Before Their Time Chapter 1: Consequences

Ruby sat alone on the edge of her bunk, slowly turning the picture over and over in her hands. She felt like the two girls staring back at her from the frame were strangers, barely recognizable shadows a distant past. The picture was her and Yang, the day Yang had taken her out to train her in hand-to-hand combat. The day Yang had saved her from an ursa. It showed a battered and bruised Yang being helped up the path to the house, leaning heavily on Ruby's shoulder, all the while protesting that she was "Perfectly fine, and definitely not needing my little sister's help." That had been three weeks before "The Incident". Three weeks before Ruby's life had been irrevocably turned upside down.

A knock on team RWBD's door jerked her out of her reverie.
"Ruby," Dove Bronzewing's muffled voice came from the other side. "Ruby, a man is out here, he says you're expecting him."

Ruby knew who it was, and Dove was right, she had been expecting, or rather, dreading, his arrival for an hour. The door cracked open, and a familiar face under a shock of unruly black hair peaked in.

"Hey kiddo. It's now or never." It would have to be now, then, Ruby thought.

She shoved the picture back under her pillow, stood, and walked resolutely to the door. Qrow pushed it open, and Ruby walked under his arm and into the hallway. Blake and Dove stood a respectful distance away. Ruby glanced their way, and nodded gratefully at them. Weiss's absence did not surprise her. Between her three teammates, she had taken Ruby's secret the worst. Blake had been sympathetic, understanding. She said she knew what it was like. Dove had been professional about it all, assuring Ruby that he didn't blame her for any of it. Weiss had been... distant. Not outwardly judgemental, but cautiously neutral. Besides them and the teachers, nobody else in Beacon had any idea that Ruby Rose, respected team leader and model student, was the sister of Yang Xiao-Long, the infamous convicted murderer.

"Yang? What are you doing here?"

"Oh, it's a long story"

When the windows of The Club had exploded into the street, and Yang and some man had crashed down at Ruby's feet, she had assumed, of course, that Yang had heroically defeated some dastardly criminal enterprise. When the Vale Police Department swarmed the area, looking for a blonde huntress, Ruby had helped Yang try to evade detection. Four blocks from the wreckage of the club, when VPD officers had spotted them, and Yang was arrested, Ruby had been outraged. A gross misunderstanding! After all, they were huntresses. Heros. Starting Beacon in less than two weeks. Ruby left the police station with her father, promising Yang that she would return to pick her up in the morning.

But the morning came, and with it came a sobering reality. Yang was accused of assaulting Junior, the owner of The Club, without provocation, destroying the interior of the building, and viciously beating the entire security staff. Junior would live, though his injuries were severe. His security was not so lucky. Without the benefit of aura, three of them had died under Yang's crushing blows. Another clung to life in the Vale General ICU. One man would never walk again. Yang faced three counts of homicide, fifteen counts of aggravated assault, and one count of malicious destruction of property.

"You should know that she doesn't want you to come." Qrow finally spoke, breaking the silence that had lain thick between them as they walked through Beacon and out to the Bullhead pads. Ruby kicked at a pebble, and watched as it bounced across the concrete.

"I know," she replied quietly, studying the laces of her shoes. "But," she continued more earnestly, looking up into Qrow's face, "I'm going anyway. I'll regret it forever if I don't."

Qrow only grunted in response, and took a pull from his ever-present flask. He opened the hatch of an idling Bullhead, and motioned Ruby to climb in. Qrow followed her into the passenger compartment, and as she took her seat, he rapped on the door to the cockpit. "Private flight," he guestured at the empty seats around them. "Called in a favor from a pilot I saved out of a crash in the Grimmlands a year ago."

Ruby said nothing. She flopped into the nearest seat, mechanically fastened the restraint harness, and stared out the window as the Bullhead rose, and Beacon fell away in the distance.

"But dad, she can't just... I mean... there has to be a good explanation! She can't, she wouldn't, just... DO that!" Ruby paced the floor of the kitchen, nearly hysterical with anger and worry and confusion. "They must have attacked her, must have faked the video! We have to do something!"

"Ruby. Sit." Tai sat at the table, his head resting on one hand and an open letter in the other. The letter was from Yang, drafted by her lawyer and signed in her own unmistakable scrawl. In it, Yang admitted to everything she was charged with, telling her father and sister that she intended to plead guilty to the charges to spare the family the humiliation of a drawn-out trial. She said Junior's security cameras had the entire incident on tape, and she had no hope beating the charges. As if this wasn't bad enough, Yang begged Ruby to stay away from any hearings, pointing out that she would be starting Beacon soon and that association with a convicted killer would be a poor way to start in a new school.

Ruby flopped into a chair opposite her father, her emotional energy spent. Tai reached across the table, and took one of her hands. "Ruby, sometimes people we love do things we can't understand. I had to learn this lesson with Yang's mother. Raven was dangerous, and a criminal. I loved her anyway. I ignored what she was and what she had done hoping she had changed, but in the end, she chose her old ways over me, and over her daughter. I don't hate her for it, but we have to accept the facts of life as they come before us no matter how hard it might be. You chose to be a Huntress. In our line of work, hard choices and unhappy endings are more common than glorious victories."

"But Yang isn't dangerous, or a criminal. She's... my sister." Ruby's voice was barely above a whisper.

