Chapter Text
There had to be better ways to go about this mission. It was just a scout op for information, but the setting made it unusual, ridiculous even, and Yang wasn't shy to let everyone know how she felt. The high notes of the violins soared above the crowd, dancing among the rafters Yang and Ruby perched in. On second thought, this is exactly to be expected of Ozpin. There always was something off about him, something not of this time. A familiar voice pulls Yang from her reflection.
"All set sis?" Pulling a small flashlight from her vest, Yang flashes it twice over towards the far opposite corner of the building where Ruby is perched. "Yang, you need to answer so I know your com link is working."
"Qrow better be right about this." The twinge of resentment she's been nursing bleeds into the statement.
"It's not how I wanted this to go down either, but this is kind of their thing. We'd blow the op in record breaking time." Which was saying a lot. According to the archives, the fastest an undercover info op was blown was one minute flat. They knew that because it was Qrow who was the proud holder of that record.
"Excuse me. I'm not exactly enthusiastic about this either." Weiss' harsh tone causes Yang to cringe slightly. Ruby points out that at least Weiss gets to make good use of her high society aristocratic knowledge, but Yang is only half listening, busy scanning the crowd by the door. The fact that Weiss is coming through on the com link means they're here. Finally, the voice she's been waiting for comes in clear.
"Dearest, I thought you were excited about this event?" Yang's stomach drops as she finally locates the pair she's been searching for. The coat man is eyeing Weiss distastefully, but Blake's comment snaps her back into character.
"I didn't think there would be such commoners present." The look of disgust Weiss gives the skeptic doorman as he takes her traveling cloak effectively puts him back in his place. Ruby lets out an audible sigh but it's difficult to tell whether it's relief or in awe of how Weiss looks. The two have been painfully dancing around what was obvious to everyone since Weiss managed to escape Atlas.
"Well, she sure knows how to play the part," Yang spits, with a little more venom than was called for. Both Ruby and Weiss begin retort, but it's Blake that cuts through.
"Hardly the time or place dear," she grasps Weiss' upper arm moving through the crowd so the rest of her statement won't draw any more unwanted attention. "Stop acting like a child. If you won't even talk to me then you don't get to be angry." Yang's heart aches, at the same time the searing anger burns through her and she closes her eyes to keep the flames from erupting. Yangfire flaring in the rafters would hardly go unnoticed.
When she finally calms down enough to open her eyes again, Yang catches an apologetic look on Weiss' face but it means little, she has no idea. The quiet apology that comes from Ruby is different and apologizes for things she shouldn't have to. Yang was already bitter and angry when Blake left, but ever since she came back, it's been ten times worse. Yang refuses to talk to Blake and her anger has been firing in all directions since she returned, taking any available shots at anybody else. Mostly at Weiss and Ruby because they've been crippled by their own attraction to one another. It was painful to watch them trying to hide the obvious rather than just get it all out in the open and get together. Ruby being even more over the top than usual and Weiss trying to keep up the ice queen act. It was a sharp contrast to what Yang and Blake used to be.
"But Qrow is right, you know," Ruby adds, just as softly. That was the worst.
They sprung it on Yang, probably expecting her to be happy to see Blake. She stormed out of the room without a word. Qrow catching her by the arm just outside the front door. She started yelling about what was it they all expected. About how she'd had enough of people up and leaving her when she needed them, but before she could finish that train of thought, he cut straight to the root of things.
"She's not your mother, kiddo." The crater Yang scorched into the ground is still in the front yard. At least Tai Yang managed to get the front door back on its original hinges and added enough dirt to fill in most of the hole.
Yang doesn't respond but shakes her head to clear the memory. There were more important things to deal with now that Blake and Weiss were in the thick of the crowd. It was becoming slightly difficult to keep an eye on them, even with Blake's faunus ears on in the open. Everyone is exquisitely dressed, an odd mixture of the classical era and modern-day high society. The strangest juxtaposition of all is the many different kinds of animals represented. Cats, foxes, mice, lions, birds, wolves, sheep, all sorts. Along with the menagerie are a small handful of shepherds and members of monarchy: kings, queens, and princesses.
