Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Snow would come up to her ankles, if it wasn’t for her boots. Trees would obscure her vision, if she didn’t know the way by heart.

“All Right Pipsqueak, lesson for today is a simple one.” When Qrow speaks, his craggy voice creaks like the thin wood surrounding them. Something is carried on the wind, the smell of hemp and herb. Of cold. Of alcohol. Of aftershave. Of pine.

It is not night, but the world is grey and white, clouds layering the sky. She hangs onto every word, and joy warms her blood, as she knows his chuckle is for her and her stupid admiration. He looks at her eyes, like she personally hung the moon in the sky. And she, him.

“Your semblance came in, and I’ve been watching you use it.” He had, since when? She has to get better at feelings eyes on her. To used to a cloak over her neck. “You’re good kiddo, really good, but I’m not gonna let you make the same mistake I’ve seen countless speedsters make. Gotta be fast for your soul, strong for your weapon,” He taps at Crescent Rose with the pommel of his own blade, she only lets him do it without repercussion, because without him she wouldn’t have been able to make her so fast. She still has trouble believing she’s finished sometimes. It’s only been two weeks, but she’s slept with her every night.

“And nimble, so that brain of yours doesn’t get to ahead of itself.” He shrugs at their surroundings, branches that curl like roots, around and around trunks and logs until the wooded path is just wood. “These trees are impossible to move through at any speeds. I’ll know that I can trust you with your semblance, once you can get home and back without so much as tripping. Beat me there, and I’ll even give you a spar kiddo.”

And with that and a wink, Qrow walks a few steps ahead, and than is out of her sight entirely. Gone into the woods. A race then, a race for a spar! She never gets those. Dad says she isn’t old enough, so she has to settle for watching him fight Yang. It’s not fair, but Qrow thinks so too, and manages to sneak them in every now and then, when she’s really earned it.

And so she’s off. She doesn’t have to think to run through these woods. Her semblance is new, and she pushes it past what she thought it could go. 20, 40, 60, 80, 100, 120, more and more miles per child-hour. She doesn’t mess up once, doesn’t so much as clip herself on a leaf. It just feels natural to move like this, and Qrow always over exaggerates the dangers of the forest. Like he was scared of something she couldn’t see. But these trees have always ever been just trees. These woods have always ever been just woods. And for as long as she has had memories, she has been the scariest thing within them.

Pride flashes in her chest, and she can’t help but howl as she goes faster than she’s ever gone before. A wolfs cry that she laughs over, before trying at it again, before laughing once more, than again, and again, and again, all the way back home.

It was so fun. That’s something she hopes she’ll never forget. Nights like these. Where being herself was just fun. Where practice was just fun. It hurts somedays, but she knows that, even if it will cost her her life, being a huntress will be everything and more.

She didn’t make a mistake, she did the best she could, which is a considerable amount. So she knows she must have beat Qrow to the house.

But she seems him, as the snow begins to fall on the log cabin. There’s a light on inside, smoke from the chimney. Yang is cooking something, and as Qrow opens the door, he laughs at her good naturedly, but she’s not in the mood to take it that way.

“Sorry pipsqueak, better luck next time.”

~~~

Most criminals would have gone for the body shot, and her aura would have eaten it right up. So she knows this man must have experience killing, or more accurately running away from huntresses, from his bullseye shout at the concrete just beneath her feet.

After making sure the people around her okay, she tries to go after him. With dust in her lungs and particles in her eyes, but her speeds been blunted to a degree she’s never really trained for. Stupid of her, stupid stupid, stupid.

“Persistent.”

There’s nothing she can do to stop him from getting onto that helicopter. And she knows whatever happens because of the actions of this man in the future, will be on her.

When he tells her it’s the “End of the line Red!” She knows the truth. She knows the truth even as she’s to slow to even get away without help.

It wasn’t the end of the line, she never even reached the it.

~~~

She’s never been useless without her scythe, not really. She may have never been able to beat Yang with just her fists, and Yang may have told the rest of the team about their 86-0 record, and she may have never taken Goodwitch’s classes that seriously, half-scared of what the pedestal Pyrrha had found herself upon would do to her own team dynamics, and half-scared of what her inexperience with Crescent Rose against people would do to flesh.

But she’s not stupid, and she has certainly never lacked in her motivation for training.

And besides, Yang has never seen her take out jackals by pressing her fingers into their throat. Nor has Goodwitch seen her throw punches with enough speed to crack the ribs of Beowolves.  

She didn’t even have to fight anyhow, she only needed to dodge once.

And no one has seen her dodge the swoops of a Nevermore wingspan that can feel like the sky falling. No one has seen her dodge the crushing wake of a Goliaths foot that can feel like a mountain opening up to eat you.

So than who was that boy, who was able to see through her so transparently, that his skinny little leg found her stomach, when she was trying her best to go as fast as she must.

Of course, he couldn’t hold her back for long. All that skill bought him just a few seconds off of her. A block, an uppercut, a missed kick, and than she was through him like wind through the air.

But just a few seconds was all it took, for her to be late.

~~~

She doesn’t regret throwing Neo off.

She doesn’t regret fighting the two of them with her blade stayed afront her. Too scared to finish the deed, to win the fight.

She doesn’t even feel guilt, as she isn’t fast enough to warn him of his own demise, her saving grace.

She knows the two of them are right, and she knows she must fight anways.

She knows, that it had to happen like this, that there was no other way. Certainty playing out on fates strings.

She just wishes she didn’t have too watch.

~~~

The long road up the tower of Beacon was made into perfect conditions by her partner. By her team.

There was no dust in her throat, no Qrow and his mysteries, no scary malicious boy that could somehow keep up with her without even showing off what his semblance was.  

It was just her, and the question of how fast could she run.

How many feet could she cover in a second? Half of one? In a blink? Was it twenty? Thirty? Fifty?

She doesn’t know how much faster she’d of have to have been to save Pyrrha. She just knows that despite everything, even at her best. She-

Just.

Wasn’t.

Fast.

Enough.

~~~

Her world becomes silver, but not for long. Dulled into grey by something, even if it burned just as hot. Her eyes open before her mind awakes, and she looks around trying to find something, anyone, her, please just one of them. She’s on a stretcher, but it’s put down, and she’s suddenly aware of-

~~~

“I’m sorry kiddo, I tried to stop them, I really did, but I can’t be everywhere at once. It’s just… it was just bad luck, you didn’t get back in time.” Qrows voice whirls out, as adrenaline is ringed from her body, and than what’s left?

A girl alone in a crowded place. Bullheads humming above with the fireflies, one of them with Weiss, as she gets the news her bastard father had taken her away while she had ran off and failed to save Pyrrha.

One of the most devastating nights in human history, something she had been preparing to give her life to defend against for as long as she had a being to remember. Training with her baby, training her focus, training her speed. And what did she have to show for it, other than a boot to the stomach. Who did she have left other than…

A hand is on her shoulder, and red eyes are right in front of her. Worried and loving in that secret way she knows Yang or Dad don’t think he’s capable. Her favorite bad influence. “Hey, you’re going to be alright, right kiddo? You…” He swallows on nothing. There’s not much left to swallow anyhow, it’s all over, and no one gave the night the memo that there where heavy things to process.

The air is cold and crisp, and the sky brilliantly clear of clouds. Any other day it would be perfect. That soft calm wind cups her cheek, and she looks down. Less she feel more like a child, for being comforted by his presence.

“You did all you could alright.” She hopes not, she hopes she isn’t that pathetic. “Just… stay with your sister, and I’ll be back in a minute, just need to take care of a few more things, okay?”

He’s gone before she can look away. Yang’s out cold, and missing an arm. It should have been her. To busy getting Pyrrha killed, to be there for her actual team.

Yang will survive, but she won’t be the same. Her sister didn’t understand the cost of this job like she did. She never faulted her for it, never corrected her, it was never her place, it wouldn’t have been helpful.

She lets out a sigh, shaky and raspy like her uncle. Throat coated with blood instead of twenty years of smoke residue. She can see her breath hang in the air, an idyllic night.

And than she see’s it out of the corner of her eye, the opposite direction of Qrow. Someone fading into shadow just as he is capable of, yet oh so far away.

She knows she has no time to think, no time to brush the hair out of Yang's sweated coated face goodbye, no time for anything. If she waits, she’ll get away, if she wait’s she’ll be to late.

Maybe there’s still one person she doesn’t have to fail.

She’s in petal burst before she can process how weak her body feels, and laughing to herself despite it all. Perhaps sardonic, perhaps just overwhelmed.

She’s relieved to have another chance, but why does Blake have to make something simple so hard.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

"And so Blake" Ghira growls into her ear, "the little girl went back for her bags full of the honey she stole, and found it caught on a branch. And she pulled at it crying out that it was hers, the bag RIPPED open, spilling the sticky sweet over her path. And when she heard from the Glade Ursa GROOOOWLING she tried to run, but found she was stuck."

"Daaaaad, that story didn't make any since." She has made sure to laugh and scream at all the right places, but she really did prefer it when one of her moms read to her.

"Perhaps, Kitten. But this is just the kind of thing I'm supposed to read to you."

She giggles from underneath her covers, "Dad, what does that even mean."

"I mean, everyone has heard these stories, so its important you do to. It will help you communicate with others one day, to have a shared baseline of myth. Someone who wasn't told to be afraid of the forest as a kid... It just isn't right. Besides, understanding some of the language in here will help you converse, and-"

When Dad gets like this, it's best to pretend to have fallen asleep. She doesn't understand what hes saying at all, but hes usually right, so it probably doesn't matter.

She tries her best to dream of honey.

~~~

Her mother strokes her hair as she speaks, calm with nails gently through her scalping, and scritching at the base of her ears. 

"And she caressed her daughters face, the blind mother. But she loves nothing but Bark. 'That isn't me' the daughter howls, but all that happens is the ruffling of her leaves, as her throat has been replaced with sap, her eyes with roots, and her skin with wood." 

"'Oh daughter, if only you had listened, of only you had followed the way. You must be blind as me, to have strayed from the path. I thought my words would be enough, what a failure of a mother I am.' The blind mother says to one one, as she takes her blade and presses it to her throat. It is the trees that grow from the mothers blood, not the daughter, who would never hear from her mother again."

Blake doesn't remember crying herself to sleep that night, but she still remembers the cowled look Kali had the next day. It was rare her mother felt shorter than Kali or Sienna. 

And she remembers how even Sienna lavished her with gentle affection, as Kali apologized profusely to the three of them.

She never had the chance to tell her, before she left, how much she cherished that story. Or at the least, her families version of it.

~~~

"My pride, let it be stated that he is foolish."

Adam speaks up for himself, as Sienna talks through him towards Blake. "Khan, you can't-"

"Shut up. Blake, if the two of you really mean to travel to Vale, keep my words in mind before you allow your Menagerien Pride to get you killed. Or, in Adams case, his Mantle pride." 

Adams hand grips her thigh, and she wishes her mother hadn't said that.

"People speak of the dangers of our Jungles, or Atlas's mountains, because the danger is surmountable. There is reputation to gain, if you prove you can prepare and survive the thick heat, or unending ice."

She pauses for a moment, as she loves to do when she thinks she has a good speech going. She looks right at Blake, and sees nothing wrong.

"But there is nothing to earn in the forest of Vale. No reputation to garner, no pride to stay intact. Stories come from somewhere, and legends are retold for a reason. Stick to the paths, travel in large groups, or you will become lost. The Trees there are thick, and loop into themselves without markers. The Grimm are unending, and hide behind branches so close as to whip your face. The moment you loose sight of the path, you will be lost. "

~~~

'To never return is a complicated phrase, full of innuendo that plays of off cultural norms we have long forgotten. In the modern day, we interpret tales of becoming lost in the woods, as one of death. But perhaps the child was only corrupted in a manner which the towns culture could no longer accept. [Heimrick, 27] Or, if you wish for a more cheerful interpretation, the notion of being lost could be a cyclic statement, one where the child has lost their childhood, and in turn begun their hike to a new and unseen life. [Todd, 31]

Blake shuts the book closed with a clap, and a bemused smile on her face. It... wasn't exactly what she had expected? Average grades and that sort of personality, wouldn't lead one to believe that Ruby reads classics and lit crit in her free time, yet, here she is.

She sighs and gets up, excited to go back to the dorms. She would have killed to see Weiss's reaction to Ruby's for pleasure books, and she's hoping she still has time. Those two are cute together she can't help it.

Besides, she really should thank her leader. It's not the type of thing she'd normally read, ever. But she truly did enjoy it.

~~~

She runs through the woods, she runs through the trees, and it feels like hours but it could be minutes, and her only guide is a red cloak slipping between where the wood presses tight and twists and confuses. 

Even at such an unrelenting pace, even as they don't speak, she feels as if she's following someone slowing themselves down even as they walk ahead, so someone slower can keep it.

