After the Storm

by Terkontar

The storm had passed and team RWBY left the grim clouds behind them, finally being able to take a breath, tend to their wounds and pick up the pieces of their shattered lives. And no matter what comes next, they'll brave this new dawn – together / Takes place after Salem's defeat, two years after the fall of Beacon. Mostly slowly burning Whiterose with some Bumblebee on the side.

31. Black and white

Author's Foreword: If the mailing system managed to break again in the time I took to finish this chapter, I swear I'm gonna flip.

In case you've just learned of this story's return — it's the fifth chapter I've released since the end of my hiatus.

---

Chapter XXVII: Black and white

Weather was quite beautiful that morning — though one could hardly tell, looking through the fogged-up window of the bathroom. Loud humming rose above the sound of running water, sort-of matching the music that blared through that small space.

Eventually, the stream was cut short; a bright yellow arm poked out from the shower cabin, snatching a nearby towel and stealing it behind the curtain. On the other side, Yang shivered. She didn't mind the cold, most of the time; right after a shower was the only time it ever got to her. Not that she minded too much — nothing beat a nice shower after a morning workout.

And nothing beat a good workout when your thoughts were being… loud.

Soon, a pair of feet landed on the mat laid out before the cabin. Having dried them off, Yang hurriedly put on her underwear and yanked a fresh shirt over her head; it would get a little damp in the process, but it still helped her with the chill. With her hair wrapped up in a fresh towel, she walked past the misty mirror and sat on the edge of the bathtub. She spent some time going through the rest of her bathroom routine; when no one came knocking, she decided to linger there for a while yet. With little else to occupy her while she waited for her hair to dry, she swiped her Scroll from the nearby washing machine.

First, there were the messages; then, there were the memes. Finally, she took to idly browsing the mission board.

Her eyes narrowed when one posting in particular had caught her attention.

"Huh."

---

The lodge's kitchen was unusually busy for the hour, housing four young Huntresses as they held council over a plate of fresh choco-chip cookies. That gathering was of the unplanned sort — an emergency meeting, really, called into session at Yang's request. The emergency? A Hunting commission that had caught Yang's eye just minutes before.

A settlement had gone dark on the CCT system. On paper, it was effectively a wellness check, one that would take them well beyond the city walls of Vale. In practice — probably a search and rescue op; potentially retrieval, if they were unlucky. The pay was… on the lower end. Below the market rate, really, as the bounty offered didn't really account for the urgency of the matter. That exact discrepancy was probably the reason why no one had picked up that mission in the two days since its posting.

Luckily for the client, the pay wasn't really a concern to team RWBY. The bounty was large enough that taking on the mission shouldn't put them in the red, all expenses accounted — and even if, they could afford to do the whole thing pro bono. Even without touching Weiss' trust fund, all four of them had plenty of savings to last them a while. The Circle had been paying them handsomely for their services, and the various side-jobs they had taken on occasion further contributed to their ample bank accounts.

Really, the only point of concern on their minds was the civilian factor, as it could potentially complicate the matters by an order of magnitude — not exactly a laid-back hunt to get back into the swing of things, as Blake had accurately pointed out.

Finally, the case had been made, all arguments and counterpoints heard out. The only thing left was for them to vote.

Ruby scanned the faces of her comrades. Yang was clearly eager. Weiss, determined. Blake, as was her wont, was keeping a cool devil-may-care veneer, but her perked up ears gave away her interest. None seemed to dissent.

"Everyone on board?" Ruby asked, if only for formality's sake. Having then received an unanimous vote in favor, she enthusiastically clapped her hands, her face breaking out into a grin. "Great!" She looked across the table, where Yang and Blake sat side-by-side. "Yang, Blake — can I leave the supplies to you?"

"Sure you can," Yang easily agreed, exchanging a quick look with Blake before they both stood up. "How much are we gonna need?"

To that, Ruby didn't really have a good answer. She bit the inside of her cheek and made a face, wincing a little at the very rough estimate she was about to make. "Enough food to tide over a small village for a day or two?" She paused for a bit, eyes squinted in thought, only to energetically tap her hand on the table a moment later. "Say what — I'll call the client and give you the deets after that; they might know how many people we're dealing with."

Satisfied with that plan, Yang snatched one final cookie and shoved it into her mouth; giving her team leader a half-hearted salute, she promptly vacated the room.

Blake hung back, however. "We should grab some medical supplies while we're at it," she noted. At that, Ruby snapped her fingers, as if rightfully reminded of something; having been granted a look of silent approval, Blake simply nodded and went after Yang.

"Remember to ask for invoices!" Weiss shouted after the pair, her voice carrying the subtlest barb of annoyance at a mishap of old. Enduring was a Schnee's memory, Ruby amusedly wondered — not without a degree of fondness.

After a brief moment of distraction, Ruby refocused on the task at hand and found herself holding back a sigh. With the matter of supplies being taken care of, what was left for her to do was — in her totally biased, socially-awkward opinion — the worst and most difficult part of the prep: talking with the client and taking care of logistics.

In other words — the much-dreaded social interaction.

Sometimes, she asked herself why she would ever willingly subject herself to all that talking, rather than leave it to someone more outgoing. Still, such was the role she'd found for herself. At first, it had been kind of… thrust onto her, due to her position as the team leader. It worked out, so it'd stuck.

As much as the thought still weirded her out, both logistics and client contact were things she was actually sorta… good at. Yang called it a master-class puppy stare, whereas Weiss attributed it to Ruby's demeanor and perceptive nature. Blake was… supportive, but she was probably just happy not to be straddled with the talking herself. Either way, Ruby could get them all set more often than not, and Weiss was always there if the situation called for a more… aggressive angle.

As Ruby's attention shifted towards her partner, she saw that Weiss had already pulled out her Scroll, all set for taking notes. When her input wasn't needed, Weiss would quietly listen in on talks and calls, making sure that no piece of info got lost in the heat of the moment.

Honestly, Ruby wasn't sure how it'd started. Weiss had never run the idea by her, or anything; one day, she had simply plopped down beside Ruby during a call and started typing. Ruby always sort-of figured that it'd been because she'd messed up at some point, or maybe let something slip, but that it'd been minor enough not to warrant a stern talking-to. Weiss' notetaking had obviously proven very useful real fast, so there had never been much of a need for them to discuss it. It'd become their routine, their little ritual before a mission; natural, almost automatic. Weiss didn't offer, Ruby didn't ask.

Weiss lifted her eyes from the screen and met Ruby's. Saying nothing, the two simply exchanged brief smiles and set out to work.

It was… soothing, Ruby had found, to have Weiss listening in.

The client's number was drummed in, the call put on speakers. In the usually nerve-wracking silence before the call goes through, Ruby found herself looking at Weiss and holding back a grin. It was a little funny, how life had played out — for Ruby to have the ex ex-heiress of the SDC acting the part of her accountant and secretary. Funnier yet, it was probably the most believable part of their whole relationship.

The call had been picked up on the third ring — and with much hurry, if the sounds of fumbling were anything to go by.

"Hello?" could be heard from the other end. Whomever that person was, they sounded dead tired.

"Hello, is this mister Rowan?"

They heard a sigh escape the stranger's throat; it was hard to tell whether it had been a sigh of relief, or perhaps one of annoyance. "Yes."

"Hi. This is Huntress Ruby Rose speaking. I just accepted your commission, and would like to ask you a few questions before my team and I head out." Dull silence was the answer she received, and it dragged on long enough for her to start tensing up despite Weiss' presence. The two of them exchanged a silent look before Ruby awkwardly added: "Do you, uh, need me to verify my license number?"

Another two seconds of nothing. Then, the man spoke up in a stupefied voice, almost shyly: "The Ruby Rose?"

Ruby flinched at the client's starstruck tone, feeling a very unpleasant shiver crawl down her shoulders. Off from the side, she sensed the stare of sympathetic eyes land upon her; she could easily imagine the look on Weiss' face, without needing to turn her way.

She absolutely loathed the recognition her name had gotten these days. It felt stifling, burdening her with expectations she knew she couldn't possibly meet. She'd never handled attention well, and while she might've come a long way from freezing up in front of her teachers and peers, she just wasn't built to be a person of world-wide renown. And yet, post-Vytal, she'd been basically turned into a symbol in what felt like an overnight — more than a human… but less than a person.

She forced a small laugh. "Ah, yeah, I get that a lot recently." Lips set in a thin line, she added: "Right now I'm just a Huntress who wants to help, though." Her tone was even and polite — if slightly forceful.

"Right, of course," mister Rowan managed to cough out, sounding a little embarrassed. Hadn't been her intention, but Ruby would take it. "I— I'll answer any questions I can. What do you need to know?"

Ruby and Weiss shared a look, with the latter giving her partner a reassuring smile. Having taken a deep breath, Ruby let herself relax and all but spilled over her seat.

"Let's start with the basics, shall we?"

---

The mid afternoon brought with itself dark tidings. The shadows lengthened beneath the relentless sun, while the world itself seemed to grow silent and still. Hardly a soul could be seen outside, leaving the vast grounds of the Beacon campus empty and lifeless. Worse yet, Yang was beginning to get bored, and not even the latest EP of Achieve Men could stave off her approaching insanity for much longer.

Alright, the things weren't quite so bad. The weather was nice, the afternoon sun shined, and the company — namely, Blake — was also great, if not particularly talkative.

What wasn't so great was that the other half of their team was being late, and by quite the margin at that. Not that Yang was much of a stickler for punctuality… but she was bored, and they'd been sitting on their asses for like half an hour now.

Blake and Yang were idling around the agreed meeting spot, at the southernmost landing pad of Beacon. The two of them and their luggage were sprawled across a whole bench, taking up the space that would easily fit four or five people. Not that anyone needed those seats, or anything — with the Academy still being closed for students, the foot traffic in the area wasn't exactly high. Annoyingly so, as it also meant that Yang couldn't even do much people-watching to kill the time. Every now and then, some Huntsman or Huntress would pass them by, either heading out or coming back from an assignment, but even those instances were getting sparser as minutes passed. It sorta tracked, seeing that there wasn't that much daylight left. About two hours, if she were to guess.

Which brought her back to her main issue…

"They're running late," she grumbled, hoping to pry Blake's attention away from the mystery novel she was reading.

Rather than look her way, Blake carefully thumbed over to the next page. "Good thing that Weiss is with Ruby. They shouldn't be too late, that way."

Though that minimal response might've come off as dismissive, Yang knew that Blake was listening; had she been actually ignoring her, Blake wouldn't have bookmarked the page with her thumb. Basically, she was waiting for Yang to say something meaningful or witty enough to warrant laying down the book.

Challenge accepted.

"Unless they're making out somewhere," Yang joked. "Weiss sorta strikes me as the type to get lost in the moment."

Blake rocked forth with a loud snort. Grinning, she closed the book on her thumb and lowered the tome to her lap. "You know, that'd be a valid reason to be late. I wouldn't even be mad at them."

'Ha! Take that, dumb book!'

Blake fixed Yang with a speculative stare. "Do you think something happened between them at the party?"

Yang creased her brow as a familiar sense of worry took root in her heart. "No. Which is the weird thing. I swear, the mood was right there." Blake met that statement with some ardent nodding, her cat ears perked up high.

It was a subject they had already touched upon before, and the three days that had passed since Ruby's birthday had brought disappointingly little new information.

Back at the party, when Ruby had gone after Weiss to check up on her, the few people who had been watching got to see… something. What that 'something' had been, however, Yang had no idea.

It'd been odd, even for the oddball that was Ruby. The vibes between her and Weiss had been getting interesting whole day long, only for nothing to come out of it when the perfect opportunity had presented itself. Ruby coulda just kissed Weiss and gone with the flow, but she hadn't — and, unless Yang's gaydar was way off, it hadn't been for the lack of interest.

Screw that Aura-bonded nonsense — she didn't need it. Ruby was still her little sister, and Yang knew most of her quirks and tells. As things stood, her gut was telling her that Ruby had held back… for whatever reason. And it hadn't been the nerves; in actuality, it was the fact that she'd been so collected that struck Yang as weird.

"Maybe we should repay the favor, after all?" Blake probed.

Yang briefly wavered, but ended up shaking her head. "I don't know what's Ruby's problem, but it didn't seem like she wussed out," she replied. Although her stance wasn't as hardline as in the weeks prior, she still didn't like the idea of putting any pressure on Ruby or Weiss.

She was starting to grow a little concerned for her baby sis, though. "We can check up on her, though. See what's up."

Ruby had seemed almost… pained, back when she'd gone for that hug. And now, Yang was left to wonder — had Ruby experienced some sort of an alcohol-fueled awakening on her birthday… or had she merely let her mask slip?

"Do you want me to leave that to you?" Blake asked.

Yang considered it for a sec. "Nah. If you get the opportunity, go for it. Just keep me in the loop."

They more or less left it at that, though the subject did linger on Yang's mind, enabling Blake to once again immerse herself in her novel. Not for too long, however — not even five more minutes had passed by the time a red-clad silhouette entered their vision, her scarlet cloak flapping like a flag on the autumn wind. Weiss was predictably tagging along right by Ruby's side, easily identified by the head of white blazing in direct sunlight. Both girls were armed.

"What was the hold up?" Yang asked the pair as they approached. Uncharacteristically for her, Ruby flat-out ignored the question and went ahead to grab the backpack Yang had brought for her.

Smiling wryly, Weiss followed her partner with her eyes for a second or two; seeing that Ruby was taken with a rather pouty mood, she replied in her stead.

"Ruby hoped to get the schematics for the support tower, in case it requires more serious repairs to bring it back online."

Yang clicked her tongue. "No dice?"

Having already strapped her knapsack to her back, Ruby heaved a sigh — one of the clearly irritated variety. "No dice. Would have to be a licensed electrician, or — ideally — a CCT technician." With one final huff, she'd vented the last remains of her frustration into the atmosphere. Then, she brushed her hair off her forehead. "Probably a concern of domestic terrorism or sabotage. Fair enough, I suppose, though it's still kind of a pain in the butt."

"Yeah," Yang agreed before sending her sister a questioning look. "Think you can get the thing working without the schematics?"

Ruby tilted her head to the side, a grimace of uncertainty setting onto her face as she weighed her odds. "Depends. If it's just mangled wires and light structural damage, then probably?" Her shoulders bobbed up and down in a small shrug. "Who knows, maybe it's just power that's down."

"We have learned something, though," Weiss chimed in, a serious look about her face. "The tower's gone dark eleven days ago."

