Thanks for reading!

I've been quite busy lately and honestly I'm just pushing this chapter out so I can finally release it. I wrote this when I was half-asleep so yeah… anyways, enjoy!

Ruby wasn't entirely sure how much time had passed since Roman's departure. All she knew was that she felt incredibly tired, exhausted, and every cell in her body hurt. For a while she forced herself to keep on alert, body tensed and loaded with nervous energy as she expected the crime-boss to return at any second. But after an eternity of fixing the door she just couldn't stay attentive much longer. She yawned a couple times, sleepiness slowly taking a hold of her. She allowed her head to fall back onto the pillow, figuring that getting some much needed sleep probably wouldn't hurt. Being able to escape from the nightmare her life had turned into was just an added bonus.

In the end, she probably wouldn't have needed any arguments on why a handful of sleep would be helpful, because she found herself unable to do exactly that. Each time she relaxed into the mattress and let herself slumber in, new waves of pain would drown out any previous sleepiness. She tried to ignore it and really- she shouldn't be this affected by her wound, she had dealt with worse- but all her effort was in vain. Her inability to sit still didn't help the matter either. She felt herself twitching and jerking, unable to loosen up. She rolled onto her other side, careful not to agitate her leg any further. For the time being she gave up her futile efforts of catching some sleep. Right now it just made her more twitchy and nervous, so it was no use anyways.

Might as well think of some ways to get outta here. She chewed her bottom lip slowly. Her leg gave her the most grief for now, and was definitely reason for concern. As long as the wound hadn't healed properly, she would be too restricted in her movement. But this could take from weeks up to months! In her opinion, this time-span seemed far too long to be deemed acceptable. If she had any say about this, she would much rather escape in the next few days, not wait for weeks. But judging from how badly it hurt, Ruby doubted it would be a good idea to put any amount of unnecessary pressure on it. And the last time she used her semblance didn't exactly end well.

Even if it healed quickly through some kind of miracle, she would still be trapped in a place she didn't know, locked behind a heavy door that wouldn't budge. And if Roman caught her escaping again, he likely wouldn't be as 'generous' as he had been the first time. But all hope wasn't lost yet. She had not forgotten about the slit in the door. Even though she didn't actually see Roman operating the door, she was still pretty confident that he used a scroll in order to lock and unlock the entrance to her prison. She also took notice of his rather large self- confidence, giving him a certain cockiness. He underestimated her- which was a good thing. She might be able to use his arrogance against him in the future. He thought he had her in the palm of his hands, able to manipulate her however he pleased. But she would prove him wrong. Ruby Rose will not let herself be manipulated by anyone, and least of all a criminal!

But how would she be able to get a hold of the scroll? It's not like she could just take it from him. He would notice once he tried to lock the room, making any efforts of stealing it useless. Even with him underestimating her it didn't help her one bit in this situation! Ruby groaned in frustration. Why did this have to be so complicated? "Okay, let's go through this step to step. First- door needs a scroll in order to be locked and unlocked. Second- whoever steps into this room will most likely be in possession of one. So obviously Roman, which isn't helping me a lot, and perhaps anyone else that comes by. At least I assume that they will have one. Third and the most important question- how can I get one, without anyone noticing?" She muttered quietly. This still wasn't helping her case. She only confirmed what she already knew, without coming up with any solutions to her problem. Maybe she should focus on a different approach to this…

Ruby couldn't overpower Roman. Sadly, the fight on the airship had proven this fact. Even if she weren't injured, she still needed her Scythe. She might stand a good chance against him if she still had her weapon, but alas, she didn't. If only he granted others permission to visit her. She might not win against him, but she sure as hell would be able to knock out a simple guard, as long as she had the advantage of surprise over them. Just, it seemed like Roman was hell-bent on being the only person that Ruby ever encounters. Since her capture she hadn't interacted with any other living being. Maybe he was the only one in this building? She chewed on her lip nervously. She had never heard any sounds except her captors footsteps. But that didn't mean anything. Maybe her prison was simply isolated from the rest of the premise. Assuming she was not the only person in this building, Roman most likely would have someone else step by her prison one day. He would at least need to bring her food, and fresh bandages once hers got too soaked in blood. He wouldn't really be doing all of this by himself, right? Ruby took a deep breath, swearing that she would knock out the first regular guard he sent by and make her escape no matter the consequences. It might just be her only chance at freedom.

