"This is as far as I can take you."
Ruby jolted, her brain caught in the standby state between sleep and consciousness. She looked out of the cockpit. She frowned. "This isn't Atlas."
He frowned at her— with the reflective visor over the upper half of his face, it was all she could see. "No. It's not. You think I've enough fuel to get you to Atlas? Let alone the clearance to dock there?"
From up above, the city looked like a map of orange dots on white paper— lines of grey streets barely distinguishable— with seayards stretching into the ocean like long fingers or branching veins.
Mum's quiet, nagging advice: 'What are you doing, Ruby? Go back— you assisted with the Ur-Dragon, the accreditation would be huge!'
'How many bullets do you have for the cannon? Did you take any? Open your eyes, Ruby, you've only been awake for thirty hours. My scythe. My scythe, Ruby. It needs care. Hone it. Clean it. Pray over water, wash the blade, then oil it with mineral oil. It doesn't cut right if you don't. It needs to cut right. Ruby. Listen to me. Listen, Ruby. Ruby. Go back, Ruby. This isn't what I wanted you to do with my name, Ruby. This isn't what we wanted for you. Ruby.'
The words crested into the bottom of Ruby's mind like a wave washing up onto a pier, quietly overwhelming the background noise of her brain before seeping away once more. Ruby blinked it away. If her Aura was a web, Summer's soul was a spider from somewhere else, plucking the threads, testing it, weaving between the gaps away from Ruby's grasp.
'She's just a girl, Ruby, and not the kind you need. You need strength. You need cunning. You need tradition and steadfastness. Did you know Pyrrha Nikos goes to Beacon?'
She blinked her mother away again. In the split moments of dark, she thought she saw Summer's gaze turning a milky white behind her eyelids. Only family could kill her. Only Ruby could eat her.
"What city is this?"
"Mantle."
Ruby glared at the pilot, but her glare didn't evoke any correction or any sign he was lying. "How much longer."
"A couple hours."
"What's my name?"
"I don't know."
"Why'd you fly here."
"Some crazy bitch threatened to kill me."
Ruby scowled. "Did you see her?"
He looked at her. He pressed a button on the side of his helmet. His reflective visor became transparent. He had brown eyes. "No."
It was a lie. Even if it wasn't, Ruby didn't need to be taking risks. She raised her swor—
"Woah, calm down!" the pilot begged, holding his hands off the controls. "I don't speak Mantell! What would I even tell the cops?"
Shit, she didn't speak Mantell either.
Mum's sharp interjection: 'Go back. Go back. You're not ready to do this. You can't.'
Sighing, Ruby dialed her weapon back to its geometric disc-form and relaxed in her seat, deliberating the practical aspects of what she was doing.
She didn't know where Weiss was. She assumed she was in Atlas, taken by her sister— the larger of two white blobs back on the Vytal platform— who she also assumed to be connected to Atlas. The location data Weiss had sent— probably in a hurry before her phone was noticed and promptly smashed into a wall— only showed a vague location north of Beacon, barely past the coast, on an Atlas-wise trajectory. Ruby checked the map on her phone.
Atlas was a long way away.
"Fuck," she whispered.
She had enough Lien for the train fare to Atlas— Greater Atlas, that is, not the floating central district. She just had to hope Weiss was in the city. If she was in the center…
She'd find her. She would. She had to.
'You're being an idiot,' was mum's advice. 'You're going to freeze to death in that snow-hell.'
"Whatever," she mumbled to herself, getting a look from the pilot that led to nothing. They just sat there. Flying, being flown. It was an extremely boring hour before they were positioned sufficiently over the city, still cruising at high altitude. Ruby moved to the back.
"H-hey! Wait! We haven't touched down yet, don't—"
She flipped a wall-mounted lever, opening the stern bay doors. The wind rushed by, deafening. She held her mother's folded-up (but no less heavy) scythe and her own staff in her arms, her disc clipped onto her lower back. She just had to hope she could ball herself up tightly enough so she didn't lose either of them as she fell.