"I know, Ruby, I know." Tai stood, rounded the table, and hugged his youngest daughter.

"What can I do now?" Ruby questioned.

Tai sighed. "You can love her, Ruby. It's all you can do now."

Ruby did more than that. In the following days, she bombarded Vale's justice system with a solo letter-writing campaign. Politicians, lawyers, police officers, judges, all received earnest handwritten letters from Ruby Rose begging for clemency at Yang's sentencing, and detailing all the good that Yang could do as a Huntress. Tai was quietly supportive, giving Ruby a shoulder to cry on and carrying her too bed when she fell asleep at the table, pen still clutched in her hand. Qrow was there for her too, when he wasn't drunk at least.

The news media was relentless. "Huntress Brutally Murders Three in Club Brawl!" Headline after headline shrieked Yang's guilt, and well-dressed pundits with slicked-back hair pontificated about the relations between hunters and the general population. Inevitably, somebody linked Yang to Tai and Ruby. When Lisa Lavender dropped by unannounced, asking for an interview, Tai decided Ruby should move to Vale with Qrow so no reporter could corner her on the street in Patch.

The next two weeks passed in a miserable blur. The day came for Ruby to start Beacon, but what should have been the greatest moment of her life had turned to ash in her hands, and her feet drug as she boarded the airship that was to take her to Beacon. She met Wiess Schnee, then Blake Belladonna and Dove Bronezwing. They got along well enough, but Ruby never breathed a word about Yang. The letters continued, written covertly and smuggled into mailboxes outside of Beacon. Yang's case was well known in the hunter community. The students of Beacon referred to her with sneers and contempt, as if anxious to prove to themselves and each other that they were different from "Her". Ruby did her best to ignore it, trying to bury herself in her school work and combat training. She would show them. Eventually, they would see. They all would see.

"Entering Vale airspace. Arrival at Vale Max Security in three minutes." Qrow's pilot alerted them with the cabin intercom as the Bullhead soared over the city.
Ruby turned to Qrow and spoke for the first time since they had left Beacon. "Will dad be there?"

"No. Yang wrote him another letter, asking both of you to stay away. She said it would be better for you, and for her. Most of what she wrote is for you, but she said not to give it to you 'til... after. She cares a lot about you Ruby, more then you realize. All she wants is for you to succeed. Do what she can't."

Ruby swallowed hard. "I want to see her."

Qrow ran his hand back thru his hair. "They'll let you, for a few minutes at least. I can't say if it's a good idea or not, but I won't stop you. Any idea what you're going to say?"

Ruby shrugged miserably. "No," she admitted. "What would you say?"

Qrow leaned over, and placed his hand on Ruby's knee. "Kiddo, I can't pretend it to know what it's like to be in the position you're in. I can't tell you what to say. Best as I see it, you should say what you would want to hear if you were her, and she was you. Make sense?"

Ruby nodded, not trusting her voice. She dropped her hand on Qrow's, and turned to look back out the window.

Ruby scooped up her book bag, loaded with her latest volley of clemency appeals addressed to anybody who she thought might have an ounce of pull with the Vale Justice Commission. She glanced around her dorm. Wiess, of course, sat at her desk, studying for an exam so far away nobody else had even bothered to take notes for it yet. Blake lay in her bunk, reading one of those books that she closed whenever anybody else got too near.

"I'm going out for a bit," Ruby announced cheerfully. "Headed into town, going to pick up some parts I ordered for Crescent Rose." Another excuse, one of many reasons she'd fabricated to explain her frequent trips into Vale to deposit her letters.

"Have fun," Blake replied distractedly, never looking away from her book.

Weiss turned in her chair. "Why don't you get your supplies delivered directly to Beacon like the rest of us? You're always going into Vale for one thing or another."

"Oh, I just have my favorite weapons shop and the owner there is always nice to me so I always get my things from him," Ruby explained lightly. This part of the story, at least, was completely accurate.

Weiss turned back to her book with a wave of her hand. "Do whatever you like, just don't forget your homework for Oobleck's class tomorrow."

Ruby started for the door, but had only made it halfway when the door was opened from the hallway, and Dove walked in holding a copy of Huntsmen Weekly. "Hey guys," he said, closing the door behind him and waving the magazine, "Check this out. Breaking news from this morning, that Xiao-Long girl that killed those guys in the bar fight got the death sentence. Guess the teachers weren't kidding when they said the justice system comes down hard on hunters who hurt civilians."

He tossed the magazine on the desk beside Weiss, the blaring headline "Huntress Sentenced to Die for Triple Homicide" upturned for all to see.

Ruby froze. Her entire body seemed to have turned to ice. She barely registered Wiess saying, "Serves her right, her actions were barbaric and unprovoked. She's no better than a common criminal, maybe worse."

"No." Ruby's voice was a strangled whisper. "Oh, no. No no no no no. Not Yang." Her voice rose to a near scream. "No! I won't let them!"

Ignoring the shock of her teammates, Ruby exploded towards the door in a shower of rose petals. As she tore the door open, she heard the window of the dorm room shatter. A huge crow shot past Blake, and to everybody's amazement, shape-shifted into a man in a blur of motion. The black-haired newcomer grabbed Ruby as she sprinted from the room, and drug her back inside.

