Chapter IX - The Faunus's Tale
Yang
They were back in the dorm after the unfortunate incident with Penny, and then all hell had broken loose.
Yang had been in many awkward situations in her life. She’d seen Qrow get so drunk that he had toppled off a balcony and into a pool (the beer had, of course, ruined the pool). She’d walked in on Taiyang and Summer Rose doing something that most decidedly was not rated G and had invariably scarred her impressionable six-year old mind (she had wanted to bleach her eyes). She had accidentally punched an old guy in the face and sent him flying into a ladder, dumping neon paint all over his tuxedo (long story). But this by far had to top the list.
Standing awkwardly with Ruby while their partners screamed at each other loud enough to wake people beyond the confines of the room? Yeah, it wasn’t the most ideal situation.
The worst part of it was that Yang had never really seen Blake get what could be called angry. Annoyed, contemptuous, bothered— sure, all of those were practically Blake’s defaults. But this cold, hardened fury? It was new, and it was, to tell the truth, alarming. The most Yang had ever achieved was getting her riled on the cliffs of Forever Fall, and seeing her disconcerted. But this— this was odd, a cutting anger that went down to the shadows in her eyes, like Weiss had struck a nerve and she was lashing out like a cobra.
Besides, Yang didn’t want that fury unleashed on her if she interrupted their argument. Why were they arguing, anyways? Blake didn’t really seem like an enthused advocate for Faunus rights. Yang had only ever been dragged to one of their peaceful protests, by her uncle Qrow, and it hadn’t been fun.
But Blake was her partner, her friend, and so, compelled to take her side in the argument, Yang went to get up before Weiss’s voice rose in rage.
“I don’t see why this is such a big problem!”
Blake’s lip curled in what could only be described as a snarl. “That is the problem.”
“You’re just trying to cause an issue out of nothing!”
Blake made a hissing sort of noise; her cheeks were spotted with high color, like fever. “You are making a mistake,” she ground out, “talking to me like this, Weiss.” She took a deep breath and, with effort, battled back a stream of insults. It didn’t go unnoticed by Weiss, because her face darkened.
“You do realize you’re defending an organization that hates humanity,” Weiss snapped, “hates us.” Blake’s eyes narrowed. “The Faunus of the White Fang are pure evil, and you—“
Blake’s mouth twisted, a starburst of pain fracturing behind her eyes, and Yang recoiled. Damn, this is about to get real, she thought, vaguely aware that if she could stifle Blake’s anger, she should try, but something warned her not to intervene, that if she did, Blake’s fury could just as easily be turned on her, and that above all was something she didn’t want. “There’s no such thing as pure evil,” Blake growled, voice low and thick with anger. “Why the hell do you think they hate humanity? It’s because of people like Cardin, people like you, that force them to take such drastic measures!” Her voice rose.
And right as RWBY got back together, we’re fighting again, Yang realized, getting up from her chair. This can’t happen, please. Not now.
“People like me?” Weiss’s eyes were blazing.
“You’re discriminatory!” Blake spat.
“I’m a victim!” Weiss snarled, fists barring at her sides, and Blake’s eyes went to slits, two chips of cold fire. As they stared each other down, the air crackling with silence, Weiss leaned forward, her face frosty. “You want to know why I despise the White Fang? Why I don’t particularly trust the Faunus?” She rocked back against the bookshelf, moonlight streaming the window. “It’s because they’ve been at war with my family for years… war, actual bloodshed.” Blake didn’t looked surprised, and Yang tilted her head, eyes narrowing. “My grandfather’s company has had a target painted across its back for as long as I can remember, and ever since I was a child, I’ve watched family friends disappear— board members executed— an entire train car full of Dust absconded. And every day my father came home furious.” Shadows chased shadows in her eyes. “That made for a verydifficult childhood.”
Ruby slipped past Yang and tentatively laid a hand on Weiss’s shoulder. “Weiss— I—“
“No!” Weiss snapped back around, chomping at the bit for a fight. “You know why I hate the Faunus? It’s because they’re liars!Thieves! And murderers!” Blake looked as if Weiss had struck her, each word painful as a slap across the face.
Yang remembered once, when she was very small, when she had shattered a vase; she had looked at the broken shards, shattered across the floor, and thought: nothing can ever put these pieces back together again.
She made to move forward, but Blake’s teeth were bared in a snarl, her eyes bright with tears, and Yang knew, she knew, things were about to fall apart— “Maybe we were just tired of being pushed around!”
And there it was.
