There was nothing quite like the feeling of coming home after a trying day. It didn't matter if you lived in a tent or a palace, the relief was the same. Of course, I was only guessing about the palace part, but still.

The last few days had been trying. I'd spent them going between Ruby's bed at the hospital and the police station. The only reason I was outside my apartment now was because she'd ordered me home. Apparently waiting rooms weren't meant for sleeping, especially when Ruby was no longer in danger.

That was one fact I still didn't quite believe. It didn't matter how many doctors or nurses told me. I'd still spent the past few days waiting for bad news. For that one phone call that would break my world. It had never come. Ruby was fine, she was even smiling, but then of course she was. And she was telling everyone not to worry about her. Like that would happen. Not with me, or her dad, or her sister.

Yang hadn't forgiven me yet. Taiyang might have spent half his time calling me an idiot, and the other half a hero, but Yang hadn't. She had offered me a single stilted display of gratitude, before doing her best to pretend I didn't exist. This was not an easy task with both of us sitting in the same room for hours on end, but she managed it.

Her apathy was fine. I deserved it and so much more. It didn't matter that I'd been the 'hero' when I'd gotten Ruby into the situation in the first place. Without me she wouldn't have needed a saviour. Yang might forgive me eventually—Ruby would no doubt force her to—but I would never forgive myself.

That was part of the reason I'd stayed at the hospital. Surrounded by the noise and bustle of a busy ward, I hadn't had any time alone with my thoughts. As I stepped into my darkened and cold apartment, I had nothing but time.

My keys and phone clattered as I tossed them onto the table. I should have really have called my parents, my sisters, but what could I say? I got Ruby kidnapped by the mafia and then got kidnapped too. Don't worry though, we're both fine. I'll be home for Thanksgiving. How's the cat doing? Yeah, that was conversation I wanted to put off indefinitely.

My stomach growled. It was only then that I realised I'd forgotten to eat. Again. The act just hadn't seemed all that important at the hospital. I'd had better things to do, like worry. The only time I'd found the energy to fulfil my body's needs was when someone brought me something.

The cupboards in my kitchen were no doubt bare—let's just say shopping had been the last thing on my list of priorities—but then again I was an American; I could eat pretty much anything as long as it was between two slices of bread.

It wasn't really a conscious decision to eat. More my body decided to do it of its own accord and I shuffled into the kitchen on laboured feet. I was more tired than any time in my life.

I flicked on the light. A package sat on my table. One that I hadn't left there. My hairs stood on end as I cast around. My fatigue was banished in a roar of adrenaline. Someone had been here. Might still be here.

My apartment was quiet, not that it mattered. It had been quiet before. I pulled a knife from a drawer. I'd wanted it to be over. The police had found Torchwick's body and those of his men, but not Neo's. It wasn't close to being over, despite the cops saying they were searching the city for her. We should have all been able to start moving forward with our lives, and yet I couldn't. Not while the package sat on my table.

I felt violated more than anything. Someone had been here, in my home, without my permission. Again. It wasn't something I could explain properly. You had to experience it. This was the place I was supposed to feel safe, and over the past week it had proven to be anything but.

"Hello?" No one answered. I didn't expect them to. I stalked through my apartment with cold metal pressed against my forearm, turning on lights, and checking cupboards. It didn't take me long to conclude I was alone. There was one benefit to the insanity of New York's tiny apartment rental market.

With my circuit complete, I was only more frustrated and furious, while not the least bit terrified. The package sat on the table, a black hole to my attention. I leant closer, my heart pounding in my ears. It could have been a bomb, but if it was, why was it in plain sight and not under my bed or something?

It was wrapped in simple brown paper and twine. There was a tag tied to one of the strings. I flicked it over with the tip of the knife.

Jaune,
I'm sorry you got caught up in all of this.
Leone.

Leone. I should have known. She'd already proved she could break into my apartment before, what was one more time? And she'd left an apology of sorts. No longer fearing a bomb, I picked up the parcel. It was heavy, much heavier than its size suggested.

A memory stick fell out of it first. The same white one with a blue snowflake. The one that had caused all this trouble. Bile rose in my throat as I just looked at it. How could something so simple have caused so much misery?

And Weiss. She hadn't said a word to the police. There was absolutely nothing linking her to the investigation apart from her being the victim of a robbery. They hadn't been able to arrest her either. They'd only had polite conversations where she'd won them over as she had once done to me.