Which means somehow Ruby is paying attention to her, even as her breath comes heavy and her pace is slowed, only for a second wind to pick back up.

She thinks to shout through the trees, to ask Ruby where they're going, but she doubts her lea- her friend(?), would be able to hear.

At least she got her wish, she is sure they will be far away from the city, whenever Ruby comes to some sort of stop. Though, the entire affair is just making her realize more and more...

She didn't talk to this girl much, even if it sometimes felt like they had already spent a life time together.

The trust in her heart, that Ruby does know the way doesn't fade, but she is starting to understand she might not know this girl at all.

~~~

Blake stumbles out into an alcove, hidden away with shelter and water for deers hiding from the rain, or worse.

 Ruby has already reached, the girl appraising it while stretching out the kinks of the journey. Stretching out the kinks of the day might not be in the cards.

Out of breath, huffing and puffing, Blake asks. "Could you have.... not slowed down, just a bit."

Ruby gives her a once over, from under her hood, Blake can't tell if she is being appraised any differently than the quality of the rivers water.

"Sorry Blake," and her laugh seems different, "you were the one that wanted to get out of the city as fast as possible. And I do want to find a caravan or town soon. After tonight... a lot of rural towns will be leaving the region, it would be good to travel with one."

Blake gives into to her urges, and collapses onto the grass. Sweat mingling with dew, a puddle that still can't see beneath the hood.

"You... how do you even know where we're going. Where are we going?"

Ruby starts breaking off wood with her bare hands from the trees Sienna Khan was scared of, before ignoring half of the question. "We're going towards the coast, tomorrow we're going to follow this river and pray to find a port town. If we find a group fleeing, we travel with them to help. Sound like a plan?"

It.. it does, but Blake isn't sure if she should follow it. Something uncertain beats like a caged animal in her chest, stuffed back into the shape of something calm by normalcy. But today was the most horrific day of her life, it shouldn't feel like this.

There must be something to say, something to feel, something beneath that cloak or in between the lines of such utilitarian words. 

Blake's never been good at sorting this sort of feeling out.

"Ruby I..."

The girl turns, "Don't worry about me princess. You'll be safe her as long as you don't follow. Just sit still and make a fire, I'll go find us something to eat." 

Ruby disappears into the trees, Red gone from sight, and a pressure is relieved. 

...

Okay, she didn't expect it from her, but if she doesn't snip this princess thing in the bud, it's clearly going to stick.

She laughs something ragged to herself at the though, but who is she to take away however Ruby is processing all this. If she want's to larp as someone else for a few days, maybe that's healthy.

Sticks are gathered and friction is made, an order obeyed. 

Still, it sounds so unnatural coming from the younger girl.

A flame sparks, and Blake's ears wilt. But what even is natural. Blake had been content to leave Ruby to her own affairs. Leave the obvious respect unspoken. Let silence be comradery. 'You deal with Weiss, I'll deal with Yang."

That's how she had thought of team RWBY, but maybe that was only ever thinking about Yang.

Always lying to herself about her ability to connect with more than one person at a time.

Always lying about things that break so easily.

Her eyes are red and raw when Ruby returns, the flame is an irritant, but not the cause.

Blake can't tell if Ruby even sees, a cloak blinds as it protects surely. Either way, she appreciates it not being remarked on.

~~~

"How did you even catch Rabbits this fast?" Blake let their stomachs settle, and the fire reduce to crackles, before she allowed herself to ask.

When Ruby returned not 30 minutes after leaving, she fell to the ground afront the fire with a thud, and tiredly began to skin and cook her prey. Neither of them opened a conversation with the other, and both of them felt comfortable in the silence, warm on a quiet night.

Blake didn't know you could see the moon from anywhere in the forest, the brush to thick. Ruby once again proved her wrong.

"I hunted them," Ruby says while pondering a bone completely cleaned off of meat. If the mood of sky is affecting her, she's not showing it. She hasn't looked up once throughout the reverie of dinner, and Blake seriously doubts her lea- par- travel companions line of sight with her hood still up.

Seriously, it's become a little ridiculous. Like that time Yang wore shades in the dorms for a week straight. Only reason she stopped was-

... 

Stupid story anyways.

"Yes I know you hunted them," Blake has the grace to immediately be cowed when she hears how angry she sounds. "But... it takes good hunters hours to find game in a place that's... well not this." She gestures around them, to the density of brush even Ruby can't ignore the meaning of.

"Blake, why does hunting game take so long."

"Well, because you have to find it, stalk it, wait for an angle to shoot from. Move to fast and they run away, make a sound and they run away."

"That's right. Rabbits can survive out here because they're faster than any predator. But you've seen my lap times, I schooled the three of you on how fast I can cover distance. Do you think I'm slower than a rabbit?"

Blake stills, and glances down at where the meat she already at was. She supposes it doesn't actually make a difference, but she feels like she'll gag if she doesn't ask. 

"Ruby, how did you kill these Rabbits?"

"Crescent Rose wouldn't leave enough to eat, you can piece it together princess."

Ruby lets out a pleased scoff at whatever look she has on her face, than gets up and stretches post dinner. It's a somewhat odd routine for Blake to watch.

For one, Blake is now just realizing. She had never seen Ruby go through a workout routine before, like she had Weiss or Yang. She had never noticed when Ruby took her showers either now that she thinks about it, nor does she know where or how Ruby maintains her Weapon. 

She had always had to utilize passive aggression with Weiss and Yang and their excessive shower lengths. She had seen both of them sweaty and sore in their dorms and in the gyms, and she knew Ember Celica innards like intimately. She even at the least knew how to clean Myrtenaster.

Meanwhile, Ruby was just... an always maintained being, never in anyone's way, yet seemingly omni-present wherever she was needed.

How had she never noticed that before?

Her eyes trail across Ruby's extended and bending body, as the second feeling of oddity refuses to chase down the bad aftertaste of the first. It’s hard to tell, her body obscured so thoroughly by layers of leather and tough fabric, but Ruby is flexible. Almost as much as her. That… that doesn’t sound right?

Ruby had always been strong, but not as strong as her or Yang. Always been coordinated, but not as much as Yang or Weiss.  Always been smart, but not as smart as Weiss or herself.

Ruby was fast, and she had a persuasion to her that made her a good leader. Perhaps not when it came to tactics, though she certainly wasn’t bad at that, but rather she just had a way of not only moving people around a battlefield smoothly, but making what should be chaotic, feel natural. That’s what Ruby’s strengths were…

But Blake drew these conclusions, watching her snipe and snip from the background, only ever delivering the odd finishing blow in the for.

Blake asks from where is still sitting on the ground, “Ruby… Can I ask you one more question?”

“I dunno, I think it’s my turn to ask a question? Have you been keeping track? I kinda lost it…”

“Track of what?”

“Of the game of twenty questions we’ve been playing  for the past 6 hours.”

Oh gods she’s talking about the tree, “Oh my god you’re a dork. No, I have no idea what question we’re on.”

Ruby doesn’t sit back down, and instead starts shuffling together something approximating a slightly softer less stick filled plot of ground to sleep in.  Even as she doesn’t look at her, there is a soft earnestness in her voice.

“Welp, you answered my question, so now you may ask me a question, go ahead Blake.”

And what to ask. Is she okay? What the fuck just happened? How many of their friends lived? Why is she helping her be a coward? How has she not broken down yet? What does this mean for the rest of the kingdoms? How many people died tonight? How many did they fail?

“Ruby…” Blake is sure Ruby must have seen the redness in her eyes early, and just chosen not to remark on them. For whatever reason she is now choosing not to remark the quiver in her voice. “What… what’s your favorite fairy tale?”

Ruby settles in for the night, cozying into her artisanal dirt bed. They will need to get supplies at their first stop, where that might be, if there are still supplies left on this continent sent to hell to get. But for now, it’s just the two of them, and a dying flame. Crackle Crackle Cracking, quitter now than the Firefly's and cicadas. Quieter than the wind on the hollow branches.

“I thought that would be obvious Blake. The Tale of the Silver Eyed Huntress.”

“The Love Story?”

“That’s not how I see it.”

Blake tries quiet her gentle hiccuping, hoping it is taken as an invitation to continue.

“It’s about fate. About a woman who is so certain about what she want’s from life, it becomes her name. Who is so dedicated to it, her contribution surpasses the logic of age. About being born into something so perfect, something that can’t be taken from you.” A rasp in her voice, and Blake will remember how it sounds forever. “And she gets to have all of that, all those amazing gifts, just by being kind to people. By giving and expecting nothing in return. It’s everything I’ve ever wanted.”

“It’s, it’s a sad story though, no?”

“How could it be.”

“She dies at the end, and someone less skilled is forced to take up her mantle, her legacy is forgotten.”

“But she makes the world a better place.”

“Her village  burns not a generation later.”

“But she tried, and for as long as she did, it was better.”

“She could have lived longer, could have stayed with her love until they were older.”

“No, I don’t think she could have. Not without a name. That’s not how fairy tales work Blake, it’s why I love them.”

“Ruby…”

“Yeah?”

The fire dies out, and it’s now just two woman trying to sleep after a long day.

“Did… did you expect something like this to happen one day?”

“Of course not.”

“But it didn’t surprise you?”

“Of course not.”

“…”

“Good night Ruby.”

“Goodnight… I’m… Thank you for letting me come with you, I’m glad you’re here with me too.”

Blake turns over, and nothing else is said.

But she does return the favor, and pretends for both their sakes, to not notice how Ruby’s whole body shakes throughout the night. Or how red her eyes are in the morning as well.

Chapter Text

Waking up to a new day is rough, when you wake up to dirt stuck to your face with drool as its adhesive. Your muscles sore and tight, your clothes dusted with debris, and head pounding with the remnants of a bad sleep.

Still, a new day must be faced, even when you’re someplace new.

In a new world.

Not everyone has the privilege this morning.

But it seems Ruby has it in excess, as she sits next to a new fire roasting four whole fish also too small to be speared by Cresent Rose over it.

The camp smells amazing, and Ruby is soaking wet. She still has her hood up, but there are wet globs of hair stuck to her chin that give her the vibe of a soggy old dog. Her garb is dry, but it’s better off than your own. Hers are designed to be worn longer without becoming dirty or damaged, though it still contorts around her body in a way that implies the skin underneath it isn't dry.

"Oh, Morning Blake! Was hoping I could wake you up to something nice. Ruby cheerfully rotates one of the fish, and Blake can't stop her stomach from growling.

"Ruby... what?"

"Yeah, it's not ideal, but who knows how long it will be till we get to a real town, I'd suggesting washing off in the river while you can. Breakfast will be ready when you're done."

Ruby fixes her with a smile, and now that the adrenaline of yesterday is fully out of her system, she hates the way she believes in it. Neither of them deserves something nice after running.

But the day continues, Blake walks what is at most twenty feet to the right, yet feels like its in its own world. A brook? Or perhaps a river, she could never tell the difference, but her books say brooks crackle, and there is certainly a pleasant and deep sound bouncing off from it. So, a brook surrounded by trees it is.

She can smell the smoke of the fire, smell the cooking of fish, hear the humming of her lea- Ruby, and she ponders only the most important of things as one does when faced with a good dip in water.

Is it worth it?

To walk miles and miles in wet clothes? Probably not, they don’t even have soup to warm her afterwards.

She slips her huntress outfit off, hating the way it peels away from her skin, and wishes she could wear something a little more like Ruby does. Something less light weight, that doesn’t soak up filth and blo-…

That she couldn’t get dirty so easily.

It doesn’t matter, they will have to buy new clothes before they depart for Menageire anyhow. Both of their outfits are terribly unfit for the weather. She doesn’t know where they’ll get the money, or find the shop, or if she’s actually ever seen Ruby wear something that’s not her Huntress or her Beacon uniform. She hopes the girl isn’t too attached to her singular outfit.

A brave new world for everyone to face.

She strips out of her undergarments too, those she definitely doesn’t want to walk in wet, and takes a moment to go through a normal routine as she would have at Beacon. Stretching comfortably to her limit. Bending her toned legs, flexing her tight abdomen, bringing her arms over her head and back down in a windmill motion. A content sigh purring in her chest, and warming her body.

She knows how you can be driven mad, and later to incompetency, if you don’t enjoy the little things in your horrid days.

A new part of her routine, one that Yang had convinced her into doing. While she stretches, she takes account of her own body. How it may be sticky with old sweat, yet her skin is soft underneath. During a stretch up, she lets her hand glide over the peaks of her breasts. She takes note of the feeling of hair under her arms, and on her pelvis, as well as the little trail down her stomach. It’s still novel to see how they frame her. In the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t that long ago she hadn’t been allowed to keep herself ‘groomed naturally’ as her smut would say.