Except, of course, she'd forgotten the deployable leather strap on Belaflor Reaps Greatest Of The Lands Most Sullied, and quickly tapped a little square of metal beneath the folded heel-joint of the head. A buckle popped out, connected to a leather strap about three fingers wide, and unspooled as Ruby locked the buckle into a slot at the bottom of the snath. She threw it over her shoulder, securing the heavy scythe— the heavy scythe which had a name— the heavy scythe which had a name that Ruby had never known, but now it felt like she should've known it her whole life.
"You… named the scythe after me?"
No, it was worse than that. Summer had always had that scythe.
"You named me after your scythe?"
The voice, for once, forced itself to shrink down. Ruby scoffed.
"Gottabefuckinkiddingme," she muttered all at once before breathing deep, holding it in, and jumping out of the airship.
Lugging the scythe around was marginally less annoying now that it had a strap, but it was still heavy as hell. Worse, she was getting tired, and she couldn't be fucked to understand this godforsaken language that all the fucking signs were in, so she had to rely on her phone and landmarks to find the train station, which made it take forever before she actually got to the fucking place, wordlessly paid her fucking fare, sat the fuck down in the stupid fucking train, and breathed.
She blacked out immediately, waking up a couple minutes later when the train started to move. "Oh, fuck," she mumbled. "Anemia. Right."
She probably shouldn't sleep. She had things to think about now that her and Weiss were an eight hour ride apart. Things like 'what the fuck happened?' and 'Holy fucking shit mum is dead,' and probably also 'Oh my god I ate my mum,' but… she couldn't. She just didn't care. Maybe it was a fucked-up trauma response. Maybe she had even more wrong with her than she thought. Maybe she just hated the horrible woman who saddled her with all this bullshit, died in front of her, then passed on a physical representation of her trauma's deliverance that Ruby would have to lug around— but the fact that mum was dead was so much noise against the giant neon sign reading 'SAVE YOUR PRINCESS' that glared out over the rest of her brain.
It sucked that mom was sad. She actually did feel bad about that. Fuck. She just left. She took mom's scythe and literally jumped out of a fucking window— fuck. What was mom gonna say when she found her!
'Hate me all you want.' Thoughts sliding across the underside of Ruby's mind.
'Look at your mothers.' Little drips of lakewater splashing through the slats.
'You were a born weapon.' You picked through the beach at low tide.
'I made sure you were pointed in the right direction.' At high tide, the lake brought the secrets to you.
Ruby woke up again. Exhaustion was working her like a punching bag— that and the lack of blood in her body. Fuck. How was she supposed to get blood, now? She hadn't thought this through— she hadn't thought anything through— but if she'd thought this through, she wouldn't have come! She would've dallied and deliberated, waiting for someone else to tell her to get Weiss, when she wanted to go and grab that ghoulish freak and bite fucking chunks out of her gay little palms again.
Kiss her. That. She wanted to kiss her. Kissing was normal. Why the fuck did she… whatever. She was too tired to police herself. She just wanted to see Weiss. As soon as possible. She'd never slept so well— she'd never slept at all, compared to
Weiss had fallen off from the weird starfish position she fell asleep in. She was curled around Ruby's upper half, one weirdly muscly leg thrown over her waist, one hand boldly on her chest, her other hand up close to her own face. Ruby never slept on her back, but she didn't want to wake the girl up. That gross little Fourth. She had such long eyelashes.
Ruby hit herself with her staff upon waking up a third time, hoping that would stoke some life into her sleepless body. Checking her phone, she'd succumbed for about twenty minutes, this time.
Mum, the waters ever-sloshing in the bottom of her mind: 'You can sleep. Take what you can, that way you can start thinking clearly. You don't know what you're doing.'
She ate her. She ate her own mother, but her stubborn soul just kept thrashing around— why wouldn't she go away? She did the deed. She fulfilled Summer's wish, she did what Raven would want, why didn't she get to reap?
"Ree-eeap."
She stared at the scythe.
"Reap-eep."
Belaflor Reaps Greatest Of The Lands Most Sullied was a stupid name. Too long, too religious. She wasn't going on some crusade.
Wasn't she?
How many dead Fourths had she made? She wasn't going to stop. She was going to be happy when she found out it was Fourths that kidnapped her partner. She'd get to do what Summer never could: show them grace. Twenty whole millimeters of it.
