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'Tell me: what do you see?' She stared blankly at the wall, every inch covered in mirrors. They were all shiny and clean, as if someone had just taken an entire bottle of Windex to them. All she could see in them was herself, her piercing blue eyes empty as they looked back at her. It felt like she could see through herself, right into the depths of her very soul. Every day, she loathed the person she saw staring back.
"I see a weak-willed girl," she whispered, stepping forward. She pressed her fingertips against the mirrored wall, watching her reflection duplicate her actions. It felt like she could feel a cool touch against her fingers, like her reflection was trying to break free of its confines. "I see..." She swallowed thickly, feeling a couple errant tears start to trickle down her cheek. "I see someone who doesn't know who she is."
'Curious...' She turned around, surrounded by the sad, judgmental looks of her reflections. They were everywhere. The mirrors covered every wall, as well as the floor beneath her and the ceiling above her. There was no escaping the bitter truth that she was forced to swallow every day. 'You know who you are, Weiss. It's who you have been ever since you were born. Some would call it destiny.'
"I don't believe you." Truthfully, she didn't want to believe it. However, she couldn't help but feel some sort of truth within those words. She had grown up to become exactly like everyone expected her to be: a haughty, judgmental brat who couldn't get anywhere without the wealth and privilege that her family name brought. If she had been born the exact same person, but without the Schnee name dragging behind her like a ball and chain, she would be nothing.
'Think about all the terrible things you've said. All the things you've done.' She felt a cold breeze tickling her skin, making her instinctively hug herself to try and find some semblance of warmth. 'Do you really think Blake respects you when you hate her kind?' Without thinking about it, she lifted up a hand and touched the scar on her face, blinking back tears. 'Do you think Ruby cares for you when you've shown her nothing but disdain every step of the way?'
"She does," but her words held no conviction. In the mirrors, she watched a memory play out: the first time she and Ruby met at Beacon. She cringed when she watched her reaction to Ruby running into her and knocking over her luggage. While it had been an annoying occurrence, her response was beyond the pale. She had treated a stranger the same way everyone believed she would: like they were an annoyance that needed to be eliminated from her life. If she could just close her eyes, she could pretend that her actions in the past were all fictitious.
Unfortunately, she couldn't close her eyes, so she was forced to watch every terrible thing she had said and done be recreated by her reflection. She struggled as she heard the horrendous things she said about faunus, all right to Blake's face. For the first time, she could see Ruby's face throughout that scene. There was clear confusion and disappointment written all over it. She felt like she was being stabbed in the heart.
Each time she watched herself say something unnecessarily rude to Ruby, she felt the girl she loved slipping farther away. It hadn't hit her that she had such strong feelings for Ruby until it was too late, which was poetic justice if she had ever heard of it. Only she could be so rude to a person she'd end up loving. It was just who she was, after all. That was the kind of attitude everyone expected from a Schnee, and she did nothing to buck those trends.
'You see? How could anyone want to be near you when you act like that?' She wanted to say that it wasn't true: that she was a changed person, and she would never act that way anymore. What did that matter, though? Even if she was changed, she had still acted that way. Nothing there was false: she had been that rude, that horrible to be around. All of her friends abandoning her was proper penance for the way she had treated them. Tears fell nonstop now, blurring her vision as she watched her reflection swim around the glass.
'Your eye isn't the only place you hold scars.' Through the tears, she watched her reflection point all over her body before letting her finger hover over her heart. 'You are scarred everywhere. You are nothing but a miserable pile of scars, stitched together to become a semblance of a human being.' Each time she attempted to deny the truth that was ringing in her ears, she was forced to choke back a sob, and the words would die on her throat again and again.
She wiped away her tears, only to see something more horrific than anything she had done in the past. Her reflection started transforming right in front of her. She was growing taller, her hair shortening as her pristine white dress tightened up into an immaculate suit. With a rapidly-drying throat, she could only watch in horror as she transformed into her father.