A foot steps into the water, testing for sharp stones, and when all is smooth, she journeys deeper. Letting it come up to her waste, and seeing how her hair sticks to her, and enjoying how the water has to curve around her only to fall back in line after parting for hips.

“It’s important to learn to enjoy yourself Blakey” Yang had said with a wink, “it’s the only Luxury you never run out of. You reaaaaly won’t run out of it, trust me.”

Heat and shame flush her cheeks, as she attempts to cool off by immersing herself all the way to her collarbone, watching how her body floats and refracts in such clear.

Long fingers glide down her stomach, sharp nails dragging over muscle hidden under fat, and through fine yet soft body hair. An absent minded touch, that demands her focus. It wasn’t that long ago that all these novel ideals about her self had entered her brain, and despite everything else that’s changed in the span of a night, this can’t be taken from her again. 

Yang had been right.

~~~

Blake feels a bit like a character from that old puzzle game, where they would just walk and walk even to their demise, unless they are told to change directions, towards a destination only the player knows.

Blake had told Ruby no more leaders, but only because she… wasn’t a fan of the idea of being a follower in a two person dynamic. Still, only Ruby knew the way, for now.

She knew it, she would pop up in a burst of vibrant red suddenly draping the high branches and cascading down to the dried leaves as rose petals, point Blake in a new direction to struggle through, then was off again just as fast.

She can’t help but get the feeling, that Ruby was really enjoying this. Always in a rush, always a bit out of breath, always smiling in a way she had never seen her smile before. It had Blake accepting instantly, that she had never seen Ruby actually smiling before.

Something to be concerned about, if the aftermath of an apocalypse didn’t feel like such a fresh slate. Ruby isn’t her problem anymore… or well, she isn’t her partners problem and therefor her problem anymore, if she ever was.

She also can’t help but get the feeling, as the trees choke closer, and the ‘path’ of pebble and wilted grass becomes nothing but root, that Ruby is on the cusp of forgetting about her, off… clearing the path of Grimm? Blake would protest her not letting her help, but Gambol Shroud is worthless in this terrain, humans should be worthless in this terrain, and frankly she just isn’t in the mood.

She hadn’t slept well at all, and if she wasn’t so good at knowing when someone is faking being asleep, she would resent Ruby for not sharing a similar fate throughout the night.

So, she feels like she owes it to the girl to let her have her fun, her joy where she can find it. But even on the run, she needs herself to be more selfish than she used to be. Even if she might have practiced it in excess.

“Ruby” she says next time the girl pops into existence, and pointing the two of them left.  Blake licks the remaining fish taste of Ruby’s fire stick. “Would you mind… keeping me company while we walk for today.”

“What’s the matter Blakey, the fo-“

“Don’t call me that.”  She has never loved Ruby as a leader more, than in this moment, when her anger is ignored, and Ruby simply says, “Right, of course. I can stick around as long as you want me to Blake. The two of us are the most dangerous things in these woods anyhow, the scouting is overkill.”

And then they walk in silence, for what must be at least an hour, though it is peaceful.

“Sooooooo” Ruby interrupts the peace, an awkward hand fidgeting in her hair, “did you like… want to talk.”

“Talk about what, Ruby. How many of our friends died last night, How your sister got hurt because of me. How a continent I ran away too is now collapsing, and it was caused in part by a man I dragged to it.”

“Okay well first off, I don’t blame you for any of that.”

“You weren’t there.” Blake knows her anger is useless, but it’s only how tired Ruby sounds, when she says, “I know, I know I wasn’t.” that takes the winds out of Blake's sails, and suddenly she has nothing to say once again.

“But-“ Ruby continues, “We don’t have to talk about that, we can talk about…” her eyes dart around the forest, than to Gambol Shroud at her hip, then back towards the trees with a flush. “The scenery?”

Blake laugh is dry, more of a cough really, but it puts a smile on Ruby's face that Blake feels pride at being able to salvage back.

It’s nothing, like how she looks when she’s actually happy though, she knows now.

No reason to let her know her jig is up though. It would be pointlessly cruel. Never kick a girls alibi while it’s down.

“How about this Ruby,”

“Wait, didn’t you ask me to walk and talk, why am I getting placated.”

Blake continues on with a self satisfied smirk. Full of wisdom, and mysterious intent, almost assuredly Blake thinks to herself.

“We can continue our game.”

Ruby tilts her head in confusion, “What game?”

And despite the circumstances, Blake feels the laughter bubbling under her throat of a bit coming together perfectly, “Ruby Rose, I can’t believe you forgot, our game of-“

Question five of twenty:

"So who's question is it anyways?"

"I asked the last question, so next one goes to you. Good question though. My question is-"

"Hey, wait? What! Blake that's not fa-"

Question six of twenty:

"So, what was the deal with you and Torchwick?" 

Ruby's face looses some of its artificial luster, and suddenly the trees feel thicker. Blake almost takes the question back, but she has a feeling that would be worse.

Plus, Ruby's light blush is cute.

"what's THAT supposed to mean."

"Chill out Weiss, I didn't mean it like that."

Ruby pouts, puffed up cheeks and all, and Blake is now pretty sure she's playing it up, if only to play off something else.

"I thought we weren't gonna talk about that Blake." 

Oh, so it's just about Weiss. heh, that makes since.

"I mean I'd rather not make it a thing, but it would be more awkward to never acknowledge them."

Ruby looks at her funny, "Blake, you said you weren't ready to talk about yesterday yet.. or at least implied it I thought."

"Oh, did you..." She doesn't know how to feel about that idea, Torchwick of all people deserved it, but to think Ruby was capable of..

 She can't keep the horror out of her voice, and she's not sure if the hate she feels towards herself seeing how Ruby flinches, is justified or instinct. 

"No, I didn't kill him," oh thank the gods,"I just..." Ruby swallows around something in her throat, "had to watch."

Oh. A lot of people had to watch people die that day. But she doesn't know where Ruby was that night, what she did, or what she witnessed. Blake doesn't understand why aftet everything, one might mourn Roman Torchwick, but what do you say to something like that other than, "I'm sorry."

"Yeah... I am too."

Question seven of twenty: 

"so what DID you mean by that?"

"Is that your question?"

"Yup" Ruby pops her P's in the same way Yang did, in the same way that entire family did. She focuses for just a second on the way her lips go behind her teeth as she does it, and feels hot envy at how close that family is. Was. Their destination putting her in the mood for it she supposes. 

"I thought... it feels like you don't actually want to talk about this?"

Ruby shrugs her shoulders in a way Blake makes sure to file away in her memory like a potential puzzle piece. "I do and I don't. We're both running away right now Blake, it feels wrong not to at least think about the dead, if there's something to say for them."

Stupid stupid girl, stupid bitch she hears a much deeper voice than Ruby's says in her head. She's not just taking Ruby from her sister, but the funerals as well, and here she is asking about Roman fucking Torchwick.

It's Blake's turn to swallow around something awful in her throat.

"It's just... why did you help me track down Torchwick like you did. Why did you enjoy it?"

"I'm a huntress Blake. I love being one. Hunting down bad guys was part of the job."

"But not one you love."

Ruby squints at her, something sharp that feels new, that makes her cower for just a second. She's not hiding anything, but there is suddenly certainty she couldn't if she tried. A reared head revealing a pressure that was always there.

"What do you mean by that?"

"It's just, I'm thinking about you, about all the things that don't make sense suddenly. About why you're helping me." Ruby keeps looking at her from under her hood, and even with the distance between them, Blake can't help but squirm.

"We might not be a team anymore, but now we're partners, kinda" Ruby shrugs with a childlike hopefulness in her strained smile, pushing an ambiguous line, and Blake hates that she's suspicious of it. "And I would hope my partner would think she deserves it."

A silence.

A cough.

"Ruby I... well... It's just that you never seemed to enjoy fighting in Goodwitch’s classes, or in the tournament. You kept back, gave us advice, took a few shots, and I always just thought it was because you didn't have the confidence to fight more experienced huntresses, but you're plenty confidant now, and... it wasn't like when we fought Grimm, I still remember what you looked like the first day I met you all the way up on that mountain. But with Roman you... you just seemed to have more fun? Or at least you got closer to it a bit more." Blake sighs, lost for a conclusion. "What was it about him, that Beacon lacked?"

A pressure eases. 

Ruby brings her hand up to her chin, ruminating her fingers along its sharp edges. "I never really thought about it like that? I mean, at Beacon I wanted to let you guys get as much practice as you could get," 

Oh. That's... awful to hear, but also informative. 

"But I guess with Roman it just felt... simple? I didn't have to think as hard about how every move I made or word I said would impact you guys. He was just kind of a cartoon bad guy ya know... he was, fun? in that easy sort of way. I didn't have to worry about him as much?"

"You didn't have too... Ruby, Roman Torchwick was scum. The worst of the worst. He was pure destruction and cruelty just for its sake!"

"Actually, he monologued at me for a bi-"

Her breath comes quick. This was supposed to be a clean break, what is this child doing here anyways. 

"And all of that poison he funneled into the White Fang. What was supposed to be a force of good for the Fanaus of Vale, was instead turned into an extension of him. What didn't you understand about that!?" 

Her breath heaves, and even as Blake took a step back, then another, until her back stood tall and pressed into bark, Ruby seems to shrink under her. She seems younger, but Blake doesn't know what to trust about the girl anymore. Should she feel guilt over her anger, or is this just another little thing Ruby has pre-thought out for 'her own good'. When did she have to start thinking about things like that, about who she was following again.

But Ruby isn't her leader anymore. Nor is she her partner. Blake had made that clear to her, even as Ruby had pushed at that boundary. She is just a huntress on the same path in the woods with her.

So deep into the woods, on a path she doesn't know.

"Blake I'm just... I'm just a huntress I kill Grimm. Everything with Roman, I just wanted to help you. Just wanted everyone to get along." 

Rubys eyes are wet, but what can Blake trust. Fucking what. "Get Along. Did you see Torchwick as a trust exercise!? So that what, we could kill Grimm better!? What? Are politics beneath the station of a huntress!?”

“No! Of course not, it’s just… I hunt Grimm, anything else an-“

“Oh, so it’s just that politics are beneath your station.”

“Blake that’s not what I mean.”

“You only figured out who the leaders of Menagerie were, once you learend they were my parents. You had never heard of the white fang until you came to Vale and fought Roman. You… can you even tell me who the fuck was running Patch.”

Ruby kicks at the dirt beneath her, before muttering. “I mean, it’s a really small town.”

Blake tries to glare at her, tries to assert something over her, but all she can look down at is that stupid fucking hood. “Ruby, be honest with me, like you said you would try to be. Could you have stopped Roman, if you really tried. Was he just free training to you, a night on the town?”

“Blake, I-“  something dies in her throat, but it just sounds like her giving up. Like her not caring.

It’s hard to storm off, when you have to follow who you turn your back on, but Blake gives it her best effort. “That’s all I needed to hear. Ruby, I don’t know what your issue is us, but if you really want to help me, learn how to let yourself enjoy what you do, without hiding away what would be actually useful.”

She doesn’t know what she said, but something switches withen the cloaked woman behind her. A “Tssk," that’s much too familiar, and has Blake shrinking into herself is heard, even as Ruby storms off into the woods. Than once again, the only thing Blake has to follow in the woods, is a winding after image of Red, and the only paths where there are no more wolves left to howl.

Chapter Text

When Blake wakes up that night. It's to Rubys watch. Perched on a branch, hunched over the shattered move, cradling it like a mother. With casual ease.

At least that’s how it looks from Blakes perspective, she knows really, the sky is so so far away. No matter if it feels like you could touch it.

Ruby either doesn't notice her waking, or doesn't acknowledge it. She's so different from her sister. Yang always cared too much, said too much, did too much. Aflame, and so hot too the touch.

VERY hot.

To the touch.

She always thought Ruby was a younger version of her sister. So wonderful and bright and burnt pure. Something real, yet someone who she could follow without thought. A simple arrow to pierce into a better world. Understanding its difficulty and trying all the same.  

She had been wrong. Nothing but porcelain is obvious about the girl, her sisters opposite. Calm and dark underneath that pale imitation that fades into the background when the sun is out.

But still there.

Of course, maybe she's just projecting 

Or maybe Ruby just had a long few days. It had been the end of the world after all.

Blake closes her eyes, resolving to say sorry tomorrow.

She dreams of Red and Black and Roses and Thorns and Books that smell new and burnt.

She has no intention of apologizing to anyone but herself, and her family, when she awakes. 

~~~

When Blake awakes the next morning, Ruby is gone. There is no running water to wash at, but there is a dying fire, and a bundle of berries next to it.

She reaches out for them, and through bleary eyes sees a path of rose petals trailing into the forest from their camp sight. 

A choice she supposes, an offer from Ruby to leave, if Blake wants her to?