Ruby hit herself with the staff again. She did need to sleep— tired as she was, bits of mum kept radiating out and poisoning her own mind. She was rescuing Weiss. She didn't care about who took her. She just wanted Weiss, then she'd take them both back to Beacon— would that make mum happy? Would she stop being such a pisser if Ruby conceded that much? What did she think her daughter was gonna do, find her partner and just start living in Atlas? Of course she'd be going back to Beacon, and they'd accept her with open friggin' arms— they had better. Not like school would be in session, anyways, unless the establishment was chill with inhaling rock dust and debris from the Ur-Dragon fight.
She wasn't gonna take credit for that. That'd be too far, even for her. Mum did that.
Mum's unbearable advice that Ruby wasn't going to heed at all: 'Just take it. I'm dead. What're they gonna do, anoint my grave?'
She didn't want it. If she had to do the stupid fucking Huntress thing, she'd do it on her own terms. For as long as she could, at least, before she ratted out that old creep and did something she really wanted. She always wanted to stress-test, like… a bridge, or something, or a plane wing. Work under some architect and give him all the math telling him the thing's gonna fucking break, then it breaks, then there's a whole investigation and she'd get to sit there and smugly testify, like, 'Yeah, I told him he's a fucking idiot, then he fired me lol.'
"Re… eee…"
Stress-test engineer… that'd be so cool… get paid to methodically break shit all day… and not in a murder way… just get to do math and make graphs and shit… walk around with, like… a clipboard and a calculator… no more weapon schematics— not for one's she'd be using… cushy job, big house… sit around all day and, like… read… when was the last time she'd read a book that wasn't for class… that'd be so great… do math all day… come home to, like… some sausage, or, like… pierogi, whatever-it's-called… get to… put up a coat, or something normal… rather than a bunch of weapons… some gross, snotty little brat… one she wouldn't shove into… combat… school… with… whitenredhair…
"Reap…"
When Ruby woke up again, she discovered she'd managed to get four whole hours of sleep. She rubbed her eyes, blinking sleep and crust out of her lids. She yawned. No more messages on her phone, but she was sure some had been sent. Once she had Weiss, she'd have to sync with the local CCT signal, but it was better to go without distractions like that for the moment.
She felt good. Just two or three more hours before the train stopped, then she'd start looking for Weiss… somehow. Follow the heart-thing again. All she had to do was hot-cold her way through the entire kingdom. Great fucking idea, sleepless-Ruby. 'Just find Weiss.' Dumbass. How the hell was she supposed to—
"Go back to sleep."
Ruby jumped out of her skin— out of the seat— her staff tumbling out of her lap before she was caught by the wrist and saved from an unceremonious meeting of ass and floor. As she should've expected— because really, she should have expected it— it was Raven. She would've done the same if she could just teleport to Weiss.
Raven pulled her back up onto the chair. "I'll watch your shi— stuff," she offered, giving a weird, slightly canned smile. "Atlas, right?"
Ruby was immediately dubious. "Y…eah? My partner got taken there."
"You're sure?"
"Not… not a hundred percent," Ruby admitted, sighing. "But it's the best I've got."
She affixed her mom with a serious stare, her mouth hardening into a thin line.
"I'm going after her. I need— I want to. Don't think you can stop me."
Raven raised her hands, shaking her head slowly. "Why would I?"
"Because, you…"
Ruby noticed the odd texture around her eyes— concealer, she was pretty sure. Concealer for bags, or for redness, or for the million other side effects of your wife dying then your kid jumping out of a window and into another kingdom. Ruby handed the staff over, then the scythe, both of which Raven held between her legs. Mom smiled at her— the same three-quarters-fake smile, but it slowly faded away the longer Ruby stared, eventually leaving her with a look that dripped with apology. Stretching unsurely— because she really didn't know how she was supposed to do this— Ruby leaned over to hug her.
Raven recoiled in her arms, but Ruby didn't relent. After a long couple of moments, Ruby felt her mother's hands on her back. Then Raven's face in her hair. Then, a sniffle.