Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Ruby’s ship creaked like it resented being in space.

The stabilizers gave a faint shudder as they exited the warp corridor, panels rattling in sympathetic protest. Ruby leaned forward in the pilot’s chair... half-padded, half-frayed vinyl... and gave the dashboard a firm tap.

“Hold it together, Crescent Rose. One more jump. We’re almost there.”

The nav system didn’t respond. It never did. But the lights flickered back into steady rhythm, like the ship heard her anyway.

The stars out here didn’t just shine... they pierced, like pinpricks through ancient cloth. Unmapped territory. A corner of the universe left off the galactic charts. The kind of place no one had bothered to name yet.

Her favorite kind.

She tilted back in her seat, boots up on the edge of the console, and let the glow of the viewport wash over her. Beyond the glass, a gas giant spun lazy and red, haloed by icy moons. And there, tucked against the furthest orbit like a secret...

Unidentified body: no registry data found. Atmospheric scan pending…

Ruby smiled... bright and wide, her whole body practically bouncing in her seat.

“Oh stars… look at you.”

There weren’t many like her, these days. Explorers. Not anymore.

Warp jumps had changed everything, collapsed vast distances into weeks, sometimes days. Now the galaxy was expanding faster than maps could track. Corporations sent probes. Empires sent fleets. But Ruby? Ruby had built a ship out of spare parts and scrap-code and named it after a fairy tale. She was here for the silence, the stories. The mystery of the edge.

She glanced over at the bobblehead tucked into the corner of the dash... a tiny, wide-eyed wolf in a space helmet. Yang had given it to her during their last hug goodbye, squeezing her too tight and muttering, "So you don’t forget I'm thinking about you."

“I’m gonna find something amazing,” she’d told Yang before leaving Patch.

“Then I’ll come home and tell you everything.”

She missed the forests, the hush of wind in the pines, sunlight slanting through the branches. The scent of autumn smoke. The feel of oil worked into her sleeves from long-forgotten tinkering. But this was what she’d always wanted, not the life others had carved out of routine and gravity wells. The stars had always felt more honest.

The scanner beeped once, sharp and clean.

Atmosphere: Human-standard. Terrain: Irregular. Life signs: Inconclusive.

Landing parameters acceptable.

Ruby swung her boots down, the flight stick still idle under her fingertips. She reached for the helmet clipped to the side of her seat, then hesitated. The readout on the dash blinked steady and green...human-standard. No need. She left the helmet where it was and flexed her fingers, the snug sleeves of her red-and-black suit creaking faintly with the motion. Sleek and fitted, the fabric moved like a second skin, cool against her skin and whisper-slick with every shift, practical enough for crawling through wreckage, but with just enough red to make her feel like a flame against the stars. Then she gripped the controls with both hands, heart hammering.

Nerves buzzed beneath the thrum of her pulse... anticipation, sharp and electric.

She leaned in.

“Let’s see what’s down there.”

The ship dipped, the viewport tilting toward a green and gold world wrapped in clouds. A grin tugged at her lips as the planet came into view, her fingers tightening instinctively on the controls. A flicker of old stone and shadowed jungle rose beneath the mist.

Her first real find.

Chapter Text

The jungle was thicker here. Every step Ruby took squelched against damp roots and fallen leaves, her boots caked in red mud and moss. Towering trees loomed overhead, their trunks twisted and gnarled, draped with curtains of vines that hung like curtains to some forgotten stage. Somewhere far behind her, Crescent Rose sat cooling on a ridge, barely visible through the canopy. The sight of it had vanished hours ago, swallowed by green. Out here, it was just her, and the silence pressing in from all sides.

Ruby wiped the sweat from her brow and took another step, the weight of the jungle pressing close around her as the foliage parted.

Stone... massive and vine-covered... rose suddenly from the green, catching the light like a secret half-buried. She froze, one foot hovering just above the ground. Her hand drifted to the sleek pistol holstered at her hip, a matte black energy sidearm with an overcharged stun setting and a heat dispersal vent along the barrel, but she didn’t draw it. She just stood there, awestruck, her chest tight and her heart pounding loud in her ears.

The ruins were nestled in a natural basin, half-buried by time and the creeping hunger of the jungle. Great stone pylons jutted from the earth at impossible angles, cracked and tilting, as if the ground itself had shifted beneath them. Some bore faint etchings, others were overtaken entirely by moss and flowering vines. 

She let out a low whistle. “Jackpot.” Her eyes roamed over the tilted pylons and tangled stone, wonder flickering across her face. She took a slow breath and shook her head slightly, as if trying to decide whether to laugh or be cautious.

Ruby made her way down the slope of the basin carefully, her steps light despite the uneven terrain. The incline was slick with moss and loose stones, and a wrong step could send her tumbling. Her suit, sleek and clinging like a second skin, moved easily with her, red-and-black panels catching glints of light between the leaves. It wasn’t her first ruin. But it might’ve been her oldest.

Even before she reached the ruin's base, the air began to change. Every step felt quieter here. The jungle still hummed and clicked with life above, but within the basin, it was muffled... watchful.

Her sensors gave a faint chirp. No radiation. No toxins. Oxygen levels within breathable range. No life signs.

She frowned at that last one, uncertain if it was a good sign or a bad one. No life signs meant no danger... or no survivors.

A clearing spread out in front of the structure, hemmed in by angled pillars and broken wall segments. Ruby paced the perimeter, scanning for a way inside. There were no obvious doors, no shattered openings... just moss-covered stone and shadowed grooves that might once have been seams. She ran her gloved hand across one wall, fingers catching on a faint line.

“There you are…” she murmured.

A bit of pressure, a hiss, and the stone groaned unnaturally. A section of the wall folded inward, ancient mechanics whining from the strain. Dust and warm air rushed out in a breath, and the darkness inside seemed to pull at the light.

Ruby took a cautious step back, one hand already on the grip of her pistol. Her eyes scanned the void beyond the threshold.

Then she smiled.

“Found you.”

She stepped forward. The glow inside was already waiting.

Cool blue light radiated from the walls, humming softly in long, uninterrupted lines that traced the edges of the corridor like veins. The air changed as she crossed the threshold, denser, but breathable, and surprisingly dry. The temperature dropped a few degrees, the shift enough to raise goosebumps along the back of her neck.

The hallway stretched ahead, quiet and narrow, constructed from the same dark stone as the exterior. Thin ridges of light ran beneath the floor and across the ceiling, pulsing with a slow, deliberate rhythm. No need for a flashlight, the ruin had lit itself for her.

Ruby exhaled slowly, eyes wide as she took it all in. "Okay... that’s new," she murmured, the wonder in her voice almost enough to mask the tension in her shoulders.

Ruby moved with care, her boots pressing into dust that seemed untouched by time. Her sensors gave a few lazy chirps, intermittent energy readings, faint signals, nothing she could lock down. But she wasn’t alone. Not truly. The ruin felt aware of her. Expectant.

She brushed her fingers lightly along the nearest wall as she passed, feeling the vibration thrumming beneath the surface. Old tech. Active tech.

The passage curved and sloped down, the light fading slightly as it deepened into the earth. Ruby felt the shift in her chest, a mix of nerves and excitement coiling tight in her ribs. Every step forward buzzed with the thrill of discovery, tempered by the whisper that she might already be somewhere she wasn’t meant to be. Still no debris. No damage. No decay. Just that steady hum, and the echo of her own steps.

Her sensors gave a soft beep, then went silent. Ruby frowned, tapping her wrist display. No signal. No readings. The entire interface blinked once, then defaulted to standby. She was on her own now.

"Perfect timing," she muttered, glancing ahead at the curving corridor. Whatever lay deeper wasn’t keen on being mapped.

She tilted her head. “Figures.”

A sigh, a stretch of her shoulders, a quick tap on the pistol grip at her hip.

“Alright... show me what you’ve been hiding.”

With one last look at the light spilling in behind her, Ruby stepped into the deeper dark.

The jungle, the stars, the sky, everything vanished behind her, sealed away by shadow. The ruin swallowed her whole.

Silence pressed in. The deeper she moved, the more the ambient hum of buried technology coiled around her. The glowing lines etched into the walls pulsed slower, dimmer—like the whole place was holding its breath.

Her boots made almost no sound on the smooth stone floor. The corridor continued to curve in lazy arcs, rising and falling gently with the contours of the underground structure. Every few minutes, the air shifted, cool, then warm, then cool again. It felt as though it passed through some vast, unseen machinery buried in the walls. Ruby kept her hand near her pistol, though so far, there’d been no sign of anything threatening. Just silence. Pulsing blue light. Stone.

And then the floor disappeared.

Her boot hit empty space mid-stride. Reflex kicked in, she flung herself backward with a startled gasp, landing hard on her shoulder. The moment her weight left the pressure plate, the false panel snapped back into place. Seamless. Silent.

Ruby lay there a second, panting.

“Seriously?” she muttered, pushing herself up with a wince. “That’s how we’re starting?”

She sat up with a groan and crawled forward, brushing dust from her face as she approached the stone floor. The seam where the trapdoor had snapped shut was nearly invisible. She tapped gently at the edge, and the panel creaked open again with a reluctant hiss. Beneath it: rows of jagged, rust-stained metal spikes. No energy signature. No sensors. Just gravity, steel, and intent. Simple. Brutal. Ancient.

She reached into a pouch at her side and pulled out a small chalk marker, scribbling a bright X beside the edge of the trap. Then she stepped carefully over it.

A few turns later, something caught her eye, a faint distortion in the floor. She knelt, brushing her fingers over the stone. The texture was too clean. Too new. She angled her head and spotted the subtle glint of metal beneath the dust.

Another pressure plate. Set flush with the floor and nearly invisible from above.

Thinking it would behave like the first, Ruby cautiously pressed the plate with the edge of her boot.

A dart hissed through the air, burying itself in the wall just inches from her head. She ducked instinctively, even though it had already missed. Her heart thundered.

“Okay,” she breathed, standing slowly. “So you’re not just decorative.”

Ruby kept moving, slower now, her eyes sweeping over every panel and groove. The floor, the walls, even the ceiling, nothing was safe from scrutiny. She found three more traps in the next hundred feet, one that shot a blinding flash of light from the floor, another that released a puff of some long-dead gas, and a collapsing ceiling section held in place by brittle cables she didn't dare disturb.

None of them felt like defenses. Not really. They felt like warnings.

Or distractions.

Ruby’s brow furrowed, a sliver of doubt creeping in. Traps that obvious weren’t trying to stop her, they were trying to make her look in the wrong direction. Her grip on the pistol tightened.

She paused in a wider chamber, circular and high-ceilinged, where the glowing blue lines fanned out in a starburst pattern across the floor. A single pedestal stood in the center, cracked and crumbling, with no visible function.

Ruby stepped around it. Slowly. Watching.

Nothing happened.

Her shoulders didn’t relax.

She moved to the far side of the chamber, where the corridor continued. Another curve. Another stretch of that eerie, humming quiet. Just as she took her next step, she heard a click.

Then nothing.

No darts. No lights. No falling tiles.

She froze.

Every nerve in her body went sharp.

Her eyes darted to the floor, the walls, the ceiling. Nothing moved. But she could feel it, that weight in the air, the shift of pressure. Something had changed.

Ruby eased back a step. Another click.

A faint sound above.

She rolled sideways on instinct.

A panel in the ceiling slammed open, and a cluster of long, metallic tendrils shot downward, striking the spot she’d just vacated with a heavy crunch. Stone cracked and shattered, leaving a shallow crater rimmed with jagged edges and pulverized dust. The tendrils whipped back up immediately, then hovered, twitching, scanning.

Ruby scrambled into cover behind a nearby archway, chest heaving.

“Okay, that’s more than just a trap.”

She peeked out. The tendrils remained suspended, moving slowly in small circles. Not retracting. Waiting.

She pulled a small reflector disc from her belt and tossed it into the hallway. The moment it hit the floor, the tendrils lashed out, blindingly fast, and smashed it to pieces.

She swore under her breath.

Her pulse still hammered in her throat as she reviewed the movement, the response time. That wasn’t automated defense tech. That was reactive.

Alive.

She stayed crouched for another minute, watching the tendrils. They eventually rose back into the ceiling and the panel slid shut.

“Right,” she whispered. “So now we don’t trust the ceiling either.”

Ruby moved on, tenser now. Her footsteps softened, shoulders hunched and tense. Her glances flicked rapidly from floor to ceiling, and one hand never strayed far from her pistol.

The corridor beyond felt darker somehow, even though the lights still glowed. She began noticing things she hadn’t before, scorch marks on the walls, hairline fractures in the floor. Evidence of past intrusions?

Or failed ones.

She found a long, thin crack in one of the walls, just wide enough to peek through. Behind it, machinery hummed, massive and slow, like some enormous thing asleep in the walls.

Ruby backed away from it, careful not to touch anything.

She didn’t say anything else aloud.

From this point forward, even her breathing became quiet, shallow and measured, as if the ruin itself might be listening. Every step forward felt like it might wake something best left undisturbed.

A/N: I actually wrote this before the prologue, so it was mostly ready to go after a bit more polishing. I’m aiming for 14 chapters but that may change, I’ve already rearranged my outline a few times.

Chapter Text

Hours had passed since the tendrils.

Ruby wasn’t sure how many. The glowing blue lines along the corridor walls had no rhythm she could track, and her suit’s internal clock had long since stopped matching what her body was telling her. Every muscle in her back ached. Her calves burned. She hadn’t spoken aloud in a while, and the silence had grown thick around her.

She didn’t like how used to it she was becoming. The silence had once been oppressive, now it felt normal, expected, like part of her. That scared her more than any trap. She wasn’t supposed to adapt to this place. She wasn’t supposed to feel at home in it.

