Atonement

Jaune's mind wandered as he looked at the fresh-forged weapon before him, sword and shield sat together like sisters.

Doctor Polendina's fervour in throwing himself working on Crocea Mors had set both their blood aflame, and for the better part of the last few weeks, Jaune had been taught everything from forge cleaning and basic smelting to advanced huntsman weapon design and expert dust working.

Well, taught was a relative term. Doctor Polendina had taken it upon himself at first to handle the more advanced aspects, but with his own team out of action for the moment (Not like Jaune could lead a team with just a shield, even if Ren and Nora were on the same page at the moment, which they definitely were not.) and team RWBY out on patrol, Jaune had an abundance of spare time, and spent most of it watching the good Doctor work. By watching, he learnt. By questioning, he understood, and before long Polendina was only passing along blueprints, designs, reading material and forging advice.

Jaune was by no means a master smith within the space of a couple weeks, but anything he fouled up Polendina fixed within seconds, the benefit of years of experience and advanced Atlesian technology. His staple weapon, with all the new little tips and tricks Polendina had outlined, was nearly finished. Against his initial idea, Pietro and Jaune had decided melt down and reforge the blade into one, solid piece. The simplicity of it was something Jaune had always loved, and it prevented weakening the blade again. Other things, however, had undergone a lot of change.

He already knew how to work with gravity Dust, it had been his saving grace for decades in the Ever After, and the fact that it has outlasted his hard-light dust by a mile had only caused him to favour it more, so when Pietro had suggested his little idea, both inspired by Maria's old weapons and by Pyrrha, Jaune had leapt at it.

It had honestly been… sombre, sorrowful, moment watching his old weapon be melted down. Despite its damage, Crocea had served him, and his family, faithfully. It had served for what must now, including his time in the Ever After, be nearly two hundred years. It had served him at the start, at Beacon, cracked and in disrepair, it had served him when reforged anew, stunning in white, and it had served him shattered and rusted. It had served his grandfather. It had served his father. That weapon did not know how to quit fighting.

So putting it to rest had been more of a blow than he'd thought. Jaune did not want to think about what his father would say, if he ever saw him again. It had been the pride and joy of his family, unlike him, and he'd stolen it. Stolen it and was now using it like a spare part.

But that wasn't really true. Deep down he knew that. The old girl might be retired, but she lad left the best of herself for him to take, rebuild with, and carry on. A lot like Penny. A lot like Pyrrha.

The gravity of it was not lost on him, or Pietro, or Maria. It was a quiet, mournful moment. But then the work had begun.

Dust incorporation, collapsible design elements outside of the blade. Reincorporating the sword and shield as separate but whole. The end result was a masterpiece, and Jaune could not wait to put it to use.

On the surface, the new weapon looked, in terms of shape, almost exactly the same. However, the blade was bright, rippling steel, hammered, forged, re-smelted and hammered again into the hardest piece of metal they could make with modern science, and sharpened to a keen edge. Darker notes shifted along it, a mark of its increased strength, but it still held the brightness of the original. It would not break again, or lose its bite for years. The golden hilt had changed to bronze instead inlaid with gold, the Arc Crest over a smaller, difficult to miss pair of conjoined symbols; Pyrrha's Spear and Penny's Sword. The grip of the sword had been shifted to a darker, wrapped brown leather that matched the tone of his under armour rather than its old blue cloth, to enhance grip. The shield had only really had its edges darkened and inlaid also to match the blade. Its design was exactly the same, down to the circlet-shaped adage on its point.

"You should name it, son." Spoke Pietro.

"It's truly yours now, the honour of naming it falls to you."

The bronze shone in the light. Pietro was right, it was his, but it had come about because of others, to be wielded in their memory.

"Aereus Mors." He whispered, his fingers running along the bronze hilt.

"Fitting, if a tad predictable." Jabbed Maria, smirking.

Jaune just looked at her and shrugged, smiling.

"Well, no one's ever called me 'original'" He remarked, amused at the comment.

"Now, I think I'll have to go get a huntsman contract and test her out."

"Ah, actually." Polendina coughed in the 'I'm really sorry I'm interrupting.' way and not the 'I'm dying' way, thankfully.

Jaune looked at him questioningly

"Yes?"

The old man, oddly, seemed to be blushing.

"Well, your stories about the ever after sparked some inspiration so I borrowed a few hands from the Atlesian forces you helped save, Team FNKI were very enthusiastic about helping, in fact…" The older doctor spoke and veered off into half-intelligible mumbling, only leaving Jaune futher confused.

