Thebigpieman
I've got this, I think.
- Location
- United States
RIP.Damn it, I edited the typo where I forgot to capitalise Four's name in the vote but everyone ended up posting the version without the capitalisation anyway
A Deathly Silence (RWBY/Drakengard 3)
Update 140 - Lady in Black
Mortifer
Embrace your inner lunatic. Fun times guaranteed.
- Location
- Under a rock.
[X] ...She wanted to know more. If talking with Four got her information on what dangers were coming from Ruby, she was the one they needed to talk to.
"...Let's go see Four." Yang decided, after a moment.
Ruby nodded. "Yeah. Makes sense."
"I'll send someone to fetch you once I've finished my meeting with Ozpin." One assured the two girls. "I'll be sure to have as much information as I can for you by then."
"Thank you." Ruby nodded her head.
"Oh, and Ruby?" One asked. "Please be sure to tell Four to get some rest. I'm sure she wants to report to me as soon as she can, but she's been working herself thin over these last few days. If you could pass on that I want her to make sure she has had enough sleep and food recently, that would be appreciated."
"I'll keep that in mind." Ruby nodded.
Yang started pressing on a few buttons on her wheelchair, slowly moving it back and forth to spin it around. The process was rather tedious, and eventually, she paused to look up at One.
"I don't suppose there's better options for wheelchairs here?" She asked.
"Not here." One replied. "The ones stored at hospitals are meant to be reliably, easily maintained, and for patients in potentially very poor health. I'll arrange into finding one more advanced. Do you have any requests, other than better turning?"
"I'd like to be able to go faster, if I can." Yang replied.
"I'll see what can be done." One promised. She extended a hand to grab the back of the wheelchair, and spun it around to face it towards the door.
...She had to have meant well with that gesture, but it still made Yang feel bitter. Turning around in a small area was this much of a trial, now? People would rather take the effort to do it for her than watch her struggle with it?
No, that's not fair. Yang knew it wasn't fair. It was just something done to help Yang, to make things more easier for her, and it wouldn't have taken One that much effort anyway.
It was just…
Damn it. She hated this.
Ruby made her way towards the exit, and Yang pressed the button to move forward and follow her.
The two girls moved in silence as they looked for an elevator. For a moment, Yang had actually seen the stairs up to the next floor, and had almost moved towards them before she remembered what that would involve.
...Her room back in Vale was upstairs. Unless she got some kind of hovering wheelchair from One, she wasn't even going to be able to go up there anymore.
It kind of hurt, how much she was realising she was taking for granted up until now. Damn it, the wheelchair was lower to the ground than she usually was, she wouldn't be able to reach the higher shelves anymore either.
No, Yang couldn't think about it. Thinking like that was just going to make her feel worse. Everything was going to make her feel worse, but she needed to just…
...Just not now. She didn't want to just break down in the middle of the hospital near Ruby, not after earlier. She…
Well, she really hoped that Four would have something to say that would help Yang process any of this. Just bottling it down wasn't going to be good for her in the long run, but what else could she do when all the news she got was bad?
She just needed to hold it together long enough to find something that can help her through this. Some good news, or a way to make it better, or… Anything.
Otherwise, it was just going to be the same thing, over and over, pushing down on her until she couldn't handle it anymore. Yand didn't know how to change that, and until she did…
Finally seeing an elevator nearby, Yang took the moment to start spinning her wheelchair. Ruby moved ahead briefly to hit the buttons on the elevator, and as she did, the silence started to weigh on Yang.
Ruby wasn't usually this quiet unless something was wrong. Was she hurting too, and keeping it in for Yang's sake? Or was she just not sure what to say without hurting Yang more?
Either way, Yang didn't like it. Maybe…
As she slid into the rather big elevator, Yang started repositioning the wheelchair to face it towards the elevator door, while Ruby pressed the button for the roof. The doors closed, and a moment passed without the elevator moving.
"...Is something wrong?" Yang asked.
Ruby frowned as she turned to Yang, but before she could speak, the elevator started moving upwards.
...That was weird. But then, maybe it was a security thing or something.
Still, Yang had broken the silence, maybe now was a good chance to talk with her sister about what had happened.
"...Question still stands." Yang tried. "Not just with the elevator. Are you alright?"
Ruby looked to the side, at the wall of the elevator, and stared at nothing for a moment.
"...I don't know." She admitted. "This… Still doesn't feel entirely real to me. It's like I'm in a bad dream, but it's not ending. Isn't that kind of bad?"
"...Who knows?" Yang replied. "It's… A lot to take in, I guess."
"Maybe…" Ruby began. "It's less that it doesn't feel real, and more that I don't want it to be real? If this was all just a bad dream, then all it means is there's something wrong with me to have imagined this. That's not as bad as people dying, is it?"
"...I guess it wouldn't be." Yang replied. The idea of her sister thinking something along those lines did hurt at Yang a bit, but that was just a hypothetical. A hypothetical that Ruby thought would be better, and Yang couldn't exactly saw would be worse than missing her father, her uncle and her legs.
She really didn't like her sister thinking that way, though. It was… Even if bad stuff had happened, stuff like 'It would be better if only I was suffering' wasn't something she liked Ruby thinking. But how was she supposed to say that? She couldn't just say that she thought it was more important that Ruby was okay than other people alive, and Yang wasn't sure how to phrase it without it coming across as at least a bit like that.
The elevators door opened, and Yang looked out towards the rooftop. There was nobody here just yet, but from where she was sitting, Yang could see the city past ths hospital.
From here, it looked fine. From this part of Atlas, it looked like nothing had happened at all. Atlas was a big place after, and logically One would want people where it's safest.
Above the city, though, Yang could see a bunch of airships hovering around. Heavily armed, flying a good distance apart but moving in formation. It was like One wanted to be absolutely sure that everything here was safe.
...It was kinda depressing, really. Even here, where it looked like things were fine, in the heart of the capital that was the heart of the most heavily defended Kingdom on Remnant, people were this concerned with security. And Yang couldn't blame them one bit.
Zero had come riding in on a dragon. A dragon.
Those weren't meant to exist. Even in regards to the 'There's a bunch of non-Grimm creatures lurking at the corners of civilisation and beyond that we can't consistently interact with and know little about,' dragons were myths. Legends. Impossibilities.
You heard them in bedside stories and fairy tales, mostly. Old, dark fables, the kind Yang didn't like that much, where people disturbed a slumbering dragon or failed to take steps to appease an angry one, where the moral was to be absolutely safe at all times and was usually a metaphor for how the Grimm would kill you and a lot of other people if you mess up.
Things like that didn't just exist.
But it did, and Zero had found one, and convinced it to help her attack Atlas and try to murder Ruby.
Yang was distracted from her train of thought by the sound of an airship approaching. Turning a lot in her seat to look back, Yang saw the airship coming from behind her.
Facing forward again, Yang waited, as the airship landed on the landing pad on the other side of the roof.
"That must be Four, right?" Ruby asked. Yang pressed the forward button on her electronic wheelchair, and Ruby followed along.
The ramp down opened up, and Four started strolling down it. She seemed rather tired, and was distracted by some device in her hand, so it took her a moment to recognise that Yang and Ruby were before her
"...Yang?" Four asked, as the moment passed. "Ruby?"
"Hey, Four." Yang waved.
Four dropped the device, and rushed at the two girls, One of her arms wrapped around Ruby's shoulder, pulling her down so Four could snake the other arm around Yang, and pulled the two girls into a hug.
"Thank god." She breathed. "I was so worried…"
The embrace was uncomfortably tight, but…
Well, Yang would be lying if she said she didn't want this on some level. She was meant to be the older sister to Ruby, so it would never feel right to be getting a comforting hug from her, and everyone else who might was…
Yang couldn't linger, though. After a few seconds, she struggled, and Four pulled away.
"So much has happened." She said. "It's… I don't…"
She took a moment to collect herself, and in that moment, Ruby interjected.
"It's weird." Ruby admitted. "And kinda bad. About mo- Your sister, I mean. Zero. It's…"
"...I don't get it." Four admitted. "When I remember Zero, I remember a kind older sister. One who'd protect me from bullies and stuff. Kinda like a more rough One. Or… Well, Yang but older than me."
...That was a comparison that Yang didn't really want to hear, or think about.
Time to change the topic, then.
"Four." Yang interrupted. "One said you might be able to tell us a bit more, about the people who attacked us?"
"I could do that fairly easily." Four replied. "I've been hunting and researching every lead I can ever since I found out. Haven't even-"
A yawn forced its way out of Four's mouth and she fought to cut it off.
