I woke up holding my pillow. It was a nice pillow. Cold, soft, and fluffy. It felt nice. I like my pillow. It's why my arms were wrapped around it.

Shame that my pillow didn't seem to want to stay with me. It was lightly pulling away from me. Instinctively, my arms tightened.

"No…" I murmured sleepily, eyes closed as I held my pillow closer. The citrus scent of the pillowcase was nice. Weiss must've washed them.

Soft strands of something sprawled against my face. They tickled ever-so-slightly. My pillow pulled away from me again.

"Let me go, you oaf." My pillow called out to me. Which is odd as pillows don't usually talk. My eyes fluttered open.

Glacial-gray eyes met my own.

Oh. This was embarrassing.

I quickly let go of Weiss as embarrassment flooded the exhaustion from my body. This was becoming too common of an occurrence. I'd long since stopped feeling pain from skin contact with her, starting around the time of the entry test.

"Thank you for releasing me." Weiss graced me with her words, a twinge of amusement to her voice. "I'm glad you were so eager to treat me like a pillow."

It wasn't fair. As I was growing more embarrassed by her, she was becoming more willing to tease me. I missed when I didn't copy her in acting like a stuttering mess.

"Not my fault you're so comfy."

Weiss got out of bed, moving over towards her dresser. "So it's my fault?" She mused, opening her draws. "Truly, I am terribly sorry for being… cuddly."

"You should be." I snip back, rolling out of bed and falling onto the ground in a heap of blankets. I got a small laugh from Weiss so it was worth it.

I pulled myself out of my clothy pile and tossed the blankets back onto the bed. I moved towards the bathroom to brush my teeth. "Think Ruby and Yang are out looking already?"

Weiss hummed, grabbing her usual dress from the drawers. "Doubtful. Then again, maybe we got lucky. Maybe the faunus actually went back to her team."

"Blake, not the faunus." I corrected her, speaking through my toothpaste filled mouth. "And don't wear that."

Weiss rolled her eyes, looking mildly offended. "What's wrong with my clothes? Also, don't talk while brushing."

I ignored her order as I had done many times. "Nothing wrong with them. You just look nicer when more casual."

Spitting into the sink, I gargled water to clear the taste from my mouth.

Weiss glanced at the dress in her hands and back to me. "Do I?"

"Mhm." I confirmed with a nod. "And keep your hair down. I like it down, it's better that way."

Weiss would've made a lovely wire with the way heat was traveling up her cheeks. Her hand palmed a few strands of white hair. "Is it?" She inspected the few stands in her hand like they'd give her an answer.

Moving over to my dresser, I began to riffle through the draws. "I think it is, at least. It'd be a challenge to make your hair look even better than its natural state." Grabbing a light green tee from my drawer, I gave it a quick sniff. It smelled fine.

I started to pull off my shirt.

"—what're you doing!?" Weiss, proving she wasn't just smart like an owl, turned her head at an angle I felt was unnatural.

"Changing, obviously. We live together and share a bed. I really don't care if you see me shirtless." My shirt was then promptly yanked off and replaced.

"It's inappropriate." Weiss huffily whined, still turned away. Her neck had a cherry twinge to it. "And it is embarrassing. Do you have any shame?"

"Hmm…" I pretend to consider her statement, searching for a pair of underwear and shorts in my drawers.

Ha. Drawers and underwear. What lovely synonyms I use.

"Nope. Shame is for people who have something to be shamed for. I'm too cool for shame." I bragged, snagging my boxers and a pair of black shorts. I had a litany of black shorts. "Anyhow, you might want to look away unless you want to see me naked."

Weiss let out something I could've sworn was a squeak and continued her mighty task of analyzing every atom in the wall. I took the opportunity to swap my lower clothes out.

"See? Was that so terrible?" I bundled my dirty clothes and lobbed them into our harper. Swish. "Ay, made it!"