"No..." Her voice was merely a whisper as she stared into the dark, uncaring eyes of her father. 'This is who you were always meant to become.' She shook her head fervently, not wanting to believe it. "I will never become him." If she said it enough times, maybe she could truly believe it herself. "I won't be him, I won't be him, I won't-" 'You're the heir to the Schnee Dust Company, are you not? Is it not your destiny to take his mantle someday? To run the company just as he has.'
"No! I would never!" She shouted at the voice, trying to sound more convincing than she felt. There was no way she would run the SDC like her father. She wasn't the same girl she had been when she first went to Beacon. Her feelings on faunus in particular had changed: she wouldn't abuse them like the horror stories she had heard concerning their labor underneath the SDC's corporate thumb. "I won't become my father!" She waited for a response, but the room was silent. It was just her and her reflection, staring at her angrily. "I won't! I won't I won't I won't!" Still nothing.
"Stop ignoring me!" Pulling Myrtenaster out of its holster, she spun the chamber around until it landed on ice. Then she started firing, shooting wave after wave of ice at the walls. Everywhere she aimed, the mirrors shattered, shards of glass tumbling to the ground. She spun around, her mind gone as she screamed out her frustrations. The walls became black voids as every mirror broke apart, leaving their reflections scattered across the floor.
"Please..." She dropped to her knees, crawling towards the broken mirrors. The shadow of her father followed beneath her, gliding like a ghost on the floor-length mirror. "I'm not... I'm not him..." She reached out and gathered up a handful of the shards, pulling them close to her. They laid across each other in an ugly, haphazard pile. In each one, she could see a part of her reflection, and she looked so angry: so ugly. "I promise..."
'You don't need to worry. You've already lost everything. Your friends, your inheritance, your dignity. There's nothing left for you to lose.' She wrapped her arms around her chest, sobbing openly. The tears that fell were greeted by her reflection's, who was crying along with her. Why? Why couldn't she have just been a better person? Why did her mother have to give up on her? Why did her sister have to abandon her? Why did she have to grow up to become her father? Why why why why whywhywhywhywhy-
"Don't listen, Weiss!" Her head shot up as she heard a different voice: a familiar voice. She started looking everywhere, peering deep into the void that had become her walls, but she couldn't see anyone. Slowly she stood up, her legs shaking as she started to move towards the center of her room. "It's not true!" There was the voice again, louder and clearer this time. It sounded much stronger than the previous voice had been.
"R-Ruby?" She stood in the center of the room, unsure of what to do. That had definitely sounded like Ruby's voice, but she couldn't tell where it had come from. 'She isn't real.' The other voice spoke in her head again, making her heart sink. 'Ruby would never forgive you for how terrible a person you are' She slapped her hands against her ears, trying in vain to block the negative words out. "N-No, it's not true! Shut up! Shut up!"
"Weiss!" There it was again. It sounded like it was coming from somewhere within the void. With slow, tentative steps, she walked forward, looking down at the shards of glass that now covered the floor. To her surprise, she saw a flash of red rush past a cluster of the broken mirror pieces. Then, on another little pile, she saw what looked like a red cloak whisk by. Could it be...?
On a whim, she started to try and piece together part of the mirrored wall that she had destroyed. She pulled pieces towards her, trying to place them together in order to build a full picture. Sometimes the glass would slice through her skin, droplets of blood dripping onto the floor, but she kept going. She didn't even let out so much as a whimper of pain. Her concentration was too great to be disturbed by such trivial matters.
'All you do is waste your time. You're trying to fix your past through your sad, pitiful reflection.' She saw her pale, pathetic face reflected in the makeshift mirror, and it almost cost her her nerve. However, this time she was able to push the voice aside. Remembering what Ruby had told her, she gritted her teeth and kept going. Piece by piece pressed together at odd angles, her eyes scanning desperately for more signs of red, but all she could see were the odd droplets of blood. 'She doesn't love you.'