"Oh…kay?" The blonde responded.

Polendina looked at him, sight, and instead moved his massive spider-chair toward a button in the wall.

"Perhaps it's better if I just showed you."

A large trap door in the floor parted, an elevator beneath rising from below. Cool mist rolled along the floor from the new entrance, spilling past their feet.

A large, seemingly white shape rose from the hole in the floor, and Jaune's mouth fell open, eyeing the new object.

"So, uh…" Began Polendina

"Did I go too far?"

For a solid minute, Jaune simply stood and stared at the thing before him.

"No." He eventually managed, a tear welling in one eye.

"She's perfect."

"I'm telling you Ruby, he's avoiding us. More accurately, he's avoiding me." Weiss huffed, swirling the lengthy spoon in her hand through her rapidly-melting ice-cream.

"Pffft, Jaune? Nah." responded her partner, slamming another over-stuffed spoon of her own icy dessert into her face from her second helping.

Isaac's Imperial Igloo was a popular destination in Vacuo. Sat on the balcony, the two huntresses could see much of Vacuo's down-town area, and beneath them the queue for refreshing ice-cream stretched nearly all the way down the street. The view over the rooftops of Vacuo was beautiful, especially with the evening sunset, and as a former Huntsman, Isaac kept the rooftop bar and balcony for Huntresses and Huntsman only. Waiters wandered in penguin-themed costumes, and ice-dust crystals sat in holders like medieval torches, spilling icy mist over the floor to keep the place cool despite the desert heat.

"He's just, y'know, caring. Doctor Polendina's like, old, and sick. Jaune's probably just trying to help like the rest of his team. Nora's helping the Happy Huntresses with the refugees, Ren's scouting all the local Grimm hot-spots for signs..." The red-head offered, trying to assuage her friend.

Weiss' face took on a sombre note at the mention of the doctor, but Ruby missed it between her own suggestion and the fact that she never took her eyes off of her ice-cream.

"If Doctor Polendina's so old and sick, why haven't you been to see him then?" Queried the snow-haired girl.

Ruby's hand froze halfway to her mouth. The frozen cream on it fell with a soft but still audible splat onto the table.

"I, uh, I don't really do well with sick people. Because! I'm, uh, awkward! Yeah! You know me, I'm weird and I'll say the wrong thing."

Ruby's poker face was famously terrible, especially with Weiss.

"Ruby, I'm asking seriously." The girl said, starting into her partner's silver eyes.

Ruby put up a pretense of childishness, blowing out her cheeks and looking away. A second glance told her that this little gambit, as usual, would not work on Weiss Schnee, and so she simply exhaled loudly and put her face in one hand, adopting the slightly more grown-up attitude that she only ever used around her partner.

"Penny died because of me, Weiss. How can I look her Dad in the eye again?"

Weiss' face went from her famous ice-queen blank to guilt-ridden in an instant, but Ruby didn't notice, eyes casting out over the rooftops of Vacuo, admiring the purple-pink skyline of the sun setting behind the pyramids.

"Ruby I-"

"Jaune too."

Weiss, for once, let Ruby interrupt her.

"He was right, Weiss, in the Ever After."

Weiss shook her head in disagreement.

"Jaune wasn't right. He was angry, and tired, and not in his-."

She cut herself off, feeling a sharp, painful twist in her chest as the memory of his pained face after she'd said he 'wasn't all there'.

"He wasn't himself, Ruby. He didn't mean it, I know he didn't."

Ruby just sighed.

"Yes, he did. He was right to. I screwed up. I know, I know, people make mistakes-" She started, preventing Weiss' own interruption before we could start it.

"But, Jaune's always been there, supported me through all the dumb plans. Just like I was trying to help you guys, he was helping me. Even after… after Beacon, he put aside everything the second I called him. Even how he was feeling, and I didn't notice. No. I ignored it."

Weiss just listened.

"I used to think I could hear Pyrrha's voice in my dreams, when we were traveling, at first."

Weiss' eyes widened, her hand moved to her mouth.

"Turns out I really could. Once I woke up in the middle of the night, and I could hear her, muffled, but near. So I went looking, and instead of Pyrrha, I found Jaune."

She'd not told anyone this, not even Jaune's own team. It hadn't felt right, walking in on his moment like that. Intruding on one of the last things he could do to spend time with Pyrrha.

