Chapter 10

He was scared.

…

No, scared would have been what he had felt when the truck had been flipped, when he had smashed his head on the chair and the world had spun with a dizzying miasma of fire, ash, and heat.

Scared would have been when he had clung on to the young Huntress' arm, when trickles of flame lined his throat and set fire to the throb of his voice, when his cries had blended into a plea at the behest of the scalding flashes of his family that had been cauterized into his brain.

He had been scared then, his hands shaking as he had passed his scroll almost automatically to the Huntress. Despite not knowing who she had dialed, he had hung onto every ring, every rolling tone bolstering his hope.

Then, the sword had cut through the door, and his voice failed as he let out a soundless scream, barely clinging onto the scroll that had been thrust into his hands.

He hadn't caught the words that the woman on fire had uttered, all he could hear was the thrashing of his heartbeat in his skull, the whisper of death drawing ever closer as the two women stared each other down.

He saw the petals first, as they fluttered to the ground mutedly, untouched by flame, a deep red like dabs of soft contrasting paint against a backdrop of volatilized chaos. It had carved through his coagulated panic, and for a moment, he awed at an innocence that didn't belong.

When the girl shot forwards to her adversary, armed with nothing but a small knife against an inferno, he had reeled backwards, clutching the seat as he steadied himself. He could barely keep up, speed and ferocity in equal parts as they cut and stabbed and punched and dodged, with masking curtains of whirling flames and petals enveloping them.

And here he was now, his hands folded over his scroll as it rung unceasingly, gazing into vicious war as it was waged in front of him, a helpless spectator as battle was fought with a tenacity and ability you could only glimpse at on the outskirts, where the Hunters fought the Grimm off so the helpless like him didn't have to.

Seeing what the VPD was up against, registering how close he had been to not seeing his family again, realizing how ill-equipped they all were, scared wasn't the right word.

He was horrified.

…brrring….brrring…brr-

" click … How did you get this number?"

Ruby growled, leaping into her semblance as she bursted towards the woman, a whirlwind of scarlet that spurred tides of howling wind. Dust swept up and her ferocity roared as she infused each strike with her frustration, and yet it amounted to nothing.

Each stab failed to hit their mark, each punch displaced nothing but air, each kick cracking upon nothing but her confidence.

The problem wasn't that her opponent was fast, the problem was that she made it look so fucking easy. She may as well have announced her attacks, the way her opponent sidestepped, ducked, and backpedaled, all the while with that aggravating smirk plastered on her face, sharpened and rimmed with a devilish thrill that bore into her, like she was preening at her own reflection glaring off the silvers she sought.

Her frustration pervaded her mind, an ugly nebulous mist that ripped grunts and snarls from the crushing band of vexation that wrapped her throat.

Ruby couldn't be hit in her semblance, and her opponent couldn't be hit regardless. Fighting was a waste of Aura.

Ruby placed distance between them, bursting away and spinning around with the knife grasped in a modified saber grip, her thumb dragging across the length of the rasped lever surface. Even now the woman still smiled, her swords resting easily in her hands as she stood smugly unguarded.

Ruby managed through gritted teeth, forcing out a slow exhale to calm the thundering of her heart and the roar in her ears. She might be outmatched, and her Aura reserves might not be fully mended from imprisonment, but she would be dammed if she let it show without a fight.

"Why did you stop Rose? I was just beginning to enjoy myself, not everyday I get tested by a Silver Eyed Warrior after all."

Ruby frowned, her eyes narrowing as she dug in her feet, ready for sudden retaliation.

"Is this just all a game to you? People have died because of you, innocent people, good people! You've crossed a line, and this won't go the way you want it to."

Her retort produced an amused huff, all the while eyes brimmed with molten flame barely contained, swords maintained in a slack grip even as they sparked with dust with a thirst for conflagration.

"Ever so bold Ruby Rose. Play the valiant hero all you want, it doesn't change what you have been from the beginning; unworthy."

Her opponent was stalling, this she knew. But so was she, inwardly regarding the withering burn of the sun as it settled lower beneath the distant hills, as yellows hued with fire melded into the deepness of the extinguishing blue hour.

