Chapter 14: Cutting deep.

Those of opinion that everybody gets fucked by life are missing the point entirely, for life needs to do no such thing. Our own sorrows, regrets and frettings will do the job just fine, if not better.

But then again, that's what friends are for.

My dearest Weiss,

I humbly beg forgiveness for staying out of touch for so long, if you even care about this anymore. I'm afraid my duties are slowly piling up on me, even with Whitley supporting me in whatever ways he can. Surely you understand.

It has been rather lonely over in Atlas without you. Mother sends her love and says she misses you. So do I. The fact that it is only possible for you to come visit us when it's summer pains my heart. We hope that you do.

Oh well. Forgive me my sentimentality. I know it's been quite a bit since you got any news from us (and that's probably how you would prefer it), but life goes on and this message will probably be the last you see in several more months. I have to depart to Vacuo in two days to survey a site where the consuls are going to be planting yet another array of their Light-forsaken solar panels, which means a venture out in the frontier, away from civilization, satellite communication and functional scrolls. Such is life. Which brings me to the point of this letter, since I know you don't exactly love it when we try and write to you. Mom and I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday in advance. We hope you're happy with your team and we have no doubt you're doing really well there. Whitley sends his regards too.

Again, if you ever change your mind, just tell us and we'll help you however we can. We miss you.

Love,

Jacques Schnee.

Weiss didn't know how long she had been staring at her scroll in her chair. Must have been a long time, though, as the sun that was previously shining through the window had long since been obscured by the murky clouds, pouring snow in spades. Then again, it was the middle of October out there. The days were getting shorter.

Another look thrown at the tablet. Weiss was asking herself the same question she always was whenever a message like this would show up.

Why haven't I still blocked them?

To question her decision would be pointless. Even if she ever did change her mind, which she hadn't, going back on her words would not only be spitting in the face of those who taught her what it meant to be a Schnee, who just so happen to be the same people she'd be apologizing to, but devaluing the last several months of her life into dust. And not the sort that her family mined. Making it little more than a spoiled little girl's hysteria about not getting a new dress. How pathetic.

Yet another glance at the scroll. How easy it was to just block all messages from them. Lock away the reason (or, at least, one of them) of her bouts of melancholy. Of endless pangs of guilt. Constant reminders of Father's distraught face and Mother's tears. How easy it seemed…

And how impossibly hard it actually was.

Having noticed that her finger was hovering just above the options menu that would let her do just that, she yanked her hand back as if it was a red-hot stove she just touched, not a scroll's screen. So as to avoid interacting with the tool any further, she put it on the table, redirecting her gaze at the window, just watching the wall of snow slowly descend on Vale, sometimes landing on the sill, slowly piling up. How uncommon for snow to pour in so much in October. In Vale at least. Atlas, on the other hand, had snowfalls like these for the entirety of winter, as well as the majority of autumn and even a couple weeks of spring.

Coincidentally, Atlas was one more thing she did not at all wanted to be reminded of.

They say it never snows in Mistral. Should've applied to Haven.

She sighed, slightly shaking her head in a weak effort to fend off the paralysis, failing miserably at doing so. Life was far easier when it wasn't Saturday or Sunday, when no classes took place and, as such, they would not be trained until complete mental and physical exhaustion, only left with enough energy to return to their rooms and plummet straight into their beds, mindlessly running their eyes through some book or exchanging meaningless small-talk. It was those days that they were left to themselves that Weiss had time to ponder on the essence of mortality and other topics removed from the material world.

She did not like weekends.

Even less, however, did she like birthdays, one of which, incidentally, was fast approaching.

Completely disregarding the small part of her mind that still clung to this world, the memories of one of the many birthday parties she had been part of came flooding in. Closing her eyes in an attempt to stave them off yielded no result. If anything, the colors only became more vivid and the vision gained in detail. Then again, what could she do about it? After all, it too was part of being a Schnee.

"Forget about a birthday of some important numbnut and you've got yourself another scandal, which may or may not attract attention from the media. It's a pain at times."

If she could go back in time to correct herself, she would probably say "at all times". Unless some crazy nutjob with swaths of money to toss into the wind organized some exotic bullshit, the gatherings of the higher circles were hilariously similar to one another. Fancy costumes, fancy speeches; wines worth someone's monthly salary; gifts as meaningless as the colorful wrapping they were sometimes encased in. Boredom carefully masked by fake smiles and handshakes.

