Chapter Text
Ruby Rose HATED Weiss Schnee. Hated her with a passion. The cold hearted bitch that constantly nitpicked everything she did. Always berated her if she wanted to go out before her assignments were perfect. At first Ruby tried to impress her partner. She worked harder and harder so Weiss would finally shut up and let her go have some fun, but it was never enough. Then it turned into a challenge to beat her. It was still never enough and she resented Weiss so much. Even Blake and Yang tried to get her to let up, but she would never listen. Just kept pushing Ruby until she felt like she was about to snap. Four years at Beacon was supposed to be some of the greatest years of her life, and instead it was four years of hell.
Graduation ended up being the best day of those four years. She was finally free and didn't have to spend anymore time with her bitch of a partner. She graduated 2nd best in her class, only surpassed by Pyrha Nikos. Weiss was ranked 3rd, and it felt great to finally beat her. When she got her hunters license she didn't even dignify Weiss by rubbing it in her face. She was better than that. She was just happy to finally get away.
Ruby had been in the field for 5 years now. She had made quite the name for herself. Even did a few interviews for some hunter magazines. Ruby didn't pay attention to whatever happened to Weiss after graduation. Yang mentioned once that Weiss had been out in the field for a year before going back home to take over the family company. Blake mentioned that Faunus were being treated as equals within the company, so maybe Weiss finally managed to do something nice for once. That was pretty much the extent of what she knew of her old partner. None of team RWBY really cared much for the heiress.
That was why it was such a surprise when Ruby received a message from Blake while she was on a mission. Apparently, Weiss was in the hospital, and Team RWBY's presence was requested. Once she got there, she greeted her sister Yang, then went and hugged Blake, who she had not seen for the last year. After that, Blake spoke to a doctor and got Ruby a visitors pass. That was how she found herself standing next to Blake in a medical observation room, staring through the glass at the unconscious form of the woman she hadn't seen in 5 years.
Blake and Ruby stood there silently watching the motionless form for about 5 minutes. Eventually Ruby broke the silence. "Blake, what are we doing here?"
Blake had a thoughtful look on her face. "Did you know she left half of everything she owned to you, me, and Yang in her will?
Ruby looks at Blake. "How do you know that?"
Blake grins. "Turns out Ice queen actually named me executor of her estate." The smile left Blake's face and she looked somber. "Which is how I also know that she left instructions that if she doesn't wake up 30 days after her surgery, they are to pull her off life support and sell off everything. Then divide the money up. 20% of that is getting split evenly between me and Yang. 25% is going all to you. Even giving 5% to one of her butlers. The other 50% is getting split between a few Faunus rights groups and charities for families of deceased hunters. She isn't even having a funeral. She asked to be cremated and that the 3 of us spread her ashes over the Emerald Forest from the cliffs where we started initiation."
Ruby sniffed, looking back at Weiss. "Maybe she finally realized how bad she was and was trying to make up for it."
Blake looks away from the window of Weiss' room and at Ruby. "Once, back at our first year at Beacon, Yang yelled at Weiss for how she treated you, and I remember Weiss yelling back at her that she refused to 'baby' you like Yang did, because she saw a great future for you."
Ruby kept watching Weiss through the window "What's your point Blake?"
Blake sighs "When I went to Schnee manor, I found something interesting in her office that I think you should see."
Ruby turns to look at her. "What is it?"
Blake shakes her head and looks back through the window. "You have to see it for yourself, just...I think she cared. She just didn't know any other way to show it."
Ruby scoffed "Not constantly being a bitch to me would have been a good way."
Blake sighed again. "After seeing what her family was like, I honestly don't think she knew any other way to act. Go on. One of her butlers is expecting you. His name is Klein."
Ruby walked to the door but stopped and turned around. "Hey, Blake...um, how...?
"24 hours until the deadline. That is why we were contacted. Other than Klein, we are the only ones in her will." Blake answered Ruby's unasked question.
Ruby glanced at Weiss through the window. "oh..." was all she could manage as she left the observation room and made her way to Weiss' home.
