Three unconscious, tied, blindfolded, bound, and gagged guards were illuminated by the torch's harsh glow while it bit into the heavy steel vault door. Mercury held the torch steady with Ruby looking over his shoulder to ensure he had the torch focused on just the right part of the door. Yang and Weiss stood guard near the entrance with alert eyes for any activity that appeared of the scope of normal.

Weiss checked her pocket watch, "10 minutes." She called out, it would take approximately 8 minutes to make it from this bank to the commercial bank. There, the rest of the Autumn Gang members should arrive promptly at the same time. Weiss Snow had no doubt that Roman, Cinder, Emerald, and Neo would have no problem keeping a schedule, especially since Roman was a bit of a perfectionist with his work.

A loud groan echoed through the relatively empty bank space, Weiss smirked to herself because the youngest member within the gang had outdone herself yet again with the pinpoint accuracy of her timing and accuracy. Within Ruby's mind was probably the blueprint of every bank vault ever made and a matching schematic that highlighted how to break into it.

Yang nodded and grabbed the empty bags to throw the money into, Weiss followed the blond into the vault. "Yang, further back, the bigger bills are kept in those compartments." Weiss called out before Yang could start reaching for the nearby stacks on shelf.

"Got it." Without missing a beat, she tore open a compartment and began dumping them into the bag. The bags they used for all their heists were old G.I. bags, when stuffed to the brim G.I. duffels all maintained a consistently neat shape that allowed them to pack their cars appropriately.

Simultaneously, Ruby and Mercury carried the torch out to one of the two modified Valesian-make Buick Specials that were parked in the alley by the bank. They grabbed a few more empty bags and briskly walked back into the bank. Half way back to the vault, they were met by Yang and Weiss both carrying two duffels a piece, the four made a neat exchange and then Ruby and Mercury were back to packing the cars with Yang and Weiss clearing out the vault.

Ruby pulls out her pocket watch, "Two minutes, how much is left?"

"We got everything, a little lighter than we anticipated." Yang handed over three empty duffel bags to Ruby, Mercury grabbed the last duffel from Weiss and loaded it into the Buick.

"Sixty seconds." Mercury called out, Yang shut the alley way door and hopped into the driver seat of one vehicle with Weiss has her passenger. Ruby jumped into the driver side with Mercury and started up her engine. Yang looked down at her pocket watch, lilac eyes concentrated on the second hand of the watch.

Tick. Tick. Tick.

She put the watch away and looked up in time to see the tail lights in front of her begin to move. All she had to do was follow Ruby to the next location. Ruby's vehicle had all the money from the previous bank stuffed in there along with the torch, what made these Buicks special was the amount of work she, Yang, and Mercury had poured into modifying the engines and the fact that they had the back seats removed. These vehicles were painted a dark blue and they usually kept them undercover at the junkyard that the Autumn Gang managed underneath the sister's names.

"This has got to be the most ambitious bank job we've pulled." Yang muttered into the rather tense atmosphere, she estimated that about forty-thousand lien was stuffed into these bags from just their bank alone.

"Just remember to go for the shiny bars in this one." Weiss shot a sidelong smile to her partner.

Like clockwork, two more Buicks pulled behind Yang and the four cars stopped alongside the backside of the Schnee Holdings Bank.

Eight people gathered in a circle, Cinder held out her own watch, "After the first shot we've got three minutes to pop the door and then five minutes to get what we can."

This particular bank was located much closer to prefecture's main police department, Ruby and Roman both agreed that there was no way they could give a guarantee that they would not get detected like during the previous banks. The plan was built around the assumption that the police would be tipped off as soon as they open fired at the armed security guards.

"Hey, what are you-" The armed guard that opened up back entrance to investigate the noise was silenced by a piece of lead entering his throat, Neo's quiet .22 Ruger pistol was tucked back into her waistband. From the car she rode in she pulled out a shotgun and began following Roman into the building.

Roman stepped over the body while Yang and Weiss dragged the dying man away from the door. Cinder, Emerald, Ruby, and Mercury began the work of carrying in the torches.

"Cin, go with Weiss, I'll help Em." Yang quickly grabbed the other end of the torch from the leader.

"Right." Cinder wasn't going to argue, it would be faster if Yang helped out with the heavy lifting.

Weiss held out a similar Winchester shotgun to Cinder, "I think you're better with this than me." Everyone knew Weiss was better shot with her pistol.

As Cinder took a step inside, two shots rang out, and then a blast from the Winchester shotgun that Neo carried earlier.