The hallways still twisted deeper, narrowing in some places, flaring open in others like the interior of some vast, calcified creature. Ruby kept going, one hand hovering near her pistol, eyes scanning every panel, every shift in texture, every out-of-place shadow.

She should’ve turned back. She knew it. Every instinct screamed it. But pride held her in place.. pride and that gnawing ache in her gut that if she left now, she'd never forgive herself. Not after how far she’d come. Not after everything she’d survived. There had to be something here. Something worth it.

That thought had started creeping in after the second hour. By now, it was a persistent hum at the edge of everything she did. There’d been no more attacks... no more ceiling-born monstrosities or spring-loaded darts... but that didn’t feel like relief. It felt like a dare. Like the ruin was daring her to stay.

And still, she stayed.

Because what kind of explorer walks away just because it gets hard?

Because something was down here. Something big. Something important. She could feel it, pulling her forward like gravity.

The traps were still there, at first. They were easier to spot now... patterns repeating, clues left in the smallest tile misalignment or too-clean a surface. She stepped over pressure plates, marked sharp corners with smears of chalk, skirted tripwires so fine they vanished unless caught in the right light. It was easier now.

Too easy. Like the ruin wanted her to let her guard down, like it was giving her just enough slack to hang herself with.

And then they were just… gone.

Ruby slowed. Every hallway she entered looked the same, dark stone, glowing veins, silence. Her boots no longer scraped against disturbed dust. There were no broken tiles, no rusted mechanisms, no hidden gaps or glinting metal. It was clean. Unsettlingly so.

She didn’t know what to do with that. Her brain kept waiting for a snap, a hiss, a jolt. Nothing came. It should’ve been a relief.

It wasn’t.

Ruby found herself breathing shallowly, stopping more often to listen. She adjusted her grip on the pistol every few minutes. Not because she saw something... because she didn’t.

Then the corridor opened up.

A circular chamber, wide and tall, the ceiling lost in dark shadows overhead. The walls were etched in the same vein-like glow, pulsing softly like the low hum of a buried engine. In the center stood a pedestal, smooth and solid, with a single handprint recessed into its surface. That, and only that, pulsed with red light, deep and veiny, like something alive.

There was a door on the far side. Simple. Straightforward. No markings. No visible locks. No indication of how it opened, or what lay beyond.

Just the pedestal between her and it.

Ruby stared at it from the threshold. Her eyes narrowed.

“Nope,” she muttered. “Absolutely not.”

She circled the room slowly, boots whispering against the stone. She kept a deliberate distance from the pedestal, like it might lunge at her the second she got too close. Every few paces, she stopped and scanned the floor, the walls, the ceiling. Looked for alternate exits. Vent shafts. Floor seams. Anything. There was nothing. Just stone and that eerie, steady red pulse from the pedestal.

She lingered near the far edge, arms crossed, foot tapping against the floor in a restless rhythm. Her eyes kept drifting back.

“I shouldn’t,” she said aloud, more to break the silence than anything else. “This is stupid. This is the definition of stupid. Touching glowing ancient tech in a ruin designed to kill me is, by every metric, a terrible idea.”

Still, she didn’t leave.

She rubbed her temple. Paced again. Crouched to look under the pedestal, even though she already knew there was nothing there.

She looked at the pedestal again.

Her mouth was dry. Her fingers twitched at her side. Everything about this screamed bad idea, but not in the way the traps had. This was worse. Quieter. More patient.

“But…”

What kind of explorer walks away from the one thing the ruin clearly wants her to touch?

Ruby stepped forward.

Because she had to. Because even if it was a trap, it was a new kind of trap. Because this was the kind of moment she’d chased across half a dozen systems. Discovery. Risk. Meaning. A line she’d crossed a long time ago... and would cross again.

The red light brightened with every step she took. The handprint was human-sized. Not just a pressure plate, it looked sculpted, intentional. The edges were too smooth, the lines too precise. It was deliberate. Waiting. Watching.

Her fingers hovered over it. She hesitated.

What if it locked her in? What if it set off a trap? What if it didn’t do anything at all, and she was just fooling herself into thinking there was meaning behind any of this?

She closed her eyes. Let out a long breath that trembled slightly, the sound echoing faintly off the stone.

And placed her palm against it.

Pain.

It jolted through her like lightning... no, worse. Like something alive had bitten down on her nervous system. Down her spine, through her chest, into her teeth. Her vision went white. Her knees buckled. She gasped, choked back a scream, and her body convulsed with the force of it.

Then it stopped.

Ruby staggered back, nearly falling, blinking hard. Her ears rang. Her brain throbbed in time with her pulse, each beat a dull hammer behind her eyes. She sucked in a breath and held it, scanning the chamber. Nothing around her had changed.

Except now the door was open.

No grinding of gears. No hiss of pressure. Just open.

She leaned forward slightly, wincing as her head pulsed. One hand rose instinctively to rub her temple.

“Well,” she whispered. “That sucked.”

Then she heard it.

A scream.

High-pitched. Young. Echoing from somewhere deeper down the corridor. A girl’s voice. Terrified. Vulnerable.

“Help! Somebody... please!”

Ruby straightened instantly, heart pounding, all pain forgotten.

“Hey! I’m here!” she called, already moving. “Where are you?!”

The corridor stretched ahead, bathed in the same eerie blue glow. Shadows twisted as she ran, the pulsing veins along the walls flickering faster, like they sensed her urgency.

No answer. But another cry echoed, fainter this time, deeper still, as if the girl was being pulled farther away.

Ruby sprinted. The rhythm of her breath broke, uneven. The corridor seemed to shift around her. The air felt heavier. Closer. The walls leaned in, narrowing imperceptibly, or maybe just tilting, her balance faltered with each turn. She couldn't tell anymore.

Another cry. Closer now. Echoing off the walls like a desperate heartbeat.

She turned a corner. Another. Her footfalls grew faster, chaotic. Her pulse roared in her ears like drumbeats.

“Hold on!” she shouted, voice cracking.

But something felt wrong.

The voice.

Too far. Too faint. Too convenient. Too perfect.

It hadn’t changed. Not once. Not in pitch, not in direction. It had looped.

A cold chill gripped her stomach. The cries hadn’t echoed the way real voices did, they’d been too perfect, too spaced, too timed. Her thoughts reeled. Had it been in her head? A projection? Was this whole thing designed to lure her forward? Shame and anger flared at once. She’d fallen for it. The oldest trick in the book.

The floor gave way beneath her with a hiss.

Ruby yelped as she dropped, sliding fast into an angled chute of smooth stone. The walls rushed past in dizzying pulses of blue light, streaked with shadow. Her shoulder slammed into one side, then her back hit the opposite wall, then she twisted again, spinning sideways now, breath punched out of her lungs.

The tunnel twisted sharply, spiraling, narrowing. She was plunging downward at a terrifying speed, every shift in angle launching her into another bruising impact. Light flickered in bursts, then vanished altogether. For a moment, all she could hear was her own heartbeat, fast and frantic, and the relentless rasp of her suit against the slick, ancient stone.

Then... open air.

She was falling. Really falling. A long, endless drop in blackness.

The wind roared past her ears. Her limbs flailed, searching for anything to grab, slow, orient. Nothing.

Then she slammed into another slope, bounced, and careened down the final stretch of the chute like a ragdoll.

Stone again, rough and unyielding.

She tumbled through a final hole in the ceiling and crashed to the floor with a bone-jarring thud. The impact knocked the breath from her entirely.

Silence.

Her head spun. Her body ached.

But she was alive.

She groaned, pushing up onto her elbows.

And then...

“Ruby?”

She froze. That voice.

“Ruby!”

Yang.

Coming closer. Urgent. Real.

“Are you okay?!”

Footsteps. Fast. Familiar.

Ruby barely had time to react before strong arms wrapped around her and pulled her close, firm and familiar, the warmth seeping through her suit like sunlight through clouds, disorienting in its comfort.

“Ruby!”

She stiffened.

Yang's arms were solid. Anchoring. The scent of oil and ash, home, clung to her armor. The hug was real. Too real.

Ruby didn’t hug back.

“Yang?” she whispered, voice hoarse. Her heart pounded, not with joy, but with a creeping dread. “What... what are you doing here?”

Yang pulled back just enough to look her in the eyes, hands still firm on her shoulders.

“I came after you,” she said, like it was the most obvious thing in the world. “You were gone too long. No word. I just… I couldn’t sit still, Ruby. I had to find you.”

Ruby stared at her. Blinked.

It was Yang. Same amber eyes. Same cocky half-smile. But everything inside her screamed that something was wrong. The scar on her eyebrow was missing. Her stance, too perfect. Off.

“That doesn’t make sense,” Ruby said slowly. “You couldn’t have followed me here. There’s no way through unless...”

“I found another entrance,” Yang interrupted, shrugging. “Long story. Took forever. I had to improvise.”

She smiled wider, but it didn’t reach her eyes.

Ruby’s hand hovered an inch from her pistol. Her breathing was shallow.

Yang must’ve seen it. Her expression softened.

“Hey... remember that camping trip near Lake Hallow?” she said. “You were eight. Wouldn’t stop talking about ghost stories. You were convinced something was watching us from the trees.”

Ruby’s breath hitched.

“Dad had to walk you to the outhouse with a frying pan.”

Despite herself, Ruby laughed. Just a little. It caught her off guard.

It felt real. Yang felt real.

And yet...

“You’re lucky I didn’t shoot you,” Ruby said, trying to keep her voice steady. “This place has been messing with my head.”

“I know,” Yang said, stepping back. “But I’m here now. Come on, let’s get out of here. I can lead us back through the path I found.”

She gestured to a corridor behind her.

Ruby hesitated. Her instincts clawed at her. This wasn’t right. But she followed.

The walk was quiet. Ruby kept glancing sideways. Waiting for something to slip. For some detail to feel wrong, to knock this fragile sense of familiarity off balance. The way Yang moved, the cadence of her voice, it was all just a little too perfect.

Yang talked like herself. Walked like herself. Laughed at the right moments. Even hummed an old tune Ruby remembered from their childhood.

But something in Ruby’s gut refused to settle.

Then they reached a room with a large platform embedded in the floor, some kind of ancient lift. Ruby’s stomach tightened. Her steps slowed, her boots barely making a sound against the stone. Something in the air here felt heavier. Her pulse ticked up, just a little, a whisper beneath her ribs that something wasn’t right. The room echoed with their footsteps, the walls etched in the same blue glow, but duller here.

“This is it,” Yang said. “Elevator out. It’s a little finicky, but I tested it. It works.”

She stepped to the side. “You go first. I’ll cover our backs.”

Ruby stared at the platform. Stepped closer. The surface had faint lines, like old circuits or runes. It looked harmless.

Then Yang said something. Just a few words.

Too smooth. Too polite.

Not Yang.

Ruby stopped dead.

“What did you just say?” she asked, turning.

Yang tilted her head. Just a little too far.

“Ruby, it’s fine. Just step on.”

No grin. No teasing. No sarcastic quip.

Ruby’s hand went to her weapon.

“You’re not her.”

The world shattered like glass.

The platform was a pit. The corridor behind her was empty. Yang... gone. The scent, the warmth, all gone.

Ruby stumbled back from the edge, gasping. Her heart thundered in her chest. Her hands trembled. Her stomach twisted.

She was alone.

There had never been a Yang.

Ruby collapsed to her knees.

Tears blurred her vision. Her chest ached. Her body shook with exhaustion and betrayal and fear.

She had almost stepped into death.

She cried. Harder than she had in years. It wasn’t just the illusion, it was the weight of every doubt she’d shoved down since she entered the ruins, all rising at once and breaking loose. She had trusted her heart, and it had nearly led her to her death.

Grief, rage, and shame mixed together, a storm in her ribs that threatened to consume her. Her gloved fingers clawed into the floor, the reinforced fabric scraping harshly against the stone until the pressure sent aching pulses through her hands. Her breath came in ragged gasps, each one catching in her throat like she was drowning on dry air. Tears streamed unchecked, blurring her vision and soaking into the dusty floor beneath her.

The sound of her own cries echoed off the walls, too loud, too raw. Her body trembled with the force of it all, muscles locking and unlocking like misfiring machinery. The pit in her stomach deepened, an ache that went far beyond physical.

She had trusted. Believed. Hoped.

And it had nearly killed her.

But after a while, her sobs slowed. The edges of her pain dulled, not vanished, but contained. Like drawing a too-tight thread just short of snapping.

A memory surfaced, Yang, real Yang, refusing to let Ruby leave Patch without making her promise this wasn’t the last time they’d see each other.

Ruby wiped her face. Took a deep breath. And then another.

“I will see you again,” she whispered. “No matter what.”

She looked back at the collapsed illusion. No way back. No visible exit. Just corridor after corridor ahead.

She had to move forward.

She found a safe corner, out of sight, and made camp. Just long enough to rest. Enough to let her heart slow and her brain stop reeling. She took off her boots, stretched her shoulders, sipped water from her reserve. Everything ached. Even breathing felt like effort, her lungs tight, her limbs sore with a weariness that seeped into the bones. She chewed a ration bar, but it turned to paste in her mouth.

She lay down, but couldn’t close her eyes. Not at first. Her mind wouldn’t settle. It replayed everything, over and over, the voice, the trap, the moment her trust almost killed her. She kept her weapon at her side and stared at the faint glow of the corridor wall across from her, pulse tapping a rhythm she couldn’t calm.

Eventually, her body overruled her thoughts. Sleep came in fits, broken by flinches and imagined footsteps, but it helped. Enough. Just enough to scrape together a thread of clarity.

When she awoke, the silence had returned. It pressed down on her chest like weight. Familiar now, but no less oppressive.

And so had the paranoia.