Hatred masterfully concealed behind obedience and complacence.

Sometimes she would get a sudden urge to talk to somebody about all of this, maybe as a desperate wish to not be the only one having to bear this. It would seem today would be just that day. And, as luck would have it, she was, for once, not alone. Or was she?

Ruby is probably too young to understand. Yang will just refuse to. She'll probably throw one of her stupid puns to derail the conversation.

Blake… ha. She might be the only one who's less talkative than I am, especially with me. Though she seems to be slowly thawing off. Even got over being on the same team with Silva.

Speaking of whom… he might understand. Oh, who am I kidding. He'll probably abstain from laughing when I try and talk about my family issues, but that's about it.

Come to think of it. I don't even know anything about their families… Well, other than Darius'.

„Weiss?"

Ruby's inquisitive voice and a gentle tap on the shoulder had the not-quite-there-yet heiress almost jump out of her seat, shattering the memories shrouding her mind into a thousand tiny pieces and flushing them down the drain in an instant. In a mere second she was torn out of her strange slumber and back in the real world, clearing up both her thoughts and vision. For once, she was glad this little dolt was around. I guess I'm not offered a choice of to whom to speak to.

"R-Ruby?" she asked, not quite in control of her vocal cords yet; as a result, the question sounded about half an octave higher than it was supposed to. Catching her still unfocused gaze, Ruby seemed to have shrunk in half, resorting to her most common manner of speaking, that is to say muttering a hundred words a second.

"Did I wake you up?"

"Ruby…"

"I… I… you've just been sitting there for ten minutes straight, haven't said a word and I thought it wasn't like you to just blackout in the middle of the day and I thought I'd…"

"Ruby!" hasty to end her partner's avalanche of words before it grew into unstoppable proportions, Weiss had to accompany her exclamation by a snap of the fingers right in front of Ruby's face. The tactic turned out to be successful, immediately interrupting her flow of words and instead reinforcing the flow of blood to her face, having it assume a bright hue of red. Muttering one final sentence: "I made you coffee!" and extending her hand in a surrendering gesture, Weiss was left with a petrified Ruby and a steaming mug of coffee shoved dangerously close to her face.

With a sigh, she carefully extracted the cup from Ruby's hand and put it on the table to avoid burning her own fingers to a crisp.

"Thanks. I just…"

"You have a birthday soon?"

And suddenly it was Weiss attempting to transform into stone, all while staring at her leader with platter-sized eyes. Having realized that maybe she said something she wasn't supposed to, Ruby covered her mouth to avoid blurting out anything else. One phrase too late, unfortunately.

"Have you been looking behind my shoulder, again?.." Despite the girl's tone simply seeping with honey and kindness, something told Ruby that this was not at all how Weiss felt. And yet in her attempt to flee from her teammate's baleful gaze she only ended up backpedaling into a wall, shrinking even further in stature and letting loose the floodgates:

"I only saw the bit about the birthday! Birthdays are cool, no? We should throw a party…"

"YOU DOLT! How many times did I tell you not to shove your nose into others' business unless asked to?!"

I should probably stop shrieking. This isn't helping.

What was supposed to be a beginning of a zealous tirade about respecting others' privacy and hers in particular ended as abruptly as her willingness to share her strife with… really just about anybody, shutting her up in an instant. Left only with an empty, unnerving feeling in her head, she turned back around and headed back for the chair. For some reason, she felt very, very tired.

How much sleep did I actually get in the last week?

"We-eiss?" she felt Ruby's hand lightly tug on her shoulder, but couldn't muster the strength or the will to throw it off. "Look, I'm sorry, I really am. But… you haven't been yourself for the last week or something. Why are you so… grumpy?"

How was she supposed to answer? Tell her of her little family feud? Avoid answering directly? Continue pressuring Ruby? It's all pointless. She's got nothing to do with it and has things to worry about other than my daddy issues.

I got myself into this and I'm seeing it through on my own. After all, why change things now?

"It's seasonal, Ruby", she said, throwing a fleeting glance at the coffee. Black like tar, for a second she thought she caught a dim reflection of herself in the depths of the drink, eerily reminiscent of Winter. She did not like this at all. "Winter gets me a bit down. Heh. What kind of Atlesian doesn't like winter?"

Silence was her answer, unsurprisingly. However, she still sensed Ruby's eyes drilling her shoulder, clearly expecting an answer that did not consist of rhetorical questions and philosophical ponderings.