The sound of an Atlesian Walther Volkpistole echoed next Cinder, the Autumn Gang leader looked over to see Weiss standing over the body of an armed guard that tried to outflank them. A shuffle in front of them had Cinder automatically shoot towards the sound. A groan confirmed the presence of another guard that hit the floor.

"Clear!" Roman called out.

Cinder lead the way through their half of the bank, Weiss followed behind with her pistol raised, "Bring them in!"

The torches were quickly hauled in to the vault door.

"Time!" Ruby called out, Mercury and Emerald got the torches going.

"Two minutes and ten seconds!" Roman shouted over the sounds of the two torches.

Yang and Weiss took position near the front windows that looked over the cross streets.

Roman and Cinder made their way to the cars to grab duffels and empty luggage. The luggage was meant for the gold bars that were supposed to be inside, the duffels were for the off chance there wasn't any gold and the gang would have to settle for the cash instead.

"Thirty seconds." Roman huffed out.

Ruby grunted as she continued working, she swapped out with Emerald to try cracking open the vault.

Still nothing.

"Fuck it, Plan B!" Ruby called out, from her suit jacket she pulled out 4 sticks of dynamite and wedged into the gap of the vault made by torches.

"C-Cover!" Roman went wide eyed once he noticed the youngest member lit the sticks without calling it out.

Mercury and Emerald dover over the bank teller counter with the rest of the gang, Ruby opted to kick over a desk and took cover a considerable distance closer to the blast.

"R-Ruby you fucking dunce!" Weiss almost stood up to yell at her, but a sharp yank at her collar from Mercury kept her down.

Just in time for a deafening blast to rock the bank floor.

"It's open!" Ruby began pulling open the door, Yang grabbed a hold and began inching it back fast with her sister.

"That was reckless." Weiss chastised with an empty luggage in hand, she paused as she took stock of the layout, "Back left corner, check the compartments." Cinder and Roman nodded.

Mercury, Yang, Emerald, and Ruby went to work loading the torches into a single vehicle. Ruby had done the math ahead of time for the weight consideration of each vehicle.

"Time!" Ruby called out as she led the four back into the bank.

"Three minutes" Roman called out; Cinder came out dragging a hefty luggage with Weiss right behind her lugging a similar piece of luggage.

"Just these two, the rest are bills." Cinder commented.

"We can go for the personal deposit boxes. Might be some jewels." Weiss suggested, they had one more empty luggage they could make use of.

"It'll take too long, cash only." Ruby replied as she grabbed the luggage.

"Cops!" Neo's voice, which was usually a soft and even tone, called out. The lights came splashing through the front windows of the bank.

"We're going!" Cinder ordered.

"Ruby, go with Cinder. Em, stay with me." Mercury yelled out as he made a mad dash to one of the vehicles.

"Break!" Roman called out, he sat in the passenger side with Neo on the wheel.

Yang revved up her Buick with Weiss in the passenger and peeled off.

Cinder barely had her door closed once Ruby floored the vehicle, and behind her she could hear Mercury's tires screech around a corner behind them. They were taking different routes to get out of the city and to the rendezvous at Sumire Sunset Inn, a place thirty minutes outside of Vale.

Ruby barely turned her corner when she saw the headlights that belonged to two Valesian patrol vehicles. Cinder felt her body jerk around with Ruby abruptly stopping and throwing the car into reverse. A bullet came whizzing threw the window shield.

Cinder Fall pointed the shotgun out the window and fire indiscriminately towards the vehicles, a broken headlight could be seen in front of them but it didn't slow the patrol cars.

"Shit." Cinder seethed, she pulled out her pistol and leaned out the window to take better aim. More bullets hailed onto them with Ruby wildly driving in reverse. Two shots rang out from her pistol, and the lead patrol vehicle swerved into the curb.

"Get back in." Ruby called out, as soon as Cinder was back in the car, Ruby stomped on the pedals and the Buick whipped into an intersection. Once Ruby had her front end situated, she slammed the transmission into first and quickly began working her way through the gears. A bullet pierced through the back window, nicking one of the luggage filled with gold.

Cinder took to reloading the shotgun, she turned and pointed the barrel at the back window. "Get me close." She requested.

Ruby stomped on the breaks, Cinder jerked ever so slightly, but she kept the barrel poised. Once she caught sight of the uniformed officer's face, she pulled the trigger.

The rear window shattered and Ruby put the car back into high gear.

The patrol vehicle veered off the road and simply sat there with a broken headlight.

Cinder watched as they made their way to the city limits of Vale, she was confused when they drove off the road.

"We still have another 20 minutes until Sumire." Cinder looked over.