Ruby suspected that she could also play the broken victim in order to gain Roman's favors. If he thought her to be compliant, he might grant her more freedom and privileges coming along with this. But the thought of being his little puppet didn't struck well with her. She would only go along with this plan, if anything else failed. It was also the kind of plan that needed a lot of time to be executed. After all, it would definitely rise suspicion if the formerly rebellious girl turned into a model prisoner over night. She would need to play along with being broken, over the turn of who knows how long. No, this seemed too risky and unstable to work.

Ruby would never admit it openly, but a small part of her rejected it because she was afraid that in the end her acting would turn into bitter reality. She was confident that she could resist Roman's efforts to break her but…

a small part of her wasn't quite so sure about this.

Ruby cracked her neck, sighing. She needed an actual plan that she could put in action. Well- the whole 'overpowering the guard' wasn't so bad, but it relied on too many variables. Most importantly, on the fact that Roman would actually entrust someone else with the care of her. It's not like she could just force him to do this. Or could she? Ruby flopped around. This involved too much 'maybe', 'perhaps' and other things based solely off luck and probability. Why couldn't she think of a single working, fool-proof plan? Right now, none of what she came up with seemed to work. She would have to wait and see if an opportunity presented itself. But this was exactly what she didn't want to do- sticking around here longer.

There was still some hope left, even if it flickered like a dying flame. According to Roman's cryptic answer, Yang might be alright. Of course, this doesn't exclude her dying to Grimm, or to White Fang members, or to Cinder or… Ruby shook her head, balling her fists. She shouldn't be thinking like this. Of course her sister was alright, she was the strongest of their team! No, she should be more worried about the rest of her teammates, and the other students. Beacon Academy had fallen, but it seemed like most of the students had been evacuated. Ruby hoped that no one followed her example and rushed into fights they couldn't win. Right now, she simply had to assume that everyone was alright. And if they were fine, then maybe someone would be coming to help her.

But you didn't tell anyone where you went when you decided to go on that suicide mission of yours.

"Shut up" she whispered, ignoring the tiny voice in her head. They would figure it out, right? Of course they would. She refused to give up hope so early. She would be able to break out from here, either by herself or with the help of others. And everyone would be alright. Even if it was childish, she couldn't stop clinging to this thought. It helped preserve her sanity, and it would help her endure whatever terrors her captor was planning on inflicting on her. So what if it seemed naive? At least she had something to fight for. She refused to just give up and let herself be broken. This was not an option.

She rolled onto her back again, eyes following the cracks on the ceiling. Her arms dug into her spine uncomfortably, the shackles not helping with the problem. Maybe she could get Roman to take them off later. Or at least bind her arms in front of her. How was she even supposed to move like this? Ruby didn't feel very optimistic about the possible outcome of her request though. Knowing him, he would leave them on just to spite her. She closed her eyes, breathing slowing. And snapped them open again when a sharp pain emitted from her wrists. A twinge of annoyance rose in her. What is it this time? She frowned, carefully turning to the side. She strained her neck to take a look at her wrists, but gave up when she fell face-down into the mattress instead. She felt something slick running down her wrists. Was she bleeding? Great, now she had another thing to worry about- infections. Who knew how dirty those cuffs were. She really needed to convince Roman to let her out of these. It's not like she would be going anywhere soon. Deciding that there wasn't a lot she could do about her wrists, she stayed in her current position, lying on her belly. It wasn't the most comfortable position, but probably the best one she could achieve in her current state. She might even be able to fall asleep like this.

She did not fall asleep. It didn't take her long to realize that ignoring the pain didn't cause it to magically vanish. Adding to that, she also felt incredibly stressed and uncomfortable about the idea of falling asleep when Roman could come check up on her at any minute. This certainly wasn't something she wanted to happen. So she ended up lying on the bed, dark hair tickling her face, silver eyes falling shut every once and then before flying open again all of a sudden.

After a while, a new problem presented itself in her ever-growing list of problems: She was thirsty. She ignored it at first, being too wrapped up in her drowsiness and the pain to pay any attention to it. But soon enough, her throat started to dry out together with the inside of her mouth, indicating that something had to be done. She carefully turned around, facing the bathroom. Ruby really hoped that it contained actual running water, as she didn't check it earlier. She now realized just how much of a mistake this had been, but there was nothing she could do about it.

She really wished she didn't have to get up but there was no other choice. Except to ask Roman perhaps, and she didn't feel too keen on doing that. He would most likely make her beg for something as simple as water, and she did not want to degrade herself any further. And if she asked him for help, he may just assume that she was becoming more dependent on him, which didn't sit well with her. She would do this her own way.