Yang hadn't noticed the strange theme until she tries to find Blake in the crowd again. She is drawn to three different sets of cat ears before slight panic sets in. "Do you have eyes on them? What is this, a costume party?"
"I got them, right in the middle of the room. I'm not quite sure, I…" Ruby trails off, sounding slightly guilty. "Do you see Ozpin anywhere?" Ruby adds the last question quickly, trying to draw attention to anything other than the fact that she had just revealed that she too had no idea where they were. Yang snorts disdainfully, Ruby had been distracted staring at Weiss when Qrow was explaining the specifics of the mission. Yang knew she herself was no less guilty. She stopped paying attention because he had started the whole brief by telling Blake that she would need to expose her ears for the mission.
"The court of Aesop. Once a year the top tier of virtue and vice come together." Blake cooley answers.
"For what?" Ruby asks, confused, but it all becomes clear to Yang. Including the fact that they could potentially be in a lot more danger than either of the sisters expected from this recon op.
"Aesop's fables. Stories that illustrate morals. They come together to do what they do best. The good guys uphold their virtue and the bad guys lie, cheat, and steal." Yang calmly explains as she finds the other half of their team dancing in the direct center of the room, gradually making their way closer to her.
"Why?!" Ruby finally grasps the implications.
"To see which morals still hold true, which can be dispelled, and possibly form new ones. Honestly, were you really not paying any attention during the brief?" Weiss rests her head on Blake's shoulder to cover her explanation and frustration. Ruby lets out a small squeak at the rebuke and Yang felt her chest tighten at the sight. Forgetting, for that second, that she is mad at Blake, but the old feelings never truly died.
A voice, smooth as silk and cold as ice comes through the com link. "Those who attempt to act in disguise are apt to overdo it."
Yang shifts into full panic, she didn't even noticed the man who now stands behind Blake. Both Weiss and Blake freeze, but the man makes no hostile movements in spite of clearly knowing they are undercover. Yang flips the field goggles over her eyes to get a better look. He's tall and wearing a plain white wrap with gold fasteners. A wreath of gold dipped laurels crowns his slightly unruly curly hair. He simply observes the pair for a moment, their expressions clearly betraying their concern at being caught.
"Then again, those who are caught are not always most guilty." He looks directly up to Ruby's position as he strokes his full beard.
The need to take action overrides any sense of personal safety as Yang prepares to drop. "Ah, ah, ah. Look before you leap." Yang curses under her breath as she stops. At least a dozen Greek soldiers that had been scattered amongst the crowd have converged underneath her, spear tips waiting to receive her. How had he even known she was about to drop? His back was to her.
Blake draws herself up to her full height as she turns to the man. "Aesop."
He tilts his head slightly in recognition. "You have no business here." His tone isn't threatening, but the cold finality of which he states this fact sends a shiver up Yang's spine.
"How do you know?" Weiss challenges and Ruby hisses her name sharply.
He throws her a knowing look. "You know full well the court in which you stand, Ms. Schnee. Zeal should not outrun discretion. You and your comrades are not here for the night's…frivolities."
Blake snorts at the description, as she desperately tries to think of something to say to bide her teammates more time to look for any sign of Ozpin. Yang is too busy watching the gears turning in her partners head. Planning their next move in what could only be described as a verbal game of chess. "Do our means not fit within the night's frivolities?"
"What you seek is not here. Do not presume to teach your elders, girl." Then, for the first time he speaks with malice, "pride goes before destruction."
"What's that supposed to mean? Tell us where he is!" Weiss is clearly getting frustrated.
"You have given me no reason to acquiesce to your request."
"Why not?" Blake asks, trying to keep what's left of her composure.
Aesop looks directly at Weiss, who visibly recoils under the intensity of his gaze. "No disguise will hide one's true character." Blake attempts to get between them, but he fixes her with the same soul piercing gaze. "Men are too apt to condemn in others the very things they practice themselves."