The memory stick was here, though it wasn't exactly the same as the last time I'd held it. Part of the casing had been removed. I peered closer. A circuit had been wedged into its innards, separate to the rest of the device.

It was tiny, but familiar. I could guess what it was. One of the thoughts that had distracted me from my self-loathing was pondering just how the White Fang had come to save the day? How had they known where we were? Leone had given me the answer.

She'd played me. Just like everyone else had played me. I should have been disgusted, instead my fatigue only returned in full force. I slumped down into a chair. The time she'd been here before, I'd caught her with the memory stick. Even then she'd been about a dozen steps ahead of me.

She must have known Torchwick was going to outwit the police, that I would have done anything to save Ruby, and that the memory stick would end up in his hands one way or another. The memory stick and the GPS tag that was hidden inside of it. I'd led the White Fang straight to him. At least The Monkey's gratitude made sense now. I'd been a tool in both senses of the word.

My fingers played a steady rhythm onto the table as I stared. I wasn't cut out for this life, not really. Investigating maybe, but not getting involved with criminals. They were just so much colder than I could ever be. While Leone had been here, trying to persuade me not to give the stick to Torchwick, and then wishing me luck, all that time she must have known that their plan could have gotten both Ruby and me killed. If Pero had inspected the USB, he might have found the tracking device. I didn't need to be a genius to know how that would have gone down. In the end circumstances had favoured the White Fang's plan, but it could have ended so differently. Would Leone even have cared? I couldn't say.

The paper came away from the bulk of the package easily enough, leaving what was within glittering on my table. For a moment I forgot how to breathe. I'd never seen that much gold, or silver, or platinum, or sapphires, or diamonds, or… you get the picture. I'd never seen that much shiny stuff gathered in one place before.

Weiss' music box sat before me. The music box that had belonged to a Russian princess. It had been a toy, but a toy that could have lifted so many out of poverty. With gratuitous largess like this, it was no wonder the people had risen up against the Tsars.

Even if the box was a staggering waste, it was undeniably beautiful. The animation, even the pictures Weiss had taken, didn't do it justice. They'd been unable to capture the finery of the engravings, every delicate swirl of the filigree on the lapis. A mere image on the screen couldn't have conveyed how the dozens of gemstones captured the light and split them into rainbows. It was incredible. Truly incredible.

The hinges offered no resistance to my fingers, and as soon as the lid opened, music began to play. The soft chimes floated through the still air of my kitchen and into my ears. Alexandra and Nicholas danced within, spinning, turning in an endless embrace. Knowing what had happened to the original owner, the beauty of it all caught in my throat.

What a gift the box would have been for a young princess, and what a gift it must have been for Weiss from her mother. It was a worth a fortune, but Leone had still given it back. I could guess why. Her apology had not been limited to mere words on paper.

The music box made sense, but why had she returned the memory stick out of all of Weiss' possessions? It couldn't just have been to tell me how they'd found Torchwick, she could have written that down as well. As the melody slowed, I set it playing again, and took the memory stick in my hand. Leone had to have had a reason. What was it? Unless…

On a whim I retrieved my laptop, but my brief optimism died. A box requesting a password still flashed. I had bullshitted Torchwick. There was no special encryption, and it didn't delete when you entered the wrong combination. Lord knows I'd tried enough times.

Why had Leone given the stick back to me? She must have wanted me to do something with it, but how could I when I didn't know the password? I bet she knew. So why hadn't she just given it to me?

I stared at the blinking cursor while the sonata trilled from the box. The gentle rise and fall of the music echoed in my mind. Something Leone had said to me the last time she was here came back to me. 'The weakest link is always the human link'. My jaw fell open. It couldn't have been that obvious.

It only took a quick Google search to bring up notes of the melody, and I pasted them into the box. It really was a secure password, a seemingly random combination of over a hundred upper and lower case letters and symbols. No one would have been able to guess it. Not without knowing the person who'd set it. I hit enter.

A red circle with an exclamation mark appeared. I slumped down in my chair. I'd been so sure, certain that I'd been about to get the answers I craved. Perhaps Leone had only meant for me to give the memory stick back to Weiss, not to know what it contained.

