SAPR

by Scipio Smith

Concert

Concert

There was a bouquet in Weiss’ dressing room.

Actually, there were a great many bouquets in her dressing room, so many that it verged on embarrassing, and so many too that, if she hadn’t had such a large dressing room, it might have gotten quite crowded in here. There was a bouquet from Twilight; and another from Blake – belladonna flowers, of course – and one from General Ironwood to thank her for doing her part to help the troops; and one from Diamond Tiara, possibly because she was confused as to the state of relations between Weiss and her brother; and of course, there were various bouquets that had come from fans excited about her big return to the stage after a long absence. But there was only one bouquet that had no note attached, and it was that one that intrigued her.

It was a bouquet of roses, six white and five red, and there was nothing to indicate who had sent it. She very much hoped that it wasn’t just some creepy stalker, because that would have been very disappointing.

Almost as disappointing as having to come back to the stage when she had thought that she had left all this behind forever.

Still, Weiss thought as she sat in her dressing room, staring back at her reflection in the mirror, it was hard to feel too downhearted about this state of affairs when she was surrounded by the proof of the enthusiasm that it had inspired in other people. Mirror, mirror, on the wall: tell me who’s the loneliest of all? Well, not Weiss Schnee, it seemed, not any more. It was true that some, perhaps even the majority, of those bouquets were from people who didn’t know her anymore, but at the same time, some of them were from people who did know her, and some who knew her as well as anyone did. She only had to look at the bouquet of belladonnas or at the mixed bunch of flowers that Twilight had sent her to know that she wasn’t alone, not any more. She might be back in Atlas, she might be back in her father’s house, she might be back performing on stage, but that didn’t mean that her life had been reset completely to the way it was before she went to Beacon. Beacon was gone, and much that was good in the world now stood in peril, but she could take a small degree of comfort in knowing that the positive effects it had wrought upon her life yet lingered in some fashion.

She didn’t really want to do this, to go up onto that stage and belt out her old favourites to the crowd, but it was hard to get worked up with resentment about it when she was surrounded by the proof of the enthusiasm that others felt for her return, when she only had to think about how excited Twilight was to see her perform again, when she only had look down at the card that had accompanied General Ironwood’s bouquet and which now sat upon little table in the dressing room.

Dear Miss Schnee,

I would like to thank you, personally and on behalf of all our forces, for your generosity in giving your time and talent to our aid. It is appreciated, and it will be remembered.

Yours,

General James Ironwood

It was hard to resent doing something when the reason you were doing it was couched in terms like that.

It might not be exactly what she wanted to do, but it was something good that she was doing nevertheless, and if she focussed on that – and on the way that she seemed to be brightening up the lives of others even if not her own – then it didn’t seem so bad.

Yes, it didn’t seem so bad at all.

The show wasn’t about to start just yet, but Weiss was already dressed and made up and ready for when it did. Rarity had made her a new dress to wear to the concert, and so Weiss was attired in a gown of midnight blue, long and flowing with a high waistline just beneath her bust so that the bulk of the gown billowed out all around her in all directions. Six straps criss-crossed out from around a boob window, fastening the gown around her neck and falling downwards across her otherwise bare arms – her shoulders likewise were left bare to the world. A sheer overlay of white silk, sewn about with diamonds and sapphires – or possibly fake approximations of the same – fell down around her dress almost to the hem, sparkling in the light of the dressing room. A sapphire bracelet – single strand, small and delicate – dangled from around her right wrist. It was…a little excessive, but if there was ever a time for that, it was probably when she was about to go on stage.

Which was not quite yet, and since it was not quite yet, Weiss felt a little restive. She got up off the chair, gathering the folds of her long gown up in both hands, and left the dressing room with her name upon the door and walked, dragging her dress behind her like a bridal train, towards the dressing room of the real star of tonight’s show.

The name on the door said Penny Dragonslayer. From the far side of the door, Weiss could hear voices coming from within.

“And then they went to a doughnut shop.”

“Ciel went to a doughnut shop?” Was that Twilight’s voice?

“Uh-huh. But they seemed to have a really nice time when they got there. Anyway, that’s why I need a less than lethal option for a weapon…”

Weiss knocked on the dressing room door.

A deathly silence appeared to descend on the other side of the room.

“Ciel?” someone, Penny presumably, Weiss had met the other girl – or gynoid – but didn’t know her well enough to be certain of recognising her voice, asked with a slight hint of nervousness.

“No, it’s Weiss Schnee,” Weiss said, with a little amusement creeping into her voice.

The door opened to reveal Twilight stood on the other side of the door, dressed in a soft blue ballgown with a high collar that rose up like a wave behind her head. A black choker, from which hung a lavender pendant that matched her eyes, was clasped tight about her throat.

She smiled. “Hey, Weiss,” she said, as she stepped back from the door to reveal Penny – Weiss recognised her by sight, even if she didn’t recognise her by the sound of her voice – dressed in a uniform that put Weiss in mind of her elder sister, with the blue-grey waistcoat over a long white tailcoat and a cravat fastened around her collar.

Weiss returned Twilight’s smile. “Good evening, Twilight, Penny.”

“Greetings, Weiss Schnee,” Penny said cheerily.

Twilight began. “I was just-“

“Gossiping?” Weiss suggested.

Twilight’s face reddened ever so slightly. “I was going to say doing a last minute check on Penny’s vocal cords but…yes, that too.”

Weiss chuckled. “May I come in?”

“Of course,” Penny said. “Be my guest.”

Weiss walked in – Twilight making way before her – and closed the door behind her. “So, what happened?”

“Ciel went on a date,” Penny said. “I was just telling Twilight what happened.”

Weiss slender brows furrowed. “Ciel…she’s your old teammate, isn’t she? How do you know what happened on their date?”

“I was on overwatch,” the coppertop informed her as though it was the most natural thing in the world.

“You mean you followed them,” Weiss said.

“I stand by what I said,” Penny replied.

“Apparently Ruby told her it was normal,” Twilight murmured.

“I see,” Weiss murmured. I wonder if Jaune and Pyrrha ever noticed?

“I have to admit, it is interesting knowing what went on,” Twilight said, with an appropriate degree of shame in her voice.

“I’m not sure that your friend would see it the same way,” Weiss replied softly. “But I didn’t actually come here to embarrass you both, but to ask how you were feeling, Penny?”

Penny was silent for a moment. “I feel…I feel as though I’ve wanted this for a long time, but now that I have it…I don’t want it any more. Did you know that my father’s here?”

“No,” Weiss said. “No, I didn’t.”

“And General Ironwood, and Councillor Cadenza; everyone is here for this,” Penny said. “Everyone’s here to see me…and you, of course, Weiss.”

Weiss smiled softly. “You don’t have to flatter me, Penny; you’re the big star tonight.” That might actually have been flattering the robot girl just a little, but she seemed as though she could maybe use the encouragement; and besides, Penny ought to have been a bigger attraction than the return of Weiss Schnee, if all things had been as fair as they ought to be. “Is Blake here?”

“I haven’t seen her,” Twilight admitted. “But the last I heard, she was on her way to pick up her dress from Rarity, so I expect she’ll be out there somewhere.”

“The point is,” Penny went on, “that for a long time, I’ve wanted something like this, to be up on a stage like this – on this stage – with everyone watching me. But now that I’m about to go on stage with everybody looking at me…it doesn’t seem so cool any more.”

“Because the fame isn’t what it’s cracked up to be, compared to the feelings that you could have towards the people that you’d like to share your life with,” Weiss murmured. “It’s a lesson that we all have to learn, I think, Penny, as unfortunate as that is.”

Penny looked at her. “How are you feeling about this?”

Weiss inhaled. “It’s for a good cause,” she said. “The best cause, maybe.”

“Ciel says that what I do on this tour will help to remind people that the Battle of Vale was a victory and restore hope to the hopeless,” Penny pontificated, a note of awe for her place in the world slipping into her voice.

“I hope you’re right, Penny,” Weiss said. “Or at least that Ciel is. Speaking of which, where is your partner?”

The dressing room door opened, revealing Ciel in a uniform much like the one Penny was wearing standing in the doorway. “Ah, Miss Schnee,” Ciel acknowledged, curtsying to her. “I wasn’t expecting to find you here.”

“No, I was just saying hello to Penny,” Weiss said. “Twilight, thank you very much for the flowers.”

“You’re welcome,” Twilight said. “I should probably be getting to my seat as well. Good luck out there, Penny.”

“Yes,” Weiss said. “Good luck.”

“You too, Weiss Schnee,” Penny said, giving her a thumbs up. “Let’s do our best!”

Weiss chuckled. “I certainly will.”

Ciel cleared the doorway to let them both out, nodding in acknowledgement to Twilight and murmuring ‘Miss Schnee’ to Weiss before she replaced them both in Penny’s dressing room and shut the door.

“Is she going to be okay?” Weiss asked, as she and Twilight walked down the corridor together, holding up their gowns as they pressed against one another.

“I think so,” Twilight said. “She’d just…she’d rather be-“

“Out in the field?” Weiss guessed.

Twilight winced slightly. “Yes,” she admitted. “She’s a little concerned about her friends.”

“Team Sapphire?”

“Yes.”

“Well, Jaune is with Pyrrha,” Weiss said, “and Pyrrha and Ruby are the two best huntresses in the year, so I think they stand a good chance of being okay, whatever’s going on out in the world.”

“You have a teammate of your own in Vale, don’t you?” Twilight asked.

“Yes,” Weiss murmured. “Cardin Winchester.” She felt a little guilty that she hadn’t thought of him more often: where he was, what he was doing, whether he was even still alive. Of him, it could not, unfortunately, be said that he was one of the best huntsmen of the year and so blithely assumed to be okay. He might be, or he might not; it depended entirely on what kind of scrapes he was getting himself into.

Twilight reached out and took Weiss’ hand. “I think…I think Ciel might be right,” she said. “If we all do our best, and if we can just remind people that Atlas is not defeated, that this is a temporary retreat and not a rout, then we’ll be reunited with our friends in the other kingdoms in no time.”

Weiss nodded. “And you? Is there anyone you left behind you’d like to know was fine?”

“I’m mostly pretty lucky in that respect,” Twilight admitted. “Everyone I really care about came home with us, but…I’d like to know that Sunset’s okay, wherever she is. That she’s still alive, at least; I’m not sure how okay you can really be when you’ve been locked up.”

“I’m sure…” Weiss hesitated for a moment. “To be honest, she’s probably safer in prison than any of the other people we might be concerned about.”

Twilight snorted. “Probably. Anyway, I should let you go.”