And this game that she was forced into was risky, oh so risky.

She was banking on the call she had instructed the officer to make. Its were results unknown to her, owned to the way she had shot for the wielder of the flames the moment she had opened the transport's doors. At least it had drawn her attention away from the truck, where she was pretty sure the officers were still taking cover, hopefully still attempting at the call.

She would delay then, with tamed hope nestled within, kindled but never allowed to flare beyond. What else could she do after all?

She wrestled with her voice, wrangling it straight and hammering it steely, the point of her glare never straying from the threat. "You know me so well do you?"

The woman scoffed, her grin stretching to the beat of a memory. "I know enough. I've beaten another just like you, another who's power was wasted on them, and you are exactly the same, grossly unfitted and equally too weak to see it to its true potential."

"What power? I don't know what you think you know about me lady, but you should get your source checked. I am just-"

"Ruby Rose. Indoctrinated into Beacon at the tender age of 15 due to 'prodigious talent', expelled in less than a year due to…let's call it 'interference'. Interesting the old man let you go despite boasting solo combat scores rivalling Nikos, and it's all been going downhill from then, hasn't it? No thanks to him."

She could've steeled past that, she had heard worse over the day, but the smirk that was sent her way was frigid and coated with a sinister yearning, a desire for misery at the behest of hatred, founded and intimate in its nature.

"The extremes taken, the sacrifices he's willed himself to make, could you ever fathom how Summer could've stood by a man like this?"

She must have reacted, she must have. There was no way she could've endured past this unscathed, not when its implications battered her with the kick and consistency of hail, brutal and terrifying.

Despite its brevity, she fought to struggle past the imposed weight, like a galaxy of orbiting memories filled with stars of bereavement had collapsed upon itself beneath her feet, and she was being pulled to the dirt with chains of steel forged in the heat of her mother's name.

When the smirk darkened, Ruby knew something about her had wavered. Be it her expression, her hands, her stance, it didn't matter. Miltia had warned her of this before, hadn't she?

Her mannerisms spoke too much, it was why she had never been allowed to be present for inter-gang meetings, when the stakes soared higher than the ceilings went, and the agreement for temporary peace hung over their heads only by a thread.

Just another mistake to add to the growing tally.

The best she could do now was not to fall into the obvious bait by pushing the subject of her mother. The name drop her opponent flaunted was designed to knock her off balance even further, and she couldn't give in even more than she already had, no matter how much she wanted to.

Dust, she wanted to.

"I'm glad I'm interesting enough for you. So, if you need this…power so badly, do you really think killing me is the best way to get it?"

A shake of the head was her reply, an almost disappointed noise humming loose, one that had Ruby bore through clenched teeth, aware that she had them tensed so hard that her jaws ached.

"You think I have been trying to kill you? Dear girl, we both know that with your Semblance, it would just be a stalemate till Beacon arrives. All I was doing was… softening you up a little." It was ominous, lined with a tone of finality that screamed at Ruby to be ready.

But there was no need to worry right?

The gap Ruby had put between them ensured that there was no way the gap could be closed without her reacting. She had her eyes trained on her, knees bent, Aura flaring, she was ready for anything that the woman could pull.

There were no environmental factors to consider, she had open space to react, and most importantly of all, it was just Her she had to worry-

CRACK

…

She flung herself into her semblance before her mind caught up with the sound, but she knew she had messed up. She just hoped she had reacted in-

…

Ruby felt the impact first on her shoulder. Her world filled with a disorder of fire, heat, and smoke as she felt herself being veered off course from where she had sprung herself, sending her sprawling to the ground as she blinked confusedly. For a moment, it was just her against the ground, wreathed in a cavort of spiraling dust and dirt kicked up into a clogging fog, nursing her slackened right shoulder that enabled her confusion with the numbness that was beginning to spread across the expanse of her collarbone.

Then it all sharpened to an anarchic crescendo, splitting and terrible, a burn that erupted from her nerves, melting flesh and bone till all that remained was bursting agony that wracked and seized. It was overwhelming, like a stake through her brain, and somewhere far away, she heard a series of tiny, muffled groans.