"...You should get some rest, Four." Ruby said.
"Justice never rests." Four muttered.
"I'm passing this on from One." Ruby added. "She's worried you're overworking yourself and thinks you should rest."
"I told you!"
A voice suddenly called from within the rather large airship, unfamiliar to Yang and addressing Four in a tone that implied a total lack of respect.
"I told you that One was gonna be mad that you weren't sleeping!"
Four raised her voice to shout back.
"Gabriella, be silent!" She called.
"...Who's that?" Yang asked.
"Have I not been introduced, here?" This apparent Gabriella called out. "I thought One was pushing the propaganda machine hard to cover up how bad this whole incident was, putting me-"
"It's not propaganda!" Four interrupted.
"We haven't had much time to watch the news." Ruby admitted. "Did we miss something?"
"...Well, the plan was that One would make the reveal in a more triumphant tone." Four stated. "But Zero… Doing…"
Four's expression clouded for a moment, and the voice in the airship sighed.
"You know what, I'll do this." She interrupted. "One's plan was that this would happen when I was the only one known, but…"
A shadow fell over Four suddenly, as a large shape covered the top of the ramp. A mechanism in the ship whirled slightly, and a long, scale-covered neck looked down. And attached to it-
Dragon.
Yang reflexively fell into a combat stance, but only half of her body was reacting to her instinct. The sudden shift in her centre of gravity, and the fact that her legs didn't act the way her instincts were used to, nearly caused Yang to fall out of her wheelchair. If it hadn't been for Ruby catching the side of it in time…
"Surprise." Said the dragon, it's black scales gleaming in the sunlight. "Now, see, if One's plan had gone off properly, this would be the point where-"
"Gabriella." Four's voice was low, almost threatening. "What do you think you're doing?"
"Introducing myself to the new Intoner and the-"
Four cut her off again. "The last time these two saw a dragon, it was trying to kill them."
"What, so now all dragons tried to kill them?" Gabriella asked. "My scales aren't even the same colour. Am I expected to believe-"
"Um.' Ruby interjected. "It's… It's alright. We- I don't really care."
"Well, would you look at that, someone who has eyes and knows that black and what aren't the same colour."
"You wanted to know about the enemy, right?" Four asked. "I've been digging deep. I've looked fairly deeply into the White Fang recently, and I think I have some leads about the other attackers. I think we can-"
"Orrrr." Interrupted Gabriella. "We can ignore the riffraff and talk about the threats that are actually, you know, threats? Deal with Zero and Michael, the White Fang go back to being beneath notice."
"Criminals are never below Justice's notice." Four sighed. She sounded really tired as she spoke, too.
...Yang was going to have to ask more about this dragon thing, because it was kinda throwing her for a loop. She didn't…
She didn't think she was processing it properly, just yet. Maybe she needed more time, or…
Well, one thing at a time. For now, Yang needed to focus on the enemy. This… Revelation… Could wait until she'd worked her way through a few levels of processing.
Yang still barely understood what had happened at the time of the attack. She needed to get that sorted, first.
And first thing's first…
[X] Why did so many people attack? The White Fang, the Mistralian warriors, the traitors from Atlas, and the mysterious woman on the road? What did Four know about them? It should be easier to wrap her head around this.
[X] Gabriella was right. Most of those people were unimportant. Most. But before Yang asked about the woman on the road, she wanted to know about Ruby's mother and the dragon first.
"...Let's go see Four." Yang decided, after a moment.
Ruby nodded. "Yeah. Makes sense."
"I'll send someone to fetch you once I've finished my meeting with Ozpin." One assured the two girls. "I'll be sure to have as much information as I can for you by then."
"Thank you." Ruby nodded her head.
"Oh, and Ruby?" One asked. "Please be sure to tell Four to get some rest. I'm sure she wants to report to me as soon as she can, but she's been working herself thin over these last few days. If you could pass on that I want her to make sure she has had enough sleep and food recently, that would be appreciated."
"I'll keep that in mind." Ruby nodded.
Yang started pressing on a few buttons on her wheelchair, slowly moving it back and forth to spin it around. The process was rather tedious, and eventually, she paused to look up at One.
"I don't suppose there's better options for wheelchairs here?" She asked.
"Not here." One replied. "The ones stored at hospitals are meant to be reliably, easily maintained, and for patients in potentially very poor health. I'll arrange into finding one more advanced. Do you have any requests, other than better turning?"
"I'd like to be able to go faster, if I can." Yang replied.
"I'll see what can be done." One promised. She extended a hand to grab the back of the wheelchair, and spun it around to face it towards the door.
...She had to have meant well with that gesture, but it still made Yang feel bitter. Turning around in a small area was this much of a trial, now? People would rather take the effort to do it for her than watch her struggle with it?
No, that's not fair. Yang knew it wasn't fair. It was just something done to help Yang, to make things more easier for her, and it wouldn't have taken One that much effort anyway.
It was just…
Damn it. She hated this.
Ruby made her way towards the exit, and Yang pressed the button to move forward and follow her.
The two girls moved in silence as they looked for an elevator. For a moment, Yang had actually seen the stairs up to the next floor, and had almost moved towards them before she remembered what that would involve.
...Her room back in Vale was upstairs. Unless she got some kind of hovering wheelchair from One, she wasn't even going to be able to go up there anymore.
It kind of hurt, how much she was realising she was taking for granted up until now. Damn it, the wheelchair was lower to the ground than she usually was, she wouldn't be able to reach the higher shelves anymore either.
No, Yang couldn't think about it. Thinking like that was just going to make her feel worse. Everything was going to make her feel worse, but she needed to just…
...Just not now. She didn't want to just break down in the middle of the hospital near Ruby, not after earlier. She…
Well, she really hoped that Four would have something to say that would help Yang process any of this. Just bottling it down wasn't going to be good for her in the long run, but what else could she do when all the news she got was bad?
She just needed to hold it together long enough to find something that can help her through this. Some good news, or a way to make it better, or… Anything.
Otherwise, it was just going to be the same thing, over and over, pushing down on her until she couldn't handle it anymore. Yand didn't know how to change that, and until she did…
Finally seeing an elevator nearby, Yang took the moment to start spinning her wheelchair. Ruby moved ahead briefly to hit the buttons on the elevator, and as she did, the silence started to weigh on Yang.
Ruby wasn't usually this quiet unless something was wrong. Was she hurting too, and keeping it in for Yang's sake? Or was she just not sure what to say without hurting Yang more?
Either way, Yang didn't like it. Maybe…
As she slid into the rather big elevator, Yang started repositioning the wheelchair to face it towards the elevator door, while Ruby pressed the button for the roof. The doors closed, and a moment passed without the elevator moving.
"...Is something wrong?" Yang asked.
Ruby frowned as she turned to Yang, but before she could speak, the elevator started moving upwards.
...That was weird. But then, maybe it was a security thing or something.
Still, Yang had broken the silence, maybe now was a good chance to talk with her sister about what had happened.
"...Question still stands." Yang tried. "Not just with the elevator. Are you alright?"
Ruby looked to the side, at the wall of the elevator, and stared at nothing for a moment.
"...I don't know." She admitted. "This… Still doesn't feel entirely real to me. It's like I'm in a bad dream, but it's not ending. Isn't that kind of bad?"
"...Who knows?" Yang replied. "It's… A lot to take in, I guess."
"Maybe…" Ruby began. "It's less that it doesn't feel real, and more that I don't want it to be real? If this was all just a bad dream, then all it means is there's something wrong with me to have imagined this. That's not as bad as people dying, is it?"
"...I guess it wouldn't be." Yang replied. The idea of her sister thinking something along those lines did hurt at Yang a bit, but that was just a hypothetical. A hypothetical that Ruby thought would be better, and Yang couldn't exactly saw would be worse than missing her father, her uncle and her legs.
She really didn't like her sister thinking that way, though. It was… Even if bad stuff had happened, stuff like 'It would be better if only I was suffering' wasn't something she liked Ruby thinking. But how was she supposed to say that? She couldn't just say that she thought it was more important that Ruby was okay than other people alive, and Yang wasn't sure how to phrase it without it coming across as at least a bit like that.
The elevators door opened, and Yang looked out towards the rooftop. There was nobody here just yet, but from where she was sitting, Yang could see the city past ths hospital.
From here, it looked fine. From this part of Atlas, it looked like nothing had happened at all. Atlas was a big place after, and logically One would want people where it's safest.