She resumed walking.

No traps. No noise. No light changes. Just smooth floor, endless corridors. Time passed in a blur. She marked her path with notches, with scraps of cloth. Nothing repeated. Nothing shifted. It was the sameness that unnerved her most.

Until finally...

A door.

It stood at the side of the hallway, marked with strange glyphs, taller than any she’d seen, more intricate, almost reverent in design. Not like the others. It didn’t belong. The light here was colder, sharper, and flickered like breath held too long. The air carried a stillness that felt ancient, untouched for centuries.

The hallway ahead was clear. Straightforward. Safe. She didn’t need to go in. There was no reason.

But of course, she did.

Something about it tugged at her. The wrongness of it. The invitation it didn’t voice.

On the ground near it, crystals, dull and scattered, lay half-buried in grime. Some looked like discarded glass, others glowed softly, like they were waiting. Their shapes varied, some jagged like broken teeth, others smooth like river stones polished by centuries. She stepped closer, crouching, eyes scanning the strange objects with a blend of awe and suspicion. Each crystal seemed to hum with potential, their dim light reflecting in her wide eyes.

They looked like keys. Or warnings.

Each appeared to fit perfectly into a carved slot on the door, as if the door had been made to receive them, and only them. Some were hidden beneath dust and rubble; she nudged one loose with the tip of her boot and winced as it gave with a soft snap. Another pulsed once when her fingers brushed its surface, a flicker of warmth spreading through her glove like a silent greeting, or a trap.

She hesitated, breath held tight. These pieces were more than decoration. They were part of something ancient. Ritualistic.

Whatever lay behind that door had waited a long time.

She crouched, studying them, fingers hesitant. Her breath came slow and shallow.

She knew it was dangerous. Every instinct told her so.

But she had to know. Had to see. Maybe it was pride, the stubborn itch not to walk away from the unknown. Maybe it was desperation, some buried hope that this was the discovery that would make everything worth it. Or maybe it was just the silence, the long hours alone, making her crave meaning even in danger. Whatever it was, it pulled her forward like gravity.

She gathered the crystals in trembling hands, weighing each one before reaching out with hesitant fingers. Her breath trembled in time with her hands as she fitted the first crystal into its socket. It pulsed once, softly, and then dimmed, as if accepting its role.

She continued, methodical despite the fear gnawing at the edges of her thoughts. Each piece settled with a click, and the wall responded with a low hum that grew in intensity. As the final crystal slid into place, the humming deepened into a resonance that vibrated in her chest.

A chime rang out, high, pure, and musical. The door shivered. Dust slipped from its edges like falling snow, and something ancient stirred behind it.

A soft chime echoed as the final piece clicked.

A panel opened.

Inside, another handprint. Red-veined. Familiar. Dread washed over her like cold water.

Her breath caught.

No. Not again.

She stared for a long time. Considered blasting it apart. Considered walking away, even if she had no idea where that might lead. But her curiosity wouldn’t let her. It was like a tether pulling at her spine, tightening with each heartbeat, whispering that the truth lay just beyond that panel.

“This better be worth it,” she muttered.

Her hand met the plate.

Shock. Again. Cold and electric. Her spine arched. Her mind screamed. The pain passed, but her limbs ached.

The glyphs rearranged, glowing.

They formed words that flickered at the edge of comprehension, half-familiar, like echoes of a forgotten dream murmured in a language her soul remembered, even if her mind could not.

A sentence:

"Let this be the fate of the one who defied her purpose, sealed in silence, stripped of name and time, watched over by cold alone.”

The door opened.

Cold spilled out. Icy fog curled along the ground like fingers reaching into the corridor.

She stepped inside.

And froze.

The room was huge. Silent. Lined in glimmering frost. The air hit her lungs like knives.

At the far end, a figure, pale and still, was encased in a pillar of ice. Only her head exposed. Her skin flawless. Her hair white. Her lips slightly parted. She looked serene.

Too serene.

Unmoving. Waiting.

Ruby took a single step closer. Her breath fogged in front of her.

The woman’s eyes snapped open.

Her lips parted, revealing the faintest glint of sharp teeth, uncertain, almost instinctive, as if reacting to Ruby’s presence without fully understanding why.

Ruby didn’t breathe.

The woman’s eyes locked onto hers.

Chapter Text

The woman's eyes locked onto Ruby’s.

Still. Calm. Unblinking.

Ruby’s heart kicked against her ribs.

"Okay…" she said slowly, inching a half-step back. "You’re awake. That’s... fine."

No reply. Just steady observation. The woman didn’t even blink. There was no gasp, no flinch, not even a twitch of surprise, just the unnerving calm of someone who was already ten steps ahead.

"You’re a vampire," Ruby said. It came out louder than she meant, more accusation than question.

The woman blinked at last, as if granting a courtesy, her expression tightening with mild offense. "I am Atlesian."

Ruby blinked back. "That’s… not better."

"I would argue it’s significantly better," the woman replied smoothly, as though she'd rehearsed it a hundred times.

"Wait… seriously? You’re Atlesian ?" Ruby’s voice spiked with disbelief. "I thought they were wiped out. Like… over a thousand years ago."

The woman’s gaze flickered, just for a moment. Her lips parted as if to respond, but the words never came. Something unreadable passed through her eyes, disbelief, perhaps, or loss, but whatever it was vanished before it could take root.

"Extinct," she said finally, "is such a flexible term."

Ruby frowned, arms folding tight. "So you are a vampire, then. All the fairy tales... Atlesians drank blood, couldn’t be killed, lived forever..."

The woman raised a single brow. "And vanished into mist? Turned into bats? Bewitched villagers with sultry stares? Really now. Do you also believe in cursed apples and magic beans?"

Ruby squinted at her. "Okay, maybe not the bat part. But still. Are you saying all of it’s made up?"

"No," the woman replied with an elegant shrug. "Just... flavored for drama. Fear does that."

"But the whole 'can’t be killed' bit..."

"Myth," she interrupted, her tone clipped. "We heal, yes, but only from wounds that don’t kill us. Regeneration isn’t immortality."

Ruby pressed on. "You’re dodging the blood part. And the whole living-forever thing."

The woman’s lips twitched into the faintest smirk. "Then perhaps you should ask better questions."

Ruby huffed. "Fine. What are you doing here? What is this place?"

"Is that your improved version of clarity?"

Ruby threw her hands in the air, exasperated. "You’re impossible!"

The woman tilted her head just slightly. On anyone else it might’ve seemed curious. From her, it was… patronizing.

"You’re quite emotional."

"You’re quite frozen."

"An unfortunate circumstance," she replied, unfazed. "One I trust you intend to correct."

Ruby stepped back, arms crossing tight. "Haven’t decided."

The woman didn’t blink. "Ah. The indecision of youth."

"The caution of someone who’s been tricked before." Ruby’s voice turned cold. Her thoughts snapped back to that red-veined panel, to a voice that wasn’t real, to arms that had felt so real until they weren’t.

The woman’s gaze sharpened. "You encountered deception."

"I did." Ruby kept her eyes on her. "Right after touching a red panel. Like the one that led in here."

"Fascinating," the woman said, almost absentmindedly. "And yet… you touched it anyway."

"I thought it might lead somewhere important."

"It did."

Ruby winced. The worst part was, it might be true.

"I’m not here to play games," she muttered.

"Nor am I."

"Then stop dodging everything I ask."

Ruby narrowed her eyes, frustration boiling over. "At least tell me your name. That’s not classified, is it?"

A pause. Then, to Ruby’s surprise, the woman actually answered.

"P…" she began, chin lifting with pride, voice crystalline and precise, but it caught, just slightly, the word falling apart before it ever became whole. Her expression held for a breath too long before softening, ever so slightly. "...Weiss."

Ruby blinked. "Weiss?" she echoed, the name strange and regal on her tongue.

The woman gave the barest of nods, as if granting her permission to speak it aloud.

"Are you going to answer any more questions?" Ruby asked, arms still crossed, her tone edged with suspicion.

"I’ve already answered far more than most would in my position," the woman replied, her voice smooth but with a faint edge of irony curling at the end.

Ruby snorted. "You’re trapped in ice . What position is that?"

"Apparently the one where I must rely on the emotional steadiness of a twitchy stranger with commitment issues."

Ruby blinked. "You’re the worst."

"So I’ve been told."

A heavy silence stretched between them, thick with tension and unspoken thoughts, until it pressed at Ruby’s chest like a closing fist. Ruby glanced down at her gloved hand, flexing the fingers as if the movement might release the tightness coiling in her chest. The wall panel by the door still pulsed with that same red light, steady, patient, alive. It cast subtle ripples of crimson across the icy floor and walls, like a heartbeat echoing through stone.

Her chest tightened. That glow had led her to a lie once already. A fabricated warmth that wrapped around her like home, only to collapse into nothing. A voice that had sounded like her sister, looked like her sister, until it vanished, leaving nothing behind but the echo of heartbreak.

And here she stood again. Same glow. Same tension. Same setup. Her instincts clawed at her like thorns, warning her not to be fooled again.

Same trap?

"You're not even asking for help," Ruby whispered, unable to keep the accusation out of her voice.

"I shouldn’t have to," the woman replied, aloof and composed. "You don’t seem stupid."

That line hit harder than it should have. It wasn’t the content, it was the effortless confidence behind it. The way the woman said it without hesitation, like she already had Ruby figured out and found her lacking. No malice, just certainty. Like a verdict quietly passed down.

Ruby clenched her jaw, feeling her pulse rise in her throat. A dozen emotions twisted inside her, doubt, anger, sympathy, fear, but none strong enough to tip the scale. Not yet. Her breath came too fast for her liking, shallow and sharp.

"No," she said through gritted teeth. "I can’t."

The woman didn’t argue. She simply blinked, slow and deliberate, as if the conversation bored her. "You’ll come back."

"You don’t know that."

"I do," the woman said softly, with unsettling conviction. "You’ve already stayed too long not to care. That’s who you are, isn’t it? The girl who can’t walk away."

Ruby stared at her, anger and confusion and guilt swirling just beneath the surface. But she didn’t respond.

Instead, she turned. The door stood open behind her, metal and stone parted in a jagged mouth that beckoned without comfort. She stood there a moment longer, trying to find something in herself to make the choice feel easier.

There was nothing.

She stepped through. Her pulse pounded in her ears like a warning bell.

Every footstep felt heavier, like her boots were weighed down with guilt and doubt, like the air itself had grown thick and cold. She didn’t look back. Couldn’t.

She was leaving someone behind. The weight of that choice pressed against her spine like a stone in her pack, silent, steady, and impossible to ignore. And this time, she wasn’t sure if she’d be able to live with it.

But she didn’t stop.

Not yet.

Ruby walked in silence.

The corridor stretched forward in seamless metallic symmetry, pulsing faintly with the same bluish glow she was starting to loathe. Each step echoed off the cold floor, bouncing back like accusations. Her arms stayed rigid at her sides, fists clenched too tightly, her knuckles pale beneath the gloves. Her shoulders hunched slightly, tension locked into every joint, like her whole body was bracing for an impact that hadn’t come yet. She wasn’t sure when she’d started walking this fast. She only knew she had to get away.

But away from what?

Her breath shuddered, and she slowed, just slightly. The hallway offered no answer. Just more silence. More emptiness. More of that sickening awareness in her chest, hat she’d made a choice.

She had left someone behind.

And not just anyone. Someone alive. Someone talking. Someone staring at her like they already knew she wouldn’t follow through.

Ruby gritted her teeth and forced herself to keep moving. Her boots thudded against the floor, purposeful, steady. She’d made the right call. She had to have made the right call. She’d touched the red light and gotten Yang. A perfect illusion. Too perfect. Arms that held her like home. A voice that knew things no mimic should know.

And then it all vanished. Left her on the floor gasping and alone.

Weiss... no, the woman... was smarter, so sure of herself it almost bordered on arrogance. Ruby couldn’t tell if it annoyed her or impressed her. Maybe both.. Calmer. Too calm. Never asked for help. Just let Ruby twist herself into knots trying to figure out the right thing to do. Never pleaded, never begged. Just stood there, watching.

Who did that?

She rounded a corner, the walls narrowing into a single passage lit by an eerie vertical slit of cyan light overhead. It bathed her in cool shades that made her suit look ghostly. For a moment, she imagined how she must look from the outside: small, ragged, tired.

She hadn’t eaten more than a ration bar. Hadn’t slept properly. Her limbs ached, and her throat was tight. Her eyes burned. But it wasn’t fatigue, not really.

It was doubt.

She stopped.

Her back hit the wall as she slid down to the floor, pulling her knees to her chest. Her arms wrapped around her shins like they could hold her together. For a long moment, she just let herself breathe. In. Out. Slow and uneven.

What if she was wrong? What if that was someone who needed help? Someone who had been locked away long before Ruby was even born, left to wait in silence for a hand that never came? Who had looked at her with something like recognition, or maybe hope? Who had said her name like it meant something more than just a sound?

But what if it wasn’t?

The question coiled tight inside her, a cold knot in her gut. Her fingers dug into the fabric at her knees. The ruins didn’t make sense. She’d passed by doors that hummed without power, corridors that bent in impossible angles, and surfaces that shimmered when she blinked too slowly. Nothing made sense. The voice that had been so real. The illusions. The memory games. And now this.

Her chest ached. Not from stress. From heartbreak. She had promised herself not to be reckless. Not to fall for more tricks. But how many signs had she ignored? How many moments had she brushed aside, telling herself it wasn’t her problem? How many times could she afford to hesitate before it cost someone more than just time?

She wanted to scream. Or cry. Or sleep. Anything but sit here second-guessing a choice that already felt like it had ripped something out of her.