"Did that look like her head to you?! You were supposed to knock her out! … What do you mean she moved-"

The voice melted into the waves of staccato throbs that inundated her, a coil in the wrong direction sending a fresh wave of hurt that elicited a distant whimper.

Had that groaning been her? It was all so hard to tell.

She cracked her eyes open, wincing past the dirt that lined them, another groan enunciated with a hiss through clenched teeth breaking free as she struggled but failed to pull her right arm to her face. It was like molten lead, the way it smoldered despite its deadened state, heavy and dragging as she conceded, maneuvering to wrestle her left hand instead to her face.

Her hands shimmered with a barely perceivable film of Aura, flickering to the rapid pummeling of her chest. The normally potent threads that made up the physical form of her Aura were dimmed and fractured, on the verge of crumbling and taking the weave of her Aura along with it.

She hadn't broken, but she would.

The crunching of footsteps over her shoulder crackled like grating static in her ears, rupturing a vial of heady dread that rode a meteoric rise deepened by the pain. And she was shaking, oh fuck she was shaking, from the pain and terror that had intermixed into a drowning blend of chill and fire, clogging her lungs and her throat and her veins with a coagulated mix of strangling trepidation.

SHE'll KILL YOU, RUN.

That was the thought that screamed itself through the maelstrom, incessant and stabbing like a bullet lodged in the brain, and she found herself canting her head back towards the dirt road she had been driven from.

Havetorunhavetorunhaveto RUN.

Gathering the Remnants of her Aura, silvers tinged with bruised red, a foot digging into the dirt with a desperation that had burrowed and settled beneath the confines of boiling skin. She palmed her willing hand into the dirt, willing herself up on the wavering fingers that struggled through the burden of a deadened shoulder.

She froze when a growl latched onto her from behind, a threat as low and serious as a grave lodged in its guttural serrations.

"You're pathetic, weak. This is what your lineage has come to, groveling in the dirt, preparing to run away instead of fighting to an end worthy of your power."

Ruby threw her head back frantically, catching on the storm that swirled in scorching amber, shrinking at the faint ripple of cruel satisfaction that pulsed a heartbeat. And terrified as she was, she almost missed the flickering of movement behind her.

It was a girl with mint green hair, scarlet eyes simply grazing Ruby as they lingered on her partner, a hint of nervousness in the dip of her head. Ruby's eyes flicked down to the weapons strapped to the girl's back. A pair of revolvers, their chambers filled with cartridges lined with glaring red markings, a series of windings and layered streaks that produced the symbol for fire dust rounds.

A dust round? She managed to stay conscious after getting hit by a fucking dust round?

…

They had dust rounds, holy shit they had dust rounds.

Ruby eyed the distance between them. There was no way either of them could move that fast, not without a speed semblance. Ruby could run, she would make it, she should do it now before they-

"You're still considering running? Fine, let me help you put a stop to your cowardice."

A hand was lifted back towards the truck, where the officers were still taking cover. Ruby paled; somewhere in between the pain and the burn and the fear, she had forgotten about them.

The hand coated with Aura, a spark writhing and blooming from its center till it rounded into a contoured ball of feral flamed coils that wrestled, layered, and curled around each other.

"Go on girl, make a run for it. When you do, I'll scorch these fragile people till their bones become all but uniform ash, and know that as their screams follow you down the dirt, you will be the one that forced their demise."

So this was it then.

Was she brave enough? Brave enough to condemn herself for two officers that at the dawn of the very same day had her collared and cuffed?

Did her desire for heroics reach further than the fear that corroded her thoughts? Was it driven deeper than the essence of coiled desperation that effected the urge to just run?

...

No.

She wasn't brave, she wasn't a hero, and she wasn't able to break the bounds of steeled cowardice, lodged into the gashes of her mind with crackling fuses, like dust laid dormant till struck by flint.

Feeling in her shoulder crept back slow, incremental, but it was there, and she cringed past the residual burn as she swept up the knife before pushing herself up, finding the ground on shaking legs.