Instantly, the wretched anger on Blake’s face dissolved, replaced with horror. Yang— distantly; very distantly, as if from another land, another lifetime, felt her heart skip, as if jerking from cords and plunging into freefall. In a second, images shuttered behind her eyes: it must be hard to be a Faunus, the Faunus are born to violent tendencies, I hate people like him, of this, you have no idea—
But Blake. Blake, her partner, her friend— someone who she didn’t even know now. Any trace of her steely visage, austere and furious like an avenging angel, had vanished, and there was the shadow of terrified helplessness in her face— she looked like she was shattering in the moment, eyes round as the moon. Her face had gone deathly white and still, shock and horror written all over her skin— and then it shattered into terror as Yang reached out, to— what? Touch her? Reprieve her? Offer comfort? Yang knew that she was the last person that could ever offer Blake any comfort.
Blake recoiled from Yang so fast she almost shot into the bedpost, like her touch was made of acid. “No. No, I— I can’t,” she whispered, and her throat bobbed in a choking swallow before she streaked out of the room in blur of shadow, door banging drunkenly behind her.
“Blake!” cried Yang, and Ruby echoed her, barely hearing Weiss’s snarl of fury. She cast a helpless look back— Weiss’s shock solidifying into an anger so chilled it sent shock whirling through Yang, Ruby with a hand over her mouth, before she was up on her feet and pounding after Blake, running as fast as if a Beowolf was on her heels.
She looked until every muscle in her body ached and despair was dark, bitter, in her chest. But Blake was nowhere to be found. She wasn’t in the turrets of Beacon, or the empty classrooms, or even her favorite haven, the library. The shadows yielded nothing, no trace of glittering amber eyes, or her pallor.
As Yang looked, it gave her time to think. And she was not bothered— not at all.
She’d seen Blake’s bow give odd movements that she had pinned to the blowing of the wind, seen the uncontrollable anger in her eyes when there was discrimination against Faunus, seen her rigid attention to the lectures. Blake being a Faunus, even one of the White Fang— no, that wasn’t what bothered Yang. Surprised her, sure, but it didn’t bother her…
It was that Blake had lied about it.
They had made a promise, Yang and Blake. A pact, really, on those cliffs. And Blake had still lied. Yang wasn’t stupid, of course; despite what many thought, a cheery nature, even if it was only a facade, did not equal ignorance. She was aware that Blake had secrets behind her smile, guilt behind her eyes, agendas behind her advice. She just hadn’t realized how drastic they were, how tortured her partner had been.
The shadows that seemed to perpetually swirl in her eyes made sense now.
Where the hell had Blake gone, anyways? Yang had scoured the entirety of Beacon. She was either a ridiculously good hider, which was unlikely, because Yang had grown up in a household with Ruby, a certified hide-and-seeker extraordinare, or she was… she was gone.
And Yang had a sinking, horrible feeling that it was the latter as she sank her teeth, thoughtfully, into her bottom lip. Blake wasn’t able to confront them. It wasn’t in her nature, to be confrontational… unless Yang forced her to it, challenged her, like that day on the cliffs. She had run. But the question was, where to? Yang was forced to stop looking; clearly Blake had fled farther as her past threatened to swallow her.
Framing her hands on the icy lip of stone rimming the turret she was in, Yang turned her eyes to the sky. The moon was a claw-scratch of white in the sky, stars running in a misty band of silver like a river.
“Please, Blake,” she said to the grinning, frosty stars and the unfeeling moon, “You’ve got to come back.”
And then, even though it wasn’t necessary, even though it stirred something to life in her chest, that sparking fire that breathed in her veins as a part of her, she whispered to the night wind, as if it could carry the sound to Blake and between all the bonds that linked between them, “Come home to me.”
Blake
Blake looked out over the waking city, swore, and mentally added another spectacular screw-up to chalk to her ever-growing list.
In fact, screwing up seemed to be a new trend for her. A bad one.
Her teeth ground together as the previous night thundered through her mind in snippets of sound and scenes. Maybe we were tired of being pushed around… that single word, we.
A single word could bring empires to their knees. A single word could create a legacy to stretch out for thousands of years. A single word could ruin a life.
A single word could break a bond.
Her most closely guarded secret, her biggest demon, a closely held part of her soul— and she’d let it slip, like a fool, in her uncontrollable tirade of rage. Adam had always scolded her for not keeping reigns on her words. Her backlashes with Ayran had gotten her punished many, many times… but it was this that yielded the most pain. This was the most memorable backlash. This was the one that had broken her life right in two.
She didn’t know what she was going to do now. If she thought about it, the mere prospect threatened to overwhelm her. So she shoved it in the back of her mind, knowing that sooner or later, she had to confront it.
Blake closed her eyes, hands curling around the still-steaming cup of tea, as if she could soak up some of the warmth to alleviate the chill that seemed to have taken up permanent residence in her marrow. The sun was shedding down warm, buttery beams of light, but she hardly felt them. Even behind her eyes, she could see Yang’s face dancing there, and all the betrayal and hurt on it. Blake opened her eyes with a grunt of frustration, meeting her own gaze in the honeyed, dark surface of the tea. Her face matched the surface: haunted, hollow.