"I don't need her to love me," she muttered, reaching out to grab more pieces. "I just need to tell her I'm sorry." She bit down on her lip as more cuts appeared on her hands, shaky touches smearing it across the glass. "She doesn't need to forgive me." As the mirror got bigger, she swore that she saw that familiar fluttering cloak on the edge of her vision. "I just want her to hear the truth from me."
"weISS!" Ruby's voice was quiet, but it became louder the more pieces Weiss shoved together. Looking down at the mirror, her eyes widened at the sight of Ruby running across her reflection. There was no doubt it was her, and she instinctively looked up to see if she was on the ceiling. All that was there was her reflection looking down at her, warped from the angle. Ruby was there, though. Somewhere...
Within the makeshift mirror, she saw Ruby running towards her. She seemed so far away in her reflection, her body split apart due to her inability to find every piece's perfect spot. Still, it was clearly Ruby: her teammate, her partner, her friend. She was there, and she was coming for her. Her heart was beating fast as she reached out towards the ground, desperately wanting to reach into the mirror and pull Ruby out.
The closer Ruby got, the faster her heart beat, until she swore that their hands touched. Her fingers, still dripping blood down her digits, touched the glass, and she saw Ruby's do the same. It felt like there was a sudden warmth on her fingertips, as if Ruby was actually there in the room. Then the mirror that she had so painstakingly attempted to put back together blew apart.
She let out a scream and her hands shot up to cover her face. The pieces shot every which way, destroying the work she'd so desperately done. When she looked down and saw that all she could see was her reflection, tears started to prick at her eyes again. She had been so close: Ruby had been right there. They had touched hands, and then... and now... she was gone again...
Then she felt something tapping her leg. She looked down in confusion, but didn't see anything. Her hand went down to absently rub her leg, and the tapping was now felt there. Shocked, she jumped to her feet and stumbled backwards, looking down again. This time, to her utter disbelief, Ruby was there again. She was in the floor mirror, standing underneath her with a familiar grin on her face. Weiss had never felt her heart swoon more seeing that smile before.
"It's going to be okay, Weiss." Ruby's reflection stood in front of hers, upside down and as lovable as ever. "Take my hand." She stuck out her hand, letting it hover inches away from the reflection of Weiss's hand. Frowning, she looked down at her hands, then at the reflections beneath her. How could she reach the girl she had to apologize to if she was stuck in the hell of her room's reflections. "Do you trust me, Weiss?"
"I do." There was no more hesitation on her part. She stuck her hand out, grasping at air. However, beneath her, her reflection was holding onto Ruby's hand, and she swore that she felt warmth pooling around her skin. It really did feel as if she was holding someone's hand, even though there was no one there. She squeezed down on the air tightly, closing her eyes and wishing that she could change everything she had ever said or done. "Please don't let go, Ruby."
"I'll never let go." The floor beneath her started to shake. With wide eyes, she looked down and saw the glass beneath her beginning to crack. The shards of the walls were bouncing and skating around the room. A long crack went down the floor, cutting right between herself and Ruby. Crying out, she jumped backwards, losing her footing and falling onto her butt. The entire room was shaking at this point, all of her furniture threatening to fall apart at a moment's notice. A shiver of fear ran down her back.
"Ruby!" She cried out, trying to find her reflection in the floor as it all began to crack and fall apart. "Help me! Please!" When she tried to stand, another ferocious tremor sent her flat down onto her back. The voice in her head was echoing again, telling her how terrible of a person she was, and how this destruction was what she deserved. Without Ruby's voice there to drag her back to sanity, she found herself slipping into that negativity again.
"Ruby..." She sniffled, trying to stand back up through her tears and her trembling frame. It was too difficult: she kept falling down, and her head was spinning with how much rumbling was going on around her. She could feel a piercing headache coming on, like someone was stabbing her right through the middle of her forehead with Myrtenaster. "Please, make it stop!" She cried out, begging as her shouts only made her headache worse. "Ruby, help me! Save me, Ruby!" In another time, she would have been horrified to hear such begging words leave her lips, but that was an old version of herself. Now she just wanted the girl who had become more important than she could have ever imagined to save her from this torment: to save her from herself.