Yang gaped at that revelation. "And they didn't think of sending a technician out there? Better yet, backed up by a couple of Huntsmen?" she questioned, only to throw her hands up in the air. "I mean, come on — it's never good news when a tower goes down!"

Weiss huffed. "Officially, they're swamped and prioritizing the biggest outages — which, this is not. They did post the commission, but no-one's taken it yet."

"And unofficially, they presume that it's either not urgent… or urgent to the point that it's already too late," Blake finished, earning grave nods from Ruby and Weiss both. "Usually, a settlement would be expected to either fix the tower themselves, or put out the word the next time they go do trade."

"That's kinda cold of the CCTS admins," Yang darkly remarked.

"But also practical," Blake pointed out in turn, rather dryly at that. Of the four of them, she was by far the most familiar with the harsh reality of living outside the Cities, and as such very little phased her. "Frontier is an uncaring place. We know it, but so do those who live there."

"Hopefully they had contingencies put in place," Weiss spoke at half of her usual volume, giving voice to the thought all four of them had had. No one saw the need to add anything.

A moment of silence snuck in between them, suddenly making their team aware of the characteristic, steady hum of an inbound VTOL. They spotted it above the academy grounds, clearly heading their way straight from the hangars. It wasn't long until the Bullhead began its descent, the soft buzz of its jets growing in strength and turning into a distinct roar. Soon, the aircraft crossed the edge of the landing platform and deployed its landing gear, kicking up the few fallen leaves that had been carried there by the wind.

"Alright, that's us," Ruby yelled over the hiss of the engines.

Seconds later, the pilot finished sitting the airship on the ground and cut off the jets. A ramp was lowered for their team to board, giving them one final cue to start grabbing their luggage — and there was a lot of it, since they took it onto themselves to take provisions for the settlement. Yang herself was loaded with three duffel bags in place of her usual one. Ruby took yet another, as well as Weiss' backpack; Weiss protested some, but relented after being told there were still first aid kids that needed to be carried. Blake picked up what was left, which mostly amounted to their stock of Dust and ammo.

As the noise of the engines quietened, Ruby stepped out in front of their group and grinned. "Team RWBY, are you ready?" she asked.

And three eager voices responded.

---

The initial stretch of their flight was a rather quiet endeavor — that was, as quiet as sitting inside a Bullhead could've been. Few words rose above the constant backdrop of droning engines as team RWBY went through their usual motions before a hunt.

Sitting on the opposite sides of a spacious hold, Ruby and Weiss were using that time to prep for the debrief. Yang, being in charge of their supplies, didn't have much to do en route; eyes closed and head leaning against the metal hull, she was quietly decompressing — or, rather, hyping herself up — with her favorite playlist blasting from her earbuds.

Blake was markedly absent from the cabin, discussing the approach with their pilot as the team's navigator. It was a large responsibility — and something team leaders often did by themselves — but Ruby had full confidence in her teammate's abilities.

Truth told, even for all of Ruby's journeys, Blake was simply better at the job. Better at reading maps, better at finding water, you name it. Her sense of direction seldom faltered even even in the worst of atmospheric conditions, and her spacial memory often proved downright astounding. The one area she didn't excel at was noticing strategic pros and cons of the terrain — outside of ambush tactics, at least. Still, with but a handful of criteria to guide her, Blake was yet to disappoint her leader, and Ruby was endlessly grateful for having one thing less to worry about.

Everyone looked up when Blake's form eventually darkened the cockpit's entrance. She briefly locked eyes with Ruby, giving her a short nod before taking a spot beside Yang; just as she sat on the uncomfortable metal bench, Ruby hoisted herself up to her feet and grabbed one of the straps hanging off the ceiling.

Having just snapped her earbuds case shut, Yang drummed on her knees. She leaned forth with a grin, her blond hair lighting up like a torch in the beam of sunlight falling through a window. "Finally! So, what's the sitch?"

Ruby pulled up her Scroll, more out of habit than any actual need. Rather than read from her notes, she cast a sweeping glance across the cabin.

"Our client is mister Rowan Argent. His sister, Aronia, lives in a settlement of around thirty people, some seventy miles south of Vale. He hadn't heard from her since two weeks ago, and recently realized that the line's gone dead. Suspecting that the settlement is in danger, he wants us to check out the situation," she informed. Then, a grave expression darkened her face. "Officially, it's a search-and-rescue mission. Hopefully, it's just the tower that's been damaged and the settlers are alright, but we all know how it is."

No one said anything to that, though the air within the cabin grew thick with a sense of unspoken agreement. It wasn't their first visit to a settlement gone dark, and things seldom turned out fine.

The ping of multiple notifications cut through that moment of dour silence. Blake and Yang looked at one another, then briefly glanced at their teammates before checking out their Scrolls. As they did, they found a bunch of neatly compiled character profiles waiting for them, complete with photos and different kinds of personal information.

Weiss, who'd sent said files, gave the pair a few moments to skim through the intel. "Our VIPs are the sister, Aronia, as well as her wife and their three-year old daughter."

Once Blake and Yang lifted their heads, Ruby carried on. "Obviously, we'll help whomever we can, VIP or not." She sighed, her face twisting in a slight grimace. "If worse comes to worst, we'll attempt to find and recover their bodies. Should we find nothing, we'll head home after three days of searching." Finally, she turned to Blake. "What's our approach?"

Called forth, Blake straightened her back and began rapidly swiping across her Scroll's screen. After a few seconds of navigating through menus, she extended her hand towards the center of their group; soon, a holo map of their mission area materialized in the air before them.

"You wanted a vantage point with a good view of the settlement, so I found us one," Blake went on to say, with a wave of her hand bringing everyone's attention a particular spot marked with a red circle. "There's a cliff, due west of the settlement. Around one hundred feet high — should give us the general idea of what we're heading into. It should also offer a clear line of fire, too, since it runs mostly perpendicular to the village's main street." After dragging her finger in a straight line to demonstrate her point, she moved her hand further west. "The approach should be decently accessible, but not too open. The support tower isn't far from there, either, if you wanted to check it out before heading to the village," she said, gaze focused on Ruby. When met with an appreciative nod, Blake smiled wryly and added: "We couldn't find any suitable LZ in the vicinity, but our pilot says he'll keep looking for now."

Without letting go of the loop strap, Ruby leaned to the side and patted Blake on the arm. "Good work," she said with a smile. Though it was repaid with but a simple nod, she did see how Blake's amber eyes sparked with satisfaction.

With the main portion of the debrief being done with, Ruby let go of her metaphorical big girl pants and allowed herself to relax. Feeling a grin crop up on her face, she turned to address her team: "So, who's keeping the second watch tonight?"

With no volunteers forthcoming — expectedly so — they ended up drawing straws. While Ruby lost with grace, the other spot in the pair was contested, as Yang saw it fit to argue that her lot was equally as short as Weiss'. More awkwardly yet, she… had a point. The fact ultimately did not change much, either way, as they settled the matter through rock-paper-scissors — and Yang was thoroughly beaten.

After that bit of tomfoolery, a sort of lull overtook the cabin while Blake and Yang spent some time to familiarize themselves properly with the case files. It lingered mostly undisrupted for maybe five minutes, eventually giving way to the usual chatter about nothing at all.

Ruby did chime in every now and then, but for the most part, she was sort of half-present in the conversation, more focused on observing her friends than talking. With it being their first mission since the end of the war, she felt that a lot was riding on the hunt's success. She could tell that the others thought so, too, and wondered about the team's morale.

The spirits were— Ruby hesitated to use the word 'high', but nothing else readily came to mind. At the same time, there were caveats. For example, though clearly eager to see some action, Yang's frame was wired with tension, and Ruby had a sneaking suspicion she was at least partly responsible for said unease. Blake was acting her usual faux-aloof self, though she also kept stealing occasional glances Ruby's way. Finally, Weiss… Weiss was difficult to describe. There was a pronounced sense of calmness about her, but it was the sort of calmness that came from sheer willpower — from telling oneself to sit still while basically rearing to go.

Ruby understood the feeling well. They'd never discussed it as such, but that hunt was a test, both for their team as a whole as well as on the individual level — for some more than for the others. It was a way for them to allay their doubt or validate their concerns; a way to see whether they were in any way ready to return to work out in the field.

A chance to feel in control of themselves.

That, perhaps, was the key reason why an air of optimism underlaid and overpowered any sense of concern or anxiety they might've had. They were vigilant and maybe a little bit unsure of themselves, but, ultimately, they all did want to be there.

Ruby herself would compare the feeling that coiled within her chest to performance anxiety — something she was intimately familiar with. The sensation wasn't quite the same, perhaps, since the one she was afraid of disappointing was herself, but it was close enough all the same. Still, for all her self-doubt, she truly did want to see for herself if — that — Weiss was right.

That she was not a broken tool unfit to lead.

Sunlight continued to draw closer in hue to orange as the flight progressed in peace. Their pre-hunt banter wouldn't be interrupted until much later, when a male voice came through the speakers.

"Pilot to team RWBY." As soon as the man spoke up, Ruby pushed her back off the hull and launched herself off her seat. She swung from one hanging strap to the other as she went, bound for the front of the airship. "We're one mile away from the target location, but I can't find any place to land. Should I keep looking?"

By the time the pilot finished speaking, Ruby made her way to the cockpit; rather than sit in the copilot's chair, she hovered in place between the two seats, grasping onto them for support.

"A mile, you say? Nah, you can stop and drop us off here." The moment she said that, she felt a lurching in her stomach, telling her that they began decelerating — not sharply enough to throw her off balance, but undeniably. "As for the trip back home, we'll try to bring the tower back online and call you over. If you don't hear a peep from us, come back here in three days at 1300. Fly over the village. We've got flares — we'll find each other."

"Understood."

Ruby sort of expected him to say something else, or at least look her way; when all that followed was awkward silence, she let out a sheepish chuckle.

"Cool," she said, finally getting the pilot to glance her way and give her a small nod.

He was a little stiff, but didn't seem old at all — maybe in his mid-twenties, at most. It sort of made her wonder if he was new at the job, perhaps due to some, ah, unforeseen openings. It could well explain him not being accustomed to small talk — either that, or he'd somehow never had to fly neither Oobleck nor Port.

Or, perhaps, he was simply awkward like that, not really knowing what to say. He did kinda remind Ruby of Jaune, from his early Beacon days.

'Game recognizes game,' she mused, then sort-of patted the pilot's chair. "Thanks."

As she began retreating to the passenger area, she heard the pilot shift and turn around in his seat. "Oh, and team RWBY? Good luck."

A smile upon her face, Ruby threw a glance over her shoulder before returning to her team.

Her teammates hadn't been sitting idle — she found them bustling about the cabin, fixing the straps of their luggage and zipping up their jackets. All three were mostly ready for the insertion… unlike their cargo, which still sat near the end of the ship, secured to metal shelves. The amount of supplies they had with them made the upcoming jump just a little inconvenient — if nothing they couldn't work with.

Having spared Ruby but a single look, Yang guessed: "We're jumping."

"We're jumping," Ruby affirmed, meandering between her teammates to get to rear section of the cabin. Not long after she began untangling the web of straps holding their supplies in place, Blake silently moved in to help.

While the two of them were unloading their cargo to the floor of the VTOL, the Bullhead continued its descent. Once it almost came to a hover, Yang yanked the door open and turned to Weiss. "Royalty first," she yelled over the hiss of the engines. Then, still holding onto the door for support, she bent her back in a theatrical bow and pointed her free hand outside.

Weiss' left eyebrow was raised partly by confusion, partly by annoyance. Still, it wasn't long until Weiss realized what Yang had meant, having noticed the meaningful look her teammate was directing at their cargo.

"Fine," she groaned, grudgingly approaching the door.

"Need me to hold onto your backpack, Princess?"

Already within arm's reach, Weiss leveled the grinning Yang with a look that was neither impressed nor amused; saying nothing at all, she silently thumbed the barrel chamber of her rapier and set it to Gravity Dust. About fifteen feet below them, the crowns of tall pine trees swayed on the wind.

Realizing that Yang was one pun away from earning herself a stupid prize, Blake stepped closer and, with a hand on Yang's shoulder, caught Weiss' attention.

"Weiss, I know that she's asking for it, but please don't deplane my girlfriend." Although she managed to keep a straight face, some amusement still bled into Blake's voice.

Realistically, there would be no risks even if what Blake had suggested came to pass. Hell, Yang was probably expecting to get yeeted off the airship, just for the laughs. Still, that didn't necessarily mean that their pilot would've appreciated that kind of roughhousing aboard his vessel.

"Have you ever thought about putting a muzzle on her?" Weiss asked in a perfect deadpan, with only the slightest movement of her eyelid telling Ruby that she was joking along.

Yang perked up, honing in onto that phrasing like a shark that sensed blood. Fighting back a smirk, she looked at Weiss and let out an impressed whistle. "You're into some kinky stuff, Weiss."

They all saw Weiss' eyes widen for a split second before she snapped her head straight, scoffed and then quickly jumped off the ship, leaving no room for further teasing.

With Weiss — who was now hopping from one glyph to another on her way down — out of her reach, Yang naturally set her sights on Ruby. She didn't say a word, not finding it necessary; with the echo of her latest joke still lingering in the air, she simply looked at her sister and wiggled her eyebrows.

Ruby, however, was prepared. "I dunno, Yang — you are the one asking to get your ass spanked."

Though delivered under the guise of some offhand remark, the riposte had an immediate effect on Yang, who quite nearly choked on her own spit. Blake also burst into giggles, though wasn't nearly as incapacitated.

Rather than bask in the glow of a successful comeback, Ruby kept up her mask and simply went ahead to grab the first bag with supplies. Her nonchalance seemed to only stoke the fire she'd left behind, and Yang continued to cackle between her coughing fits well until Ruby returned.

In the meantime, Blake calmed down enough to make the jump and join Weiss on the ground. It wasn't long till the two gave the all-clear, prompting Ruby to drop the first supply bag off the airship.

With the help of Weiss' glyphs, safely lowering most of their cargo to the ground took but a few moments. Not the most cost-effective solution, perhaps, but — considering the wind and the ever-present trees — it beat messing around with a rope.

Their stock of Dust and ammo was left to the last. Rather than tossing it down, Ruby strapped the ammo bag to her back, then hugged their Dust supply to her chest after Yang had handed her the case.

Having done one final sweep around the cabin to make sure they've got everything, Yang gave Ruby a nod.