“And I should let you go find your seat,” Weiss said. “I hope you enjoy the show.”

“Oh, I will,” Twilight, her face lighting up with enthusiasm. “I’m sure it will be great. I can’t believe that I’m getting to see you perform live again! And that I got to talk to you backstage before the gig!”

She was so enthusiastic that it was impossible not to be at least a little infected by it. Weiss said, “Look out for a new song that I wrote just for tonight.”

“You wrote a new song?” Twilight gasped. “This is going to be the best night ever!”

Twilight left her then, heading back into the auditorium, but her enthusiasm buoyed Weiss up, compensating for her own somewhat lack of the same, and continued to do so until she was called for and made her way out up and onto the stage.

The concert hall was silent as a tomb as Weiss walked up onto the stage, and just as dark. Her chunky wedge heels tapped upon the black surface underneath, the sounds of her footfalls echoing off the architecture specifically designed to enhance acoustics. This was the place where she had first performed in public, but she had forgotten just how big it was; even in the darkness, she could sense the size of this place, the scale of it, as though she could feel the high ceiling looming so far above her.

A spotlight fell on her as she took up her place, standing in the centre of the Atlesian gear-and-spear that was marked out in white upon the otherwise black stage. The footlights shone into her face, reducing the audience sitting down in the pit below her to mere silhouettes, shadowy figures in suits and gowns, indistinct and indistinguishable. She couldn't see Twilight, she couldn't see Blake, she couldn't make out anyone. She cast a quick glance upwards; in the boxes - the closer ones at least - it was easier to make out some faces, like her father and Whitley sitting alone in the box closest to the stage upon the left. Weiss wondered if Whitley would have liked to have his girlfriend with him; perhaps Father was not so keen. Weiss spotted, or thought she spotted, Diamond Tiara herself in another box, along with her friend Silver Spoon, a little further away from Weiss and from the stage.

All was silent. The world waited upon her word.

There was no live band or orchestra, there was only a technician, barely visible in his dark clothes - the outfit that was supposed to make it hard for the audience made him only a vague shape to Weiss as well - waiting in the wings for her signal to start the music.

Weiss took a deep breath. "Thank you all for coming," she said. "In not too long, you're all going to get to see Penny Polendina, the hero of Atlas, up here. But, right now..." she motioned with one hand for the music to start, "it's my turn." She smiled slightly and took a half-step backwards while remaining in the spotlight as the music began to play.

Weiss closed her eyes, and started to sing.

"When I was young..."

---

Ciel heard the music begin, echoing backstage as she and Penny waited in Penny's dressing room. Soon, it was joined by the angelic voice of Weiss Schnee herself.

Ciel's brow furrowed ever so slightly. She could not help but feel that Miss Schnee's presence, her dramatic return to the stage, was an attempt to upstage Penny. Not by Miss Schnee herself - she seemed pleasant enough, and Twilight had nothing but good things to say about her - but by her father. Jacques Schnee was a great man, to be sure, and he had been a friend to the military in the past, but he would not be the first great man in history to be vain, both of his personal success and of his legacy. It appeared that, having seen a limelight, he could not resist but to shove his family into it somehow. Or perhaps Ciel was simply being overly suspicious; Jacques Schnee had been a friend to the military in the past, perhaps he simply wished to support them again as he had done before.

With good fortune, it would be that straightforward.

"Ciel?" Penny asked.

Ciel looked down at Penny, where she sat with her face reflected in the dressing room mirror. "Yes?"

"Do I have to say the line about buying another me?" Penny asked.

"You don't want to say it," Ciel murmured.

"No," Penny said. "I'm not something that you can just build in a factory like a knight. I'm me. I'm Penny Polendina."

"You are," Ciel said, "and being Penny Polendina, you are unique. So don't say that line."

Penny blinked. "Really? That's it?"

Ciel's eyebrows rose. "You expected me to argue?"

Penny shrugged. "I thought you might. I thought you'd want me to say the lines as they were written."

"Do not mistake me, any improvisation up on stage will be frowned upon," Ciel declared, "and by more than just myself. But in this instance, that is a badly written line, written by someone who doesn't know you or understand you. It may be that there will be other gynoids or androids created to serve Atlas in the future, but though they follow in your footsteps, they will not be you any more than my brothers are myself. Each will be as unique as you are."

"A flower of the north?" Penny asked.

Ciel's lip twitched upwards. "Precisely. And every flower that blossoms amidst the rage of winter is unique."

Penny was silent for a moment. She listened to the music and the singing floating in from the stage. "It's beautiful, isn't it?"

"I prefer her earlier work; it was less commercialised," Ciel murmured.

Penny's eyes widened. "Are you a fan?"

"No," Ciel said quickly. "I have simply...been known to listen...upon occasion. You are correct; she has been blessed with an immensely talented voice in addition to all the other gifts with which she has been blessed: wealth, grace, valour, skill at arms, and the name of Schnee besides. She is incredibly fortunate."

"Do you think she's lucky?" Penny asked.

"Should I not?" Ciel replied.

"I just think..." Penny hesitated. "Because her name is Schnee, it's like she'll never get to decide for herself what she wants to be. Other people will choose for her."

"That..." Ciel paused. "That is very perceptive, Penny, I hadn't considered that...although now I see why it might have occurred to you. Are you unhappy with the role that has been set for you?"

"No," Penny said quickly. "But it has been chosen, by my father and General Ironwood and others. It's not bad, and because of it, I've made some great friends, but...it wasn't my choice."

"You swore an oath as a huntress of Atlas," Ciel reminded her. "Was that not your choice?"

Penny was silent for a moment. "Yes," she replied.

"No one can swear on your behalf," Ciel said. "No one can speak the words in your stead. No one can bind your soul and body and your honour to our flag but you. That you have done so, that you have chosen to do so...do not lose sight of that, for it is a choice worth making, though all other choices were denied to you."

Penny smiled, albeit briefly. "This party tonight, after the presentation?"

"Yes," Ciel murmured.

"How..." Penny trailed off. She looked down at her hands. "How should I behave?"

It was Ciel’s turn to take pause as she sought a kindly form of words. "With perhaps a little less spring in your step than usual. The after party will be attended by some of our kingdom's wealthiest and most distinguished citizens, including councillors and Jacques Schnee. A touch of decorum would not go amiss."

"You mean that I should act like you?" Penny asked.

Ciel's eyebrows rose. "That rather depends on what you mean by it."

Penny rose to her feet and glided around the stool with hands spread out on either side of her like a dancer. She faced Ciel and curtsied. "I am Ciel Soleil," she declared, her voice dropping an octave as she placed one hand over where her heart would have been, had she possessed one. "It is an honour to make your acquaintance."

Ciel's eyebrows rose yet higher. She folded her arms. "Penny, do you imagine that I was born to these manners?"

Penny blinked. "Yes?"

"My parents were NCOs. I am the first of my family to attend Atlas Academy, let alone graduate," Ciel declared. "I taught myself to behave with grace and courtesy so that I could mingle with Schnees and councillors and not shame myself with my conduct." Ciel spoke of her ambitions rarely, but that did not change the fact that she had ambitions. She did not intend to remain a humble specialist her whole career. "I am not one of them, so I must be better than perfect at the things they do."

Penny's face assumed a pensive expression. "Does that apply to me, too?"

"Perhaps not," Ciel said. "You are...a special case. Nevertheless, I believe that a little restraint would be advisable."

"Restraint," Penny said. "Got it."

Do you? Do you really? Ciel wondered. She had a great deal of affection for Penny, but the idea of her being restrained? Ciel, to put it politely, had doubts.

---

The set had passed more quickly than Weiss had expected it too. Indeed, she had been surprised by how natural she found it, being back here, singing. Once she had started to sing, it had been like slipping on an old and well worn shoe: it didn't matter how long ago you had last put it on, it hadn't regressed from being worn in in your absence. It had been much the same with being here; having trained her voice back into shape since her father had told her that she would be doing this, actually getting up on stage and doing had been easier than she had thought. Once the music began to play, she could lose herself in it, and during the short interludes between songs, it had been easy to slip back into singing idol mode, affecting a genial rapport with the audience, appearing to soak up their acclaim as though she needed it. If any of them realised that she didn't really want to be here, she would be very surprised.

Weiss smiled. "This is nearly the end of my session," she said. Somebody booed, and Weiss said, "Oh, thank you." She touched her heart as if flattered. "But before I go, I want to give you something a little different. This last number is brand new; it's something that I wrote especially for tonight, and I would like to dedicate it to my dear friends Blake Belladonna and Twilight Sparkle, who are in the audience tonight." Weiss paused. "At least I hope they are, I can't actually see any of your faces because of these lights." That got a laugh out of the audience, as she had expected that it would. "Okay," Weiss said. "This last song is called: This Life is Mine." She raised her hand to the technician in the wings, and waited for the soft, airy notes of the music to begin to echo through the concert hall.

Weiss began to wail, a haunting sound as though she had suddenly been possessed by some dread spirit, as the music swelled around her.

"Mirror...can you hear me?"

---

Ciel's eyebrows climbed into high reaches of her forehead, hidden beneath her bangs, as she waited in the wings with Penny and listened to Weiss finish her last song.

"I will not surrender,

This life is mine!"

An interesting time to declare war on your father, Ciel thought, for the meaning of the lyrics seemed to her to be quite unmistakable. And yet, unusual as the action might have been, unwise as it perhaps was, Ciel could not restrain a certain degree of admiration for Miss Schnee's boldness: she had planted her flag, come what may. It now only remained to be seen what her father would do about it.

The audience appeared to grasp at least some of Ciel's own thoughts upon the matter; or perhaps it was simply the fact that they hadn't felt quite so much like outsiders as adolescents that 'Mirror, Mirror' seemed to be speaking directly into their souls and thus they had been left without an appreciation for Miss Schnee's more introspective works. Either way, the applause for Weiss Schnee's final number was tepid, more polite than enthusiastic, even - or perhaps especially - from Mister Schnee up in his box.

Miss Schnee acknowledged the applause without acknowledging how little of it there was or how lacking in enthusiasm. She bowed to the audience. "Thank you," she said. "Thank you so much. And now, the moment that you've all been waiting for, the hero of Atlas and of the Battle of Vale: Penny Polendina, the Dragonslayer."

More music began to play, a stirring patriotic march, began to play, amplified by the acoustics in the concert hall.

Ciel turned to Penny. "Good luck," she said.

Penny nodded. She looked a trifle nervous. "Restrained?" she asked.

Ciel shook her head. "That's for the party. Now you can be as exuberant as you like."