"Hey!" Wiess demanded, "Just what do you think you are doing?"

Weiss, Blake, and Dove lept to confront the intruder and his apparent kidnapping attempt. Ruby was frantically running and twisting and clawing, trying to escape his iron grip.

"Stand down, all of you!" The man shouted. "I'm Ruby's uncle, I'm here to help!"

Myrtlemyster hovered a foot from Qrow's nose. "You're what?" Wiess demanded, but nobody was paying attention to her anymore. Ruby was hysterical, sobbing and babbling.

Dove stared in confusion. "Was it something I said?"

Qrow pulled Ruby into a hug, calming her and muffling her sobs against his chest. Blake walked past Weiss, pushing the tip of her rapier down with one hand. "The girl in the news. Ruby knows her."

Qrow scooped Ruby up, and sat down on the nearest bunk bed with the crying girl in his lap. "Yeah. You could say that. It's her sister."

Weiss's mouth opened and closed several times, but words failed to form. Blake turned away, terrible memories of her own secrets flooding into her mind. Dove rubbed his hands awkwardly. "Oh boy. This, this is going to be complicated."

"We have to stop them!" Ruby sobbed. "We can't let them kill Yang!"

Qrow looked up at Ruby's teammates. "Out. Wait in the hall, go jogging, read Blake's books together, I don't care, just go be somewhere else. And if any of you breathe a word about this to anybody else, I promise you, I will feed you to a deathstalker." He didn't have to tell them twice. Wiess, Dove and Blake practically ran from the room.

Once they were alone, Qrow turned his attention to Ruby. "I need you to listen to me Ruby, and listen well."

"Ok," she sniffed.

"This isn't going to be easy for you to accept, and I would give anything for it not to be this way, but events have overtaken us. Believe me, I know what it's like to have a sister do things you can't justify. I wish I could shield you from this, but I can't. Yang is guilty of what she is accused of, the witnesses, the evidence, even her own testimony, it all condemns her. I looked at it myself. Broke into the crime scene the night after. It's exactly like they say. She walked into The Club, started a fight for no apparent reason, and killed three men. She's guilty."

"I know," Ruby said miserably. "But... a death sentence?" The words seemed to stick in her mouth as she looked imploringly into Qrow's face.

"Ruby, you know that the Vale Justice Commission takes a very hard line against Hunters that commit crimes against civilians. We're stronger, faster, combat trained. We swear to defend life and the law. Rouge huntsmen are second only to grimm as a threat to law and order. There's a new Attorney General, a man named Arthur Watts, and he insisted on the maximum penalty to set an example."

"But she can appeal, can't she?" Ruby asked hopefully.

Qrow nodded. "She can, and I'm certain her attorney will. But Ruby, don't expect her sentence to be commuted. It would be cruel and wrong of me to give you hope in that situation."

Ruby buried her face in Qrow's shoulder and cried. Qrow held her close, silently cursing whatever ill fates had led to this day. In the back of his mind, he knew this scene had played out in homes around Vale, when word had reached wives and children that their husband and father had been killed in a senseless brawl. There had to be a reckoning for that, Qrow knew it. But this? Was this what justice looked like?

A board creaked in the hall.

"Ok, I know you're there. Get back in here," Qrow called to the door.

Nothing. Qrow lost his temper.

Setting Ruby on the bed, he crossed the room in two long steps and threw the door open. He seized the arm of the figure outside the door, and jerked them into the room. Headmaster Ozpin caught himself on the corner of the table, and turned to face Qrow.

"Qrow. Why am I not surprised to find if you got here ahead of me?"

"You really need to be here, Oz? We're kind of having a moment."

"I do apologize for my inopportune arrival, but I was unaware that you had already beaten me here. I came straight here once I heard the... news."

Ruby slid from the bed, and came alongside her uncle. "Please, Headmaster, can't you do something to help Yang?"

Ozpin sighed. "I'm sorry Ruby, but Yang Xiao-Long wasn't ever officially a Beacon student. That limits whatever influence I may have had. That said, I will write a personal letter asking for her sentence to be commuted to life servitude in the Grimmlands Expeditionary Unit."

Qrow spat. "You and I both know that that's a death sentence by a different name."

"Please, Uncle Qrow, it's better than nothing." Ruby turned her wide silver eyes to Headmaster Ozpin. "Thank you. Now, I think I need to talk to my team."

"Professor Goodwitch has them in her office. We met them in the hallway, and decided it was best to keep an eye on them until we had a chance to talk to all of you together. I understand completely if you don't want the student body to be aware of your relationship to Yang Xiao-Long. Rest assured that none of the staff will reveal anything."

"Thank you. Uncle Qrow, please stay. I would like to talk to you more after I see Weiss, Dove, and Blake."

"Sure, kiddo. Whatever you need."

Ruby nodded gratefully, let herself out the door, and walked away in the direction of Glynda Goodwitch's office. After she left, Qrow turned to Ozpin. "Poor kid. I don't know what's worse, making her think there's a chance or telling her the truth." He took a swig from his flask. "Whole business is rotten."

Ozpin nodded. "A real shame. Yang Xiao-Long was one of the finest Huntress candidates I've seen in recent years. Unfortunately, this isn't the first time I've seen something like this happen, and it probably won't be the last. I'll write the letter for Ruby, but from what I know of Attorney General Watts, it's unlikely I'll be able to sway his opinion."