And yet she sat still. Alone with the question. The ruins around her silent and uncaring.

A soft metallic click pulled her from the spiral.

She snapped her head up.

A floating orb, sleek, metallic, and entirely alien, drifted around the corner ahead. Its surface was mirrored steel save for a single pulsing red eye in the center. It didn’t speak. It didn’t buzz.

It just saw her.

Ruby dove for cover behind a support column jutting from the wall.

Too late.

A crackling surge of light shot past her, slamming into the far wall and detonating. The explosion rattled her bones, hurling shards of molten debris down the corridor.

Ruby’s heart punched into her throat. That would’ve killed her.

She rolled out and fired, one, two, three shots, her energy pistol lighting the hallway with red streaks. One missed. One scorched the wall. The third hit dead-center.

The orb sparked, sputtered, and collapsed to the ground in a whirring heap.

Her ears rang. Her hands shook. Smoke curled into the air.

Ruby stood frozen for several seconds, staring at where the thing had been. Then she looked at the impact zone.

A hole had been blown through the wall.

She breathed, long and ragged. And laughed, just once, sharp and startled.

"Thanks, Yang," she muttered.

A few months ago, she’d been dragged into extra combat drills. "You’ll thank me when something shoots at your head," Yang had said.

She hadn’t expected to be this grateful.

Ruby holstered her pistol, adrenaline still pounding through her chest. The silence that followed rang louder than the explosion, an empty, electric hum that made her skin crawl. Her breaths came fast, shallow, the aftermath of near-death sitting too neatly beside the strange calm settling into her limbs. Was it relief? Or just the lull before the next strike? She couldn’t tell. Either way, it didn’t feel like safety.

If she was going to die down here, and let’s be honest, the odds weren’t looking great, did she want it to be like this? Running? Doubting?

Or did she want to at least try?

Try to help someone?

Try to save a girl with a name too regal and a tone too smug and a presence that made her question everything?

She turned.

And she ran.

Back toward the chamber she’d just left. Her boots slapped the floor, rhythm quick and sharp, as if her body had decided for her. Her pulse pounded in her ears, hot and insistent. Her lungs burned, but not from exertion, from the fear that she might find nothing at all, just cold air, an empty room, and the weight of her own hesitation. Toward the strange door and the woman with ice in her voice. Toward the thing that might be a trap.

But it might also be right.

Chapter Text

Ruby paused in the threshold, reluctant to cross into the room again. Her hand hovered near the edge of the doorway, fingers brushing over the carved stone, cold and ancient beneath her gloves. She took a breath that didn’t quite steady her.

The ice block hadn’t changed. Weiss still lounged inside it like she owned the place, all effortless poise and disdainful elegance. That same faint, annoying smirk was plastered across her face, like she’d been waiting for Ruby to return just so she could be insufferable about it.

"I told you you'd come back," Weiss said, her voice lilting and precise, every syllable dipped in slow, simmering superiority. There was something infuriatingly satisfied in her tone, like a noblewoman watching a peasant slip in the mud.

Ruby scowled, stepping inside with a little more force than necessary. "Don’t make me regret it."

"Oh, I wouldn’t dream of it," Weiss replied smoothly, her voice as calm and crisp as fresh snowfall, eyes glinting like frosted glass. She couldn’t move, not with the ice encasing her up to the shoulders, but she still managed to project the air of someone completely in control.

Ruby’s boots tapped across the stone floor with a deliberate rhythm. Arms folded tightly, she moved forward until the cold started to bite at her skin through her jacket. The air was sharp with frost, and a thin mist clung to the base of the room like it couldn’t bear to rise.

Weiss watched her with that same inscrutable expression...half-bored, half-amused, fully condescending.

Vampire eyes, Ruby thought again, a little more forcefully this time. It didn’t matter how pretty or how poised Weiss looked...there was something unnatural about her. Something eerie. Definitely vampire. She was still calling her that in her head, even if Weiss hated it. Especially because Weiss hated it.

"Alright," Ruby said, planting her feet firmly and leveling a look at her. Her tone was wary but steady. "Here’s the deal. I’ll let you out...but only if you answer one question."

Weiss’s brow arched delicately. "How generous," she said, her smile growing in that irritating way that made Ruby want to throttle her with a pillow. Or maybe just shake some answers loose...if only the ice would let her.

Ruby ignored the bait. She crossed her arms tighter and narrowed her eyes. "Why were you locked up in here? I’m not going to accidentally release some ancient mass-murdering bloodsucker, right?"

The question landed and settled like dust in a long-abandoned room.

Weiss’s expression remained carved from ice. No twitch. No shift in her gaze. No sign of breath. The stillness around her wasn’t just a lack of motion...it felt deliberate, like she was daring Ruby to misread her. Even the mist at her feet seemed to hold itself still, waiting. Her eyes were fixed and glacial, unnervingly still...as if even the idea of blinking would be giving too much away. There was a frozen tension in her stare, the kind that felt ancient and immovable, like frost that had never melted.

The silence stretched. Not passive, not empty...it was a silence that screamed. A wall, deliberate and immovable.

Ruby’s throat tightened with a rising frustration. “Right. That’s what I thought.” She spun on her heel, boots scuffing hard against the stone. “Enjoy the frostbite.”

She took two steps, then a third. The mist near the door curled at her ankles like it didn’t want her to leave. For a heartbeat, she actually thought about walking through it, leaving this cold, infuriating vampire and her smug silence behind.

“I was betrayed.”

It wasn’t shouted. It didn’t need to be. The words slipped into the air like a blade between ribs...quiet, unexpected, and piercing. They settled with weight, sending ripples through the silence that wrapped around Ruby and clenched in her chest like a fist made of frost.

There was something in Weiss’s voice Ruby hadn’t heard before. No sharp edges. No condescension. No superiority. Just... grief. Grief that was old, deep, and worn like a chain around her throat. The kind of grief you don’t cry about anymore because it’s too heavy for tears.

Ruby felt it like a sudden drop in temperature, like her bones had suddenly remembered they were surrounded by stone and mist and ice. A chill that crept inward. It was a confession without ceremony or performance...just a wound laid bare, not to be healed, but because it refused to stay hidden any longer.

She froze. Not because she was afraid, but because moving felt wrong. The voice that spoke those words didn’t belong to the Weiss she’d met. It wasn’t cold or cruel or calculated. It was... human. And raw.

And it hurt to hear it.

She turned slowly. Weiss had lowered her gaze. The smirk had vanished like a mask peeled away, revealing something brittle underneath.

“My father,” Weiss continued, barely louder than before. “He did this.”

There was a quiver there, small and quickly buried. When she looked up again, her walls were already rebuilding...tone sharpening like a refrozen lake.

“That’s all you get.”

Ruby’s heart ached before her brain could stop it. The pain was quiet, more like a pull than a pang, like a thread tugging at something soft she’d tried to shield. She exhaled slowly, buying a second to smother the sympathy rising in her chest.

“Fine,” she said at last, her voice steadier than she felt. “Then explain this place.”

Weiss lifted her chin, armor fully back in place. “This ruin...as you call it...is a disposal ground. A place to bury problems too inconvenient for execution. Somewhere those in power can wash their hands of consequence without the burden of accountability or the spectacle of a public reckoning.”

Her tone remained crisp, but there was something distant behind it, like she was reciting a script she'd had too long to memorize. “You don’t get a name. You don’t get a record. You just… vanish. Swallowed by stone and silence. A perfect solution for the inconvenient.”

Ruby blinked. “So… a prison?”

Weiss sniffed. “Not quite. It’s a mockery of redemption. Those sent here are told they can leave if they reach the bottom, that there's a path to absolution waiting below. I’ve never seen anyone else. You're the first to open this room.”

Ruby frowned. “So you’re saying this whole place was built just to… mess with people?”

“Mess is a crude term,” Weiss said. Her voice held that ever-present air of refinement, but there was a subtle tightness beneath it now. “But accurate.”

Ruby shifted uncomfortably, rubbing the back of her neck. “Okay, so… what was with the creepy red glowy thing i activated? The one that felt like it was trying to crawl inside my skull and redecorate?”

Weiss winced, ever so slightly. “The whisperglass...”

“The what now?”

Weiss sighed. “Whisperglass. An ancient failure. Originally designed for mental interface with machinery. Doors. Terminals. Communications. But then someone discovered they could do more...implant suggestions, create illusions, overwrite memories.”

Ruby made a face. “That’s... horrifying.” Her voice dropped to a mutter.

“They were eventually banned,” Weiss added primly. “But, as with all things powerful, they found darker uses. Especially in places like this.”

“So it messed with my head. Great.” Ruby scratched her temple, more unsettled now that she understood it hadn’t just been some random tech malfunction. That explained the eerie clarity, the too-perfect translations, the way she’d just... known things down here. It hadn’t been her imagination...it had been inserted. Forced. Just like the image of Yang, just like the traps that whispered promises she’d wanted to believe. Her gut twisted. The ruins weren’t just trying to kill her...they were trying to get inside her head, twist her thoughts, make her question reality. Make her doubt herself. And they were good at it. Too good. Every step forward wasn’t just about survival anymore...it was about holding on to her own mind.

“It did more than that,” Weiss said, eyes narrowing. “It allowed this conversation. Didn’t you notice the language I was speaking didn’t quite sound like your own?”

Ruby hesitated, brow furrowing. “I guess… I just understood it. It sounded weird, sure, but I thought it was like a regional accent or something. Not... I don’t know... some kind of alien translator mojo.”

Weiss made a noise halfway between a sigh and a groan. “No, I most certainly do not speak your language. The whisperglass didn’t translate...it embedded the knowledge directly into your mind. You didn't learn my language; it was forced into you. Crude, invasive, but functional.”

Ruby tilted her head. “So… it gave me space vampire language powers?”

Weiss gave her a long, withering look. “You are… insufferable.” Her tone was flat, but her expression betrayed the faintest twitch of incredulity.

“For the last time,” she added coolly, “I am not some mythological creature ripped from a bedtime story. Yes, I drink blood...but it’s a biological requirement, not some dramatic flourish. I don’t turn into bats. I certainly don’t sparkle. And every time you insist on painting me like something out of a children's horror holovid, I lose just a little more hope in the state of interstellar education.”

Ruby raised her hands in mock surrender, grin widening slightly. “Alright, alright...no bats or sparkle. Got it. Still sounds kind of vampire-y though.”

Weiss rolled her eyes, the motion deliberate and glacial. “You’re impossible.”

Ruby’s grin faded, her brows pinching together. “Wait… hold on. You’re a prisoner, right? So why would they want people to be able to talk to you at all?”

Weiss’s gaze flicked toward her, cool and unreadable. “Because that’s part of the punishment.”

Ruby tilted her head, still clearly trying to process it all. “So… they trap you in a frozen tomb and then just expect you to chat with people who wander in? That doesn't make sense.”

“They want me to plead,” Weiss said, her voice sharpening like frost underfoot. “To beg for release. To humiliate myself before strangers. That’s what they built into this...false hope wrapped in civility.”

She looked away, the tightness in her voice fraying at the edges. “They want me to believe there’s a chance. That someone might help me. But only if I ask for it.”

Ruby’s expression darkened as the implications sank in.

Weiss pressed on, quieter now. “It’s the whisperglass. Anyone who reaches this place gains the knowledge to understand me. To hear me. To speak with me.” She paused, eyes narrowing just slightly. “They want me to plead. To hope. And then to be denied.”

Ruby’s voice was soft. “But you’re not asking.”

“No.” Weiss met her eyes. “Because that’s the final cruelty. To make me believe someone might say yes...then walk away. I won’t give them the satisfaction. Not the ones who built this. Not the ones who left me here. They’re all probably long dead, but their game continues.”

She looked away. “I refuse to play it.”

Ruby swallowed. “Then… why wouldn’t someone let you out?”

Weiss was silent again. Her gaze dropped for a breath, just long enough for the quiet to thicken around them.

Then, softly: “Because of what it takes.”

Ruby waited, but the answer ended there. Weiss didn’t elaborate. Her expression didn’t shift.

Another beat passed, the silence pressing in tighter.

Ruby exhaled sharply through her nose. “You’re gonna make me ask, aren’t you.”

Weiss’s lips moved with something almost like a smirk. “I already told you,” she said lightly. “I don’t beg. Not even for the truth.”

Ruby stared at her, tired and wary. “Fine. What does it take to release you?”

Weiss’s gaze slid toward the wall. Ruby followed it, her eyes landing on a single object she hadn’t paid attention to before.

A rapier. Beautiful. Ornate. Mounted with reverence on a sculpted rack of silver and black stone. It didn’t just look ceremonial...it looked sacred. A relic.

“You must take that blade,” Weiss said, voice low, almost clinical. “And drive it into yourself. With the intent to kill.”

Ruby blinked, taking an involuntary step back. “That’s...no. No way.”

Her stomach churned. She couldn’t tell if it was horror, or disbelief, or the weight of guilt pressing down from within, guilt that she might walk away, fear that this might all be another cruel trick, or the heavy responsibility of holding someone’s fate in her hands. It twisted deep in her gut, thorned and tangled, impossible to ignore.

“If your resolve is absolute,” Weiss continued, calm and unflinching, “you will survive. The illusion responds to intent. Commitment.”

Ruby’s voice dropped to a whisper. “And if I hesitate?”

Weiss didn’t hesitate. “Then you die.”

Silence followed. Cold and consuming.

Ruby stared at the blade. Her breath hitched. It was just a weapon, but now it felt like a monster sleeping on the wall.

Weiss looked away. “That’s why no one ever would.” Her tone wasn’t mocking. It was matter-of-fact. Quietly devastating. As if the truth was a weight she’d carried alone for too long.