But she doesn't know her way, it's not a real choice. It’s just being rushed through her breakfast and into the day, solitary, reminding her how dependent she is on the girl right now.

Is Ruby that cruel? Or did she just need time to cool off as well? Or... did Ruby think Blake needed the time? 

The memory of her outburst fills her with disgust. Is it pride that keeps her from an apology?

No, well maybe. But Ruby is...

She sighs to no one, she thinks, she's a little unclear on how close Ruby sticks to her while she's off clearing the way of Grimm. 

She wouldn't leave her alone... right?

She braves forward into the woods.

~~~

The day begins rough and uphill. The day continues, rough and uphill. Overarchingly, the day remains silent, rough, and uphill. 

Her feet are cut and sore, her skin (and smell) is starting to forget the taste of soap, her hair is knotted and probably has a leaf in it, and she is alone.

Alone and visionless, as even as they climb further and further up into the mountains of Vale, there is no break from the oak canopies. No way to see the valley below, how much has been travelled, and how much is left.

And she feels lonely.

"ugh, Ruby. Can we... talk?"

A beat of silence.

A beat.

A beat 

 A ruffle of leaves. 

Rubz pops into existance on a branch above her, apperance ruffeled, and out of breath. A sense of excitement in her smile, in the petals and leaves falling to the ground, just now fizziling out. Even as her adrenaline wears off, Blake can hear some nerves in her voice. True or invented, she still can't tell.

"Of course Blake, what's up?"

"You... You seem relaxed?"

"Hopefully not too relaxed, I still have a job to do, these woods are not a walk in the park princess."

"No I mea- wait, are we safe right now?"

Ruby waves her off, and laughs in that chuffed way she used to do when playing off Weiss's anxietys "Psssssh, we're fine. Just gotta pay attention and keep ahead of the Grimm we're drawing in, and it's no big deal". 

Ruby hops down from her tree, and begins to walk along side by side with Blake. guiding her forward by small inclinations, and the inertia of assurity. 

"Right well... I just wanted to say... wait, are you even mad still?" 

Ruby throws her arms behind her head as she walks, and she looks so much like Yang. Even if the anger Blake knows must be there is so different. 

"Nah, not one bit. I'm sorry for getting frustrated yesterday. And I’m..." a pause, an intake of breath. Blake wants to believe her so badly, but she knows she won’t be able to. Bitter, that the desire is born from her not having anyone else right now.

She will never be dependent on just one soul again.

Ruby plays with her hair, twirling a tuft that’s sticking out from beneath her hood.

"I'm sorry I didn't take Roman more seriously. I... I've thought a lot about why, but frankly I was just scared."

"Scared? Ruby scared of what. Could you or could you not have taken him out?"

"Kinda depends on if his henchwoman was there or not? I recently learend that she would have absolutely evened the playing field."

Ruby pauses, then under her breath. "Not that we will have to worry about her again though." The comment is quiet, mournful. And Ruby’s guilt almost alights in Blake again, how many people did Ruby’s choice get killed.

Its not a fair thought at all, and who is she to talk. How could anyone have known. Besides, she doesn't want to be mad at her. "Than... what were you scared of?" She allows herself to voice instead.

Ruby stops in her tracks, a leaf crunching beneath her boot. Blake almost stumbles forward, not having expected it. It's to her knowledge the only time Ruby has halted her blitzing pace for anything other than sleep, since the beginning of the end.

Blake tries to meet her eyes, but the top of her hood reminds Blake of the height difference between the two of them, just an inch or two, but there. 

It also reminds Blake that Ruby wants to hide.

“I’m… I’m not quite sure Blake.” She sounds miserable, but it’s not enough. She didn’t want to drag it out of Ruby today, or even tomorrow. But there are some things you can’t hide from, when you spend every waking hour of the day with a person. (By certain definition of with.) Blake, has to understand why Ruby did what she didn’t. Why she was so cowardly, or was it confidence? She has no idea, but she needs to understands. She gets closer, not touching the girl, but looking over her. Pressing her further into the tree. “Not good enough, try again.”

“I know! I know! You think I don’t! You think I don’t know I’m the reason why so many people died! Why Pyrrha died, why Penny died. Even now you see me as a child, you try to tell me that what happened at Beacon was no ones fault. But we wouldn’t be running if you really believed that. Blame lies at everyone’s feet. And I was supposed to good enough, I was supposed to be a good enough despite my age, and I am. Just like my fu- my fucking mother-”

Ruby stutters over her words as she rushes to get them all out. It’s the first time she’s heard her leader. Fuck, no, the first time she’s heard just Ruby stutter. It’s… the first time she’s heard her curse actually?

“And how was I supposed to do all of that Blake, when you all saw so much potential in me. But you also saw that I was weak. That you also saw I was young.  And you saw those things and you felt hope, and potential, and, and!”

Blake doesn’t back off, even as Ruby’s breath quickens, as the body under the cloak shivers once, a hand to its throat. She plans to not move, not even the sneer on her face, even when hands meet her shoulders and shove. She has fought Ruby before and won.

But her Scythe had always been in front of her, Blake never thought about it before, but that is not how Ruby holds it when hunting Grimm.

Yang had once told her and Weiss that Ruby was terrible at hand to hand, that her body strength was on the weaker end.

But to her knowledge, Ruby only sparred hand to hand with Yang. And she had never seen anyone but the two sisters pick up Rubys weapon.

It’s not a surprise than, that she can feel how futile it is to try and stand. That she can just tell how easy it is to push her down and away. She can see it now, from the underside, that Ruby had left camp early this morning because she was afraid.

She can also see how desperate Ruby is to find and answer. For herself. For Blake. For forgiveness. To not ruin something else.

Blake is disgusted with herself.

“Ruby… I’m sorry, we don’t have to… you don’t have to figure this out today. It’s a long walk ahead, I think. I’m not actually clear how far we are from wherever it is you’re taking us. But I know the coast is another few weeks out at the least.”

Ruby leans further into her tree, a nonchalance she knows the younger girl doesn’t feel. With kick backed legged and crossed arm. Desperate to not appear lost, desperate to make Blake understand her.

Desperation looks awful on red and black.

“No, Blake. I just… what was I supposed to do. I like hunting, I like hunting on my own, I like to fight. But if I was good, I wouldn’t be a child. If I loved to fight, I wouldn’t be pure. If I was selfish and alone, I wouldn’t be a leader. If I was smarted I wouldn’t be behind all of you. I just… I didn’t know what to do, I thought I was being who you all needed me to be, and I wasn’t, and I’m sorry.”

Blake gets up, and takes Ruby by the hand. “Ruby… have you tried, just being whoever it is you are? This is… fuck. Why would you even do all of that! No one asked it of you!”

“Oh trust me princess, people have been demanding that of me for much longer than you’ve been around. Nothing special about it, so don’t think you’re special.”

Blake hates how she is relieved by Rubys spittle. How she’s convinced that it’s inherently honest. She hates how much she enjoys yelling back.

“We weren’t the only people that needed you! I thought you of all people would understand that! That’s why I had chosen to follow you!”

Ruby laughs down at where their hands join. “I know, but the three of you were everything to me. I was your leader. You were all I cared about needing me. You still are. And it’s why I’m not your leader anymore.”

“You’re just you now.”

“I… I don’t now how to be? I’m still. I’m still here for you, for all of you.”

“You don’t know how? Ruby just… just be honest with yourself. And with me. You can’t disappoint me like that Ruby, I promise.”

“No, but I can scare you.”

The two girls deflate along with the tension, and Blake would be a hypocrite, if she denied the truth.

“After all this though, don’t I deserve to know who you could be. If you weren’t obsessed with your own idea of leadership. Don’t you deserve it?”

She laughs, and Blake hates how hollow it is. Who is she performing for. “I… I’ll try princess. I can only promise I’ll try.”

“That’s all I can ask Ruby.”

A scythe doesn’t unfurl. A cloak doesn’t come undone, and Blake laughs to herself, as she realizes she gets to be one relieved that the other doesn’t run off instantly.

Their grip lightens, only kept together by the brushing of fingers, both uncertain what is allowed. Both uncertain what they themselves even want. But still, their hands do not slip apart, and for only a moment, Blake guides the two of them through the woods.

A distance measured not by distance, that is unknowable, for all she knows she led them backwards. Measured instead by the time, Ruby stays by her side before slipping off into the woods again.

To do her job?

To pursue Grimm?

To protect her?

To have something to do.

Chapter Text

Blake pokes at the fire with a stick, accomplishing nothing. But there isn't much to do for entertainment here, and Ruby was so protective of the thing as she had built it, that it left Blake intrigued.

A flame crackles.

A hollow log falls, never to get up again.

Black humms in thought with her stick, listening to Ruby in the background ramshackle together some makeshift shelter for them to share. She had told Blake she could smell rain coming, and Blake frankly didn’t believe her.

At least, she wouldn't have, but Illia had always claimed the same, and had never been wrong.

She would have been at the attack, on the other end of the sword though.

Doesn't mean she isn't dead.

A pressure in her throat. She takes a slow deep breath, full of fresh refreshing smoke.

"Ruby" she says, and hears how it sounds on the cusp of breaking.

They hadn't talked to each other much these past two days, ever since Blake pushed Ruby into some sort of admission of guilt/ epiphany/ break down. But when they had, it was common for their voices to sound like this.

They both did the other the kindness of ignoring it, letting the other recover from everything at their own pace.

Ruby doesn't say anything, but she hums to let Blake know she was heard.

"You can... you can ask the next question. I feel like I've taken too many from you as it is." Blake's eyes shutter as she feels eyes on her, but she doesn't see them. She doesn't turn her head towards the cloak. She sees lilac and green and green and-

Question eight of twenty:

"Were you actually reading smut in the dorms? Or was that just like, a bit you were doing as a part of our joint rehabilitation of Weiss."

A mirthless laugh, "That's your question?"

"Yup, I consider it one of great importance. I never did figure it out....."

"And if you did, you would have considered it part of Weiss's rehabilitation? I didn't even realize that's what we were doing to her?"

"This smells an awful lot like you stealing the question again princess."

Blake can't be too upset at the nickname. She can hear the 'Blakey' Ruby managed to course correct out of, and Princess continues to be preferable. 

She turns to Ruby and sees her proudly putting the finishing touches on their leaf beads and leaf-stick rooves. The girl appraises her work with a thumb stretched out like it’s making a picture frame, and a tongue sticking out between her lips.

It's cute, Blake has always thought it was cute. She did the same thing lining up shots and perfecting equipment in the forge. Blakes glad its one of the mannerisms that is (probably) real, and not one of the thousand little things she faked for their sakes.

Blake’s also glad, that she's paying enough attention to notice the way Ruby jumps when she gets to close. 

It's not surprise that scares her, the girl is much too keen for that. What it is, is a problem for another day. 

"It wasn't smut... It just also wasn't not smut."

"Ah yeah, I know what you're talking about. My dad loved those sort of books. I stole some as a kid but they were sort of... garbage." Ruby cringes meekly as if Blake might be offended, but she just nods sagely it Ruby's accurate appraisal of her beloved genre. 

Wait, "Your... Dad?

Ruby tucks herself into her leaves, and Blake follows suits. 5 feet of dirt and a starry night keeping the two apart. She isn't sure how much Ruby can see right now, but Blake can see everything.

Her rhythmic breathing, the flecks of dirt accumulating on her unwashed outfit, and for one of the only times since this has all began, her eyes. 

Ruby cuddles into her cloak, her cheek pressing into its inner sides, and Blake can't stop herself from smiling.

It feels as if Ruby is staring right at her with those tired beautiful eyes. It feels like contact is being made.

But that’s of course nonsense and happenstance. Right now, only Blake and her Faunus vision can see.

"Yeah, my dad. You know how it is with those books, preying on lonely old men." She laughs at her own joke through a yawn, before quieting down into what Blake is starting to think of more and more as Ruby's natural voice. Artificial sweetener removed.

"He uh... He started reading them after mom died I think. Me and Ya-... I never thought about it much, how weird it might be just like, genre wise for someone like him... It felt wrong to joke about it even."

A lump in Blakes throat, a beating in her heart she tries to quell. There are cicadas out tonight.

Ruby coughs, "How did you get into them?

Blake blinks, than blinks again. It really looks like Ruby is staring at her. Gaze flicking to any movement. Blake squirms into her leaves, but it would be dishonest to say there wasn't an odd sense of comfort she felt tonight. Right now. As her body slowly dozes off even through a conversation.

"I uh... There was just a time in my life, where there were no other options."

Question nine of twenty:

Bang! and a flutter of leaves.

"My turn for a question."

Bang! and the cracking of wood.

"Hmm?"

Bang! and the smell of oil.

"Who... Okay, so I know you said your Uncle Qrow taught you everything, but I've been doing some thinking-

Bang! And the shifting of shoulders bracing for recoil. Blakes eyes dart to the barest hint of skin exposed by her corset. She thanks the gods Ruby can't see her with her eyes down her scope, layed flat across the tree branch beneath Blake. Yet, Blake still fears something. She doesn't want to underestimate what Ruby can perceive, and she... Blake isn't weird. She shouldn't think about Ruby like that. Not when the girl is so clearly disinterested in anything of that nature. She's so young, and her and Penny were so pure, and she's Yangs little sister, and-

"I've been doing a lot of thinking. And you had told me and Weiss that you learned everything from Qrow. How to fight. How to hunt. How to build your weapon... But it doesn't add up."

Bang! And some haughty chuckling from the girl below her.

"What isn't adding up for you princess."

Blake puffs her cheeks for just a second, "Don't be like that. It's just. His weapon is built on clockwork. Yours isn't. His scythe has a mode for a shotgun and a sword. Close range and fast. Yours only has a sniper mode, there's no way he taught you how to shoot that good."

Bang! The cracking open of bone. Where from? Blake can not see.

"And he was the only teacher you and Yang ever talked about. He was your only teacher. Especially...now, I can see some of the ways he rubbed off on you, but I was just curious where he ended and your self training began."

Bang! And the clouds part, Blake has to cover her eyes from glare.

"What, trying to find out how similar the two of us are? You may have spent some time in the outskirts Blake, but I can still tell you’re a city girl at the end of the day."

Bang! And Blake tries to glare daggers into Ruby, but they all bounce off her cloak.

"You’re right, I learned everything from teachers. First my parents, then... than someone else. It's still my question though."

Bang! And then silence. In a single smooth motion, too quick for Blake to follow, Crescent Rose goes from a monster of a sniper, too something compact on Rubys hip. She cracks her shoulders with a content little breath, than in a burst of petals, falls to the ground. Blake has to brace her legs to keep up with her on the descent.

"You more or less figured it all out yourself Blake. He gave me enough to build off of, I wouldn't be where I am without him... But at the end of the day, I'm still my own person. Now come on, we should be safe for another few days."

Question ten of twenty:

They were beneath the stars. Held up by branches and leaves, as Ruby had informed Blake that tonight it would be safest to sleep above the ground.

A scary thing to be told, and not one you question.

It had been a while though, since she had seen the sky so clearly. Since her bedding had felt light as air (on account of it mostly being air.) It had been a life time since the sky had been clear of pollution.