Above the city, though, Yang could see a bunch of airships hovering around. Heavily armed, flying a good distance apart but moving in formation. It was like One wanted to be absolutely sure that everything here was safe.
...It was kinda depressing, really. Even here, where it looked like things were fine, in the heart of the capital that was the heart of the most heavily defended Kingdom on Remnant, people were this concerned with security. And Yang couldn't blame them one bit.
Zero had come riding in on a dragon. A dragon.
Those weren't meant to exist. Even in regards to the 'There's a bunch of non-Grimm creatures lurking at the corners of civilisation and beyond that we can't consistently interact with and know little about,' dragons were myths. Legends. Impossibilities.
You heard them in bedside stories and fairy tales, mostly. Old, dark fables, the kind Yang didn't like that much, where people disturbed a slumbering dragon or failed to take steps to appease an angry one, where the moral was to be absolutely safe at all times and was usually a metaphor for how the Grimm would kill you and a lot of other people if you mess up.
Things like that didn't just exist.
But it did, and Zero had found one, and convinced it to help her attack Atlas and try to murder Ruby.
Yang was distracted from her train of thought by the sound of an airship approaching. Turning a lot in her seat to look back, Yang saw the airship coming from behind her.
Facing forward again, Yang waited, as the airship landed on the landing pad on the other side of the roof.
"That must be Four, right?" Ruby asked. Yang pressed the forward button on her electronic wheelchair, and Ruby followed along.
The ramp down opened up, and Four started strolling down it. She seemed rather tired, and was distracted by some device in her hand, so it took her a moment to recognise that Yang and Ruby were before her
"...Yang?" Four asked, as the moment passed. "Ruby?"
"Hey, Four." Yang waved.
Four dropped the device, and rushed at the two girls, One of her arms wrapped around Ruby's shoulder, pulling her down so Four could snake the other arm around Yang, and pulled the two girls into a hug.
"Thank god." She breathed. "I was so worried…"
The embrace was uncomfortably tight, but…
Well, Yang would be lying if she said she didn't want this on some level. She was meant to be the older sister to Ruby, so it would never feel right to be getting a comforting hug from her, and everyone else who might was…
Yang couldn't linger, though. After a few seconds, she struggled, and Four pulled away.
"So much has happened." She said. "It's… I don't…"
She took a moment to collect herself, and in that moment, Ruby interjected.
"It's weird." Ruby admitted. "And kinda bad. About mo- Your sister, I mean. Zero. It's…"
"...I don't get it." Four admitted. "When I remember Zero, I remember a kind older sister. One who'd protect me from bullies and stuff. Kinda like a more rough One. Or… Well, Yang but older than me."
...That was a comparison that Yang didn't really want to hear, or think about.
Time to change the topic, then.
"Four." Yang interrupted. "One said you might be able to tell us a bit more, about the people who attacked us?"
"I could do that fairly easily." Four replied. "I've been hunting and researching every lead I can ever since I found out. Haven't even-"
A yawn forced its way out of Four's mouth and she fought to cut it off.
"...You should get some rest, Four." Ruby said.
"Justice never rests." Four muttered.
"I'm passing this on from One." Ruby added. "She's worried you're overworking yourself and thinks you should rest."
"I told you!"
A voice suddenly called from within the rather large airship, unfamiliar to Yang and addressing Four in a tone that implied a total lack of respect.
"I told you that One was gonna be mad that you weren't sleeping!"
Four raised her voice to shout back.
"Gabriella, be silent!" She called.
"...Who's that?" Yang asked.
"Have I not been introduced, here?" This apparent Gabriella called out. "I thought One was pushing the propaganda machine hard to cover up how bad this whole incident was, putting me-"
"It's not propaganda!" Four interrupted.
"We haven't had much time to watch the news." Ruby admitted. "Did we miss something?"
"...Well, the plan was that One would make the reveal in a more triumphant tone." Four stated. "But Zero… Doing…"
Four's expression clouded for a moment, and the voice in the airship sighed.
"You know what, I'll do this." She interrupted. "One's plan was that this would happen when I was the only one known, but…"
A shadow fell over Four suddenly, as a large shape covered the top of the ramp. A mechanism in the ship whirled slightly, and a long, scale-covered neck looked down. And attached to it-
Dragon.
Yang reflexively fell into a combat stance, but only half of her body was reacting to her instinct. The sudden shift in her centre of gravity, and the fact that her legs didn't act the way her instincts were used to, nearly caused Yang to fall out of her wheelchair. If it hadn't been for Ruby catching the side of it in time…
"Surprise." Said the dragon, it's black scales gleaming in the sunlight. "Now, see, if One's plan had gone off properly, this would be the point where-"
"Gabriella." Four's voice was low, almost threatening. "What do you think you're doing?"
"Introducing myself to the new Intoner and the-"
Four cut her off again. "The last time these two saw a dragon, it was trying to kill them."
"What, so now all dragons tried to kill them?" Gabriella asked. "My scales aren't even the same colour. Am I expected to believe-"
"Um.' Ruby interjected. "It's… It's alright. We- I don't really care."
"Well, would you look at that, someone who has eyes and knows that black and what aren't the same colour."
"You wanted to know about the enemy, right?" Four asked. "I've been digging deep. I've looked fairly deeply into the White Fang recently, and I think I have some leads about the other attackers. I think we can-"
"Orrrr." Interrupted Gabriella. "We can ignore the riffraff and talk about the threats that are actually, you know, threats? Deal with Zero and Michael, the White Fang go back to being beneath notice."
"Criminals are never below Justice's notice." Four sighed. She sounded really tired as she spoke, too.
...Yang was going to have to ask more about this dragon thing, because it was kinda throwing her for a loop. She didn't…
She didn't think she was processing it properly, just yet. Maybe she needed more time, or…
Well, one thing at a time. For now, Yang needed to focus on the enemy. This… Revelation… Could wait until she'd worked her way through a few levels of processing.
Yang still barely understood what had happened at the time of the attack. She needed to get that sorted, first.
And first thing's first…
[X] Why did so many people attack? The White Fang, the Mistralian warriors, the traitors from Atlas, and the mysterious woman on the road? What did Four know about them? It should be easier to wrap her head around this.
[X] Gabriella was right. Most of those people were unimportant. Most. But before Yang asked about the woman on the road, she wanted to know about Ruby's mother and the dragon first.
Last edited:
- Location
- singapore
[X] Why did so many people attack? The White Fang, the Mistralian warriors, the traitors from Atlas, and the mysterious woman on the road? What did Four know about them? It should be easier to wrap her head around this.
WanderingTwix
Posting something good once in a full moon
- Location
- United Kingdom
what?
[X] Gabriella was right. Most of those people were unimportant. Most. But before Yang asked about the woman on the road, she wanted to know about Ruby's mother and the dragon first.
Last edited:
- Location
- Washington
Gabriella is Best Girl.
[X] Gabriella was right. Most of those people were unimportant. Most. But before Yang asked about the woman on the road, she wanted to know about Ruby's mother and the dragon first.
Exterminatus
Tsukumogami User
- Location
- Southern California
[X] Gabriella was right. Most of those people were unimportant. Most. But before Yang asked about the woman on the road, she wanted to know about Ruby's mother and the dragon first.
Alexander89
Pet the pretty kitty? Y/N
- Location
- Italy
[X] Gabriella was right. Most of those people were unimportant. Most. But before Yang asked about the woman on the road, she wanted to know about Ruby's mother and the dragon first.
Update 141 - Was It Worth It?
Mortifer
Embrace your inner lunatic. Fun times guaranteed.
- Location
- Under a rock.
[X] Gabriella was right. Most of those people were unimportant. Most. But before Yang asked about the woman on the road, she wanted to know about Ruby's mother and the dragon first.
There was a lot to process, about what had happened. A lot Yang needed to sort out. But in the end, it wasn't much of a contest, was it?
She'd forgotten about seeing Penny fighting against Three, for instance. Or, hell, the part where Penny and Ciel tried to keep her out of it, to keep her away from finding Ruby in the first place. Penny who Ruby had been spending time with and enjoyed hanging out with, and she had been part of the attack.
But here? Now? That hardly mattered. It didn't even cross Yang's mind until now. Of course she hadn't, it wasn't the big issue.
The big issue, the one that needed addressing more, was obvious.
The rogue Intoner, Ruby's mother. Entering the scene riding a legend, arriving to kill the other Intoners- Including Ruby- For no stated reason. The one who, from the brief time Yang had been able to observe her, seemed to be the ringleader. She was confused over some people being around, but she seemed to know Blake and Penny, at the very least.