"He was training, in the middle of the night, following a video of hers she'd made for him… On repeat. For hours, Weiss. Once I realised what I was hearing, every night I heard her voice. Every night he trained for hours. Jaune must've been running on, what, maybe four hours sleep, less than? For months as we traveled across Anima. Watching my back as my partner in the Hunt while you were trapped in Atlas. You know what I did about it Weiss?"

Ruby looked her partner in her icy blue eyes sadly.

" Nothing. Jaune is my best fried. He was suffering, I was the only one who knew how badly, and I did nothing."

Weiss swallowed hard.

"So whether he meant it or not, whether he was right or not, I deserved it. I did. He was right, I was trying to make it all about my pain, when I've done nothing to help with his."

Ruby's eyes shifted back to her rapidly melting ice cream, but did not move to take another bite.

"I'm not like you Weiss, I'm not mature enough to know how to come back from that. I've never had to before. That's why I haven't gone to talk to either of them. I wouldn't even know what to say. I'm sorry doesn't feel like enough."

Weiss stared at the table between them. Ruby's outburst had brought a lot to the fore, some things that she was also responsible for.

"Well, for the record, I'm sorry." The former heiress whispered.

Ruby looked up.

"What?"

"Ever since Beacon, I've put so much pressure on you Ruby." Weiss kept staring at the table as night fell outside.

"Weiss, you don't have to, Yang already-"

"Yang doesn't speak for me. I owe you an apology."

Ruby quieted, and Weiss continued.

"I gave you a hard time about being a leader, when you were first picked. I gave you a hard time when you were just trying to be my friend. Even when we got closer I just… left it all to you. I didn't even realise I was doing it. In Atlas I told my father that you, and the team, were my family. I thought I meant it. But I got so caught up in what he was doing with the election, with fixing things with my brother, my mother, with what was going on with Winter… I spent so much time watching the family that I'd left I didn't bother to check in on the one I'd chosen. The one that had chosen me. I just… left it all up to you. You defended me from my father, and I was so busy nipping at his heels out of sheer spite that I didn't even think to protect you when Yang started that fight."

Ruby put her hand on Weiss'

"Weiss-"

"I'm so sorry, Ruby. I didn't notice. I'm your partner. I should've noticed we were pressuring you too much, putting too much on your shoulders, just leaving it all up to you. As usual I was too fixated on my father, on what was happening to Atlas…"

Ruby squeezed her hand hard, and Weiss finally looked up.

"Weiss, it's okay. Really. We've all been through… a lot."

The words 'a lot' failed to sum up just how much they'd all gone through, yet the sheer weight in the usually hyper-active Ruby Rose's voice encapsulated it perfectly.

Weiss nodded, and squeezed her friend's hand back.

"Just promise me that you'll talk to me, Ruby. I meant what I said back at Beacon, I want to be the best partner I can be, and I can't do that if you don't let me, okay?"

Ruby rolled her eyes, slipping easily back into the hyper-childish persona they all loved her for.

"Okaaaaaaay, mom."

Weiss smiled softly, truly, at her adopted sister's antics.

"And for the record, Jaune might be your best friend, but you're mine."

The sudden admission took the red-head by surprise to such an extent that she started to tear up slightly, before again making it a part of a joke.

"You really mean it? I'm the Ice Queen's best friend!?"

Weiss rolled her eyes.

"Don't let it go to your head, dolt."

Ruby just grinned wider.

"Don't worry Weiss, Jaune is just my best guy-friend. You're my best girl-friend, which means we can paint our nails, and go shopping, and talk about cute boys like our tall, blonde and mature friend right?"

Ruby's on-point impression of Weiss' mockery of her so long ago, coupled with the remark regarding her embarrassing comment toward Jaune in the Ever After, had Weiss throw a heap of napkins her way, blushing furiously.

"RUBY!"

The red-head's high-pitched laughter could be heard for a mile, as could Weiss' furious, embarrassed, amused attempts at shutting her up.

Nora stood with Robyn in the dark. A nearby campfire illuminated the queue of refugees waiting for their turn at the soup her ladle was stirring.

The refugee camp was a dreary place. Too many people with too little food and not enough huntsman to protect them left for a dismal atmosphere, and things were only looking bleaker. They'd been supplementing the food with military rations from the few supply ships that had escaped the battle of Atlas, but it wouldn't last. There weren't enough resources to go around, and with news of the fall of Vale, news most weren't a party to, the already stretched food supply would be useless in a couple of weeks when another kingdom's worth of refugees arrived, escorted by what was left of Vale's huntsmen.