Finally, she found her footing, wobbling along the shaking ground to try and get to her bed. 'There's nowhere for you to go.' She could see that her headboard had collapsed onto the sheets, and it looked as if the entire bed was threatening to fall out into the void. 'Just an endless plain of sorrow that you know you deserve to live in.' She kept moving, as if reaching this random destination could save her.
"I... won't give up," she gasped out, seeing a blur of red moving through the cracks in the floor. "Not... until I tell Ruby... what she means to me!" She fell to her knees, a few feet short of the bed. Tears were falling down her face, and her head was pounding relentlessly. Blood kept trickling from her fingers, but she couldn't quit. She wouldn't quit. Then she found something on the floor in front of her.
"What the..." She scooped up a few red petals, cradling them in her hands. They weren't reflections: they were the real thing. The texture on her skin was so familiar, and it made her feel a surge of energy. She knew that she could keep going. "Ruby! I know you're here!" She shouted to the ceiling, where the full-length mirror was also falling apart. "I'm sorry for how terrible of a teammate I was, Ruby! And how horrible of a friend I was! I was selfish and short-sighted, and I was wrong! Everything I said was wrong! Please forgive me, Ruby!"
Suddenly, the petals in her hand started to float out of her hands. She watched them rise into the air, then start blowing around her. Soon, a huge wind had kicked up around the room, picking up the shards of the mirrors and whipping them around in a circle. She was trapped within it, but she didn't have the strength to move anyway. All she could do was watch as the shards went faster, transforming into red petals.
She watched in silent amazement as the wind became red, circling around her until she couldn't see anything else. The entirety of her room was gone behind the blur of the breeze. She could still feel the room shaking, but the only reminder that anything was happening was the mirror she was sitting on. However, that specific spot wasn't cracked: it was as flawless as it could be. She could see the petals' reflection, along with her own self, and it was making her dizzy. It took a lot of willpower to avoid throwing up.
Then the red vortex stopped. For a moment, all of the petals held together as a wall, none of them so much as fluttering in the dying breeze. Then they all fell to the ground, smashing around her in a pool of red. Everything was back to normal. All of her furniture was where they were supposed to be, without any noticeable damage to anything. The walls that had cracked and crumbled were back up, as sturdy as ever. It was all made of normal materials as well: no more mirrors surrounding her from every angle. Standing right in front of her, looking down at her with a face full of concern, was Ruby.
"Weiss?" She stared up at her, mouth agape as she tried to take everything in. All of the destruction was gone, and the voice in her head had dissipated. Now she could just hear Ruby's voice, and the way her breathing sounded so uneven in her ears. "Weiss, are you oka- Oof!"
"Oh Ruby, I'm so sorry!" She had jumped to her feet and tackled Ruby in a big hug. "I'm sorry for all the terrible things I ever said about you, and all the times I was a terrible teammate. To you, and to Blake and Yang. I've been so ungrateful while you've been nothing but patient, and I don't deserve having someone so amazing in my life. I don't, but you're here. I can't believe you're here." She pulled back to look in Ruby's eyes, noticing that she was slack-jawed and utterly flabbergasted.
"Weiss, what's going on? I saw you freaking out on the floor, and-"
"I love you, Ruby." That shut her up instantly. "I've loved you for longer than I ever cared to admit. Maybe I was scared, or I was just too full of myself to believe the truth, but I can't hide it any longer. You might never forgive me for how terrible I was to all of you for so long, and I completely understand. I just had to tell you the truth: about how sorry I am, and how much you've come to mean to me over all this time."
"Uh, wow, uh... That's a lot to take in." Ruby laughed awkwardly, patting her shoulders. "Uh, well, first off, it's okay, Weiss. I know that we didn't exactly get off on the right foot when we first met, but that's all water under the bridge. We've moved way past that, right? Besides, we've become great partners! I trust you with my life!" She smiled such a warm, truthful smile that Weiss just couldn't help but believe her.