“It’s why I don’t ask,” she added after a beat, almost to herself. “Why I won’t. Because I know how this ends. They built this place to break people. To watch hope flicker and die. I won't give them the final piece. I won’t let them see me beg and still walk away. Not even in memory.”

Ruby couldn’t respond. Her throat had gone dry.

Weiss’s voice softened, strangely hollow. “It is my eternal punishment, after all.”

Ruby didn’t move. The words echoed in her mind, but her feet stayed planted. Her eyes flicked back toward the sword, then to Weiss, then back again. She wanted to believe. She almost did.

But this place had lied to her before. Over and over. Every door she opened, every hallway she walked, every whisper that crawled into her head...it had all been some kind of trick. Some game.

Her mind flashed back to the worst of them...the illusion of Yang. That perfect, heart-wrenching mimicry. The way her sister had smiled at her. Had spoken to her. Had reached out...only to vanish in an instant, replaced by something hungry and cruel. She'd trusted it for just a moment. And it had nearly gotten her killed.

That wasn’t just a hallucination. It had been designed to hurt her. To use the people she loved as weapons against her. So what was this, then? Another weapon? Another test?

Ruby’s chest tightened. It would be so easy to believe Weiss. But it had been easy to believe before, too...and look where that had gotten her.

What if this was just one more?

What if the real punishment was her?

She clenched her jaw, trying to push the thought away, but it stuck like thorns. Her hand curled into a fist at her side. No one had helped her down here. No one had told her what was real. Why should she risk everything now...again...for someone she’d only just met?

Even if that someone looked so heartbreakingly tired of being alone.

Even if her voice had cracked like something inside her had finally given out.

Ruby looked at the sword.

She didn’t want to do it.

But she couldn’t walk away.

Not from this.

Not from her.

Her eyes lingered on the blade, then flicked back to Weiss. The silence between them stretched, dense with everything unsaid. Ruby could have turned around. She could have walked away and continued deeper into the prison. Whatever this place held next, it didn’t require this. No door had locked behind her. No mechanism had forced her hand.

This wasn’t survival. It was choice.

And that made it harder.

She didn’t owe Weiss anything. She hadn’t even known her an hour ago. And yet… that voice. That grief. That refusal to break, even while buried in ice...it clung to Ruby in a way she couldn’t shake.

Her instincts screamed to be careful. That she’d been manipulated before. But something deeper...quieter...told her this moment was different. That this was the part of her that hadn’t cracked yet. The part still capable of choosing something without gain. Without guarantee.

She didn’t want to make this decision.

But she wanted to live with not making it even less.

Not after everything she’d seen down here. Not after what the whisperglass had done to her mind. The thought that this, too, might be some twisted trick sent a chill down her spine...but so did the idea of walking away. Of leaving Weiss behind. Of not knowing.

She studied the ice again. Studied the girl inside it. Every instinct told her to be cautious, to doubt, to guard herself. But there was something deeper...a quiet, stubborn voice that said this wasn’t a trap. That Weiss wasn’t like the rest of this place.

Ruby bit her lip. Then she breathed in, slow and full, and made her choice.

She would believe her.

With a breath that caught halfway up her throat...more reflex than relief...Ruby took a step forward. Then another. Each one echoed like a heartbeat in the silence. Her mind spun, caught between hesitation and momentum. She thought of the traps. The lies. The twisted illusions that had nearly unraveled her piece by piece. Of Weiss...infuriating, proud, brittle behind the frost, and quietly, terribly alone.

One step.

Two.

She reached for the hilt.

Weiss’s voice reached her, softer than before. “Don’t hesitate.”

Not a command. Not even encouragement. Just a quiet breath of disbelief, like she couldn’t believe Ruby had come this far at all.

Ruby’s fingers curled around the grip. It was cold...colder than she expected, even after everything. Her chest rose and fell once, then again, slower this time. She could feel her pulse behind her eyes. Her fingers twitched against the hilt, then curled tighter as uncertainty whispered through her spine. Her legs locked in place, unwilling to move forward but unable to retreat. The weight of the moment pressed down on her shoulders, dragging her breath shallow. She thought of turning back again...of giving herself just one more second to think. But the image of Weiss...cold and waiting...held her there. Made her stay.

She closed them.

She brought the blade down slowly, turning it in her hands until the tip settled against the center of her abdomen...right below the ribs, where it would count. It wasn’t elegant. She had to grip the cold metal of the blade itself with one hand while steadying the base with the other, awkward and tense. Her breath trembled in her throat. It would be quick, she told herself. It had to be.

And then she thrust.

Every nerve braced for the agony she was certain would follow. She expected her breath to catch, her body to seize up. She expected the sharp bloom of pain, the copper tang of blood, the spiraling panic of her own life slipping away. She even expected the darkness creeping in at the edge of her vision, ready to pull her under.

But none of it came.

Her breath caught...for a different reason. There was no sharp pain, no blood, no collapse. Just an eerie stillness, like the world itself had paused to see what she’d done.

She opened her eyes, expecting to see the hilt buried in her stomach.

There was nothing. Her hands were empty, fingers curled tightly around air that no longer held a weapon.

The blade had vanished.

Then the illusion shattered like glass...silent, beautiful, absolute. The shimmer of unreality peeled away from the edges of the room, like waking from a dream she hadn’t known she was in.

The rapier was back on the wall, exactly where it had been, pristine and untouched, as if it had never moved at all.

Behind her, the ice cracked...once, loud and sharp like a gunshot. Ruby spun around just as fine spiderweb fractures began racing across the surface. Hairline lines split outward from Weiss’s body in every direction, splintering like the surface of a frozen lake beneath too much weight.

And then, all at once, the block exploded.

Shards of glittering ice burst outward in a brilliant flash, scattered across the floor like stars falling from a broken sky. The mist roared outward and then settled, clearing just enough for Ruby to see the figure stepping through the haze.

Weiss.

Her long, silvery-white hair fell in silky waves down her back, no longer stiff with frost, but shining with a faint iridescence that caught the light like moonlit snow. Her skin, pale as porcelain, held a soft, almost ethereal glow. A diamond-shaped pendant glinted at her throat, nestled against the sweetheart neckline of her gown.

The dress itself was a cascade of icy blues and pale whites, layered like delicate frost...short in front, baring graceful legs, but trailing behind in a sweeping train of translucent fabric that drifted like mist. Each fold was edged in lace so fine it might’ve been spun from frozen dew. A band of sculpted roses rested at her hip, silvery petals carved in impossible detail.

Her arms were clad in long white gloves, seamless from fingertip to elbow, and her heels clicked softly against the stone as she stepped forward. Her sapphire eyes...sharp, intelligent, and unmistakably hungry...met Ruby’s with an intensity that stopped her breath.

Fangs gleamed subtly as her lips parted, not in a smile, but in the first real breath of freedom.

Weiss stood tall...elegant, poised, and undeniable.

And she was free.

For a single breath, she held herself upright...perfect and still, like a sculpture come to life.

Then her knees buckled.

Ruby startled as Weiss collapsed forward, the strength gone from her limbs in an instant. She dropped to the ground in a swirl of pale fabric and crystal roses, one arm barely catching her weight before she slumped onto her side.

"Weiss...!"

But Weiss didn’t answer. Her eyes fluttered shut, breath shallow, lips parted. The glow behind her gaze had faded into something faint and fragile.

Ruby froze, heart stuttering at the sudden collapse. She stepped forward instinctively, boots scuffing lightly on the stone, gaze flicking over Weiss’s crumpled form.

She looked so delicate now. Not in the poised, imperious way she’d carried herself before... but fragile, worn down. Her limbs trembled with the effort of holding herself up, like a marionette with fraying strings.

Ruby's thoughts spun. However long she’d been trapped, it was too long. Everything about this place reeked of forgotten time. With no food, no light... no blood. Whatever Weiss was, it wasn’t a myth. It wasn’t some bedtime story. She still needed that to survive... still bound by the rules of flesh and bone. And now, her body was crashing under the weight of that deprivation, fragile from neglect, unraveling at the seams.

The silence pressed in again. Not empty this time, but thick with a different kind of weight.

Freedom, Ruby realized, didn’t come like a triumph.

It hit like gravity.

Chapter Text

Ruby was already moving before she knew it, instincts overriding doubt. She dropped to her knees beside Weiss’s crumpled form, the cold stone biting through her suit she reached out with hesitant fingers. Weiss was motionless, her breath shallow, her skin somehow paler than before. Ruby’s heart hammered in her chest, a mix of panic and confusion and guilt tightening in her throat.

What if she had waited too long?

“Weiss?” she asked, her voice low, almost afraid to break whatever fragile thread kept the other girl tethered to consciousness.

No response. Just the faint rise and fall of her chest and the soft flutter of lashes against her cheeks. Her lips were parted, and Ruby swore she could hear the faintest rasp of breath… but it was weak. Barely there.

Ruby hovered, hands twitching uselessly in the air. What was she supposed to do? What could she do? She’d made the choice, stabbed herself with a sword to free this girl, but now that she was here, free, she looked like she was already fading.

And then the realization hit.

Blood.

Weiss had said it. Admitted it. Biological requirement.

Ruby stared down at her own gloved hand. Her fingers trembled as she slowly pulled off the glove, revealing pale skin underneath. She hesitated, teeth digging into her lip. This was insane. Completely and utterly insane.

But Weiss needed it. And Ruby wasn’t going to let her die, not after everything.

She extended her hand, hovering it just above Weiss’s mouth.

“Okay, but seriously… try not to bite too hard, okay?” she muttered, half-joking, half-nervous.

That got a reaction. Barely. Weiss’s eyes fluttered open, unfocused and dazed, but aware. Her gaze snapped to the offered hand, then up to Ruby’s face. Something flickered in her expression, surprise, confusion, maybe even something softer, but it passed quickly.

“You’re serious?” she rasped, voice dry as parchment.

“Don’t make me change my mind,” Ruby said, forcing more bravado than she felt. “You need it, right? So… just do it.”

Weiss hesitated, her pride clearly warring with her need. But in the end, instinct won. Her lips parted, and with a sharp motion, her fangs sank into Ruby’s hand.

To her surprise, there was no pain. Just a strange warmth, like the prick of a needle dulled by numbness. Ruby tensed at first, bracing for the worst, but the sting never came. It was… oddly gentle. A quiet exhale escaped her lips, and she stilled, caught in the surreal calm of the moment, unnerved, but strangely steady.

Weiss drank.

It was quick. Quicker than Ruby expected. Just a few seconds, and then Weiss pulled back, blinking as if waking from a dream. Her entire posture shifted...stronger, more alert, like color had flooded back into her all at once.

She let out a slow breath, and her eyes locked onto Ruby’s.

“…Thank you,” she said quietly.

Ruby cradled her hand, surprised to see the skin already sealed. No blood, no wound, just smooth skin where teeth had broken it moments ago. “Don’t get used to it.”

Weiss’s smirk returned, but it was smaller now, more amused than smug. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

She stood easily, moving with a grace that hadn’t been there just minutes ago. Her eyes flicked to the wall, to the rapier resting in its cradle. Without a word, she strode forward and lifted it from its mount. The metal glinted in the dim light, elegant and deadly.

Ruby’s gaze lingered on the sword, then on Weiss. She was back to being composed, cold, and controlled... but not entirely. Something had cracked in the ice. Just a little.

Weiss looked back at her, and for a moment, Ruby could see it, the curiosity behind those guarded eyes. She wanted to ask. Why had Ruby helped her? Why had she gone so far?

But the moment passed.

“We should move,” Weiss said, her voice firmer now, but tinged with urgency. Her eyes swept the room once more, lingering on the shattered remains of the ice. "I have no desire to stay in this place a second longer than necessary."

Ruby nodded. “Yeah. Let’s go.”

They moved deeper into the prison together, the corridors narrowing, growing more twisted and complex. The air felt heavier here, and the oppressive silence was broken only by the soft echo of their footsteps.

Eventually, the corridor widened again... and then ended abruptly.

A chasm yawned before them, impossibly wide and cloaked in shadow. There was no visible floor below, no bottom. Just darkness.

At the edge stood a pedestal. Familiar in design. A whisperglass, pulsing faintly with red veins of light.

Ruby stepped closer, examining the smooth indent meant for a hand. Without waiting, she placed her palm into it. A moment later, glowing tiles flickered into view across the chasm, stretching in a jagged path toward the other side.

“We’ve got a way across,” she said.

Weiss stepped up beside her, brow furrowing. “Let me see.”

She placed her own hand into the device. More tiles appeared... but something felt... off.

Weiss gestured to a nearby glowing tile. “I see one there, just a few paces out... do you?”

Ruby took a cautious step closer to the edge and squinted. “I… don’t see anything there.”

Weiss’s brow furrowed. “Describe what you see then. Where does your path go?”

Ruby pointed toward a bend near the middle of the chasm. “There’s a cluster curving left, like a staircase. Do you see that?”

“No,” Weiss said. “Mine curves right.”

Ruby blinked and looked between them. “So… we’re not seeing the same tiles.”

“Apparently not,” Weiss murmured, gaze sharpening. “Let’s compare a few more.”

They traded observations, pointing out shapes and angles, describing clusters and edges.

Ruby gestured toward a tile that jutted like a stair-step. “You see that one?”

Weiss shook her head. “No, mine cuts in a sharper bend three paces left.”

They paused, exchanging looks as the realization clicked into place.

“What about the one just past that?” Ruby asked, pointing again.

“I don’t see anything there,” Weiss said. “Describe what you see in your path.”

Ruby tilted her head. “There’s a sort of zigzag, starting from that stair-step one. It turns twice before heading left.”

“My route doesn’t do that,” Weiss replied. “Mine turns in the opposite direction. There’s no zigzag.”

“None of this matches,” Ruby muttered.