"Alright, that's it!" Ruby yelled towards the cockpit. "We're jumping!"

Already in position, Yang leaned back and grinned. "Thanks for the ride!" she hollered, then launched herself forward with a gleeful whoop.

Had there been anyone to see it, they'd see a smug smirk light up Ruby's face, if for a moment but brief — gone with petals scattering on the wind.

Yang might've been the first one to jump, but she sure as hell wasn't the first one to touch ground.

---

None of them had been looking forward to trekking a mile through a forest with all the luggage they'd taken, but trek they did. It was only right before they reached the cliffs over the village that Ruby let them take a bit of a breather. Rather than carry their cargo any further, they hoisted their baggages onto some trees with the help of Gambol Shroud, marking the location with some UV paint. By the time they were done, the sun already hid behind the mountain crests, casting a veil of shadows unto the land and warning them that they had precious little daylight left.

The last stretch of their walk didn't take long at all, as they'd rested maybe hundred fifty yards from the forest's edge. The cliff laid right beyond, and once they reached it, they all bore witness to a sad sight.

A small settlement of maybe fifteen, seventeen houses sprawled below. It must've been a gorgeous place to live in, once upon a time, with quaint little ponds and numerous gardens filling up the ample open space between the nice, cozy buildings. In the present, however, that village was but an empty shell of what had once been.

Even in the dim twilight of the evening, one could easily tell that the place had been attacked. A couple of houses had burnt down completely, leaving little but rubble and already cold, charred frames. A handful more had been torn apart. Surprisingly, however, those were in the minority; large part of the buildings remained largely intact, save for broken down fences, burst-down doors and an odd collapsed roof.

The tall electric fence that surrounded the perimeter was in a much worse shape, either rent asunder or toppled down altogether; the gate had been burst open and torn off its hinges, while the nearby autoturret tower had been collapsed onto the neighboring house.

Still, the biggest clue as to the settlement's fate were not the signs of destruction, but the black silhouettes pacing about the scene, like maggots crawling around a pus-ridden wound. The Grimm.

They numbered in the dozens, but likely didn't exceed one hundred. As far as Weiss could tell at the distance, all Grimm present were small-fry, with the pack being made up mostly of Beowolves and Ursai. Going by the busted-down gate, an Ursa Major or something of similar size was somewhere nearby, but she couldn't spot it. Trusting not her eyesight, she reached for a pair of binoculars that rested inside a pouch on her hip.

Beside her, Yang clicked her tongue, a grave grimace darkening her brow. "Crap. Totally wiped out. Days ago, by the looks of it."

A singular howl from below punctuated Yang's words. For a time, no one said anything else; Blake seemed to be listening for something, whereas Ruby continued to scan the ruins through the lens of her scope.

Suddenly, Ruby's brow creased. "I wouldn't be so sure. Look," she spoke, then passed the confused Yang her rifle.

Yang went ahead with Ruby's suggestion. The sights clearly offered her little clarity, as she soon glanced at Ruby and awkwardly asked: "So… what am I looking for, exactly?"

As soon as Ruby had expressed her doubts, Weiss looked again at the ruins with more critical of an eye. It took her a couple of seconds to notice, but one thing did indeed strike her as peculiar, if not entirely obvious.

"Most of the Grimm are gathered around the central hub," she pointed out.

Blake nodded, seemingly having arrived at the same conclusion. That being said, her expression remained clouded, as if she was deep in thought. "And I might be wrong, but I think it's a generator that I'm hearing," she eventually added.

Ruby snapped her head to the side, looking at the Faunus with wide eyes. "Really?"

"I think so?" Blake tentatively affirmed, her cat ears fluttering. "It's really faint, so it's probably underground."

Ruby cracked a slight smile. "Good catch!" Gaze moving on towards the ruined settlement, her expression grew serious once more. "But yeah, what they said. It looks to me like the Grimm are gathered around a single area. Drawn to something."

"Survivors," Yang quietly aired.

Ruby nodded. "Hopefully."

"For how long can you run a generator without refueling?" Weiss asked, directing her question mostly at Blake. It was largely a shot in the dark on her part, but if any one of them were to know, it would be Blake, given her experience with living off-grid.

Going by the fact that Blake seemed to spare the question some thought, Weiss hadn't been off the mark.

"Depends, really," Blake hesitantly answered, then went on to rub her chin for a while. "Small-form civilian grade? Definitely less than eleven days, in my experience."

Ruby appeared mostly satisfied with that answer. Taking her weapon off Yang's hands, she fiddled for a bit with the new scope before shouldering the rifle. "Alright, let's see what you've got, Velvet," she said, leaning in. As soon as she pressed the eyepiece to her eye socket, she drew a sharp breath, her face positively lighting up with geeky glee. "So cool!"

Weiss caught herself smiling at the half-whisper, half-squeal Ruby had just let out. The girl had mounted the new sights onto Crescent Rose only that afternoon and hadn't had the time to try it out yet. She was clearly thrilled — what about exactly, Weiss did not know… but she had no doubts that she would hear all about it.

Ruby spent maybe half a minute examining the settlement through her new optics. Considering her wide grin, it was hard to tell whether she was actually looking for something, or just playing around. Eventually, however, her smile dimmed, and it almost appeared as if something had given her a pause.

Suddenly, Ruby's left hand pointed at one of the houses located in the hub area around the village green. The others gave her some puzzled looks; the building was rather badly torn up, but otherwise unremarkable.

"The ground's warmer around that building," Ruby claimed, still looking through the scope. "Northern wall. Looks like an air vent."

'Thermal vision, huh?' Weiss wondered, finally understanding what Ruby had been so psyched about. It also put in context something else that Coco had said at Ruby's party — when asked if she could even see anything with her shades on, Coco had simply laughed and said that they had night vision built in. Weiss had taken it for a joke or a bluff back at the time, but was now forced to reassess the veracity of Coco's claim.

She also felt a little… outdone with her own gift. Not wanting to dwell on it, she fired Ruby a question instead.

"So, what's the plan?"

It was only then that Ruby tore herself away from the eyepiece. She cast her gaze down at the rifle and lightly brushed her hand against the chassis of her new scope.

"I'm sorta tempted to zero this baby, but…" She shook her head, then turned her eyes at the ghost town below. Keeping quiet for a thoughtful while, she eventually raised her arm and drew a line in the air, directing everyone's attention towards the main road leading to the settlement's main hub.

"There's a nice, straight-ish line I'm seeing," she said evenly before giving their resident diversion specialist a sidelong glance.

Catching her meaning immediately, Yang bared her teeth in a daredevil's grin. "Say no more."

---

A small piece of rubble, no larger than half a brick, rolled down a shingled roof with a series of rapid clinks. It got the attention of several Beowolves present in the vicinity, including an Alpha. The leader of the pack lazily lifted its upper body off the ground, but didn't move, instead leaving two of his underlings to investigate in his stead.

The Beowolves warily followed after the sound. They were led about forty yards away, towards a small side alley between two buildings. They slowed down and sniffed the air as they drew close, but their downwind approach offered them no warnings. They crept silently right along the house's wall, one after the other; before long, the one walking in front poked its head 'round the corner…

And was deafened by the sound of its skull splitting right open.

Yang's metal fist had fallen onto the beast like an anvil, coming down with enough force for the Beowolf's limp body to bounce off the ground, sending bone shrapnel in every direction. Immediately, the second Beowolf growled and came in swinging, but it was startled and sloppy; the blond blur ducked beneath the clawed arm and slammed her leg into the monster's side, sending it flying into the nearby wall. Dazed, it fell back to the ground, landing flat on its face. Before it could recover, Yang grabbed its wrist and put a foot down on its back, twisting the Beowolf's arm as far as it would go.

And then beyond.

The Huntress smirked. If the little scuffle from just before wasn't enough, the beast's pain-stricken howls were bound to draw the attention of all its buddies.

"Thanks, pal." She released the pressure from the Beowolf's shoulder blade, only to bring her foot back down onto its neck with a crunch.

She let go of the body as it began to disintegrate, turning her eyes to the Grimm in front of her. Other than the Alpha, there was about a dozen more Beowolves, as well as two Ursai; many more could be heard approaching from deeper within the village, all pooling into a funnel between two rows of houses.

She was the star of the show, and intended to keep it that way for a while yet. So she let herself feel — feel her anger, her worry, her frustration. Thoughts of Raven snaked beneath her skin like live fire, whereas the echo of Salem's cold voice made her body hair stand on end. She embraced both the hurt and the rage, turning herself into a treat no Grimm would pass on.

Stepping a little closer, Yang cracked her neck and popped all five of the knuckles she could pop. A wide, predatory grin climbed onto her face as she regarded the growing horde.

The food was already on the table; it just didn't know yet that it was the meal.

---

As more and more Grimm poured onto the road to challenge Yang, the wind of their death picked up within the shade of one of the side alleys. A cloud of crimson burst forth from shadows, rounding off the end of the Grimm column and cutting off their main path of retreat. Some in the rear managed to catch a glimpse of red petals and began turning around, but they couldn't do a thing before the first gunshot propelled their doom towards them.

Ruby swept down the left side of the road like a thundering hurricane of black, red and steel. A handful of Grimm in her path managed to duck or escape; some got off with a missing limb, but otherwise kept their life. Overwhelming most, however, were caught up within her harvest.

Blake wasn't far behind, jumping into the breach that had been cut out for her. Caring not for the rain of limb, ash and bone Ruby had left in her wake, she dashed from one beast to another, finishing off the wounded and pushing the rest onto the other side of the street. Weiss supported her from afar, filling the road with explosions and letting a couple of her summons to stall the final few stragglers that had been lagging behind the horde. Together, they were making sure that the other half of the road would be primed for the next reaping.

Somehow, Blake continued to make her way down the street without getting hit by some random severed limb. She even managed to kick one of the flying heads mid-air, punting it into another Beowolf and throwing the beast right back into the next 'death lane' — straight under Ruby's scythe. The human combine flew past her in a blur; by the time Blake joined up with Yang, Ruby was already helping Weiss clean up the rear.

Their gambit resulted in straight-up slaughter. Between Yang's opening act and Ruby's harvest, they'd slain around half the Grimm in the village — all within the span of seconds. What remained were the stragglers, mostly Ursai, as well as a bunch of lucky Grimm that managed to dip into hiding before Ruby could've reached them. Yang and Blake were steadily eliminating the latter, whereas the other two slew anything that dared to crawl out from the village.

Dodgeball. It was a simple yet elegant strategy — one that proved devastatingly effective against large groups of lesser Grimm. It played into all of their strengths: Yang's ability to keep the enemy engaged, Blake's hit-and-run fighting style, Weiss' crowd control, and Ruby's borderline unparalleled ability to rapidly cut down large swathes of Grimm. It required coordination and trigger discipline, but their team had practiced and refined their maneuvers to a fine edge. They were natural; routine. And it showed.

Unexpectedly, the telltale barks of Yang's gauntlet fell silent for a longer while. It wasn't because Yang stopped fighting, no — in fact, she was duking it out with an Alpha. While it didn't appear like she was struggling, she was on her back foot, for whatever reason.

She back-stepped away from a swipe intended to take her head, then grabbed the Beowolf's arm and hurled the beast over her head and through a window of a nearby building. Having bought herself some time, she glanced at her weapon and seemed to give it a hearty tug; soon, a sigh left her body.

With a quick jab, she crushed the trachea of a Beowolf trying to sneak up on her. As it fell limply to the ground, she looked up the street.

"Yo, Ruby!" she hollered, getting her sister to turn around. "That offer to look at Celica still on the table?"

Twenty yards away, Ruby snorted. "Sure!"

In the meantime, Weiss was bracing to take on yet another Alpha. She was actually sort of disappointed with how little she had to do in the fight so far, so she readily welcomed the challenger — as well as the Ursa that trailed right behind it.

The Alpha reared back to take a swing at her, but Weiss was ready to receive it. She would freeze it in place and then drive Myrtenaster in the underside of its jaw — or so she thought. Instead, she was forced to sidestep as the beast crumpled to the ground, half its neck missing.

Her surprise was so great that it messed up her footing, leaving her little choice but to shield herself from the Ursa with a hard light glyph. The Grimm reeled from the collision, and Weiss left him no time to recover, relieving it of its head with the sword-arm of her Arma Gigas.

She turned her confused eyes at Ruby, who was in the process of dismantling two more Ursai. She had no doubt that it was a round from Crescent Rose that folded the Alpha — as she'd heard it — but something about the whole situation felt off. Covering each other was one thing, but Weiss had had it — why would Ruby fire?

She didn't dwell on it for too long, as luck saw it fit to fulfill her craving for more violence. While the Grimm caught between the pairs were steadily nearing extinction, more kept coming from within the settlement. The ratio of Ursai to Beowolves also kept increasing, which made things less personal in an odd way — but Weiss wasn't going to complain.

The sound of snapping wood and breaking glass alerted them to a larger Grimm finally deciding to grace them with its presence. It barreled straight through a nearby house, bursting through a wall in a shower of dust and wooden splinters. A lone shingle bounced off the beast's skull plate, but the Ursa Major didn't even seem to notice; it just paused briefly to shake off the rubble, then roared and rushed towards its doom — straight at Weiss.

By the time the creature moved, Weiss had a couple of ice glyphs already lined up to break the charge. She carefully bid her time, and was just about to fire them up when a red blur barged into her killzone.

A hissing gasp tore from her chest. With a runaway detonation on her hands, she hastily dumped more Aura down her connection with the glyphs, willing them to move further away. It wasn't far, but enough.

Ruby and Weiss ended up hitting the Ursa at the same time — the former with an overhead strike straight to its spinal column, whereas the latter ran it through with twin ice spikes to the abdomen. Due to her last-second adjustments, both of Weiss' spears whiffed their intended targets of heart and underjaw. One managed to rip a chunk out of the beast's jugular, whereas the other punched a hole in its belly, clear through to the other side.

"Careful!"

Ruby wasn't harmed, but she didn't get off quite scot-free. While the spikes narrowly missed her, the same couldn't be said for Crescent Rose. It was unlikely to have gotten actually damaged… but its blade was now very much stuck in a pillar of ice a foot in diameter. Said pillar was likely the only reason the Ursa got to keep its head — not that it had much use of it, now.

Ruby hung down the scythe's shaft, putting her full weight on it while giving the ice a few solid kicks. "I'm fine!" she assured Weiss, quite dismissively at that.

But Weiss wasn't fine.