"You gotta drive." Ruby cradled her right shoulder; beneath her black coat the dark material of her shirt was wet.

Cinder leaned over and quickly ripped open the buttons of Ruby's shirt.

"Shit, Red." Cinder saw two holes in her shoulder, she quickly removed enough of the material to see the other side of her shoulder. There was only one exit wound. "We gotta go back to Glass City, fast."

Ruby grunted as she moved out of the driver side with much difficulty, she stumbled forward on to the front fender of the Buick.

"Ruby!" Cinder ran out and leaned over the girl, she helped take off Ruby's coat and then her ruined button up. With the bloodied shirt, Cinder did her best to dress the wound and try to maintain some pressure.

"We… gotta move…" Ruby sighed out, she powered through the pain while Cinder drug her to the passenger side.

"Stay awake." Cinder commanded with a steely tone; the car jerked into first.

"Okay." Ruby strained.

Cinder began speaking out loud to keep Ruby focused, "We need to lighten up one of these cars, tell me which one and how."

Ruby grunted, but she began processing the request. She babbled out what she thought should happen in the most coherent way she could manage. The world seemed subdued in a way and her head was a little light.

Cinder responded the best should, but once they arrived at the Sumire Sunset Inn, Ruby was babbling and the words didn't make sense.

The other three vehicles were already parked and presumably gassed up; the other members of the Autumn Gang were laughing at something that Yang said.

But those lilac eyes flashed to red once she saw Cinder stumble out of the driver side and the passenger side door opened up to a pale faced and sweaty Ruby Rose.

"Why didn't you let me go with her?" Yang raged in the passenger seat, the bloodied vehicle that was riddled with bullets was being driven behind them by Neo and Roman. Weiss sat in the passenger side with Emerald in the third vehicle.

The past few hours on the road had consisted of Yang going into a cycle of hateful comments and long tense silences.

"Because you would have gotten pulled over with twenty grand in the back." Cinder growled out, it was settled that Yang would ride with gang leader – Cinder was one of the few that could stand toe to toe with Yang's outburst.

"Why did you let that happen to her? You were supposed to be look out!" Yang leaned over to get in her face.

Cinder wasn't having any of this, she whipped out her pistol and smacked Yang in the cheek, Yang seethed and prepared to take out her 1911, but the click of a hammer being cocked back next to her right hand stopped her.

"You need to calm the fuck down." Cinder kept a hand on the steering wheel while her other held his weapon steady, "We're an hour away from Glass City, so if I shoot you in the hand, we can probably save it at the place Ruby should be at by now."

Yang twitched, but she sat back, she learned early on to never take any of Cinder's threats lightly. The pistol was placed back into its holder and Cinder took hold of the wheel with both hands.

"We didn't expect back up to be so close and we didn't exactly have the room to maneuver around." Cinder explained, "We drove half a mile in reverse right in front of those pigs, of course we were an easy target, but your sister kept her cool and got us out of there."

She flicked her eyes over at the blond while she sulked.

"She'll be fine, Weiss and Neo patched her up pretty well for the trip back, she seemed stable when Merc took off." Ruby had passed out cold, but bleeding out had stopped and she was still breathing. Once the car was light enough, Mercury had taken off in a mad rush, with his driving skill, Cinder had no doubt he'd make it in time to the doctor at Glass City.

Yang stared out the window, "First time back to Vale and this goes down…"

"We're not going back there - to Vale." Cinder shrugged, "I haven't been back there since Ro and I picked you two up."

Yang nodded and continued staring out the window.

"I lost my father to the Black Plague too." Cinder stared out at the road, Yang merely looked over at the woman, "Then my mother took over the Grimm Pack."

"Is that why you left your family?"

The sound of the engine's purr over the highway filled the space between the two, "Part of it."

"What's the other part?"

"Don't tell anyone this, not even Roman knows."

"I got the hots for the White Fang's daughter, Blake." Yang spilled out, "Ruby doesn't even know that, but Mercury's got an idea."

Cinder smirked, "That's an interesting take there." She looked over at the blond, "What else you got?"

Yang laughed lightly, "Not much else."

"As it should be." Cinder chuckled.

The air between the two was suddenly much easier to breathe.

"Something else that has to do with my mother."

Yang listened intently to Cinder; this was likely the first time the Autumn Gang leader had confided into someone else about the matter at hand.

A/N

Been a while guys.

To sum it up, my old computer broke and all the research and work I did went down with it. Then life happens and I ended up in hiatus for a while.

With all the craziness going on, I find myself with some time to revisit old stories and start working on them again.

So, welcome back to Public Enemies. I hope you enjoyed this update.

-DevilRed