Defeated, I sat there and listened to the music box as it wound down, following the notes I'd copied into Word. F# G F#... So on and so on. I had nothing better to do. My eyes snapped open. Just before the chorus, the pitch had gone down when it should have gone up. It happened again. Another subtle variation. The melody the music box was playing was different to the one I'd found online.

I went to YouTube and played the version from the film side by side with the real thing. They were different. I had no doubt. The tunes weren't the same. I'd been stupid to even think they would have been. The music in the film had been written to accompany a song. It might have sounded similar, but they hadn't been shooting for a hundred percent authenticity.

I set the music box playing again, concentrating intently with a pencil in my hand. I didn't have much of a musical ear, but I persevered and, after an hour, the folders began to appear. As I looked at them, I finally understood.

Weiss' secretary showed me into her office. I hadn't had to wait this morning. I'd barely sat down when I'd been chivvied up. This time Weiss didn't rise to greet me, instead she glared.

"Perhaps you would know why the police have been hounding me for the past week?" Her voice was chill.

I didn't say anything; instead I placed a neatly wrapped parcel on her desk. I took a seat.

"And what's this?"

"Open it and see."

I saw the exact moment her nimble fingers revealed what was inside. Her entire face lit up, a grin stretching from ear to ear. The happiness exuding from her was entirely unrestrained, it washed over me in a wave, and I couldn't help but smile with her.

"Jaune…" Weiss breathed as she removed the last of the paper. "You found it," she finished dumbly.

I very much doubted she had ever said anything so obvious or stupid, but she'd been thrown so far off-balance she'd forgotten to be embarrassed. It didn't take Sherlock Holmes to know how much the box meant to her.

"How?" Weiss met my eyes with unbridled joy, and not the least bit of surprise.

"With a lot of work and a little help. I also found this." My voice was as cold as hers had been as I put her memory stick next to the box. Weiss' red tongue flicked against her pale lips.

"I… I don't understand."

"When you first came to my office, I asked you what was on these. You just said 'research'." I remembered that moment well, mainly because my awful attempt at a joke had been enshrined in my mind.

"Well… yes." Weiss looked down at the stick then back up to me. "That was the truth." Her voice had come out defensive.

"I know. I know." I let out a heavy sigh. It had been the truth, but not the whole truth. The whole truth might have saved me from all of this. "But you didn't tell me just how important that research was. Just what it might have done in the wrong hands."

"What?"

"The burglars never wanted your music box Weiss. Or your jewellery. Or the cash. They were hired by the mafia to steal this stick in particular. And you know why. I can see it in your eyes." Behind those sapphire portals, cogs and gears were turning.

"But…"

"You must have known Weiss. Why didn't you tell me?" I couldn't keep the accusation from my voice.

"Because it wasn't your business to know. It was no one's business. Not yet. It's private research." She leant forward in her chair, placing her palms flat on the desk. "And no, I did not know. How could I? They stole millions of dollars' worth of my belongings, but I was meant to know that they simply wanted some hydrogeology data? That would have been a wild stretch of logic."

I held up my hand. Maybe I had been unfair. Weiss' reasoning made sense. "That data almost got my friend killed." And me, but that didn't seem all that important in comparison.

Weiss looked away, her head falling. She spoke to the window. "I… heard. I'm… sorry."

Profiled against the window, she looked ever so beautiful, and ever so sad. The joy at the rediscovery of her mother's music box had fled from her. It wasn't her fault. Not really. I'd simply had to take my anger out on someone.

"Thank you." What else could you say to a heartfelt apology really? "I'm not sure how much of the data they were able to access. Probably all of it."

"And you?" Weiss asked me.

"Yes." I'd seen it all. All those maps of groundwater levels in Manhattan over the last couple of centuries. The data about the rivers and lakes nearby. How the constant urbanisation of the area was effecting the movement of water through the earth. The hypotheses of the effect it would have. And I'd seen my own photo, the one where I'd been standing next to Pyrrha before the sinkhole in the warehouse. I at least knew what had persuaded Weiss to take a chance on me in the first place.

"Great." Weiss' head sank into her hands.

"What are you going to do?"

Her ponytail swished side to side. "I don't know. It's not ready to be published."

"Ready or not people know."

"Jaune," Weiss bit her lip. "I need more data. It hasn't even been peer-reviewed. You do realise what this is showing right?" I nodded. "I can't just say that a quarter of Manhattan might be structurally unsound based on preliminary findings. If I'm right, the costs are going to spiral into the hundreds of billions. And if I'm wrong, I would never be able to show my face again. I'd be ruined for life."