After she had stopped in the courtyard, tears blurring her vision, a stinging in her heart, Sun had come to her, seen her crying, and offered to give her residence in a small flat he’d rented out in downtown Vale. She’d acquiesced his offer, because it was all she had. The flat had been small, but not uncomfortable, and he had left while she slept to do whatever it was a foreign student did while in another city. She had assumed he was probably leaving to raid local shops, but she was glad of the privacy.
Sleep had not come easily that night. She’d tossed and turned, adrift in fitful sleep; when dreams did come, they were dark and threaded with lilac eyes and the blurry silhouettes of her parents. She had woken, shaking and cold to the bone, and Sun was fixing coffee and pancakes with bananas in the kitchenette. He was ravenous; she didn’t think she could eat ever again.
Now, they were on the sunny balcony atop a small tea cafè.
Sun was watching her. She didn’t trust him, in particulars; trusting a stranger— even if he was a Faunus and appeared to have honest, straightforward intentions— was a dumb idea. But he had offered her kindness and a listening ear, and that meant the world to her at the moment.
She needed to speak these words before they consumed her alive.
Even now, they were rattling in her skull, tearing sharp claws at her chest. Sun didn’t know her; he wouldn’t judge her for her past, and if he did, she could always leave, because she wasn’t obligated to owe him anything.
It just— it wasn’t so with Yang. What if her partner, her friend— Blake winced a little— had condemned her, for just— for just fleeing like the coward she was?
Blake wanted Yang to think she was a good person. She wanted to be a good person, for her. Blake had never felt that way. She hadn’t given a damn what Adam thought of her, or Weiss or Ruby or Sun or any of them. If they perceived her as calculating and cold, so be it; it was no skin off her nose. But Yang was different; Blake didn’t know how, but she was, and Blake cared, and that was all there was for it.
God, sometimes she had the worst luck.
“So,” she murmured, wind tousling her hair. Her voice was rough, hoarse from so long in not speaking. “You want to know more about me.”
Sun set down his teacup and frowned, lines creasing his brow. He looked apprehensive. “Well, yeah, sure, that’s the general aim.” He framed the air with his hands and tried for a grin, which fell flat in the solemn air. “At least, you’re finally talking, damn. Nearly a day or so now and you’ve given me nothing but small talk and weird looks!” He looked satisfied as she narrowed her eyes, and flicked his tail at her. “Case in point.”
A sigh rustled its way from her lungs, the words dragged like rocks from her throat. “Sun, are you…” she faltered, the enormity of her past weighing on her. “Are you familiar with the White Fang?”
“‘Course.” His voice was dry, dismissive, touched with flippant scorn. “I don’t think there’s a Faunus in Remnant that hasn’t heard of those psychos. Crazy, wannabe dictators—“
She flinched, stared into the dregs of her cup, knuckles whitening on the curling, delicate stem. Her own voice sounded distorted, echoing, in her ears, like she was speaking from far away, out of a body that wasn’t her own. “I was— once a member of the White Fang.” That’s putting it lightly…
He choked in a most unflattering manner, sputtering on his tea. When he turned his eyes back to her, they were pools of disbelief. “Are you— are you serious?”
“To my chagrin, I am.” She swallowed, and he fell silent, eyes narrowing. “I was… I was a member for most of my life, actually. I was born into it, by my mother and father.
“Back then, things were different. In the ashes of the War, the White Fang was created as a link between humankind and the Faunus, a symbol of peace and unity. But that didn’t last. We were still discriminated against, treated like dirt. That was something we could not stand for. And so the White Fang rose up as the voice of a revolution.” Her lips thinned as a succession of images flashed behind her eyes: a sword, a corpse, a pair of swirling dark eyes, a crowd of screaming Faunus. “I was at the front of every rally. I took part in every boycott. I actually thought we were making a difference, but…” Her voice darkened. “I was just a youthful optimist. There was no difference that the humans offered us… just disparaging acknowledgement. We were the aggressors, and the humans were the heroes. They were vindicated and we were vilified.”
Anger bubbling in her veins, she continued. “Then, five years ago, our leader, Julian, stepped down… so they say. Others think he was forced into it, but… that doesn’t matter. A new leader took his place. A new Faunus with a new way of thinking. His name is Ayran.” Sun’s eyes glinted at her use of present tense, but he didn’t interrupt, and she went on.
“He had big plans, big ideals… ones he refused to share with any of us. He’s the most malevolent person I’ve ever known. Suddenly, our peaceful protests were being replaced with organized attacks. We were setting fire to shops that refused to serve us, hijacking cargo from companies that used Faunus labor. And the worst part was, it was working. We were being treated like equals.” Her nails dug into her arms. “But not out of respect… out of fear."