"You—you're—I can't—" I ruffled her head as she proceeded to degrade into sputters. If I had to suffer teasing, she had to. I may have started it, but…

…losing is for losers.

"You can change?" I casually say, looking at her expectantly. It was painful to hide my smile as she got even redder.

The dress in her hands got flung at my face. "Not in front of you, you—you actual troglodyte!"

I make an exaggerated play of eyeing up the room. "This doesn't look like a cave to me." I titled my head at her, giving her curious eyes. "Does it look like we live in a cave to you?"

She got all huffy at that. "You know what I meant…"

"I do know what you meant. However, using big words for the sake of using big words only can insult people who are dumb." I placed her thrown dress on top of the drawer. "Using big words, however, can be more fun if you use them to highlight an obvious trait in a less obvious way. For example: Weiss, your pulchritudinous nature is radiant today."

There was an annoyed glint to her eyes. She also got slightly sheepish. "...what does that mean?"

"Exactly!" I proudly puff up my chest. "You have no clue what it means, making you feel dumb. But, for the record, it means beautiful."

"Oh…" Her eyes were quickly averted from my own. "...you're just saying that to make fun of me, aren't you?"

I cast her an odd glance. "What? Why would I do that?" My eyebrows furrowed in confusion and I continued to look at her weirdly. "I've never hidden the fact I find you to be beautiful. I'm pretty sure one of the very first things I said to you was that I like your hair."

"...oh."

"Yes, oh." I toss one of my tee shirts at her. It's a basic, pale blue shirt. "Stop acting so insecure and go put that on. Find shorts on your own."

"Do I really look better in casual clothes?" She asks in a slightly nervous tone, almost as if she thought I was trying to develop a habit of lying to her or something.

"You look good in anything." I replied to her honestly—I was not, in fact, trying to develop a habit of lying to her. "It's just that some clothes are better than others. I like how you look with your hair down and in casual clothes. That's just how I feel."

"Alright." She murmured, grabbing something from her drawer. "I'll—I'm going to go change now."

Weiss hurried off to the bathroom. I leaned against the wall and blew air. Talking about emotions was always tiring. It wasn't Weiss's fault. Far from it, really. I tease her a lot, it wasn't shocking that she would think I was also teasing her about her looks.

Don't really know why she would think that I didn't think she was good looking. She is an objectively attractive person, unlike myself. Pretty face, nice figure, and stunning hair—literally anyone would think she is good looking.

She is odd. But who am I to talk about others being odd? Pots and kettles, after all.

A ding from my Scroll dragged on my attention. I pulled out the aforementioned device, feeling slightly curious as to who would text me at…seven in the morning. Probably Ruby harassing us to hurry up.

I typed in my password and went to my messages. Nope, not Ruby. Actually, this was a more comforting message: Hey, honey. The message read. Sorry we didn't pick up your call last night, we had an early night yesterday. Your father and I will call you around eight tonight, see you and your teammate then! Hope you're enjoying Beacon and that the Schnee girl is nice. We have a big reveal to tell you, but it's fine to have Weiss be there. Love you!

I blinked in mild surprise. I hadn't told them I'd gone to Beacon. I hadn't told them I was on Weiss's team. Oh well, Beacon had a public roster. They'd probably looked it up and found out from that.

I was soon pulled out of my musings.

The bathroom door swung open and Weiss walked out, head leveled high. I'd say she looked confident but the shuffle to her steps kinda ruined that.

"How do I look?" Weiss asked me, voice held steady but rushed.

I gave her a beaming smile. "You look great." And she really did. She let her hair down, for one. Her hair was really nice when down. Not to say it wasn't nice up, but it was better down. The way it flowed and cascaded down her back was pretty. I liked it.

I also liked how she looked in my shirt. It was nice. I use that word a lot—nice. But it felt apt. She felt regal when wearing her dress, all fancy shmancy. "You have that girl next door look to you. I didn't even know you owned jeans, though. I thought you only owned fifty pairs of the same dress."