My apartment was in the danger zone, as was my office. As were millions of other people's homes and places of work. The costs would be astronomical, as would the insurance claims. Anyone who knew ahead of Weiss' publication stood to make an absolute killing. At the end of the day, this had just been an insurance scam, though one with the value of billions. No wonder it had been worth killing over.

"Weiss, I'm not going to tell you what to do. I don't have that right. But people know now. The information is out there. People will profit from it at other people's expense."

"I know that." Weiss screwed up her eyes, her nose wrinkling. "I haven't even told my father because I know he would only view it as an opportunity to grow his fortune. You look at me and think I'm a spoiled rich girl playing at running a charity. Don't try and deny it, I saw it the first time you came here. Well I'm not." Her voice softened. "I am actually trying to improve other people's lives. And I won't be improving them by crashing the New York property market because I drew the wrong conclusions."

"And you won't be helping them if you are right and don't say anything either. In that case, sooner is better."

"I know." Weiss rolled the memory stick through her fingers as if it contained the weight of the world. To be fair, that wasn't far from the truth. I could only be glad it wasn't my decision to make.

"Well, rest assured that no one will hear anything from me."

Weiss smiled at me, her eyes glinting. "Thank you. You know, I thought I'd made a mistake on you at the start, and the middle if I'm honest, but you've come through for me. I don't know how to repay you."

I bit my tongue down on what I wanted to say. There was an easy way to repay me, to pay me. But that wouldn't have exactly been chivalrous, and I knew what people always said about me. "There's no need."

"Nonsense. If you ever need anything you only have to ask." A favour from the millionaire daughter of an ex-KGB billionaire. That was probably worth its weight in gold. "And as for your fee." She filled in a cheque and slid it across to me. My eyes widened when I saw the number. "The extra is for your friend. I know hospital stays aren't exactly cheap."

They weren't, even if you had insurance as good as Ruby's. Technically her injuries had been sustained off-duty, and though I'm sure Taiyang would sort it out in the end, the extra money would stop everyone worrying about it. "Thank you. This will mean a lot to us."

Weiss stood and held out her hand. "I can't convey how sorry I am all this happened. I would never have come to you if I'd realised."

I squeezed her cool skin. "You couldn't have known. And I don't hold a grudge." It was as much a surprise to me to realise that I didn't. Weiss hadn't done any of this maliciously, and she hadn't been involved. My first impressions of her hadn't been flawed. I was good at reading people.

Weiss smiled at me again. She really was stunningly pretty. "That's good to hear. If I ever have another problem that I think you can help with, I'll be in touch." She thought for a moment. "Though I promise they won't be as messy."

I showed her my teeth. "I somehow doubt that." We laughed together.

"And I'll tell my friends about you." With Weiss' money, she'd saved my business and my dream for the short and medium terms, but a steady stream of rich customers would save it in the long term as well.

"Thank you. Goodbye White Snow."

Weiss scowled, but it was a playful one. "Now I'm rethinking my tip. Goodbye Jaune, and so long."

I backed away two paces before turning. She was royalty after all. As I looked back for one last glimpse of her, I saw her flick open the lid of the music box, melancholic rapture enshrouding her. My stomach fluttered. Moments like these, were the entire reason I'd chosen to be a detective. I'd helped her. At the end of the day, that was all that mattered.

I knocked on Ruby's door, definitely not feeling self-conscious in the slightest. It wasn't like I was wearing a chest plate or anything. To be fair I didn't have long to be embarrassed. I'd only just changed in the corridor. You definitely don't want to be walking around Manhattan with a sword strapped to your leg, plastic or not.

The door opened and Ruby threw herself at me. It didn't matter to her that I was wearing armour. Nothing would get in the way of one of her hugs. She squeezed me tightly and I squeezed her right back.

We didn't say anything, but then we didn't need to. Words weren't needed with the truest friends. Silence spoke more than loud enough. After several long seconds, I pushed Ruby out to arm's length, trying to judge her condition. She only smiled up at me, her cheeks red and glowing with health—and probably alcohol, but I wasn't going to judge. My worry must have shown.

"I'm fine." She was. And she looked it. You wouldn't have known she'd only been discharged from hospital a few days. She'd bounced back to being her normal cheerful self with frightening speed.

