if Harriet had an actual crush on the general. Even so, Harriet had not defied Pyrrha or tried to disobey orders—either because she realized she would be committing the same sin Pyrrha and Weiss had, or because she was afraid the Invincible Girl of Greece would simply kill her. It was generally known that Pyrrha had threatened to kill Emerald Sustrai, and meant it; luckily, Emerald had proven her loyalty. Gradually, over the long winter, Harriet had moved from grumpy and bitter, to accepting and neutral, to actually kind and respectful. Weiss still wasn't sure about it, but it was a nice change in Flight Lieutenant Bree. "Sauna?" Pyrrha smiled at her friend.

"I thought you'd never ask." The two went next door, took off their flight suits and underwear, and walked naked to a large sauna that some wonderful Luftwaffe morale officer had installed in the female pilots' locker room. Inside, they draped towels over their middles and sat on the benches. Pyrrha poured cold water on the hot rocks, bathing them in thick, warm steam. "Oh God," Weiss sighed. "That feels so good."

"Mm-hmm." Pyrrha leaned back against the wooden walls. "I saw Fiona Thyme's Alpha Jet on the transient tarmac."

"I did as well." Weiss chuckled. "I'll bet this month's pay that she's visiting my brother down in Berlin." Weiss took off her towel and wiped her brow with it. "I'd still like to know how that happened."

"They've been working together on the refugee resettlement efforts. I think it's very lovely."

"I admit they make a surprisingly nice couple," Weiss said. "I just hope if they get serious, they remember to use some protection. Unlike my sister."

Pyrrha laughed. "How much longer does Winter have?"

"Two, maybe three months. I still can't believe she's carrying Qrow's child." Weiss shared Pyrrha's laugh. Much to her embarrassment, Winter had turned up pregnant the previous November, and since Qrow Branwen was the only person she had been with, there was no doubt who the father was. Qrow had been alternately overjoyed, terrified, and flabbergasted—overjoyed that he could give a son or daughter the childhood he'd never had; terrified that he would get killed on operations; flabbergasted that Winter would agree to have any child of his.

But she had, and the two were engaged—even if, Winter had remarked, she would have to wear black at the wedding, the traditional German punishment for the bride already being pregnant. Luckily, Winter was grounded because she controlled the Winter Maiden, and Rissa Arashikaze had been quick to take Qrow off her secret missions. At least someone might get a happy ending, Weiss thought.

She was silent for a long time. "Thinking about Marrow?" Pyrrha asked.

"No, not at the moment."

Pyrrha adjusted her towel and stretched out her long legs, as Weiss got up to pour more steam on the rocks. "Can we expect anything between you and Marrow? He gets back from Israel in a few days."

Weiss shook her head as she sat down. "No…I don't think so. I'm not the marrying kind, Pyrrha. At least I don't think so. I don't love Marrow—not even the puppy love, if you'll forgive the expression, that my brother has for Fiona. I like him a great deal, even cherish his company." Weiss blushed a little, and not from the steam. "And I do enjoy…well, you know."

"I should hope so," Pyrrha grinned.

"But there's nothing serious between us. Yang said we're…ugh…fuckbuddies." Weiss wasn't sure how she felt about that arrangement—there was still just enough of a Lutheran patina left that living in sin with Marrow still bothered her. There had been times she had prepared to call it off with the handsome Faunus, only to have him literally sweep her off her feet, and next thing she had known, she was lying naked in bed, exhausted but satisfied.

Pyrrha giggled, which always sounded strange from her. "That sounds like Yang. I prefer the term 'friends with benefits.' I read that somewhere the other day." She breathed in the steam. "Ah, that feels nice. I need to take you to Greece, Weiss. Get out of this cold."

"Might as well. We're not doing anything else." Weiss began undoing her braid. "What's she waiting for, do you think? Salem's Russian. I would think she would hit us during the winter. That's kind of the Russians' forte." Weiss sniffed a laugh. "As we Germans know all too well."

"She was hurt pretty hard during the Polish campaign too," Pyrrha pointed out. "And she knows that all of NATO is arrayed against her now. She may be trying to get us to attack her first." Pyrrha took off her towel and dabbed at the sweat on her face. "One thing I think we can be assured of, especially now, after that attack on Arizona yesterday—Salem hasn't given up."