The girl with green hair snuck a worried look to the back of her partner's head, one that would go unnoticed as she maintained her smirk, her hand gripped around the flames that threatened to spill loose towards the truck.

"Cin-Ma'am, should we-"

"Silence. Let the girl make her decision."

Ruby flexed her numbed fingers, shuffling a foot back as she regarded the duo hesitantly.

Her throat tested with a cough, her vision narrowed through a swirl of dirt and apprehension, she spoke tryingly, with a rawness she couldn't control slipping through her fissured cadence, the press of a cancer in her chest.

you will die

"My...my mother, you know her?"

"I knew of her."

just like she did

"What happened to her?"

The smirk grew just a bit wider, a trickle of devilishness dripping off the slant of flaring eyes.

"She played the hero, you all do."

kill or be killed

Ruby sucked in a scattered breath, anchoring herself to the grit of the knife's handle, the notches that bit into her skin as she squeezed over the abrasions, securing an ampule of comfort that she fastened to her heart. The wind dripped off her cheekbones, tensed and coiled, burning to the intensity of the boil in her eyes.

At least her mum wouldn't be disappointed, she would be a hypocrite if she did.

Her eyes coated red, a well of Aura called to sink to the balls of her feet.

She wasn't brave, she harbored fear in coiled muscles and traitorously shallow breaths, but beneath that was an urge, a roar erupting at the back of her skull tuned to the edge of the knife. Her mother hadn't walked away from a fight, and neither could she, but carrying her virtue wouldn't save her life.

A squeeze at the knife's hilt, a final deep breath for focus.

"I would hate to break tradition."

The world blurred in a haze of red and roses, her feet lifting as she spiraled towards fiery Ambers, with only a sneer relented as she steered her focus beyond their accompanied grin.

She had to think clearly, fast strikes would not be enough to win this fight, not when they had tested each other to no conclusion, and certainly not when her Aura was already tanked.

But her speed was useful for more than just swipes and stabs.

She latched on to the wide eyed gawk of the green haired girl, a hand caught in the throes of Ruby's semblance, snailing down to reach for her guns, clearly having been caught off guard.

There, that was how she would fight.

She darted close to the flames, the knife raised up above her shoulder as she feinted a slash across her torso, her expression unrevealing when the woman smirked, making to dodge the strike with a clean sidestep.

At the apex of her strike, that was when she made her play. Ruby abandoned the attack, the edge of her foot digging into soil as she bounded off her abrupt maneuver, making straight for the green haired girl who fumbled for her guns.

Ruby was too close all too fast, and the girl realized that, bringing her leg up to thrust it towards the barreling whirlwind of ravening scarlet.

She was slower, much slower, and Ruby darted around the kick swiftly, placing the girl in between her and the flames that had begun to flare dangerously.

There was no more hesitation after that.

Ruby spun the knife around her thumb into a hammer grip, a roar breaking loose as she stabbed and slashed and carved away at the girl, the tension in her chest exploding into untamed savagery as she went for everything.

Eyes, lungs, brain, heart.

She hadn't fought her way out of Patch just to die here, and she would be damned if she let them take her without blood to speak for their efforts, and so Ruby wielded her fear, callousness, and rage, exalting the edge of every swing, the thrust of every stab, and the roars that splintered her normally precise strikes into a brutal animalistic frenzy.

The girl was falling apart, each attempt at a block or a dodge appearing more frenetic than the last, all the while twisting wildly as Ruby forced her in front of Cinder, a growl of frustration escaping from the latter as she narrowly halted yet another one of her attacks in lieu of her partner's intruding torso.

"What are you- Get out of the way!"

"I-I can't!"

The girl let out another cry as Ruby forced a headbutt through her defense, the meaty thump that resulted sending molten sadistic satisfaction that slipped between the cracks of her fury. She surged forward as the girl stumbled, not giving willing her an inch to breathe, not an ounce of respite for these murderers.

"Cinder-!"

Cinder.

"- I'm sorry!"

An ugly sound tore its way out from the woman, Cinder.

"Don't you dare, we can't afford to-!"