“No,” Weiss said, voice low. “These aren’t shared. Whatever mechanism controls this… it’s showing us individual paths. Intentionally.””

Ruby frowned. “You think that’s on purpose?”

“It must be. A test, maybe. One that can’t be passed alone.”

“These aren’t in the same pattern,” Weiss said slowly. “And based on the discrepancies, I don’t think they’re supposed to be.”

Ruby nodded slowly. “Yeah… definitely not the same.”

They compared, pointing. Some tiles were visible to both, but those were few. Most only appeared for one of them.

Ruby picked one that glowed for both. “Okay, let’s start here.”

She stepped onto it.

The tile groaned.

“Ruby!” Weiss yanked her back just in time. The tile cracked and crumbled, vanishing into the dark.

Ruby stumbled, catching her breath. “What the hell? We both saw it!”

Weiss frowned, staring hard at the spot where the tile had been. “That must be the trick,” she said after a tense pause. “The ones we both see... they’re the fake ones. Illusions crafted to bait us.” Her voice was laced with disgust, more at the system than at Ruby. “It's forcing us to rely on contradiction. To doubt what we see with our own eyes.”

Ruby's brows furrowed. “So we just… trust what the other person sees?”

Weiss gave a terse nod. “And ignore our own instincts… apparently.” She crossed her arms, visibly unsettled. “It’s devious. Whoever designed this wants to break our confidence in ourselves. Make sure we can’t get through unless we’re willing to surrender control.”

Ruby swallowed. The implications were as unsettling as the fall. But she looked at Weiss, saw her composed despite everything, and forced a smirk. “Well… at least we’re equally confused.”

They tested a few with a cautious toe. The theory held. The tiles only one of them could see were real.

They exchanged a wary glance... then, silently, both stepped onto the same tile, one that Ruby could see and Weiss had cautiously confirmed. It held.

Ruby exhaled slowly, tension easing from her shoulders. A flicker of doubt still lingered beneath the surface, trust didn’t come easily in this place. She glanced sideways at Weiss, wondering how many more leaps of faith she could afford before one of them went too far.

Weiss, already scanning ahead, pointed sharply toward the next safe tile. “There. Slightly right, two paces.”

Then Ruby hesitated. Her boot hovered above the next invisible tile. Her gut twisted. Everything in her screamed not to do it, not to risk another fall. She glanced over at Weiss, who was already waiting on the far edge of the previous step, her arms slightly tensed, prepared to react.

Ruby nodded once, steadying herself. “Okay. One… two…”

The void yawned beneath her, the tile Weiss had pointed to nothing more than shadow to her eyes. Her stomach flipped, instinct clawing at her to retreat.

“You’re fine,” Weiss said, calm but firm. “Trust me.”

Ruby wavered, breath caught in her throat. Every muscle in her body screamed to pull back. But she didn’t. She clenched her jaw, closed her eyes... and stepped.

Solid.

Her knees nearly buckled from the flood of relief.

Her breath came out in a huff, half-laugh, half-relief.

With each cautious step, they moved in tandem, their coordination sharpening as the fragile thread of trust between them strengthened. Ruby’s heart beat faster with every successful move, the distance shrinking but the tension mounting. Then, just as she shifted her weight onto a new tile, a sharp crack echoed from behind her, slicing through the quiet like a warning bell.

“What...” Weiss’s voice sharpened with alarm as the tile beneath her groaned in protest.

Ruby reacted on instinct, lunging forward and snatching Weiss’s wrist. With a force she didn’t know she had, she hauled the other girl forward. They landed hard on the next safe tile, a tangle of limbs and startled breaths.

Weiss ended up sprawled atop Ruby, eyes wide with shock, her hand clutching Ruby’s shoulder in an iron grip that lingered just a second too long.

Then she blinked, as if waking from a trance, and hastily pushed herself upright. She brushed invisible debris from her sleeves with meticulous precision, a flicker of her usual haughtiness returning. “I had it under control,” she muttered, though her voice wavered at the edges.

Ruby arched a brow, lips twitching. “Sure you did,” she said, her tone light but teasing, the tension easing just a touch between them.

They didn’t say more, simply moved on, each step sharpening their rhythm. The gap ahead was narrowing, but the danger still pulsed beneath their feet like a silent threat.

The final stretch was chaos... a blur of shouted directions and instinctive leaps. “Left! Mine!” “Back two!” “Diagonal, now!” Their voices overlapped, urgency and trust tangled together like the flickering patterns beneath them.

Each jump was a gamble. Each shouted command became a makeshift lifeline, yanking them from hesitation into action. Their focus narrowed, the rest of the world vanishing until only the tiles and each other remained. There was no time to second-guess, no moment to analyze. Just move, believe, leap.

They hit the stone hard, tumbling in a clumsy heap of limbs before rolling to a stop. Ruby groaned as she sat up, brushing dust from her arms, while Weiss straightened with her usual poise, albeit with a small wince. They had made it, barely, and the full weight of that realization sank in with every heartbeat. Solid ground. No illusions. No crumbling tiles.

They stood there, close, shoulders brushing with the rise and fall of their chests. For a moment, neither spoke.

“We made it,” Ruby said finally, her voice quiet and tinged with disbelief, like she didn’t entirely trust that it was over.

Weiss didn’t turn to face her, but her voice caught slightly, just for a moment. “Maybe we make a good team,” she said, her tone softer than Ruby had heard it, carefully measured, like she wasn’t entirely sure she wanted it to be true, but said it anyway.

Ruby’s grin brightened, her gaze locking with Weiss’s for a beat longer than usual. In that moment, a strange warmth curled in her chest, tentative, unexpected. She wasn't sure if it was relief, admiration, or something more fragile taking root. But whatever it was, it made her want to keep going. To trust again, even if just a little.. “You know what? I think we do,” she said, more sure of herself now. The words hung there between them, fragile but sincere, as something new and promising stirred in the space where mistrust had lived.

A/N: Re-polishing my outline I’m feeling this coming to a close with 11 chapters total (10 + Epilogue) for the story I want to tell. Some of the scenes already fit better as a combined chapter so that shortened it up a bit. 

Chapter Text

Hours had passed since they left the chasm behind. The memory of it lingered in Ruby’s muscles... the blind leaps across nothing, the heart-pounding uncertainty of each step, the way they had to trust without question. The rhythm of it still echoed faintly in her legs, in her chest, a tension that hadn't quite faded, a phantom tension she couldn’t quite shake. At some point, they had collapsed beside one of the smoother walls of the corridor, too drained to speak.

Now, their footsteps echoed in quiet unison as they continued deeper into the prison. The air felt heavier here, thick with something Ruby couldn’t name... pressure, maybe, or expectation. Even Weiss seemed quieter, her usual clipped precision dulled by fatigue or focus. They hadn’t spoken much since the rest stop. There wasn’t much to say.

They turned one final corner and entered a circular chamber that dwarfed everything they had passed so far. The walls curved in smooth, dark stone, unbroken except for a single impossibly massive door embedded directly ahead.

And beside it... two whisperglass panels.

One on the left. One on the right. Identical in design. Each embedded with a glowing red imprint of a hand. Right and left, spaced just far enough apart to make using both simultaneously impossible.

Ruby felt a chill crawl up her spine. The setup was obvious. Purposeful. This wasn’t just about access... this was about torment.

She glanced at Weiss, who had gone still. “This place really was built to break people, huh?”

Weiss’s expression darkened. “It’s cruel. Designed to give hope and then rip it away.”

“But there’s two of us.”

Weiss gave her a sidelong glance. “Lucky us.”

Ruby approached the right panel. “What do you think happens if we both use one at the same time?”

Weiss shrugged stiffly. “How should I know? We’re using a failed ancient technology in a way it wasn’t designed for.”

Ruby frowned. “But this whole place was built around these, right? There has to be some kind of outcome they expected.”

Weiss scoffed lightly, crossing her arms. “You’re giving them far too much credit. Just because they wanted it to work a certain way doesn’t mean it won’t backfire spectacularly.”

Ruby glanced back at the door. “Still... maybe it's like that hallway. Some kind of test?”

Weiss sighed, a hint of weariness slipping into her voice. “Or maybe it’s a trap. The kind that requires two people so it can break two minds instead of one.”

Ruby let out a shaky breath, then stepped toward the right panel. “We don’t have another choice.”

She placed her palm near the panel but didn’t press yet. “Ready?”

Weiss hesitated for a long moment before she began walking toward the left panel, each step reluctant. Her arms hung at her sides, and her jaw was tight with unspoken apprehension. Finally, she took her position opposite Ruby, tension curling her shoulders inward. "As I’ll ever be."

They exchanged one last look. Ruby swallowed. “Three… two… one.”

Their hands hit the panels.

The jolt hit instantly. Familiar and alien at once, a surge of static ripping through her body. Light exploded behind her eyes... and then everything went white.

The world reformed slowly. Disjointed. Ruby wasn’t in her body anymore. She was looking out through someone else’s eyes... tall mirrors, high ceilings, a desk made of dark polished stone. Anger buzzed beneath her skin, sharp and cold.

A man stood across from her. The sneer on his face was as cutting as any blade, a look that dripped with disdain and disappointment.

“You’ve humiliated this family for the last time,” he snapped, voice rising like a storm. “Do you think I’ll let you ruin a sixth match? Do you think I won’t do something about it?”

Weiss’s voice... her voice, but Ruby felt it... rang with icy defiance. “I won’t marry some off-world brute just because you want a trade route to Sirius Prime. I won’t chain myself to someone for your ambition.”

He slammed his fist on the desk, the sound echoing like thunder through the high-ceilinged room. “You’ve refused five perfectly arranged alliances. Five! Do you know how much influence I’ve lost? What am I to do with a daughter who won’t perform her one duty?”

“I’m not for sale,” Weiss hissed, her blood boiling. “And I won’t be your pawn. I’d rather rot in a cell than live as someone else’s bargaining chip.”

He stepped around the desk with measured steps, each one echoing with the authority he believed he wielded, and leaned in close enough for Weiss to feel his breath. "You think this tantrum means anything? You think defying me will endear you to anyone?"

He paused, lips curling into a sneer. "You’re not a princess anymore," he growled, eyes alight with cruel certainty. "Not after this. You’ve made your choice."

Weiss’s heart... Ruby could feel it... stumbled, then raced in her chest. “You can’t strip me of my title. It’s mine by right.”

Jacques leaned forward, voice lowering to a venomous whisper. “Who will stop me, Weiss? Who will question the High Sovereign when I tell them you tried to kill me? When I paint you as a traitor? They’ll eat it up... and you’ll be nothing.”

The world shattered like glass.

Static.

Darkness.

Then light returned.

Weiss stood in chains.

The cold bite of metal clamped tightly around her wrists and ankles, the unyielding restraints a harsh reminder of her fall from grace. Her heels echoed softly against the polished stone as she was led to the center of the chamber, every step drawing her closer to judgment.

The tribunal chamber loomed around her, grand and imposing. A ring of robed figures sat in silence, elevated and distant, their expressions hidden behind sculpted visors that glinted in the cold light. Shadows pooled beneath their thrones, making them seem more specter than sovereign.

Weiss lifted her chin. She would not bow her head. Not now.

Then a voice rang out... official and merciless:

“By decree of the Crown Concord, under the eye of Atlas, and in the name of the High Sovereign…”

Another voice followed. “Weiss Schnee, the Radiant Princess, is hereby found guilty of high treason and the attempted regicide of the sovereign flame.”

The next cut like ice: “By judgment of this tribunal, she is henceforth stripped of her title, her name, and all rights of inheritance.”

“Let her walk the shadow eternal.”

The sound faded again.

Static.

Darkness.

Then: the endless cold.

Weiss trapped in the block of ice. The door looming ahead like the last memory of the outside world. Nothing moved. No light. No sound. Her vision blurred at the edges, flickering with phantom illusions of movement that never came. The cold was not just around her... it was within her, a gnawing numbness that spread through every inch of her awareness.

Time passed in a blur of frozen stillness. Years. Decades. Centuries. She lost track. The concept of time fractured, crumbled like the pieces of her broken identity. Her thoughts dulled, narrowed to a single point of focus: the door.

Her eyes locked on it, unblinking, unwavering. The silence pressed in, dense and suffocating, as if even the air had forgotten how to move. Her vision swam with the faint remnants of light, and she didn’t dare blink... afraid she might miss something, anything. But nothing came. Just the cold. Just the stillness. And then, as if in answer to some silent plea, the light slowly faded around her.

Until it opened.

A woman.

And Weiss… Ruby could feel it. That first flicker of hope, fragile and unfamiliar, bursting against the silence like a spark in the dark. It seared against the weight of her imprisonment, a warmth she hadn’t let herself imagine.

The woman's voice came brittle and cautious, as if forming the words might shatter something inside her. "Okay..." she said slowly, inching a half-step back. "You’re awake. That’s... fine."

Hope. Buried. Smothered. But there.

It rose like smoke in her chest, uninvited and unwelcome. She tried to crush it, to smother it beneath the weight of every year spent staring at that cursed door, every second spent in the silent dark. Hope was dangerous. Hope made things hurt more when they failed.

But it flickered again, this time brighter. Stronger.

She clung to her cold armor of doubt, of resignation, tried to remind herself what happened the last time she believed. But that voice... that presence... it cracked something inside her.

For the first time in an eternity, something stirred.

Static.

Then nothing.

Ruby gasped as she returned to herself.

She staggered back, vision swimming. Weiss stood beside her, silent and unmoving. Her body remained turned slightly away, a rigid statue of composure masking whatever storm churned beneath. The silence between them stretched long, heavy... not tense, but weighted with unspoken understanding. No words were needed. Not yet. Her face was turned away, her posture stiff with shame or pain or both. Ruby didn’t need to ask. She knew Weiss had felt it too. That she knew what Ruby had seen.