"Great!" Penny cried. She patted her hair, as if it might have gotten out of place while she wasn't looking, and then strode out onto the stage, waving enthusiastically to the audience with one hand.

As the applause rolled down upon her like a wave cascading upon the shoreline, Penny and Weiss met near the centre of the stage. Penny clasped Weiss' hands together warmly, and Weiss said something to her that Ciel couldn't hear or make out from her lips, before Weiss, her elegant gown flowing like water all around her, left the stage and joined Ciel in the wings.

"That was an interesting choice of final song," Ciel said softly.

Weiss looked at her. "Did you like it?" she asked in a whisper.

Ciel was silent for a moment. "I prefer your introspective work to your rebellion anthems," she admitted, "or indeed your more commercial offerings."

"You might be the only person who does," Weiss muttered.

Penny stood in the centre of the stage, under the spotlight just as Weiss had been. She waved one final time as the applause died down.

"Salutations!" she cried. "My name is Penny Polendina, and I am the Dragonslayer of Vale!" Her swords, which had been slung across her back, shot into the air above Penny's hand, and as she flourished with one hand, they formed a spinning circle in the air beside her, resembling the drill of swords with which she had burrowed so fatally through the dragon.

"Did she write this herself, or was it written in some PR department?" Weiss asked in a hushed voice.

"The latter," Ciel replied, equally softly.

"But I am here tonight," Penny continued, "to ask for your help!" She pointed out at the audience, her finger tracing a line in the air from one wall to the other. "The Kingdom of Atlas is asking for your help, and so are all my comrades in the military. Not everyone can kill a leviathan-class grimm, or become a huntsman, or serve in the military, but if you buy Defence Bonds, every lien you spend puts a bullet in a soldier's gun! And if you buy enough bonds, why, you could buy a paladin or even a new cruiser!

"I'm Penny Dragonslayer, and I'm doing all I can to keep Atlas safe, alongside thousands of comrades who are doing all they can to defend our kingdom too. Are you doing all you can for Atlas? Buy Defence Bonds, and you can be a hero of Atlas, just like me!

"Now, it might not be safe for me to show you what I can do in here, but there is a film we made earlier..."

---

Applejack and Rainbow Dash sat on the roof of the control room of Farm Station B-13, one of the many phoney farms that dotted the corridor of land between Atlas and Mantle.

Yes, Applejack knew that the land around these parts was otherwise too cold and hard to be farmed, but that still didn’t make it farming what they were doing in these places, what with them big glass domes and the artificial heat to keep the cold out and the artificial everything else too on account of nothing natural but a little cold sunlight could get in through the glass. It might be the only way to grow food out here, but that didn’t make it farming. Real farming, like they had down south, was about working with what you got, sun or rain; it was about feeling the earth like you were connected to it, treating it with love so that you could get something out of it. It wasn’t about using fancy science to change the way the world was so that it suited you a little better.

Even if it sometimes seemed like Atlas was all about changing the world to suit itself better, in every single way possible.

There were times when Applejack felt out of step with the kingdom she lived in. She might have been better off being born in Mistral, or one of those out of the way places they had in Vale.

But that would have meant that she would have missed out on her friends, and she wouldn’t give them up just because she wasn’t the biggest fan of too much technology getting in the way of the simpler things in life.

“Thanks for agreeing to do this mission with me,” Rainbow said, as steam rose from the cup of hot chocolate she’d just poured out of her pastel pink vacuum flask. “Guard duty can get pretty boring by yourself.”

“Anytime, partner,” Applejack replied. She might not like these farm stations all that much, but that didn’t mean they didn’t need looking after. Most of work was done by robots - if she shifted around, she could look down through the glass and see them right now, working away like honeybees - but there were a few folks in the control room down below making sure the robots did what they were supposed to do and keeping the temperature right and all that, and so there was a need to protect them in case any grimm showed up. “You want something to eat?” she asked, before taking a sip of her own hot chocolate.

“You brought snacks?”

“Apple fritters.”

“Oh, you’re the best,” Rainbow said, as Applejack reached out from underneath her winterweight poncho and shoved the plastic tub of fritters towards Rainbow Dash, who sat opposite her on the flat dark roof, where they both leaned against ventilation shafts rising up out of the ceiling. Rainbow grabbed one of the fritters in her hand and bit into it with a satisfying crunch. She grinned. “You know, some people say that the life of a huntress is rough. But here we are: a beautiful night, good food and good friends. Seems like an okay life to me.”

Applejack chuckled. Her rifle - One in a Thousand, and no, that was not a reference to the average number of times she hit the target, Rainbow Dash - was slung over her shoulder; it shifted slightly as Applejack grabbed her guitar and put it across her lap. “We even got music,” she said, strumming gently on the strings.

“I’m not sure how much the guys who are relying on us to stay alert would appreciate that,” Rainbow said. “But...yeah, this isn’t a bad life.”

“Nope.”

Rainbow finished off her fritter. “I...I really mean it, Applejack; thanks for coming out here. You didn’t have to after the way I acted.”

“It ain’t nothing,” Applejack said. “It’s all done with now.”

Rainbow’s brow furrowed. “Is it?”

“Sure it is,” Applejack said. “You said you were sorry; there ain’t nothing more to be said about it.”

Rainbow nodded. “All the same…”

“All the same, what?” Applejack asked.

“I can’t believe that you thought I was mad at you,” Rainbow said. “Seriously, why would you think I was mad at you?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Applejack said, her voice laced with sarcasm.

---

One month earlier…

Applejack pushed her hat back on her head. “Well ain’t that a whole mess of worms in the apple barrel.”

“Mmhmm,” Rainbow growled, her arms folded across her chest. Her head was turned away, and she didn’t meet Applejack’s eyes.

“So that woman who had me and Fluttershy captured was working for the Queen of the Grimm this whole time?”

“Yeah,” Rainbow muttered.

“And she’s trying to-”

“I just told you all of this, do you really have to repeat it back to me?” Rainbow snapped.

---

Present day…

“Maybe it was the way that you looked at me like I’d just shot Tank and squashed him under my boot, and darn near bit my head clean off, too,” Applejack said.

“Right,” Rainbow said, scratching the back of her head. “Sorry about that.”

“You had stuff going on,” Applejack said. “I’m just glad that you weren’t actually mad at me.”

“Nah,” Rainbow said. “The General should have picked you from the start. You should have led the team, and I should have gone with Fluttershy.”

“General Ironwood has his reasons,” Applejack said. “I ain’t gonna call him wrong about you leading a team any more than I’m about to call him wrong for keeping most folks in the dark about...this whole thing. The General’s always had a soft spot for you, and I can see why; nobody I’d rather have by my side neither.” She paused. “I never meant to take your place. I’d never do that to you.”

“And I’d never blame you if you did; you’re like my sister.”

“Oh, no,” Applejack said. “I got enough trouble with the little sister that I got without taking responsibility for you, too.”

“Why am I the little sister?”

Applejack looked at her.

“Okay, sure, you’d totally be the big sister,” Rainbow muttered. “So what do you think, about...all this? I was too...much of a jerk to really ask you that before.”

Applejack said nothing for a moment, her fingers gently strumming the strings on her guitar. “It’s one heck of a thing,” she admitted, “but...I guess I never was one to believe in no miracle to make the grimm go away, and now, I know I was right about that. They ain’t never gonna be gone. They’re like weeds or worms; they just keep coming back, but they can be kept away so long as we keep keepin’ ‘em away.”

“And the rest?” Rainbow asked. “Maidens, magic, relics?”

Applejack sighed. “I don’t deny the world has got a mite more complicated. Or at least more complicated than I thought it was. I can see why the General and the others keep all of this stuff to themselves.” At least, since they’d started keeping it to themselves, she could see why they didn’t stop; it was a lot to ask anybody to take in all at once, and she could see that not everybody would take it all that well. She could even see that not everybody would take it in a way that worked best for everybody. Applejack tried to see the good in this world, but that didn’t mean she didn’t see the bad, too. That Cinder woman who had them captured - she was supposed to be all better now, or something, but that wasn’t going to stop Applejack knocking a few of her teeth clean out for threatening Fluttershy that way if she ever saw her again - was proof that some folks were best off not knowing how much power they could get hold of if they went looking for it. “Since you never told me, I’m guessing you don’t know who the Maidens are?”

“No,” Rainbow said. “I don’t even know who the Fall Maiden is right now. Hopefully it isn’t Cinder, but...yeah, I don’t know their names.”

“I guess we’ll be told if we need to be told,” Applejack said. “Until then...the relics are locked up - except for the one that the enemy got and we can’t get back on account of the whole can’t kill her thing - the maidens got the magic, and if we need to have anything to do with that...the song remains the same, I guess, is what I’m trying to say.” She strummed her guitar again for additional emphasis. “We do our jobs, protect our homes...make sure there’s a home left for someone else to take care of once we’re through.”

“Except our enemy has the relic that lets them make all the right moves,” Rainbow murmured.

“This ain’t chess,” Applejack said. “Which is good, seeing as how neither of us can play worth a damn. But she can know the right moves and she can make the right moves, too; it doesn’t mean we got to roll over and die when she makes that move. She can know what to do all she likes; she doesn’t know how hard we can hit back when she does it.”

Rainbow grinned. “Well, we did give her a taste already, but...yeah, I’ve got no problem giving her another.”

The two of them looked up, their eyes drawn inexorably towards the broken moon that shone so brightly all the stars around were drowned out by its radiance.

“We can win this, right?” Rainbow said. “I mean maybe we can’t win win, but we can hold this ground, right?”

“We can,” Applejack declared. “On account of we got so much ridin’ on us that we can’t afford to lose.”

“So we won’t,” Rainbow said.

“Nope,” Applejack agreed. “We won’t.”

---

The ballroom was filled with the elite of the Kingdom of Atlas.

Or at least it was filled with its wealthiest and most prestigious citizens; Weiss wasn't sure that she would characterise most of these people as the elite, although many of them thought of themselves in that way, but as she stood in the ballroom, she wondered how much actual virtue there was amongst this moneyed company. They filled the ballroom in their gowns and suits, their jewels and chokers, the pearls and diamonds that adorned the wrists and neck of every lady. It was enough to make Weiss glance awkwardly down at the sapphire bracelet dangling from her wrist.

I am not like them.

I won't become like them.