Ruby roared, both hands strangling the hilt as she stabbed the knife downwards, the point barreling towards terrified reds as her defense shattered. And it should have been terrifying, her intention to claim a life, but in that moment, the stress and the pressure and the setback after setback after setback had scorched her blood to a boil.

All she could see was red. All she could focus on was driving the knife between those scarlet eyes, those eyes that had begun to shimmer with speckled green, elevated by choking terror, before they were veiled by the squeezing of crushed eyelids.

It made her feel powerful, in control, rewarded for doing finally doing something that would make a difference. The knife plunged ever lower, yet her heart soared in anticipation. This was what needed to be done, this was what she had to-!

…

A flash of blinding green, and the eyes blew wide.

Lilacs.

Her hand lurched to the side, a whimper elicited as she severed a lock of hair, narrowly missing the face that flinched under the knife's caress. The world fell silent, the heat and rush smothered by the yellow strands that waltzed to the ground, swaying rhythmically to the pulse of her shock.

Yang's alarm gave rise to a disquieting pressure, the way it enveloped and wrung her throat. Her sister's eyes were wide with horror, an arm flung in front of her face to shield from the strike that Ruby had intended to carry through, a slight tremble in her arm that Ruby could feel snaking through her bones.

"Please don't do this!"

Yang's words were confusingly foreign, spoken with the voice she knew, yet carried forth with undertones of...something. Maybe it was because she had never heard Yang sound so terrified before, if she had ever at all.

The road was clear, the two women she had been fighting nowhere to be seen, leaving nothing behind but fragments of charred dirt and the truck, a thick column of smoke billowing past the low hanging clouds.

What the hell is going on?

She took a breath for calm, then she stilled. The corners of her mouth were upturned, a maniacal grin that had latched onto her face as naturally as a dip into her semblance. Had she been smiling the whole time?

Why? Why had she been...

It doesn't matter, not now, there were more important things to be concerned about.

Yang was unarmed, dressed in standard classroom attire, she was not ready for a fight.

Ruby scanned the area, scrutinizing any potential hiding spots that the duo could have retreated to. Idly, she gestured for Yang to stand up, a chaste flick of her wrist that spoke her urgency.

"Listen, Yang. I don't know what the hell is going on, but you can't be here unarmed. I don't know if you're here because of whatever semblance she has, but you need to run, before they come back."

Yang nodded frantically, fear accented in her words as she stammered, "I'll call for help, don't worry! But could you uh, hand me the knife? In case they find me?"

What…?

Ruby flicked to Yang, an ugly sentiment blooming in her mind. The knife raised with her arm, muscles tensed and pulled taunt by wariness that clawed up the length of her spine, coming to rest as a leery whisper at the back of her skull.

"Come again? I'm not sure if I heard you wrong, but it sounded like you were asking me to give away my only fighting chance."

Yang paled, propping herself up on her elbow as she swallowed nervously.

"I-Well, look around Ruby, it's clear they're long gone, and you have this…wildness in your eyes that's really starting to give me the creeps. Just…at least lower the knife, you know Summ-Mum wouldn't want you hurting me."

Ruby paused. She narrowed her eyes, burrowing into the Lilacs that stared at her with such naked fear, a quality that assured her certainty.

"Please, don't leave me too."

"It'll be ok Rubes. We'll be ok."

"You're not Yang. Yang would never hold our Mum over my head."

'Yang' shrunk back as Ruby brandished the knife, withering under the heat of Ruby's glare.

"Last chance before I cut you. Who are you? Where are they?"

Yang's eyes flickered, a small glance behind her that prompted Ruby to look over her shoulder, finding nothing but the clumsy dirt road that spanned the distance. She glared back at Yang, slanting down to splay the flat of the knife against the underside of her chin, doing her best to ignore the churning uneasiness that sprouted from seeing her 'sister' wince from her threat.

"You don't think I won't do it just cause you look like her? Let me prove you-"

Her words died in a gasp as a sweeping foot from behind removed her footing, and a hand on her back pressed her into the dirt.

Then her flesh started sizzling, and everything fell apart to the flames.