No words could fix it.

So Ruby crossed the space between them and wrapped her arms tightly around her.

Weiss froze, her body going rigid, breath catching in her throat as if the gesture itself had stunned her more than the centuries of silence ever could.

Ruby didn’t let go. Her grip was firm, grounding... offering something that had no name yet carried weight enough to anchor broken things.

Then, slowly, Weiss exhaled. The tension drained from her shoulders inch by inch, her resistance melting under the warmth of Ruby’s embrace.

Her arms came up... stiff at first, unsure... then settled around Ruby’s back with a trembling steadiness. The movement was small, awkward, but it was there. The kind of touch that said: I don’t know how to do this, but I’m trying.

They stayed like that, still, quiet. No sound but the steady rhythm of shared breath and the faint hum of the prison walls.

Ruby leaned in closer, the weight of everything pressing on her chest, a storm of emotions churning behind her eyes. The pain of what she’d seen, the helplessness of centuries endured, the injustice that had no voice... all of it settled like lead in her heart. She had no magic, no grand power. Just her word. But she meant every syllable. Her voice was soft, barely more than a breath against Weiss’s ear. “I’m getting you out of here. I promise.”

They stayed like that a while longer, cocooned in silence.

Eventually, they pulled apart... reluctantly, slowly.

Ruby stepped back, eyes searching Weiss’s face. “What did you see?”

Weiss didn’t respond right away. Her eyes flicked to the ground, her lips pressed into a tight line as if weighing what to share. Then, with a flicker of something unreadable in her gaze, she finally said, “A blonde-headed brute who insisted we ‘spare’ before throwing me all over the yard and putting me in a headlock.”

Ruby blinked, startled, then tilted her head with a crooked smile. “Wait... you saw that ?”

Weiss gave a tiny shrug, her mouth twitching with the faintest trace of reluctant amusement. “That's not to mention the part where she body-slammed you like a professional wrestler before declaring you her favorite training dummy.”

Ruby snorted, laughter bubbling up before she could stop it. “Well, yeah. That sounds like Yang.”

Weiss allowed the ghost of a smile to tug at her lips, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes. “You have a very lovely family. Warm. Loud. Unrelenting.”

Ruby’s grin softened into something gentler, touched with pride.

Then Weiss’s expression shifted... curious, confused. She turned toward the great door and blinked. “It’s open.”

Ruby looked too, noticing the faint light spilling through the crack. “Huh. Must’ve been open for a while.”

They stood in the quiet for a moment, the weight of everything still settling between them.

Then Ruby let out a breath and met Weiss’s eyes. “Let’s get out of here.”

A/N: This was one of the very first scenes I had mapped out for this and I have been so excited to finally get here. 

Chapter Text

The massive stone door groaned shut behind them, sealing off the corridor with a heavy finality. Dust shivered from the frame, drifting in lazy spirals through the air. The echo of its closing faded slowly, swallowed by the oppressive stillness ahead. Another door stood in their path ...  smoother, smaller, but no less imposing.

"Who puts a door behind another door?" Ruby muttered, exasperation coloring her tone as she planted her hands on her hips.

Weiss raised a single eyebrow, her arms crossing neatly. "Someone with a particularly cruel sense of humor. Or someone who doesn’t believe in overcomplicating things ...  just complicating them repeatedly."

Despite herself, she smirked faintly. Ruby snorted and stepped forward. The second door was flanked by the now-familiar whisperglass panels, red veins pulsing gently beneath their hand-shaped indents. No surprises ...  just the same eerie invitation as before.

"We need to be cautious," Weiss murmured, inspecting the panel with a frown. "These weren’t meant for just one person. They knew no one could have made it past the previous chamber alone. Whatever lies ahead... it’s expecting us. Together."

Ruby nodded solemnly and stepped to the opposite panel. She stared at the hand-shaped indent, red veins pulsing beneath the glass like a slow heartbeat.

"Alright then," she murmured, more to herself this time. "Let’s knock."

She hesitated. Just for a second.

The last time had hurt ...  not badly, but enough to make her cautious. She could feel her pulse in her fingertips, her breath steadying in her chest.

"Just a shock," she whispered. "We’ve done this before. No big deal."

Then, finally, she pressed her palm flat against the whisperglass, just as Weiss mirrored the motion. Instantly, the chill of the surface gave way to a sharp jolt that shot up her arm, like static electricity concentrated into a nerve-deep sting. Ruby winced but didn’t pull away.

A moment later, the door clicked ...  not loud, but final. It slid open with a sighing groan, revealing only stillness and a vast expanse beyond.

Silence.

They stepped into a vast chamber, cavernous and geometrically pristine. The high ceiling curved like a dome above them, its edges disappearing into shadow. Far, far across the smooth floor, a platform shimmered faintly ...  an elevator, maybe.

Ruby sucked in a breath, her voice hushed. "That has to be it." Her eyes locked onto the distant elevator platform, but doubt twisted quietly beneath her ribs. It looked so still ...  so perfect ...  like it had been painted onto the far wall. For a flicker of a moment, she wondered if she was only seeing what she wanted to see. If this was another trick, another trap dressed up as hope. Still, her heart fluttered with the thought that it might finally be the way out.

Weiss stepped up beside her, eyes narrowing with careful scrutiny. "Assuming it's real."

Ruby nodded slowly, but didn’t take her eyes off it. "Still... even if it isn’t, it’s the first sign of a way out we’ve seen."

They stood there for a moment, just taking it in ...  the eerie stillness, the faint promise of escape glimmering at the far end of the room.

Then, without a word, they started walking.

Ruby’s boots clicked against the polished floor. Weiss’s footsteps followed, careful and alert.

The elevator remained a distant gleam ...  a fixed point on the horizon. They walked in silence, each footstep echoing like a metronome in the vast chamber.

But after what felt like far too long, Ruby slowed, her brow furrowing. She cast a glance to the side ...  a bit of rubble, slightly cracked, almost familiar.

“Have we… passed this already?” she asked, uncertain.

Weiss didn’t stop walking. “The elevator’s definitely closer now.”

Ruby looked back over her shoulder, then forward again. The elevator seemed closer ...  but something felt off. Her steps didn’t feel like they were getting her anywhere. Her breathing hadn’t changed, her legs weren’t burning. It felt like walking in place.

She didn’t respond right away. Something in her gut prickled with doubt. They’d been walking for too long without any real change ...  no strain in her legs, no shift in the platform’s distance. The whole experience felt like a treadmill disguised as progress.

They kept walking. And walking. The elevator always stayed the same distance away... never quite closer, never quite farther. Just there, dangling hope like a carrot on a stick.

Ruby stopped first. “Okay… this is ridiculous.”

Weiss turned, confused. “What?”

Ruby gestured behind them. “That crack in the wall. I’ve seen it twice now. Maybe three times. We’re looping or something.”

Weiss’s gaze followed Ruby’s hand. Her brows drew together. “No… that’s... wait. I remember that shape too.”

They both turned slowly to scan the room. Every direction looked the same ...  smooth floor, distant ceiling, the faint shimmer of the elevator always just out of reach.

“Try walking the other way,” Ruby said.

They reversed course. Ten steps. Twenty. Still no difference. They tried again with different approaches ...  side-by-side, then splitting up, then syncing their stride perfectly. Ruby even reached for Weiss’s hand once, hoping maybe contact would change something. But nothing shifted. The elevator remained just as distant, the room just as still.

They returned again to the spot with the familiar crack.

Ruby let out a sharp breath through her nose. “Okay, this has to be an illusion. Nothing else makes sense.”

Weiss stood still, arms crossed tightly. “They knew no one could have made it past the previous chamber alone, as I said before. Whatever this is… it’s expecting something from us. Together.”

A long pause stretched between them, tense and quiet.

Ruby stared out at the ever-distant elevator. “So what are they trying to test now?”

Weiss’s expression shifted ...  eyes narrowing slightly in thought. “What’s the worst thing that could happen to two people who made it here through teamwork?”

Ruby looked at her, brow furrowed.

Weiss answered her own question. “Being forced to leave each other behind.”

Ruby frowned. “Weiss... ”

“Trust me.”

Weiss started walking toward the elevator alone. The chamber didn’t resist her. Her footsteps echoed across the floor, each one deliberate and precise. She moved past the rubble and further into the vast space, her silhouette shrinking with distance, but her posture never faltering.

She didn’t look back, not yet ...  not until she was sure she could get far enough to matter. Her pace was steady, like she was balancing resolve with defiance, daring the illusion to react. With every step, the silence seemed to press in tighter, more oppressive.

And Ruby stayed where she was, trying not to let every inch of distance feel like a mile.

Ruby watched in tense silence. Each step Weiss took away from her made the air feel a little thinner. The silence stretched out, taut and oppressive, a weight pressing in at the edges of Ruby’s thoughts. It was fine. It had to be fine. She told herself that again and again.

Halfway there, Ruby’s gut twisted sharply, as if yanked by a tether she hadn’t noticed until it snapped tight.

She bit her lip and shifted her weight. Weiss had asked her to stay, and she wanted to honor that. But a flicker of doubt crept in... slow and sharp. What if this was permanent? What if Weiss never came back? What if the illusion wasn’t just trying to test them... but to separate them?

Ruby’s breath hitched. Her eyes darted to the edges of the room, half-expecting them to close in. She took a step forward without meaning to, her body reacting before her mind could shout stop.

And Weiss was suddenly standing beside her again.

Both of them froze.

“It’s not blocking us from going forward,” Weiss said slowly, the realization settling in her voice like a stone dropping into deep water. “It’s resetting us the moment we feel like we’ve been left behind.”

Ruby's lips parted, then closed again. Her eyes flicked toward the elevator, then back to Weiss. “So we have to choose to stay apart.” The words felt unnatural in her mouth ...  like something she was never meant to say.

Weiss’s expression softened slightly, though tension still clung to her shoulders. “It’s cruel,” she admitted. “It’s testing the one thing it knows we’ll hesitate on.”

Ruby gave a shaky nod, eyes searching the space between them. “That we’ll have to let go. Even if just for a moment.”

Weiss’s breath caught slightly, just enough to notice. Her eyes flicked to the floor, then back up to Ruby’s. “That’s not easy for either of us,” she said, her voice softer than before, but edged with resolve. “But we’ve come this far together. We can take one more step ...  even if it’s apart.”

A beat passed. Then Weiss stepped closer, her voice low but sure. “Do you trust me?”

Ruby didn’t answer immediately. She held Weiss’s gaze, her chest tight, her thoughts racing. She wanted to say yes. She meant yes. But the words got caught somewhere just behind her ribs. Trust wasn’t the issue ...  not really. The issue was letting her go, letting her walk into uncertainty alone.

She swallowed hard and gave a small, tense nod. “...Yes. I just... don’t like it.”

Weiss’s gaze softened just a fraction, and she reached out, briefly pressing a hand to Ruby’s arm. “I’m not leaving you behind. I promise. I’ll see you again in just a few minutes.”

That promise settled over Ruby like a blanket not quite warm enough. She clenched her jaw, forced her breathing to stay even, to stay still. “Then go,” she said. “I’ve got your back. From here.”

Weiss gave her a final look ...  something caught between gratitude, determination, and a flicker of vulnerability ...  then turned with deliberate grace, her shoulders squared, her path set.

Step by step, she crossed the room. Her footsteps were light but purposeful, each one a signal of her resolve. Ruby stayed rooted in place, arms folded tight against her chest like they might keep her instincts from taking over.

Every few paces, Weiss would glance back. Ruby didn’t move. Her arms were crossed so tightly it felt like she was holding herself in place by sheer force of will, gloves creaking softly with the tension in her grip. She didn’t move.

The further Weiss got, the more Ruby’s heartbeat seemed to fill the chamber, pounding behind her ears. Her mouth felt dry. Her legs wanted to run.

But she stayed.

Weiss reached the elevator platform. Her steps slowed, breath catching in her throat as the edge loomed before her. For a heartbeat, she hovered, not out of fear, but because this step carried meaning ...  not just for her, but for Ruby too.

She looked back once more, locking eyes with Ruby across the void of space between them. There was tension there ...  not fear, not quite ...  but something taut and vulnerable, like a string drawn tight.

Then, hesitantly, Weiss stepped onto the platform.

For a split second, nothing happened.

Then the air snapped like a thread pulled too tight. The chamber rippled ...  not visually, not even audibly, but felt , like pressure releasing from behind their eyes.

The illusion shattered like glass.

A blink later, they were standing in the center of the room again, shoulder to shoulder, as if nothing had changed ...  but everything had.

Weiss blinked hard, visibly reorienting herself. “...Okay. That was new. Did you... ?”

She didn’t finish the question. She didn’t need to.

The cold reality of the stone chamber settled in around them. The real one ...  no distortion, no tricks. The elevator stood off-center, unmoving, and undeniably real this time.

Ruby stared, stunned. “So we weren’t even close to it.”

Weiss let out a long, uneven breath. “We never moved at all.”

They exchanged a glance ...  not quite relief, but shared understanding. The illusion was over. The test passed. The elevator now stood in quiet invitation.

They stepped forward, side by side..

A sharp, mechanical click.

Ruby’s breath caught in her throat. Her heart skipped ...  a quick, visceral stutter that sent her thoughts reeling. For a split second, it felt like she was back in the upper floors, surrounded by traps she couldn’t see until they sprang. The air thickened, every instinct screaming at once. Her hands twitched, her posture coiling with readiness even before she fully understood why.

That sound ...  not just a trap. A memory. A warning. Something she'd heard before, many times, and never wanted to again.

Her instincts flared. Her eyes flicked toward Weiss... then past her.