She was standing beside Whitley, both of them standing silently behind their father, still and silent, standing there like dolls while he talked to a group of high-to-mid-level functionaries, people of the sort that Weiss would not normally have expected her father to associate with. Her father had not actually introduced them to either Weiss or Whitley - nor had he introduced his children to his guests; perhaps he simply expected them to be known to all concerned - but she was pretty certain that one of them was Principal Cinch, the woman who had been meeting with her father when Weiss had come back from her session with Rarity. The principal was a woman of late middle age, with hair in various shades of purple and pink, and sharp eyes behind a pair of half-moon spectacles. She put Weiss in mind of an older, possibly disappointed Professor Goodwitch, her face beginning to bear the lines of years. Weiss had less idea of who the flamboyantly dressed man with the goatee and high-collared cape or the slightly plump blue-haired woman were, but from what they said to her father she got the impression that they were all high level functionaries of one sort or another; not the sort of people she would have expected her father to associate.

A combat school principal? Really? What business could you possibly have with her, father?

Principal Cinch looked at Weiss over her father’s shoulder. She stared at her. Weiss looked away, but not before catching a glimpse of the older woman’s eyes; it was as though she could sense Weiss’ curiosity.

Principal Cinch coughed into hand. “Mister Schnee, perhaps these matters, sensitive as they are, are best discussed with a little more privacy.”

“Hmm?” Jacques looked over his shoulder, as if he were only now noticing the presence of his children for the first time. “Ah…yes, I see your point. Children, go amuse yourselves for a little while. I have urgent business to discuss.”

Whitely smiled slightly as he bowed, one hand tucked behind his back. “Of course, Father. Ladies, sir.”

Weiss spread her flowing gown out upon either side of her. “Sir, madams.”

The gentlemen in the scarlet cape inclined his head towards her. “Miss Weiss.”

The blue-haired woman said, “We must talk later, Miss Schnee. My son has told me so much about you.”

Weiss stopped. “Your son?”

“Later, Weiss,” Jacques said sharply. “Can’t you see we’re busy?”

“Of course,” Weiss said. “I’m sorry, Father.”

She curtsied for a second time and backed away a few steps before she turned around and started walking forwards before, in backing, she tripped over the hem of a dress that looked wonderful but was perhaps not the most practical thing in the world to wear.

She looked for her friends, but amidst the press of Atlesian high society in all their glittering finery – not to mention the serving staff who made their way assiduously amongst them, serving drinks and hors d’oeuvres while sometimes being berated by the guests for whatever they had done wrong – it was hard to make out anybody specifically. She couldn’t even see Whitley any more, and he’d only been gone for a moment.

As she looked, Weiss’ steps carried her towards the back of the ballroom, where a series of works of art for silent auction sat behind a red velvet rope. They were all in a patriotic style, intended to stir the blood and raise enthusiasm for all things Atlas and its military: a portrait of Penny, seeming to float in the air, her swords forming a ring around her; Atlesian cruisers soaring above the clouds in perfect formation; mighty Paladins striding forth. All very inspiring if you liked that sort of thing, but at the same time, Weiss couldn’t help but feel that they were touched with loss: the ships that soared with such precision had been torn to pieces, the paladins that trod so heavily upon the ground were now reduced to bolts and armour fragments. Only the Dragonslayer herself had come through the battle unscathed.

The central painting was definitely touched with loss, and unlike the other works, it was probably intentional. It was a painting of Beacon, the intact tower rising up towards the top of the frame, with Atlesian warships hovering in the sky at or near level with the tower’s tip, each ship facing a different direction as though they were floating sentinels set to guard the tower. But Weiss’ gaze was drawn down from those lofty heights to the grounds of the academy itself, which had been painted in such a way as to seem as though it was full of ghosts.

The courtyard was alive with people, but rather than paint any specific figures – Weiss could not see herself here, nor Flash, nor Cardin, nor Blake, nor anyone else – or even generic stand ins to represent the students, the artist had drawn mere coloured silhouettes in the shape of men and women, silhouettes that perhaps she could have identified had they been a little larger and she had time. Some were white, some were green, and some were blue. White for Atlas, blue for Mistral, green for Vale; the ghosts of three kingdoms haunted this representation of Beacon. Realising that made Weiss look again at some of the combinations of colours; there were two white Atlesians, one male and one female, in company with two green Valish men; was that supposed to be Team WSTW, or was she just imagining things, clutching at straws? And what about the Atlesian, Mistralian and Valish girl with the Valish boy over there?

I’m almost certainly reading too much into it.

But I’m also almost certain that reading into it is precisely the point of this painting.

Nobody can see themselves in this work...but at the same time everybody can.

The only figures who were not silhouettes where the Atlesian knights scattered around the perimeter…only they were not drawn accurately either; rather, android heads had been painted onto the bodies of true knights of old, clad in archaic armour and wielding long lances with the Atlesian flag upon their pennants.

“That’s a weird thing, isn’t it?”

Weiss’ attention was drawn towards a young man with blue hair, all combed over across one side of his face, who had snuck up on her while she was distracted. He was wearing a black waistcoat bedecked with silver over a salmon-coloured shirt. Rings of silver sat heavily upon his fingers.

She glanced at him for a moment, before returning her attention to the painting. “I like it,” she replied. “It reminds me of…happier times.”

The blue-haired boy was silent for a moment. “I guess it does have a certain charm about it.” He smiled sheepishly. “You two are a match in that.”

Weiss rolled her eyes. “Has that line ever worked on anyone?”

“Not yet, but I believe in learning from my mistakes,” the boy said. “And besides, it has broken the ice, hasn’t it?”

Weiss exhaled loudly. “In a manner of speaking, I suppose.”

He held out his hand to her. “I’m Henry…Marigold.”

Weiss sighed as she held out a pale and languid hand to him. “Weiss Schnee.”

“I know, I saw your performance,” Henry said, as he took Weiss’ hand and held it for a moment. “You were wonderful, and I promise I’m not just saying that because you’re pretty.”

“Honestly, sir, I thought you ought to take a hint,” Blake said, as she and Twilight walked out of the crowd towards the pair. “I think she’s made it pretty clear that she’s not interested.”

“Blake!” Weiss cried, whirling to face her friend. “You came!”

“I said I would, didn’t I?” Blake replied. “Did you have doubts?”

“No, I…” Weiss trailed off for a moment as she took in Blake’s dress. The Princess of Menagerie was gowned in shimmering black velvet, sewn with diamond dust so that it glittered like the stars in the night sky, while a silver white sash was tied around her waist in a loose, slightly sloping fashion, the ends trailing a little down her hip. Slightly puffy capped shoulders left her arms bare, but only until her long white gloves began. A slit down one side of her cocktail dress exposed her leg as she walked. A white choker enfolded her throat, just standing out against her fair skin. “You look amazing.”

The corner of Blake’s lip twitched upwards. “So do you.”

“Thanks,” Weiss said. “And thank you, Twilight, for introducing us both to the best dressmaker in Atlas that nobody knows about.”

“I’ll have to remember to tell Rarity you said that; she’ll probably stick it in the window,” Twilight said. “That was a great show, Weiss, absolutely amazing.”

“Although I’m slightly questioning whether or not you want us around,” Blake said with an undercurrent of amusement in her voice.

“Excuse me?” Weiss said. “I dedicated a song to the two of you.”

“A song that was all about telling someone to get out of your life and stop trying to control you,” Blake pointed out.

Weiss scoffed. “That wasn’t about either of you,” she declared. “Are you really going to leave me alone again with-“ she turned around, but Henry Marigold was gone. He had sloped off somewhere while Weiss was distracted. “Huh. I guess he could take a hint.” She returned her attention to her friends. “I’m so glad you liked the performance, Twilight. And what about you, Blake?”

“Apart from my confusion over your message,” Blake said, a slight smile playing across her face. “You have a great voice.”

“I suppose I do,” Weiss murmured. “If only that was the end of it.”

“You mean as long as you didn’t have to go through this party?” Blake suggested.

Weiss gestured at the guests in the ballroom. “These are supposed to be the elite of our kingdom, if you can believe that.”

Blake was silent for a moment, her golden eyes scanning the crowd. “The elite of this kingdom is found amongst its armies,” she said. “Not here.”

Weiss’ eyebrows rose. “Do you hear the Atlesian anthem playing in your head when you say things like that?”

“What?” Blake demanded, the dash of shock that Weiss had said such a thing mingling with the greater portion of offence at what it might imply, or perhaps she really did hear the anthem and didn’t see what was wrong with doing so.

“I’m just saying,” Weiss replied. “Since you came here, you’ve become more Atlesian than the Atlesians.” She smirked. “It’s actually quite adorable.”

Blake snorted. “Perhaps I have to be more Atlesian than the Atlesians, seeing as I’m not one.”

“I suppose,” Weiss murmured. “But that doesn’t mean that you have to go around saying things like that.”

“Like what? That there are better people wearing an Atlesian uniform than there are in this room?” Blake asked. “Is that something so controversial that it has to be debated?”

“Perhaps not controversial,” Twilight said, “but possibly not something that should be said too loudly while you are actually in this room.”

Blake looked at her. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I know how to keep my thoughts to myself…although I have gotten a little out of practice lately.”

It must be nice to be able to speak your mind, Weiss thought. She fussed with the bracelet on her wrist, turning it this way and that. "Twilight's right," she said softly. "Even if you're right - and I can believe it - probably best not to say so. These people really do like to think of themselves as the best of Atlas, even if they're not."

"Some of them might be," Blake allowed. "I probably shouldn't judge them all based on one party."

"Were you judging?" Twilight asked. "Or were you just praising the people you know better?"

Blake was silent for a moment. "Maybe a little of both." She tucked some stray hairs behind her human ear. "So, any thoughts on how the fundraising is going?"

"I wouldn't get your hopes up too high," Weiss said. "The richest people in Atlas didn't get that way by spending their money to help good causes."

Blake's eyebrows rose. "You caution me to watch what I say, and then you come out with something like that?"

"I can say what I like; I'm Jacques Schnee's daughter," Weiss declared, although in her opinion, she wasn't saying it particularly loudly. "Although I suppose most of them will contribute something; patriotism is still somewhat fashionable at the moment, and no one wants to be left behind by the pack." She turned back to look at the painting of Beacon and all its ghosts. "You know...I think I might buy this."

Blake and Twilight joined her in front of the painting.

"Really?" Blake asked, scepticism evident in her voice.

"You don't like it?" Weiss said.

"I can see what it's trying to do, I think," Blake conceded. "But...no." She paused. "Although I have a tree made out of guns in my dorm room, so who am I to criticise your taste in art?"

Weiss frowned. "A tree made of guns?"

"It's a symbol of peace," said Blake, in a dryly serious tone.

"I see," Weiss murmured, even though she didn’t really.

