Chapter Text
"You know, I don't like spies," Ruby muttered, giving the tree boy a side glance, while the rest of her focus was on the graves upon the hill.
"You're a good assassin, I should've guessed you'd spot me." Came the voice of a teenage boy with a washed away Menagerien accent, though the hint of Atlesian proved odd.
"Something you want, kid?" Ruby squinted, identifying that the boy had red hair and differently colored eyes, but she couldn't tell exactly what color they were.
"I'll be straight to the point with you old lady. Salem's the reason my mom died, and your the only one who can kill her."
Weiss breathed heavily, taking the smell of ash, blood, and metal. She could hear the loud battle cries and screams of pain all around her, the noise was suffocating. Across the battlefield she could see Blake, equally tired from the battle, she could only imagine how well her old friend could hear the sounds around them.
Finally, the Faunus looked back to her, half of her White Fang mask broken, leaving only the right side intact. The golden eyes that once were followed by a happy grin, a laugh, or a silent chuckle was now only a look of hate stuck in Blake's eyes.
Then again, Weiss was sure she's no better. Blake turned into Adam, she turned into her father, Ruby became her mother and Yang became Qrow. Pyrrha died, Jaune ran away, and no one had heard from Ren and Nora in years.
After Beacon, it was all cold and lonely. She'd become the true heir to the SDC and become just as her father would have wanted. She and Whitley had been ready to take over after he died. And sure, maybe it was her fault for the bastards early ending. He was abusive, manipulative, cruel, and overall a horrible person. But by the time he'd died, she'd already taken his place.
It was too late.
By the time she'd finally been able to contact her old friends, two years after the Fall, it was worse than she thought. She'd been able to dial Yang, and she'd told her everything. A young boy named Oscar Pine had Ozpin with him, and she was working with them to finish something she wouldn't go into detail about.
RNJR? Ruby and Jaune had a big fight that changed everything, apparently.
"You're the reason Pyrrha's gone!"
That had screwed them both and by extension Ren and Nora. Within a few years, Ruby, Nora, Jaune, and Ren had all disappeared. But not until Ruby and Jaune had already taken up some extreme self-destruction habits on their own.
And then there was Blake. The night of the Fall, Adam had taken her. A couple of years later, Adam and Sienna were found in a river upsidedown and Blake had stepped up to lead the Fang. She'd been even worse than Adam or Sienna with her even more violent take on equality. No one really could know what had happened to Blake in those few years.
Weiss had scoffed when Yang finished, saying that she should have known better than to have left everyone and that she was sorry. Yang had chuckled, noting how she really did no better than Weiss, wished her luck with the SDC, and then they'd both hung up.
They hadn't spoken since.
And that brought her here, twelve years after the Fall, Aura almost broken, arm and ribs broken, ankle sprained and blood running from her forehead.
Blake was in equally bad shape, with at least a couple of broken ribs, a broken nose, and a fractured wrist. Her own Aura had kept flashing, on the brink of breaking.
It would only take a few more hits before one of them was done.
Nora scoffed, eyeing the poster on the beat-up Mistralian wall. It was old, a bit too old. Why? Because Ruby was smiling, her eyes were still a bright silver and she didn't have the claw-like scar over her right eye. She looked down at her Scroll, the blue light illuminating her face.
She clicked on 'Mission(s)'. And all the way at the bottom of her missions list...
Search and Destroy: Ruby Rose.
Beneath her name detailed it all. Cresent Rose, Petal Burst, and even her eyes. Everything Ruby could, and everything she had, was laid out right there. Her most notable kills.
Torchwick, Roman. Fall, Cinder. Neopolitan. Watts, Arthur. Callows, Tyrian. Rainart, Hazel. Black, Mercury. Sustrai, Emerald. Esclados, Carmine. Celadon, Bertilak. Albain, Corsac. Ace Operative Bree, Harriet. Ace Operative Zeki, Vine. Operative Schnee, Winter. Ace Operative, Amin, Marrow. Ace Operative, Ebi, Clover. Ace Operative, Ederne, Elm. Special Operaive, Cordovin, Caroline.
Arc, Jaune.
The Mission used to be a Bounty. Before Ruby had killed multiple Ace Operatives all at one time. There was no more simple: Capture, order. It was an order to kill on sight. After the Ace Ops, the Atlas Military had managed to capture her. She made sure they got a picture of her, and then Ruby busted out, taking the lives of Caroline Cordovin and Winter Schnee on her way out.
While the Mission was set as a Search and Destroy, the SDC were the ones backing the Lien the Mission was worth, should it be completed. With proof.
Proof being Ruby's head.
Nora would personally be the one to throw it onto Weiss's desk.
Blake coughed blood, it trailing down her chin, while some landed on the inside of her mask. Through the tiny eye-holes, she could see Weiss' right hand come up to her face, her too coughing up an equal amount of blood.
She gently pushed back some of Blake's ink-black hair, a soft smile across her blood-streaked face.
Then she ever so slowly pulled off the mask, looking at Blake as a few tears fell from her pale frosted blue eyes. Even amongst a world of orange, yellow, red, purple, white, Silver, multi-colored, and differently colored eyes, Weiss and Jaune's blue eyes were supposedly a rarity, something Blake found interesting.
Meanwhile, Weiss eyed the scar over Blake's nose. It was small, just barely noticeable. She didn't wanna know how she'd gotten it. Then her eyes traced to the deep bags under her former best friend's eyes. Yeah, it was Blake alright. But instead of a metaphorical mask to hide her emotions behind, this time she truly did hide the stress the world threw at her.
"This is... Inconvenient." Weiss laughed, coughing up more blood as she did so.
"On point." Blake snorted, hacking a bit.
"That's a Yang pun." Weiss snickered, eyeing Mytenaster, buried deep within her friend's heart.
"The fuck no it isn't," Blake growled, angry at the mention of her old... Partner. Yang had been nothing more than a partner.
"Whatever it is, I got your sword inside me before she did," Weiss noted dryly, Gambol Shroud within her own iced-over heart.
Blake, realizing she'd said that aloud, grunted. "Of all the ways to die, never did I think Weiss Schnee would bore me to death."
"Never did I think you could lie about a friend. Then again, was Yang your friend?"
"Shut up, I don't wanna die listening to snide remarks."
Weiss scoffed.
"What in the hell did he do to you, Blake?"
"More than you wanna know."
"Talking about things is therapy. And we'll only live for like 30 more seconds..."
"I fucking hate you, Schnee."
"Love you too, Belladonna."
Weiss gave a grin, but then everything got heavy, she dropped Blake's mask.
And then it was dark and quiet.
Yang huffed, igniting a fire within her palm. Silently, she thanked Semblance Evolution for that. "Where is she?"
Velvet coughed up some blood, glaring at her old blonde friend. "Even if I knew, why the fuck would I tell you?"
"Oh, for old times sake." Yang laughed, but it lacked the humor everyone used to know her for.
Velvet scoffed, "go to Hell."
"You gonna tell me where she is?"
"Nope."
"Then I guess you'll beat me there."
"Sun!"
"Neptune for fucks-- Neptune!"