Chapter Text
Today had been going so well. There had been no problems. No issues.
Not until someone who wasn't her, to be precise (Klein would be pleased), had decided to be-
"-so incredibly reckless!" Weiss waved the vial in her hand for the sake of punctuation. "Do you know what this could have done if it had hit the ground any harder? Do you?"
The girl, no, the baby-faced dolt Weiss was lecturing, looked like she wanted to sink through the ground and die… Weiss would have felt bad if she were yelling about anything else.
Dust was volatile. Dust was dangerous.
The dolt had tripped over a whole case of the substance, kicking it hard enough to send vials of it spiraling and tumbling like dice across the yellow brick road.
"I don't know about you, fool, but I have no wish to see my makers anytime-"
There was movement in the corner of her eye. Weiss turned her head to see who was approaching them, ready to give them a piece of her mind too, if necessary - she shut up.
She shut up immediately.
Weiss' jaw snapped shut hard enough that it hurt, eyes going wide as they made contact with someone she'd never thought she'd meet in the flesh. And for good reason.
Blake Belladonna, daughter of Ghira and Kali Belladonna, 'princess' of Menagerie, who'd been missing for five years.
Right here.
Right now.
Oh dear.
And here she was, all out of sorts.
"I didn't realize we had company." She made to curtsey on reflex. "Please, let me-"
Weiss was three words in and a pinch of her skirt before she realized she'd just made a mistake.
A full vial of fire Dust had just slipped from her fingers, the ones pinching her skirt, and Blake had jumped away with visible terror…all before Weiss had finished introducing herself.
Gods damn it.
There was light.
…
…
…
An unknown amount of time later, assumedly not that long as she came back to herself with ringing in her ears and the familiar feeling of rubble beneath her, Weiss gathered her thoughts.
Weiss Schnee, the heiress of the Schnee Dust Corporation, singer, dancer, and Huntress in training, was a good person in her opinion. She tried very hard to be.
… She believed that she wasn't a bad person, at least. She had her flaws, her tiny imperfections. As perfect as she may have looked on the first, second, and you could be forgiven for making that mistake for the next five glances after, she was just like any other girl.
She refused to take the blame for what her father did, had done, and will do. No matter how horrendous. Or stupid.
None of that was due to her.
"My head…" The dolt, who seemed to be sharing the hole Weiss had found herself in, whined.
Weiss heard her.
Weiss ignored her.
This wasn't about her.
Weiss continued.
What her father did, had done, and would do, and how Weiss was forced to shoulder the responsibility for it all anyway… The time when she could wash her hands of his many sins was passed, if there had ever been a time at all, and so she would face them head-on.
"What just happened?"
She'd shoulder that burden until she no longer had to, whenever that was. It might well be hers to carry until the day she breathed her last. But she would bear it with the quiet dignity that was expected of her…while doing her best to lighten the load, as it were.
To make things easier.
"Why am I in a crater? Why is there a crater?"
Some may think that this wasn't the time for this level of thought, but personal revelations waited for no woman.
Anyway, again, that burden could be made lighter. She could cleanse the stains her father had left on the family legacy. It would take effort, time, everything she knew about public relations and diplomacy, and the sheer earnestness of a true believer in improving society… And the people within it.
Faunus or human, it didn't matter. That was what she was talking about. That was what needed to be fixed. Or, at the least, addressed.
"Did we just blow up!?"
It had been far too long since the fracture at the heart of society was addressed. The gulf between human and faunus had yawned ever wider throughout her life, threatening to crumble the very foundations of everything she knew.
And her father was content to make it worse.
That was the sin she bore through no fault of her own…and it was absurd that anyone pretended that the differences between the two races were so high that they were insurmountable.
"Are you okay?!"
Differences. What differences?
"Can you hear me?!"
A tail? Ears? The ability to see in the dark? Gills?
So what?
Didn't they breathe the same air and eat the same foods? Didn't they share the same dreams? When they bled, was it not as red as anyone else's?
Did their souls not shine as bright as any other's?
"Please don't be deaf!"
Could they not interbreed?
Weiss nodded to herself.
Yes. Yes, they could.
And yes. Yes, they did.
Weiss rested her case.
They were more alike than they were not, and due to her unique position, she had an obligation, no, a duty to bridge the gap, to begin making amends, to attempt to shift public opinion into something more accepting than when she'd started.
It would not be easy. She knew that. History was not as forgiving as she was. Or willing to accept that, sometimes, perfection was the enemy of 'good enough'.
But someone had to try.
She squared her shoulders, lifted her chin, and picked herself up and out of the hole she was in. She dusted herself off, mentally writing off the vial of fire Dust that had just blown up as a business expense.
"Oh jeez, oh gosh, you can stand? You're standing! Thank the gods!"
Diplomacy…thoughtful words, and strong deeds, so she resettled her stance on the uneven flooring. Yes, this was still salvageable. She just needed to project confidence, reliability, and respect.
"I'm not going back to jail!"
Approachable. That's what her stance was—the stance of someone meeting an equal in all respects, ice blue eyes meeting the warm amber of honey without hesitation. She reached out a well-manicured hand in greeting, in invitation, in hopes of reciprocity.
Thoughtful words. Careful words. What she wanted only mattered so far as her counterpart wanted the same thing.
Careful.
"We would make beautiful children."
Kill her now.