"This is as far as I'm going," Qrow said, crossing his arms and leaning against the unpainted the concrete wall. Twenty feet ahead of them, a series of heavy sliding gates barred the way into the maximum security wing. Three guards waited for them to approach.

"Can't you come with me?" Ruby's voice betrayed her grief and nervousness.

"Kiddo, it's best if I don't. This is something you need to do yourself, and besides, I tend to be bad luck in these kinds of situations."

Her uncle was right, Ruby decided. This one was on her. "Thanks for bringing me," she whispered. Then, gathering herself, she marched with all of the confidence she could fake up to the two guards on her side of the gate. "R-Ruby Rose, here to see Yang Xiao-Long."

"Identification, please." The guard held out his hand toward Ruby, and for a moment she thought she saw a hint of compassion on his face. She produced her Vale Identification Card, as well as her Beacon ID badge. The man took them, glanced them over, and gave them back. "We've been expecting you, this way."

The second guard flipped a switch, and the first gate slid open. Ruby followed the man through the gate. As it closed behind her with a metallic clang, she briefly wondered what the guard had meant about expecting her. Maybe Qrow had guessed what she would want and called ahead.

"Arms." The guard turned to her with a metal detector wand in his hand.

"Huh?"

He prodded her elbow with his wand. "Raise your arms, shoulder height."

Ruby complied without complaint, holding her arms out flat as the guard ran his wand up and down over her body. The metal detector gave off a piercing whistle as it passed over her waist.

Ruby shuffled her feet nervously. "Oh, that's probably just my Scroll."

"Sorry, Miss, there's no communication devices allowed beyond this point. You'll have to leave here."

"But I can't!" Ruby protested. "I..I.." Her voice failed her.

"Miss Rose, the guidelines are clear. Absolutely no communication devices in the maximum-security wing. I cannot allow you to proceed unless you give me your Scroll."

Ruby's composure broke. "I was going to take a picture!" She sobbed, looking pleadingly at the guard. "She's my sister, and I'm never going to see her again. Please, you have to let me keep my Scroll!"

The guard opened his mouth to argue, then closed it, and looked furtively back and forth. He had signed up to contain Vale's most violent criminals, not to break the hearts of sobbing little girls. "Ok. This is against my better judgment, but I'll let you keep it. Understand, I'm taking a very real risk to my job by letting you do this. Whatever you do, don't get caught."

"Thank you," Ruby sniffed. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean too..."

"It's ok," the guard assured her. He stepped to an intercom panel on the wall, and pushed a button. "Watkins. We're all clear in here. Open gate number two."

The second gate slid open with a clatter of gears, and the guard motioned for Ruby to follow. He led her out into a grim looking concrete-walled corridor, lit by dirty light fixtures. Heavy metal doors lined both walls, each leading into a max security cell block. Ruby stayed close on her escort's heels, feeling small and alone in this strange, unforgiving environment. Two-thirds of the way down the corridor, the guard stopped. He punched in a combination on the keypad of one of the doors, and it unlocked with a loud click. The door swung inwards, and Ruby followed him through it. She found herself facing another massive steel door.

"Wait here." The guard said without further explanation. He let himself through the second the door, and locked it behind him.

Ruby suddenly felt very much like a prisoner herself, trapped between two locked armored doors, in a small, cold room. She wrapped her arms around herself, wondering miserably what Yang had thought when she had been thrown into a place like this. Had she found a way to make this environment liveable? Maybe she had made a friend. Maybe she worked out all the time. Ruby had seen an old prison movie once, and it seemed like everyone spent all their free time doing push-ups. Maybe... Wait. None of that mattered now, did it? Ruby laughed bitterly to herself. It was funny how all the things that seemed important in life lost their meaning when life itself was drawing to a close.

Ruby's thoughts were interrupted by the second door loudly unlocking again, and swinging open. She was expecting her garden, but instead three people interred the small room, suddenly making the space seem crowded. The two newcomers were another prison guard, and a short man in a black suit. An ornate white necklace hung about his collarbone, and he wore a small red cap. He nodded to Ruby as he passed.

"Miss Rose, this way." Ruby's guard called for her to enter the cell block. Gathering herself, she walked through the door with as much boldness as she could muster. As she walked between the rows of cells, she glanced to her right. A wolf faunus stared straight into her eyes through the thick glass window of his cell door. The man bared his teeth, revealing long canine fangs. His eyes were absolutely devoid of emotion, and Ruby felt as if she was staring into two deep pits of black ice water. Something about the man chilled her to her bones. She snapped her head back forward, and studiously avoided looking at any of the other cells as she followed the guard. He stopped in front of a door, and pressed the button on a speaker.

"Inmate 1665, place your wrists in the cell restraint device." A few seconds passed. "I am opening the door."

The cell door slid open at the flip of a switch, and of the prison guard stepped into the doorway. "You have another visitor."

"Ok." Ruby heard Yang's voice from in the cell, and her pulse quickened. The guard nodded at Ruby, and she stepped forward into the door.

Her breath caught in her throat. Gone was the vibrant, energetic huntress Ruby had know. Before her, with her wrists shackled to a pedestal in the middle of the cell, stood a dull, defeated shell of a woman. Worst of all, Yang's prized hair was now cut short, barely hanging past her jaw.

