Roman Torchwick rarely enjoyed the holidays- it was always busy everywhere, so robberies weren't too easy to pull off. And, with all the new huntsman and huntresses in training at Beacon, the Dust Shops would never be emptied of people. The entire time, Roman was out of work to do. He could plan, yes, but there's only so much planning anyone could do before you had to do something. And now that those kids were around almost every corner, things were even more irritating. Especially due to that little girl that always showed up, the girl he nicknamed "Red." After having one of his henchman sneak into the school and copy her school file, he now knew her name was Ruby Rose, but it was out of habit he called her that nickname. It infuriated her, he was sure, and she was just so cute when she was angry. Now that she was around, stealing the city's Dust got even harder. Yes, this year the holiday season was going to make his job very complicated, indeed.

Complicated, but not necessarily impossible.

At any rate, for the past several years Roman had to spend Christmas around Cinder, Mercury, and Emerald, and occasionally Junior and the Malachite twins would come too. It was rather dreary, with all the business talk going on, and, unfortunately for Roman, there wasn't enough alcohol in the world for him to forget after the "party" was over- every year, Cinder would have him fuck her on Christmas Eve, claiming it was their present to each other. Well, Cinder may have been a beautiful woman, but she wasn't all that good at sex. As a matter of fact, she was too quiet and, there was no good way to put it, over-used. Torchwick always had his suspicions about how she became so cozy with the White Fang to begin with, and fucking the leader was one of them. Not that he gave a rat's ass about it. Cinder could do whatever she wanted as long as he kept the clothes on his back and the security of her protection. After all, she needed him to steal all the Dust for her, so getting rid of him would be a huge loss. He might've been a piece in her little game, but he certainly wasn't an unknowing pawn.

It was about the right time of the year to start setting up for the big "party." Roman had already ordered the White Fang workers to start setting up everything when he noticed the note stuck to his map on the wall. He walked over to it, frowning. "What's this?" He swiped the note off the map, his eyes scanning over it curiously, first quickly, then again, much slower to make sure he read correctly. Finally, he crumbled up the paper, smirking. He turned around and called out. "Alright, listen up!" All the faunus stopped working on set up and looked at Roman. Most of their faces were vacant, Roman noticed. No wonder these ones believe in the cause of the White Fang so much. There couldn't be much going on in whatever passed for a brain in those skulls of theirs. "Stop the set up, the party is cancelled. Everyone can go home now." A few of the faunus seemed a little surprised, and one came up to Roman with a very confused look on his face. "What do you want?" Roman sneered at the man. He probably was a wolf or a dog faunus, what with the pointed furry ears poking out on his head.

"Listen, Torchwick, just because we're working with you doesn't mean you get to boss us around like we're your slaves." He growled lowly. "Speaking of which... we aren't slaves, and we're still waiting for our payment this week. Now, we were promised payment after we finished our work today, and by Remnant we are going to get it. Find us something to work on until then, or pay us now. We don't really care either way." Torchwick looked the faunus up and down. Roman's very nature wanted to tell this one that he could go suck a fat one, but this guy was actually pretty built. So, with his own health and welfare in mind, the master thief continued carefully. They glared at each other for a few moments, Torchwick hoping the faunus would just back down on his own. He didn't budge, to Roman's surprise. Finally, Roman let out an exasperated sigh.

"Fine, fine, I'll find something for you to do! But if you haven't noticed..." Roman walked over to the door of the warehouse and opened it to reveal the snow-covered world outside. "It's winter out there! Do you know what happens during winter?" The faunus man shook his head.

"No, but-"

"People are shopping for Christmas presents, cities are packed with with families!" He shouted, swinging Melodic Cudgel around, gesturing for who knows what reason. "Dust gets bought at the speed of light by huntsmen and huntresses! Do you realize how hard it is to rob any store in a city that's so restless?!" He got into the face of the faunus. "Hm? Do you?! Sorry if I don't have anything ready for you, but it's hard to plan any robberies right now. So, if you don't mind, I'll go look at my map and see what we can do about your lack of work to do." As Roman started to walk toward his planning space, the faunus finally got the nerve to speak up.

"Why a robbery?" He asked. Roman turned around and narrowed his eyes at the man.

"What do you mean, 'Why a robbery'? I'm a thief- stealing is what I do! What else would I do if not steal?" Roman laughed dryly. "You faunus, you don't seem to understand much, do you?" Roman went back to his map, trying to figure out what would make the most sense for the day's theft.

"You're a professional criminal." The faunus simply stated. "Surely you can arrange an assassination, or a kidnapping, or something. There has to be someone you want to knock off." Stupid faunus, Roman thought with an irritated look on his face, just because I'm a criminal doesn't mean I can just-

"That's it!" Roman grinned. Now that Cinder was out of town for a few weeks he had the hirelings all to himself. He grinned viciously. "Alright, a few of you are coming with me on a little trip. The rest of you- I want an inventory on how much Dust we've collected so far by the time I get back. We probably won't get any more until Cinder gets back, so it'll save you animals time in the long run. Now..." Roman pointed at the dog faunus, a monkey faunus, and a cat faunus."You three, come with me." Roman began to walk towards the door.