"Ruby, I'm fine. Could you please just leave me alone? If you want company, I'm pretty sure the rest of the team is in the library."

"And why won't you join us?" It would seem that Ruby felt like getting deep under her skin. All in all, though, Weiss could hardly fault her leader. "I've seen you sitting in this chair every time we're not in class or training for the last ten days or something, either writing something or just looking at your scroll. What's happening?"

You do realize she actually cares?

So? I know what she's going to say: "We're all here for you, you don't need to hold it in, bla-bla-bla". Talking about it won't solve any of my problems and she can't help me solve them, either. And her pity is the absolute last thing I need.

"Nothing that concerns you, Ruby."

"How is my teammate, my partner, not my concern?!"

"Ruby," she repeated, this time in a much, much different tone. Cold and monotone, with no inflection of emotion whatsoever, it had the girl take a step back and slightly twitch as Weiss' words were scraping her ears like nails. After all, she wasn't called Ice Queen for nothing. "This conversation is going nowhere. I will not tell you what you want to know because you don't. Need. To know it. It has nothing of value for you or the team, it will not affect my performance, and it's certainly not something you need to worry about. You have plenty of other things to take care of. My problems are not part of these things."

Taking a short look at Ruby, who still stood at the door, she could see a thin layer of moisture form in the corners of her eyes, slowly turning the whites to a reddish hue. For how small this part of the body was in relation to the rest of it, it baffled Weiss how many emotions they could reflect at a time: sadness, bewilderment, anger… yet at the same time understanding and sympathy.

She shook her head in dismay. She could not remain angry with her if her life depended on it.

"I'm sorry…" Stuttering was another thing Weiss had barely been subject to. Regardless, she had to pause for at least two seconds coming up with the right words. "Ruby, I didn't want it to come out like this. But I really have nothing else to tell you," with that, she turned away, staring blankly at the wall. "Continuing this bickering will only make matters worse."

She could hear Ruby turning towards the door. "If you change your mind, we're at the library."

And then there was silence.

I guess I'll just go back to where the guys are.

It's not like Ruby didn't expect this kind of attitude from her; after all, despite her settling the issue of leadership with Weiss and getting rid of blatant animosity, it still was Weiss she had to deal with: rational, harsh and blunt as a sledgehammer, which, come to think of it, went against what Ruby expected from an heir to a multibillion corporation that had its eyes and hands… everywhere, really: from media to industry to politics, consuls notwithstanding.

She sighed, not really paying attention to where she was going – the route to the library had been memorized by her and her team after about three weeks spent here; she would come there eventually. Weiss or no Weiss, it still stung. You'd think that after a month and a half of living and fighting together she'd have more trust in me.

But, then again, it's not like she knows everything about my life. Why don't I expect the same?

Well, probably because my life doesn't have me spend evenings blankly staring at a wall or a scroll.

Was it always like this, though?

She could feel some gear in her head turning and stopping with a deafening click, making things… well, not crystal clear, but certainly shedding some light on the situation. Having given it some more thought, Ruby arrived to a conclusion that Weiss' behavior was awfully reminiscent to that of Yang about a decade ago. She never bothered to tell her sister this, but at times, she would catch a glimpse of her just staring at the wall with the same hollow gaze she saw in Weiss' eyes so recently. It wasn't hard to draw the parallel between the two: just like Yang was haunted by the memory of her mother, maybe Weiss' problems had a similar root. It's all guessing. And she won't tell me. But I should probably still bring this up, even if I only tell Yang.

As expected, several minutes of navigating through the corridors of the dorms led her to the library, where she immediately headed for the nice cozy corner that team RWBY and, coincidentally, JNPR, chose as their congregating spot of sorts. Kind of strange that nobody decided to come and claim the place for themselves before us.

The aforementioned "place" was located in a small alcove not too far from the entrance, and consequently, the librarian and the desktop rows, yet didn't attract a lot of attention or have people passing through it, making it a perfect place to study… or to prevent others from studying. A certain long-haired blonde came to Ruby's mind as one of the worst offenders in the latter activity. One turn to the right and she could witness said blonde whispering something to her neighbor, who just turned out to be Blake, currently busy reading some book. Another participant of the gathering, Darius, only threw a bewildered glance at Yang, flipping a page in a book of his own with one hand and tapping something on his scroll with the other. Seemingly having heard Ruby's footsteps, he raised his eyes, meeting hers for a second.