"No, that's fairly certain. It's just like her to switch her axis of attack from Europe to the United States, at the same time the Crown is causing trouble in the Middle East." Weiss closed her eyes. It made sense. Assuming the Arizona attack had not been an isolated incident, Salem would ramp up the pressure on the Americans. It would not take long before they started demanding that the half of the US Army that was in Europe be called home. It was classic Salem, from what Weiss understood of their foe: divide and conquer, sow division, then strike when her enemies were too busy arguing with each other.

"I'm sure Ruby's all right," Pyrrha said. "That attack was well south of Hill."

"I know," Weiss told her. "But I'm more worried about her state of mind right now. Maria called this morning and said she told Ruby about Pietro's passing. Given how much Ruby still blames herself for Penny being killed…" Weiss' voice trailed off, abruptly remembering who else blamed herself for the second Penny's death.

Pyrrha stared into the steam. "I know what you're thinking, Weiss. I don't blame myself for Penny-either one. I killed her sister because there was no choice. There was a choice with Penny the second time, and I refused to take it." She sighed. "We could've gotten her out of there. There was no need to call down the Winter Maiden."

Weiss wasn't sure about that-by Penny's own admission before her death, she was mortally wounded-but she didn't want to argue. Pyrrha had been through enough pain in the last year to last several lifetimes. "Pyrrha…you don't mind me…all this talk of relationships…"

Pyrrha raised her head and gave Weiss a heartbreakingly sweet smile. "Not at all, Weiss. I've come to terms with Jaune's loss. As for Clover…well, I don't think that could've ever been much in any case. I know now that he refused to sleep with me because Arashikaze had ordered him to, but even if he hadn't…we were both still in love with other people." She leaned back again. "I've decided not to look for love, Weiss. To be honest, I'm surprised to be still alive. A year ago, even at Beacon, I would've told you I wouldn't be." At Weiss' look of concern, Pyrrha's smile only widened. "I'm all right, Weiss. Really. Life is precious, and I take every day at a time." She shrugged. "Besides, how many of us weren't remotely looking for relationships, and now here we are—Winter and Qrow, Ruby and Oscar, Fiona and Whitley, perhaps? And I refuse to give up on you and Marrow."

"Oh ho. Playing matchmaker?" Weiss got up and put her towel around her neck. Her braid was free now, and Weiss' hair fell in shining white waves to the small of her back. "Well, I'll call Ruby later. That should help, a little."

"I will as well. It's not fair she should be exiled so far away." Pyrrha followed Weiss out of the sauna. "And I don't mind being a matchmaker! It's fun."

"Huh. I guess if nothing else, it would kill my father to know that his youngest daughter and his only son are both fucking Faunus." Weiss let out a loud howl of laughter at her own words. She rarely used profanity, but the idea of her being lovers with Marrow and Whitley being lovers with Fiona—even if she wasn't sure that her brother had taken that next step with the sheep Faunus or not—struck her as an uproarious form of revenge.

"Pardon?" Nebula Violette stuck her head around a locker. She was wearing her flight suit. "Weiss, I am surprised at you! Such locker-room language!"

Weiss grinned at the Frenchwoman. "Well, we are in a locker room, Nebula." She opened her locker and pulled out fresh underwear. "Do you have the night CAP tonight?"

"Oui." Nebula zipped up her flight suit. Her face and scalp still bore the burn scars from Beacon, where burning aviation fuel had set her hair on fire; only the quick reaction of a White Fang soldier, of all people, had saved her life. She wasn't burned as badly as Cinder Fall reportedly was, but the pink scars were still stark against her pale skin and purple-dyed hair. "Speaking of your father, Weiss, did you hear the news?"

Weiss closed her eyes and sighed. One part of her wished Nebula would just shut up; Weiss wanted nothing more to do with her father. "No."

"He was sentenced today. Five years for conspiracy."

Pyrrha snorted. "It should've been life in prison for treason! He conspired with Watts and Salem!"