"Um... sir? Where are we going?" The monkey faunus asked him nervously. Roman Torchwick paused by the door, and looked back at the three faunus. He had a mad gleam in his eye, and a smile to match it.

"I pay you not to think, but if you really must know..." He laughed, the mad man inside leaking out from him. The trio of faunus glanced at each other, slightly scared.

"Ruby, if you don't get out of bed, we're leaving without you!" Weiss groaned, trying to shake their leader awake. Personally, she still believed Ruby wasn't fit to be the head of the team, but it wasn't like she needed to tell anyone else that. No, one day Ruby would make a major mistake, and Weiss would be there to take over and show her skills as a leader. It would all be so much easier if the red-head would just disappear, the heiress thought to herself. None the less, for now, she would play the role of the good little team mate. After a few minutes, Ruby had barely stirred. Finally, Weiss gave up and walked out of the dorm room with Yang and Blake. At least there weren't any classes today- it would reflect badly on all of them if their leader didn't show up- or worse, she was late. But, luckily, it was time for the holidays, and team RWBY was one of the many that decided to spend these two weeks together.

It was a week until Christmas, so everyone was setting up some kind of celebration. For instance, Teams RWBY and JNPR were celebrating together with snowball fights, snowmen, hot chocolate- Ren and Yang worked together on that project-, and, finally, Christmas presents. Since it was the holidays, students were allowed to come and go from the school as long as they got permission from a staff member and had another student accompany them. So, everyone went in groups of two. Ren and Nora went together, Jaune and Pyrrha did too. Team RWBY decided that, as a precaution to keep conflict from arising, Ruby would go with Blake, and Yang would go with Weiss. Occasionally that changed, though, because they always had to get a gift for the person they were with. It complicated things, but they worked through it.

A few hours later, it was time for Blake and Ruby to go gift shopping, but Ruby was still nowhere to be seen. Yang was waiting, too, because she had the perfect ideas for presents for Weiss and wanted to tell the others right away. But, as time began to pass, it was becoming obvious Ruby wasn't coming. Yang almost went to get her from the dorm, but Blake stopped her. "I can do this, Yang. Don't worry about it, I can pass along the info." Blake smiled kindly. Yang was kind of clingy to Ruby sometimes, even if she didn't know it. But, once in a while, she had to let up a bit. Blake started walking to their dorms, taking in the view of the snowy world around them as she walked through the halls. When she reached the dorm room, she knocked on the door. "Hey, Ruby?" No reply. She knocked again. "Ruby, it's time to go, come on!" Still no reply. Now Blake was getting worried. She went to open the door- it was locked. Damnit, she thought, where did I put my key?

"Hey, Blake! What's wrong?" Pyrhaa frowned when she walked out of her dorm. "Did you lock yourself out? Jaune always does..." She sighed.

"I can't remember the code for our room, and Ruby isn't responding when I knock..." Blake looks at Pyrhaa hopelessly.

"Hang on, I think Ruby gave Ren the code, I'll ask him." Pyrhaa turned to go back in their room, but suddenly there was a scream from team RWBY's dorm room. Blake banged on the door relentlessly.

"Ruby!" She cried out. It's no use, she thought, I can't get it...

"Move, Blake. I've got this." Suddenly Jaune was there. Blake moved, but Pyrhaa started to speak.

"Ah, Jaune, I don't think that's such a good idea..." She tried to reason with him, but Jaune didn't listen.

"I'm coming Ruby!" He yelled and he ran at the door. He body slammed it... only to fall on the ground, clutching his arm. "...Ow!" Pyrhaa patted his shoulder.

"Let me try, okay?" She smiled kindly before making her own run at the door. This time, it fell into the room. Blake ran in and nearly screamed in horror. Ruby was there, but she was bloody, and she was being carried to the window by...

"Torchwick!" She growled. The criminal jumped slightly at the mention of his name, but he quickly recovered. He smiled and suddenly Blake noticed the two other faunus in the room with them. She knew immediately they were members of the White Fang. Pyrhaa came into the room quickly, and soon the battle had begun. Neither of the girls had their weapon with them- they had both stored them in their lockers- so it was hand-to-hand combat. Torchwick occasionally fired off a shot into the mix to keep the girls on their toes, but for the most part he was talking into the radio in his hand. Blake didn't hear much, but she caught the words "package" and "retrieval." She knew that, if she was going to save Ruby, she had to get to Torchwick, and fast. With this thought now preoccupying her brain, she didn't notice the fist coming towards the side of her face. In a matter of moments, both her and Pyrhaa had been taken out and were sitting on the floor, their energy exhausted. Both the faunus climbed out the window, quickly disappearing from sight.

Roman looked at the two girls, smirking, and then his gaze settled on Blake. "Hate to fight and run, but I've got an appointment with Red here, so I'm afraid this is where we part ways." He sat with his legs dangling from the window, still holding Ruby close. Before he slid out, he called back, chuckling. "Ta-ta, kitty cat!"

Jaune crawled into the room, his body still aching all over. He looked the window, and then at the girls. They all just sat there for a second, then he finally spoke the question on each of their minds. "What the hell just happened?!"