Ruby felt sick.

As the guard turned to leave, Ruby caught his arm. "Please, does she have to stay in... that?" Ruby nodded towards the restraint pedestal.

"Unless I stay with you, yes. I'm not bending the rules on this one, Miss. Like it or not, she's a dangerous criminal and I refuse to risk your safety and my job. You have a half an hour, at most." Without another word, he stepped out of the cell, and the door slid shut. Ruby turned to Yang.

"Ha. I should have known you wouldn't stay away," Yang commented in monotone without raising her eyes from the floor.

In a shower of rose petals, Ruby shot across the narrow cell and hugged Yang with enough force to throw her back against her restraints. "Oh, Yang, I'm so sorry! I wrote letters and I talked to Professor Ozpin and did everything I could think of and... and... I tried Yang, I really did! You've gotta believe me!"

"Ruby. Stop." Yang shifted her weight, pushing the smaller girl away from her.

"But Yang, I thought you would be happy that I never gave up on you." Ruby felt hot tears well up in her eyes.

"Don't you get it?" Yang snapped, jerking her head up and looking at Ruby for the first time. "You should have given up! I did! You should have been honest enough, enough of an adult, enough of a huntress, to accept that what I did was inexcusable, and I deserved whatever punishment they sentenced me to." Yang dropped her head again, as tears spilled from both girls' eyes. "I'm a monster."

"I don't care!" Ruby shouted, stamping her foot for emphasis. "You're still my sister, and that counts for something."

Yang shrugged. "If you say so. Please tell me dad isn't waiting out there somewhere."

"He's not," Ruby assured her. "Uncle Qrow brought me."

"Figures. Apparently he sent the priest that left just before you got here."

"I met a priest on my way here, I didn't think he was here to see you. You never seemed to care too much about that stuff before."

Yang laughed bitterly. "Maybe I should have."

Ruby shuffled her feet. "So... did it help?"

Yang looked up. "I think so. I guess I'll find out here soon enough. I know I did some bad things, but he said because I admit it, and I'm sorry for it, I can be forgiven for it."

"I forgive you, Yang," Ruby said earnestly. "And I'm sure that whatever comes after this, you'll... you'll find forgiveness there to." Ruby could barely finish through her tears.

"Now there Ruby, enough crying." Yang's voice changed, some of the old life sneaking back into it. "Tell me all about Beacon."

"Oh, it's alright. I'm the leader of team RWBD. My partner is a girl named Weiss Schnee, yes, the SDC heiress. Blake Belladonna and boy named Dove Bronzewing are the other two members. We all get along okay. It didn't start that way though. The first time I met Wiess, we almost exploded."

"You...what?"

"It was an accident!" Ruby launched into her story of meeting Weiss, and initiation, and all the things that went on in school. Yang listened, glad for the distraction and feeling more alive than she had in months. Ruby rattled on, talking about classes and teachers and her team. Abruptly, she stopped, faced Yang, and asked, "Why did you do it?"

Yang sighed. "I've been asking myself that question ever since. I'd like to say I felt threatened, or they tried to kidnap me, or something, but I can't. The truth is, Junior made me angry and I started the fight because I wanted to. After that, well, I guess it all just got carried away. I'm sorry, I know you deserve a better explanation than that."

Ruby turned away, her mind in a turmoil. She wanted to be angry, to scream at Yang, to demand she give a reason for the pain Ruby was in. She wanted to cry, to mourn the lost potential, snuffed out by a moment's loss of control. Ruby bit her lip until she tasted blood.

"Look, Ruby," Yang continued, "I know how much damage I've caused. I took innocent lives, left families grieving, broke your and dad's hearts, and I can't even say why. But if you'll listen, there is one thing I want to tell you."

"Miss Rose. Two minutes." The guards voice came through the speaker by the door.

Ruby spun around, a panicked light in her eye. "It's not too late, Yang! I could overpower the guard, take his keys. We can get you out of here. You could run away, go to Vaccuo maybe. We could..."

"Ruby!" Yang's voice was surprising sharp. "Stop it. Even if that was possible, I wouldn't let you ruin your life to save me from punishment I deserve. Now come here, and listen."

The truth of Yang's words cut through Ruby's panic. Deflated, she crossed the cell to Yang. Slipping under the taller girls arms, she stood up between Yang and the restraint pedestal and hugged her with all the strength in her body.

"That's better." Yang inhaled deeply, smelling Ruby's hair. "Ahhh. I remember you hugging me like this when you were little. You would always say you were going to be a huntress, like your mom, and go save the world. Guess in the end, we both ended up like our moms. Don't ever forget what that little girl used to say. Grow up, be a huntress, be a hero, save as much of the world as you can. You're going to have to do it for both of us. I'll be watching you, sis, don't let me down like I've let you down."

Ruby stifled a sob into Yang's bosom. "I won't," she promised. "I'll make you proud. I'll never forget you, Yang."

"Miss Rose. Please stand in front of the door."

"Time to go, Ruby. Tell anyone who still cares that I'm sorry, and I love them."

Ruby reluctantly loosened her grip, and stepped away from Yang. "I will. I'll always love you, Yang, no matter what."

"Ruby, I need you to promise me one thing before you go. Please, don't come to... to the execution. I don't want you to see that. I want you to remember me like I am."