Nebula shrugged. "Plea bargain." She put on her G-suit and survival vest. "Well, I am off with Octavia. Indigo Flight flies again…mostly." The Frenchwoman sighed. Indigo Flight would always be short one member: Gwen Darcy, killed at Beacon. Dew Gayl was still alive, but back in her home nation of Israel. "At least my Rafale and Octavia's F-16 is an improvement over the old F-8 and F-5, ne c'est pas? Good night."

"Don't let the GRIMM bite," Weiss joked, and Nebula laughed as she left.

Pyrrha pulled on her uniform. "Nebula should not have said that about your father. You deserved to find out in a different way."

"I already knew, Pyrrha. I saw it on the news before we took off. I just didn't want to be impolite." Weiss shut the locker and finished dressing. "Five years. He'll be out in two, on parole. Though I don't know what he'll do after that. Mother divorced him. He still has the Schnee name, but he'll never come within sniffing distance of the company." Weiss slipped on his shoes. "But that bastard will find a way to land on his feet, I know."

"It's not fair," Pyrrha said, then rolled her eyes. "Of course it isn't. Life isn't fair—we know that all too well. Still…for a man as corrupt as Jacques Schnee to only get five years? And only for conspiracy? Didn't they try him on any other charges?"

"You heard Nebula. He plea-bargained his way out of the charge of treason."

"But he was involved in other things." Pyrrha paused. "At least that's what Blake claimed."

"Blake wasn't wrong."

The two women left the locker room and went out into the cool evening. "Want to join me for a rousing game of chess?" Pyrrha chuckled. "Not exactly party animals, are we?"

"I'd love a game of chess. I'll be over to your room in a minute. I need to stop by my place first." Pyrrha gave her a nod and went on ahead; she lived in a separate dorm from Weiss.

Weiss' dorm room was little more than an apartment; heroine of the Fatherland or not, she was still only a Hauptmann, a captain—and she considered herself very lucky to be still that. The Luftwaffe had chosen not to prosecute Weiss for Ruby Flight's actions in Poland, saying that having one Schnee on trial was bad enough. Still, it was a very nice little place, not even the size of her bedroom at either Schnee mansion, but it was hers and she liked it.

Weiss sat at the little desk. She picked up the picture of Ruby Flight sitting next to the computer, and rubbed off a bit of dust. The picture had been taken in Japan, while Weiss was still recuperating from breaking her leg at the Battle of Nishinoshima. All of them were dressed in kimonos, the one day they had managed to do some sightseeing and drove down to Hakone. Weiss and Blake were prim in theirs, while Ruby was grinning and holding up bunny ears behind Blake, and Yang was sticking her tongue out, pulling open the front of her kimono to show off her barely-contained breasts. Nora had taken the picture, she remembered. It had not been a year since the picture had been taken, and Weiss felt like it had been five.

Weiss set the picture back down and opened the desk. She found the card at the bottom of a stack of them—she had placed it there deliberately. All that was on it was a phone number, but that number went to the Deputy Director of Intelligence of the Central Intelligence Agency, Rissa Arashikaze. Weiss picked up her cell phone and began dialing.

Ploetzensee Federal Prison

Berlin, Federal Republic of Germany

16 April 2002

Weiss sat in an uncomfortable chair in the meeting room. She wondered if that was deliberate, so that the visitor wouldn't stay too long. German prisons had a deserved reputation for being fair, even luxurious compared to other nations' prisons, but Ploetzensee wasn't one of them. Jacques Schnee might have plea bargained his way out of a long stay, but that didn't mean he had to be comfortable.

The door opened, and a guard led Weiss' father into the room. Aside from that guard, it would only be the two of them, at a single table. Jacques was cuffed, but that was all; he wore a prisoner's blue jumpsuit. When he sat across the table from Weiss, the guard attached his cuffs to a lock on the table. "Is that necessary?" Jacques complained. "I'm hardly going to attack my own daughter." The guard said nothing, merely returned to his position at the door. Jacques shook his head. "Neanderthals." He looked across at Weiss and tried a winning smile beneath his trimmed mustache. "Well, enough of that. I was surprised to hear that you had come to visit."

"Oh?" Weiss said. "Not even Whitley or Mother, or Winter?" Her question was a lie. She already knew that none of the family had visited Jacques.