Let's just get this over with.

She took a deep breath, assessing the situation. She could steady herself with her good leg, and avoid putting too much pressure on the other one. Yeah, that would work. She lifted both her legs, grimacing as the pain that had been slumbering for the past few minutes awoke again. Her right foot hovered over the floor, left one touching the ground. So far so good. She pushed her upper body upwards, wincing when she accidentally put some pressure onto her right foot. At least she was sitting upright now. One win for Ruby. The only thing left to do now, was to somehow drag herself across the room and hope for the best. A tiny whine escaped her lips as she put more weight onto her injured foot, getting up from the bed. Teeth clenching hard, she continued on her painstaking journey. It took her an embarrassingly long amount of time to arrive at the small run-down bathroom, but she made it.

To her shared relief and astonishment, the bathroom actually contained a small shower, a toilet and a sink. She longingly stared at the shower, aching for a long hot bath to rub away all the dirt that had gathered over the course of the past events. But with her hands shackled, taking one would be to be too much of an inconvenience right now. The room wasn't particularly warm, so if she took one in her clothes she would freeze half to death. And that didn't even account the possibility of Roman walking in on her. Definitely didn't need one that badly. She turned towards the basin, furrowing her eyebrows. It had one handle, so it should be easy enough to activate it even in her current state. She turned around, fumbling around blindly until she caught hold of the cold metal grip and turned it on. Ruby bowed down, flinching for a second as the ice-cold water hit her face. It didn't stop her from gulping down as much as possible though. One couldn't be too sure how long she would be provided with such supplies. She took one last gulp and let the water swirl around in her mouth, spitting it out after she was done. This was about the best she could do to clean her mouth right now.

Now she only had to repeat the process from before, and get back to the softness of the bed. Stifling a curse, Ruby went to work. She managed a few steps before her leg suddenly gave up underneath her, sending her tumbling face-forward onto the floor. She took harsh, quick breaths through clenched teeth, suppressing the urge to scream. The pain emitting from her leg was excruciating, taking over all her senses and leaving her weak and immobile on the ground. She couldn't even be bothered to gather herself up and continue walking. Instead, Ruby stayed where she was, too exhausted and in too much pain to care about her current position.

The coldness of the tiles slowly seeped into her skin, causing her to shudder. She gazed longingly at the bed, so close yet so far away. Maybe she should give it another try… but she was so tired and she didn't want to irritate her leg any further. She barely noticed her eyes closing, head falling back onto the ground.

"Rise and shine, sleeping beauty, rise and shine!" She twitched, but reacted no further. Something started poking her side insistently. "Just five more minutes Yang" she mumbled. And screamed abruptly when something poked her leg. Hard. She drove up, vision blurry and clouded by black spots, dizziness causing her to sway wildly and nearly fall back down again. All her previous sleepiness had evaporated, leaving her wide awake. "Stop that!" She yelled as she saw Roman poking her wounded leg with his cane, a sadistic glint in his eyes. He grinned at her discomfort, gaze shifting towards her face. "Red, if you don't like beds you should have just told me so! It would have saved me some money on furniture- just kidding, it was for free." His annoying laughter rang through Ruby's head as she was still fighting against the waves of agony that tormented her body.

She moaned as the pain slowly subsided. "W-why did you do that?" "You wouldn't wake up. Don't complain about it" he said in a matter of fact tone, as if it were completely normal to wake someone up by literally poking their freaking injury. Tensed silence filled the room as Ruby angrily stared at her tormentor. Her show-down was interrupted by the sudden and loud grumbling coming from her belly. Her cheeks turned a slight red while she tried to mask the grumbling by coughing awkwardly. It was too late though, as Roman had already heard it. "Looks like somebody is hungry" he remarked, eyes fixed on the girl. "Yeah, I haven't eaten in since you brought me here" Ruby said, rolling her eyes as if to say 'duh'. Suddenly her voice turned sweeter. "By the way, there isn't really a chance that you know how long I've been here?" "Not gonna tell you, Red. But good try!" Ruby pouted, shoulders sagging down. "I suppose you won't just give me food like this, and will instead tell me to give you something in return, right?"