“Was the sky this clear in patch.”

“Clearer” Ruby says from across the way, nostalgia in her voice.

Blake doesn’t press her on it. Curiosity may burn in her stomach, but the two of them had gotten through the week, by letting the other keep their mournful little moments to themselves. Blake didn’t ask about Penny, or the bizarre double life Ruby had apparently been living within her own mind at Beacon, and in return Ruby didn’t ask about Yang, or Adam.

She didn’t ask at all about the man that had maimed her sister, that was hunting her down. Like she wasn’t even scared. Like she held no other thoughts other than the safe escort of Blake through the woods. And Blake was too much of a coward to tell her she wasn’t strong enough, that no Grimm could stand up to him, that she isn’t safe with her. So incredibly selfish, but Ruby had been right. Blake…. Needed someone willing to stay with her after everything.

And Ruby needed someone she couldn’t fail.

Ruby could never fail Blake, not while Blake was busy failing her.

She breathes out, and the night air is crisp. She can hear Ruby shuffle in her tree, clearly having heard her worrying.

Blake doesn’t know if she has gotten closer to the girl, but she feels it. She feels more aware of the little things she let Ruby lie to her about at beacon, that she let herself ignore.

Little things is all it is though. Except for of course, the little traveling game they’ve made for themselves.

“Blake?” She knew it was coming, and she braces for whatever truth Ruby will request. Honesty is a two way street, and she really needs it from wholesale from Ruby.

Feeling closer, but not feeling trustworthy.

“Yes, Ruby?”

“We… You’re going to your parents, after we find a port town. But what do you plan to do in Menagerie?”

Fairs fair, she had asked about Qrow. Besides, she deserves to know what destination she gave up on her sister on to pursue.  Still, Blake wish she had a better answer.

“I… I don’t know. To say sorry I guess?”

“Sorry, to who?”

“My parents.”

The constellations are different here. She tries to remember the various gods and goddesses her father had told her watched over Menagrie at night. But she couldn’t see them fully there through the smog. And she can’t see them here, in a land she never fully felt at home in. She…

“Ruby I… I haven’t been home in a long time.”

Quiet, than softly.

“What’s it like for you… home.”

“When I was a kid? It was wonderful. My father, and my two mothers,” she can hear Ruby shift at that, but the girl doesn’t ask any questions like she expected her too. Rubys family isn’t normal either she supposes, “They loved me, doted on me, trained me, took me to protests, made me fall in love with Menagerie. It’s a wonderful city. Warm, with amazing food on every corner, the buildings are made of wood and sand and keep the heat out in a way I don’t really understand, and the beach and the forest and the tides… there’s no place I’d rather be…”

“But you left.” Rubys voice is flat, and Blake tries to understand the reasons why she shouldn’t take it personally. Her heart still beats faster.

“I… I did. For the Fang, not the one I was raised in, but you know that story already. Two of my parents, they saw what it had become years before I did, and I hated them for it. My other mother, she let me go with him without hesitation. Let me go.”

“I’m sorry.” It sounds genuine enough, it sounds understanding enough, but what does she know. She appreciates the gesture, if not the lack of two way understanding.

“I… I haven’t talked with any of them since. They… they must hate me now. I hate myself for it. More cowardice, more running away. But I… I guess it’s one moment of weakness I can try to fix.”

“They don’t hate you Blake.”

Her lips curl in a snarl, “They do. Anyone would. If you could feel anger, you’d hate me for running to. I just-“

“Nope. First of all, I can feel anger Blake. Just not towards you, just not over these li- … Just not over this. Besides, no one will hate you for running away. They will just love you for coming back.”

“That simple?” Fuck she sounds like she’s pouting, she sounds like she needs to be reassured.

“That simple.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“I can’t, but I’ll stick with you, keep you safe, until you and your parents are good again. That’s a much clearer mission to me than ‘escort you to a port than never see you again.’ If you’ll have me I will at least.” Blake can hear Rubys laugh from across the trees, and can remember her smile.

Fuck, how does this girl make commitments so easily.

“You’ll stay with me, all the way to Menagerie?”

“It needs Grimm hunted to, doesn’t it?”

“Of course, more than most kingdoms.”

“Than I’ll be fine there, more than I would in most kingdoms. I told you Blake, I’m not letting anyone else go. Right now, all I have left is you.”

Don’t say that. Don’t say that. Blake want’s to feel safe with her but she can’t if she says that. Don’t, stop, how does she fix this, no.

“Ruby I… Thanks, for not letting me run away from everything that night. Thanks for… being you.”

“I try my best.”

Blake swallows spit, heavy and choking. A weight on her chest, a weight on her heart. She has to get down but she can’t. She has to stop talking about this. A fast breath, a deep breath, they don’t reach her stomach. But she reaches her nose and-

“Ruby?”

“Yes Blake?”

Question eleven of twenty:

“Do you know when we’ll get to a town, or a River?”

“Few more days at most. Good question by the way, next ones mine.”

Fuck. Well, after everything she’s done, Blake guesses she deserves that.

Chapter Text

Question twelve of twenty:

At the beginning of the second week into The Woods, Ruby had begun walking side by side with her throughout the day. Only dashing off when the Grimm got close enough that Blake's ears bristled at a crunching leaf or the like. 

Blake doesn't know if the change came due to some growing trust from within the girl, the new girl? Whoever it was Ruby was allowing herself to be after the fall. So different and distant, and hot and cold, just like her sister and nothing like Weiss, or she had been with Weiss, but still familiar in little glimpses. Acting like Blake is a stranger, an old friend, or the more agreeable part of a job. The only survivor of a terrible night, and the face forcing her to remember it.

Blake really wishes Ruby would decide who they were too each other, but has no room to judge really, even as her memories of Beacon fade away into something a little bit less real, the more she understands just how little Ruby of the Ruby she loved there had been true. Blake understand what it’s like to need to remake yourself, she could never deny that chance to Ruby.

Still something feels unresolved, and until it is, questions plague Blakes mind on an otherwise unpleasant hike. this extra time Ruby is spending with her. Is it just because the girl trusts her more? Or is the distance they have made from Beacon, physical and temporal, making the energy of the road trip less straut? Less need to run from awkward conversation and memories as the path is instead haunted by guilt, and newer, closer feeling, nightmares.

Or maybe Blake is just over thinking this all entirely. Maybe Ruby cares for her just as much as she did at Beacon, however much that may have been, and the change just comes from the blessed downhill, and the thinning trees as their journey reaches some sort of end. 

The day has been full of comfortable silence. Wishes of luck right before Ruby runs off, assurances that Blake doesn't need to draw her blade, and observations on the occasional flower that is capable of growing in this more hospitable area of the woods.

Blake still has her question.

"Ruby... what was home like for you?"

Blake can track the tilt of the girls head by the ruffling underneath her hood, and the two walk in silence for just a bit longer, before Ruby begins to speak in a voice steelier than what Blake is accustomed to, but softened by some lost emotion Blake thinks might be nostalgia, if it didn't sound so mournful.

"Patch was cold, not like Atlas, it didn't have any climate that would change my culture or my clothes, nothing about Patch was remarkable in that way, but in all of my memories there's snow on the ground. Even when I recall times where I know there shouldn't be any."

Rubys boots squelch into the muck of the ground, and pull up gunk that will stick for the rest of the day, as the two walk in silence as she gathers more of her thoughts. A normal occurrence. 

"I think it's because all of my favorite memories revolve around it. Yang letting me cuddle up to her in her room when house got too cold. My mom caught in an endless cycle of chopping firewood, as she only ever got enough for a few days when she went out. Coming back in and telling us stories by her fire, baking nonstop to keep the house warm and smelling sweet."

Ruby tilts her head downward, lost in some memory for a moment. 

"When she was gone, winter was always when Qrow came around most often. Not able to do whatever jobs he was on when the worst of the weather hit. He smoked back then, and had a weirder smelling alcohol in his flask, so the house didn't smell half as good as the winters mom was alive..." Ruby takes a breath during her story, and uses it to chuckle at herself. "But he would take me out in the woods and train me then. Help me build Cresent Rose and use her."

Ruby bumps her with her hips, a gesture Blake knows Ruby had observed Yang do to her and Weiss on weekend trips into the city. Her brain briefly shortcircuts trying to find deeper meaning and whys in what is probably just a friendly gesture.

"I dunno Blake, Home was nice. I wish I could remember more of it, but what I do have defined me in ways that… I’m glad I’ve lived the life I’ve had. It’s the life I needed to live to be here."

"I uuuh..." Blake powers through an awkward cough, battling the blush off her face, " I feel kind of bad, that was such a lovely summary, made my own talking about Menagerie feel inadequate. I’m supposed to be the eloquent one, so I thought."

"Pshhhw" Ruby discards her depreciation in the charmingly childish way Blake knows now, was played up at Beacon. "Don't worry about that Princess, your story was fiiiiiiiine. I'm just glad you trust me enough to tell me an-… I’m glad, you know you can talk to me.”

Blake’s Eyes hook on a smile from beneath Ruby’s hood, proud and sad and hidden, a gust of wind cloaking that part of her face as it blows at their backs.

"Ruby... I’m sorry we didn’t talk as much as we could have, when we were a team.” Black tries not to make the second half of her apology, feels like the allegation she knows it is, "But I did talk to your sister, and my partner plenty. The two of didn’t have… I know that’s not all to patch that…” Blake swallows wrong, but gets the name out. “Yang mentioned... that after your mother died, your father shut down? That she had to-"

Something sharp, and a red cloak with black tint under it, is suddenly just too loud, just too close, demanding in a way that comforts a sickness in her stomach that feels reactive.

"Don't!" ...." Ruby stops, than takes a step back. Blake can see her eyes run over her body, up and down, wavering at something. It occurs to her that it’s not all that easy to breath right now, and Ruby squeezes her eyes, before turning back under her cloak, and beginning to walk just a bit faster down the path, so that she’s ahead of Blake. “Sorry. Don't just... It wasn't like how Yang said. Dad was good, but Yang still had to step up, but it wasn't-"

Hands twiddle with the hem of her cloak.

Blake composes herself, and brings up a hand towards Ruby, that Blake knows she can’t see. "Ruby you don't have to-"

"Blake it's fine. I promised you honesty right?” A laugh Blake is beginning to associate with her own break throughs, and the precipice of Ruby’s break downs. A voice in her head that sounds like Yang says ‘Blake downs’ and that of all things is what fully settles her nerves, as she gives Ruby her full attention. Even as they continue to walk. Even as Ruby is ahead, and Blake is behind. “I promised it to you thinking it wouldn’t be hard, but I’m starting to realize I don’t even notice when I’m… omitting stuff I guess."

The cloak in front of her shrugs.

“But at the end of they day, there isn’t much to say. Yang did have to step up, but I never asked that of her. I think most people, they remember more as they get older, but all my memories are from when I was barely old enough to talk. From when mom was alive, and from when Yang was my sister.”

A shudder, and than a drop down into that voice that Blake can’t help but listen to raptly. Her leader, but now just Ruby. “After mom was gone, Yang changed how she treated me. I won’t lie to you, I won’t discredit what she told you. Without Yang, I might not have made it. I may have needed another mother, but I never wanted one. I wanted my sister, and no one could replace Summer…”

Ruby stops her story for a second, as the two approach a shallow river. The water almost dry. Ruby takes a second to appraise it, before skipping across it’s stones on her tip toes. Blake catches up to her side, by instead opting to jump the few foot gap.

Blake can’t help but smile at the girls antics, and can’t help but wonder if Ruby can see from underneath her hood.

“So yeah, most of my memories of Patch are of training because… Me and Yang didn’t hang out as much, outside of what she needed to do to keep the two of us alive, and our house from burning down. Not that she did everything without my help, she was just a Kid to, and she was training to be a huntress as well. I was too young to understand a lot, but I helped where I can… It’s just, part of helping was realizing that just like I needed my sister, Yang needed to feel as if our home still had a mom in it. That… wait, did Yang ever tell you about Raven?”

Blake can’t really believe what she’s hearing, and her mouth moves before she can process everything. “She did, but isn’t it a bit too late to be worried about keeping your sisters secrets I’d think.”

Ruby laughs fully at that, and Blake can’t help but wonder, wasn’t that joke just a bit too mean for Ruby to enjoy?

“Still felt like it might have been to much to tell her old crush that ‘she was the mom sister as a kid because she couldn’t stand the idea of being left without a mom.’”

“Ruby… that’s… that’s terrible! What about your Uncle, the two of you shouldn’t of haved to-“

“Didn’t you grow up in a terrorist cell? Qrow was busy, and he was around when it really mattered for me. Nothing else to say.”

“But what about for Yang!”

Ruby hunches in a way that is clearly guilty, “I… He was there sometimes for her, and Yang always had her own friends without me. She didn’t need him as bad and… wait that sounds terrible, but, I tried for her. I really did.”

“Ruby, I am not blaming you for any of that, but you were so young! You… fuck this explains a lot about how you reacted to me running actually. You, you really noticed all that as a child? To the point you were able to-“

“Blake, there’s nothing else to say.”

Ruby petal bursts off, and Blake almost instantly hears the distant sound of gunfire, followed by a howl. Arms wrap around herself, as she is hit with a terrible whiplash. She thought that… she had been trying to connect with Ruby, she thought the girl was in a good mood? When did it flip so fast?

Fuck she can’t wait to get to a port. She hopes she didn’t just ruin their game, there’s still a long way to go for that, but right now with Ruby, there really is nothing else to say.

Chapter Text

The following day, the forest cleared up a little. The sky was visible outside of the patches and enclaves they took refuge in, and Blake stopped feeling like she was getting squeezed between a city of branches.

She had room to move, to run, and most importantly. To use Gambol Shroud again.

She doesn’t know if the sudden change in terrain means they are almost out of the woods, or if they  aresimply at the base of what is about to be a second even more fucked up mountain, but for now she doesn’t care.

She doesn’t care as she swings through the canopies, wind against her skin, as if everything was right again. It’s a difficult lie to believe though, as she is forced to grapple with the fact Ruby had always been faster than her, even when she was using Gambol Shroud, even in more open terrain, and she had just been hanging back.

She would love to question the girl as to why, even if she already has most of the puzzle pieces. But the reason it’s on her mind, is because now that the forest is a tad less dangerous, (A voice that sounds like her mothers, growls in her mind to never let her guard down, no matter appearances,) Ruby has stopped hanging close enough to lead Blake down the correct way, by the hem of her cloak, and instead is off in neverland. Leaving Blake with nothing put a path of fluttering Rose’s, as she tries and fails to keep up with  leader body guard and guide.

At least Ruby is nice enough to leave the occasional straggler for Blake to pick off. Weak little things that wouldn’t hold up Ruby for a second, and is barely worth the practice in Blakes mind. She kills them anyways, half out of boredom, and half out of fear Ruby thinks she needs the practice.

Still, Blake can’t remember ever being somewhere so remote, and having the only Grimm approach her be baby beowolves and runt of the litter boarbatusks.,, Just how many Grimm is Ruby killing while she’s off scouting ahead.