She didn't understand it at first, the feeling that spawned in the pit of her stomach. It was dark and sucked out the warmth out of her body, steadily crawling upwards and leaving strange tingling wherever it went. Its black tendrils soon coiled around her throat and squeezed her ribcage, and it almost felt like she was getting pulled inwards, into the abyss. She felt sick — could even taste it at the back of her tongue.

It hurt.

Weiss continued to fight, though the nagging feeling had never left. Eventually, a spark of understanding lit up within her, setting the dark tendrils on fire. It spread to her nerve endings and burned up her face; still, even though she suddenly felt hot, it did nothing to warm up the cold pit that laid at her core. At the border where flames and ice met, a storm began to brew.

She was being coddled, made into dead weight. She felt insulted, humiliated — and the fact that Ruby was the source of it all hurt beyond what words could describe.

Her eyes burned, but there were yet more Grimm to kill.

In the meanwhile, Ruby continued to struggle against the ice, making her seem like a prime target. Some opportunist Beowolf dashed in her direction. Noticing the inbound hostile, she fired a couple of rounds from Crescent Rose; although it caused the cracks in the ice to spread, it still wasn't enough to break the scythe free.

She let go of the shaft and closed in on the Grimm, sidestepping when it lunged at her. Its claws digging into the rubble, the beast spun around and attacked again, only to miss. Taking advantage of that opening, Ruby swooped in, pressing her shoulder against the Beowolf's body and grabbing its arm. Then—

It was like a movie that was missing some of its frames. In one moment, Ruby was ready to throw the Grimm over her shoulder; the next, there was a wet crunch as the beast had been piledrived into the ground at impossible speeds, sending shards of bone and splotches of tar-like flesh in every direction. Red petals fell down onto the Beowolf's carcass; it soon disintegrated, merely an afterthought in Ruby's mind as she went back to her scythe.

Cleaning up the remaining hostiles didn't take long — especially after Ruby had finally managed to rip Crescent Rose free off its prison, in one fluid motion taking a limb off yet another Ursai. Once all the Grimm had fallen, she leaned on her scythe and looked around, satisfied.

"Alright!" she called. "Let's start searching!"

The four of them headed towards the hub. The whole way, Weiss trailed behind the rest of the group, ignoring the sporadic glances Ruby sent in her direction. When their team spread out for the search, Weiss hung back for a bit before stomping off after her partner.

It wasn't long until Ruby noticed she was being followed. She stopped and — perhaps sensing Weiss' upset — mustered a wry, awkward smile, as if to try and apologize for getting into Weiss' line of fire.

But that wasn't at all what Weiss was after.

"What was that," she ceded through her teeth, her breath trembling with a growl she'd barely contained.

On her part, Ruby seemed genuinely clueless as to what Weiss was so upset about; it implied an absence of intent behind her actions, and Weiss couldn't quite decide whether it made things better or worse.

In the moment, it definitely made her angrier. "I could have handled it."

Her words found little purchase at first. Ruby's gaze simply went vacant for a moment. Soon, however, her eyes widened, face going sheet-white with both realization and horror.

"I…"

Before Ruby could gather her thoughts and cobble together a response, Yang's shout took them both out from the moment.

"Hey! I think I've found something!"

Further vexed by the interruption, Weiss inhaled sharply through her nose. Then again, perhaps it was a blessing in disguise — she was not in the right headspace to hear Ruby out, and she knew it. Without another word, she turned on her heel and stormed off to wherever Yang had wandered off to — but not before giving Ruby one last look that said 'we are not done talking'.

---

Ruby's feet carried her forward, but her will wasn't in it as she dragged them across the cobblestone. Why, she almost wanted to find herself a dark corner and hide from the world. Disappear altogether, preferably. Funny — she'd been feeling pretty good about herself that day… up until the point when that sentiment crashed and burned.

She'd totally deserved it.

It'd been quite a while since the last time she'd made Weiss upset. She'd definitely managed that day, and then some — walking briskly some ten paces ahead of her, Weiss looked livid. Then again, perhaps 'livid' wasn't the right word. The echo Ruby felt through their connection was like a cold sphere buried in the center of her chest; rigid yet empty, it made it harder to breathe.

Weiss was hurt, which was the real reason why Ruby felt like shit. Anger was all Ruby's — woven from self-loathing, lined with frustration and fear. She'd thought she was in control, of herself and her impulses — or at least self-aware — but… she clearly wasn't. And Weiss now suffered for it.

She had to talk with her and properly apologize, as soon as she had the chance.

Blake stood at the threshold of the very house Ruby had singled out before, waiting for the two of them. The building was… sort of standing, if worse for wear. Most of the northern wing had been absolutely demolished, exposing to the elements what Ruby presumed to be a living room. Yang could be heard from the inside, digging through the rubble.

As Blake stepped aside to let the new arrivals pass, something caught her attention enough to make her gaze linger on Weiss. Briefly, her confused eyes sought out Ruby's; being offered no answers, she followed Weiss into the building and disappeared from view.

Before heading inside herself, Ruby had to fold Crescent Rose into its rifle form. A quick, spontaneous peek through the scope did confirm that the ground around the building was warmer than it ought to be. Despite the state the rest of the house was in, the stone foundation seemed mostly intact, which was promising.

When Ruby finally made her way through the empty doorframe, Yang was just-about done with her cleanup. Having already cast aside the ruined remains of a wooden staircase, Yang was trying to set upright a rather heavy-looking cupboard. Once she managed to get it vertical, she held it in place for a time, making sure it wouldn't fall down again. When it gave no indication of being about to collapse, she let go and dusted off her hands, giving her teammates a satisfied grin.

She jerked her head at the dusty carpet lying in the corner of the— space. "Noticed that randomly folded rug 'neath all this crap. It looked sus, so I started digging." Then, with a nonchalant wave of her hand, she pointed at something that had already garnered the attention of everyone present. In the floor right beside her feet was set a black, rectangular trapdoor.

Kneeling down beside the hatch, Yang drummed a simple tune on the metal.

They all heard… something. The reaction was immediate and unmistakably real, but it was difficult to tell what exactly it'd been. A while of nothing passed in silence, but they wouldn't be held in their suspense for long — soon, a series of metallic clangs and scrapes came from the other side, with the hatch cracking open but a moment later.

They caught a glimpse of some face peeking at them from the darkness below. Then, the trapdoor's wings swung open so violently that Yang had to grab one before it could bust her kneecap. Immediately, a flood of cries, thanks and shouted questions spilled at them from below.

A small crowd of people was clogging the flight of stairs leading down to the cellar. Without an exception, they all looked frightened and tired, but it didn't appear they'd been harmed. A couple of them carried weapons, but they'd lowered their rifles as soon as they saw that it wasn't Grimm that waited for them on the other side. Amidst those armed, one face immediately struck the girls as familiar — a short, somewhat tan woman with sharp, orange eyes peering at them from beneath a dark fringe of hair. Asahi, Aronia's wife.

Yang raised her hand to stem the tide of chaos. "Alright people, listen up!"

Although she'd yelled, she'd kept an even, friendly tone of voice. Thankfully, it was quite enough to get the job done without startling anybody; when everyone finally piped down, she turned her head to Ruby and gave her sister a little wink.

Having thanked her with a small nod, Ruby looked at the scared yet hopeful faces peering at them from the hole in the floor. "Yes, we've come to rescue you. But right now we need you to keep calm and head back inside, until we make a clean sweep of the entire settlement. We'll come back to you after we're done, alright?"

A wave of murmurs spread across the gathering. After a little while, they all expressed reluctant agreement.

"Is there anyone here who requires immediate medical attention?" Ruby asked, prompting another round of murmurs. The fact that the answer wasn't an immediate 'no' forced her to hold back a sigh. Few were the things that complicated a hunt more than civilian presence, but the presence of civilians that were also sick or wounded definitely made the cut.

Thankfully, the survivors ended up shaking their heads.

Blake put on a reassuring smile. "Then lay low for a while. It shouldn't be long."

With another round of thank-yous, the settlers retreated back into their bunker and locked the hatch.

Yang flashed a grin at her teammates. "So far so good, right?"

Blake smiled, but aside from her, Yang's enthusiasm was met with rather lukewarm reception; Ruby merely hummed in half-hearted agreement, whereas Weiss didn't react at all, simply turning to face the exit.

"Blake and I will take the north side," Weiss announced. Though surprised, and somewhat concerned, Blake followed her outside without any protest.

Yang watched them leave in stunned silence. "O-kay…"

Ruby heaved a sigh, then walked past Yang and patted her on the shoulder. "Let's go."

The two of them headed south, up a cobblestone road curving around one of the few ponds of the village. With no real system in mind, Ruby simply led them to the nearest building that stood out — the scorched ruins of a two-story house overseeing the lakeside.

Little of it remained, bar one of its walls and the charred skeleton of support beams. Sad, empty frames lingered where doors and windows had once been, making the building seem even more dead than its ghost-town neighbors. That said, its stone foundation, while cracked in places, was still structurally sound.

With the civic twilight well underway, Ruby put on a small headlamp and turned it on. She walked over to the nearest window frame and stuck the barrel of Crescent Rose through, more out of the overabundance of caution than actually expecting any hostiles.

Nope, nothing. The only threat inside was the one of collapse.

Given the signal of coast clear, Yang stepped inside, but waited right beyond the threshold. Although she didn't do as much as peep when Ruby walked past, one look at her face was enough to tell that she had questions.

Ruby needed not to wait long. As she got on her knees to take a peek under a pile of scorched rafters, Yang approached her and just hung around for a while. Her eyelids fluttering, Ruby let out a long exhale. She really didn't feel like having that conversation, but it sure would've been preferable to Yang just standing there.

Yang peeked over a crumbling wall to make sure that no-one was around to eavesdrop.

"Soo," she finally started. "What's up with Weiss?"

Rather than answer right away, Ruby nipped at the inside of her cheek. "I messed up," she quietly admitted, not looking up, her voice a little hoarse with tension. "Didn't let her fight for herself. Didn't mean to, but…"

She had trailed off, but Yang didn't need her to finish. "Salt on a wound, eh?"

Ruby had nothing to say to that. Leaving the subject matter there, Yang gave her shoulder a sympathetic squeeze before delving deeper into the ruins.

They searched in silence for a couple of minutes. On Ruby's end, the investigation proved a fruitless endeavor, accomplishing nothing besides getting her covered in soot and ash. She was just about ready to have them move on when Yang called out to her.

"Think I can see another hatch. Lend me a hand."

The sound led Ruby to the remains of a burned-down kitchen. That was what she guessed, anyway — the cracked stone tiles shifting beneath her feet were the only remaining tell, really. She was no expert on the matter, but it seemed to be the place where the fire had started. In other areas of the house, parts of the walls or even whole pieces of furniture managed to survive; there, the destruction was absolute, leaving nothing but dead, gray cinders.

Yang was right — they did find another hatch after but a while of digging; smaller one, granted, but a hatch nonetheless. She knocked, and they waited… but even after the cloud of fine ash had fallen back to the ground, their call remained unanswered. They'd tried just opening it, but it wouldn't budge… which, considering the absence of any lock, suggested that it had been blocked from the other side. It definitely wasn't melted shut.

Ruby and Yang shared a brief look. Given a small nod of go-ahead, Yang rolled up her sleeve and fired two shotgun rounds into each of the trapdoor's hinges; with that done and no sounds coming from below, she proceeded to rip the metal sheet off its frame.

Nigh immediately, the all-too-familiar smell of bad news wafted from the maw of darkness below. Even though they both had half-expected it, they still recoiled from the foul stench, taking a step back and burrowing their noses in their clothes. It didn't help that much, but it was enough to stop them from dry heaving.

"Anyone there?" Yang called out, although both she and Ruby knew damn well that no-one would answer. In a sense, the dead could be very loud.

Still, someone had to go there and check; count the bodies. Not what they were getting paid for, but… it only felt right. Intent on heading down herself, Ruby was already pulling up her cloak over her face, only to be stopped when a firm hand was put in her chest.

"Let me," Yang said, likely out of consideration for Ruby's current state of mind. She quickly untied the perfumed, purple scarf from her arm and used it like a mask. Having taken one last, deep breath, she turned on her chest-mounted lamp and jumped down the hatch.

While it was something she could've handled, Ruby appreciated not having to go. The sad reality of the job — or perhaps her own circumstances — was that, over the years, she'd gotten somewhat desensitized to the sight of rot and gore. While each a tragedy, random corpses didn't faze her much, anymore… but the smell never became any easier to stomach. Putrid and sweet, in a way that made you gag and choke on nothing but air and bile. Worse yet, it stuck to you; got into your clothing, your hair, refusing to be subdued or leave until a long shower.

Yang poked her head out of the hole after maybe twenty seconds. Ruby helped her out, then followed after Yang as she put some distance between herself and the cellar.

Having taken off the scarf, Yang pressed her forearm to her mouth and just kept breathing through her nose for a bit, clearly focusing on trying not to retch. In response to Ruby's questioning look, she simply straightened three of her fingers.

She needed about half a minute to steady herself. "Three dead. Adults. Probably asphyxiation, but it's hard to tell."

A chill ran up Ruby's spine. To sit trapped in the dark whilst the fire above kept sucking out what little air you had… what a terrible way to go. Not a thought she wanted to dwell on, for sure.

Eager to move on, they secured the hatch lid back in place and left the scorched ruins behind. They continued with their sweep of the south end; while the settlement hadn't been particularly populous, it covered a disproportionately large area, dotted with quaint gardens and young orchards. Plenty of places where Grimm could hide, but none laid in wait for them. It wasn't long, however, until they started finding more victims — what remained of them, anyway.

It… wasn't pretty. It never was. The Grimm left little of their victims, but they were not tidy eaters. What usually remained was hardly enough to bury, but more than sufficient to disturb — a finger here, some bloodied rags there, that kind of thing. There was even a theory that such eating habits were intentional, or maybe evolutionary, meant to cause terror and despair in anyone who'd stumble upon a feeding site; a spiderweb made of viscera, alerting Grimm to the presence of prospective victims. Back at Beacon, Ruby found that theory to be gross, interesting and ultimately preposterous. Nowadays… she wasn't so sure anymore.

The whole pass took them maybe fifteen minutes. It was definitely time well-spent; they'd found tools, supplies and — most importantly — yet another bunker of live survivors.

Not everyone could've been saved, but for once in a long time they could simply… help.