Maybe more, but Yang didn't remember too much about the actual conversation that was held there. Between the shock of seeing a dragon and what happened afterwards, she hadn't really had much time to think about it.
That didn't matter right now, though. What did, was where Yang's priorities lay.
"Four." Yang asked. "I.. Really want to know about Zero."
"...Yeah, I suppose that makes sense." Four admitted. "I… Didn't really want to talk about it, but I guess that must be what you really want to know about, right?"
The black dragon that was still on the airship, poking its head out behind Four, rolled her eyes. "Obviously."
"Well…" Four began. "I don't know why she's attacking us, but I've tried to find out everything else I can. Where she might have been recently, what she might have been doing, the resources she has on hand, what we need to look out for…"
"And the dragon?" Ruby asked. "Gabriella, you called him Michael? That's his name, right?"
"Who else would I have been talking about? The cat?" Gabriella asked.
"Be nice, Gabriella." Four asked. "She's been through a lot."
"Well I hadn't heard anything about her being stabbed in the brain, she-"
"From what we can gather, Zero had to have been in an area around Atlas recently." Four began. "Her dragon would have had to rest, so it couldn't have flown too far, and while we do know that Zero escaped in an airship, we know that it was stolen during the attack. Once we have the people to spare, I might be able to figure out if she had any support."
"At the same time." Gabriella interrupted. "She couldn't have been nearby until recently. One was digging around a lot to find her sisters, deep enough in the wilds around Atlas to find me in the first place. I'm not sure if you've realised this, but it's not easy to find dragons."
"...Well, this incident is the first I've heard of them actually existing." Ruby admitted.
"We prefer to keep it that way." Gabriella noted. "Killing one human is easy, and so is killing a thousand, but there's not many of us. Unless there's more hiding away where we can't find them, there's enough dragons in the world to count them on one of your hands. With how many humans there are, one of you are bound to find us in our sleep and bomb us eventually, if you were looking for a kill."
"And I know where One's investigations went, too." Four continued. "She found me on the same continent as Atlas, Two and Five in Vale, and Three in Mistral. Maybe Zero hid deep in the land outside the Kingdoms, probably even likely if she found a dragon as well. But she's co-operating with the White Fang, and she would have needed to approach civilisation if she did that."
"...So she was in Vacuo, then?" Yang asked.
"Most likely." Four admitted. "It's the place One has the least amount of people looking around. The government there isn't able to keep track of everything. I was there not long ago, but I was focused on finding the White Fang. I didn't even think to look for Zero."
"Probably for the best." Ruby replied. "If… Imagine if you had found her, and she'd killed you before anyone realised what was happening?"
Four looked away.
"Would've been real bad." Gabriella chimed in. "Zero's basically better than Four in every way, and as much as it hurts me to say this, Michael's stronger than me."
"He is?" Ruby asked. "How do you know?"
"Six, when there's only a handful of dragons out there, figuring out who the strongest is isn't that hard." Gabriella explained.
"...Oh." Yang noted. "He's the strongest dragon. Of course he's the strongest dragon. Zero's the strongest Intoner too, isn't she?"
"I wasn't there, I couldn't tell." Four said. "But I've heard about the fight. Ruby and Three were both fighting her at once, right?"
"For a bit." Ruby admitted. "...How did mum get pushed back, anyway? What made her stop fighting? Something must have happened."
"Girl." Gabriella interrupted. "I'm going to tell you this right now. Stop calling that woman your mother."
"Why?" Ruby asked.
"It's a word with attachments to it." Gabriella explained. "You think of someone like that, you'll get attached to them. Then it'll hurt more to think about them running out on you, or them fighting you. You're just gonna go and make it easier for Zero to hurt you if you remember that connection."
For a second, Yang wanted to dispute that. She'd never known a mother, and Ruby's wasn't there when she was a kid, so neither of them should be attached to the concept of a mum, right?
But then… Hadn't Yang once wanted to find her own mother? Even if it was only to know why her mother had left, part of her was still attached enough to the concept to want to know why she had been abandoned. Part of her had still hurt over that.
So maybe the dragon had a point, then.
"...Alright." Ruby accepted. "So, why did Zero run away?"
"I'm not sure." Four replied. "One said that Two did something, but wasn't clear what. Just that it… Hurt her."
"...Hurt her?" Yang asked. "What do you mean? Is Two okay?"
"I don't know." Four replied. "She wasn't responding to anything when I tried to check on her. She was awake, her Disciple was forcing her to eat, but… She just wasn't reacting to anything. It's like she wasn't there at all."
Four's voice hitched for a moment there, and she turned away from Ruby and Yang, trying to take the moment to compose herself.
...It hurt to see this. It hurt to hear that Two was hurt, and to see someone like Four was suffering because the people around her were hurt as well.
How much was Four hurting because she wasn't there to help her sisters? How much would Yang be hurting, if it was her who hadn't been there, while Ruby got hurt bad enough to be in the state Four was describing?
And why did Two have to be hurt at all? Why was Two suffering? She hadn't done anything wrong in her life, so why was fate being this cruel to her?
It…
"Do we know where she went?" Yang asked.
Four took another moment to collect herself, and when she responded, she didn't turn back around to face Yang.
"We're not sure." Four replied. "We'll need to figure out where her airship went before we can figure that out, and she'll have abandoned it by then. We could figure out a continent, maybe, but before long she'll be able to be anywhere."
...So, the strongest Intoner had attacked alongside the strongest dragon, pushing them back had broken Two somehow, and now the two of them could be anywhere and there would be no way of figuring out where before long.
Fucking…
"Is there any good news?" Yang asked, before she could stop herself. Her voice was more bitter than anything she'd ever heard before, and she still didn't know if it fully gave away how bitter she was feeling.
Four and Ruby gave Yang a concerned look, and Yang immediately regretted her outburst. Those two were suffering enough, they didn't need her getting angry at stuff they couldn't control…
"Well, for one thing, we learnt a lot in that fight." Gabriella noted. "We know that Zero's trying to kill us now. I imagine you'd be worse off if you'd met Zero alone in Vale and thought she was friendly, Six?"
"...That'd be bad, I guess." Ruby muttered.
"And we also found you." Gabriella continued. "A bonus Intoner not even One knew to look for. Zero was always going to come for us for whatever her reasons are, so it was kind of her to do so in a way that had another one of her enemies pop up. Now we just need to find your disciple."
...That was alright for them, perhaps. If Yang and Ruby hadn't been involved, and Zero had just attacked Atlas while they weren't here, Yang would still be able to move her legs and her father and uncle would still be alive.
Ruby apparently thought the same. Before she said anything back to the dragon, she looked at Yang for a long moment, and Yang could see the look of pity in her eyes.
Damn it…
"...How's Three?" Ruby asked, suddenly. "Have you seen her?"
"I've heard from her." Four replied. "I wasn't here when they found her, but she was buried under some rubble left over from the Schnee manor. Took a while to dig her out, apparently, but she's alive."
Ruby let out a sigh of relief. "Zero was about to kill her when I arrived. I'm glad I was able to save her."
...Ruby seemed to be taking comfort in that.
In which case, Yang should probably stay away from any thoughts along the lines of 'If only Ruby and I hadn't been here.'
"Please don't go growing a hero complex here." Gabriella interjected. "I don't want to have to keep watching you girls go and develop unhealthy character traits, it makes One upset."
"...What do you mean?" Ruby asked.
"Wanting to protect people is good and all." Gabriella continued. "But I can see it all over your face. 'I was able to help someone by being in danger, so me being hurt and the people I care about being hurt isn't that bad.' How long do you think it'll be before that turns into 'I have to endanger myself and the people around me to help others'?"
"Hold on!" Yang interrupted. "Just what kind of person do you take my sister for?"
"Human." Gabriella replied. "Well, Intoner. You know what I mean. You people tend to justify things to yourself and the young ones especially tend to fall into traps."
"So what?" Yang asked. "If it makes Ruby feel better-"
"If your sister wasn't an Intoner, she'd be dead." Gabriella interrupted. "And she didn't know that in advance, did she?"
"Enough, Gabriella." Four snapped. "This isn't the time."
"What, should I let it fester, then?" The black dragon asked. "Sure, fine, but you're explaining it to One."
And with that, the black dragon returned to its place in the airshop once again.
"...Sorry about that." Four sighed. "Gabriella tends to be a bit… Aggressive… And rather thoughtless."
"It's fine." Ruby brushed off. "She's right. I'm only alive because of something I didn't know about."