The Happy Huntresses were doing everything they could to keep spirits up, but there was only so much the small group of women could do, even as good as they were. The Heeadmaster of Shade had been much freer with his information than Ironwood had ever been, which was a welcome change, but the old saying of 'No news is good news' definitely applied. It seemed like every day some fresh morsel of bad information spread through the ranks. The kingdom's problems were causing too many Grimm attacks, and despite having the Winter Maiden on side, they'd had too many close calls. With each fight, even Nora could see that Winter was tiring. The woman was now the head of what was left of the Atlesian military, the Winter Maiden, and self-appointed protector of Vacuo. She'd thrown herself into the work after she'd thought Weiss had died, and even after her sisters' return didn't seem to be able to, or want to, shake herself free of it.

Which, all in all, drove Nora crazy. Winter was busting her butt trying to keep everyone safe, so were the Huntresses, Team RWBY had got caught in something recently about going to another world to kill Grimm or something, which was still doing something. Nora Valkyrie, on the other hand, famously only really good for breaking legs and hitting things with hammers, was stuck ladling soup.

The orange-haired girl wanted to help these people, really help them, and spooning out dwindling food wasn't doing it, but there was nothing she could do. Team JN_R was out of action. Jaune, despite his pretences, was not okay. The leader of her team had been through a lot in the time they were gone, and from what Weiss had filled her in on, none of it was good. Whenever she saw him he had a bizarre, fish-out-of-water look, as though everything was utterly foreign to him. That, and losing him had broken something in both her and Ren, and they'd both had to deal with it alone this time, following the fallout of their arguments in Atlas. She'd thought he'd come see her, come try to help, but he hadn't. Nor had she for him, she couldn't bring herself to, and even with Jaune back that hadn't changed. They were circling each other, waiting for… something, anything, to bridge the gap that seemed to get wider with every passing day, save for one thing.

"Your boyfriend's back." Robyn spoke finally, handing out a loaf of bread.

Nora didn't look, she wouldn't be able to find him if she did. When Lie Ren wanted to hide from the world, there was no-one better at it.

The bitterness of the thought felt awful, even if it no longer took her by surprise.

"You sure?"

"The girls are." Robyn nodded at her huntresses, each one both organising their little soup kitchen and keeping an eye out for trouble, sharing subtle nods and glances about things they'd noticed so subtly that no-one else would be able to pick up on it.

As much time was she was spending with them now, even Nora couldn't pick up on everything they intended to communicate. It was something she missed dearly. The Huntresses were a team, and even before Atlas had fallen, JN_R had not been a real team in a long time. In the Emerald Forest, where they'd first met, everything had flowed like water. It only took, what, eight words for her fledgling team to communicate and take down a Death Stalker that had probably been in that cave, growing, for centuries? Their friendships flowed from that source, a soft, easily formed, flowing bond that had become unshakable in a short time. It had been the polar opposite of team RWBY. The tumultuous arguing, usually between Weiss and the others, sometimes between Blake and Yang, had never come to play in her team. They'd been close from the start, they had just… fit. It had been the family that she and Ren had been searching for, for years.

So the fact that Jaune was hiding from the world, and that the boy she thought was the love of her life was hiding on a rooftop watching her instead of talking to her, broke her heart.

Nora looked at the broken moon, impossibly bright in the low firelight, as she unconsciously ladled out more soup.

"Gods, Pyrrha. We're a mess without you. We've kept it together as best we can but… I can't keep them both in line on my own, y'know? You were always so much better at this than me." She whispered.

Images of her flame-haired teammate played across her mind. Pyrrha and Ren sitting in silence, reading a book together. Pyrrha in the library, helping Jaune study while Nora distracted Ren. Pyrrha's wry smirk matching Nora's own grin as the two sparred, and sparred hard.

It caught her most in the quieter moments, the grief. More so since Atlas. The road had been long, and busy, and she'd been able to put it off. Feeling it. This was the first time they'd managed to be somewhere… stable, calm. Not running across half the planet or training like crazy, and finally everything that Nora had been fighting off having to feel, had started to come out, at the worst possible time. When she felt most alone in the world.

"You say something?" Asked Robyn, most of her attention on the line of refugees they were serving.

"Hm? What? No." Replied Nora, quickly wiping a tear from her eye.