Ruby arrived at Schnee manor where she was greeting by a cheery balding man with a big bushy mustache. "Ah, Miss Rose. It is a pleasure to finally meet you."
Ruby looked confused "uh. Klein, right? You were expecting me?"
The man smiled brightly at her. "Yes, Miss Belladonna said you would be stopping by. I have been instructed to take you to Miss Schnee's office. Would you like anything? Tea? Coffee?"
Ruby followed the butler through the large house. 'No wonder I could never impress the bitch, if this is where she lives.' "oh. Coffee please. Cream and 5 sugars. Um, no offense but, how do you know me?"
"Oh, Miss Schnee spoke of you and your team often."
Ruby blinked "She did?"
"Indeed. She told me her time at Beacon was some of the best years of her life."
Ruby was even more confused than before. How could Weiss have been happy there? She was always pissed off while at Beacon, mostly at Ruby herself. Constantly pointing out the tiniest of mistakes in anything Ruby did. If Ruby wasn't so intent on proving the bitch wrong, she would have just told her to go screw herself. She was shaken from her thoughts when Klein stopped in front of a door and turned to her.
"Miss Belladonna asked me to give this to you. She said you should watch it before going in."
Ruby looked down and took the scroll he had held out to her. "What is on it?"
Klein pointed up to a corner in the hall and Ruby looked up to see a security camera. "Security video of the interior of her office from the day she was admitted to the hospital."
Ruby looked at the scroll, then the door, then back to Klein. "What does Blake expect me to find in there?"
Klein's smile fell and he had a somber look on his face. "If I had to guess, Miss Rose? I would say 'closure'." Klein turned and walked back the way they came. "I will return with your drink momentarily." With that, he was gone while Ruby leaned up against the door and opened the scroll, the video Blake apparently wanted her to see already loaded and ready to watch. After a moments hesitation, she pressed play.
The video opened up to a black and white image of the room she was outside of. There was a large, expensive looking desk at one end of the room stacked with papers. Bookshelves lined the walls. In the only placed not covered in bookcases there was a small desk that Weiss was sitting at writing on something. Above the desk there were papers pinned to a cork board, but the angle wasn't good enough to see what was on them.
The video didn't really show anything for about a minute, just the bane of Ruby's existence sitting there writing. As Ruby watched something finally changed, and it made her breath catch.
As Weiss sat there writing, her shoulders shook a couple times, then her free hand went up and rubbed at her eyes. Her hand came away and she looked up at the wall, then went and wrote a bit more. She suddenly went into a coughing fit for a good 10 seconds. When it finally stopped, she pulled her hand away from her mouth and appeared to be staring at it. It was shaking and slowly moving toward her chest where she grabbed something that was hanging around her neck. Moments later she started shaking all over and fell from her chair to the floor, convulsing on the ground as people burst into the room and picked her up, two of them getting her stable until the convulsions stopped, then carrying her while a third appeared to be talking into a scroll. They left the room with Weiss in tow and a few seconds after that, the video ended.
'She had a seizure.' Ruby had seen enough medical emergencies while in the field to recognize what that was. Closing the scroll and putting it in her pocket, She took a deep breath and turned back to the door.
'Time to see what Blake found I guess.' With that thought, she opened the door and went inside.
When Ruby got inside, she saw much of the same thing that she saw in the video, with one exception. She was able to see what was on that cork board. As Ruby stared at the wall, her jaw hung open and she couldn't believe what she was seeing. The entire board was covered in news article and stories..about Ruby. Every interview, minor news clip, anything public involving her huntress career was there on that board. Weiss had been following her career ever since graduation. In fact, there was a picture of her from graduation as she got her hunters license. Looking at everything, she was pretty sure the only one not covered was the one she was on when she got the call from Blake about Weiss.
Sitting down in the chair that Weiss had been sitting in when she had her seizure, Ruby looked down at the note she had been writing. It was in Weiss' perfect, flowing cursive handwriting, and it started with two words. 'Dear Ruby,'