~~~

In retrospect, it should have been obvious that tensions were just running high. Nothing like the worst night of both their lives to skew perceptions. They should... really talk about that at some point... Not just to make herself feel better, Blake does want to talk about it either, it's just... even after everything Blake doesn't know what to say. Doesn't know how to approach the girl without remembering how much they both failed Weiss. Gods, Blake doesn't even know where Ruby was during the fall, what she had to do, what she had to see, besides apparently the death of Roman Torchwick.

Still, even with everything she's learned about the girl, even with how different she's been acting, she's still the same person.

Tonight Ruby had let Blake wander just a little from camp, (after giving some pretty excruciating directions,) to scavenge a little for berries or anything else she can find, and Blake will admit that being able to help procure it does make dinner taste all the sweeter.

That, among everything else, was a kindness familiar to Blake.

And when she returned to their riverside camp earlier than Ruby had expected, she saw even more of Ruby that was familiar to her, yet ever so distant. Re-contextualized or changed she can’t remember.

Ruby doesn’t notice her at first, on the other side of the clearing and focused on her task. She has taken all of her hunters garb off, as well as her undergarments, not being able to afford to get anything wet, as she stands in the river, body tense and ready to snap at a moments notice.

Blake doesn’t mean to stare, so it’s only concern that glues her eyes to the girl. To an old scar that almost reaches the underside of her left breast, crawling up from her hip. Faded scratch marks along her thigh. Blake had seen glimpses of Ruby before, it would be impossible not to having shared such close quarters with her at Beacon. Back then, she could have sworn that Ruby’s build had been similar to hers. Soft skin and flexible fat hiding what muscle they did have. Ruby had always seemed so different from Yang. Now though, her frame looks every bit like a younger, more agile, version of her sister. She seems thinner now as well, though Blake supposes she must as well after this brutal hike. Lean muscle on rough skin makes her look stronger than Blake had taken her for. Rigid definition around her shoulders, down her back, around her stomach, bone showing at the waste. Hair there that’s unkept and matted and makes Blake's throat dry.

Where there was a woman standing there. A woman whose image had Blake's skin feeling sensitive, body feeling weak. Suddenly aware of the tax the hike had already taken on her. The callouses and lost weight and beaten skin and nothing else. There was now petals.

And than where there was petals, there was again a Woman. A woman triumphantly holding two fish by their necks with her bare hands. Body wet and shining with fresh water as hair her sticks to her forehead, her underarms, her—holy shit, Ruby’s trans?

Blake has the good sense to finally look away, and she thanks every god anyone has ever believed in that Ruby sounds more confused and slightly surprised, than embarrassed or upset.

“Blake?”

Blake refuses to look at her, power walking to a different corner of the camp with flushed cheeks.

