Nora kept her elbow up against the car door, her fist balled and pressed into the side of her head as the truck rumbled along. There had been several drafts of who should go where with whom, and with each revision, Nora had gotten more and more annoyed. Ren kept looking at her with justified concern. Sage kept pointing out inconvenient truths that changed things. Mercury kept being ornery and defeatist. The professors felt like people Nora barely even knew anymore. In the end, she didn't want to go with anyone to check for grimm… but there was at least one person who wasn't actively pissing her off.

"…how's the hammer mod coming along?" Roman asked. "Last I saw, you almost had the scythe ready to attach."

"It's coming," Nora said with a sigh. "Having a little trouble with the spring mechanism to get the blade to snap back and forth on command. Wish we still had Professor Rembrandt around."

"I'm gonna pretend I know who that is," Roman offered as he kept his remaining eye on the road.

"Weapons lab professor," Nora explained. "He was… one of my least favorites, but he was good at what he did. No sense of humor at all, wrote me up a few times for messing around in class. I'd give a lot to have him back now, though. Or the old me."

Roman just kept driving for a while, occasionally shifting in his seat and letting out an anxious noise here and there. Though he knew Nora would be fine if he just kept quiet… he also knew that doing so wasn't his style. Neither was the sort of conversation that he knew was coming… but the silence and burden of guilt over not engaging was infinitely worse.

"…you know, people don't just completely shift into someone else," Roman said, sounding almost annoyed. "You're still 'the old you', and the shit you miss is still deep in there. It's not your fault that you've lost your… let's go with manic side, for now. People shift with their circumstances, and until yours allow you to be fun again, you shouldn't just act like that aspect of you is dead. You'll get it back once this is all over, if that's really who you want to be."

"Yeah?" Nora asked, her expression involuntarily twisting into a sneer as she looked at her reflection in the mirror. "What makes you so sure?"

"I'm a lot more like who I was before becoming a petty criminal now that things have started to work out."

Nora blinked, watching her reflection shift to something resembling confusion. She finally leaned off of her fist and looked over at the older man. Roman continued to keep his eye on the road.

"…things have started to work out?" Nora asked in disbelief. "You're just thriving in all of this? How?"

Roman glanced sideways for a brief moment, meeting Nora's eyes.

"…I got kicked out at 18. Didn't take school seriously enough. Couldn't make it into a huntsman's academy and ended up out on the street. Had nothing, nobody, and no direction. That's why I turned to stealing dust and running odd jobs, and I just kinda… shifted. Got angry. Started seeing less and less as morally questionable, so long as I got by. That isn't true anymore. I've got a place to stay, people I think are interesting and apparently like having me around for whatever fucking reason, and personal vendettas to settle alongside taking down Salem. It's new. It's a second chance. It's… dangerous and a little exciting. Like living the kind of action movie that makes dumb guys rock hard."

"I hate how much sense all of that makes," Nora replied. The huntress shook her head and then crashed it back into the headrest with a sigh. "So you think that once I… I guess fix my life, I'll feel okay again? Or at least a little better?"

"Sounds simple when you say it like that, doesn't it?" Roman encouraged. "I mean, 'fixing your life' sounds like it's going to be a bitch, considering it would mean killing Salem to help get over Ruby…"

"I'm not going to get over Ruby," Nora said, her tone full of warning. "And it's not… it's not her death that's affecting me so much. That's what people don't get."

"...sure as hell seems like it is," Roman said quietly, though loud enough for Nora to hear and continue the conversation.

"I don't know why I even started going into it. You hated Ruby," Nora accused.

"I did not hate Ruby," Roman corrected. "I hated that she got in my way, but since you people came back, she was… I was actually starting to like her a bit. Starting to like her, and starting to get… a little worried, even though I didn't feel like I should've cared that much that fast."

"Worried about what?" Nora asked, giving Roman her full attention.

"Worried that she was changing," Roman started. "Going down a similar angry, stubborn path like the one I did. Come to think of it, that's how I'm starting to feel about you, too. Which is why we're still talking, and I haven't just told you to shut up. We're in this together whether we like it or not, Nora. I don't really know you well, and I hate these sorts of talks, but… I'm counting this toward my redemption arc, so start talking."

"Your redemption arc?" Nora asked with a little laugh in spite of herself. "…sorry, that was mean."

"Hey, if Neo can fly out to Vacuo and buddy up with Yang, I can become some big hero and get my name in lights for helping kill that fucking witch," Roman asserted.

"Your name in lights?" Nora asked. "Where? What, you want to be famous?"

"Oh, is that such a surprise?" Roman asked defensively as he looked over at Nora again. "The street urchin everyone ignored who got a taste of fame in the criminal underground wants to be known all over Remnant, and maybe settle down with that bombshell witch when this is all over. How shocking and unexpected."

"You and Glynda?" Nora asked, finally sitting upright as she looked Roman over in a whole new light. "That is a mental image I didn't need."

"Oh, shut up," Roman ordered with a sneer. "I'm hot and you know it, even down an eye. So is she. And nothing's gone on yet, but I am gonna make a move eventually. She saved my life, and… I mean. Come on. Those tits, right?"