"Hey Ruby."

"Hey…"

"Hey sis!" Yang, smiling as ever, waved her hand at her sister's return. The smile, however, dissipated soon after she realized Ruby wasn't looking at her as much as at the floor.

"Based on the fact that you come alone I'm assuming you couldn't convince Weiss to join our little get-together," Darius stated. Ruby nodded. She didn't exactly have anything to rebuke it with.

"And, seeing as you're looking way less cheery than before you left, I'm assuming things… escalated?"

Ruby nodded.

"I'm going to punch her one day, I swear," Yang grumbled, and Ruby could see a crimson spark flash in her eyes for a millisecond. "I thought the two of you have settled things, what happened this time?!"

"Weiss happened, Yang," Blake, on the other hand, did not seem surprised whatsoever. "It's like we didn't live together for a month and a half. Did you expect her to just… come along and bring cookies?"

"Ruby's rubbing off on you, you know?"

"Don't change the topic."

"Guys, guys, please!" the girl raised her hands, attracting the attention of the bickering two. "It's not that simple."

"Do tell", with a drawn-out sigh, Darius shut his book and put the scroll to the side before redirecting his gaze at her. "What did happen?"

"Well…" Ruby had to pause for several seconds getting her thoughts together and trying to form a coherent chain of events. "You remember when we left for the library, she was just sitting at the table, scroll in hand? When I came in, she was still just sitting there, didn't even change the pose? So, I thought she was sleeping, made her some coffee to… you know… wake her up…"

"By pouring said coffee on her dome, I'm guessing?" Having noticed Ruby's flustering, a thin, fleeting smile flashed across the boy's face before disappearing without a trace. Still, for his transgression he was hissed at by the other two members of the team.

"Not funny," she mumbled before returning back on track. "So I come behind her and accidentally see what she was looking at. It was some message from her dad, I think. Or maybe her brother. If she has brothers. Or uncle…"

"Ruby…"

"Yeah, yeah, sorry. Well, I tapped on her shoulder and she nearly jumped out of her seat and looked at me, and her eyes were so empty…" she felt shivers running up her spine as the image of Weiss looking into nothingness materialized before her eyes again. "It's like she didn't even see me for the first second or so. I told her I made her coffee and then…"

Having run out of breath, Ruby had to go through a quick inhale-exhale routine to restore the amount of oxygen in her lungs to sufficient conditions. Another second passed as she considered… leaving out the part that got Weiss so angry with her, before realizing the whole story would immediately lose its meaning if she did. So, she continued:

"And then I asked her about her birthday. That's what the letter was about."

"And she got mad at you for reading behind her shoulder?" Blake mused, nailing the answer… partly because she, too, was subject to Ruby's rampant curiosity. The majority of the team was, really, but unlike Blake or Weiss, Darius had an advantage in the fact that he resided on the roof and did most of his reading there. So really it was only these two that suffered the most.

"Ye-e-eah…" Ruby confirmed. "And then she started shouting at me, I started shouting at her and it all just went downhill."

"I'm gonna punch her."

"Yang!"

"What?!" It would seem that Ruby's story and its intent to spark understanding in the hearts of her team failed miserably and only caused the exact opposite, at least in Yang, whose hair already started glowing far brighter than it was supposed to, even with the lighting. "Can she not spend one day without being an asshole to somebody?!"

"YANG!" Out of other options, Ruby had to resort to shouting. "Stop this! I don't think you would've been much friendlier after Mom left."

Silence. Again. Today was far too generous on these moments of silence so tense and thick even Crescent Rose wouldn't cut through them. She hated them.

"I'm guessing we weren't supposed to hear this…" Blake muttered, desperately trying to cover herself with the book.

"Hear what? I didn't hear anything," Darius suddenly proclaimed in a tone that rivaled even Nora in its innocence, flapping his eyelids in the most inconspicuous way possible. Utterly confused by his sudden fit of deafness, Blake attempted to reiterate:

"She just said…"

"I didn't hear anything," he repeated, heavily accentuating the last word. "The only thing I heard right now was a stream of profanities emerging from Ruby's lips so terrible in its details I chose to forget it right away… unless Ruby wants to repeat it to me, forever engraving it in my brain crust."

...What.