"I have many clothes, thank you very much." She defended her apparently varied wardrobe. "I just tend to wear a dress…that I have many copies of."

"Well, you should use those many clothes more often, then. The cold queen look is nice and all, but when warmer you have more of an angelic vibe."

Her eyes widened at my words. "...angelic? Me?"

"Sure." I gave a light shrug. "Angels are depicted as being warm, white haired beings who radiate beauty." I began to count on my hands. "White hair? Check. Warm? Sometimes. Radiating beauty? Also check. Seems angelic to me."

"Th—thanks." She stuttered out, looking bashful. "You're…not terrible yourself."

"A compliment? From you?" I deflected, not wanting to get into her white lie. "Guess you really want to fulfill that whole warm presence thing."

She swatted my arm lightly. "I'm being serious. You look good."

"I look homeless." I bluntly say, indicating my state of dress and appearance.

"What was it that you called it yesterday?" She examined her nails. "Oh, yes. Your homeless chic. Maybe you don't put extreme effort into how you dress, but you pull it off. You're ruggedly handsome, not messy or sloppy."

I smiled for her sake. "Thanks. I'll keep that in mind next time I'm trying to get a date."

"You're ridiculous."

"Might be," I shrugged helplessly. It drew an annoyed huff from her, bringing a twitch to my lips. "Anyways, we should head out soon. Ruby'll be annoyed if we take too long."

"Let her." She said tightly. "Ruby should be grateful that we are even helping her. If it was up to me, we'd let that faunus girl find her own way back."

"Lucky for her, I chose!" I cheer brightly. Weiss deeply sighed. "Anyhow, let's go. Chop chop, Sunshine."

She rolled her eyes and we went to meet our… acquaintances down at the front of the building. It was only a quick walk.

Ruby and Yang were already waiting for us at the front of Beacon. Ruby was practically vibrating. "What took you guys so long! We've been here for so long waiting for you guys, Blake might've vanished off to the winds and we'll never find her and she'll be gone and then it'll only be team RY and that'll be so sad and—"

Yang ruffled her sister's hair, an oddly solemn look on the teen's face. "It'll be okay, Ruby. We'll find her, right?" Yang cast me a glance, wanting me to back her up.

I nodded to soothe Ruby's nerves. "We'll find her. Trust me."

Ruby's shoulders slumped in relief. "Thank you so, so much for helping us, Nigel and Weiss. It—I don't know what we'd do without you guys."

I shot her a light smile. "As much as I like praise, how about we get off to looking?"

Yang nodded. "Sounds like a good idea, Nigel. How about you go with me and Ruby goes with Weiss? Also, speaking of Weiss, the hair looks great!"

Weiss upturned her nose and snorted, ignoring the complement. "Absolutely not. Let's stay within our teams, thank you very much."

I held back a groan. Was Yang really still trying to get Weiss and Ruby to be best of buds? Especially now?

"I don't care much about who I go with. But," I added on, looking towards Weiss. "She clearly has a strong opinion. I'll go with staying in our teams."

"Whipped." Yang muttered cheekily, giving Weiss and I a teasing glance. I just nodded in agreement.

"You're not wrong. Weiss is scary."

Weiss pouted. "I'm not scary."

I tried to raise a single eyebrow but I failed in my endeavor. "Right, sorry. I meant you're terribly long winded. Easier to obey than to hear you prattle."

"Hey!"

"Yeah, Weiss Cream—you've got a terrible speaking problem. You totally love the sound of your own voice!" Yang added, helping me make Weiss's day just that much worse.

"Well, hard to not like her voice." I continue along. "She is a singer."

Yang lit up like a lightbulb. "She most certainly…" Yang built up, a grin on her face. " Sings like a canary." She snickered at her own joke.

I gagged.

"That was terrible." I bluntly say.

Red had an embarrassed look on her face. "She always does this." Ruby snitched, looking up at Yang.