A sigh escaped from somewhere deep within her, a knot of bitterness and resent loosening in her chest. “So I left. I refused to squander my skills, myself, to aid in their violence and deteriorating morals… and I decided to dedicate my life to helping the weak, mending the broken, vanquishing the evil of the world. I would become a Huntress.” She twitched her ears ruefully. “So here I am, a liar and a fool… a criminal hiding in plain view with only the aid of a little black bow.”
Sun’s eyes held sadness, not revulsion, and she hadn’t realized how much she’d been hoping someone, anyone, wouldn’t judge her until it was there. “Have you told your team this?” He pressed gently, leaning forward. “Your friends, your partner?”
Shame filled her. She’d heard Yang cry out after she had fled, and still she hadn’t looked back. “I— I can’t.”
“You have to,” he insisted. “I’m honored you’ve trusted me with this, Blake, but it needs to be heard by those who care for you the most.”
Her hands clenched on the lip of the table. “Sun, I don’t even know if they consider me a part of the team anymore, especially after I ran off. What if they…” Her voice quavered and she swore. “What if they hate me now?”
He eyed her thoughtfully. “Hate you for having courage enough to leave those holier-than-thou megalomaniacs? I think what you did was commendable, and I hardly know you. What’s to say your team won’t think you’re brave, too?”
She swallowed. I will not cry, she told herself gruffly, before nodding, afraid that if she spoke, her voice would break. “I… thanks.”
“So,” he said, slamming down his cup and grinning broadly at her, “what are we going to do about it?”
She blinked, confused at his rapid fluctuation between somber to looking like he’d downed three espressos in less than three minutes. “What?”
“You know, all these robberies and stuff. There’s gotta be someone behind it, and there’s no better detective than a Faunus!” He drummed the edge of the table with his fingers, a thoughtful expression on his face. “Actually, wait. Let’s get out of here before we start hatching heroic, jail-the-big-baddies plots. Tea shops are never the best place for violence, and I hate tea.”
“I love tea,” she murmured, but a small smile threatened to play over her face. She killed it, stifling her amusement; there was still darkness winding out ahead of her, and the looming matter of her team.
Blake was wary as they wandered the street. Trying to keep a low profile, with Sun’s loud talking and flirtatious winks at other girls they passed, was out of the question, so she had to settle for discreetly keeping an eye out for a telltale gleam of sunlight on golden hair, or the shuff-shuff of leather, or a sunny voice, or anything that might let her know where her team— she swallowed— was. Thank her stars that she and Yang weren’t Bonded, or her partner would be able to locate her instantaneously.
But a Bond required a connection stronger than trust, and Blake had shattered whatever thing they had forged back on the cliffs. She wanted to reconcile it, of course; the question was if Yang could forgive her.
If she could find her, which wasn’t looking so likely right now, but she had bigger worries than the complexity of what she was to her partner. She didn’t want to puzzle over that just yet.
“I’m fresh out of kickass-saving-the-world ideas,” Sun admitted, jerking her from her thoughts. “So… your call? What’s the plan now?”
She shook her head in frustration. “I don’t think the White Fang’s behind this. It doesn’t make sense. Ayran… he hated everything about the humans, their accomplishments, and that includes Dust, so why would he be stealing all of it all of a sudden? He didn’t need it.”
Sun’s eyes grew wider. “What if he did, though? Like, what if there’s the smallest chance that he was behind all this. I mean... the only way to prove that the White Fang didn't do it, is to go to the place where they would most likely go to if they were to do it, and not find them there! Right?"
“Aside from all that terrible grammar…” She frowned, pressing her palm to the side of an aged tenancy, and furrowed her brow. “It could work. The only problem is that I’ve no idea where they would go, if it’s him behind all this.”
"Well,” he said consideringly, “while I was on the ship, I heard some guys talking about offloading a huge shipment of Dust coming in from Atlas."
She felt her heart jump with forbidden hope. “How huge?”
He brandished his arms for effect, indicating a patch in the air roughly the size of a house cat, and Blake immediately scolded herself for that thought. “Huge. Big Schnee Company freighter."
“You're sure?"
“Hundred percent.” A steely look flared in his eyes, wiping away the glittering mischief. He didn’t look like Adam anymore, and she felt something loosen in her chest. “We’ve just gotta wait ‘em out.”
“I can wait,” she said softly, “for a long time, to stop them.”
He knocked his elbow into hers. “See? You’re already plotting to smear those pricks in the dirt. Far strides, eh?”
She frowned at her feet, drawing her arms closer so her elbows jabbed out, a visible guard. Her eyes sliced across the city, sweeping in an unconscious search for a flare of tawny hair. “We’ll see about that until I’m there and stopping them, Wukong.”