"Still, I just had to apologize. I was quite the burden on all of you." She clasped her hands together, looking down at her feet. "I let the way I was raised blind me to certain truths of the world, and I couldn't figure out why what I was doing was wrong until it was too late." She wiped at her eyes, feeling another wave of tears coming on. Then her hand was pushed aside, replaced by another. "Ruby?"
"Please don't cry, Weiss." There was sadness in Ruby's eyes, her hand surprisingly gentle as it wiped away her tears. "I promise you, everything is okay. You made some mistakes in the past, but that doesn't make you a bad person. The fact that you can admit to those mistakes means you're learning, and I think that's something to be celebrated. I'm proud of you for being able to admit those things." She smiled brightly, then a hint of red started to flood into her cheeks. "And, uh, speaking about admitting things... You said that you, uh, you know..." She tugged on her skirt, trying to find something to do with her hands. "... that you love me?"
"Oh, well... yes, yes I did say that." Wiping away a couple more stray tears, she forced herself to speak past her embarrassment. She had just gone through way too much chaos to let something so trivial like that bother her. "I do love you, Ruby. I've felt that way for a very long time. You're just... someone that I never thought I would meet in life. You're distracted and chaotic, but everything you are that I'm not somehow drives me closer to you. It makes me feel like I have to protect you from hurtling off a cliff, while at the same time I feel safe whenever I'm around you."
"I should have said something awhile ago, but I was too embarrassed, and too afraid. Emotions have... never been my strong suit." She frowned at the noticeable smirk on Ruby's face, though she quickly tried to hide it behind a hand. "I learned that showing emotions would cause me... certain issues." She didn't elaborate, but from the way Ruby's smile vanished, it was clear she had at least some inkling of understanding. "So I hid them, and after all these years, I never learned to confront them properly. In the end, I only hurt myself by not doing so." She looked down at her hands, at where the cuts from the mirror shards had been. There was nothing there anymore.
"Well, you're telling me now, right?" Ruby took hold of her hands, gently massaging them. "Sometimes it just takes time to get to know your feelings. Even I'm not always in tune with them as much as you might think." She stared at Ruby skeptically, which made her laugh. "I'm being serious! Sometimes I don't understand how I feel about certain things, and the emotions that hit me are like being thrown across the forest by a Beowulf. But, there is one emotion I've never questioned." She squeezed Weiss's hands tighter, blushing and smiling. "And that's my feelings for you."
"Really?" She felt lightheaded and warm, unable to control her rapidly-beating heart. "You have feelings for me too?"
"I'm pretty sure I've had them longer than you." Ruby laughed, and she found herself becoming lost in her partner's eyes. "Yang has been teasing me about them for the longest time, telling me I should tell you, but... I wasn't sure you liked me back." She swallowed thickly, knowing that Ruby had a point. Her attitude had never engendered herself to others, so it was unlikely that Ruby would have ever realized that there was a mutual reciprocation. "I didn't want to ruin what we had, since we had become so close as friends."
"I had no idea..." She had been aware of how touchy-feely Ruby was towards her, but she had just thought that was how she was as a person. It wasn't as if she didn't show affection towards others, so she hadn't thought that she was anything special. That had been a big reason for not saying anything when she realized the truth about her own feelings, though her embarrassment and social awkwardness were what truly won the day. "I've wasted all this time... I've been the worst partner you could have ever had..."
"No, don't say that!" For some reason, Ruby's voice sounded distant. Then it sounded worried on top of that. "Weiss? Weiss, what's wrong?!" The room was spinning, and she felt as if she was floating. She blinked once, twice, then her eyes didn't open. Everything was dark, as if she was swimming around in the void that had been hidden behind her walls. She thought that she could feel something or someone shaking her body, but it just made her coast along the darkness.