“I… Don’t worry, I found berries.” Is somehow the best she has to offer.

~~~

The fire dims and crackles, her stomach is full, and her body is pleasantly sore. Something chirps, and bugs sing, as they are briefly in a part of this dreadful place that has life in it, not just Grimm.

The night is cold, but not unbearable. And the clear sky above seems so big, so perfect, that it gives her a sense of place in the world, instead of making her feel small. Like no matter how many times she runs, no matter how many people she fails, there will always be somewhere to go, and someplace to return to.

“Blake…” Ruby sheepishly begins, “I don’t understand why you’re so embarrassed, I promised it’s not a big deal, I mean we’ve all see-“

“Ruby.”

“Yeah?”

“Can we talk about something else.”

Ruby bumps into her with her shoulder, laughing tired and content. “I dunno, isn’t there already enough we are just pretending didn’t happen. Seems like at some point our ability to ignore things will hit critical mass.”

“What do you even want me to say?”

“I dunno, you spent more time with my sister these past few months than I did? Feels like you’d have learnt a good response for getting caught staring.”

It still feels wrong to hear Ruby make that sort of joke. It still feels upsetting to hear Ruby talk about her relationship with her sister like that, not accusing or put off by saying something objectively sad, but rather like it was nothing but normal. Blake still laughs at the joke, shakes her head low as her face warms up again.

Tonight is nice, really it is.

“Just, anything else. Please?”

Ruby holds up her hands appeasingly, and Blake can see callouses clearer when the girl is illuminated by the fire. Pale fingers a striking color, when the Red and Black of her cloak and clothes seem to blends in with the rest of the dimly illuminated night. “Alright, alright…can you, tell me more about how Gambol Shroud works?”

Blake perks up her eyebrow, “Ruby, I think you know everything there is to know. You literally interviewed me about her during the first week of classes. Not to mention the training you came up with. The team combos you theorized.” Blake laughs a little softly into the fire, “Really, you might know her better than I do.”

A hand is placed on Blake's shoulder, and it squeezes tight. “Blake, no one will ever know her better than you. That’s not…” Blake can understand, even without seeing her eyes, just from the way Ruby's mouth moves, that she’s at a loss for words. “That’s not how weapons work. Gambol Shroud isn’t just yours, she’s a part of you. Even if you can learn how to use her better, even if someone more skilled would use her differently, even if… even if anything. You, will always be the person that knows her best. Nothing can change that.”

Blake has to choke down the lightest of tears, though for the life of her she has no idea why she even feels the urge to cry, much less a stinging behind her eyes. The feeling passes quickly. “You really are good at that Ruby.”

“What, talking?”

“No. Well, kind of. Just… explaining how you see the world. You’re still as awkward as the day I met you. But just as earnest, just as eloquent… You might be taking my spot for seeming the most well read.”

Ruby doesn’t say anything, and Blake laughs, sensing the discomforting, and realizing Ruby doesn’t know what to say to that ironically.  

“Anyways, what I was trying to get at Blake is… I don’t want to know how Gambol Shroud works, I want to hear what she feels like to you?”

The sounds of the forest dominant a moment of tense silence, as the meaning of Ruby's request really sinks in for her. She really doesn’t get why Ruby can’t understand how much charisma she can have sometimes.

Blake cuts through the moment with the unsheathing of gambol shroud. A shimmer of slick metal cutting through the crackle of the fire, and shimmering in the night. Her fingers twirl it’s ribbon around themselves, as she extends it as for as long as her arms can take her.

She falls with her back to the ground, and holds her blade to moonlight. Ruby follows her down, and scooches in a bit to see whatever it is Blake is looking for. Blake tries to ignore how close she is, needing all the focus she can muster to collect her thoughts, gather her words. Even as her cloak slides off her face just barely as she lays back. Showing how her hair, longer without the presence of mind to cut it, frames her face differently. Curls around the sharp crescent shape of her jaw. As her nose wrinkles in curiosity, and for the first time in a while, reflected in the gleam of Gambol Shroud, Blake can see her eyes again.

Blake coughs, and with a curious expression, Ruby turns to look at Blake fully. Genuine confusion clear on the entirety of her face.

Blake focuses on her weapon.

“It’s a part of me that I’m always throwing out. Throwing out, forcing it into something so I can latch on, and close the distance. I get in, I get what I can get. Quick little licks, Than I… I leave again. Only to start the process anew.” It’s weird, to put her fighting style into impractical words. Especially when she knows what Ruby is taking from it. Her question was not one of practicality.

Question thirteen of twenty:

“May I?”

Ruby’s question is gentle, reverent. Blake can’t look at her when such a pressure is being excreted, still dimly she nods. Ruby’s hand crawl up Blake's wrists, than gently intertwine with her hands, taking Gambol Shroud from them, without ever once leaving open the possibility for the weapon to be dropped. Supported always during the transfer.  

Ruby gets up first, and Blake dumbly raises her head in struck fascination to watch. First, she takes a few swings. Her form is perfect, and Blake understands instantly just how much Ruby has watched her, paid attention to her. But luckily for ego, there is nothing fluid about her movement. Ruby understands how to use Gambol Shroud, but not an idea how to fight with her. Not yet at least.

Next, with a quick flick of her wrist, a motion that has Blake watching the flex of her arm, Ruby switches her weapon into pistol mode, taking a few shots. Blake has no clue what she was aiming at, but a tree gets it good, and Blake can only assume her accuracy was perfect.

Ruby takes account of what’s in her hands again. Feeling it, weighing it, judging it with her eyes. She rears her shoulder back, than flings Gambol into the woods. Blake remembers Sienna’s laughter, when she had first attempted learning how to throw her blade, hearing it clatter off surfaces uselessly. Tonight, she hears a hearty thunk as Ruby lodges it into the bark of a tree.

Blake feels a bit breathless, as Ruby gives the string connecting it a testing tug, before tensing her body, lunging to move… and than falling flat on her face into the dirt.

Blake laughs sleepily, getting up a bit more to watch as Ruby excitedly gets back up, a smile on her face as her aura heals a scrape on her cheek.

Once, twice, thrice, Ruby tries to hurl herself as she’s seen Blake do before, only to eat shit on dirt every time.

Blake can’t contain her mirth. “Ruby, is now really the time to be practicing this.”

“Come on Blake, can you name a better time other than the present?” Ruby laughter crackles alongside the camps flame, a gentle mania seeming to overtake her. She had been as tired as Blake just a moment before, but something about getting her hands on a new weapon has possessed her. “Come on, don’t hold out on me princess, what’s the secret to this?”

“I don’t have a secret other than practice Ruby.” Blake takes a second, to reflect on if that’s actually true, “though… you are tensing a bit too much maybe? You don’t get momentum from Gambol, as much as you’re letting her carry you, taking advantage of what’s already there.”

Ruby takes a moment to think, tilting her head and biting her cheek, a stark difference from ramming herself into the ground without hesitation like she had been doing before. It’s only Blake's Faunus hearing that allows her to hear her muttering to herself, “what’s already there huh… yeah okay, I can do that.”

That’s what Ruby mumbles, but it’s not what Ruby does. As she prepares to go again, her body tenses in a way that has Blake's eyes slit. Doing the same thing again, the same thing she was just advised not to do, feels incredibly unlike Ruby. She, unlike Blake, learns from her mistakes.

But than she lets Gambol fly, before disappearing into a mass of petals. Zooming to where it dips into a downswing, she reappears, grasping it with a sudden weight, and letting the momentum carry her into another petal burst.  

From half asleep, to learning a new weapon all in the span of twenty minutes, Ruby is suddenly flying to and fro across the clearings skyline. Exhilaration in her voice, Rose petals dissolving from above, into the cinders of the fire below, creating the illusion of fireflies burning away beneath the nights sky.

Blake's entranced. A sudden antsy energy fills her. Infectious, as in her left ear she hears “wheeEEEEEEE” and than in her right, “Blake! This is awesome!”

It’s something shared, and Blake's eyes flicker to where Ruby has left Crescent Rose in its compact form in her bed.

“May I try?” Blake asks, and from above she can hear Ruby snickering on the wind.

“You can certainly try anytime you wish princess.”

Blake's curious hands reach towards Ruby's love. Every huntress no matter their feelings on the person, understands the potential importance of learning the weapon of the person you travel with. Fight with. Maybe not a partner, maybe not a friend, but together.

She attempts to heft Crescent Rose up. Ruby's body is nothing like Yang's, and she has never seen Ruby struggle with her weapon. Never heard it clatter. Never seen any sign of weight or impact as it cuts through Grimm like butter.

So she’s surprised when it doesn’t even budge.

“Ruby, what the fu-

Chapter Text

Blake hated when she was right. A questionable trait for someone so head strong. Yet, rarely when she was certain of something, was it of a positive outcome. That’s what… that’s what she had been using Ruby for, back at Beacon. Someone to believe in the good of the world for, while she herself was busy being caught up in the what ifs of what could go oh-so terribly wrong.

Somewhere in her heart, even back at Beacon, she knew that Ruby was no less pessimistic than her. She couldn’t trust anyone who wasn’t, it comes with a certain level of understanding. It’s just that Ruby was also much more optimistic than her, when it came to her belief in a single persons ability to make the world better as well. It’s what she had admired in her most as a leader. That understanding of how fucked everything could be, how hopeless it all was, tempered with an earnest belief in trying anyways. Ruby had been everything Blake wishes she could become.

It's just somewhere along the way she got confused. Mixed the truth of Ruby up with some unfair false idol in her mind. Put her leaders ideology far far above what Blake herself could reach. Told herself that she wasn’t pure enough to be like her leader, not innocent enough. Idolized a naivety that Blake should have known wasn’t really there.

This journey through the woods acted as a force of consciousness, that wouldn’t let her do that to Ruby again. No intrinsically innocent soul could act so nonchalantly over the fall of Beacon… among other things.

For example, no one who was genuinely pure of heart. No one who didn’t have to choose to make this world better day by excruciating day, wouldn’t be flipping the fuck out over this incline. Blake knew a second entire mountain was possible, but fucking gods fucking damn it.

At least there had been a river like Ruby had promised, but when they finally get to a town, Blake fully plans to put their beeline to Menagerie on hold and pass out for a few days straight.  Collapse into a pillowy bed after a scaling bath that steams the entire room… She tries not to drool over the fantasies that keep her moving forward.

The two of them trek and and trek and Blake presses forward on calloused feet. As crisp air sends shivers down her sweat slick and dirt sewn skin, exposed by the holes nature has cut open into the clothes they would have had to replace anyways before leaving for a new climate. And she miserably press on.

Ruby, despite looking much the same as Blake, presses on happily. Even as Blake huffs and puffs and prays to whatever god will listen, that she will be struck down where she stands.

“Ruby… can we please take a break.”

Ruby stops with a perk of her head, looking around, then back at Blake curiously. Blake groans, as Rubys bursts off into the woods, leaving her alone with the ever encroaching acreage of trees that can’t seem to keep their branches to themselves.

She pops back in after a few minutes, and Blake does appreciate the little huff of air she gives off, so that at least she’s pretending to be winded. Blake’s been getting better at noticing, and thusly appreciating, the little things she does for her sake.

However, she doesn’t appreciate the way Ruby’s eyes roam downwards, than back up. Appraising her, and quickening her heart, before saying without any judgement in her voice, which is worse than if she was actually being at least a little mean about it, “I’m going to be honest, it’s not the beeeeeeeest? Place to take a break? But… if we need one we need one.” Ruby shrugs, “We will be fine here for a little while.”

Blake sighs in relief, and out of the corner of her eye, catches the moment where Ruby looks at her fondly. When Blake goes to sit leaned back against one of the many,many,many,many winter rotted trees, Ruby follows her. Sits next to her. Just barely not shoulder to shoulder, and Blake wonders if that is a choice she consciously makes as well.

Blake lets the distance stand.

She wishes she could say she enjoyed the silence, but silence is not to made to be enjoyed in excess. No branches moving, or whistling winds, or birds chirping, or insects buzzing. The forest is still, and so the burden of contemplation lies solely upon her, what with Ruby seemingly being apart of the damned place.

Question 14: Favorite childhood memory

She raises an eyebrow at Blake questioningly, when she sees how embarrassed she is to ask. But then she sighs, and chuckles to herself, letting her cloak swallow her hung head.

Ruby hesitates for a moment more before speaking, and Blake wishes terribly that she could see her face.

“I… I don’t have a lot of memories, of my mother I mean. But there’s one I remember perfectly. There was snow outside the windows, and our house didn’t have heating, but there was a huge fire… it was dusk, and it felt like the only light, even as everything was illuminated. It was just me and her, and she smelled like her cookies, and my stomach was full of them, and she held me while reading my favorite story. The Tale of The Siler Eyed Huntress... I’m not sure If it was the first time I’d ever heard it, but it feels like it was. And I remember how she looked down at me, and it felt like she was telling me about us.”

One of Rubys hands reaches for nothing, before falling back to her side. Blake can hear the raspy nostalgia in her tale, the one that came about suddenly as soon as she mentioned her mother. An old wound still fresh, and she so badly wishes she could see Ruby’s face.

Still, just a cloak. One Ruby laughs under, thought it may sound sad.

“Sorry if that was too predictable an answer Blake. Me being happiest when I was still holding into my mother… stupid, I know.”

“Than… do you have a memory you love, one without her?”

Ruby goes stiff still, and Blake hopes it’s out of momentary confusion. When Ruby’s body drains of tension, Blake hopes, it’s not a quiet anger.

“I…” Ruby brings a hand up under her hood in some sort of contemplation, “I guess probably my first day out with Cresent Rose? Qrow had helped me put on the finishing touches, let me get in a single sparring session with him, than Yang, to figure out how to hold her, than strictly forbid me from going out with her again until he was home from his next mission.”

Ruby chuckles to herself, unguarded and low. Utterly enchanting. “I Didn’t listen. I’m not sure if he ever realized that I had taught myself to pick locks, but I broke into the cabinet he was keeping her in late at night and snuck out with her. Didn’t find much, just a few Beowolves-“

Does she think that’s not impressive? If Blake had encountered multiple Beowolves the day she had got Gambol, all the way back then… she probably would have died. She had always trained more with humans, than Grimm she supposes. But still.

“It was probably too cold for me to have stayed out until dawn, but I did anyways. I dunno, that night always stood out to me. Climbing snowy trees, testing out my baby for the first time, practicing my shooting… I like where I am now, I don’t think fondly of days where I was worse. I’m always moving forward, and happier for it… but sometimes I kinda miss nights like those, when everything I knew I wanted, was still new.”

Blake smiles at her fondly, and places a hand on her shoulder. Ruby doesn’t really react to it, but Blake can tell she’s a bit lost in memories. “Ruby, that’s…” wait, isn’t that a bit weird, “That was a really lovely story, thank you for telling me, but…” Blake uses her free hand to hide her laughter, trying to inject good humor into her question even when she doesn’t really feel it. “Is there…well I’m just wondering, what about any days with Yang? She just… she talked about you two a lot, the days when you where younger. I’ve heard so many of them and… I don’t know, I was just expecting a story I’ve heard before from a different perspective is all. She… she spoke so much about when the two of you were young.”

Blake stared at her hands as they spoke, stared they hide themselves under her crossed legs. Her worn shoes pressed into the dirt mixed with the beginnings of a powdered snow. And from the corner of her eye, she saw one gleaming with silver, turning to stare at her proclamation fast as a cut. Surprise or a dare, and it is surrounded by red and black and roses, so much so that she can’t help but flinch, tug her hand away like it was touching something hot.

“I thought we agreed not to talk about that.”

“We did! It’s just… sorry, just wasn’t what I was expecting. But that’s no excuse.”

And without an excuse, there is more silence. This time broken by Ruby, like the crunching of a branch, beneath the paw of an animal neither of them can see.

“What about you, do you have a favorite memory?”

Blake can feel her ears, flick in surprise than consideration.

“I think… I’m not sure. Before I left for the fang, a lot of my memory just… melts together, or isn’t there. But I remember what felt warm, what felt right. Before I… ruined things by leaving. My parents all bickering with each other, reading or discussing this or that, while I was tucked between them on the couch. It’s been so long but I just… I miss when we where all together.”

Blake grips a hand into her thighs, “I was the one that drove them apart you know. Me leaving. It’s why… Sienna left my parents. Did I ever tell you guys that? That my parents were…”

Blake looks towards Ruby, a little unclear on how to describe what her parents where, they where always just her parents.

“Blake,” Ruby says with a little chuckle, “My parents were a whole hunters team I’m pretty sure, I get it.”

Blake can feel her cheeks heating up, “but weren’t your Uncle and Yangs Mom on the…”

“I’m a little Hazy on the details myself, It’s like you said, this sort of thing can be weird.”

“Right…”

Ruby nudges into Blakes side, before standing up. Her back towards Blake. “So you left so long ago you barely remember them… and you leaving is why they’re apart in the first place… And this is what we’re trekking continents for, running from Beacon for?”

Blakes ears press into her head, “Ruby I…”

A hooded figure reaches a hand down towards Blake, offering to pull her up.

“Well lets go fix what’s broken, and make some new memories along the way, okay?”

Blake takes her hand.

Question 15: Favorite weapon from team WBY

Ruby sputters and awkwardly laugh, as if Blake had just asked her something terribly uncouth.

Smile Smug, and looking at out from the top of the mountain, above the endless trees and towards Hope. What looks to be a small village, old enough to have reinforced walls and a freaking castle. Blake takes a breath of fresh air, content with the journey, content with herself, for just a moment. For she knows, yeah, yeah she has. She’s been waiting for the perfect time to spring that question on her, and what is perfect, if not for the first instance of beauty within these woods. The first sound, of the end of their first leg.

“Blake! You can’t just ask that!”

“I thought the whole point was that we could ask anything”

“We set boundaries! You set boundaries! The team was one of them.”

“Eh, we’d have to talk about all that stuff eventually. Besides, it’s not like their weapons are here to hear what you have to say about them. It’s just talk behind closed doors.” Blake wiggles here eyebrows in the direction of Rubys cloak, by now just working on the assumption the girl can tell what she’s doing somehow anyways.

“Blake! That’s… I mean! UGH!”

“It’s an innocent question Ruby. Why are you acting as if I was implying something. Inuendo only applies to people, not weapons.”

“You’re a menace.”

“I know my audience. I heard how Weiss would rib you when she thought Yang couldn’t hear. And I heard how you talked about Cresent Rose when you thought no one could hear.”

“Blake, now I know you’re just messing with me. I never… You know what, I won’t even dignify this, I have no clue what you’re implying.”

Ruby crosses her arms, and in the sky a bird flies. A river runs down the mountain, through the trees, and ends at a reservoir their glorious town has bult itself around. There is an honest to gods rainbow arching towards it. The moment could not be more perfect.

“And yet, Little Rose, you have to answer my question anyways.”

Ruby brings a hand up under her cloak, and Blake hopes its to cover a blush she can’t see anyhow.

“Nope, sorry. I just can’t choose a favorite. Everyone had such cool weapons, and they where all unique in their own perfect and beautiful ways.”

The end of Rubys sentence tapers off into a somewhat scolding teacherly tone, but Blake can’t help but focus on the word she uses so casually, had not has.

…

“Okay, let me rephrase than. Fuck Mary Kill. Myrtenaster, Ember Celica, Gambol Shroud.”

Ruby barks out a harsh little laugh Blake can tell she would have preferred to hide, and bristles with pride at her ability to draw a sound like that out of Ruby.

Ruby pretends to think for a few seconds, but clearly had given this question at least a little thought, before Blake had asked.

“Fuck Ember Celica, marry Myrtenaster, kill Gambol Shroud.”

Blake gasps, than scoffs, than blushes a little bit. “WHAT! But that’s!? Elaborate!?”

“I don’t know what to say Blake. They all have their qualities sure, but there’s something so chunky about Celica. How everything just clicks into place, and you have this moment of anticipation before the weight of the sun crashes into you. A million clicking gears all flattening out into one perfect package delivery system. Than Myrtenaster is this slender sleek masterpiece, pricking right into all these perfect spots that only an experienced user could find, over and over and over, than a satisfying little click and rotation, and its like this simple repeated pattern you thought you had gotten used to, is brand new all over again.-“

Rubys voice picks up its pace, it’s tempo, it’s heat as she gets lost in some sort of though that before now, before the flush on Rubys cheeks she’s somehow spreading to her own, Blake had thought was just a bit that some huntresses did.

“And than gambol shroud… is a pretty little ribbon tying together a pistol, and a sword.” Ruby’s smug lil smile is sharp and Blake wants to do something about it, even  if she can tell Ruby is trying to invoke a reaction from her. “She sure is nice don’t get me wrong but… you asked me to compare.”

“Wow…” Blake gives Ruby her best look, the type of disapproving glare that had Yang back peddling, but if it cows Ruby at all, she doesn’t show it. “You could have just lied you know, the other two aren’t even here, and we are going to be traveling together for the foreseeable future. You might even be meeting my parents.” Oh my god, Ruby is going to meet her fucking parents on Menagerie. That really had only just occurred to her now… Eh, not like that meeting can get any more awkward than it’s already going to be. 

“This isn’t something I can just lie about Blake.” Ruby says with the facsimile of honor.

“Yeah, but you had a whole thing prepared for the other two, you don’t have anything else to say about Gambol.”

“Don’t ask questions, when you’re not prepared for the truth, princess.”  