It would appear she was the only one confused by her teammate's sudden bout of insanity as Blake redirected her gaze back at the book, accompanying his speech with an understanding "oh." Yang just sighed, turning to the boy:

"You know, that was pretty damn obscure even for you. Thanks," she then took a couple of wide strides to Ruby, lowering both herself and her tone:

"Ruby, what did I say about bringing this up in public?!"

"How else was I supposed to calm you down?" Ruby, on the other hand, refused to make a conspiracy out of their conversation, keeping her voice even. "I'm telling you, she's got problems of her own. I… think it has something to do with her family."

"You tried… talking to her about it?" Blake asked.

"Yep. That's how things… escalated, as Darius said," she reluctantly nodded.

"And I'm not surprised," he chimed back in. "You see, despite your noble intentions, you… kinda ran into cultural differences here."

"What's that supposed to mean?!"

"Give me a moment and I'll explain, my hasty Valean friend," a short chortle preceded him changing both his facial expression and his voice to a far more serious one. Somber, even. "Thing is, in Atlas, we believe that everyone is entitled to their own sorrow… as long as they contain said sorrow, that is. I don't doubt for a second that she may have some big time family issues, but… this incident goes pretty much in line with what we've seen from her so far. So… unless she decides to come to any of us for closure, which is unlikely, or unless it actually starts affecting the team more than it did before, us trying to get under her skin will only make things worse."

"But… that doesn't make any sense," Ruby shook her head after a couple seconds of digesting the information. "You spent, like, five minutes just talking to me about your life decisions literally on the second day of school and you're Atlesian, too!"

"Ah, but there's a difference," he raised his finger. "Unlike Weiss, my "sorrows" very much affect my team because I'm a danger to anyone on the opposing end of my scythe, including you guys. Yang can attest to that, I'm certain."

The latter only scoffed:

"Don't even remind me."

"Well… that's fair."Ruby couldn't help but agree with her teammate. After all, the incident of Darius going ballistic in the middle of a simple training spar was very much fresh in the minds of team RWBY, especially its last letter, who just so happened to be on the receiving end and had to spend the rest of the day with an arm cast. "Doesn't help us, though. What are we gonna do?"

"Ruby, we know her only as much as you do," Blake shrugged. She seemed to be the only one actually indifferent to the topic, neither sympathetic to Weiss' struggle like herself or Darius nor ready to slip into uncontrollable rage like Yang. From what Ruby saw from her so far, it wasn't exactly surprising. Exactly how did Darius manage to win her over again? "If anything, you probably know something we don't. You are her partner, after all."

Without saying a word, Ruby simply walked over to the table the rest of her comrades was residing at and took a seat, placing her head in between her hands, sifting through memories, slips of dialogue… anything that could give her an idea. Yet as the minutes went on, she caught herself getting frustrated more and more and the frown on her face grow deeper and deeper. Darius' words were not helping in the slightest, only further adding to her growing anger. How are you supposed to help someone who doesn't want to be helped?! You can't just shove that help down their throats!

…Or can you?

Like a midday sun, an idea flared up in her head. Sure, a less than sane one, but by this point, she was grasping at straws, and this one seemed solid enough.

"So Darius…" she began, her gaze unfocused as she was more busy flipping and turning said idea in every way imaginable than paying attention to conversation. "You're saying that Weiss will probably not talk to us about her issues."

"Not unless she has a rapid change of heart. Or mind. Or really her entire personality," he chuckled.

"And us trying to get her to talk about it won't help either…"

"Nay."

"So maybe we shouldn't focus on the issues themselves, but on the way she approaches them?"

She watched Darius' eyebrow slightly rise in confusion.

"You see, that's generally the correct way to solve problems, but right now, I don't quite understand what you're getting at."

"Well…" for a moment, she was silent, thinking of the right way to put the problem. "When I was talking to her, she said that I had 'plenty of things to take care of' and that her own problems were not one of them. I think she thinks that whatever troubles she has, they're hers to bear and hers alone."

"Is she wrong?" a question from Blake. The answer was Ruby's irate stare:

"Of course she is! Even if we can't help her with them, it still doesn't mean she has to deal with them alone. That's like, 'being friends 101'. And we're more than that. We're a team! We've got to help each other out… well… even if not physically."

Instead of answering, the rest of the team only exchanged glances between each other. To Ruby's anger, she could not make out what emotions prevailed in them. Then, Yang spoke up:

"O-okay. Guess we'll just go along with that, sis. What's on your mind?"

"We should remind her of all that. Inconspicuously, of course… did I use that word right?"

"And how would we do that?.."