When she was able to open her eyes, and the world again appeared before her, she found herself flat on her back. By the softness she could feel beneath her, she knew she was lying on her bed. Hovering above her, with worried tear-tinged eyes, was Ruby. For a moment, she forgot what had happened or why Ruby was there in the first place, but then everything clicked and she made a surprisingly impulsive decision. She would probably never truly understand what made her do what she did, but she just wanted to wipe that worried look off of Ruby's face. So she reached up, pulled Ruby down to her, and kissed her.
It must have been surprising for Ruby to be suddenly kissed by the girl she had feelings for for so long, but to her credit, she didn't hesitate for a second. She immediately kissed her back, and the two of them got lost in each other's lips. They kissed until they had to pull away for a breath, both of them gasping as they stared at each other. Then they started to laugh. Neither of them knew why, but the entire situation just felt funny for whatever reason.
"I, uh, I didn't expect that to be our first kiss." Ruby wiped at her eyes, repeatedly pressing her lips together. "Wow, you taste good." That made Weiss blush, but she had to admit that Ruby also tasted pretty good.
"You do too," she whispered, wanting more than anything to get a second taste. However, she refrained from another kiss, because her head was swimming while trying to understand everything that was going on. "Do you love me, Ruby?"
"What gave it away?" She giggled and leaned down again, this time to plant a kiss on Weiss's forehead. "Yes, I do. I love you, Weiss Schnee. I've loved you for a long time, and I'm so relieved I was able to get it off my chest. So then..." She tapped her fingers together, smiling hopefully. "Do you love me?" Chuckling, she pulled Ruby down for another kiss. It was slower, longer, and full of all the words that she had never been able to say before.
"What gave it away?" She smiled at the laugh that drew out of Ruby: it made her heart soar like nothing else ever could. Just hearing those sounds made her feel that life was worth living, and everything in the world would be alright. "I may have never said it when I should have, but I do. I love you, Ruby Rose. More than anything or anyone in the entire world. I didn't know it at first, but having you in my life makes me feel like I should become a better person. I don't believe I would have realized how wrong I was living my life if I never met you."
"Does that mean I get to call you my girlfriend?" As much as she was trying to keep herself contained, Ruby was practically vibrating with excitement. It looked like she was about to dash out of the room, leaving nothing but rose petals in her wake.
"I suppose so." She acted like she was being burdened by Ruby's enthusiasm, but really she was just as excited. It was just harder for her to express it properly. "But, only on one condition." Ruby's eyes widened, having not expected there to be any conditions to their potential relationship.
"What condition?"
"That I get to call you my girlfriend." Ruby just stared at her for a moment, eyes wide and mouth agape. Then she started to laugh, her body quickly being overcome by it. She fell onto the floor, rocking back and forth as Weiss watched her, amused. "Is it that funny that I want you to be my girlfriend?"
"N-No, no no!" Unfortunately for Ruby, she couldn't stop laughing. "I just... didn't..." Her words struggled under her laughter, her body shaking with her movements. "Didn't expect..." It became such an issue that she ended up rolling right into the bed. "Waah! Oww..." She rubbed her side, whining when she saw Weiss barely holding back her laughter while she peered over the bed. "That's not funny."
"You're right: it's hilarious." Smirking, she reached down and offered her hand, which Ruby took to help herself back onto her knees. "So, are you willing to accept my condition?" She watched as Ruby's laughter faded away, and her expression softened into the most wonderful smile she had ever seen.
"Absolutely I am!" She got up and clambered onto the bed, then wrapped Weiss up in a tight hug. "I love you, Weiss!" Chuckling quietly, Weiss hugged Ruby back, embracing the warmth her new girlfriend gave her. Looking over towards her vanity, she could see the last remaining mirror in her room. Staring back at her was her reflection, but it was no longer the sad, pallid ghoul she had been seeing before. Instead, she was smiling, looking warm and alive with Ruby in her arms. That voice in her head had been wrong: Ruby did care for her. She wasn't beyond redemption.
"I love you too, Ruby."