He turns to leave, pausing for a moment to speak once again over his shoulder. "And strangers should avoid those who quarrel among themselves." As he exits, he glances into the rafters, to Yang's position. "Those who enter by the back stairs must not complain if they are thrown out by the window."
"Yang?!" Ruby calls out, just as Yang herself is grabbed from her perch. They are promptly thrown out the window. Blake and Weiss, having entered through the front door, are escorted out by the group of soldiers once Aesop disappears into the crowd.
No one speaks in the airship on the way back to Patch. All lost in thought, each pair quietly shaken by the statements so obviously aimed directly at them.
***
"What happened?" Qrow seems to already know that something had gone wrong. "Well?!"
Yang is the first one to speak. "Maybe if someone hadn't told me to not act like a child their cover wouldn't have been blown."
"I'm right here, Yang. You could at least look at me when you fucking blame me for ruining this." Blake reflexively stands from her chair angrily.
Qrow is too late at stopping Yang from squaring up to Blake, eyes burning red. "You fucking ruined EVERYTHING!" She storms out of the room, leaving Blake in shock. It was the first thing Yang had said directly to her since she came back. Blake quietly apologizes before she leaves, tears visibly streaming down her face as she disappears. Qrow shakes his head, this time letting his niece storm off to cool down on her own.
"I'm just really glad nothing happened to you," Ruby says, glancing at Weiss before looking back down at her boots. "Well, both of you," she adds quickly, trying to backtrack.
Weiss folds her arms across her chest, "We were never in any real danger." Her tone is dismissive and cold.
"I was really worried and I was stuck up in those stupid rafters."
"You could try having a little faith in your teammates. You are the leader," and with a final huff of indignation, Weiss leaves. Ruby just stares at her boots trying to fight back tears.
"She definitely deserves that nickname," Qrow says as he bends down to nudge Ruby's chin up. "Don't give up. Something tells me that ice already has a few cracks in it."
"Is it that obvious?" She sniffles as she wipes her tears.
"What happened? What did he say?"
Ruby found it odd that Qrow already knew that they had interacted with Aesop, but she doesn't bother to ask. Qrow always had a tendency to already know things. "He mostly talked in weird little phrases, but I think he knows something about where Ozpin is."
"And?" Qrow prods for more.
"And when Weiss told him to tell us, he said we gave him no reason to ak-we-est to our request." Ruby looks at him slightly confused.
"It means no," he supplies, "then what?" Qrow didn't seem to be too concerned with the fact that they had failed to get any information on Ozpin.
"He looked at Weiss kind of funny. Like he could see into her soul, and said 'no disguise will hide one's true character' and then he said something to Blake, I'm sorry, I don't remember I…I," tears begin to slide down her face again. It was all too clear that what Aesop had said rattled Ruby.
"Men are too apt to condemn in others the very things they practice themselves," Yang says from the doorway disdainfully, like the words themselves were sour in her mouth.
Qrow turns to her. "You're sure he knows something?" Yang simply nods in response. "You four are going to have to find out."
"But he said no," Ruby argues.
"No," Qrow shakes his head. "He said you gave him no reason to tell you." He looks back and forth between the sisters. "What was the last thing he said?"
"Something about throwing Ruby and me out the window...which he did." Yang is not as amused as Qrow about this.
"Yeah, he does that. But before that, what did he say? Come on, you two are smarter than this."
"Strangers should avoid those who quarrel among themselves." The re-appearance of Blake has Yang making a bee-line for the door again.
"Stop." Qrow demands. "Don't you get it? Especially you." He points at Yang, who is thoroughly done with all of this. "We had better bear our troubles bravely than try to escape them."
"Quit talking in riddles and tell us what to do to get it out of him!" Yang's semblance flares as she reaches her tipping point. Ruby nearly knocks her sister over with the force of her hug. After a few moments of her sister's embrace, Yang's eyes cool to their original color, but she's still staring daggers at Blake.
"When you figure it out, you'll know what to do. Knock it off and go get some rest."