---

After ensuring the area was safe, team RWBY rounded up the survivors and led everybody to one of the more-intact houses near the town's green. The property belonged to Mr. and Mrs. Greene, a rather lovely older couple; being the de facto leaders of the community, they didn't mind at all hosting the gathering. Lit by two electric lanterns, their living room was packed full that evening — every seat, every surface was taken by rapt audience that hung onto every word the four Huntresses spoke.

In total, spread over three different bunkers, they'd found sixteen people. Some of them were sick, but thankfully not bedridden; there were also three kids in their midst. It wasn't ideal, but Ruby preferred to have everybody in one place — at least for the general rundown of the situation. Thankfully, all three persons of interest were alive and well, cooped up together on the couch.

Rather predictably, the team was bombarded with questions. For a time, they tried to keep up with the rapid fire, but the growing chaos soon forced them to get a firm hold of the conversation.

Ruby outlined the plan of action. The next day, she and her teammates would focus on repairing the tower and searching for anyone who might've escaped the attack. She wanted everybody to stay underground while they were away, which was not exactly a popular decision, but it went through without any open objection. Assuming they'd manage to restore the comms, she said, the help should come within two days; if they didn't, three.

Getting a sense of order and direction seemed to calm down most everyone, making the following Q&A much more manageable. When the subject matter started to turn dark, Ruby had Yang escort the children and their volunteer caretaker — Asahi — back to a safe house. The oldest of the kids was only thirteen — they really didn't need to hear what was to be discussed.

With the children out of the earshot, Ruby confirmed that there had been fatalities. Most settlers took the news in grim silence, having already expected as much; one woman, however, immediately shot up from her seat and asked whether anyone had seen a teenage boy, or maybe his eleven year old sister. Taken aback, Ruby, Blake and Weiss looked amongst themselves, only to relax somewhat when all three silently shook their heads. Their answer did little satisfy the lady, who settled down only after they'd assured her they'd do everything in their power to find the kids.

Come next morning, Ruby wanted to enlist some of the adults to help with corpse recovery and identification. There were quite a few volunteers, including the lady from before. There were even murmurs of starting right away, but Ruby was quick to shoot down any and all discussion of doing so. Her reason was entirely pragmatic, and a concern of safety. Volunteers or no, the recovery was bound to cause emotions to rise, and Ruby cared not at all for fending off Grimm in the middle of the night — with civvies running about, to boot.

Eventually, the emergency meeting came to an end. One after another, people started filing out through the door, to be then escorted to their respective safe houses. Ruby planned on staying behind for a bit, just to keep an eye on the Greenes, who wanted to grab a couple of things before going back underground. While others were vacating the premises, she perched comfortably on the armrest of a couch and began consulting her notes.

After a little while, she spotted motion in her periphery.

"Miss Rose?" The person to approach her was none other than the reason she was there to begin with — miss Aronia herself. She was a short, somewhat stocky young woman with bright eyes and a round face. She looked very pale in the cold lanternlight. Her blond hair was cut in a messy chin-length bob with a long, wavy fringe that covered her left eye. She was dead-tired and was missing her dark lipstick, but, other than that, she looked nearly identical to the photo they'd got of her.

"Just Ruby is fine."

The woman shuffled abashedly from one foot to the other. "Right. Thank you again for coming to help. Really, it means the world to me and my family. We— we were beginning to lose hope." She hung her head and just stood there for a bit before looking up and asking: "How much is my brother paying you?"

Ruby knew just the way to deflect. "You can ask him yourself in a few days."

"I suppose I can," miss Aronia said with a faint smile. Then, her back straightened and she took a step closer, looking Ruby in the eye with new intensity. "Still, we have to make sure your team is compensated properly."

The sudden zeal gave Ruby a small pause. She laughed awkwardly and shook her head. "Really, it's fine. We didn't pick this assignment for the money, and you'll need the funds more than we do."

"But—"

Thankfully, miss Greene came in to back Ruby up.

"Come now dear, you've heard the young miss. Let it rest for now," she said, only to give her neighbor a conspiratorial wink.

Or maybe not.

Be it as it may, miss Aronia sighed and dropped the matter, settling for a simple hug. The physical contact surprised Ruby, but she didn't mind it too much; would've appreciated a heads-up, but it wasn't that big of a deal. She understood that the woman likely needed it.

In the meantime, miss Greene was watching Ruby rather curiously. After a little while, she chuckled to herself, as if in slight disbelief. "Who would've thought that it'd be the Red Angel of Mantle herself who'd visit us in our time of need."

Hearing that moniker made Ruby shudder. Of all the nicknames she'd gotten over the years, that one counted among her least favorite. Much to her eternal chagrin, it also happened to be the most popular, and by far at that.

She had social media to thank for that state of affairs. During the evacuation of Mantle, dozens of people snapped a picture of her standing atop the ramp of the cargo freighter they'd used for transport. Said photos had soon flooded the socials, and since most people hadn't known the name of their mysterious savior, they'd come up with their own. '#RedAngel' was the hashtag that had caught the most traction. Eventually, even the news networks had picked it up; after that, it stuck.

The sentiment behind it was nice enough, but she always felt it projected some rather hefty and frankly unwanted expectations onto her. Besides, she also found it to be woefully misplaced — after all, if she was supposed to be an angel, then her wings were destruction. Not particularly angelic, that.

She pulled back from Aronia's hug. "Don't feel like I much deserve the title," she admitted with a dry laugh.

Miss Greene tilted her head, looking at her curiously. "No? You and your friends definitely looked the part when you stood at the entrance to our safe house." Having said that, she took a moment to contemplate Ruby's meaning, the wrinkles about her face seeming to deepen in the harsh lighting. "But perhaps you're right. Angels are perfect. They want for nothing… and never suffer." Her eyes, hiding behind a pair of wire-frame glasses, softened. "You, honey, are much more real."

After helping the Greenes carry their things underground, Ruby just sort of lingered around the village, idly patrolling the area. The rest of her team headed out into the night for some time, off to grab their cargo; thanks to Weiss' summoned Lancers, the round trip took them maybe fifteen minutes. Together, the four of them distributed the supplies between the bunkers before retiring to the same safe house as their VIPs. It was rather packed down there, but it made keeping an eye on them much easier.

The next couple of hours weren't particularly eventful. Blake spent most of that time reading, whereas Yang and Weiss would play with the little Magnolia until she tuckered out and went for a nap. Ruby made camp right by the entrance, setting up a little workshop on the concrete stairs whilst she worked on Ember Celica. With her headphones on, she locked herself away in her little world, taking her time as she went over each plate, wire and screw. Layer by layer, she peeled the mystery off the malfunction; she cleaned everything, fixed what she could with her limited tools, then put the whole thing back together.

Having tightened the last screw, she packed up the shop and wiped her hands. Her knees popped in protest when she finally got off her butt, startling some woman who'd been solving crossword puzzles a few feet away. With Ember Celica dangling off her wrist, she wove a path through a labyrinth of bags, people and random crap, all the way to the rear of the cellar, where Weiss and Yang had been chatting up Aronia and her wife. Her approach had been spotted, and by some unfortunate accident she made eye contact with Asahi; Ruby smiled awkwardly and gave the woman a small wave, then knocked the headphones back onto her shoulders and walked up to Yang.

"All done?" Yang asked with a grin.

Ruby rolled her head. "Sort of." She let the gauntlet slide off her forearm and onto Yang's hand. "Bit of a patch job, but at least it should cycle for now. Gonna give it a proper tune-up when we get back home."

Yang gave Ruby a curious look while securing Celica around her wrist. "What's up with her?"

"You bent the cycling gear, just enough so there was a chance it'd seize up." Yang hissed as if in pain, but that wasn't even the worst of it. Ruby winced. "Aaaand, the stalling probably busted the motor. It spins for now, but the bearing doesn't have a lot of life left, I think."

"Fff— ahah, my bad." Although Yang had managed to catch herself just in time, Aronia still leveled her with a pointed stare; on her arm, little Magnolia slept undisturbed. "Thanks."

Ruby smiled. "No biggie."

Asahi had been listening to the exchange with clear interest in her eyes. "So, you are also your team's weaponsmith?"

"You could say that? I know a thing or two, and find tinkering to be pretty relaxing; definitely beats talking to people, heh."

Yang let out a chuckle. "She's being modest."

Feeling slightly uncomfortable with being put on the spot, Ruby rolled her eyes. "Right, whatever." Before Yang could try to argue, she pointed a thumb over her shoulder. "Gonna go stretch my legs. Do a couple rounds 'round the perimeter." Her gaze swept over her teammates. "Anyone coming with?"

"I."

Ah. She… really should've expected it.

Their eyes locked, and the gaze of blue held Ruby in place. Weiss no longer looked angry, which was oddly even more anxiety-inducing; her face was now but a mask, neutral and hard to read. Her stare was unblinking and posture rigid — unrelenting, like a crystal of ice. To some random onlooker, it could've been a little intimidating, but Ruby recognized it for what it was — Weiss trying to keep her emotions on a tight leash.

And she was the reason such fine control was needed. Great.

Weiss didn't stand up right away, almost as if waiting to see whether Ruby would challenge her or back out; when neither happened, she silently scooped up her rapier and jacket, then passed Ruby by on her way out.

Sitting nearby, even Aronia and Asahi could feel the tension.

Ruby stole a furtive glance at Blake and Yang, not really expecting any help. What she found in their eyes was sympathy, but also encouragement — not really of the 'everything's gonna be fine' variety, more like 'go, you need to talk'. They needed not tell her twice.

Ruby spun on her heel and headed towards the exit, grabbing Crescent Rose along the way. She'd embraced her fate — not quite boldly, perhaps, but she was sort-of ready to face the music. She had a massive fuck up to own up to.

Weiss was waiting for her topside, her silhouette casting a shadow on the empty doorframe, backlit by the light of the moon. Seeing that Ruby was already closing the hatch, she stepped out onto the empty street and made a few slow, measured steps. When Ruby caught up to her, Weiss picked up her pace, guiding the way towards the main gate.

The sound of footsteps on cobblestone carried off into the night, but it offered little reprieve from the loaded, almost oppressive silence that followed the pair. As they strolled down the empty streets, watched by the hollow eyes of shattered windows, that silence hung between them like the stench of a corpse — wrong, unwanted and plain out of place. It made Ruby feel as though her skin wanted to crawl off her bones. Weiss also didn't seem immune to its effects, as Ruby managed to catch something that sounded like very faint, anxious humming.

When they were maybe a stone's throw away from the gate, Weiss started dragging her feet slightly, slowly coming to a halt. When she stopped, so did Ruby; after a little while of standing still, Weiss turned to her right and made a few more steps towards a nearby pond.

"It's so quiet," she whispered, and her voice sounded like a gunshot midst the windless night. Ruby couldn't tell whether she was talking about the night itself, or the silence that divided them.

Gazing over still waters, Weiss looked almost like taken out of a painting, frozen in time. Framed with silvers, cyans and blues of the moonlight, she seemed nigh ethereal… and sad.

"Mm."

For how quiet the night had been, Ruby's thoughts were oh so very loud.

Seconds kept ticking off, measured by the rapid beating of her pulse. She could speak up first and get it over with, but something was stopping her. Perhaps it was because Weiss deserved an apology spoken to her face. Maybe she just sensed that Weiss was still gathering her thoughts. Whatever the case might've been, she waited — and silence was part of her punishment.

She lingered in that limbo for what felt like a long while; once the quiet was broken, it would offer no relief.

"Do you not trust me as your partner?"

Both the question and Weiss' tone were like a beanbag shot to the gut. A beanbag well-deserved, perhaps, but…

"What? No, that's not it!"

Weiss finally turned around. She wasn't crying yet, but her eyes glistened in the dim light. "Then why, Ruby?" she asked. "I fucked up and got hurt, yes, but I'm fine now. I'm ready. We've fought, for crying out loud, and I was perfectly okay."

"I know, I just—" Ruby started, only to get cut off.

"Then why—" Weiss' voice cracked — and so did Ruby herself.

"Because I'm not being rational, okay?!" she cried out, much louder than she would've liked to. Nothing about any of that was how she'd wanted it to be, but she was too swept up in the rising tide to stop it.

With force, she jabbed a finger in her own sternum, only to clutch her fingers on the fabric of her jacket and shake it. "I know!" Animatedly waving her hands about, she would carry on till words no longer burned on in her chest. "I know that you're one of the most talented Huntresses of this generation! That you can take care of yourself — hell, that you can kick my butt! I know it all, but I'm still so fucking terrified that I'm going to lose you!" Staring Weiss in the eyes, she didn't blink once — not even to shed away the tears that were nearly blinding her.

The confession stunned Weiss, leaving Ruby with some room to breathe and pull herself together. Thankfully, she had stopped short of actually screaming at Weiss… but she had startled her somewhat.

What an unsightly display, that was. Just about everything that could go wrong with her sorry-ass attempt at apologizing had done so. But what's done was done; all she could do now was get her act together and pick up the pieces.

"I didn't mean to coddle you, and I feel shitty," she said, much quieter now, her voice a little hoarse. "Shittier still, now that I just unloaded on you. But I don't control it." She shook her head. A hollow, self-deprecating laugh ripped free from her throat like a curse. "And that's the thing. The issue isn't you — it's me being fucking weak."

Weiss had been standing with her lips slightly parted for the past while. Having finally remembered to close them, she just looked at Ruby for a bit. Her gaze seemed… softer, now, though not necessarily in a way that made Ruby feel any better, being unpleasantly close to pity.

It appeared that Weiss was about to say something, but then a crunch of breaking glass alerted them to the fact that they had an audience.

"Crap," Ruby hissed, quickly wiping off her tears. In a single motion, she unfurled her scythe to its full length and began scanning the forest for heat signatures.

They weren't difficult to find.

"Mostly Beowolves," she let on.

Weiss moved into position next to her, Myrtenaster in hand. "How many?"

"Around couple dozen, far as I can see." Reaching out to her thigh, Ruby grabbed a chem light and cracked it against her knee, tossing it onto the road ahead.

Hearing more movement on the other side of the ruined watchtower, Weiss heaved a tired sigh. "Make that double, then."

She wasn't far off.

They opened fire as soon as the first Beowolves ran out from shadows. That initial salvo was enough to force the Grimm to backpedal and scatter — they dashed behind the nearby buildings and into the bush, likely looking for a way to surround them.

In that brief window between engagements, both of their Scrolls began going off. With someone banging on their comms, Ruby drove Crescent Rose in the ground for a bit and inhaled deeply through her nose; having wiped her snot with the sleeve of her jacket, she accepted the call.