~~~

Height became subjective during the descent of the mountain. No more was the way obstructed by dense forestry, but rather foresight became an unending outcropping of trees just an inch shorter than other trees, and a grey sky that went all the way towards the ocean. 

If the weather had been this bad the entire time, than it would be news to Blake, as the dying canopies had shielded them from not just sun and moon, but rain as well.

If the weather had been this bad the entire time, than the fantastical thinker in Blake would believe that it originated, and continues to be exuded, from whatever that thing that had broken free from a mountain, and acted as a topper to the tower of Beacon, was. 

No matter the case, the end result of this final change in incline, was that instead of Ruby disappearing from view for large parts of the days, Blake could instead track the girl. Perching at the tops of trees, down and a few minutes walk forward from her current position, raining hell and bullets on whatever it is that would be getting in her way, if it wasn’t for her protector. 

What path even, would Blake have been able to take, if Ruby hadn’t chased after her. 

The other end result, of this final change in incline, is That Blake noticed when Ruby was looking at her. Silver eyes underneath red cloak, somehow finding her with eagle accuracy through the maddening brush, and gazing down at her. Eyes slitting with focus, and all together making Blake feel like the prey Ruby hunts. Even if between tense stomach churning pauses. Falters in her steps whenever silver from beneath that shadowed hood bore down at her. Blake knew she was being watched, because she was being protected. A quick glance backwards, to make sure she was still there. Frantic, sometimes, as far as Blake could tell from her little understanding of Rubys shrouded mannerisms, reminding her that this path was much, much, more dangerous than her time with Ruby had made her feel to be true. That her mother had been right, and Ruby, despite continued false appearances at times, was indeed hyper vigil.

It is from this distance, and this framing, that younger girl and former leader, asks Blake her next and most pointed question. Having to yell to be heard, but not seen. Not that it matters much, as they are for miles and miles and miles, alone. 

Question 16: How do you see me

Blake puts her hands over her eyes, and squints as best as she can, before shouting, also as loud as she can. “Well! You’re a bit far off! But you look pretty cool right now! Like one of those church statue angel things! The ones with the weapons modeled after local huntresses! Protecting the village and what not! But if the colored stone used to build them, flowed in the wind like actual fabric! On account of you not being made of stone!”

Ruby shouts back earnestly, “Thank you! Very descriptive princess! But I meant more abstractly! I’ve just felt a bit off recently, and the question was nagging at me!”

“WHAT!” Blake Shouts.

“I SAID MORE ABSTRACTLLY PLEASE!”

Silence stretches for a moment, as Blake process’s what she’s heard, and thinks carefully on her next words…

“RUBY, I CAN’T HEAR YOU!”

“I SAID! Oh gods damn it all, just give me a sec and I’ll come back to you.”

“WHAT DID YOU SAY?” Blake shouts.

Blake tilts her head up at the girl quizzically, before her protective church décor startles her by firing off one, two, and finally three sniper shots that rattle the forest. Echos of something much stronger, than someone as small as her should be, breaking through the crisp air.

The top of the tree where Ruby was perching, bursts into a cloud of petals, and suddenly Blakes traveling companion is right in front of her, just barely outside of what a reasonable person would consider personal space.

“I said, Blake, that I meant it a bit more… abstractly? Than that?”

She sounds nervous. It’s a sound Blake had almost forgotten. But than Ruby reaches for her hood, and has Blake hearts hammers, she slowly pulls it over her head. Unveiling an unkept head of hear with pointy ends reaching down the back of her neck, and framing her sharp face like tracery. Longer than when they had first left, much longer than her memories of the girl from beacon, not at all like Blakes hair which had already grown out to what must be close to its full length.

Only the tips are red, with more natural black hair than Blake was expecting. It all ties together into a much older, and much more feminine look. Ruby no longer looks her age, she looks Blakes, and it’s nothing like what Blakes imagination had been running away with. With her appearances, outside of scant moment that demanded Blake eyes be drawn downwards or closed, being hidden from her more or less since Beacon. A hidden figure full of unexpected capability, and lower voices that took a much more direct approach to control and leadership.

“I just… I’ve felt off since Beacon. It’s both obvious, and yet I still feel as I don’t know why. and plus I kind of feel like I’ve been forcing myself to be with you hear, not like a stalker hopefully it’s just even if it would have taken you longer you could have needed your own space and your own journey and I don’t want to impose and I also want to help and I just want to know what I look like to you cause I’ve just been going through the days and I don’t know what I look like to me. –“

Blake didn’t expect her eyes to feel that much more vulnerable, when she could see the rest of her, all of her. Grown up from the child Blake had failed, Grown up next to her, but at a distance. It had barely been two weeks, that amount of time can’t change someone, not really. But a bit of perspective always can.

Blake grasp Ruby’s shoulder, “Breath, Ruby. Take your time.”

Ruby looks at her softly, and Blake can tell that maybe a few things are catching up to her. A few conversations they kicked down the road showing their face. A few thoughts both of them had tried to push down, bubbling back up.

“Back at Beacon… Sorry, even before then, I’m trying to be honest with you here and it feels like all my life. I’ve taken my ques on who I am, from the people around me. I… I’m a huntress, I’m Ruby Rose, I’m my mothers daughter.” Ruby laughs at a joke Blake can’t hear, “and I do mean that in two ways… but there’s so much more than that, that makes a person. At least I think so, at least I’ve seen it in others,” the girl under Blakes hand shakes, “I’ve seen it in you… But I’ve never felt it. I’ve just been who people need me to be, and I thought I liked who that was. I thought… I thought I had been starting to become a pretty good leader.”

Blake’s hesitant, “Ruby you were…” hesitant to tell her the truth, that she had been the best. That she had been exactly what she needed. Because it’s starting to sound like that’s not what Ruby needs to hear. Blake might think that this break down was insane actually, but Blake had been younger than Ruby when she had had her big life changing breakdown… and it would probably be good for both of them to shed some tears sometimes soon.

Ruby doesn’t sniffle, but her voice is hoarse.

“Ruby… what changed?” Blake doesn’t know if it’s the best question to ask, but it’s one that will make her have to think more, have to share more, and hopefully that’s enough.

Ruby looks at her, a bit surprised, a bit like the question knocked her off guard, from whatever insane thing she was about to spiral into next. “I… The person Weiss needed to believe in wouldn’t have left Vale. The person Yang needs wouldn’t have chased after you. The person Qrow taught, would have done what he said, he doesn’t set firm rules often after all… but I did none of that, I went after you. I went after you, and I did it for me.” Ruby laughs just a tad manically, but Blake thinks she’s probably earned it. “But now what. Do I just base all my personal choices on if I can hunt grimm where I’m at. Is that… is that all I am?”

Ruby breaks their physical contact, and Blake knows better than to chase after it. The girl needs her space, even as she looks a bit haunted, even as she looks at Blake with a desperation that remind Blake so much of who she was at Rubys age, that she wants to scream at her to stop.

But she doesn’t, even as her stomach roils.

“I’ve been happy escorting you, princess.” Okay maybe that amount of manic laughter is a tad concerning, “There’s been a part of me that’s been satisfied that I’ve never felt before…” Ruby whispers the next part, like some shameful secret. Like the airs of embarrassment she would occasionally put on for what Blake now knows, was probably only for Yang's amusement. “Like purpose being fulfilled, without so much fucking expectation.”

Ruby runs a hand through her hair, leaning back into a tree, and than looking at her hand a bit confused, as if she had expected her hair to stop before it actually did. “and as nice as this has been Blake, I feel like I’m loosing something. Like if you let me, I could do this forever and never be anything else. So… I’m asking,” Ruby swallows once, like she’s scared to ask Blake for anything, even after she gave up so much to make sure she was okay. After she gave up everything else, to still be able to stand by her. “Blake, who do you see when you look at me. What can I be for you.”

Blake stiffens. She can feel a nervous sweat as her skin becomes clammy, not just exhausted. That was… that was a lot, but they will both be relying on each other for… for the aftermath of Beacon. And Blake knows she has to get this right, she has to get this right, and she can’t…

She has to get this right.

“Ruby. You are nothing like how you used to be, exact this brief little glimpses where you are. You were exactly what I needed at Beacon, and I’m sorry you had to be.”

Ruby looks at her, tired but genuinely confused. But Blake doesn’t let her take back the burden of speech yet.

“It doesn’t matter how much you enjoyed it, doesn’t matter how right it felt, or how good you were. It was wrong, to make anyone feel like that. When I see you now, I don’t know who I’m looking at. It feels like I don’t know who you are anymore.” It’s Blake's turn to swallow in fear, because she really hopes this is the right thing to say. “… But I think that’s amazing, don’t you? Because it means you can be anyone. It means you can just be you. And as soon as you figure that out, I’ll be sure to let you know who I see.”

“Heh, no promises you’ll like em though.”

“No Ruby, none. It’s like you say, I don’t want to lie to you. Your potential wouldn’t be amazing, if I didn’t have the capacity to hate you just a little bit.” Oh thank god she clocked that as a joke, thank god she actually laughed. “I… I don’t want to do that to you anymore. Be who you want to be Ruby, don’t do it for me.” Don’t place that burden on me, she hopes Ruby hears. 

Ruby laughs humorously, before getting up, ready to take off again. Breaks over Blake guesses. “I can’t help but feel like we keep on circling back to the same conclusions, the same advice.”

“Change can look a lot like stagnation, when you don’t have the privilege of being able to look back at it yet.”

“Pfft, read that somewhere?”

“No, just… just thinking about it lately I guess. You’re a thought provoking woman Ruby Rose.”

“Oh come on now princess, that one was clearly a line.”