It was her idea that we were here, and that I was wearing a breastplate. With everything that had happened, we'd missed last week's D&D session, and Ruby was determined not to be the cause of missing another. She'd promised everyone that she was alright and, looking at her outward appearance, I couldn't call her a liar.

I wasn't the only one dressed up. If I had to put a name to it, I would have said Ruby looked a fair bit like Little Red Riding Hood with a long crimson cloak, but Little Red Riding Hood wished she kicked that much ass.

"Anyone else here yet?" I asked as I shifted my cases of beers inside.

"Just Yang."

I kept the smile on my face and thankfully Ruby didn't notice the effort. She didn't need any antagonism. Ruby helped me with beers. She probably shouldn't have been doing any manual labour, but she dared me to tell her so. I was too much of a coward to.

"Alright Jaune?" Yang presented her glove-encased knuckles to me. You wouldn't have known there were any difficulties between us from her greeting. If Yang wanted to pretend for Ruby's sake that was fine by me. I bumped her fist.

"Sup Yang."

She was wearing black shorts and yellow tank top with matching gloves. In fact she looked much like she did before one of her MMA bouts. I don't need to say it, but she looked good. Really good. But then, when did Yang ever not look good? Perhaps she wasn't as in to roleplaying as the rest of us, but she put in the effort when required.

"I see you still have the sword." She gestured at my hip. "Are you compensating for something?"

Ruby laughed, which was exactly what Yang had intended. She really was a great sister. Even if I was the butt of the joke I laughed with her, and then she dissolved into a mess of half-tipsy giggles as we strung the joke along further.

Nora tried to bash the door down with her hammer when she arrived, and only Ren's intervention stopped her succeeding. Even Penny turned up bedecked with a number of swords that actually glowed. She chose not to address where she'd been when I'd needed her, though it was another thing I could let slide. Normally we would have started, but Ruby had invited Pyrrha as thanks, and I was entirely sure that Ruby hadn't let her say no either.

When Ruby answered the tentative knock on the door my jaw dropped open. So did Ren's. And Yang's. I'm not sure what Ruby had told Pyrrha, but she'd gone all out. It was as if she had stepped from the pages of Homer's Iliad. She could have been Hector, or Aeneas, or maybe even Achilles. She had everything, the spear, the shield, the greaves, a red sash, even a bronze collar. My own breastplate started to seem very inadequate.

"Pyrrha…" Ruby said breathlessly.

"What?" Pyrrha looked around at all of us. "You told me to dress up. I haven't overdone it have I?"

"You look awesome!" Pyrrha had to juggle her spear and shield to catch Ruby's flying hug. I'm not quite sure how she managed it, but I guess you don't become an Olympic athlete without picking up some skills.

"Oh… thank you." Pyrrha's cheeks approached the shade of her hair.

Ruby didn't notice. "Come in. Come in. Guys, this is Pyrrha."

"Hello everyone." Pyrrha gave a small wave. "And hello again Jaune."

"Hi." I didn't know what else to say. I couldn't begin to repay her for what she did for me. "It's uhh… good to see you again."

"Likewise." She trailed off.

Ruby cocked her head, looking at both of us, before she spared our blushes. "Now we're all here, let's get started then."

I stayed in the kitchen with Yang, Ren, Nora, and Penny while Ruby talked Pyrrha through the basics of rolling a character. It didn't take long—or much alcohol—for our social inhibition to lower. Soon enough Yang was back to her old self and ripping on me without mercy.

It was exactly what we'd all needed. Being together, drinking, chatting, laughing. Even Pyrrha became more comfortable even if she was an outsider to our little clique. Ruby sat her down right between us on the floor. I had no doubt seeing the grins all around, that soon we'd be adding another friend to our group.

Ren flicked his hood up, casting half his face into shadow. He looked around at all of us poignantly.

"Humanity has been pushed to the brink, scratching a living in the few cities and towns that hold back the darkness. All of you live in this terrifying land, but you do not cower in fear. Instead you decided to become warriors, hunters, heroes. So let us begin on the eve of your first day at Beacon Academy."

A/N: Well that's it, the end. I would like to take a moment to say thank you to my editor u/rebkos for suffering through all my first drafts.

If you enjoyed the story consider giving it a follow/favourite, and thank you for reading.