Yang's voice came from the speakers. "Everything cool? We've heard gunshots."

"Yeah, s'fine," Ruby replied, her eyes darting around her surroundings. "My dumb ass attracted some Grimm here, is all. Sit tight and keep an eye on everyone; we'll handle it."

There was a brief pause before Yang's response. "O-kay…?"

That was about all the break time they would be allowed. Ruby silenced the line; the next moment, her scythe was cutting in half a Beowolf that had figured she hadn't spotted it on the nearby roof.

Soon, about thirty Beowolves swarmed the main road; some tried flanking them from the lakeside, whereas others went over or through the ruined buildings. Normally, Ruby would take on the larger group — the ones coming from the waterfront, in this case — while Weiss picked off individual Grimm that fell through. That was precisely what Weiss moved in position for… but Ruby wavered.

She did engage the pack, but it was hard to focus on the enemy in front of her. As if drawn by some magnetic force, her eyes kept straying to check up on Weiss' situation. Battlefield awareness was a skill she used to take pride in, but that wasn't it. She wasn't aware — she was distracted. It was an impulse, and it made having her back turned to Weiss a very uncomfortable endeavor, now that she was consciously trying to go against it.

They'd been in a nearly identical situation dozens of times, prevailing with ease every single time. Weiss had it. Ruby realized that… and yet, that knowledge did nothing to calm her rampaging heart. The temptation to turn around, ditch the flank and help was primal, and to resist it was to feel the breath of Death itself on her neck. It was torturous.

Thankfully, the fight didn't last long. Besides the main force made up of Beowolves, a bunch of creeps had tried storming in through the gate, but their whole advance had been stopped in its tracks when Weiss put a shallow crater where their legs had been. A singular Nevermore had also popped up, but Ruby made sure to condemn it to past tense with extreme prejudice. Other than that, there were no surprises.

Ruby was first to clean up her side of the battlefield. When she looked, Weiss was also wrapping up, basically toying with the last fou— three Beowolves. An Alpha was among them, struggling to break out from the grasp of its icy time-out.

Before she even realized, Ruby was already mid-step. She immediately froze, startled by the fact; planting both of her feet on the ground, she willed herself to stand by and watch.

Jumping in would be asking for getting blasted, she knew, but the temptation still existed. She contemplated putting a fifty cal through the Alpha's skullplate, but quickly stomped that idea to the curb; under normal circumstances, she totally would've, but the last thing she wanted was to make Weiss even more upset. And so she waited, finger off the trigger, feeling her heart beat against her eardrums.

Weiss didn't take long. When the Alpha fell bisected to the ground, she turned to look at Ruby; nigh instantly, the thrill of combat left her face, superseded by some unusual, complex expression. Finding it hard to look at, Ruby began fumbling with her Scroll to check in.

Her fingers hurt.

Yang was quick to pick up. "Status?"

"Still standing," Ruby announced. She was trying to sound upbeat, but it came out a little too airy to be convincing to her own ears.

"Expected nothing else, sis." Contrary to her words, there was a hint of tension leaving Yang's voice.

"See you in a bit."

Ruby hung up. She made a couple of steps towards the lake, letting out a shaky breath. She felt a little weak; not woozy, but like her knees were going to buckle underneath her. Her arms didn't feel much better — she probably wouldn't straight-up drop Crescent Rose were she to swing it, but she sure felt like it. The sensation wasn't entirely unfamiliar, but she associated it with difficult, prolonged battles, not warm-ups. Her relief was immense, but a deep sense of shame came with it.

A pack of Beowolves. It was all that it took to leave her shaken.

"Apology accepted."

Ruby turned on her heel, shooting Weiss a confused look. "I… haven't even apologized yet," she said, her arm unconsciously reaching to her neck.

For but a single heartbeat, an echo of a smile graced Weiss' face. "But I can tell that you mean it. Also, that you are not as weak as you seem to believe," she replied in a gentle voice, then averted her eyes and turned them earthbound. "I… might be a little cross with you for a while. But I'll get over it." With that promise, she began walking off towards the village hub.

Ruby swallowed, fighting against the burning of her eyes. "I'm so sorry."

Weiss paused and looked at Ruby; once again, a faint glimmer of a smile shone through — for a little longer, this time.

"We should make sure that's the last of them," she said, then jerked her head in the direction of the hub. "Come on."

---

The night air was pleasantly cool against Weiss' skin.

With her legs curled up to her chest, she was sitting on what had once been the upper-floor wall of somebody's house. Now, that particular section reached no higher than two feet from the floor, offering her clear and unobstructed view of the entire settlement. The location was a little open to her liking, but they'd been blessed with clear, windless weather that night.

A long night was ahead of her. Were it just the four of them, they'd each have a watch three-hour long. Sadly, the civilian presence didn't offer them that luxury, requiring of them to be extra careful. It had been agreed that it'd be safer to stand guard in pairs — and so there she was, about to huddle up in her coat for six hours straight.

At least she would have some company… even if she herself wasn't in the most companionable of moods.

She turned her head towards the staircase, just in time to see Blake emerge from the darkness downstairs. Even after all this time, it still unsettled her a little, just how quietly Blake could move about — if Weiss hadn't seen her enter the building, she would've been caught totally off-guard.

Blake strode over, a steaming mug in each hand.

"Here," she said, handing Weiss one of the drinks. As she sat down beside her companion, dangling her feet down the exterior wall, she gave Weiss a speculative look. "You seem to be in a better mood."

Weiss let out a dry chuckle. "Am I that easy to read?"

Blake thoughtfully narrowed her eyes. "Sometimes, but not usually, no. Which only goes to show how upset you must've been." For a little while, she simply observed Weiss, as if trying to figure out what was going through her head. "How did it go, if you don't mind me asking?"

Weiss smiled wryly at the question she knew had been coming.

"It went…" she let out, only to realize that she didn't have an answer on hand. She hung her head in pensive silence, trying different ways to put her feelings to words. Ultimately, she gave up, picking the easy road of simply telling what had happened. "You were right. She didn't even realize what she was doing. Complete autopilot," she quietly admitted.

She and Blake had already talked about the reason behind her upset, back during their initial sweep of the area. She… hadn't been particularly talkative, back then, much less open to hearing that Ruby might not have been conscious of what she'd been doing.

'All I'm saying is that you might be adding meaning where Ruby put none,' Blake had said. She'd been on point — annoyingly so.

"We were attacked, during that conversation," Weiss continued. "Ruby consciously kept herself from babying me, but…" She paused, then felt a chill crawl down her back as she recalled what she'd seen when she'd looked at Ruby. Pale and hyperventilating, she'd held Crescent Rose in a death grip of stark-white fingers. Her whole body had been rigid with tension, so much so that it looked like she was about to pull a muscle or crack a tooth. "I didn't think it'd be so hard for her."

Blake absently nodded her head. She was looking over the settlement, but it was clear as day that it wasn't what she was seeing in her mind's eye. "It's really difficult to fight that kind of fear. Speaking from experience."

Weiss blinked, only to perk up once she'd realized what Blake was talking about.

Of course she would understand Ruby's frame of mind. Blake and Ruby, they were the same — both had seen their partners getting gravely wounded due to something they felt responsible for, and they both had ended up hurting said partners due to resulting guilt and fear. Blake empathized with Ruby, because she had already lived through that, and knew her plight.

And through her, Weiss could better understand.

"Do you… do you think it'll stick with her for long?"

For a heartbeat, Blake looked at her with surprised eyes. A short, breathy laugh then slipped out, completely devoid of light. "I think that Ruby is much stronger of a person than I am. But if she's anything like me… then she won't forget it anytime soon."

Blake gazed forward, neither at the ground nor the sky — at when, not where.

"It's been two years since the Fall of Beacon, but I can still remember seeing the empty space where Yang's arm should've been. See the cut, hear the sound of Wilt cutting her flesh…" A visible shudder she couldn't quite hold back rocked her upper body. "It's all still so vivid, so real in my memory — almost like a movie I can watch in my head, frame by frame."

She let out yet another mirthless chuckle. Her lips set into a wry smile, she looked at Weiss, and there was something dark lurking beyond her pupils. "Funnily enough, me getting stabbed I don't remember at all. But that?"

Weiss nodded stiffly, letting her gaze fall to the ground beneath. A question popped up in her mind — a question she'd already pondered, and already got her answer for.

She wetted her lips and asked it still. "How… how did Ruby handle things, back when I got…?"

"I think you already know the answer," Blake replied, a little dismissively. When she saw that Weiss wasn't satisfied, she let out a sigh. "Weiss. I love you to bits, which is precisely why I'm not going to hand you any more ammo for emotional self-flagellation, okay?"

Weiss' fingers tightened around her mug. "I just…" she began, but a warm hand landing on her knee cut her words short.

"I know. Don't go there; it's not worth it."

It was hard to argue with that serious, amber stare, even though a part of her wanted to. She let go, for now, allowing for silence to come in between them. For some time, she simply tried to put her thoughts in order, only to find herself conflicted.

A dry, humorless hum vibrated within Weiss' throat. "I don't know whether I should feel better or worse, now."

Blake regarded her in thoughtful silence. She stayed quiet for a good few seconds, making Weiss believe she wouldn't comment. When she did speak up, she did so in a way calm and matter-of-factual, so much so that it seemed to come from a position of complete certainty.

"Don't feel bad for being hurt. Ruby's issues definitely shouldn't invalidate your own feelings." A crooked, self-conscious smirk showed up on her face. "And I suppose you can take heart in the fact that, unlike yours truly, she didn't decide to do something that would hurt you."

Weiss frowned, that latter remark earning Blake a long, concerned look. "What about you?" she quietly asked. "Are you okay?"

Blake was smiling — for real, this time. "I think I'm getting there."

---

Eight dead and four unaccounted for.

Such was the grim conclusion of their morning search and recovery. Arriving at that tally was a drawn-out and difficult endeavor. Identifying the burnt house trio had been easy enough, but they'd been the notable exception; with all the others, there was barely anything left to recognize. Most had to be identified by the scraps of their clothing. One person, by the dentures left in their skinned skull. Lastly, and most memorably, there was a case of a man who recognized his brother's mangled arm by a characteristic scar on his ring finger.

Notably, what they hadn't found was any sign of the two missing kids. There was hope for them yet, however faint — the teenager had used to hunt wild game with his grandfather, and knew the woods well; moreover, his hunting rifle seemed to be missing.

Their team had called off the retrieval around 9 AM. Partly, because they'd figured they'd found everything they could, but mostly because they'd expected visitors. Indeed, it wasn't long before a small pack of Grimm had shown up, lured there by the distress of potential prey. Hoping to encounter grieving siblings and disturbed neighbors, the beasts found nothing but Dust and lead.

Sometime around eleven, they'd set off a smoke candle. Right after that, Weiss and Blake struck out to begin a search of the surrounding forest. Sending out Blake had only been natural, as she was the best tracker on their team, but Weiss had also volunteered. She'd posited that her summons could prove useful, both for the search as well as the extraction. She'd raised a few — admittedly pretty good — points, but Ruby still had had certain misgivings about her tagging along. Ruby hadn't voiced them, knowing they were illogical, but she wasn't happy with the situation, either. As a result, her mind would wander over the course of the following hours, her eyes often turning eastward as she perched high on the support tower.

It had been very apparent from the get go that the tower was positively busted. It appeared crooked even when she'd looked in its direction the evening prior, and a closer inspection had only caused her to laugh — no sane worker would climb that thing, ever. Her sanity was however of questionable standing, not to mention that she didn't fear gravity much.

Thankfully for their purposes, the damage was mostly structural. Far as she could tell, it seemed that some sort of a flying Grimm had divebombed the tower to disable its autoturrets — perhaps that Nevermore she'd slew. Whatever it had been, its sheer mass had caused steel beams to buckle and bend, leaving most of the structure's load to be supported by a handful of metal cables. It was… stable enough, not that she had any illusions. It was going to collapse, there was no doubt about it — but it hadn't yet, and soon it wouldn't be her problem anymore, assuming she managed to pull off what she'd set out to do.

The task seemed surprisingly achievable, if a little daunting in scale. Some of the tower's apparatus had been knocked out of place or torn off, but the finer electronics seemed surprisingly intact. All in all, the repairs she had to make were numerous, but didn't seem like something she couldn't solve with the tools she'd taken from home and a liberal application of elbow grease. Time would show if the job was indeed as simple as it seemed, of course — but she had hope.

While Ruby worked on the tower, Yang patrolled the village below. They remained in contact on short-range comms throughout the afternoon, though they kept idle chatter to a minimum; every now and then, she'd ask Yang to scrounge up some materials and bring them uphill, or warn her that she was about to take some potshots at a stray Grimm. Other than that, the sisters didn't talk much until Ruby came down to grab a bite to eat, most of the repairs already done.

Ruby was sitting on a wall of pale fieldstones, unhurriedly chewing her way through her second cheese sandwich. The bread was still decently fresh, so she made the most of it before having to resign herself to dry rations. Her headphones sat crooked upon her head, leaving one ear uncovered, just in case. A handful of settlers milled about the village; with two Huntresses around to keep them safe, they were free to stretch their legs or scavenge what they could from their old homes. The sight was, admittedly, a little depressing, but Ruby thought there was also a quiet strength to it — a sense of hope and perseverance flickering to life amidst the ruins.

She saw mister Greene exit his house, but thought nothing of it at the time. Wrapped up in her inner musings, she almost fell off her perch when the man spoke to her.

"Death and destruction don't phase you, eh, young miss?"

Scrambling to take off her headset, Ruby looked at mister Greene. There were strands of steel-gray in his beard and dark hair, but he appeared to be holding up well. He was probably in his mid-sixties, but struck her as the approachable sort. Oddly, he kind of reminded her of Maria, even though the two didn't look similar at all — nor was he nearly as grumpy. They did share something, though, even if Ruby couldn't quite put her finger on what exactly that was. And she still had no clue what he could want with her.

Then again, old people seemed to like their small talk.

When she took a while to answer, he spoke again. "I imagine you must've seen a lot of it, back in Mantle."

Ruby frowned.

'Mantle was far worse,' she was tempted to say. At least to her, the sight of decay and cold rubble was much easier to bear. Somber and perhaps disgusting, but usually easier. The passage of time made the horror less real, in a way, the pain more distant, abstract. A rotting corpse seemed much less of a person, compared to someone whose light had just faded from their eyes. Morbidly, there was also a dark sense of assurance in the stomach-churning stench of rot — there was nothing she could've done.