"Y'know, whatever's going on between you two, talking to a friend might help." Spoke a voice from behind her, causing Nora to jump.

"Yikes! Fi, don't do that to me!"

Fiona had the grace to look sheepish, which can't have been hard given that she was a sheep faunus. Was it racist to think that? Probably not right?

"I'm just saying." The Faunus continued.

"If you let it all stay in your head, that means it's just in a self-affirming echo-chamber. If you let it out, maybe you'll realise what bits sound dumb and what don't."

Nora sighed, images of her defeated-looking leader and the wry smirk of her long-gone best friend coming to mind.

"Thanks, Fi, but there's not really anyone I trust enough to do that with, at the minute."

Fiona nodded understandingly, and continued pushing a crate further down the bread line.

Nora sighed, casting her eyes at the buildings where Ren might've been.

At least she was being relieved soon.

"Still 'watching over' her, huh?"

The gravelly voice of Qrow Branwen carried over the rooftop toward him, turning Ren's lips into the faintest of frowns.

"You found me again."

"Not a lot that can hide from a birds' eye view, kid."

They'd had these little clandestine meetings for a few weeks now. Qrow often got bored on patrol, looking for trouble, and the only people here he really talked to outside of Ruby & Yang were Willow and Robyn, both of whom were busy on the bread line most nights.

Qrow was many things, but a sympathetic ear to struggling refugees was not one of them. If there was one thing he had in common with his sister besides blood, it was that they both lacked any form of 'soft demeanour.' Outside of his nieces, anyway.

Ren didn't bother standing. Lying prone, chin resting on his arms, his eyes never left the orange hair of his partner below, seen through the lens of a rain-run off square cut into the wall before him.

Qrow sat down, back to the wall, neither trying to hide from those below nor particularly caring to broadcast his presence either.

"Y'know kid, one of these days you're gonna realise that you'd be better off just talking to the girl."

The older man pulled a flask from his hip and offered it to the green-clothed boy.

Ren's pink eyes glanced at it.

"I don't drink."

"Neither do I, anymore." Chimed Qrow in response, making a show of pouring the clear liquid from above his own face and down his throat.

"It's water. We're in a desert. You figure it out."

If it were in Ren's nature, he would have rolled his eyes, but as ever he remained stoic as he took the flask and drank.

"I'm not good at talking." He admitted softly.

Qrow nodded his head.

"Me neither, but if there's one thing I know about women, it's that they like you trying to, even if you suck at it."

Ren was quiet for a moment.

"Where's all the women that knowledge has got you, then?" He eventually replied.

Qrow snorted loudly.

"All over Remnant buddy. Can't have them around me for too long though, it would cramp my style."

Ren eyed him.

"Too afraid of your semblance might do, you mean."

A salt-and-pepper eyebrow raised itself at the boy, but Qrow said nothing.

Ren caught himself.

"Sorry."

Qrow simply nodded.

"You could talk to your friend about it y'know. Blondie. You've had your girl forever, surely he's come to you for advice on women before?"

The older man paused for a second, looked thoughtful.

"Better not have been about my nieces though." He added, half-joking, half-legitimately threatening.

The memory of a talk Ren and Jaune had shared once, while the raven-haired boy had been stuck in nothing but a towel listening to his best friend try and get to the point, while also enjoying being called the brother he'd never had, came to his mind.

It wasn't Jaune's words that played in his head though.

"You can't get it wrong if it's the truth."

No one missed Pyrrha like Jaune did, aside from her mother, but Ren and Nora were a very, very close second. The thought that her words on the subject had evaded his mind for so long was a punch in the gut,

They'd been fighting this fight now far longer than she'd been in it with them, and it was starting to show. Pyrrha crossed his mind less and less these days, and he was sorry for it. Sadly, the few times they'd spent together in their months at beacon were all too easily forgotten amidst the stress and pain of the day to day trying to keep the kingdom from falling before Salem even had to lift a finger.

Pyrrha had never steered any of them wrong, though, and Ren was ashamed that it had taken Qrow's impromptu and accidental nudge for him to remember it.

Ren realised suddenly that he could no longer see the shock of orange hair he spent every night watching just in case. He rose over the wall and cast his eyes around but couldn't find her. The soup-kitchen had thinned out the crowd to only a few people, and Nora had apparently left early, a few of the Happy Huntresses staying behind to finish up.

Qrow rose next to him and cast an eye out himself.