Ruby nodded as she stepped to the door. "Goodbye, Yang."

"Goodbye, Ruby."

The door slid open. "This way, Miss Rose." Ruby turned, and walked from the cell. The door closed behind her, and Yang was gone forever. "Follow me," the guard said as he passed her and headed back the way they had come. Ruby threw her hood up over her head, and followed. She didn't remember much about the trip out of the cell block. She kept her eyes locked on the floor four feet in front of her, following close on her escort's heels. She was vaguely aware of two other guards passing them headed in the opposite direction. Doors opened and closed, and before she knew it she was standing back outside the outer gate where she had left Qrow.

Ruby was emotionally drained. She wanted to leave, to run, to put as much distance between her and this wreched place as possible. Even where she stood now, in the atrium outside maximum security, the drab walls and grey ceiling felt suffocating.

"You ok, kiddo?" Qrow walked over to Ruby and dropped his hand on her shoulder.

"No," she responded in a small voice. "Let's get out of here."

Qrow settled his arm around her shoulder, and guided her to an elevator on the other side of the room. A uniformed guard wordlessly opened the door, and let them enter. Once the door had closed, and the elevator was climbing toward the rooftop landing pad, Ruby relaxed, letting out a long breath.

"How'd it go?" Qrow asked.

"It went." Ruby responed. "We talked about..." Ruby suddenly went stiff with a gasp and threw a hand over her mouth.

"What's wrong, kiddo?"

Ruby stared straight ahead in horror, not saying a word. She had completely forgotten to take a picture with Yang. Then, she remembered the last words Yang had said to her. "I want you to remember me like I am." Ruby realized she didn't want to remember Yang like that. The Yang she had seen in the cell was a shadow of what her sister had been. That wasn't the Yang she was going to remember. The Yang she was going to remember was the Yang in the picture under her pillow. Ruby let her hand fall back to her waist, and looked up into Qrow's concerned eyes. "It's ok. Nothing's wrong. It worked out like it should have."

Qrow said nothing, but held Ruby closer to him. The elevator doors slid open, and the pair emerged into the brisk Autumn afternoon. Their bullhead sat on the pad, engines already idling. Qrow helped Ruby in, and the aircraft climbed away from the prison.

Ruby say in silence as the bullhead carried her back to Beacon. She tried to process what had happened. She was glad she had gone. That had been a risk, but one well worth taking. It had been hard, traumatic even, but Ruby would have done it again in a heartbeat. The bullhead finally slowed, and settled with a bump on the Beacon landing pad. Ruby stood, and turned to Qrow. "Thanks, Uncle Qrow. I'll never forget you helping me."

"I'm always here for ya, kiddo. You're strong, you're going to be fine. Now go, your team is waiting for you."

Her team? Ruby looked out a window, and saw Wiess, Dove, and Blake at the edge of the pad. She took a deep breath, and pushed the door of the bullhead open. Wiess waved as Ruby climbed down. Ruby smiled. Life went on.

Yang smiled. Her life was nearly over, but she more at peace now than she had been since that fateful night at the Club. She was glad Ruby had ignored her request not to come. It had been good to say some of what she had written to Ruby in person. A small, selfish part of her was glad that there was at least a few people left who would mourn her. She felt terrible for the pain she had caused, not only for the families of the men she had killed, but especially for her dad and Ruby. But Ruby was strong, and Yang knew she would be o.k. That was all that mattered now.

Yang still stood in the center of her cell, her wrists shackled in the restraint post. The fact that the guard had not released her when Ruby left, like he had after the priest had gone, made Yang think the end was near. She wasn't wrong. Less than 5 minutes after Ruby had been taken away, her cell door slid open again, and two guards entered, one of them carrying a set of wrist and ankle irons. The one without the restraints stopped directly in front of her.

"Inmate 1665. Pursuant to the capital sentence decreed by the Vale Justice Commission, you will now be transferred to the penetentiary execution facility for final termination. Do as we say, and we'll make this quick and easy. Now, stand with your feet 6 inches apart."

"Ok." It was all Yang could think to say. She slid her feet closer together. The guard with the restraints knelt behind her, and fastened the heavy ankle irons around her legs. A short chain linked the two cuffs, limiting her stride to 2 feet at most.

"No running now," Yang thought.

"I am going to release your left wrist. Do not attempt to resist, or we will subdue you with all necessary force." The guard unlocked the restraint on Yang's left arm, gripping her forearm firmly as he did so. Yang relaxed, letting him bend her arm behind her and hold it against small of her back. She wondered how many condemned fought back at this point, struggling against the inevitable. She guessed many did, with nothing left to lose. Yang stood compliant as the first of the wrist shackles was clamped around her arm. She knew struggling now would only lead to unnecessary pain for her, and wouldn't change anything in the end. These men were just doing their job, no reason to make it hard on them all. The guard unlocked her right arm, and guided it around to join her left. The second cuff was clamped on, securing her arms behind her. A small chain ran from the wrist cuffs to the ankle cuffs, further limiting her motion.

The guard who had spoke before came to stand in front of Yang again. "As a Class 2 aura user, you have the choice of pre-execution aura breaking. Do you wish this procedure to be implemented?"