It was that fleeting moment of transition from 'is' to 'is not' that stuck with her. Not the quiet of the grave, but screams and the rasping of final breaths. Ephemeral, yet casting a lasting shadow on both mind and memory. 'What if', she'd ask herself with each burning building. Ashes held no such uncertainty.

The picture of the surrounding destruction was depressing, yes, but relatively common across Remnant. Each such site was a tragedy, no doubt, but they were usually tragedies far removed from Ruby. She could feel sympathy for the victims, but it affected her in a very limited way, leaving her with the luxury of seeing the silver lining.

Mantle had been a waking nightmare. Terror and slaughter, all on a scale she still struggled to wrap her mind around. It just didn't compare. Still, she'd never go ahead and diminish the personal hell those people were going through.

"And before that," she stated simply. "I fought at Beacon. After the Fall, I spent months traveling across Anima. Seen a lot of places like this; more than one in similar condition."

Mr. Greene nodded, and there was a distinct air of melancholy about him as he scanned the ruins around them. "It's a sight that stays with you, isn't it?" From the way the man had said it, Ruby had a hunch it wasn't the first settlement he'd outlived.

"Don't you get weary of it all?" Noticing Ruby's arched brow, he quickly backtracked. "Ah, sorry, I suppose it's just the retired teacher in me speaking. It wasn't my intention to sound judgmental — it just pains me to see such bright youths exposing themselves to all this misery."

Ruby considered his words while eating the last of her lunch.

"Weary, huh?" She wondered out loud. "Yeah, sometimes."

"Then why come here? Certainly not for the paycheck, from what I've heard."

"To make a difference." Her lips were smiling as she said that, but the rest of her face remained somber. "But it's not as selfless as it sounds. It has always been my dream to be a Huntress and help people, but… things have rarely been quite so simple, the past two years. There always seemed to be some but, some catch, no matter what I did." With a sigh, she turned her eyes towards other settlers idling about the village. "Here, things are finally black and white, for a change. No sacrifices to be made, no difficult choices — I get to simply help people. Makes me feel better."

Just when some warmth began to find its way into her eyes, she had to turn around in alert, wary of the rapid footsteps that shook the house behind her. Moments later, its front door flew open and crashed into the wall, letting through a brown-haired woman. It was the same lady whose kids were missing, and she was clearly furious — like, red-face livid.

As soon as Ruby made eye contact with her, the lady screeched. "Don't you have any empathy?!"

Ruby reeled, taken aback by that verbal assault. Equally as surprised, mister Greene tried to step in and mediate.

"Come now, there's no need for—"

His pleas for peace went completely ignored as the woman stomped closer and continued to lay into Ruby.

"Does our pain mean nothing to you?! We are people! Our lives are not some fucking toys to make a wannabe hero feel better about herself, you bitch!"

Ruby frowned, now realizing what sort of situation she was dealing with. That said, another person burst forth from the building before she could say anything — miss Aronia's wife. A rifle was slung across her shoulder, but not of a model Ruby could easily recognize.

"Seren, calm down!"

The so-called 'Seren' spun on her heel to face the other woman, her arms frantically flapping about; if it was possible, her originally pale face turned even redder.

"Calm down?! My kids are gone, and you are telling me to calm fucking down?!" She scoffed, baring her teeth in a furious snarl. "Easy for you to say, with your happy little family safely together."

Although Asahi was trying to remain composed, her jaw visibly tightened, making it clear that the other lady had struck a nerve. She closed the distance in a few measured steps, pausing within arm's reach, then squared off against her neighbor; although nearly a head shorter, Ruby had no doubts whom of the two would win if it came to blows.

Tilting her head up, Asahi held the other woman's heated stare.

"Your kids might still be alive. And do you know why that 'might' even matters?" Without breaking off the stare-down, Asahi thrust her whole arm in Ruby's direction. "Because she came here to bail us out. And if you ever get to see Sul and Auri, it's because her friends are out there risking their lives to look for them, while she is making sure that they will have a mother to return to!"

The swing managed to surprise Ruby even though she'd half-expected it.

Nothing had happened, at first, but everyone had held their breath. The next moment, the scene had unfrozen and lurched forth on fast forward — the angry lady had tried to slap her neighbor, only for Asahi to catch her by both wrists and hold the woman in place.

"Ser— Seri, listen to me!" Asahi yelled as they continued to scuffle. "I get that you are stressed, but yelling at your only chance to see your kids again ain't gonna help!"

Miss Seren quit struggling in her grasp. Her teeth gritted, she fixed Asahi with one last, furious stare; without another word, she tore her wrists free of Asahi's grasp and stomped away, off towards the village's green.

"I'll keep an eye on her; make sure she doesn't do anything reckless," mister Greene said.

Asahi wanted to argue. "I should—"

"Rile her up even more?"

The sobering stare of a veteran teacher made her reconsider. "You have a point. Thanks."

Left with a nod of goodbye, the two ladies stood awkwardly in front of miss Seren's house. Ruby was the one to speak up — partly motivated by genuine gratitude, partly wanting to break the silence.

"Thanks for the save."

Asahi gave her a weak smile. "Of course, no problem." After saying that, her eyes strayed, drawn towards miss Seren. A crease upon her brow, she watched with pity as the woman sat on some rock, head hidden between her folded arms. "Sorry about that. She's not usually like this, but with her kids gone..."

Ruby understood. "It's fine, really."

With a sigh, Asahi began walking away towards the town gate; that said, her eyes lingered on Ruby, as if inviting her to come along. Having nothing better to do, Ruby acquiesced — besides, keeping tabs on the woman was her job.

Asahi took a few moments to study Ruby with curious gaze. "You took it quite well."

"Ah, well… I'm sort of used to it," Ruby replied, scratching at the base of her neck.

"People being assholes, you mean?"

"People being afraid," she gently corrected.

"Like I said." Asahi's casual shrug got Ruby to laugh, a little against herself. Asahi smirked, but a more serious expression soon replaced it. "Get that treatment a lot?"

Ruby drew a lungful of air. "Less so nowadays. I have been turned around at the gates and cussed out more than once, though." Then, she added, a little quieter this time: "People have been really distrusting since Beacon."

A small, genuine frown appeared on Asahi's face. "Sorry to hear that." The woman threw a glance over her shoulder, then returned her attention to Ruby. "Anyways, don't take what she's said personally. We're all grateful for what you've been doing. She's just stressed out of her mind. I can't even imagine what it's like, to have your kids missing…"

Ruby couldn't either, in truth. She definitely understood what it meant to be stressed out of one's mind, though, and how easy it was to lash out in that state; as such, she didn't have it in her to blame miss Seren. How could she, having once been inches away from punching a doctor supposed to operate on her loved one.

When Ruby didn't comment, Asahi went on to continue, her mood growing even more subdued.

"This whole mess makes me feel really guilty about dragging Roni here with me. Thank Gods you came."

"The 'Gods' had nothing to do with it," Ruby grumbled, basically on reflex.

"Not one to believe in the Brothers, are you?"

She blew air through her nose. "Oh, it's not that. I just think they're assholes." She then leveled the woman with a curious stare. "Why did you settle here, anyways?"

"The usual. Economics, combined with a healthy dose of romance of the frontier." A tiny, self-conscious smile flitted across Asahi's face before she drove her gaze into the ground. "It seems so stupid now, but I really thought that we could build a life for ourselves here. Be happy. Our little heaven, for the fraction of a price." She let out a bitter chuckle. "Of course, I knew there were risks, but I figured I had what it takes to defend my family. Guess a few years attending a Combat School were enough to make me cocky."

That latest nugget of information piqued Ruby's interest. It definitely explained the custom rifle, for one.

"Signal?"

"Pharros. Good times." Asahi stared off ahead, her gaze running off somewhere distant; her wry, self-demeaning smile continued to linger as she spoke. "There was a time I wanted to be a Huntress, too, you know? Meet new people, see the world, be a star. Never did end up going to an Academy, though. Back at the time, I convinced myself that it was because my Ma didn't approve, but… truth is, I was simply too big of a coward."

"Cowards don't tend to settle the frontier," Ruby pointed out.

"Not the smart ones," Asahi somberly agreed. "The rest nearly get their loved ones killed."

Ruby wondered about that. Asahi struck her neither as a coward, nor a fool. Besides, she'd seen spent rifle casings, last night, and would bet the last of her snacks that they'd match the caliber of the rifle Asahi carried on her back. Not that she voiced her thoughts, finding she was in no place to argue.

After all — wasn't she the same?

By that time, they quite nearly arrived at the shattered gate. Asahi stopped and looked around, pausing for a bit to marvel at the massive scorch mark Weiss had left on the road during the last night's skirmish. Noticing that she was being stared at, the woman let out an awkward chuckle and rubbed her neck.

"Sorry. I've been meaning to chat with you for a bit, but here I am, being a downer," she spoke, smiling apologetically. Then, her eyes rested on Crescent Rose, strapped securely to Ruby's back. "It's an interesting weapon you've got there. May I take a look?"

Just like that, Ruby's day had been made — for a little while, anyways. Sadly, she was left to her own devices all too soon. With no one to distract her, she milled about the village for some time, trying to stave off intrusive thoughts with music — to little avail. Worry, nagging and unwanted, wormed its way back into her skull. The further the sun sailed westward, the harder it was to stand still; her anxiety was further fueled by the memory of a weather forecast that promised rain ere sundown.

It was stupid. Weiss was a kick-ass Huntress in her own right, accompanied by another of similar caliber. Between her summons and various areas of effect, she could easily offset numerical disadvantages; Blake's presence, on the other hand, basically guaranteed that they'd get neither lost nor taken by surprise. Ruby knew she had no need to worry —and yet there she was, catching herself chew her nails.

Just when she was about to head topside and try to drown herself in work, she heard shouts coming from the heart of the village. She began heading that way, her pace urgent but not frantic — that is, until some high-pitched cries pushed her to use her Semblance. She vaulted over a building then blasted down the main road, arriving at the scene in less than a second. She quickly realized there was no reason to be alarmed.

Weiss and Blake had returned — and they weren't alone. Two new faces stood at the heart of the commotion, wrapped up tightly in a mother's arms. Sul and Aurora, Ruby believed were their names. The teenage boy seemed pretty tall for his age, if somewhat lanky; a weathered bolt-action rifle hung off his shoulder, its barrel scraping against the cobblestone as he knelt beside his mother. The little girl Ruby could barely see, her head burrowed in miss Seren's shirt; she could hear her alright, though.

Ruby decided not to intrude upon the scene, content to just observe from afar. Pleasant warmth radiated from deep within her chest, spreading slowly to her limbs and fingers. She was glad — genuinely glad — to have come to that village. For once in what felt like a long while, she could simply take pride in her trade, unburdened by guilt or doubt.

Ruby caught herself staring at Weiss. And who would blame her? Weiss looked positively radiant. Not necessarily in the usual meaning of the word, perhaps, but radiant all the same. She was beaming. Her satisfaction was palpable, but not in a smug way; rather, she simply took heart in the happiness of another. Although she was visibly tired and somewhat dirty, she seemed to glow in Ruby's eyes, the blue accents of her clothes so bright and vibrant that nigh everything else seemed dull and gray by contrast.

The sight did things to Ruby. Things she didn't dare name or quantify, but things that brought her hope.

At some point, Blake noticed Ruby's stare and gave her a wink. Perhaps taking it as a cue to look the same way, Weiss also turned in Ruby's direction — just in time to let herself be caught off-guard when miss Seren pulled her into a hug of gratitude. Though she was a little stiff, she let it last for a while, eventually patting the woman on the back as she withdrew. When Blake's turn was up, Weiss intended to make a tactical retreat, only to be stopped in place by the eleven year old glomping her waist; always with a weak spot for children, she let the little Aurora hold on until the kid had her fill.

Upon her release, Weiss approached Ruby and stood beside her. Together, they watched the reunion continue.

"They have been hiding in a cave, around four miles from here," Weiss explained before breathing out a small chuckle. "I tripped over a snare he made. That's how we found them."

In that moment, miss Seren turned their way and made eye contact with Ruby; after a little while, the woman sent her a grateful, apologetic nod before turning away and saying something to her daughter.

Ruby's attention shifted back to Weiss. "Did you find anyone else?"

Although Weiss shook her head, the smile that had been lingering on her face for the past while did mostly fade. "But we found a broken rifle. Bitten right through." Her eyes met Ruby's, and in them Ruby found deep pity. "Blake thinks that someone saw the kids escape, then tried to lure the Grimm away."

There was nothing to say. Her brow furrowed, Ruby simply nodded.

'Can't save them all' was a lesson long since engraved onto their bones, but that did not make the injustice of it all any more palatable.

---

Leaning over the railing in a way that would give any safety officer a heart attack, Ruby anxiously scanned the tower's high voltage cables for one final time. The word 'final' was subjective, there — and probably the third time she'd used it within the last five minutes. Once more unable to find any damage, she withdrew back onto the catwalk and looked at the sky.

She was steadily running out of daylight. Worse yet, blue-gray clouds hung ominously over the eastern horizon. The weather forecasts might not have predicted any storms or strong winds for the night, but she'd rather not risk all her hard work going to waste. She had done what she could to reinforce the structure, but… you never know, you know?

Using the time pressure to her advantage, she shook off the temptation to check the cables again. Instead, she approached the main structural beam of the tower and pushed a Dust canister into a socket — then pushed it again, with more force this time, until it obediently locked in place.

Upon a closer inspection of the town, Ruby had quickly decided that using its mangled power grid was a can of worms she'd rather not open. Thankfully, the tower had a built-in emergency generator, so that at least was not an issue… except that she was a little antsy about turning it on. She likely had but a single shot at making the tower work, and she worried she'd blow it.

Literally.

Laying her hand on the kickstart lever, she looked at Weiss through the metal mesh of the catwalk. Standing at a safe-ish distance from the tower, Weiss nodded, ready to use her glyphs if need be. Taking a deep inhale, Ruby pulled the switch.

Then flipped a breaker.

Then another.

And one more, all on the same breath.

Nothing had happened. Or, that was to say, nothing bad had happened. The generator hummed to life, but that was it — nothing exploded nor was set on fire, nor could she smell any magic smoke in the air. A good start.

She pulled out her Scroll, only to feel herself deflate a little when it reported 'no signal'. Still, she wouldn't let it bring her down so easily. Deciding to give the tower some time to warm up, Ruby went up the ladder, all the way to the highest platform.

