Chapter Text
From Ch25: Bumblebee
Present,
A broken shard of black metal clatters into the sink, splattering blood droplets across the smooth, clean porcelain.
The intact part of Gambol Shroud drops beside the severed end of its blade. The weapon’s black ribbon falls across the rim of the sink and cascades to the floor.
A trembling hand turns the faucet for hot water. There’s a spluttering, and then water spurts out, splashes down against the metal pieces.
It’s interrupted by a second hand, holding a thick, fluffy towel, getting in the way. The towel grows fat as it absorbs the water. Once it’s saturated, the faucet is turned off.
Above the basin of the sink, great gasping gulps for air fail to calm the person taking them. She can’t stop her trembling. Even now that they’re safe, every fiber of her being vibrates, on edge. Her cat ears twitch, seeking out danger sounds that don’t exist.
KNOCK. KNOCK.
Blake jumps. The towel thwumps in the sink. Water leaks out, mixes with the blood coating Gambol Shroud’s tip, and trails into the drain.
“Blake—?” Comes tentatively through the door.
“I’m—” Blake’s eyes dart between the towel, Gambol Shroud, the faucet, herself in the mirror. Her brain fails to make a decision on what to say, or do.
The bathroom doorknob turns. The door slowly opens. “I just wanted to make sure you’re…” Yang trails off. Her gaze meets Blake’s.
...
Hours Ago,
Snow-dusted trees fly by outside the Argus Limited private cabin’s window. The further away from Mistral, the further north, the train travels, the denser the trees seem to become, the thicker the snow.
Blake, perched on the one of the lower bunks of the two sets of bunk beds in the cabin, watches them go. Her fingers rest on the spine of the turned over book she’d been going to read, but she doesn’t pick the tome up again.
It takes roughly a day and a half for the Argus Limited to travel between Mistral and Argus, barring no interruptions. As it stands, Blake and her friends’ journey will take have taken them two full days by the time it ends. There’d been a brief…disturbance.
Manticores, attracted by the ancient, mystical lamp now resting on the bed between Blake and the wall, attacked the train. A situation that would have proven dire had the Spring Maiden not been aboard.
When she closes her eyes, Blake can still see Yang, atop the train, surrounded by a swirling vortex of ice, earth, and fire. In her mind’s eye, she watches as Yang commands the elements, witnesses the flames accompanying the pained, frustrated yell that escapes the maiden as she does.
Ozpin hadn’t lied to them, necessarily, but he had withheld certain truths. Important ones. Blake can’t say she doesn’t get it, at least a little bit. Some things are hard to talk about, especially if they’re personal. It didn’t mean the not being told didn’t hurt. It just meant, for her, at least, it hurt a little less than everyone else.
Blake’s eyes flick briefly to the lamp, now in her care.
Yang had dispatched the Manticores easily. The Argus Limited had gone on its way. A confrontation had happened. Ozpin had revealed truths…not easily accepted. They hadn’t signed up for a futile war, or at least that’s not how Blake, even knowing now Salem couldn’t be beat, continues to see it.
She’d gotten her friends back, she wanted to keep them back, Yang’s new position and the lamp meant their next step would be Atlas, so, together, they would go to Atlas. Fighting Salem was…if there was anything Blake learned about the ‘big picture’ it’s that massive scale, world-defining issues can’t be solved in an instant, easily, or without significant effort. The entity in the lamp, Jinn, had once told Ozpin that Salem couldn’t be beat. It had been hard to hear, but that didn’t mean there was nothing they could do. At least not in the immediate present.
From Ch26
"Penny?” Ruby waits until she has her full attention. “Do you think we can control…?” she gestures to the sewage.
“Water? I believe so. Ice is water in solid form, so—“
“No, I mean…” Ruby tries gestures again to get her point across.
Penny blinks.
Ruby sighs and just goes for it. A mass of sludge rises from the water. Whether it’s mostly earth and dirt, or something else is debatable. Either way, it smells.
"We should have thrown this at him," Penny says.
Ruby snickers.
From Ch27
Copper is going to a rave.
She’s very excited. It will be her first ever rave! She didn’t even know raves existed before Neon mentioned her upcoming plans for one in their last conversation. Then, she’d invited Copper! Which she hadn’t imagined. The text is right there, safety stored in her memory.
Going, of course, has taken some planning. Copper knows she isn’t supposed to leave her room without being escorted by her father. She did consider asking him to take her to the rave, but, she knows for a fact he won’t be available. He’s going to be at an important dinner with the Council, select high level Academy faculty, and some ‘concerned citizens’ (namely one Jacques Schnee) at the same time. It’s been a huge stressor on him, if way he grumbles at his scroll sometimes when he’s with her is anything to go by.
So, Copper will just have to get to the rave on her own. A thought which was very scary the first time she thought it, but has become significantly less so with every return to it.
The rave will be held on academy grounds. In one of the training arenas in the wing currently closed for repairs following a recent elemental explosion (that Copper knows was due to Ruby). It’s not very far away. Neon even agreed to meet her in one of the courtyards, so they could walk together.
She recorded a loop of footage from her own personal security camera that her father uses to check in on her. So, if he decides to check in on her remotely, she’ll be covered.
She’s even carefully acquired a student uniform so she wouldn’t seem out of place. And also a wig for good measure.