Yang's lawyer had explained to her this question was always put to condemned prisoners with unlocked auras. For obvious reasons, having an unlocked aura could interfere with execution. But the execution would be completed, which had sometimes led to painful, prolonged deaths. Now, the option was given for auras to be sapped in advance, usually by a sharp beating with shock batons. Yang had considered this, and had her answer ready.

"No. I'll face my execution without it. It's best for it to only hurt once."

"As you wish. Walk."

The gaurd behind Yang gripped her elbow, and gave her a light push forward. As she walked out of her cell, she felt an unexpected sense of loss, like she was seeing a friend for the last time. As strange as it may have seemed to anyone else, her cell had been her sanctuary. Here there had been no guards shouting orders, no reporters with their cameras and questions, no judges thundering condemnation. Here, like nowhere else, Yang had enjoyed a measure of peace.

"Hey, Blondie!" The shout came from a cell occupied by another death row inmate, a short lizard faunus. "Save me a chair at the beauty parlor!"

"See you soon, Jax," Yang called over her shoulder.

Six months ago, Yang would have recoiled from a man like Jax, a convicted serial killer. Now, their shared fate allowed her to share a moment of macabre humor with someone she should have regarded with nothing but loathing. The significance of this was not lost on Yang as her escort ushered her into an elevator at the end of the Maximum Security cell block.

"Too everyone else in Vale," she thought, "I'm just like Jax. A monster, just waiting my turn for final justice. But I'm not really like him, am I? Right?"

Doubt crept into Yang's mind as the doors closed. How many bad things did a good person have to do before it made them a bad person? Yang it did her best to push the thought from her mind. It didn't really matter now. The elevator climbed slowly, and Yang flexed her fingers against her hand handcuffs. Doing something, anything, with her hands helped to distract her from the reality of the situation. She found that if she turned her wrists inward, and pulled up, she could keep tension on the chain running from her hands to her feet, and thereby keep the leg irons from rattling. That was good.

DING!

Yang flinched. The noise alerting the riders they had reach their destination seemed as loud is a gunshot in the oppressive silence of the car. The guard beside her spoke without turning to look at her.

"Your execution will proceed as soon as we exit the elevator. You will be given an opportunity to make a short statement. Witnesses will be able to hear and see you, but they will be behind mirrored glass so you will not be able to see or hear them. Comply with all instructions, and we will ensure your end is as efficient and painless as possible."

"Thank you," was all Yang managed to reply. She expected to be ushered forward immediately, but nothing happened. After a minute of tense waiting, she gathered the nerve to speak. "I'd prefer if we could just get on with it."

The guard checked his watch. "Execution isn't scheduled for another five minutes. They'll open the door when they're ready for us."

"Five minutes," Yang thought to herself. It wasn't very long to live, but when all you had to do was stand around waiting to die, it seemed like an eternity. Yang flexed her hands again, taking a deep breath. She idily wondered how many breaths she had left. Maybe she should count... No! She wasn't going to waste her last minutes like that. Yang closed her eyes and pushed her mind back in time, back to her early days on Patch.

She remembered playing on the beach when Ruby was barely old enough to walk. She remembered making cookies with Ruby and Summer Rose, then eating those cookies with Ruby as they sat on the porch waiting for Summer to come back home. Summer hadn't come back, and Yang had taken on the role of older sister/mom to the devastated Ruby. Ever since both girls were little, it just seemed obvious that they would both become huntresses. Yang remembered Ruby cheering and screaming from the sidelines when Yang had won her first tournament at Signal Junior Huntsman Academy. That had been a good day. Ruby had followed her to Signal, and the two girls had trained side by side as they prepared for their career as huntresses.

"What a waste," Yang thought, allowing self-pity to creep in. "All that work, the sacrifice. And this is where it ends? I had plans! Dreams!"

"The men you killed had dreams too," a voice in the back of her mind pointed out. Yang ground her teeth in frustrated anger. The logical part of her mind knew she had brought this on herself, but to truly accept that when an elevator door was the only thing separating her from execution was another matter entirely.

"What would a true Huntress do in this situation?" Yang wondered.

"Accept responsibility," the voice replied.

Yang squared her shoulders. That was the answer. The only real answer. The only thing left for her to do was to face reality head-on. If she couldn't have the life of a Huntress, the only thing left was to die like one. And, like they had read her mind, the elevator doors slid open.

Yang swallowed. Her resolve, so strong a moment before, wavered. Now that the doors were open, and Yang could see the noose ready and waiting, bravery was much harder to come by. The guards each took one of Yang's elbows in a firm grip, and walked her forward out of the elevator. Yang glanced around as she was marched onto the gallows. Two more guards waited outside the doors. They were in a tall, narrow room. Near the top of the opposite wall, and level with the platform, was a large window of mirrored glass. Yang averted her eyes from it, imaging the hateful stares being leveled at her from the other side. The guards walked Yang across the steel floor, stopping her near the edge of the platform in the center of a large trapdoor. She could see over the edge of the platform that they were about eight feet above the floor. The noose hung a few inches above her head.

"You may make a short statement if you wish," the guard to her left said.

Yang cleared her throat, and looked at the mirrored glass. "I want to tell all of you watching that I would give anything to undo the damage I have caused you. I don't ask you to forgive me, because I don't deserve it. I accept full responsibility for my actions. My only hope is that my death here today may bring a measure of peace to those I have wronged. I apologize to all those I have disappointed and let down. Goodbye."