"That is disgusting," Nora said with a smirk. "And she does have nice tits."

"And you said you weren't fun anymore," Roman pointed out. "But anyway- we're getting off track. If it wasn't Ruby's death specifically, what was it that got you spiraling to begin with?"

Nora's smile faded rather quickly and she let out a sigh, looking out on the road again. It had suddenly started to rain, and Roman engaged the wipers to offer a better view of the empty countryside ahead.

"…I saw the signs that she was changing and taking on too much way before we got to Beacon. I reached out to her several times throughout the journey here, trying to get her to talk to me in private and open up, and just… be there for her, like her team always was. She would 'yes' me to death and then just… not do it. It made me feel like shit. Like what I was putting on offer wasn't good enough even though we walked from Sanus to Mistral together, bonded for over a year, fought together, shared secrets… and she just… I didn't push hard enough. I was too late to save her."

"Or Ruby didn't put as much effort into her relationship with you as you put into your relationship with her."

Nora's eyes widened as she looked to Roman once again, the rain picking up rather quickly.

"What?"

"Don't 'what' me, you heard exactly what I said, and I meant it," Roman snarked. "I don't buy the whole 'don't speak ill of the dead' shit, and I'm not saying Ruby was some kind of monster. What I'm saying is it sounds like you did everything right, she didn't, and now you're carrying that burden just because she died. How's that fair to you? What do you expect to happen if you let some shit like that take you over, cloud your judgment, and turn you into someone you don't like being? What the fuck are you doing wallowing when you're the one who made all the right calls? Fuck your offers of help not being enough. That's on her. It's not on you."

Nora shifted in her seat, her face beginning to feel a little numb.

"…then why do I feel l-"

"Because humans are fucking stupid," Roman interrupted. "We focus on all the wrong shit, we internalize things, we don't understand how to control our emotions, and we create giant fucking messes out of things that don't deserve as much attention as we give them. You're a good friend, a good huntress, and a good person to carry on Ruby's memory, but you need to stop doing this to yourself. If I spent all this time dwelling on all the shit I've done, I'd be getting nowhere, bitter, and spiraling, too. Only one who can stop the process is you, so… stop it. Keep honoring Ruby and fighting for her, but leave it at that. Otherwise, you'll eat away at yourself until there's nothing left. Give yourself permission to move on. She'd want you to."

"She would," Nora agreed. "She definitely would say something about not being 'all sad and whatever', and tell me to just keep going. Maybe you're not as bad at this kind of thing as you think."

"Maybe," Roman considered. "But I still hate these kinds of talks. That's part of why Neo and I got on so well- we avoided anything deep like the plague. We worked well together, and just… functioned. Fed off each other. Probably wasn't healthy, but… yeah."

"Probably not," Nora agreed. "But… you do you, I guess. It's getting bad out here. Gonna be hard to see anything, if there's anything out here at all. So far, no grimm…"

"That your way of saying we should turn around?" Roman asked. "It's only been about an hour."

"Not at all. Just sayin'," Nora answered. She hesitated for a moment before turning fully to face the side window and scan the horizon. "Hey, Roman? Thanks for all of this. It… did actually help. I feel like some kind of burden was lifted. Maybe not entirely, but it's starting to come off when before, it was chained down."

"Sure," Roman acknowledged. "Any time… I guess."

"…can I ask you one other thing?"

Roman heaved a sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose between his thumb and forefinger.

"…do you have to?"

"I feel like you're the only one I could ask," Nora tried, once again looking at her reflection instead of what was beyond the glass.

"…gods damn it, that's bait," Roman accused. "That is absolutely, 100% bait to get me curious. Fuck you, Nora! What?"

"You've killed people, right?" Nora asked casually. "Did you ever… want to? Like, someone you hated. Did you enjoy it?"

The truck came to an abrupt stop, and Nora could tell that Roman was staring at her with an expression she wouldn't want to see.

"…Nora… what the fuck?"

"I want Salem to suffer," Nora explained. "Astrid, too. Just killing them isn't good enough. I can't stop thinking about how angry they make me, and I just… it's getting scary. I feel like I could just keep swinging on either one of them until they're unrecognizable. Like it would somehow make me feel better, even though I know it wouldn't, in the end. What does that mean? Is that at-all normal?"

Roman paused, mulling it over as the rain beat down on the roof of the cab.

"…yeah, you and me both. I don't know what it means, but I try not to think about it. No point in it until we actually have the opportunity to do it, but… you're not alone in wanting to just annihilate them, if that makes you feel better?"

"I don't know if it does," Nora admitted as she sat up straighter. "Grimm. Flier, out to the right."

Roman leaned forward to see better where Nora was pointing through the rain. He could barely make out some sort of winged creature about a half mile out, flying in a straight line.

"…grimm," he confirmed. "Let's follow it… and not talk about this anymore."

"Yeah," Nora agreed as she kept her eyes locked on the beast. "Yes to both."

Author's Note:

Nora's simultaneously getting better and worse! Yay!

Next week, some fighting in Mantle.

-RD