Yang continued to brightly smile and patted Ruby's back. "You loooove my puns, Ruby! They're not meant to be… punitive." She slapped her own knee at that.

"You should not be allowed to touch comedy, Yang." Weiss gave the blonde an annoyed look. "Your jokes feel more like listening to a feline viciously drag its nails across a chalkboard than anything even remotely humorous."

Yang remained positively unphased.

"How chilly of you, Ice Queen!" Yang cracked herself up more. Weiss huffed, an action which managed to make Yang even brighter. "Getting cold feet, Sunshine?

My gaze narrowed slightly as Weiss bristled at Yang's comment. "No."

The extroverted girl gave me a curious glance. "No?"

I nodded my assessment and we stared at each other for a couple moments. Eventually, Yang relented and backed off. "Got it, got it. No Sunshine."

Weiss crossed her arms. " No one should be calling me Sunshine…"

"Hm. Nah." I ruffled Weiss's hair as she shot me a weak glare. It made her look more like a cute kitten than anything else. I voiced that.

Weiss practically folded into herself as Yang loudly laughed. Ruby moved over to my partner and patted her on the back comfortingly.

Shockingly, Weiss didn't rebel. Probably because her face was going through supernova, but still—it was impressive.

"Well," I pulled us back on topic. "We should probably actually go and, you know, look for Blake? Losing daylight and all of that?"

Ruby piped up, raising her hand like I was her teacher or something. "Ooh, ooh! We'll walk through Vale and go to areas she's already been to with us in the past! She might have gone back there!"

Seems logical enough, even if it was unlikely Blake would go back to an area she knew her team had been to whilst she was trying to avoid them. "We'll try to find faunus-friendly places then. It's possible she frequents some?"

The other three nodded their agreement and we set off to look through Vale. The city, not the whole kingdom. We'd be screwed if we tried to search the entire damn nation for Blake.

We soon split our ways and Weiss and I began to prowl the sidewalks of Vale. Vale was a nice place, yet it was very different from Atlas.

Where Atlas had hundreds of buildings which scraped the stars and reached towards the heavens, Vale was much more lower to the ground. It wasn't less advanced, per say, but it clearly focused less on pushing technology into its infrastructure.

It was a lot more like Mantle than Atlas, in my opinion. But it had a nice, cozy vibe to it

I grasped Weiss's hand as we walked. She gave me a slightly confused, awkward look. "Why're you holding my hand?"

"I have a plan. It requires us to be holding hands."

She looked at me strangely, her forehead creasing. "What plan could possibly require us to hold hands?"

I give her a deadpan stare. "The kind that requires us to pretend to be dating."

Weiss sputtered, emotions flashing across her face. "What kind of plan is that! That is—that's ludicrous!"

Shrugging lightly, I continued to walk along the sidewalk. "Well, I want to try and get into one of those private faunus places—cause, ya know, they aren't allowed in most places. They tend to not be so willing to let humans in, though, so we have to improvise."

"And how, exactly, does that require us to pretend to be dating?" Incredulity dripped from her voice like venom off the fangs of the viper. She already had one step down towards acting like an animal.

"Most of these places keep their rooms very dark to make sure humans aren't getting in. I can see in the dark. You can't. I can guide you if we are holding hands."

Weiss had a mildly constipated look on her face. "That's…okay, fine." She exhaled deeply. "So, what, do we just go up to some faunus and—"

I pulled her forward with more speed and tapped a dark-skinned bunny man on the shoulder. "Hey, man, wassup?"

Mr. Rabbit jumped up, slightly startled. He looked at me in trepidation, voice quavering. "Look, I don't mean any harm. I'm just walking to get to the store for my—"

"—hey, hey!" I lightly tap him on the shoulder again, trying to get him out of his mild frenzy. "I'm friendly! I'm just trying to find a place and I thought you could help me."

He still looked at me in suspicion but most of the panic was gone. "Seriously, I don't know any places you could be talking about. I don't even know you!"