Yang turned her head slightly, and nodded at the guard. A third man stepped up behind her, and brought the noose down around her head. As the noose settled around her shoulders, Yang was glad Ruby hadn't asked why they cut her hair short. It would have been difficult for her to hear the explanation. The rope felt surprisingly smooth on Yang's neck as the slack was taken up in the knot. She felt the guards hands against the back of her neck and head, as he adjusted the knot to sit behind her left ear. As he completed setting the noose, Yang heard a rustling of cloth behind her. She realized she was about to be hooded.

"Please," she whispered. "Don't do that. I want to go with my eyes open."

"You don't get a choice in the matter, convict," the man behind her muttered. "The hood isn't for your benefit, it's so your victims don't have to watch your tongue swell up and your eyes pop out as you thrash." With that brutally honest reply, the executioner slipped a black hood over Yang's head and pulled the draw string below her chin.

The two guards that had been holding Yang's elbows released her, and under her black hood Yang suddenly felt very alone. It had all been very efficient. Less than two minutes before, she had been in the elevator, now, all that was left was the drop. She heard somebody reading her formal declaration of execution, but she tuned it out. Yang prayed that whatever afterlife she was bound for would accept her repentance, and hoped that her neck broke cleanly at the end of the rope. She had heard stories of people voiding their bowels and emptying their bladders as they were hung, and in an effort to avoid this final indignity she hadn't eaten or drunk in a day.

"...and by the authority invested in me by the Vale Justice Commission, I hereby order this hanging to proceed."

Yang tensed. This was it. She had imagined this moment, tried to mentally prepare, but now that it was upon her, she couldn't fight down a wave of terror. Her Huntress-trained senses both heard and felt a click in floor beneath her.

Then she was falling.

Instinctively, Yang tried to scream, but as the sound rose in her throat, she felt a massive blow to her neck. Pain exploded through her neck and head, sharper than anything she had felt in years. She realized the noose jerking tight had broken her aura, but not her neck. Too late, Yang regretted turning down pre-execution aura breaking. The pain in her neck was incredible. She twisted her head sideways, trying to draw a breath, but the grip of the rope was unyielding. Yang panicked. She twisted and squirmed, fighting the noose that was inexorably choking the life out of her. Her chained hands beat against the small of her back as she rolled her shoulders, trying to expand her neck. Yang managed to suck down a desperate lungful of fresh air as she bunched her shoulders, only to have the noose cinch even tighter as she relaxed them. Her chains clanked furiously as she paddled her legs, trying to find some angle where she could breathe. Her fingers opened and closed, as she frantically felt behind her for anything to hold on to. In the back of her mind, Yang knew it was hopeless, and the quickest way out was to relax and let it end. But Yang had been a fighter her entire life, and it was hard for her to simply submit to death now. Her head burned like it was on fire from the inside, as oxygen deprivation began to set in. Under the black hood, stars swam in Yang's vision. She pulled her heels up against the back of her thighs as her struggles began to slow down. Dimly, she realized that the pain was subsiding. Her feet prickled like a thousand ants were crawling up them. She kicked them down, trying to rid the sensation. Her legs seemed oddly heavy, she couldn't lift them again. Everything was cold. Blackness hovered at the edge of her thoughts, and she embraced it, letting go, and falling into the comforting void of oblivion.

"Thus, kindly, I scatter." Ruby let the ashes flow from the silver urn, sift through her fingers, and dance in the breeze that tugged at her cape. The clifftop by Summer Rose's grave was empty and peaceful today, as it always was. Ruby closed her eyes, breathing in the cool fall air, and listening to the rustle of leaves blowing through the grass. The last of the ashes fell from the urn, leaving a light gray dusting on the headstone before her. Yang would have liked this, Ruby reflected. They had built her a small memorial in the flower garden behind the house on Patch, but this was where she truly belonged. Here, at the top of the cliff, bathed forever in the sun and the cooled by the breeze, Yang was finally free. Ruby could visit her mother and sister together now, in the peaceful solitude of the forest hillside. She replaced the cap on the urn, and with a final whispered goodbye, she turned and walked back towards the small road that had brought her here. A familiar yellow motorcycle sat on the side of the road, waiting her return. At first, Ruby had been terrified to ride Bumblebee, after all, her legs barely reached the ground, but she wasn't about to let Yang's prized motorcycle sit in a shed and gather dust. Ruby picked up the yellow helmet from its cradle behind the seat. It wasn't her color, by then again, neither was the golden ribbon tied through her hair. She flipped back the hood of her cloak, and settled the helmet on her head. A few seconds later, a cloud of slowly settling dust was the only sign that Ruby had ever been there. She flew through the gathering twilight, back towards Beacon, back towards her destiny. She had a world to save. Yang would have wanted it that way.

Author's note: Hi all! First off, thanks for reading! I've always enjoyed a good tragedy fic, and after reading pretty much every RWBY death fic I could find, I guess it was inevitable I'd try my hand at writing my own. "Before Their Time" will be a collection of disconnected stories, with each chapter being independent from the others, unless specifically noted. I've got several more chapters in the works, so if you liked what you saw, stay tuned! Comments, suggestions, and reviews are appreciated!