"Ruby-"
"No, it's try." Ruby admitted. "I… I don't regret saving Three. But I nearly died."
"...If it makes you feel better." Four spoke up. "Now we know there's very few circumstances where you could die. Unless another Intoner is involved or there are dragon bones involved, as far as we know, you can heal faster than you can die."
...Well that was good news, at least. Ruby being hard to kill beyond ridiculous circumstances. Now if only those exact circumstances hadn't just reared their head.
"And it gets better." Four continued. "It's… You'll want to ask One or Three for details, but dragon bone stuff interacts oddly with Aura and Intoner tricks. If I stabbed you with a dragon bone sword, it'd pierce your leg and hurt for a while, but your aura would heal it eventually, even though the ability to heal that an Intoner has wouldn't heal it. But if a dragon itself made the wound with its teeth or anything, then it doesn't heal without outside intervention."
"I think Penny said something about that." Ruby muttered, softly. "It only cancels out aura for a moment, without a dragon's soul behind it."
She looked down for a moment, before shaking her head softly.
"...I think I need to go lie down for a minute." Ruby said. She turned towards the elevator, but then stopped. "...No, not until we're done."
"It's fine." Yang assured Ruby. "Four, One wanted you to rest as well, right?"
"I guess she did…" Four admitted.
"Then you two go lie down." Yang insisted. "I'll go find someone else to talk to until One's done with her meeting or something."
"Alright." Ruby muttered.
Four stepped off the airship ramp and pressed a button on her device, and the airship started to close.
"I'll get you when One's ready to talk to us again." Ruby said. "Where should I look for you?"
Yang thought for a second, about where she would want to go.
[X] To where all the injured are. She wants to see if all of her friends are alright.
[X] Even if people said she wasn't responsive, Yang wanted to check on Two.
[X] ...Maybe Yang should just wait around One's office and see if anyone important was around.
There was a lot to process, about what had happened. A lot Yang needed to sort out. But in the end, it wasn't much of a contest, was it?
She'd forgotten about seeing Penny fighting against Three, for instance. Or, hell, the part where Penny and Ciel tried to keep her out of it, to keep her away from finding Ruby in the first place. Penny who Ruby had been spending time with and enjoyed hanging out with, and she had been part of the attack.
But here? Now? That hardly mattered. It didn't even cross Yang's mind until now. Of course she hadn't, it wasn't the big issue.
The big issue, the one that needed addressing more, was obvious.
The rogue Intoner, Ruby's mother. Entering the scene riding a legend, arriving to kill the other Intoners- Including Ruby- For no stated reason. The one who, from the brief time Yang had been able to observe her, seemed to be the ringleader. She was confused over some people being around, but she seemed to know Blake and Penny, at the very least.
Maybe more, but Yang didn't remember too much about the actual conversation that was held there. Between the shock of seeing a dragon and what happened afterwards, she hadn't really had much time to think about it.
That didn't matter right now, though. What did, was where Yang's priorities lay.
"Four." Yang asked. "I.. Really want to know about Zero."
"...Yeah, I suppose that makes sense." Four admitted. "I… Didn't really want to talk about it, but I guess that must be what you really want to know about, right?"
The black dragon that was still on the airship, poking its head out behind Four, rolled her eyes. "Obviously."
"Well…" Four began. "I don't know why she's attacking us, but I've tried to find out everything else I can. Where she might have been recently, what she might have been doing, the resources she has on hand, what we need to look out for…"
"And the dragon?" Ruby asked. "Gabriella, you called him Michael? That's his name, right?"
"Who else would I have been talking about? The cat?" Gabriella asked.
"Be nice, Gabriella." Four asked. "She's been through a lot."
"Well I hadn't heard anything about her being stabbed in the brain, she-"
"From what we can gather, Zero had to have been in an area around Atlas recently." Four began. "Her dragon would have had to rest, so it couldn't have flown too far, and while we do know that Zero escaped in an airship, we know that it was stolen during the attack. Once we have the people to spare, I might be able to figure out if she had any support."
"At the same time." Gabriella interrupted. "She couldn't have been nearby until recently. One was digging around a lot to find her sisters, deep enough in the wilds around Atlas to find me in the first place. I'm not sure if you've realised this, but it's not easy to find dragons."
"...Well, this incident is the first I've heard of them actually existing." Ruby admitted.
"We prefer to keep it that way." Gabriella noted. "Killing one human is easy, and so is killing a thousand, but there's not many of us. Unless there's more hiding away where we can't find them, there's enough dragons in the world to count them on one of your hands. With how many humans there are, one of you are bound to find us in our sleep and bomb us eventually, if you were looking for a kill."
"And I know where One's investigations went, too." Four continued. "She found me on the same continent as Atlas, Two and Five in Vale, and Three in Mistral. Maybe Zero hid deep in the land outside the Kingdoms, probably even likely if she found a dragon as well. But she's co-operating with the White Fang, and she would have needed to approach civilisation if she did that."
"...So she was in Vacuo, then?" Yang asked.
"Most likely." Four admitted. "It's the place One has the least amount of people looking around. The government there isn't able to keep track of everything. I was there not long ago, but I was focused on finding the White Fang. I didn't even think to look for Zero."
"Probably for the best." Ruby replied. "If… Imagine if you had found her, and she'd killed you before anyone realised what was happening?"
Four looked away.
"Would've been real bad." Gabriella chimed in. "Zero's basically better than Four in every way, and as much as it hurts me to say this, Michael's stronger than me."
"He is?" Ruby asked. "How do you know?"
"Six, when there's only a handful of dragons out there, figuring out who the strongest is isn't that hard." Gabriella explained.
"...Oh." Yang noted. "He's the strongest dragon. Of course he's the strongest dragon. Zero's the strongest Intoner too, isn't she?"
"I wasn't there, I couldn't tell." Four said. "But I've heard about the fight. Ruby and Three were both fighting her at once, right?"
"For a bit." Ruby admitted. "...How did mum get pushed back, anyway? What made her stop fighting? Something must have happened."
"Girl." Gabriella interrupted. "I'm going to tell you this right now. Stop calling that woman your mother."
"Why?" Ruby asked.
"It's a word with attachments to it." Gabriella explained. "You think of someone like that, you'll get attached to them. Then it'll hurt more to think about them running out on you, or them fighting you. You're just gonna go and make it easier for Zero to hurt you if you remember that connection."
For a second, Yang wanted to dispute that. She'd never known a mother, and Ruby's wasn't there when she was a kid, so neither of them should be attached to the concept of a mum, right?
But then… Hadn't Yang once wanted to find her own mother? Even if it was only to know why her mother had left, part of her was still attached enough to the concept to want to know why she had been abandoned. Part of her had still hurt over that.
So maybe the dragon had a point, then.
"...Alright." Ruby accepted. "So, why did Zero run away?"
"I'm not sure." Four replied. "One said that Two did something, but wasn't clear what. Just that it… Hurt her."
"...Hurt her?" Yang asked. "What do you mean? Is Two okay?"
"I don't know." Four replied. "She wasn't responding to anything when I tried to check on her. She was awake, her Disciple was forcing her to eat, but… She just wasn't reacting to anything. It's like she wasn't there at all."
Four's voice hitched for a moment there, and she turned away from Ruby and Yang, trying to take the moment to compose herself.
...It hurt to see this. It hurt to hear that Two was hurt, and to see someone like Four was suffering because the people around her were hurt as well.
How much was Four hurting because she wasn't there to help her sisters? How much would Yang be hurting, if it was her who hadn't been there, while Ruby got hurt bad enough to be in the state Four was describing?
And why did Two have to be hurt at all? Why was Two suffering? She hadn't done anything wrong in her life, so why was fate being this cruel to her?
It…
"Do we know where she went?" Yang asked.
Four took another moment to collect herself, and when she responded, she didn't turn back around to face Yang.
"We're not sure." Four replied. "We'll need to figure out where her airship went before we can figure that out, and she'll have abandoned it by then. We could figure out a continent, maybe, but before long she'll be able to be anywhere."
...So, the strongest Intoner had attacked alongside the strongest dragon, pushing them back had broken Two somehow, and now the two of them could be anywhere and there would be no way of figuring out where before long.
Fucking…
"Is there any good news?" Yang asked, before she could stop herself. Her voice was more bitter than anything she'd ever heard before, and she still didn't know if it fully gave away how bitter she was feeling.