I lower my voice slightly. "We're new to town and we thought that, you know, there were some places for people like us?"

He eyed me, drinking in my image. " Someone like you?" He repeated oddly. "Are you—you don't look like a—"

I continued to keep my voice low, leaning forward some. "We're faunus, like you. I know we don't look like it, but we are."

He had a skeptical expression on his face. "Faunus? But you don't even have…well…"

I brushed a hand through my hair and used my semblance to create an ethereal cat ear that instantly vanished a second after. "We're both cat fauni. My semblance just hides my features well. As for my girlfriend…"

I cast Weiss a pitying look and spoke low enough that it seemed like it should only get to the faunus. "Willa…she lost her ears and tail in an attack. They…didn't much like them and so they…" I imitated a snipping motion.

The bunny man had a horrified and pained look on his face, almost as if he'd eaten a particularly painful snack. "Is that all that they..?"

I shook my head somberly, eyes aiming downward as I clenched Weiss's hand.

Hopefully my acting was good enough. Weiss was, at least, doing a good job of keeping her face blank.

The faunus gave an empathizing look to the both of us. "I…I'm so sorry that happened. It's—I can show you where to go." His eyes cast down and he shuffled. "I'm Andres. I'm…there's a place that will help our kind. I'm not a—well, they will help. They do so much…"

Trying for a pained smile, I laid my hand back on his shoulder. "Thank you so much Andres. It means a lot. On a happier note, the diffident one is Willa and I am Nolan."

Andres looked at us with calming eyes. "It's good to meet you two. I'll get you there, it's not far from here."

"Thank you." I gave Weiss's hand a squeeze and she shot a grateful smile at Andres.

"Just follow me now. It's only just around the corner."

"So we lucked out, then?" I joked to the darker man as we began to walk at a slightly brisk pace.

Andres snorted. "Just a bit."

"I'm glad, then."

We continued to walk past a number of shops. Andres didn't talk much and led us fairly efficiently. Pretty nice guy.

After only a couple of minutes of walking, we entered a small toy shop. It dinged and the shopkeeper, a normal looking human, saw Andres and gave him a quizzical look.

Andres just nodded at the man and we simply moved past him, going towards the back of the shop.

"Downstairs?" I guessed as we moved into a backroom. "Also, was that man a human?"

Andres hummed in agreement and opened a door. "It's downstairs, yeah. And he's some kind of fish faunus—lets him camouflage and hide his features."

"Ah."

As we moved downstairs, Weiss gripped my hand like it was a lifeline. I began to enhance my photoreceptors, the darkness of the room becoming negligible.

We reached the bottom of the steps. A long, stone hall met us there. It was nearly completely pitch black, the scent of petrichor permeating the area.

Andres stopped and turned back towards us. "This is where I leave you guys. Just keep walking and you'll find people at the end of the hall." He laid a hand on my arm. "I hope only the best for you two. I'd stay if I could, but my boyfriend needs me home and—"

I squashed the slight feeling of shock—I had not guessed that. "You've helped more than enough. Thank you so much."

Andres gave us both smiles and walked back up that stairs. I turned over to Weiss. She had a slight tremor to her figure. "Just hold onto me, okay? I'll keep doing the talking."

She gave a stony nod, almost as if the motion was painful to make.

I took that as a good enough sign to keep walking down the hall. I practically dragged her by the hand as we walked, each step from her robotic.

"Stop!" A masculine voice called from behind a mask. I looked to my right, staring at the man. They had built the entrance to whatever this place was at the end of the L shaped hall. "Humans are not allowed down here."

From next to me, Weiss was practically shaking. The circulation in my hand was completely messed up due to how hard she was squeezing. Makes sense, though.

The man was wearing a White Fang mask. Even if Weiss could barely see, she could likely make out that much. She was probably terrified out of her mind,

I put my arm around her shoulders and held her close. The White Fang had killed several of her family friends. They'd tried to kill her on several occasions.