"Do you really want to look at this all the time?" Twilight inquired. "I mean...doesn't it make you sad. This...this is how it should have been, all the kingdoms-"

"Can we briefly pause to observe the fact that Vacuo is nowhere to be seen?" Blake pointed out. "If Sun were here, he'd probably be very offended." She paused. "Actually, he probably wouldn't, but he'd have the right to be."

"Well, no offence to Sun Wukong," said Weiss, "but the fact is that, even before your mother signed that treaty, Menagerie was more of a real country in many ways that Vacuo." She smiled. "I'm sorry, Twilight, you were saying?"

"It's okay," Twilight said. She pushed her glasses back up her nose. "But...this is how it should have been: all the students coming together under the protection of Atlas, but doesn't that just make you sad that the reality ended up being quite different?"

"Not that different," Blake suggested. "The city and the kingdom were protected, even if the school wasn't."

"You really are getting extra money from the PR department, aren't you?" Weiss asked seriously.

"No, I-" Blake stopped when she saw the smile on Weiss' face. She pouted ever so slightly - it was adorable - and shook her head.

"So, are you going to buy the painting?" asked Twilight.

Weiss looked at the price. It was pricey, but by the time her father saw the bill for her credit card it would be too late; he wouldn't risk the embarrassment of trying to get his money back from the military and the ensuing negative PR. "I think I will," she said. "It's for a good cause, after all. And I'll have gotten something out of this party." She sighed, leaning against one of the metal poles holding up the red rope. "When is this going to be over?"

"I'm not sure," said a voice that was familiar, one which she hadn't heard in too long. "But I'm glad that it's not over just yet."

Weiss turned around. Standing in front of her, having just emerged out of the press of party guests, was Flash Sentry.

"Flash?" Weiss murmured.

He grinned nervously. "Hey."

"Flash!" Weiss cried, crossing the short space between them in a dash, her gown billowing out around her, as she leapt up to wrap her arms around him. "I've missed you."

She felt him put his arms around her, holding her close. "It's great to see you, too," he murmured. He held her for a moment, their cheeks - their whole bodies - pressed against one another, before he gently lowered her back down to the ground. Two pairs of blue eyes stared into one another.

"We'll leave you to it," Twilight said, an unabashed smile playing across her face. "Come on, Blake; let's see if we can find Penny."

"Sure," Blake said, as she allowed Twilight to lead her away. She too was smiling, although she was being a lot more subtle about it than Twilight.

Weiss didn't really care. They could think what they liked. Seeing him again, after so long - or what had felt like so long - now here was a blue-haired boy whose company she had no objection too. "I had no idea you were coming," she said softly.

"I wanted it to be a surprise," Flash said. "Surprise!"

Weiss snorted and giggled at the same time.

"That was the first time I'd ever heard you sing," Flash said. "You were beautiful out there."

Weiss felt a slight flush rising to her cheeks. "Thank you," she said. She frowned. "You'd never heard me sing before?"

Flash laughed nervously. "I was, um, I was kind of a rock snob when I was younger," he admitted, scratching the back of his head with one hand. "If you couldn't play a guitar solo you weren't a real artist, that kind of thing."

"You were an idiot, you mean."

Flash laughed even louder. "Yeah, I guess you could put it like that. And then...it didn't feel right to listen to your records while we were on the same team together. It felt...weird, you know?"

"I...I think I do, yeah," Weiss replied. She paused, and in that pause she finally noticed what it was that Flash was wearing: a crisp, white Atlesian uniform, with a touch of gold brocade hanging down his right shoulder, and silver facings on his collar and his cuffs. "Are you-?"

"Would you mind if we got some air?" Flash asked, before she could finish her question.

Weiss nodded. "Sure." She slipped her hand into his as they turned towards the great glass bay doors that led out of the ballroom and onto the balcony beyond. Flash looked down at her hand in his, then looked back up to her and smiled.

Weiss smiled back as she lifted up her gown with her free hand and the two of them walked together through the guests and the waiting staff, opening up one of the glass doors and stepping outside into the chill night air.

"Is that better?" Weiss asked.

"Yeah," Flash said. "But...aren't you cold out here?"

"Only a little," Weiss said. "I have my aura."

"All the same," Flash said, and he took off his white jacket and draped it like a cape around her pale, slender shoulders.

Weiss' lips twitched upwards. "Thank you," she whispered, as she hopped up onto the white balcony rail, holding his jacket around her. "So...I'm not sure that I know where to start. It's been-"

"Months," Flash said. "Yeah, I know. I'm sorry about that."

"You don't need to apologise," Weiss said. "Although...I wouldn't mind knowing where you've been."

Flash leaned upon the rail. "Getting my prosthetic," he said. "Rehab. And then...then I needed to decide where I was going to go from there. What I was going to do, now that Beacon's gone and everything is...so different. I went back to Canterlot for a little bit to clear my head." He smiled wryly. "I fought with my mom a lot."

Weiss snorted. "What about?"

"She never liked the idea of me becoming a huntsman," Flash admitted. "I, on the other hand, didn't really want to join the military. I wanted to do the right thing the way I saw it, not the way some general saw it. After I got back, Mom wanted me to take a job in the government, or maybe study law like she did." He paused. "So we compromised: I've become a huntsman but in the military, and she made sure that I got an assignment where I won't lose any more limbs. Which is why you're looking at Lieutenant Flash Sentry of the Council Guard."

Weiss' eyebrows rose. "You're in the Guard?"

"Like I said, my mom wanted me to be safe," Flash said.

Weiss chuckled. "Well, I for one thought you looked very dashing, in the brief moment before you so gallantly gave me your jacket."

"And you look beautiful," Flash said. "With or without the jacket."

They stared into one another's eyes. Weiss...she had missed him so much, but how could she ignore the fact that under his pants leg there was a prosthetic where once a real leg had been and that was all her fault? She'd been a terrible leader, and because of that Flash had lost a leg. It was incredible that he still wanted to talk to her after that, and there was no way that he would feel...no, he couldn't. Could he?

She didn't know what to say.

She didn't know how to say it.

Flash scratched the back of his head. “Did you…get the bouquet that I sent you?”

Weiss blinked. “You didn’t…was that you? The bouquet of roses without a note?”

“Surprise,” Flash repeated. “Again.”

Weiss giggled, covering her mouth with one hand. “Yes,” she said. “I got your mysterious bouquet of flowers. It was very sweet of you…although you could have attached a note.”

“I wasn’t sure what to say,” Flash admitted. “A part of me…a part of me was worried that I’d left it too late to say anything.”

“That isn’t true,” Weiss said. “At least…I hope it isn’t true.”

Flash stared into her eyes. “I think…I think it’s only true if we both think it is.”

“But we don’t,” Weiss replied. So why is it so hard to know what to say to you?

But then there was no need to say anything because he was kissing her.

At first she was surprised, her eyes widening as his tongue touched hers. But then...then she let herself go with it, closing her eyes and melting into his embrace as he put his arms around her, pulled her towards him, lifting her off the balcony and pressing her body against his. Her arms were around his shoulders, pawing at them; she could feel one hand of his running through her ponytail. His jacket fell to the floor at their feet.

When he stopped Weiss was flushed and breathless. "Took you long enough," she whispered.

“Was it worth the wait?” Flash asked, his tone mingling humour and anxiety in almost equal measure.

The only response from Weiss was a bright smile that slowly spread across her face until it made her blue eyes shine brightly as a summer sky.

This time it was her who initiated the kiss, putting her hands on his face, running her delicate fingers through his hair as he put his hands upon her shoulders. It was...she’d been waiting for this; she didn’t realise just how long she’d been waiting for this but she had. She’d been waiting for this since...since the Vytal Festival? Since second semester? Since he’d asked her out and she’d told him ‘not yet’ because telling him ‘no’ would have been a lie?

It didn’t really matter. However long she’d waited for this, the wait was over now. It was here.

They lingered out there on the balcony for a few minutes, neither of them wishing to - or willing to - go back inside; neither of them wanting to rejoin the crowd within the ballroom. Though a great crowd thronged just a few feet away, upon this balcony in the chill night air it felt as though they were within their own little world, cut off entirely from the rest of Remnant, as if fairies had spirited them away to some secluded bower where none would find them.

And neither of them wanted to rejoin the real world. Not yet.

And yet their awareness of that world pressed down upon them nevertheless.

“So,” Flash muttered. “Are we going to tell your father that we’re going out.” He stopped. “We are going out, right?”

“I don’t know, are you going to take me out?”

“Yes,” Flash said, a little more loudly than necessary. “I mean, if you’d like to...go out for dinner sometime, or something.”

Weiss smiled. “I’d love to.”

Flash grinned. “So...are we going to tell your father?”

“I’d rather-”

"Ahem."

Weiss realised with a growing sense of mortified dread that her father was watching both of them, standing in the doorway that they had just used to get out onto the balcony. His look was frigid, and Weiss felt the flush of her kiss freeze under the wintry chill of her father's gaze.

"Father," she murmured.

Flash also looked as terrified as the situation warranted, and his hand trembled as he held it out. His voice shook too as he said, "Flash Sentry, sir. It's an honour to meet you."

Jacques gazed at Flash's hand as though it were covered in dirt from the mines, but after half a moment, his expression softened. His tone, when he spoke, verged on genial. "Ah, so you're Silver's boy. Your mother and I have become quite good friends, and she's told me so much about you." He took Flash's hand. "I would have preferred it if you'd asked first, but don't worry. I was once a young man myself, after all." He gave a leering sort of laugh that Weiss could not help but find incredibly creepy.

"Uh, thank you, sir," Flash said, sounding as confused as Weiss felt by her father's reaction.

"All the same," Jacques said. "Probably best if you both come inside. Now."

"Of course, Father," Weiss said softly, gathered up the folds of her skirt as she followed him back into the ballroom. Flash, having picked up his jacket off the balcony floor, gave her a look that seemed to be asking what was going on, to which Weiss could only hope that he took her own look that he had no more idea than she did.

The blue-haired woman with whom her father had been speaking earlier approached. "Flash! I've been looking for you."

"I found him with my daughter," Jacques said.

The woman's eyes widened. "Mister Schnee, I apologise-"

"Please, Silver, there's no need to react that way," Jacques said breezily. "Boys will be boys, after all, and, from what you've told me, your son is a fine young man, now that he's put his youthful foolishness behind him and decided to settle down to a life here in Atlas. Perhaps he can teach my daughter to do the same." He chuckled. "Frankly, I wouldn't have thought Weiss had the good judgement to choose someone so suitable."