Jacques scowled. "The only contact I've had with your mother is her divorce lawyers." He bit back an insult intended for Willow. "She took everything."

"You could hardly run the company in prison, Father," Weiss pointed out. She also knew Jacques had lied as well. Willow had left him enough to live comfortably for the rest of his life; Jacques simply could not access the money while incarcerated.

"Whitley hasn't come either, though I know he's in Berlin," Jacques continued. Weiss was tempted to tell him about Fiona, but decided against it; that was her brother's business. "As for Winter…" His scowl deepened. "She whored herself out to that mongrel Branwen. She'll regret that." Jacques sighed, then waved it off. "As I said, enough of that. At least you're here." He tried to reach across to take her hands, but the cuffs kept him from doing so. "Thank you, Weiss."

"Before you thank me, Father," Weiss said, "you should know I'm not here to see how you're getting along in prison." She looked around. "I must say that it's better than the prison cell I was in when I was Raven Branwen's prisoner in California, though not as nice as the room I was put in when I was the guest of the Red Prince…before he dosed me with kerasine, anyway." Weiss met her father's eyes with her own. Both were icy blue. "You know, it's interesting. Both times I was threatened to be sold into a brothel. The only difference was, the Red Prince actually tried it."

"He was a spoiled brat," Jacques snarled, and Weiss was surprised at the venom in her father's voice. "How dare he try his drugs on you. A lunatic who deserved exactly what he got. At least the Americans got that right, for once. A shame about the Red Keep, though…it was a rather beautiful place." He paused. "Or so I've heard."

"You never visited there?" Weiss asked.

"Why would I deal with that scum?" Jacques snapped.

"He had investments in our company."

"So do a lot of people. It wouldn't surprise me if this Salem creature had investments in the SDC." Weiss noticed that Jacques used the old title for Schnee GmbH—the Schnee Deutsches Company, the amalgamation of German and English that Nicholas Schnee had used.

"Perhaps we need to pay better attention as to who invests in the company," Weiss observed. She reached down and opened the satchel she had brought with her. She took out two folders and dropped them on the table. They were just out of Jacques' reach, so she slid them across. Jacques looked at Weiss strangely, then opened the folders. One was filled with printed sheets of numbers and figures. The other was photographs. Jacques flipped through the sheets, while Weiss watched his face carefully. She saw him swallow. One hand went up towards his throat, as if he was going to adjust a tie that was not there—a nervous habit of Jacques' that Weiss instantly recognized, even if Jacques tried to pretend he was merely scratching his chin. Then he went through the photographs, and this time he couldn't stop the nervous tic.

"You said you had never been to the Red Keep, Father," Weiss said. "That's very odd, since those pictures seem to suggest differently."

"I…I…those are forgeries!" Jacques suddenly declared. "Computer-generated images!"

Weiss picked up one of the photographs. It showed Jacques shaking hands with the Red Prince. "I didn't think computers could fake an image like this just yet. Impressive." She tossed the photo contemptously back on the table. "But they're not fakes, are they, Father? These were taken from the Red Prince's own security cameras. I suppose you didn't know that he had those scattered all over his castle."

"But that's impossible!" Jacques blurted. "The Red Keep was obliterated! The Americans put a cruise missile into it last September!"

"True, they did—I should know. I was almost still there." Weiss picked up another photograph that showed Jacques laughing with the Prince. "These pictures were taken just over a year ago, by the way. But it seems that the Prince had these on a secure drive, almost certainly for future blackmail." She practically threw that picture at Jacques. "I've only obtained the pictures you see. Luckily they don't show you playing naked chess with the Red Prince's slaves, which would have made me explosively vomit. Then again, not all the disks have been gone through yet by the CIA. It seems the Red Prince's Chamberlain was on their payroll."

"The CIA? You're working with the goddamned CIA?" Jacques shouted. "And you trust them?"

"I trust them more than I trust you, Father."

Jacques tried to raise his hands defensively. "Weiss, please…you must believe me. I never engaged in any of that depraved little bastard's games. Never. And I never trafficked in drugs or sex slavery. The Red Prince had legitimate business interests. Those were why I was there."

