March 25, 2022

Weiss visited Elsa in the hospital again. She was still in a coma, but was stable. As she sat next to her little cousin, whom she often considered a little sister and helped her through her fire training, she sighed and said to her, hoping she could hear her, "C'mon, Elsa, hang in there. I raised you in the firehouse, pretty much." She then chuckled as she remembered several moments she had with her. "You always said that we were more like sisters than cousins."

Penny then walked in and noticed Weiss. "Oh, hey, Captain."

"I told you," Weiss replied to her. "You don't have to call me by my rank at the firehouse all the time, Penny."

"It's a habit from my Atlas days," she replied. "Anyway, I sort of heard what you said. She was close to you, huh?"

"Yeah," Weiss replied as she looked over Elsa. "I helped her fill her application out. She was so excited to join when she turned 12. A month after she got in, though, she saw some bad shit."

"How bad?"

"We let her ride the ambulance one day," Weiss began. "Call came in as a Bravo unknown. Turned out to be a full-blown cardiac arrest in an alleyway, and the guy didn't live. We had Elsa do CPR for a bit, but she got tired out. Right after we cleared that scene, we got sent to a shooting victim."

"Yikes," Penny replied in shock. "I can't imagine seeing that at 12."

"Yeah," she replied. "Guy got shot trying to stop a guy from mugging a woman who he also shot. The mugger was never caught. The victim and the woman he was trying to protect died. Elsa did the PCR while we worked on both of them. After we got back, she was shaken up by both calls real bad."

June 3, 2015

As Elsa put her gear away in her locker, she looked despondent. Weiss noticed this and walked over to her. "Elsa, what's up?"

"It's nothing," the younger girl replied. "I'm fine." She then tried to walk away, but Weiss grabbed her by the back of her shirt.

"You're lying," Weiss replied. She could see in Elsa's eyes that the prior two medical calls had gotten to her mentally. "Elsa, let's talk. You can tell me anything, even stuff you don't tell your parents."

Elsa then wiped her eyes. "It's just not fair."

Weiss could immediately tell this was about the calls she just witnessed. "This is about the cardiac arrest and the shooting, isn't it?" Elsa silently nodded. "Ah... Let's go in a back room." She then wrapped a shoulder around her as they walked together, comforting her.

"We talked for a good hour," Weiss continued. "And I convinced her to stay."

"That's good," Penny replied. "Any other stories?"

Weiss then chuckled as she recalled a more lighthearted story. "There's her 16th birthday. That was fucking wild. It was May 18, 2019, and I got off campus to hold a party with her. I brought the rest of Team RWBY, too."

May 18, 2019

"Weiss," Elsa slurred to Weiss and Winter as she climbed on top of a statue of a horse near a bar. "Take a picture of me!" She then burped as she pretended to ride the statue, her fist held high in the sky in triumph. "Woohoo! Vorwärts, Soldaten! Angriff den Feind! Pflüge sie mit deinen Kugeln nieder! Zeigen Sie Vacuo, woraus Atlas besteht!" She drunkenly recited a quote by a famous Atlesian general in the Faunus War from a key battle against Vacuo that was commanded to his soldiers on horseback.

"Absolutely," Weiss replied as she pulled her scroll phone and took a picture. "You're awesome, man!"

"Dude," Winter replied as she stumbled near the statue. "She is fucking haaaaaamered, and I am too! Genial, Elsa! Steig auf das Pferd!"

Elsa then jumped off the horse statue and held her stomach. "Ugh... Guys, I... Verdammte Scheiße, ich bin krank..." She then ran to a nearby trash can and ducked her head in it as she threw up loudly. "Scheiße, es ist so widerlich! I'm gonna es wieder tun!" She began to mix her Atlesian and Valeanian as she threw up again.

Weiss ran to her and pulled her white hair back to prevent it from being stained by the vomit. "Ich habe deine Haare, Elsa! Vomit away!" She then laughed as Elsa continued.

Winter, somewhat concerned, asked her, "Geht es ihr okay?"

"She'll be fine," Weiss replied. "Are you all set, Elsa?"

"Yeah," Elsa replied as she wiped her mouth with her bare hands. "Agh, fucking hell... I'm done drinking for the night... Lass uns nach Hause gehen."

"Ja," Winter replied. "Gute Idee. Let's not stick around here much more."

Present

Later that day, Ruby and Penny rode along on Ambulance 201 with the two paid firefighters to a medical call. As they minus one of the paid firefighters walked into an apartment with the stretcher, Ruby started off with the patient, who was lying on the floor in pain. "Okay, sir, what seems to be the problem?"

"My stomach," he replied in severe pain. "I have really bad cramps!" He then tensed up as another cramp came, causing him to moan.

Penny asked him, "Any blood?"

"No."

A paid firefighter then checked his pulse with the wrist of his right arm. As he did, he asked him, "What's your name, sir?"

"Robbie Meadows," he replied. "I was cleaning my apartment when I got these horrible cramps. Agh, Jesus..."

"I got 120 on the pulse," the paid firefighter replied. He then asked the patient as Ruby put a blood pressure cuff around his left arm, "Did you have anything to eat recently?"

"I had a chicken sandwich and some wine," he replied. "About two hours ago. The pain came about an hour later. I tried putting it off, but it got so bad that I had to call you guys." He then pointed to a part of his stomach. "It's right here."

"Alright then," the paid firefighter replied. "Penny, what do you got for a blood pressure?"

"I got 160 over 100," she replied. "You had a pulse of 120, correct?"

"Yeah," he replied. "I got a respiration rate of 24 as well. Sir, did the wine taste funny, or the chicken sandwich?"

"Not at all," he replied with a chuckle. "The wine was great. The bottle is over there." He then weakly pointed to an opened bottle of wine on a table.