"Is this your mother?" Weiss hissed,

Flash nodded. "Weiss, allow me to introduce my mother, Silver Sentry, Law Officer to the Council. Mom, this is Weiss Schnee...my..." he trailed off, probably because they hadn't had a chance to talk about what that kiss meant before all of this.

"His girlfriend," Weiss finished for him, holding out one pale hand. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Mrs Sentry. Your son is a wonderful young man."

"And so taken with you, Miss Schnee," Silver Sentry said, taking Weiss' hand for a moment. "I must say, the gulf between you and that traitorous faunus hussy he was last involved with is unbridgeable. I'm glad that you've finally started making good choices in your life, Flash."

"Thanks, Mom," Flash muttered, not sounding very grateful in the least.

"Your father is a great man, Miss Schnee; I hope you realise that," Silver Sentry said. "He is going to change our Kingdom, and for the better."

"All with the help of my good friends," Jacques said.

Why are you acting like this, Father? Weiss wanted to ask. Just what in Atlas is going on here?

“Weiss, stand over here,” Jacques commanded, gesturing to a place just beside him and to his right. “Now that I’ve found you the time is right, I think; and Whitley- Whitley!” he snapped his fingers at his son, summoning him away from Diamond Tiara. “Stand beside me, to my left.” Only when his children were in their proper positions, posed behind him like puppets or dolls, did their father raise his voice to attract the attention of all his guests throughout the ballroom. "Ladies and gentlemen, your attention for a moment if I may.”

---

Ciel cut nimbly through the crowd to return to the side of Penny, handing her a flute glass filled with light brown drinking chocolate. "Here," Ciel said. "Your drinking chocolate."

"Thank you," Penny said, plucking the flute glass from Ciel's grasp. She frowned as she placed her fingertips upon it. "Shouldn't it be hot?"

"Not this particular kind; it's served cold, like gazpacho soup," Ciel explained.

"Oh," Penny said. "Okay then." She drained about half the glass in one go. "It is quite nice."

"It is supposed to be sipped," Ciel informed her in a tone of gentle reproach. "Although it still amazes me that you can drink anything at all."

"It was always my father's intent that I would be able to pass for human," Penny declared. "But there wasn’t time to complete that non-critical functionality before we left for Vale. Even though everyone knows what I am now, Moondancer still gave me the upgrade like they’d originally planned. So although I don't need nutrients to survive, I can consume them. My tongue has simulated taste buds on it, and my lower torso contains a processing unit in which waste is stored before being-"

"Yes, thank you, Penny, that's enough for now," Ciel said quickly. "Some things are not appropriate conversation for the dinner table, or the party for that matter; although I do admit it is my fault for having brought the subject up. Ahem. In any case, how are you enjoying the party so far?"

"It's okay," Penny said. "Restraint can be a little...boring."

"Yet it is no less necessary for that," Ciel reminded her. She hesitated. It was rather ridiculous that she was even considering asking Penny about this, but at the same time, who else could she really ask? Who else would even want to listen. "Penny," she said softly, "may I ask you a frivolous question?"

"Frivolous questions are some of the best ones," Penny answered. "Ask away."

"Do you..." Ciel trailed off momentarily. "Should I...do you think I should grow my hair out?"

"Huh?"

"You know," Ciel said, patting her hair lightly one hand. "Let it grow a little longer before cutting it."

Penny blinked; her eyes moved up and down Ciel's body as though she were scanning the other girl. "How long were you thinking?"

"I'm not quite sure yet," Ciel admitted. "As long as Twilight, possibly."

"Do you want hair as long as Twilight?" inquired Penny.

"Not particularly," Ciel said, "but I would not wear it long; rather...it might allow me to style it in more interesting ways: pinned back, in a bun, perhaps a chignon."

Penny stroked her chin and placed her other hand upon her hip as she assumed a knowing look, or at least an approximation thereof. "Is this for Lieutenant Thunderlane?" she asked.

"Thunderlane has not mentioned my hair," Ciel declared proudly. Certainly, she would not tolerate being dictated to in matters of appearance upon a first date. She could stand a doughnut shop, but she could not have stood commentary on how she could improve her appearance. "However, I do wonder if he might prefer...something a little more interesting that would, nevertheless, not compromise operational effectiveness."

"Hmm," Penny mused. "I can't see it, but then that's probably because you don't have long hair. Can you imagine me with long hair?"

Ciel considered it for a moment. "No," she conceded.

"And yet I've been thinking about it too," Penny said, with one finger in the air. "Do you think I could pull it off?"

"Possibly," Ciel acknowledged. "If accompanied by a general maturation of style."

"Hey, girls," Twilight said, emerging from out of the milling press of guests with Blake in tow. "What's up?"

"Ciel and I were just talking about doing our hair and cute boys," Penny said enthusiastically.

"Really?" Blake asked, with an undercurrent of amusement in her voice.

"We were not talking about doing our hair and cute boys," Ciel said, with a degree of asperity in her tone. "We were talking about doing our hair and handsome men."

"That is a big difference," Blake agreed in a completely earnest tone of voice. "Although there is something to be said for older boys, if you understand my meaning."

"You think there's something to be said for immaturity?" Ciel asked.

"It has its charms," Blake replied.

“Referring, I presume, to that Sun Wukong fellow who tried to stowaway on board the Valiant before the fleet sailed for home?” Ciel asked, her tone becoming somewhat arch.

A flush of colour appeared on Blake’s pale cheeks. “I...you certainly can’t fault his earnestness.”

"Which do you think Flash is?" asked Twilight. "Boy or man?"

"I wouldn't presume to know him well enough to say," Blake said.

"Who are we talking about now?" inquired Penny.

"Flash Sentry, Weiss' boyfriend."

"Weiss has a boyfriend?" Penny asked.

"He's not actually her boyfriend," Blake replied.

"If he isn't yet, he will be by the end of the night," Twilight declared.

"That sounds fascinating," Penny said. "I wonder where they are." She started to stand on her tiptoes to see over the crowded ballroom.

"Penny, down," Ciel commanded. "The state of affairs between Miss Schnee and Mister Sentry are none of our concern. How are the two of you enjoying the party so far?"

"It was fine," Blake said. "Until someone decided that it was amusing that I feel proud to wear this...okay, I'm not wearing this uniform right now, but you know what I mean."

"Hey! That was Weiss, not me," Twilight said.

"Whichever of them it was did you wrong, Blake," Ciel said. "There is much honour in wearing this uniform which we are only metaphorically wearing at this precise moment; to wear it is to wear the honour of Atlas itself, to be custodian of it but also to be cloaked by it in turn; and there is honour too in the path that you have chosen, for all that I imagine it must seem a lonely one at times."

"It's weird how you two are becoming so alike when you've barely exchanged three words with one another," Twilight murmured.

"Because we are both members of a band of brothers," Ciel said.

“Since we barely know any boys, shouldn’t it be a band of sisters?” Penny asked.

“That doesn’t have the alliteration,” Ciel explained.

“A sorority of sisters?” Twilight suggested.

“That just makes us sound like nothing more than school friends,” Ciel said.

“Which you are, when it comes down to it, aren’t you?” asked a new and unfamiliar voice to the conversation. “And even if you weren’t, as a proud Shadowbolt, I feel obliged to ask if you think there’s anything wrong with that?”

All eyes turned to the figure who had stolen upon them so swiftly and with such stealth. She was a girl of average height, or perhaps a little shorter, with white hair tinted with just a hint of blue, worn in two large ponytails descending on either side of her shoulders, and thick-rimmed square glasses covering her purple eyes. She was wearing a crisp white dress uniform, with a dark bow tie around her neck.

“Sugarcoat,” Twilight said, without all that much enthusiasm. “You found me.”

“Of course,” Sugarcoat said. “If you want to avoid me, try not to make so much noise.”

“I wasn’t trying to avoid you,” Twilight said, with a hint of guilt in her voice. “I’m just not sure that I need close protection at an event like this.”

“Oh, so this is one of your bodyguards,” Blake said. Of course, General Ironwood mentioned Sugarcoat in the room. She held out one hand. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, I’m-”

“Specialist Junior Grade Blake Belladonna,” Sugarcoat cut her off with a monotone that sounded like a slightly raspier version of Ciel’s voice and a flat stare to match. “So-called Warrior Princess of Menagerie.” Her expression didn’t alter as she added. “An impressive nickname for someone who spent the Battle of Vale hiding in a hole.”

Blake’s hand fell to her side. “Excuse me?”

“Was anything that I said untrue?” Sugarcoat asked.

“It would be just as accurate, and more courteous, to say that Specialist Belladonna was assisting in the protection of Councillor Cadenza,” Ciel replied. “Or would you like to have it said of you that you hid during some battle while you were doing your duty safeguarding Twilight?”

“They can say that if they like; that will also be true,” Sugarcoat acknowledged.

Twilight cringed. “Listen...Sugarcoat...I know that you’re here to protect me and everything, but...could you please try and be...a little less aggressively you?”

Sugarcoat stared at her flatly for a moment. “No,” she said. She switched her attention back to Blake. “So, Belladonna, what do you think of Atlas so far?”

“Well, the company isn’t always brilliant,” Blake said pointedly, “but overall, I like it here. I like it a lot.”

“Of course you do,” Sugarcoat said. “You’ve bought into the mirage, like so many people here.”

“Mirage?” Blake repeated.

“My semblance allows me to pinpoint the exact weakness of anything,” Sugarcoat declared in a seeming non-sequitur. “In combat I use it to know exactly where to shoot my target to shatter it.”

Blake’s eyes narrowed, and Ciel confessed that she was struggling somewhat to see the relevance of the abrupt change of subject. “That’s a useful semblance,” Blake murmured.

“You don’t understand,” Sugarcoat said, a hint of impatience entering her voice. “The weakness of anything. This kingdom, this society, this way of life.”

“Atlas has no weaknesses,” Ciel declared.

Sugarcoat snorted. “Do you believe that, or do you think that spouting slogans will protect you?”

“I think that we’ll protect each other,” Penny answered in a defensively perky tone, “and make up for one another’s weaknesses so that it’s just like we don’t have any.”

Sugarcoat rolled her eyes. “You’ve been spending far too much time with ex-Canterlot alumni.”

“If I’m wrong, then why didn’t you just shoot the dragon dead?” Penny asked, her tone guileless. “Since you could see its weakness with your semblance?”

Sugarcoat looked confounded by that, and somewhat put out by the fact of her confounding. “The...the opportunity didn’t present itself,” she said defensively. She cleared her throat. “The fact remains that this whole kingdom is a mass of breaking points: fracture lines between the military and the people, the people and the civil elite, the civil elite and the military; any one of a number of fault lines could be leveraged to fracture this kingdom.”