To top off how crappy this situation was, she had no weapon with her and she could barely see. I rubbed soothing circles into her right arm.

"Luckily for you, we are not humans."

He had a skeptical glint to his eyes. "Really? But you don't look—"

I repeated the same trick as I did earlier, making a cat ear appear and disappear. "My semblance hides it well but I am still a faunus. As for her?"

The faunus turned towards Weiss, her shakiness only increasing.

"Well, she used to have cat ears. It—can I lean forward? Towards your ear?"

After a moment, the man nodded. "Don't try anything."

"I won't." I promised. I leaned forward to whisper. My voice grew quiet. "She had them once. Some humans weren't the most…well, you know how humans are. They cut them off. Cut the ears and tails away. And then they…" I hesitated and stopped talking.

I felt pretty crappy about lying about such serious things. It almost felt like I was taking away from people who had actually suffered these things. Which I was sort of doing.

I was a horrible person.

The White Fang-er? White Fang soldier? I don't know. Anyhow, he tightened his grip on his sheathed sword, a murderous glint in his eyes. "Fucking humans." He spoke tightly, venom dripping from his mouth. Literally dripping from his mouth. "They—gods, they're so…I hear of how we suffer everyday and it's always so—"

One thing that is true for humans and faunus is that when you talk about serious things, it gets them to struggle to address a topic. Often it leads to avoidance of that topic: this is seen in the case of talks about suicide or depression. What lovely beings people are.

The terrorist sighed, wiping his lips and splashing venom onto the ground. "Humans are…they need to die. What they do to us is just so—" His eyes trailed over Weiss, who still had a tremor to her. "Is she..?"

"Had masks on. Was dark." I curtly say, managing to pull Weiss even closer to me.

He cringed, a pained expression crossing over his masked face. "I'm sorry, didn't mean to…" He paused and stared at his hand. A second later, he pulled off his mask, revealing a tanned man in his mid twenties with blond hair and purple eyes. There was a scale pattern to his skin and fangs poked out of his mouth.

"Thank you. You're…you are too kind." I murmur out, letting Weiss bury her head in my shoulder. "I'm Nolan. She's Willa."

"Edward." He added, trying for a smile. Empathy played about in his eyes. "Follow me. We have everything you guys could need in here."

I wonder how they got this everything that he spoke of. Some of it was probably stolen but, well…

I cast a glance at the gun strapped to him. It was not of any make I'd ever seen. I knew a decent amount about guns, so it meant it likely wasn't from any of the four kingdoms at all.

They were producing new things. Somehow.

Edward began to walk and we trailed behind him. "What if one of us wants to… help…with what you guys do?"

I couldn't see his face but I imagined he was smiling. "I did say everything."

I hummed my assent, continuing to follow him. "And how do we get this everything? Do we take them from like, what, the SDC?"

He chuckled. "Partly, we do. Some of our things are from them. But our people aren't reliant on humans," he practically scoffed at the word, "for our lives. Back home, we've been making our own things."

"Menagerie lacks Dust, though."

Edward laughed again. "Dust isn't the only power source around. Luckily, Menagerie has a lot of the other kind."

Other kind? I mouthed to myself. What could that possibly mean? Dust was the only known source of power—or it was the only practical one. Combustion reactions are theoretically able to produce energy sufficient to power things but no one has actually seriously considered them because…well…it seems highly inefficient and expensive.

The same goes for theoretical nuclear power. The sun is powered by fusion and fission—people have theorized we could do it on Remnant but, again, inefficient and expensive.

The faunus weren't stupid, though. Necessity breeds innovation. Maybe they had discovered a new fuel source. That's a terrifying thought. Especially if Menagerie was being run by the White Fang.

The White Fang was just a Menagerie paramilitary force, then. Or maybe they were literally just the Menagerie military.

"But we still have to go through the human communication network." I prodded, digging for more information.

"Do we?" Edward elusively said. "Humans aren't the only ones capable of making a communications network."

Oh.