"Same time tomorrow night?"

This time Ren really did roll his eyes. The boy dropped off of the rooftop in silence.

Shaking his head and grinning, Qrow turned around to go back out on patrol, but something caught his eye.

A light, bright, golden and small from this distance was emanating from amongst the dunes.

It was only there a couple of seconds before it vanished.

"What the-" He muttered, rubbing Clover's old badge in thought, debating taking flight in his bird form and going for a closer-

The scroll at his waist blared music, and Qrow jumped.

"Fucking- Yeah?" He started, picking up the phone.

Winter's voice filled one ear.

"We have a problem. Get to the command ship as soon as possible."

Even without her being there for him to enjoy goading, Qrow rolled his eyes.

"Yes, Ice Queen, at once your Frozen Majesty."

A derisive snort and the sound of a cut connection told him everything he needed to know about her opinion of his little joke.

Qrow cast one last eye across the dunes, and seeing nothing of any real importance, took flight in his bird form, toward Winter's command ship.

The icy chill of nightly wind cut through Pyrrha's skin like a knife.

The sand under foot gave way to her stiletto heals, her sore ankle thrumming in pain sharply at the sudden and awkward change in footing.

She hissed in pain and leant over gracelessly, taking her shoes off and letting her stocking-covered foot spread into the sand.

Pyrrha hadn't been on a beach since before she'd left home for Beacon. She'd spent most of her time training on sand under her father's advice, and the return of the feel of it beneath her made her homesick.

Still, there were more important things to worry about at the moment.

The desert of wherever the hell she was would prove the death of her, and quickly, if she did not find shelter. Her clothes and armour were chosen for combat in the Vale summer, not the freezing desert, and exposure would kill her as surely as a knife.

An arrow-

The thought was shaken from her mind before it had time to form. She could not dwell on that, not right now. There would, hopefully, be time enough for that later.

As her emerald eyes glanced upward from her bent-over position massaging her ankle, Pyrrha spied light over the rise and fall of the sand. Three immense ziggurats rose out of the ground ahead, lit in the flickering light of a thousand fires, some great and some small. Silhouettes of warships were barely noticeable in the dying light of the sunset behind then, and firelight danced off of the great crystal underneath what she thought had to be Amity Coliseum, creating the illusion of an immense fiery beacon, calling its subjects home like her father had, torch in hand, for years after she'd spent too long training on the beach.

It was beautiful, from this distance, but another shift in the breeze reminded her of the cold and snapped her out of her appreciation for the aesthetic of the place.

Pyrrha reached for her scroll, the newly pristine display ignited in front of her. Full signal. One would hope so, being this close to the signal tower of Amity.

Fingers moved without thought and before she knew it she was calling Jaune.

How long had it been? A few weeks? Months, maybe? All she had to do was let him know she was alive, ask him to forgive her for throwing him in that locker-

The call did not connect. The dial tone of crapped out before it could even begin to ring.

His phone was dead. Of course his phone was dead.

Silent laughter roared from her so hard she doubled over, activating Miló into a spear to hold herself up.

It was just so utterly Jaune. She comes back to this world, the first thing she does is call him, the boy she declared her love for right before she went in for a fight that should end her, and the idiot hasn't even charged his phone.

The worst part wasn't that she was unsurprised. The worst part was that it was so like him that instead of being angry, or disappointed, she was honestly ecstatic. It was so utterly, hilariously, totally Jaune that it proved, without a doubt, some things never changed.

He was still her lovable idiot. He was still very much the partner she knew and loved.

Pyrrha started walking slowly, taking care not to put too much weight on her ankle, using Miló in spear form as a walking aid.

One hand on her spear, her heels dangling from their laces tied to the trigger guard, she tried another number.

Nora.

It rang, thank the gods. It rang, and rang, and rang, and rang…

Oh, of course, it was clearly late. Which meant Nora would currently be snoring her head off in bed somewhere.

Another, softer giggle didn't escape her lips even though her shoulders betrayed her mirth.

Of course, she now phoned the one she should've started with.

Ren.

It rang, rang again.

"Who is this?"

The quiet rage was unmistakable. Pyrrha knew him well enough to tell from the level of Ren's voice when he was angry.

She tried to reply, but nothing came.

Ah. In her desperation to get some kind of contact, she'd forgotten.

Ren waited for a reply, but when none came, seemed even angrier.

"Whoever this is, lose that scroll you're using, or at the very least, lose this number.