“You’re exaggerating,” Ciel said. “The existence of a small number of malcontents like Robyn Hill does not equate to the kind of existential threat that you describe.”

“Doesn’t it?”

“No,” Blake said firmly. “And the idea that your semblance, valuable though it is, makes you some kind of social expert or prophet is ridiculous.”

“So we had best hope,” declared an older woman who cut through the crowd towards them, a woman with tightly styled hair in a variety of purple shades. “As I often found myself saying when subject to Sugarcoat’s infamously bleak analyses during her time as one of my students,” she added, a genial smile upon her angular face. She placed one hand on Sugarcoat’s shoulders. “And yet, she was one of my best situation analysts, weren’t you?”

Sugarcoat’s back straightened with pride. “Yes, ma’am.”

“However, I think you may have worried your fellow officers enough for one night,” the other woman said. “And Miss Sparkle is quite correct; this isn’t a situation that requires close protection.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Sugarcoat said, before she retreated a little into the crowd.

“I apologise,” the older woman said. “When I taught her, I encouraged her to say what was on her mind. Perhaps I should have taught her to recognize when not to.” She smiled once again. “Allow me to introduce myself: Abacus Cinch, Principal of Crystal Preparatory Combat Academy.”

Traditionally, instructors - especially principals - in the Combat Academies were commissioned officers, even if they were on the reserve list, and so Blake, Ciel and Penny all simultaneously came to attention.

“Specialist Junior Grade Blake Belladonna.”

“Specialist Junior Grade Ciel Soleil.”

“Specialist Junior Grade Penny Polendina.”

“As you were. I’m here as a guest, not a principal or brigadier general,” Principal Cinch said genially. “You are all quite well known. I would have had to be far less observant of the world outside my office window than I am not to be aware of who you are, and you, Miss Sparkle. It’s an honour to meet the hero of Vale, the Dragonslayer herself.”

“Thank you, ma’am,” Penny said brightly, “but I’m not the only person who was a hero at Vale.”

“Perhaps not, but you are the greatest of them, and the only one to become a national hero,” Principal Cinch amended, “and you, Specialist Belladonna, it’s a pleasure to meet you as well.”

“Uh, thank you, ma’am,” Blake murmured. “Although I’m not entirely sure why?”

“Why not?” Principal Cinch replied. “Your record speaks for itself. So much so that I can’t help but wish that I’d been able to get you into my combat school. I can hardly imagine what you would have become by now with the benefit of a Crystal Prep education.”

“I might have found the cramming period easier,” Blake admitted, referring to the accelerated program's crash course covering academic material that was normally covered over three years compressed into a couple of months. Dust theory, Atlesian history, grimm studies, and military tactics... it had felt like it had been physically and forcefully crammed into her skull, studying until it felt like her eyes were bleeding. Of course, for Blake, it had actually been worse, with even more material to cover in the same time frame, since she had been starting even further behind her fellow accelerated students, as her pre-Beacon education was best described as "erratic." She had taught herself what she could, but a love of reading and her mother’s best intentions couldn’t always make up for the scarcity of books in the average White Fang encampment, even in the peaceful days of her parents’ leadership. But she had gotten through it, with perseverance and some excellent tutoring and more than a few caffeine-fueled all-nighters, she had gotten through it and passed, no extensions, no waivers, no special treatment. “But...with all due respect, Principal, I had a friend who spent some time at Crystal Prep. She...was not entirely complementary about it.”

“Indeed?” Principal Cinch replied, her tone conveying very little. “Alas, not every child is prepared to put in the kind of hard work and dedication that my school requires. Unlike some combat schools, I don’t believe in coddling my students or in substituting platitudes for preparation.”

“Hard work wasn’t my friend’s issue,” Blake said. “Ma’am.”

Principal Cinch smiled thinly. “Of course, you’re talking about Ilia Amitola, aren’t you? Forgive me for not making the connection immediately, given your...background. I suppose I should be gracious enough to congratulate you on making one of my former students flee the field - with the caveat that she dropped out before completing her time with us. A pity. She was terribly gifted. Interesting, is it not: one of my most talented students and you, one of Atlas’ most talented huntsmen, both-”

“Faunus?” Blake suggested.

“I was going to say not really Atlesian,” Principal Cinch said. “You were born in Menagerie, and Ilia’s subsequent actions make it clear that she never considered herself a part of this kingdom. It makes you wonder if Sugarcoat might have a point, if there isn’t something broken in the heart of Atlas.”

“With all due respect, ma’am, I think that’s backwards,” Penny said. “The fact that people like Blake want to come to Atlas - as well as all the great people already from Atlas - shows that this is a great kingdom, doesn’t it?”

Principal Cinch appeared amused to hear it. “Perhaps,” she said, without sounding much convinced by it. “We can only hope that it is so, and hope to take the necessary corrective measures if it is not so. It was a pleasure to meet you all. Specialist Belladonna, we will watch your future career with great interest,” she added, before she turned away and disappeared into the crowd.

“What was all that about?” Penny asked. “It was...weird.”

“Crystal Prep can be a little...abrasive,” Twilight explained sheepishly.

“And worse than that,” Blake muttered.

“You know them?” Twilight asked.

“By reputation,” Blake answered. “My...old friend Ilia used to attend there...before she joined the White Fang.”

“She joined the White Fang because she didn’t like combat school?” gasped Penny.

Blake smiled just a little. “No, I don’t think even she would say Crystal Prep was that bad, but in trying to fit in with the students there...she started down a dark path, and I’m afraid it made her the kind of person who wouldn’t balk at joining the White Fang and doing all the things they asked of her.”

Penny frowned. “I’ve never heard someone talk about Atlas the way that other girl did.”

“There is a good reason for that,” Ciel said in a prim tone. “That girl was talking nonsense. The strength of Atlas is unassailable because the strength of Atlas is ourselves. So long as we continue to stand strong alongside our-” - the corners of her lips twitched upwards - “-our sorority of sisters, then the kingdom will stand strong upon the backs of our sacrifice.”

“Exactly,” Blake agreed. “This kingdom isn’t perfect, but nowhere is, and I know that the qualities that drew me here - the qualities that I saw in Rosepetal, in General Ironwood: the loyalty, the strength, the courage - they’re real, and they’re what make Atlas great. And I won’t be told otherwise by some girl I just met who thinks her semblance tells her so much more than it actually does.”

"And here we go again,” Twilight said, with a slight sigh. “It’s not that... there's nothing really wrong with you saying things like that; it's just a little...excessive, at times. You don't need to prove how much you love Atlas, to us or anyone else."

"I'm not...I suppose I am, a little," Blake admitted, "but I really do think that I'm a part of something pretty amazing. But...if it's really bothering everyone, I will try and tone it down a little."

"It does not bother me at all," Ciel observed. She glanced at Twilight. “You never complained about my love of our kingdom; or that of Rainbow Dash, for that matter.”

“I’m not complaining,” Twilight insisted. “I wasn’t even the one who first brought it up, I...okay, with you...you’ve always been like this ever since we met. It’s just who you are. And Rainbow Dash...I know that she loves Atlas but she doesn’t talk about it so much as she just lives it, and besides I’ve known Rainbow for years and I’ve gotten used to the way she is. But with Blake...it’s just the fact that you weren’t like this when we first met, it feels like such a big change in the time that we’ve known each other.”

“But Ciel’s changed, too,” Penny said. “She told me that she wasn’t born acting this way.”

“No?” Blake asked.

“We all change from the time we are born,” Ciel said, stating the obvious. “But, Penny is correct; I...adjusted myself to my circumstances and desires.”

“You became more than those around you, who never had any need to be as much but who would note any way in which you were less,” Blake murmured. “You changed to give them nothing to use against you.”

The two of them stared into one another’s eyes, the Atlesian commoner and the foreign princess, both of them outsiders in the halls of northern kings. Ciel curtsied. “Indeed,” she murmured. “Twilight, if you commit some faux-pas then your councillor sister-in-law laughs and says that that’s just Twilight, and everyone agrees how charming you are, how genuine; if Blake or I were to do the same thing then they would say ‘well, this is what comes of giving foreigners or Mantle rats a seat at our table’.”

"Hmm," Twilight murmured, sounding a little uncomfortable with the turn the conversation had taken. "So, anyway, circling back around a few minutes: what were you thinking about doing with your hair, Ciel?"

"We were both thinking about growing it longer," Penny declared.

Blake's brow furrowed. "Can you grow your hair?"

"Not technically, but I can always get new hair instead of what I have now," Penny explained.

"Interesting that you're both thinking of lengthening," Blake said, as she ran a hand through her own already long raven locks. "I was thinking that perhaps I should cut mine."

Ciel's eyes narrowed. "I don't see the need for that in your case, although it might not hurt to run a comb through it once in a while."

Blake chuckled. "It is a little bit wild, isn't it?"

"Please don't say anything like 'it needs to be disciplined'," Twilight begged.

"Alright," Blake said. "I won't." She paused for a moment. "Weiss doesn't think that very much money will be raised here tonight."

"She was afraid it wouldn't be," Twilight clarified.

"Why not?" Penny asked.

"Because being wealthy does not, in and of itself, make you generous," Ciel said.

"Ladies and gentlemen, your attention for a moment if I may," the voice of Jacques Schnee rose above the din, silencing all other conversation in the ballroom. "On behalf of my entire family, I would like to thank you so much for joining us on this occasion to celebrate our gallant forces. We all respect the sacrifices made by our soldiers to keep us safe.”

“Here, here,” Ciel said softly, expecting that he would finish with that, or perhaps offer a toast to the troops, the Kingdom, the General, or all three.

At most, she expected that he would announce a sizable purchase of defence bonds. She did not expect him to keep on talking at length.

Unfortunately, carry on talking is exactly what he did. “But respecting the soldiers and all they give in the cause of this kingdom is not the same as agreeing wholeheartedly with the ways in which our troops are used.”

Ciel frowned, and she was not the only one. Twilight was starting to look suspicious, and Blake had turned away in disgust; doubtless, she thought – and probably rightly – that this had something to do with the Menagerie treaty.

At this place? At this hour? You choose now, of all times, to bring this up? Can you not air your political disagreement at a more respectful time? Can we not celebrate the sacrifices and achievements of our troops without dragging politics into this?

“For too long I, like many of you here in this room, have watched as our national interests were sacrificed upon the altar of international cooperation, our armies squandered in the service of other kingdoms, our wealth given away to outsiders with no claim upon it. Our taxes go to fatten up grimm in foreign lands,” Jacques declared.

