The Fallen Knight

Chapter 7: Meeting

"Why?"

Blake sighed as she found herself under Ruby's judgmental look. The girl had found out about her confrontation with Felix on NPR's room and was now looking for a reason behind it. She told them how she met with Felix on the school's forge and he told her about how Blake banged into their room's door and woke him up along with his team.

"It was... it was just a hunch, okay?" Blake said as she crossed her arms, knowing that her reason was not the best one.

"You were the one who said we weren't going to look for more activities from the White Fang or Torchwick, yet five seconds later you go and accuse someone of working with them?" Ruby asked, looking completely distraught and clearly affronted by what she did.

"If my hunch was right then the same man that hurt Yang was here, under our roof!" Blake defended.

"Except, that it wasn't that man," Weiss said, closing the book she was reading and getting up from bed. "The student is just that, a student, he came from Mistral and has bonds with another team that comes from there. And while our interactions with him have been limited and will be more so from now on after this, he has shown to be both a good sport and a good friend that fills the space Arc left for Pyrrha and her team."

"People sometimes hide their true colors," Blake said with a look of reminiscence. "Sometimes they look like charmers, where a beast lies down. Waiting for the right time to get out."

Ruby and Weiss exchanged looks and the young leader walked forward and grabbed Blake's hands. "Blake... I get you are upset, we are all... we all want Torchwick and those guys with him to be stopped but... Even if—IF—this Felix is that Felix we just can't confront him about it. What if her goes to Ozpin and that gets us in trouble again?"

"Specially after we are basically under his scope," Weiss remarked. "We are hanging on a thin line and the last thing we need is to get accused of harassment."

Blake was silent for a moment, before she gripped Ruby's hands and nodded. "I will go walk for a bit... I'm sorry, guys..." She said as she let Ruby go and walked out of the room.

Once alone Ruby gave a shuddering breath, before walking mechanically to her bed and sitting there. Weiss observed as her leader took various breaths before one of them came out as a sob. "Ruby..."

"I suck as a leader," She said as she bit her lip and tried to contain her tears. "I suck as a leader, as a friend, as a sister, as everything!"

Weiss observed as Ruby tried to hold herself together and tried to not break down. Her eyes softening as she took in consideration that Ruby was just fifteen and trying to be many things at once, leader, hero, etcetera. She had her doubts when Ozpin choose her as a leader, but gave the benefit of the doubt and while this wasn't the best scenario at least no one died and they did managed to almost beat Torchwick had it not been for the interference of the mercenary.

She sat next to Ruby and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. "You don't 'suck' Ruby. This is just a... setback..."

"But Yang... she..."

"She is going to wake up soon, she is too stubborn not to," Weiss told her. "We are still students Ruby; we have four more years to become better." She knew that if Blake was here, she would say that those are four years where Torchwick continued to run rampant.

"B-But," Ruby sniffled.

"No buts," Weiss said. "You want to prove you don't suck as a leader? Then let's get up from this mess and prove our teachers we can deal with this sort of things, even if it sadly means that we won't attend to the dance."

"... At least I won't use those stupid shoes Yang to for me."

"You dolt," Weiss said, rolling her eyes.