No, Ren, please, I'm here… I'm right here!

The line went dead as he hung up.

SHIT! Bugger the fucking cunt of a thrice-damned whore's bastard daughter-

If Pyrrha could speak, the series of expletives she swore thereafter would've made a mistralian sailor blush purple.

No, no no no this wasn't right. Pyrrha Nikos didn't curse. She'd never cursed.

Pyrrha barely knew the word fuck let alone everything else that had just roared to the fore of her mind.

Sandy air scratched at her already sore throat as she breathed deeply.

Stress, that's all it was. Stress.

Texting! She could text him!

Ren, it's me. It's really me. I need help.

The three dots of 'I'm typing' arose from Ren's end. Stopped. Arose again.

This was torture of the highest form.

Whoever this is, you could not be further from who you think you're impersonating.

Pyrrha stared at the screen, confused out of her mind.

Impression? I'm not doing an impression! Ren, it's me, I'm… I don't know where. It's a desert, Vacuo maybe? I need help! Please!

More dots.

I say your impression is terrible, because this is clearly a scam. A friend of mine had that scroll before you. A dear one. The reason I know it's not her is two fold;

1. She died nearly three years ago.

2. Pyrrha Nikos could not figure out how to use emojis. At all.

She stared at the screen in shock.

Three years. She'd been gone three years.

Absently, she scrolled upward, trying to get away from that knowledge. The implications of it.

Only to read her earlier messages with mounting horror.

Her first text to him did have emojis. A knife, a scull, a cross, a thumbs up.

I'm not actually dead anymore. I'm good!

Where the hell had that come from? She hadn't even realised she was adding them, let alone that they started making sense to her. They never had before.

The second one had a far longer stream of emojis aligned with it. A clown, a map, a large question mark, a sand dune, a pyramid, another large, differently colourful question mark, a first-aid red-cross and a pair of hands clasped in prayer.

No impression you clown, I need to know where I am, is it actually near Vacuo? Send help please!

When the hell had this started making sense to her?

Pyrrha stared at her phone, trying to make sense of it all for so long she didn't register that the sand beneath her feet had given way to sandstone, nor that the light before her had gotten brighter until she hit her head on something.

Said something being the shaft of a spear that had been dropped in front of her to prevent her passage.

Snapping her head up to say sorry, the lips, again, moved. Sound did not come out.

This new… quirk of being shot in the chest was as frustrating as it was tiring.

The guard, a dog-faunus with very long, floppy ears, eyed her tiredly.

"Another one wandering back after curfew eh? When will you Mantle lot learn there's a reason we don't brave the desert at night? You're a right state."

Pyrrha didn't know what to do other than nod, confusedly. Her mind was somewhere else.

The guard sighed, apparently taking pity on the sand-tossed girl walking barefoot into the city.

"Fair enough. The soup kitchen's closing up for the night, I'd get in there quick if you want fed."

Pyrrha's stomach growled with a fierceness and volume that would put anyone to shame. The guard laughed loudly and fully as she blushed scarlet in embarrassment.

In her defence, apparently she hadn't eaten anything in three years. What she had eaten she'd thrown up a half hour earlier.

He stood aside, gesturing down a road to her.

"Go on, get some grub. Just don't tell your mates I let you through, if word gets out you can all wander out at night it'll cause problems. Our little secret, okay?" He winked.

Pyrrha nodded again, tiredly, but did her best to smile at him thankfully. He nodded her along, and shifted back to his post when she started to move off.

Minutes later she found herself in a dusty street. Small canvas tents lined the buildings tightly, small lamps lit in the entrances to a few, casting warm but gloomy shadows out across the cobblestone as many people sat, wreathed in blankets, blowing on their soup to cool it enough to eat as others passed their finished bowls down the line back to the tables.

Three women stood by a few tables, packing things away. One collected the assembled bowls, another seemed to be collapsing tables. The last, a short, white-haired faunus, stood by a large, still-steaming bowl, hand on her chin contemplatively.

Pyrrha wandered over, unknowingly silent on her shoe-less feet, and went to say something.

Only for it to fail, again. Gritting her teeth, she went to reach for the girl's shoulder.

Only for her stomach to once again growl like a feral animal.

Fiona Thyme jumped out of her skin.

"BROTHERS!" Nearly knocking over the soup bowl, she span, hand halfway to her weapon, but upon seeing the sheepish smile on Pyrrha's face, relaxed; even as the other huntresses looked over.