Four and Ruby gave Yang a concerned look, and Yang immediately regretted her outburst. Those two were suffering enough, they didn't need her getting angry at stuff they couldn't control…
"Well, for one thing, we learnt a lot in that fight." Gabriella noted. "We know that Zero's trying to kill us now. I imagine you'd be worse off if you'd met Zero alone in Vale and thought she was friendly, Six?"
"...That'd be bad, I guess." Ruby muttered.
"And we also found you." Gabriella continued. "A bonus Intoner not even One knew to look for. Zero was always going to come for us for whatever her reasons are, so it was kind of her to do so in a way that had another one of her enemies pop up. Now we just need to find your disciple."
...That was alright for them, perhaps. If Yang and Ruby hadn't been involved, and Zero had just attacked Atlas while they weren't here, Yang would still be able to move her legs and her father and uncle would still be alive.
Ruby apparently thought the same. Before she said anything back to the dragon, she looked at Yang for a long moment, and Yang could see the look of pity in her eyes.
Damn it…
"...How's Three?" Ruby asked, suddenly. "Have you seen her?"
"I've heard from her." Four replied. "I wasn't here when they found her, but she was buried under some rubble left over from the Schnee manor. Took a while to dig her out, apparently, but she's alive."
Ruby let out a sigh of relief. "Zero was about to kill her when I arrived. I'm glad I was able to save her."
...Ruby seemed to be taking comfort in that.
In which case, Yang should probably stay away from any thoughts along the lines of 'If only Ruby and I hadn't been here.'
"Please don't go growing a hero complex here." Gabriella interjected. "I don't want to have to keep watching you girls go and develop unhealthy character traits, it makes One upset."
"...What do you mean?" Ruby asked.
"Wanting to protect people is good and all." Gabriella continued. "But I can see it all over your face. 'I was able to help someone by being in danger, so me being hurt and the people I care about being hurt isn't that bad.' How long do you think it'll be before that turns into 'I have to endanger myself and the people around me to help others'?"
"Hold on!" Yang interrupted. "Just what kind of person do you take my sister for?"
"Human." Gabriella replied. "Well, Intoner. You know what I mean. You people tend to justify things to yourself and the young ones especially tend to fall into traps."
"So what?" Yang asked. "If it makes Ruby feel better-"
"If your sister wasn't an Intoner, she'd be dead." Gabriella interrupted. "And she didn't know that in advance, did she?"
"Enough, Gabriella." Four snapped. "This isn't the time."
"What, should I let it fester, then?" The black dragon asked. "Sure, fine, but you're explaining it to One."
And with that, the black dragon returned to its place in the airshop once again.
"...Sorry about that." Four sighed. "Gabriella tends to be a bit… Aggressive… And rather thoughtless."
"It's fine." Ruby brushed off. "She's right. I'm only alive because of something I didn't know about."
"Ruby-"
"No, it's try." Ruby admitted. "I… I don't regret saving Three. But I nearly died."
"...If it makes you feel better." Four spoke up. "Now we know there's very few circumstances where you could die. Unless another Intoner is involved or there are dragon bones involved, as far as we know, you can heal faster than you can die."
...Well that was good news, at least. Ruby being hard to kill beyond ridiculous circumstances. Now if only those exact circumstances hadn't just reared their head.
"And it gets better." Four continued. "It's… You'll want to ask One or Three for details, but dragon bone stuff interacts oddly with Aura and Intoner tricks. If I stabbed you with a dragon bone sword, it'd pierce your leg and hurt for a while, but your aura would heal it eventually, even though the ability to heal that an Intoner has wouldn't heal it. But if a dragon itself made the wound with its teeth or anything, then it doesn't heal without outside intervention."
"I think Penny said something about that." Ruby muttered, softly. "It only cancels out aura for a moment, without a dragon's soul behind it."
She looked down for a moment, before shaking her head softly.
"...I think I need to go lie down for a minute." Ruby said. She turned towards the elevator, but then stopped. "...No, not until we're done."
"It's fine." Yang assured Ruby. "Four, One wanted you to rest as well, right?"
"I guess she did…" Four admitted.
"Then you two go lie down." Yang insisted. "I'll go find someone else to talk to until One's done with her meeting or something."
"Alright." Ruby muttered.
Four stepped off the airship ramp and pressed a button on her device, and the airship started to close.
"I'll get you when One's ready to talk to us again." Ruby said. "Where should I look for you?"
Yang thought for a second, about where she would want to go.
[X] To where all the injured are. She wants to see if all of her friends are alright.
[X] Even if people said she wasn't responsive, Yang wanted to check on Two.
[X] ...Maybe Yang should just wait around One's office and see if anyone important was around.
- Location
- Washington
[X] To where all the injured are. She wants to see if all of her friends are alright.
SoothingCoffee
Umumumu
- Location
- The Library
[X] To where all the injured are. She wants to see if all of her friends are alright.
Exterminatus
Tsukumogami User
- Location
- Southern California
[X] Even if people said she wasn't responsive, Yang wanted to check on Two.
Alexander89
Pet the pretty kitty? Y/N
- Location
- Italy
[X] To where all the injured are. She wants to see if all of her friends are alright.
Update 142 - Hospital Roll Call
Mortifer
Embrace your inner lunatic. Fun times guaranteed.
- Location
- Under a rock.
[X] To where all the injured are. She wants to see if all of her friends are alright.
Having separated from her sister and Four, Yang wheeled her way through the hall. She'd been given directions by one of the doctors in the building. Yang tried not to think about the exact details of the meeting, because she didn't want to think about the pitying look in his eye. She had moved on quickly from there anyway.
Yang didn't want to think about herself right now anyway. She had friends who had been hurt as well, after all. She needed to think about them as well.
...And just how much of that thought process was Yang not wanting to think about her own situation, and subconsciously wanting to focus on someone else's suffering to distract from her own?
No, no, if she thought like that she was going to doubt everything she ever did. She couldn't just let herself be consumed with this despair and pain. If she started looking at her every action and thought 'What if I'm doing this because I'm messed up,'she'd never get past it.
Even if it was hard, Yang had to…
There was already so much messed up about all of this. If she couldn't trust her own thoughts, what did she even have?
Trying to push the rebellious thoughts out of her mind, Yang thought about her friends. The people who had been hurt up until this point, the people she knew.
She really hoped none of them had turned out to be in on the plan as well.
She knew that some of them weren't, at least. She'd seen how badly hurt Peri and Ren had been, she'd been there when the grey-haired bastard cut off Melanie's leg.
Not that Yang would really call Melanie a friend. Miltia was her friend, Melanie was Miltia's sister, and there was history between the two, even if Five had sort of fucked it up by addicting Melanie to her Song.
...Yang missed the days where Five was the most of her worries. Or, well, she had been miserable then as well, but at least she knew what to do. Find Ruby, save her. Simple.
Now? Yang didn't even know where to start.
...Coco and Velvet were injured as well, weren't they? Yang wasn't entirely sure if Velvet was alive, actually. The Faunus had been hit in the chest with a dagger from an Intoner, and hadn't gotten medical attention afterwards. She was probably dead. Best not to get her hopes up for her being around.
Not that it would matter that much, Velvet was ultimately just another one of Five's victims, just the least obnoxious one. Compared to what Yang had seen of Melanie and Coco, at least.
Out of the rest of the people who had been involved…
Peri and Ren were alive for sure, they had evacuated early on. Em…
...Yang couldn't be sure, but she thought that Em had made it out? The green-haired girl had helped Yang out just because it seemed like Yang needed help, so she hoped that Em hadn't been killed after she passed out.
Who else had been part of the trip, or in the area?
Yang didn't know where Sun, Sage, Eris, or Piran had been during the incident. Penny and Ciel had been traitors. Gawain had been a traitor. And that left Nora.
She'd been in the building, last Yang left her. Away from all the fighting and in a hospital room so she could recover. All of Zero's targets were out of the building, but…
...Hadn't Four said Three was buried under rubble, though? That gave Yang pause. Had something happened after Yang had fallen unconscious that had caused something to happen to the building? Was Nora actually okay?
Yang could feel the worry gnawing at her heart again, as she approached the wing of the building where the injured people were. According to the doctor, they had, for the most part, recovered. Some of them were still unconscious, some of them had wounds that wouldn't heal due to the trauma of the events etching the injuries into their souls, but a lot of people were here for now just for ease of accomodation.
Yang had been the worst off out of the survivors of that manor, apparently. And yeah, she couldn't picture people having worse injuries than Yang losing the ability to use her legs. But at no point had the doctor said who was actually here.
Moving around a corner, Yang passed by the room where she had been in until recently. Yang looked at the room for a moment, and actually took a moment to try to map out the place in her head.