A dart, fast as a whisper, blurred through the air.

“ Weiss! ”

Ruby lunged. She slammed into Weiss with her full weight, shoving her clear of the shot.

A sharp sting ...  then fire. Pain bloomed hot and sudden across her back as the dart pierced through her suit and drove deep into muscle.

Her knees buckled. Her momentum carried her forward a step before she collapsed.

Chapter Text

Ruby hit the ground hard.

Pain bloomed instantly... sharp, searing, overwhelming. Her back arched as her limbs spasmed, muscles locking in unnatural patterns. She tasted metal. The air burned in her lungs.

Poison. She knew that feeling. She’d felt it before... never this strong, but close. Her vision blurred at the edges, every pulse of her heartbeat sending fire rippling outward from the dart buried in her back.

She could barely hear the scream.

"Ruby!"

Weiss’s voice tore across the chamber, raw and desperate.

Footsteps pounded toward her, and a moment later, Ruby felt arms around her, careful but frantic. She was rolled gently, her head cradled against something soft. Weiss. Kneeling. Her lap.

"Stay with me," Weiss whispered, her voice taut with barely held panic. "You don’t get to vanish on me... not after everything."

Ruby tried to speak, but her tongue felt thick. Her lungs wouldn’t cooperate.

Weiss hesitated only a moment. Her breath hitched. Then, with trembling fingers, she pulled off one glove and flung it aside. Ruby barely registered the motion.

Then came the bite.

Weiss sank her teeth into her palm... quick and clean... and held it to Ruby’s lips. The blood came fast, richer than Ruby expected, and Weiss muttered something in a language that bent in her ears, unfamiliar and strange.

The moment stretched, thick with something Ruby couldn’t name. Her heartbeat slowed, then skipped, then returned again... steadier. She felt Weiss’s presence like a thread pulling taut between them.

There was no flash, no sound... just a sensation, sudden and complete. Her breath caught as a wave of warmth washed through her, not like heat, but like being remembered. Like someone opening a locked door inside her chest.

Something had changed. Not around her, but within .

Ruby felt it... not like a shift in the room, but a shift in herself. A quiet certainty nestled in her chest like a second heartbeat. Something foreign and familiar all at once. She couldn't name it, couldn't see it, but it echoed in her bones, in her breath. Something of Weiss was in her now. And something in her had opened, reached out, and accepted it.

Her vision swam. Her lungs expanded. Her body, moments ago stiff with pain, loosened like cords being untied.

She gasped.

Her body jerked once, then eased. The pain, so vivid a breath ago, dulled into nothing. It was gone.

But Weiss crumpled.

She slumped sideways with a fragile exhale, her body folding in on itself like a flame losing its air. Her eyes fluttered shut, lashes trembling, and her hand remained suspended in the air for a heartbeat longer... then lowered just slightly, fingertips still brushing Ruby’s shoulder as if to anchor herself.

"Weiss... ?"

No response.

Ruby’s pulse surged, a wave of panic crashing against the fading edges of her adrenaline. Her vision swam. She gritted her teeth and forced her limbs into motion, pushing herself upright... arms quivering, every breath a shallow rasp.

"Weiss," she whispered again, more desperately now. She crawled closer, hands searching blindly for contact. Her palm found Weiss’s cheek... cool, damp, far too still. "Come on… please. Say something."

Weiss’s lips parted. Barely.

A flutter of movement. A blink. And then a whisper, fragile as glass: "You’re alive."

Ruby froze. Weiss’s voice was so faint it felt imagined.

"You had no right to leave me,” Weiss murmured, her voice low and composed, but laced with unmistakable steel. Her lips barely moved. Her eyes, half-lidded, glimmered with stubborn fire even through the haze of exhaustion.

Ruby stared down at her, heart pounding, throat tight. "What did you do?"

A beat of silence passed.

Weiss didn’t answer immediately. She blinked slowly and let her gaze fall away, breath shallow.

"“The Atlesian Blood Vow,” she murmured at last. “Old magic. Deep magic. Some say it’s a curse, others call it a promise. I see it as a calculation.”

Ruby’s brows furrowed faintly, but she didn’t interrupt.

“I used it to heal you,” Weiss continued, voice rough. “It was the only method available to me that guaranteed results. And… it came with conditions.”

Ruby’s stomach tightened.

Weiss drew in a slow, steadying breath. “Your life is tied to mine now. It’s more than healing... it’s sharing. When you breathe, I breathe. When you die, I die. And when you age... I will age with you. We’ll move through time together, years neither of us were meant to have.”

Ruby’s breath hitched. The weight of it landed all at once... like gravity itself had doubled. It wasn’t just the vow. It was what it meant. The commitment, the trust, the terrifying vulnerability of someone choosing her without hesitation.

She couldn’t find words. Just a flood of feeling... guilt, awe, fear, gratitude... colliding in her chest like waves against stone. She wanted to cry, to laugh, to scream. Instead, she just breathed, shaky and wide-eyed, clinging to the warmth of Weiss’s nearness.

Weiss shifted beside her, and Ruby moved to help, sliding an arm under her shoulders. With a grunt of effort and no small amount of care, she pulled Weiss upright. They rose together, ending face to face... close, breaths mingling in the quiet.

Ruby didn’t let go. Neither did Weiss. Their hands stayed clasped between them, fingers threaded like they belonged there. Not desperate... steady. Grounded. Like they were choosing each other all over again.

They stood that way for a long moment, surrounded by stillness, their bodies brushing with quiet reassurance.

Finally, Ruby found her voice. It was soft, almost unsure. She hesitated, her thumb brushing lightly against Weiss’s knuckles. The question had been sitting in her chest for what felt like hours... days... trapped behind fear. But now, with their hands clasped and the silence growing warm instead of cold, she let it rise.

“So... what happens after this? When we’re finally out of this place... what do you want to do?”

Weiss gave a soft laugh... light, dry, and exhausted. “Well, considering I just tethered my life to someone who treats ancient prison tech like it’s a puzzle box with no instructions...”

She offered the smallest smile, her voice carrying a touch of dry amusement. “I suppose I’m stuck with you now. Clearly, you need someone to keep you from poking mysterious artifacts unsupervised.”

Then her expression softened, dropped its usual defenses. Her voice lowered to a whisper.

“If... you’d want that. If you’d permit it.”

Ruby’s heart jumped.

She looked at Weiss. Really looked at her. Pale, trembling, stained with blood... yet holding herself together like a statue carved out of fire and stubbornness.

Ruby felt her heart stutter in her chest. She didn’t know if it was foolish or brave, but in this moment, it felt inevitable. Everything they'd endured... every illusion, every moment of trust and fear and reckless hope... had brought her here.

Ruby wanted to kiss her.

It was insane. They hadn’t known each other long. Hours? Days? A week? Time in the prison had bent around them like a dream. But through all the illusions, through every trap and test... Weiss had been the one constant.

She was real.

So Ruby leaned in. Slowly. Her hand rose to Weiss’s cheek, fingertips brushing gently over chilled skin. Her heart thudded in her chest, not from fear... but from the magnitude of the moment. Of choosing this. Of choosing her.

She kissed her.

It was soft. Gentle. A question, not a demand. A confession, barely whispered.

Weiss went rigid for a moment, startled. Her breath caught, her hand twitching in Ruby’s grasp.

Then, just as slowly, she kissed her back. Her movements were hesitant, as if she wasn’t sure how... but she tried. A little unsure. A little clumsy. Her lips pressed into Ruby’s like she was learning a language she’d only ever read about in stories.

But real.

So achingly real.

They lingered in the afterglow of the kiss, forehead to forehead, breaths mingling between them. Ruby’s thumb brushed along Weiss’s cheek, reluctant to break the contact, the stillness. Her other hand never let go of Weiss’s.

Slowly, they exhaled together... one shared breath, steadying.

Then, without speaking, they turned toward the platform at the far side of the chamber. Their hands lingered together for a beat longer… then slipped apart, fingertips brushing in a silent goodbye to the moment.

The platform waited... still, silent, expectant.

Weiss walked with her head high, chin lifted in stubborn defiance of the exhaustion dragging at her frame. But Ruby, ever watchful, caught the slight tremble in her hand, the tension in her jaw, the way her breaths came a little too shallow.

Without a word, Ruby reached for her again. Their hands met, and this time, Ruby gave a small squeeze... not because Weiss needed it, but because she did.

Together, they stepped onto the waiting circle of metal at the far side of the chamber.

And it rose.

A/N: Ok so there was supposed to be a post escape > walk back to the ship scene, but I wrote it 4x and hated it, so I thought this would be a better place to end. 

Chapter Text

Ruby leaned back in the pilot’s seat, boots propped on the edge of the console, arms folded behind her head. Through the wide viewport, the planet Patch hung just beneath them... lush and green and familiar. It looked smaller than she remembered.

Maybe everything did, now.

A soft instrumental track played in the background, barely loud enough to register over the hum of the ship. The scent of coffee and engine oil lingered in the air. One mug sat beside her, half-empty. A second, mostly full, rested precariously on the console edge.

“Are you sure this is a good idea?”

Weiss’s voice floated in from behind her, sharp with tension.

Ruby smiled without looking. “It’s Patch, Weiss. Not a war zone.”

Weiss paced the narrow strip of floor behind the chair, jacket draped over one arm, a datapad clutched in the other. She wore a perfectly pressed vest over a blouse that had already been changed twice in the past hour. Her hair was in a tight braid... then not... then braided again. At some point, she’d muttered something about protocol. Ruby had mostly tuned it out.

“I just... what if they don’t like me?”

That got Ruby to turn.

She looked over her shoulder, one eyebrow raised. “Why wouldn’t they like you?”

Weiss gestured vaguely, her hands restless. “I’m… not exactly the most adaptable company. Too precise, too guarded, too used to structure. I don’t know how to be easy around people. What if I say the wrong thing? What if I just... stand out in all the wrong ways?”

Ruby spun her chair around fully. “Weiss, you survived brain-frying ruins, wrangled ancient traps like a pro, gave up your immortality to save my very mortal butt... and you still remembered how I like my coffee the next morning. Honestly? My mom’s probably gonna build you a statue. You’ve got this.”

Weiss didn’t laugh, but the corner of her mouth tugged upward.

Ruby stood and crossed the few steps between them, gently plucking the datapad from Weiss’s hands and setting it aside. Her shoulder brushed against Weiss’s, and she let the contact linger longer than strictly necessary.

“You know,” Ruby said, her voice low, “when we first met, I figured you'd brush me off and tell me to stay out of your way. Smiling felt like a stretch. And now here we are... with a ship, a shared coffee habit, and a view like this?” She gestured vaguely at the planet below, the ship around them. “Sometimes I don’t know how we got from there to here, but I’m really, really glad we did.”

Weiss let out a soft exhale, her voice quieter than before. “I used to think trust had to be earned with rules and distance. That the safest thing I could do was stay apart.”

Ruby tilted her head, eyes searching hers. “And now?”

Weiss looked down briefly, then back up. Her voice was quiet, but steady. “Now the silence feels different when you’re not there. Like I’m waiting for something I didn’t realize I needed.”

Ruby blinked, caught off guard by the openness. Her breath hitched slightly, and she shifted her weight without realizing... like her body needed a moment to catch up to her heart. Weiss didn’t usually give this much away... not all at once.

She gave her hand a gentle squeeze, smiling softly. “I didn’t exactly make it easy,” she said. “I just... kept showing up. Kept talking. Kept crashing into things until you were stuck with me.”

Weiss laughed under her breath, the sound small but real. “You were impossible to ignore.”

“And you,” Ruby said, voice lowering, “were impossible not to fall for.”

Ruby smiled, and for a moment, they stood there in the quiet hum of the ship, orbiting something old and familiar. And somehow, everything had changed.

Ruby’s hand curled into hers, warm and steady. “Whatever’s waiting down there, we’ll face it together. And for what it’s worth... I think they’re going to love you.” She paused, smile tugging at her lips. “Because I do.”

Weiss stood quiet for a moment, the breath she took deliberate. Her hand tightened just slightly in Ruby's before she nodded, slow and thoughtful. She didn’t speak at first... just nodded, slow and thoughtful. When she did, her voice was soft. “Then I’ll be fine.”

They kissed... light, familiar. A promise exchanged in silence. A rhythm they’d come to know.

A soft tone chimed on the console.

“Descent window’s opening,” Ruby said, glancing toward the controls. She moved back to the pilot’s seat, fingers dancing across the panel like it was second nature.

The ship responded with a low hum, thrusters engaging as they tilted downward. Outside the viewport, the sky shifted... darkness giving way to deep blue streaked with sunrise gold. Patch came into clearer view: forests and winding rivers, familiar coastlines and soft mountains. Home.

Weiss slipped into the seat beside her, unusually quiet. Her posture was straight, but her hands fidgeted slightly in her lap. Ruby didn’t say anything... just reached out, and after a beat, Weiss took her hand.

Not tight. Just enough.

The ship entered the atmosphere with a smooth glide, fire trailing in gentle arcs outside the glass. For a moment, everything seemed to hold still: the music, the engines, the tension.

Then came the soft thud of landing struts. A low hiss as the ship kissed solid ground.

The bay lights dimmed. The ramp began to lower.

Sunlight spilled into the corridor, warm and gold and impossibly bright after so much time in orbit.

Weiss stood at the top of the ramp, frozen for a breath too long. Her fingers still curled in Ruby’s.

Ruby stepped a half-step ahead, turned back with a grin. “Come on,” she said. “Let’s go home.”

Weiss met her eyes.

Then she followed... down into the light, into the breeze, into the green hills of Patch, where something new could begin, grounded in everything they’d fought for.

Into whatever came next.

Together.