"I'll get it," Ruby replied as she got up and took the bottle, reading it. Immediately, a possible explanation dawned on her. "Guys, this wine is like 200 years old."

"Yeah," the man, still in pain, replied. "It's a 235-year-old wine from 1787."

"Holy crap," Penny remarked. "That's older than the fire company. Sir, how did you get that bottle?"

"From my family back home," he replied before he moaned again. "I've had it for a year but never opened it until now. Is that it?"

"I'm not gonna say it definitely was," Ruby told him. "But the possibility exists. What about the chicken sandwich? Was it refrigerated or anything?"

"I made it this morning," he replied as he rolled around a bit on the floor. "I ate part of it then, but left it out until now."

Penny and the paid firefighter looked at each other and nodded. She then said, "That's another possibility. Ruby, take the wine bottle to the hospital for analysis." She then got up and walked to the stretcher to grab a backboard. "Okay, sir, we're gonna slide you on the backboard and then put you on the stretcher, okay?"

"Got it," replied the man as Penny positioned the backboard next to him. Then, both she and the paid firefighter carefully lifted him onto it as Ruby grabbed the wine bottle. Within seconds, the patient was laying on the stretcher, and the backboard was slid out from under him. Ruby and Penny dragged the stretcher out while the paid firefighter carried the backboard with him out of the apartment. "Don't worry, sir. You'll be at the hospital soon."

March 30, 2022

That morning around 9 PM, Vigilant Fire Company volunteers trained on the use of bailout kits from the second floor of the firehouse. They would jump from the second floor down to the apparatus apron in front using a rope and hook system in their gear hooked to their air packs. As the firefighter before her went next inside the upstairs ballroom, Ruby prepared herself by taking her helmet off as she took a knee to put her mask on. Once she was all set, she turned her air pack on and hooked her mask tube into the regulator to start breathing air. She then got down on both knees and crawled to the window to begin preparing for the escape.

The company instructor, in this case 2nd Captain Dafydd Llewelyn, asked Ruby, "Did you feel the windowsill to check for integrity?'

"Doing that now," Ruby replied as she felt the windowsill with a gloved hand. She then pulled her hook out from the bailout bag and hooked it on a corner of the windowsill. She then leaned over the windowsill and reached out, rolling her body over as she kept a tight grip on the rope. Once outside, she dropped slightly before catching her footing and rappelling down the front of the building slowly. Once she was on the ground, she righted herself and disconnected from the rope before Dafydd threw her her hook from above. "I got it!" She then caught it and began to walk back into the building to come off of air and put her pack's bailout system back in service.

Theresa asked her as she handed her a bottle, "Need a water?"

"I'll be fine," Ruby replied. "How many more do we got left before we do ladder bailouts?" She then began to take her air pack off and come off of air.

"I think about four more," she replied as she put the water back in a cooler. "How'd you do?"

"Pretty good," the younger firefighter replied. "I almost slipped, but I caught myself." She then chuckled. "Denis is all excited to do this when he turns 16 next year."

"It's not really too exciting," Ruby noted. "Regardless, maybe we can let slide him coming in for overhaul a few times before then."

April 1, 2022

Today, Delwyn and Ruby were to make a speech at an event in the western city of Hanson to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the Hanson Massacre, in which Vacuouan forces murdered over 10,000 civilians and prisoners of war, 60% of them Faunus, in and around the captured city following the assassination of a general who was visiting the war front. As Ruby stood by her husband's side at the podium, she looked back at the impressive and towering memorial to the massacre behind her. It consisted of a soldier and presumably a civilian wearily walking as they carried a body on their backs, with the base of the statue containing a plaque.

"30 years ago today," Delwyn began his speech. "Vale experienced one of the worst tragedies in its modern history when over 10,000 of its own citizens and soldiers were murdered in and around this city. Many of them were Faunus, an intentional part based on the Authoritarianist government of Vacuo's campaign to exterminate them. Countless men, women, and children were taken from Vale and murdered by Vacuouan forces during the war simply because of their race, either here in our own lands, or in the prison camps elsewhere in Gris Manchette's evil empire. It was not just the Faunus, either. Countless prisoners of war, LGBT individuals, handicapped individuals, intellectuals, civil rights activists, and even at times randomly chosen civilians were murdered at the hands of a hateful ideology. Today, we must continue the efforts of those who stood up to Authoritarisnism and condemn bigotry wherever it exists, lest this massacre ever happen agai-"

Suddenly, the king stopped himself as he heard several loud pops nearby. Ruby immediately reached for a pistol in her waistband as two guards did the same. She then grabbed Delwyn and yelled, "Assassin!"

As a guard slumped over from a bullet wound to the chest, a man tried to jump up on stage with a pistol and emptied his gun, but Ruby fired three shots at him as several guards also exchanged fire with the man, striking him down and killing him. Delwyn yelled out, "I'm fine! A guard's been hit!" He and Ruby then ran off stage and towards several local police officers as Ruby looked over and saw that a second man had been struck by the would-be assassin's bullets as well.

On stage, guards rushed to the aide of their fallen comrade as well as to a member of the House of Lords, the Baron of Hanson, who had also been shot. As the crowds rushed away from the scene, a guard checked over Delwyn and Ruby on scene to see if either had been injured. The guard asked both of them, "Do either of you think you were hit?"

"Not at all," Delwyn replied. "We just heard the gunshots and ran." Ruby nodded in agreement. "Who's been hit?'

"A guard," he regretfully replied. "And the Baron of Hanson, as well. That's as much as I know, Your Majesty."

"Damn it," Ruby cursed to herself, disgusted that the would-be assassin chose a memorial to war dead for the site of his attack. "Why did it have to be here of all places?"