She hadn't been paying attention until now. She'd been distracted by what was going on in her own head, so far. From here, the elevator was back the way she came, and around a corner. One's office wasn't far from here either, and-
"Yang?"
The blonde girl turned to the source of the voice, and looked over towards Lie Ren. Looking over him quickly. Yang didn't see any injuries, but there was some kind of mechanical device around his wrist, and the look in his eyes…
...He looked as hurt as Yang felt.
Just that idea, that concept, was sending dread through Yang's heart. If Ren looked like that, then…
No. No, she…
She could hardly think 'She had to be wrong,' She was doubting those words before she even thought them. But wouldn't it be nice, to be wrong here?
"Ren." Yang nodded in greeting. "You were looking for me?"
"Doctor said you'd woken up." Ren muttered. His voice sounded… Exhausted. "Everyone's… We've been stuck here a while. Gotten into the habit of meeting up to figure out what's going on. Do you have time to go see everyone?"
"I was looking for everyone anyway."
"What about your sister?" Ren asked, the continued consistency of his melancholic tone starting to unnerve Yang. "She refused to leave your side, earlier."
"She went to lie down." Yang replied. "She's… Been through a lot."
"I see." Ren noted. "We'll meet in Miss Flowers' room. She's still bedridden."
"How bad?" Yang asked.
"Nothing that wont heal." Ren replied, turning his back on Yang as he led the way.
...The fact that he didn't say anything about Yang's wheelchair was also unnerving Yang. He wasn't emoting much, he sounded tired, he looked like he was suffering, and he didn't even mention the obvious…
It hurt Yang to think about. She couldn't tell if it was her own pessimism, or if all the signs really were pointing to that one possibility.
Pushing the thought out of her head, Yang followed Ren in silence for a bit longer. It took a while to get there, since Ren was moving slowly enough that Yang didn't lose him around a corner, but they only had to turn around two to get there. It wasn't that far away. At most, it would have been a thirty second walk.
Ren pushed his way into the room, and Yang waited as he held the door open.
There was some discussion going on when the door had been opened, which didn't quiet down immediately.
Once Yang wheeled her way into the room, though, things went silent.
...Yeah, that's about what she expected.
Looking around, Yang observed who else was in the room. Lying on the bed with a cast around her legs was Periwinkle Flowers. The girl seemed to be the most shocked of the people in the room on a casual glance, but that made sense. She was Yang's classmate, after all. Ren was the only person who knew Yang before this trip in the room, and he seemed unresponsive as it was.
Sitting on a chair by Peri was Eris, the girl from Vacuo who Yang barely knew. Yang… Vaguely remembered hearing something about Eris being in the Schnee Manor Ruby was in, when the attack started, but hadn't seen her. The girl seemed fine, right now. Had a nasty scar along her arm, but otherwise, fine.
...it occurred to Yang that it was Penny, who had mentioned Eris. Shortly before Penny and Ciel tried to seal Yang in a room where time was slowed down. Was Eris trapped somewhere similar?
On the other side of the room, standing and frozen mid-meal, was the Faunus boy, Sun. He didn't seem all that injured at all, right now.
It was just the three of them in the room, right now. Yang was willing to accept the possibility that most of the other people she had worried about weren't in the building at the time, and she wouldn't expect an addict like Melanie to be with the others here, but…
"Where's Nora?" Yang asked.
The silence seemed to grow heavier somehow. After a moment, there was the sound of something cracking, and Yang looked over towards the door Ren was still holding. Around the point where Ren was holding the door, it had cracked and been damaged by the tightening of his grip.
...Oh.
Oh, there wasn't much way for it to be made much more clear, wasn't it?
God damn it.
After all that Nora had been through, after how hard Yang had tried to get her to somewhere where she could recover, after how much Ren had already lost…
Nora had to die as well?
It…
It just wasn't fair.
The five teenagers in a hospital bed were silent for some time, until eventually, the girl from Vacuo spoke.
"Perhaps we should begin again." She broke the silence with a voice that seemed more fitting to ending an awkward silence, rather than a mournful one. "Yang Xiao Long. It is good to see you well."
"You don't gotta lie, you know." Yang muttered softly. "Can't be any worse than what I already thought."
"I have heard the story." Eris interrupted. "You were in the thick of combat with the enemy, yes? Then the fact that you are still here is worth praising."
...It was a transparent attempt to improve her mood, coming from someone who didn't know Yang well. The fact that it didn't work was no big surprise.
"...Glad you guys look okay, at least. Yang said. "For the most part, anyway."
"I was lucky." Sun noted. "Knight Guy knocked me out, like, right away. I missed the whole thing."
"And Ciel stopped me from contributing to events, as well." Eris confirmed. "Even when the building collapsed, her Semblance let her slow the flow of time in the room I was in. It took hours of proper time for the room I was in to collapse, and people were able to save me before then."
Ren took a deep breath, drawing attention to him before anyone else spoke. "Those two are only here because Atlas wanted to check their backgrounds to be sure they weren't going to go home and right into another trap."
"Sage got to leave already because he had a relative who'd worked with Atlas before, so they were able to check him quickly." Sun explained. "My paperwork got held up for some reason, and Eris-"
"The Vacuan Government is overworked, as of the moment." Eris interrupted. "They won't be able to send Atlas the information about my situation for a while longer."
"...I see." Yang noted. "Guess they really want to make sure none of us get hurt again?"
"It'd be really bad PR if they did." Sun noted. "And we only got involved because Atlas invited us as part of a lottery thing we won."
"Lucky us." Yang tried to make a joke, but wasn't able to muster up the effort to make it sound sarcastic.
...Ren and Peri were still being really quiet right now. The reason why was obvious for both of them, but Yang didn't like it.
Well, at least when she healed up, Peri would be able to go home. Didn't her dad end up tagging along for the trip? Yang hadn't seen him in a while but with a parent right there in Atlas, it'd be easy to vet him and have Peri sent home.
Ren might be a more complicated matter. Yang wasn't sure what kind of place he was staying at in Vale, but he didn't have any parents or guardians. And-
Yang cut her thought short when she realised what she had done. She'd started thinking about something she didn't like, then instantly repressed it instead of addressing it. Peri, Ren. Not talking. Didn't like it. Needed to address it.
...But how? Yang didn't know how to address Ren's issue, of what happened to Nora. And Peri's issue seemed to be the shock of seeing Yang in a wheelchair. Both of those were things Yang barely wanted to think about herself. But she couldn't just ignore it and let other people suffer as well. It just felt wrong.
...It wasn't like Yang could talk about both things at once, though.
Taking a brief breath, Yang decided on her course of action.
[X] Talk to Ren about Nora. Yang needed to tell him that she had taken Nora to the top floor of the mansion, at least.
[X] Talk to Peri about Yang's own condition. It was easier to digest, so Yang might actually do something with that.
Having separated from her sister and Four, Yang wheeled her way through the hall. She'd been given directions by one of the doctors in the building. Yang tried not to think about the exact details of the meeting, because she didn't want to think about the pitying look in his eye. She had moved on quickly from there anyway.
Yang didn't want to think about herself right now anyway. She had friends who had been hurt as well, after all. She needed to think about them as well.
...And just how much of that thought process was Yang not wanting to think about her own situation, and subconsciously wanting to focus on someone else's suffering to distract from her own?
No, no, if she thought like that she was going to doubt everything she ever did. She couldn't just let herself be consumed with this despair and pain. If she started looking at her every action and thought 'What if I'm doing this because I'm messed up,'she'd never get past it.
Even if it was hard, Yang had to…
There was already so much messed up about all of this. If she couldn't trust her own thoughts, what did she even have?
Trying to push the rebellious thoughts out of her mind, Yang thought about her friends. The people who had been hurt up until this point, the people she knew.
She really hoped none of them had turned out to be in on the plan as well.
She knew that some of them weren't, at least. She'd seen how badly hurt Peri and Ren had been, she'd been there when the grey-haired bastard cut off Melanie's leg.
Not that Yang would really call Melanie a friend. Miltia was her friend, Melanie was Miltia's sister, and there was history between the two, even if Five had sort of fucked it up by addicting Melanie to her Song.
...Yang missed the days where Five was the most of her worries. Or, well, she had been miserable then as well, but at least she knew what to do. Find Ruby, save her. Simple.
Now? Yang didn't even know where to start.
...Coco and Velvet were injured as well, weren't they? Yang wasn't entirely sure if Velvet was alive, actually. The Faunus had been hit in the chest with a dagger from an Intoner, and hadn't gotten medical attention afterwards. She was probably dead. Best not to get her hopes up for her being around.