He raised an eyebrow, clapping sarcastically. "I see that even you are capable of learning." "What is that supposed to mean" Ruby muttered. "If you ask me really nicely, I might be willing to give you something in return." "And with 'really nicely' you mean you want me to beg for the food, right?" A wicked grin was all she needed to answer her question. "What if I refuse to?" "Then you won't be getting any. Not really a big loss for me." Ruby chewed her lip in aggravation. There was no way out of this, not without severely injuring her pride. Why couldn't things just be easy for once? "Can I get something to eat?" She hissed out, face scrunching up in distaste. "You can barely call that asking nicely, much less begging. I'm getting the feeling you don't want to eat at all, Red." She balled her hands, trying to ignore the feelings of shame that rushed through her. "Please, can I have something to eat?" "Still not exactly what I meant, but alright. You know, you being on the ground really adds to this whole thing. I like it!" She clenched her teeth at his mocking words. Now wasn't the time to get mad. "So, you are gonna give me something or not?" "Don't be so impatient Red. I can change my mind about this any time so it would be better if you tried being a bit more polite."

For one second she considered a harsh retort, but she knew it wasn't worth it. He just wanted to provoke her, and if she allowed him to things would only get worse. "I'm sorry." She said flatly, trying to ignore the satisfaction her apology gave him. She froze as something touched her head. A hand gently ruffled her hair. "Well done." She shivered at the gleeful tone, holding her breath until he removed his hand. Only then she dared to exhale shakily, body taut in stress.

To her surprise, Roman actually kept true to his promise of bringing her food. She kind of expected him to starve her, but maybe she overestimated his cruelty. The smell of the soup filled the room the moment he returned. She had to admit, seeing him balance the plate while keeping the heavy door from falling shut was a tiny bit impressive. She expected to see him spill it's content, but it appeared that he could handle it.

"So, am I supposed to eat on the ground?" He ignored her question, instead putting the soup down in front of her. She sighed. "Guess that means yes. Can you unlock the cuffs? I'm kinda bleeding there, and I can't eat this with my hands bound."

"Are you sure? It's a soup, you should be able to, you know- sip it." He snickered at her indignation. "I'm not going to do that. I would rather starve, thank you very much." She turned around, not for the first time wishing that she could be somewhere far away right now. She jumped a little as Roman touched her wrists, fumbling with the handcuffs behind her back. One second later a metallic clink sounded out, and her hands were free. Maybe she should focus on getting the key to those handcuffs before planning any break-outs.

She lazily stretched her arms, relishing the feeling of being able to move them again after all that time. One look at her wrists confirmed her suspicions of them bleeding, as the skin had been scraped open on some parts. It didn't look too bad, but… "Do you have antiseptic or something I can put on those?" she showed him her wrists, gesturing to the blood. "You have a lot of demands for a captive, don't you." "What? If you hadn't shackled my hands so tightly, I wouldn't be bleeding right now! Don't blame me for not wanting to get an infection or worse" she huffed, gingerly rubbing the sore spots. "Geez, I get it. I will get you some cream. Aren't you hungry?" Another grumbling sound resonated from her stomach in response to his question, causing her to blush bright red again. She picked up the plate of soup, inhaling the delicious aroma. Before she even knew it, she had eaten up everything, leaving her to sigh in content. She barely even noticed his departure, and only looked up when the door fell open again.

"Can you just leave my hands uncuffed? I'm not going to run away with my leg, and it's not like I will be getting out of that door anyways. Right now those shackles are just a useless nuisance."

She massaged her wrists, stimulating the bloodflow, then went on to crack her knuckles. "No. If you behave well in the future, I might remove them permanently, but for now I won't." He threw a small package of lotion at her, Ruby catching it with one hand. She hissed as her skin burnt when it came in contact with the antiseptic. She was barely done applying it when her captor already forced her hands back roughly once again. "Hey! Be more gentle, you are gonna make it worse!" She protested at his careless treatment. "It's not gonna kill you", he responded as he put the cuffs on again. She noticed a distinct lack of tightness this time around. Looks like he did listen to her, albeit barely.

After he left, she slumped down, sighing as she contemplated the bed again. Finally she put herself together, wobbling over to the slightly stained mattress and threw herself down. Her limbs ached from having been on the floor for so long. Most definitely not an experience she wanted to repeat, if only to keep Roman from taking the bed. This guy would go as far as to leave her in a completely empty room just for the fun of it. And he probably would even expect her to thank him for his generosity. Yep, gonna avoid sleeping in on the floor in the future.

"Yang, guys, I really hope that you are out there somewhere" Ruby whispered.