Blake Belladonna. Daughter of Ghira and Kali Belladonna, 'princess' of Menagerie, Weiss' hopeful partner in civil rights advancement. And, it had to be said, a woman with hips so well-built that it made Weiss feel faint, proceeded to give her a blank, disbelieving stare as the bow on her head attempted to pin itself to her skull.
Weiss forced herself to stand straight, her face burning as she resisted the urge to collapse back into the hole she'd just freed herself from… The SDC's in-house construction department would have taken too long to bury her anyway. "What?"
"What?" The dolt that Weiss had been trying to ignore until she couldn't, still covered in rock dust and smelling of ashes as she witnessed Weiss' shame with blank incomprehension, echoed.
Gods damn it, why?!
==========
Blake felt something that, before Beacon, she thought she'd never feel for a Schnee.
Something new.
Something strange.
Concern. That was what she felt. Blake felt concern.
Blake felt as if she should be worried that someone in a suit, somewhere sitting in a chair worth more than Blake had ever seen in her life, had decided that Weiss Schnee, her school partner (gods help her), was the right person to be the face of the most powerful corporation in the world—because she should be!
Blake should be worried! Everyone should be worried!
That wasn't just a feeling! This was real life, and Weiss shouldn't have been allowed near anything resembling a decision!
This wasn't right!
The Schnee were supposed to be diabolical masterminds! Cold and heartless thieves! Slavers! Shameless monsters and leeches that made the world a worse place by breathing!
People who knew what they were doing!
"That Nevermore dropped me into a tree after I set it on fire! A TREE! And I'm stuck! Wait! My branch is breaking! It's going to break! I'm up here, and the ground is down there. Oh no! No! HEEEEEL-"
From what Blake gathered after everything was over and they'd escaped with the chess pieces, Weiss had done that by accident.
Not on purpose. By accident, while trying not to fall from nearly a mile in the air, she had the revolving part of her Dust Rapier get caught on a feather that had it spinning like a gameshow's roulette wheel, forcing her to jump when it went off.
And it had gone off.
The giant Nevermore lit up the sky for miles around in a ball of fire, lightning, ice, and gravity (why was it purple?). It screeched, hooted, and performed impressive midair tricks for everyone to see before crashing into the mountains hard enough to leave an imprint.
All the while, Weiss slowly fell into the forest on a series of black glyphs before getting caught in some branches of the tallest tree in the forest. The same tree Blake had been in, getting the lay of the land and blissfully unaware of what was coming after Weiss had spent the night in the infirmary.
Dust explosions were dangerous, after all. You couldn't be too careful.
Right?
Oh.
Wait.
"It's dead? I-I mean, of course! The only thing I could have done was to expend all the Dust in my possession to slay the beast so that it couldn't hurt anyone before making my escape! The fire was necessary! And it all went just as I planned!"
She hadn't planned shit.
And that was going to be the next… four years? More? Of her life.
Blake stepped back from the bathroom mirror, forcing herself to stop grinding her teeth before she broke something. She took a breath, forcing her fists to open and her blood pressure to drop low enough that her pupils stopped being anxiety-driven slits.
Calm. Calm.
She had to stay calm. Human eyes didn't do that. And if she didn't stay calm, she'd blow her cover.
She was a human. Not a faunus. White Fang? What White Fang?
Calm.
Books, tuna, tea, cardboard boxes she could sit in (a guilty pleasure), and high places where she could enjoy all of those things while no one even noticed she was there, watching. Observing.
Calm. Happy place. Good thoughts.
Weiss still stuck in the tree.
Oh, yes. Yes. That was a good one. Blake could feel the pounding in her head slow as she imagined what could have been if Weiss hadn't turned her head to look Blake in the eyes.
If only Blake had known that the forest was full of cameras before, she'd have never tried lying about how she'd never seen Weiss in her life… Miss Goodwitch hadn't thought that was funny.
She hadn't thought that was funny at all.
Blake adjusted the bow at her neck, suppressing the wince that memory brought up in favor of looking good, feeling good, and giving herself a little smile in the mirror, just like those self-help books kept telling her to do… It was probably the only smile she'd make today.
It was a nice smile.
"You are a good person." Blake also adjusted the bow on her head, making her ears slightly less uncomfortable. "You are smart and beautiful, and people like you." She paused, shoulders tensing as she remembered just why she was here and who she'd left behind...and how. "... People like you."
Maybe she'd believe it if she did this enough, as the books said.
"Hello? Blake?"
Blake's pupils went from round to narrow simultaneously, and her head began to pound again with a vengeance.
As did her back.
Her poor, poor back.
"Do you require assistance? Help to get to the nurse? I know you said you were fine, but-"
"AHHH! … Ah? I fell on someone…? Yes, yes, I did. You must have heard me. You are my hero, truly. Let me help you up in return, and thank you for your assistance in a manner - BELLADONNA!?"
Putting on clothing after that unfortunate mishap could be challenging," Weiss continued blithely, her voice light even through the door as Blake reached for a weapon that wasn't there at her hip. "Gods forbid you were to slip in the bath after…" Weiss paused with a cough, a hint of strain entering her tone as Blake picked up a hairbrush instead. "Did you know that, in Mistral, baths are often taken in groups? For the sake of socialization and health?" She paused again." A delightful custom."
Blake abruptly opened the door, holding the hairbrush high.
Weiss looked up at her, hope in her eyes becoming unease and the beginnings of terror.
"YOU'RE ATLESIAN!" Blake howled.
The brush came down.
"OW!"