When she checked again, her face cracked into a grin. "Yes!"

Weiss, however, was quick to cool her enthusiasm.

"I can't log in anywhere."

Ruby frowned, but soon found that Weiss seemed to be correct. Just to double-check, she tried calling Dad, but — sure enough — the line was dead. Running a quick diagnostic scan only made her confusion deeper — she was clearly getting pings from Vale, just… not across the whole band?

Spurred on by a random idea, she went on to try something else. It took her a little while to remember the exact frequency, but she was decently sure she got it right.

"This is Huntress Ruby Rose. Can anyone hear me?" she called into the aether, crossing the fingers of her free hand.

A few moments later, she let out a gleeful cry when the line crackled to life.

"Beacon Dispatch Central. What is your emergency?"

---

Clad in darkness of a cloudy evening, Blake steadily made her way up the tower. And hated every moment of it.

The metal of the ladder was slick with rain and freezing to the touch; the climb was enough for her fingers to go numb, making her regret picking fingerless gloves for the hunt. She had to keep her head down if she wanted to avoid getting pelted across her face, but even then stray water droplets would slide down the rim of her hood and straight onto her neck. Her jacket felt wet and heavy — while thankfully not soaked through, it still clung to her body with each and every movement of her limbs. When the end of her climb was finally within her reach, she breathed a sigh of relief.

Blake poked her head through the topmost platform of the tower and glanced around. Ruby was already there, stood by the railing as she waited for her. Blake's fellow watchwoman had put quite some effort into making their night more bearable — she'd set up a waterproof canopy over their little nest, as well as built a makeshift furnace out of some cinder blocks. It was that very furnace that Blake made a beeline for, craving the blessed warmth that it promised.

Beneath her hood, Ruby's eyes glimmered with mirth as she watched Blake warm her hands by the fire.

"Pretty cold tonight, eh?"

"I could kiss you for starting this fire."

Ruby let out a small laugh. "Don't let Yang hear you."

Blake took off her jacket and draped it over a nearby girder to dry off. Thankfully, the weather wasn't particularly windy that evening — she could bear with the cold for a little while. She wished she had Ruby's cloak for this final night, though.

Having left her jacket to hang, Blake took notice of a metal bucket that stood not far from the furnace. She squatted down to investigate.

"Charcoal?"

"Aronia said we could have some. I figured it'd be more convenient than dragging dry wood up here." Ruby looked at the curtain of rain in front of her. "Not that it's an option any longer."

For some time, the steady drum of rain pelting the canopy was the only thing to be heard at the towertop.

"So, how are things between you and Weiss now? All good?" Blake asked, finally able to feel her fingers again.

"As good as they can be, I suppose. Considering that I sorta sprinkled salt onto her wounds, then added rubbing alcohol for good measure." Ruby tried to laugh, but it was so weak that it came out as barely a hum. Bending her back at nearly a right angle, she placed both of her arms on the railing and then rested her forehead on the top. "My bad."

Ruby sounded so dismayed that it looped back to being slightly amusing. Blake smiled and shook her head.

"Seriously, you two should just kiss and make up," she laughed under her breath.

Ruby glanced Blake's way, but said nothing at first; for a while, Blake thought that the downpour would be her only response.

"If only it were that easy," the girl finally said, her voice nearly lost to the rain.

Blake instantly perked to attention, her back tauting like a bowstring. Ruby's hood hid her face well, but it didn't matter. There had been… something in Ruby's voice — almost a wistfulness of sorts — that made Blake question whether they were still talking about patching things up between Ruby and Weiss. In the same vein, she felt there had been meaning in the pause that preceded Ruby's words, but she could only guess at its nature.

If her gut feeling was right, though…

It was rare for a chink to appear in Ruby's armor — and she was tempted to take a stab at it, were it indeed the case.

Blake approached the edge of the platform — slowly, quietly — and stood beside Ruby, leaning her back against the safety railing. A shiver shook her frame as she felt the fabric of her sweater soak through, but she left being upset about it for later.

"What if it is?" she spoke, her voice making it clear that the subject matter had changed. She tried her best to catch Ruby's gaze as she said it, but the latter wouldn't let her, purposefully averting her eyes.

"Listen… mind if we change the subject?"

Blake managed to keep a straight face — barely. Beneath that collected veneer, however, she was getting excited like a schoolgirl. Still, she wasn't deaf to Ruby's averse tone, and wondered whether she should push her luck.

She decided to play it safe. "Not particularly," she said, trying her best to sound casual. "But it seems that something's bothering you, and I've come to realize that talking helps sometimes."

Ruby let out a dry laugh. "I already do have a shrink."

"I'm… not sure I follow," Blake said, furrowing her brow in genuine confusion. "Other than your impulse to protect Weiss, what does Glas have to do with anything?"

Ruby deflated a little against the railing. She seemed… tired. "More than you realize," she quietly exhaled.

There was a note of finality to Ruby's words. Realizing that it was about as much as she'd get out of her that night, Blake backed down.

"Alright, as you wish."

She was by no means disappointed with the outcome of the conversation. In fact, she'd glimpsed something she flat-out hadn't been expecting — a conscious want within Ruby, so completely different to Weiss' denial and self-imposed friendzone. She had imagined Ruby had been getting swept up in the flow, perhaps not understanding the situation fully… but it no longer seemed to be the case.

It might not have been outright proof, but it was as good as they could hope for. Yang had been right — Ruby had held back.

For what reason, though… Blake couldn't even begin to guess, other than Glas having something to do with it. Whatever it was, it appeared that Ruby felt pretty strongly about it. They had no choice but to respect it.

She leveled Ruby with a curious look. While content to let the mystery of Ruby's motive lie — for now, at least — there was something else she'd been wondering about.

"What do you think of the hunt so far, oh leader mine?"

Ruby straightened her back. "So far so good, no? Getting the tower running was a nice bonus — kinda surprised myself there, heh," she replied, flashing her teeth in a tiny, awkward grin. It was but brief, however, her smile soon fading away. "If things continue to go well, I'd like to go on another hunt sometime soon." Suddenly, her eyes snapped to meet Blake's. "And I'd want for it to be just you and me, if that's alright with you."

In a single breath, Ruby had Blake both worried and taken aback.

"I—" Blake stammered, staggered by the unexpected offer. "Are you sure things are alright between you and Weiss?"

Ruby blinked. "Huh?" she let out, only for the spark of clarity to light up her face. "Oh, yeah. We've been better, but give us a few days. That other hunt's got nothing to do with my fuckup from yesterday." Then, she hesitated, a thoughtful look crossing her face for a spell. "Or maybe it does, in a way? In any case, it's something that has been on my mind since Thursday."

'The day after Ruby's party, then. Something to do with its anticlimactic finale, perhaps?'

"Why me, then?" Blake questioned, still a little at a loss. "Wouldn't you normally take Weiss along on a duo hunt?"

Ruby lowered her eyes, as though ashamed. "It's… kind of the point not to," she said cryptically, kneading the left side of her neck. "I guess you could say I wanna check something."

Blake gave her a slow nod. Although she couldn't quite put it to words, she had a feeling she somehow understood Ruby's unstated desire.

"Alright, I can cover your butt," she agreed, and a playful smirk flickered to existence a heartbeat after. "But it's on you if Weiss gets jealous."

Ruby snorted before matching Blake in kind. "I think I can handle her."

"Famous last words~."

---

Jagged remains of a broken wall jutted from the surrounding fog, dew-slick and shining in the light of morn. Two silhouettes perched at the top, overseeing the sea of mist that laid a heavy blanket over the ruined village. The pair held a mostly-silent vigil over the breached gate, enjoying each other's companionship as they ate their breakfast — or dinner, in Yang's case.

Having eaten the last of her granola bar, Blake crumpled the wrap and pocketed both of her hands to hold covetously onto her body heat. She lazily pulled her shoulder blades together and stretched her legs, holding back a small yawn. A little to her own surprise, she found herself at peace that morning — almost at home midst the sparkling fog. Just her, Yang, and the nature's serene beauty. She was even feeling fairly refreshed, for the six-odd hours of sleep she'd had.

The same couldn't be said for Yang. Having been awake since 1AM, her poor beloved was looking a little worse for wear. Alas, such was the nature of the job.

Blake smiled a little as she saw Yang let out a yawn so mighty that it made her tear up.

"How was your watch?"

Yang listlessly stirred her cup of instant noodles. "Uneventful. Meaning, long." She slurped up the contents of her spoon. "Yours?"

"You were right," Blake replied. "Ruby did hold back at the party."

Despite the dark circles around her eyes, Yang's lilac stare was sharp and focused when she looked at Blake. Unblinking, she just watched Blake for a couple of seconds while she chewed. "You sound awfully sure. Spill."

Blake was perfectly happy to share her observations.

"And Doc has something to do with this, yeah?" Yang questioned once Blake had finished her account of the night.

"That's what she's implied," Blake affirmed before making a brief pause. "Also, I'll be going on a hunt with her, just the two of us."

Yang shifted on her spot, arching a puzzled eyebrow. "Not her and Weiss?"

Blake nodded. "I was surprised, too." She didn't share the reason Ruby had given her, however, feeling it wasn't hers to divulge. Be it sensing an intentional omission, or simply guessing, Yang just nodded, not pressing her to elaborate.

"Seems like she wants to sort herself out, first," Yang let out, rubbing her face. Having heaved a resigned sigh, she scooped up a spoonful of already lukewarm noodles and shoveled it into her mouth. "No harm in keeping an eye out, but we should let her be for now, I think. At least she isn't dealing with it alone."

They more-or-less left the matter at that. Once Yang had finished her meal, they began making rounds around the settlement, eventually bumping into the other half of their team. The four of them reconvened briefly to discuss their course of action for the day; with their extraction scheduled at 1400, they all had a busy morning ahead.

It was settled that Yang would hold the fort and prepare everything for their departure; in the meantime, the other three were going to spread out and search the nearby woods for one last time. They didn't expect much to come of it — especially if the fog didn't let up — but it was the least they could do. Before splitting up to attend their assigned tasks, they set off another smoke flare, hoping against hope that its neon green plume would call a lost soul home.

Regrettably, the passage of time brought neither answers nor stray survivors. Of the whole search squad, Blake had gotten the closest to finding any leads, but even that was nothing but a disappointment. A single empty shoe, size twelve, stuck in a tangle of bushes; any other tracks had been long since swept away by rain.

Realistically, they'd been chasing ghosts. If anyone had managed to escape, in the twelve days that had passed since, they had either reached another settlement… or met their end. At least one of the missing settlers belonged to that second category, if that bloodied rifle had been anything to go by. Still, two fates remained ultimately unknown — and whether they liked it or not, team RWBY had no more time to spare.

The sound of approaching cavalry reached their ears seven minutes past 2 PM. Two Bullheads came to their aid, landing on a patch of grass at the town's green amidst cheers and cries of relief. Thanks to most everything having been prepared in advance, the boarding went surprisingly smoothly. Ruby, Weiss and Yang stuck close to their VIPs, whereas Blake hopped onto the other craft, piloted by their recent acquaintance. Officially, as Ruby's liaison — in practice, to read in peace and comfort of the co-pilot's chair. Within ten minutes of the Bullheads' arrival, they were already en route to Vale.

The morale among the settlers was decently good, if not free of somber undertones. It was only natural, as each and every one of them had lost someone. A kin, a friend, a neighbor — every single life lost a scar upon the heart of another. That sense of indelible loss could be felt in their interactions and hushed talks. Yet, silent gratitude shone in the survivors' tired eyes whenever they looked at the young Huntresses; they all had been given a future, and none took it for granted.

In that state between hope and mourning, minutes ticked by in peace. Bar an occasional glance, no one seemed to be in the mood to engage with team RWBY, leaving them to their own devices — and company. The girls felt like strangers intruding upon some intimate moments; not unwelcome ones, perhaps, but strangers nonetheless. Even their adult VIPs mostly kept to themselves, huddled together in the rear of the cabin, their baby between them.

Little would change until about halfway through their journey, when mister Greene leaned forward, catching Ruby's attention.

"Is your team open to long-term contracts?" he probed, causing all three Huntresses within the earshot to stir. "It's nothing concrete just yet, but some of us have been talking about rebuilding our home."

"You still want to come back?" Yang questioned, somewhat in disbelief.

Mister Greene shot a brief glance towards Aronia and her wife. "At least some of us."

Weiss knitted her eyebrows. "It's already November. I don't suppose you're planning to return this year?"

The older gentleman nodded. "It'll have to wait till the thaw, at least."

Ruby pressed her back against the hull. "Then I'm afraid we'll have to decline. The next school year picks up in April."

Her reasoning seemed to have brought about more questions than answers; even Aronia and Asahi looked at her strangely from their nook in the rear, as if not believing their ears.

With an awkward chuckle, Ruby massaged the side of her neck. "Let's just say that we didn't get our licenses the conventional way. It's complicated."

The man shifted back on his seat, taking that explanation at face value. Although his proposition had just been shot down, his smile suggested he wasn't too displeased by the fact.

"I see. That's too bad."

His wife also smiled warmly as she looked at the three girls. "Best of luck on your path, then, wherever it may go; may it bring you happiness."

"That's the hope, ma'am."

---

Author's Note:

PSA: I finally started cross-posting AtS to AO3! Only the first three entries are posted there for now, but they also feature a couple of illustrations by yours truly! If you use AO3, I'd really appreciate it if you showed this story some love over there c:

More illustrations to come. I'll probably be posting them to Twitter, once I force myself to actually use that site. Social media are such a bother, I swear.

And with that, we broke 300k words mark. Dang.

Whew, this one was a chonker! For a time, I considered splitting it into two parts, with part one ending just before Yang's opening act; in the end, I decided against it, afraid that part one would land a little flat. Writing went surprisingly smoothly, all things considered — I knocked out solid 12k words in September alone. Had I not been away for half the summer, I actually would've managed to hit that 'late August' date. Oh well; teaching kids to write was a just cause, I think, even if it did end up shaving off like a year of my life.

Assuming I manage to keep up my current pace, we may have a more frequent release schedule ahead of us. It kind of depends on how I decide to handle this next stretch of the story — either as a bunch of bite-sized chapters, or a singular 'compilation' covering the month of November. I think the former might work out better, but which would you prefer?

Had fun writing this chapter. I think it's a little… different, from the usual AtS fare. I hope you liked it!

MonkeThe2nd: Ask and you shall receive, eh? Glad to have you on board.