Ciel growled wordlessly, baring her teeth a little in a most unladylike display because how dare he? How dare he? To dismiss all the empty spaces who had filled the parade ground as having merely fattened up the grimm? To speak so of those who had given their lives for Vale? The jewels of Atlas deserved better by far than to be spoken of so by the likes of Jacques Schnee, a man who for all his accomplishments had never once demonstrated valour in the field.

There was an old Mantle proverb: Every man thinks meanly of himself for not having been a soldier. It was clearly not true in the case of Jacques Schnee, but it might have been better if it were.

He continued, as if he hadn’t said enough already. “And we are here to generously give more money because our government is starving the military of the resources it needs to spend the money instead upon Menagerie.”

Blake scowled, and crossed her arms, still with her back to the head of the SDC.

“I, for one, cannot stand by and watch this gross mismanagement of our kingdom and its affairs continue any longer which is why, my friends, I hereby declare my candidacy for the vacant council seat."

For a moment, there was nothing in the ballroom but stunned silence. Then the applause began. It started slowly, from little pockets scattered about the ballroom from whence it spread outwards as more and more people took up the applause. It was never universal - General Ironwood looked astonished, and so did several other people who did not clap - but it spread throughout the ballroom, and as it spread, it rose in volume until it was a great wave falling upon the head of Jacques Schnee.

Ciel’s eyebrows rose even as did the applause, rising to a deluge from all the corners of the room. Meanwhile, Ciel and her friends and comrades stood in shock; Twilight and Blake looked as horrified as Ciel felt – probably as she looked as well – even as the enthusiasm from other quarters seemed to mock their disquiet.

Penny looked confused. “I don’t understand,” she said. “What does this mean?”

“I…am not certain, Penny,” Ciel murmured. “But I think it means little good.”

Comments

[RIPoste]

Oh my, politics. On that note, how do you manage it though, if you are? Do you base it off current politics? Or history? Just curious.

Great writing, as per usual!

[Sollys]

Good chapter, least we got a few mentions of Sunset.

[Pinklestia]

I agree with Twilight, I want to know what is happening with Sunset.

[Mastermind4892]

This was a magnificent chapter! It's so good to see that some of us are able to find happiness in times like this. They deserve it.

As for Jacques Schnee, I found it a delightful twist that everyone was talking about Atlas having no weaknesses and then the Schnee patriarch announces his campaign for a council seat.

It's also no surprise that he approves of Flash Sentry. First of all, a romantic relationship with someone of agreeable stature in Atlas would keep Weiss in Atlas. But more importantly, his mother is an associate of Jacques, and since Flash is now a member of the Council Guard, Flash would be protecting him. Which also means that he will be Flash's boss! Weiss may have drawn a line in the sand, but now, if she doesn't want anything to happen to Flash... she'll have to be a good little girl.

[JMP]

Well, happy that Weiss has a boyfriend now. And yeah, I agree with Twilight, actually. Blake being super patriotic now is...a bit much.

[RolkFlameraven]

Well yes, there are quite a few steps between Weiss and Sunset, just not quite in the way that Flash's mother was thinking.

So Sugar Coat has the Shatter Point as a semblance? Is it more like Val Armorr's (Karate Kid DC comics) or Mace Windu's?

Still, just being able to see the weak points doesn't mean someone is going to hit it. Sadly I fear that Surger and the rest of the Shadowbolts are going to face a fall of Atlas before they realize they should be using their powers for helpinging. Though that also lends itself to Twilight getting ahold of the stupid that Sunset is doing and going full Midnight doesn't it?

And Blake, please don't cut your hair, Adam has been dead for a while now, it lost much of its symbolism by now. I guess it could be to symbolize a new start in Atlas, but you look better with the long hair, at least in my opinion.

[Spellflame]

3...2...1.......
......
.....
....
...
..
.
boom

[BeardedRedMane]

Can we just not have Weiss slap her father? Right here and now? Like really, whats stopping her?

[RedDog5207]

Hey everyone, Rooster Teeth Animation has just uploaded the World of Remnant video about the SDC and I felt its timing was pretty appropriate considering this chapter's showing Weiss' concert and Jacques' bombshell announcement.

Plus, seeing Weiss and Flash becoming an official couple was a nice treat which could help give us POVs on what's going on on the political opposition side. More so since Flash's mother is one of said opposition members. Also, does anyone find it amusing to see Penny getting "stage fright"(?) and us getting hints about her new hairstyle like in RWBY Vol 7 canon?

[Mister Morden]

Wow, Cinch just gave off a Palpatine vibe. Even said the same line...

And so the plot thickens some more. Multiple plot lines running... When will they all meet up?

[JMP]

10240841
Bane is also a pretty good comparison. I just happen to have seen more of Index and Railgun than I have Batman so the iron sand similarity is what I caught onto first.

[DarthRevan]

Blake's drinking the Kool-Aid on literally the worst Kingdom on Remnant

[Scipio Smith]

10243285
Atlas isn't the worst kingdom, Atlas is the cool one.

[The Corrupted Champion]

10243382
eh... i really liked mistral myself. if i had the opportunity to live in the rwby universe, it would be in mistral.
on another note, i can't help but feel that all the characters' talk of Atlus being the ultimate kingdom with no weaknesses at all is definitely foreshadowing; my money says that Sugarcoat hit the nail on the head; Atlus here may be better off then canon, but it's still a ticking timebomb, and their over exuberant patriotism will come back to bite them in some fashion. Jacques is being the slimy little cretin we all know and love, and Flash makes his grand return! i enjoyed the cute little scene with him and weiss.

another awesome chapter, another reason to smile in the shittiness that is lockdown; keep it up!

[everydaygamer]

10243382
It has a cool look but the whole Military controlled state thing was always kind of concerning what with the general "might makes right" attitude they always seemed to have, and as we saw in Volume 7 that kind of thing can go really wrong really fast.

The biggest problem with Atlas is how much power Ironwood has. Since he has complete control of the military with no one to oppose his decisions if he wanted to take control of Atlas there would be very little that could stop him.

[RedDog5207]

10244092

“My semblance allows me to pinpoint the exact weakness of anything,” Sugarcoat declared in a seeming non-sequitur. “In combat I use it to know exactly where to shoot my target to shatter it.”

Sugarcoat looked confounded by that, and somewhat put out by the fact of her confounding. “The...the opportunity didn’t present itself,” she said defensively. She cleared her throat. “The fact remains that this whole kingdom is a mass of breaking points: fracture lines between the military and the people, the people and the civil elite, the civil elite and the military; any one of a number of fault lines could be leveraged to fracture this kingdom.”

I have to agree with this one, we already see hints of it not just between faunas and human relations, but also between the common people (both are showcased by examples such as in Mantle and Low Town) and the Atlesian social, political and financial/economic elite (for example, the elites in Atlas and Watts' unwitting puppets, Abacus Cinch, Flash's mother, Jacques and their private elite group). The human rich get richer and the human and faunus poor get poorer, which further adds to the tensions between humans and faunus.

The Atlesian military under Ironwood appears to be fairer and provides opportunities for advancements to both humans and faunas based on merit, but even they are still under the control of the civilian Atlesian Council and in SAPR's setting, Ironwood's two council seats have a limited advantage since the Atlesian Council has more than five seats like in RWBY canon...... meaning he could be outvoted. And it's obvious that the civilian Atlesian Council is open to corruption and backstabbing as hinted in the Council meeting during the Breach where Ironwood needed Cadence's support and speech to sway the other Atlesian Councillors to support Ironwood.

I had to say it @Scipio Smith but while Atlas may technically be the best kingdom on the surface........ under the surface, there are social cracks and inequalities slowly forming which Watts knows how and who to use to apply pressures and leverage to cause internal instabilities the same way Cinder did with Vale and Lionheart, Watts and Chrysalis are now doing with Mistral.

On a final personal note, does anyone want Sugarcoat's Semblance to allow her to "see" or pinpoint that what Abacus Cinch and her clique are doing is instead undermining Atlas rather than saving it? If she's that aggressively blunt and tactless........ could Sugarcoat be as equally blunt and tell that to Cinch's face that she and her clique's policies are part of the bigger problems threatening Atlas rather than Ironwood and Cadence?

[MSie95]

“I’m mostly pretty lucky in that respect,” Twilight admitted. “Everyone I really care about came home with us, but…I’d like to know that Sunset’s okay, wherever she is. That she’s still alive, at least; I’m not sure how okay you can really be when you’ve been locked up.”

Awww, nice that at least one person cares.

Blake was silent for a moment, her golden eyes scanning the crowd. “The elite of this kingdom is found amongst its armies,” she said. “Not here.”

Weiss’ eyebrows rose. “Do you hear the Atlesian anthem playing in your head when you say things like that?”

Yeah, Blake has a tendency to fall into absolutes.

"Can we briefly pause to observe the fact that Vacuo is nowhere to be seen?"

You speak my mind.

“Yes,” Flash said, a little more loudly than necessary. “I mean, if you’d like to...go out for dinner sometime, or something.”

Weiss smiled. “I’d love to.”

This ship oddly fits. Well, maybe not that oddly. His mother though, its the old Sunset she's talking about but still. Jeez

“There is a good reason for that,” Ciel said in a prim tone. “That girl was talking nonsense. The strength of Atlas is unassailable because the strength of Atlas is ourselves. So long as we continue to stand strong alongside our-” - the corners of her lips twitched upwards - “-our sorority of sisters, then the kingdom will stand strong upon the backs of our sacrifice.”

So many death flags.

“Of course you do,” Sugarcoat said. “You’ve bought into the mirage, like so many people here.”

I like this Sugarcoat. She points the thing as they are. On the bigger picture her social skills are much to ask. Hope she the rest of Shadowbolts won't end up as villains. At least not for long. They're usually more missguided than evil. If show them the right models.

And Hopefully Whitley and Diamond's relationship will be good for them. Dismond's been redemed and Whitley still has the possibility. In the show at least.

10243382
Atlas is as much cool as just have the cool toys. Everything will be fine with the Kingdom as long things will go smoothly for them.

And they have cool people. Said it before but Atlas in this story is way better than the Show is because Most of the Equestria Girls characters became Altesians (Even Daring Doo- it's a personal opinion but I think it would be more interesting making her Vacuo rather than Atlas. Give Vacuo some slack people, they do nothing. Be it fanfics or cannon) while the rest of the world have to deal with, well mostly villains or neutral characters (like Queen Novo, not evil but very isolationist). That's unfair adventage and I have to say it- one the biggest flaw in the story. Spreading the cast on other kingdoms wod provide some better perspectives.