Weiss nodded. "I do believe you, strangely enough. For all your other lack of morals, you've never gone into selling drugs or buying brothels." Jacques seemed relieved at that. "But what about Faunus slaves? How many of those?"

"That's preposterous," Jacques said dismissively.

"Is it? I told Blake Belladonna the same thing at Beacon when she accused our family of being involved in that. Now I think she was telling the truth." Weiss' teeth were bared in anger. "My grandfather may have helped create the Faunus, Father, but he tried to treat them fairly. He even helped set up Menagerie—"

"Out of guilt for using them as quick-breeding cannon fodder during the GRIMM invasion of Europe!" Jacques exclaimed. "I was there, I saw that!"

"No doubt," Weiss agreed. "But Nicholas tried. You never did. You couldn't get European Faunus to work in Schnee mines for criminally low salaries…but Middle Eastern Faunus? Trying to escape persecution in North Africa, or Syria? That was a different story, wasn't it?" Weiss' finger came down on the pictures. "And the Red Prince was your broker. His father before him. No, Father, they weren't slaves. You paid them to keep the books nice and legal." Weiss next pointed to the figures. "You paid them a pittance, pocketed the difference, and then kept them underground, living in squalor. The one thing the White Fang did right—trying to free them. Adam Taurus was a lunatic, but he at least understood that the only way you'd let those poor Faunus go was through violence."

Jacques snorted. "The White Fang? They killed as many Faunus as they freed."

"Perhaps, Father. But that's neither here nor there. The fact is that you exploited them. They came here to find a place away from being murdered and enslaved, using the Red Prince or his father to smuggle them into Europe. And then you bought them, for all intents and purposes, and gave them more of the same." Weiss stood up. "You took a name that's been respected in the Fatherland since we were the von Schnees, riding with Blucher at Waterloo. You took the reputation of a great man…and you destroyed it. You turned the Schnee name into a curse. You drove your wife, a woman who loved you and bore your children, to almost killing herself with alcohol. And then you left those children to carry the can for your crimes." Weiss slapped her hands down on the folders. "And you know what? We will. Whitley's already started. And whatever mistakes I made in Poland, I can sleep well at night knowing I'm not you."

"What…what are you going to do?" Jacques whispered.

"Going to do? I've already done it." Weiss picked up the satchel. "A copy of these folders was sent to the Bundesnachrichtendienst last night." She referred to the German Federal Intelligence Service, their version of the CIA.

"The BND? Why them?"

"Because your crimes were international." Weiss slung the satchel over her shoulder. "I imagine these will be of great interest to those in the Federal government." She looked around the room. "There's not enough there for the death penalty, Jacques…but there's plenty to make sure you never leave these walls again." She smiled viciously. "Don't worry. I'm going to meet with Mother for lunch. I think that money she had intended for you when you are released will be better served helping Ghira Belladonna resettle refugees in Menagerie." Weiss surprised herself with a laugh. It was cruel, perhaps, but it felt right—the salt in the wound. "I think Big Nicholas would like that, don't you, Jacques?"

Jacques looked up at her. His eyes were no longer icy. They were the eyes of a broken man. "Weiss, I'm still your father."

Weiss shook her head. "No, Jacques. Once upon a time, not long ago, you disowned me. You would've left me to rot in Raven Branwen's prison in California, or worse, sold to the whorehouses of Tijuana. You said then that you had no daughter." She turned her back on him and walked to the door. "Well, I have no father."

Weiss left a silent room behind her.

AUTHOR'S OTHER NOTES: Ouch. Jacques might wish Ironwood had killed him in this fic. Weiss has come full circle, from not believing Blake to helping, in a way, serve the justice that the White Fang dreamed of dishing out.

And this was a chapter of shipping. We have confirmation of Qrow getting Winter pregnant, Weiss is still thumping the mattress on occasion with Marrow-he gets a lot of action in my stories-and now Fiona and Whitley. (Note that Whitley is older in this story.) Snowbird, Slushpuppies, and whatever Whitley/Fiona is. (Rich Wool?) Yep, I'll never let my favorite ships go. And a little cameo from Nebula Violette!

Next up? Well, that should be obvious: Blake. What's her and Oscar been up to on the ocean blue?