"Don't- Please don't do that. Scared me half to death!"

Fi breathed in and out hard for a few moments, hand steadying herself on the table.

"Phew, okay. Hello, I assume by the noise you'd like some food?"

Pyrrha nodded, and slipped out her scroll, and wrote 'please'

To which, unconsciously, she added a praying hands emoji.

Fiona breathed again and grabbed a bowl, puffing her cheeks out as she filled it.

"Honestly, sneaking up on a girl like that when you want her to feed ya. Just plain rude."

Pyrra's face must have looked distraught, because she immediately back-pedaled.

"Whoa there, I'm only playing. Here you go, and some bread. I've got a little extra today if you don't mind it a bit burnt." She winked.

Pyrrha accepted the bowl gratefully, collapsing Miló and hopping over to a table to lean on for support.

As she wolfed the food down, Fiona eyed her carefully. Normally she'd have picked up on the unwanted attention, but she was so hungry that for once extra attention didn't bother her.

"Hey, Robyn, can I get a hand?" Fi called over to another woman.

A tall blonde looked over before wandering over as Pyrrha was just about finished.

"I haven't seen her around before. Shade student maybe? Think we can get her back to the dorms tonight?" The sheep-faunus asked.

Robyn shook her head.

"No, it's the other side of the city, and this quarter's rough at night. I'd rather not risk it." she frowned, looking down.

"Especially not on that ankle. What's your name, red?"

Pyrrha went to answer. Voice failed, again. Frustrated, she went to grab her scroll, but she'd left it too far over on the table in her zest to eat and her ankle prevented her from getting it quickly.

"Well, doesn't matter. You can crash with us tonight, we'll take you home in the morning. Promise." The woman winked at her, and for the first time all day, Pyrrha felt less like a fish out of water.

"Here, throw this over yourself, it's a cold night, and it's gonna get colder."

Pyrrha let the woman wrap her in a thin cloth shawl, and the night's icy bite lessened.

"Here, lean on me." Said a third woman, clearly a friend of theirs, lifting Pyrrha's arm over her shoulder.

"Huntsmen & Huntresses get places with roofs, it's a bit of a reward for risking our lives on the daily. Come on, we'll get you settled in for the night, maybe take a look at the ankle."

The scarlet spartan allowed herself to be led into a nearby mud house, eyes drooping in exhaustion. Making it across the desert after vomiting her guts out had taken it out of her, and, despite the weirdness of the time-line, she hadn't slept in what felt like days. One second she'd been fighting Cinder, the next she was falling through the branches of a tree. Even that had been hours after the fight with Penny, the battle against the Grimm.

Pyrrha Nikos, exhausted and leg in pain, all but collapsed onto the bed the nice lady dropped her on, and barely felt them wrapping up her ankle as she fell asleep, belly full of soup and the kindness of strangers around her.

A/N: Okay, I know, I didn't technically live up to the one post a week thing, given the last was last monday. However, I've been working additional hours and cross-posted the fic between AO3 and . To say nothing of the fact that this chapter alone is nearly DOUBLE the word count of the last three combined, which means that with this one chapter I have in fact doubled the length of the entire fic. So I kept the promise about longer chapters at least?

I think I've figured out what I'm going to do with Pyrrha's semblance, a little mix of her, Neo, and a little something small from the Ever After left in too. Anyone who's familiar with the Fate series may have an inkling of an idea, but I'll leave it ambiguous for now. Feel free to suggest your own ideas, you never know what I might take inspiration from.

Introducing characters has made this a lot more interesting, at least from a writing perspective. It's difficult to get the proper manner of speaking / cadences of each down pat, but I think I did a pretty good job with Qrow, Ruby & Weiss in particular. Ren's difficult because he generally speaks so little and is usually kinda monotone, whereas Nora is a very energetic character but her emotional state atm seems like it would make her tone it down a bit, so I've got a bit of a balancing act there. Overall I'm happy with the work.

The emoji thing is a reference to the fact that Neo would communicate with a lot of Emojis with Roman on their scrolls, and it's a nice non-invasive way of reminding everyone she's still in there, somewhere.

The Jaune / Pyrrha reunion should be in the next 2 – 3 chapters, depending on how things go, and boy is it gonna be a doozy...

Hope you guys are still enjoying this, as always please do review, it really motivates me to write more, even if it's just a simple 'Nice, this doesn't completely suck." Thanks! Hope you enjoyed it!