The heat that followed was searing in nature, something sure to blister and mark. She could barely hear her own screams over the agony, so intense and blinding that even her own unintelligible thoughts succumbed to the blaze. Somewhere far off, she heard a vague shattering, a muted shriek like a bereaved cry, and the flames on her back licked ever closer to her soul.

Ruby couldn't tell when the hand had been removed, only barely realizing when Cinder squatted in front of her, both hands in plain view. The flesh on her back still boiled, like her spine played kindle to an inferno, and her uncontrollable writhing only made everything worse. She clawed at soil, her static fingers scarring crescents into her palms as scattered sobs escaped her in strangled outbursts.

And she pleaded to her racked soul, begging for a trace of Aura to soothe, anything to put out the wildfire that ravaged her back. Then she saw them, shards of glittering red that drifted solemnly along the wind, wheeling further way in spiraled patterns.

She knew what it meant; the fight was done.

She lifted her gaze to Cinder, peering at a whetted sneer through the watery film of her despair as it leaked and stung at her eyes, as a mixture of coagulated blood and charred flesh afflicted her mouth and sunk its repulsive memory into her brain.

Cinder made to speak, sinking words prepared to lower Ruby down into a sure grave, with her partner further back staring at Ruby with a messy confusion of horror and uneasiness.

"Don't worry Rose, your power will be wielded for a greater purpose than what you have granted it, see it as an honor."

Ruby tried once again for her Aura, a deep pull into the confines of her chest for a spark of desperate hope, but she was crippled, and she had broken.

She was going to die, but she had known that coming into this. It did nothing to lessen the terror she felt, the sting of depressive bitterness that had carved itself a home in her chest, fueled by the stabbing crackling flesh of her back.

But she had saved two lives.

That was a net plus right?

A choked laugh broke out of her at the thought of some cosmic karma tracker, her short moment of respite followed up by a wince as the ashen nerves on her back protested from the movement.

"Something funny?"

Cinder's expression was infuriating, the amalgamation of a triumphant smirk and a heated scowl, and it made her glare come easy. A fire had come to prosper at the base of her throat, superheating every wheezing breath, filling her lungs with clogging ash that scorched.

Still, she forced out her words, tuned to a raspy growl carved by flame.

"Fuck you."

Cinder's expression hardened, a passing scoff discarded as she stood up, shifting her head to look over at her partner, "We've been here long enough, reinforcements from Beacon will be here shortly. Get her to that clearing, I'll call for the bullhead."

Ruby dropped her head back to the dirt, her sore neck from peering up only contributing to the pain she had been sentenced to enduring. Her body felt like molten lead, the way it dragged when she attempted to move, the way her nerves pinched when she contorted just the wrong way.

Her face in the dirt, she listened to the crunching footsteps as they circled around to her legs, a stagnant pause spared before a hand wrapped around the lace of her combat boot dragged her leg up, drawing a hiss as her injuries split her thoughts yet again.

Then the dirt started dragging beneath her, catching on her belt, her face, and her hands, rocky degrading soil that scraped and gashed her face like gritting sandpaper. They moved in intermittent bursts of haggard movement, a patent struggle that despite the hurt it brought about, had Ruby clutching on to that small pulse of satisfaction from knowing that she hadn't allowed her capture easily.

Though she supposed it didn't matter in the end. She had still-

Cinder's partner gasped, a note of striking potent alarm, translated through the strangled grip on her leg. "Stay back, both of you! We have an agreement with your boss through Roman, this is none of your business."

There was a sound of scraping metal far off, like sharpened thirsty blades glancing off each other, a test of mettle that primed the tenacity of their wielder.

"The terms we had with Roman also included that Xiongs aren't to be touched. You overstepped your bounds with Ruby Rose, that very much makes it our business."

Ruby never imagined she could relent any form of relief from the sound of a snarl notched and imbued with such loathing venom it practically defined the word, especially one coming from Miltia, but she managed it anyway.

Still a better response time than Beacon and the VPD. Thank dust for the Malachite Twins.

Author's Note:

Hope you all enjoyed! Sorry if it all seems a little off, I am terribly rusty. Life's been hectic lately, hope I can get the next chapter out without as much of a delay.