That's terrifying.

"Wow." My voice sounded impressed. I was impressed. And scared. "I can't wait to see what we have to work with, then."

Edward snorted. "Aren't we all? Guess it's a guy thing, liking big guns and cool weapons."

"Not wrong." I murmur in agreement, following the faunus into a large chamber. A chamber filled with dozens of masked people. Weiss's grip on my hand managed to tighten even more.

"Just through here." Edward said, pulling us through the crowd. I held Weiss close to avoid letting anyone bump into her.

Then they did. A masked woman accidentally walked into Weiss. Weiss freaked, a glowing glyph appearing in the air. A glowing, snow shaped glyph. A symbol which was unique to one family.

The Schnee family.

A family that ran a business that was universally hated by fauni. A company which the White Fang was waging war on. A company that most fauni blamed for all of their issues.

Voices rapidly picked up in panic. "Schnee! They're here! They—"

I spun on my foot, drinking in the shocked look on Edward's face. My hand pierced straight through his skull, bone and sinew and gray matter clinging to my arm.

My hand felt infinitely heavy.

Screams picked up. I managed to hear a feminine voice yelling out Edward's name. I only felt heavier. But I had a job to do.

In my attack on Edward, Weiss had managed to get slightly separated from me. I turned towards her and began to move, channeling chi to slow my perception of time.

Light glistened off of bullets in the air. They moved fast even to my insanely quick sense of time. I forced myself to move faster, forcing my aura to accelerate my limbs far beyond their limits.

Still, though, I was too slow. A bullet caught Weiss in the shoulder, piercing right through the skin and out the other side. That one bullet had cracked her aura in that area.

What the hell kind of weapons were they using?

I reached Weiss and wrapped an arm around her. For that, I got a bullet straight through my chest. It was odd to feel your insides get ripped open in slow motion. I could practically feel every cell get ripped apart by the sheer power of the bullet.

It was incredibly painful. My aura didn't even slow it down in the slightest.

Seeing parts of my lungs splatter on the ground was even worse.

My legs kept moving. Everyone around me was statuesque with how slow they were compared to me. Weiss hadn't enhanced her senses so even she was like a doll with how limp she was.

I ran and ran. I kept running, a boom striking at my feet. Anyone in there with aura would probably chase after us. My only saving grace was that I could think much faster than they could.

Helped that I was pretty swift.

Retracing our steps, I made my way through the dark halls of the White Fang base. It still felt painfully slow, almost as if I was moving through a sludge. I didn't dare lighten my senses, though. I would like to at least see any bullets before they hit us.

The wound in my chest slowly knitted up. I could feel my aura patching the hole in my lungs. It was a slow affair.

It was also incredibly painful. Imagine you slowly sunk a knife into your shoulder and then slowly took it out. Then you slowly dripped salt into that same wound and with each second another tiny cut was added to each cell in the injury.

That was sort of what it felt like.

I held Weiss close to my chest, hand covering her wound. I wondered what this felt like to her. Had she even noticed we'd moved?

From her eyes, she might have? Weiss was likely in the state where her brain recognized something but didn't process it yet. Once she did she'd likely speed up her own perception. Not as much as my own, but she likely would.

I had time to think. Lots of time to think. I didn't much like that. After all, I had a lot to think about.

I'd killed someone. It didn't hurt, the act of killing. Yet, all the same, it felt heavy. I'd killed someone who was, from what I could tell, a genuinely good person. He took his mask off to help Weiss feel better. He was kind and wanted to help two complete strangers. He fought for what he believed to be the right thing.

And I had gone and killed him by striking his one unarmored place. A place that was unarmored because he wanted to help Weiss feel comfortable.

Killing him didn't hurt but I certainly felt like scum all the same.

I continued moving, the end coming near.

My feet pounded up the stairs as we ran through and out of the toy shop. I burst into the darkened street, Weiss in my hands, and felt utterly exhausted.

I'd remember Edward. He was a good man.