Not that it would matter that much, Velvet was ultimately just another one of Five's victims, just the least obnoxious one. Compared to what Yang had seen of Melanie and Coco, at least.
Out of the rest of the people who had been involved…
Peri and Ren were alive for sure, they had evacuated early on. Em…
...Yang couldn't be sure, but she thought that Em had made it out? The green-haired girl had helped Yang out just because it seemed like Yang needed help, so she hoped that Em hadn't been killed after she passed out.
Who else had been part of the trip, or in the area?
Yang didn't know where Sun, Sage, Eris, or Piran had been during the incident. Penny and Ciel had been traitors. Gawain had been a traitor. And that left Nora.
She'd been in the building, last Yang left her. Away from all the fighting and in a hospital room so she could recover. All of Zero's targets were out of the building, but…
...Hadn't Four said Three was buried under rubble, though? That gave Yang pause. Had something happened after Yang had fallen unconscious that had caused something to happen to the building? Was Nora actually okay?
Yang could feel the worry gnawing at her heart again, as she approached the wing of the building where the injured people were. According to the doctor, they had, for the most part, recovered. Some of them were still unconscious, some of them had wounds that wouldn't heal due to the trauma of the events etching the injuries into their souls, but a lot of people were here for now just for ease of accomodation.
Yang had been the worst off out of the survivors of that manor, apparently. And yeah, she couldn't picture people having worse injuries than Yang losing the ability to use her legs. But at no point had the doctor said who was actually here.
Moving around a corner, Yang passed by the room where she had been in until recently. Yang looked at the room for a moment, and actually took a moment to try to map out the place in her head.
She hadn't been paying attention until now. She'd been distracted by what was going on in her own head, so far. From here, the elevator was back the way she came, and around a corner. One's office wasn't far from here either, and-
"Yang?"
The blonde girl turned to the source of the voice, and looked over towards Lie Ren. Looking over him quickly. Yang didn't see any injuries, but there was some kind of mechanical device around his wrist, and the look in his eyes…
...He looked as hurt as Yang felt.
Just that idea, that concept, was sending dread through Yang's heart. If Ren looked like that, then…
No. No, she…
She could hardly think 'She had to be wrong,' She was doubting those words before she even thought them. But wouldn't it be nice, to be wrong here?
"Ren." Yang nodded in greeting. "You were looking for me?"
"Doctor said you'd woken up." Ren muttered. His voice sounded… Exhausted. "Everyone's… We've been stuck here a while. Gotten into the habit of meeting up to figure out what's going on. Do you have time to go see everyone?"
"I was looking for everyone anyway."
"What about your sister?" Ren asked, the continued consistency of his melancholic tone starting to unnerve Yang. "She refused to leave your side, earlier."
"She went to lie down." Yang replied. "She's… Been through a lot."
"I see." Ren noted. "We'll meet in Miss Flowers' room. She's still bedridden."
"How bad?" Yang asked.
"Nothing that wont heal." Ren replied, turning his back on Yang as he led the way.
...The fact that he didn't say anything about Yang's wheelchair was also unnerving Yang. He wasn't emoting much, he sounded tired, he looked like he was suffering, and he didn't even mention the obvious…
It hurt Yang to think about. She couldn't tell if it was her own pessimism, or if all the signs really were pointing to that one possibility.
Pushing the thought out of her head, Yang followed Ren in silence for a bit longer. It took a while to get there, since Ren was moving slowly enough that Yang didn't lose him around a corner, but they only had to turn around two to get there. It wasn't that far away. At most, it would have been a thirty second walk.
Ren pushed his way into the room, and Yang waited as he held the door open.
There was some discussion going on when the door had been opened, which didn't quiet down immediately.
Once Yang wheeled her way into the room, though, things went silent.
...Yeah, that's about what she expected.
Looking around, Yang observed who else was in the room. Lying on the bed with a cast around her legs was Periwinkle Flowers. The girl seemed to be the most shocked of the people in the room on a casual glance, but that made sense. She was Yang's classmate, after all. Ren was the only person who knew Yang before this trip in the room, and he seemed unresponsive as it was.
Sitting on a chair by Peri was Eris, the girl from Vacuo who Yang barely knew. Yang… Vaguely remembered hearing something about Eris being in the Schnee Manor Ruby was in, when the attack started, but hadn't seen her. The girl seemed fine, right now. Had a nasty scar along her arm, but otherwise, fine.
...it occurred to Yang that it was Penny, who had mentioned Eris. Shortly before Penny and Ciel tried to seal Yang in a room where time was slowed down. Was Eris trapped somewhere similar?
On the other side of the room, standing and frozen mid-meal, was the Faunus boy, Sun. He didn't seem all that injured at all, right now.
It was just the three of them in the room, right now. Yang was willing to accept the possibility that most of the other people she had worried about weren't in the building at the time, and she wouldn't expect an addict like Melanie to be with the others here, but…
"Where's Nora?" Yang asked.
The silence seemed to grow heavier somehow. After a moment, there was the sound of something cracking, and Yang looked over towards the door Ren was still holding. Around the point where Ren was holding the door, it had cracked and been damaged by the tightening of his grip.
...Oh.
Oh, there wasn't much way for it to be made much more clear, wasn't it?
God damn it.
After all that Nora had been through, after how hard Yang had tried to get her to somewhere where she could recover, after how much Ren had already lost…
Nora had to die as well?
It…
It just wasn't fair.
The five teenagers in a hospital bed were silent for some time, until eventually, the girl from Vacuo spoke.
"Perhaps we should begin again." She broke the silence with a voice that seemed more fitting to ending an awkward silence, rather than a mournful one. "Yang Xiao Long. It is good to see you well."
"You don't gotta lie, you know." Yang muttered softly. "Can't be any worse than what I already thought."
"I have heard the story." Eris interrupted. "You were in the thick of combat with the enemy, yes? Then the fact that you are still here is worth praising."
...It was a transparent attempt to improve her mood, coming from someone who didn't know Yang well. The fact that it didn't work was no big surprise.
"...Glad you guys look okay, at least. Yang said. "For the most part, anyway."
"I was lucky." Sun noted. "Knight Guy knocked me out, like, right away. I missed the whole thing."
"And Ciel stopped me from contributing to events, as well." Eris confirmed. "Even when the building collapsed, her Semblance let her slow the flow of time in the room I was in. It took hours of proper time for the room I was in to collapse, and people were able to save me before then."
Ren took a deep breath, drawing attention to him before anyone else spoke. "Those two are only here because Atlas wanted to check their backgrounds to be sure they weren't going to go home and right into another trap."
"Sage got to leave already because he had a relative who'd worked with Atlas before, so they were able to check him quickly." Sun explained. "My paperwork got held up for some reason, and Eris-"
"The Vacuan Government is overworked, as of the moment." Eris interrupted. "They won't be able to send Atlas the information about my situation for a while longer."
"...I see." Yang noted. "Guess they really want to make sure none of us get hurt again?"
"It'd be really bad PR if they did." Sun noted. "And we only got involved because Atlas invited us as part of a lottery thing we won."
"Lucky us." Yang tried to make a joke, but wasn't able to muster up the effort to make it sound sarcastic.
...Ren and Peri were still being really quiet right now. The reason why was obvious for both of them, but Yang didn't like it.
Well, at least when she healed up, Peri would be able to go home. Didn't her dad end up tagging along for the trip? Yang hadn't seen him in a while but with a parent right there in Atlas, it'd be easy to vet him and have Peri sent home.
Ren might be a more complicated matter. Yang wasn't sure what kind of place he was staying at in Vale, but he didn't have any parents or guardians. And-
Yang cut her thought short when she realised what she had done. She'd started thinking about something she didn't like, then instantly repressed it instead of addressing it. Peri, Ren. Not talking. Didn't like it. Needed to address it.
...But how? Yang didn't know how to address Ren's issue, of what happened to Nora. And Peri's issue seemed to be the shock of seeing Yang in a wheelchair. Both of those were things Yang barely wanted to think about herself. But she couldn't just ignore it and let other people suffer as well. It just felt wrong.
...It wasn't like Yang could talk about both things at once, though.
Taking a brief breath, Yang decided on her course of action.
[X] Talk to Ren about Nora. Yang needed to tell him that she had taken Nora to the top floor of the mansion, at least.
[X] Talk to Peri about Yang's own condition. It was easier to digest, so Yang might actually do something with that.
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