Chapter 4

Echos of the Heart

Yang led Blake into a modest sized kitchen, half-dragging, half-carrying her best friend with one arm. The aroma of bacon and eggs struck the faunus almost like a slap across the face, and she found herself struggling to recall the last time she'd had a warm meal. Nose curling broth cooked over a campfire didn't count.

Her bare feet slid across the polished wooden floor until she was gently deposited at a round breakfast table with her former partner taking a seat beside her, taking deep breaths. Large glasses of orange juice had already been poured and laid out before them, and Blake found herself looking over as if to make sure it was okay for her to drink.

The blonde however was already gulping down the liquid, and with a brief hesitation Blake did the same, nearly finishing the entire glass.

She found herself choking afterward and the other girl began rubbing circles into her back. Yang couldn't help herself from smiling as the act reminded her of her sister, but her lip would occasionally twitch when she'd notice the bruises covering the other girl's body.

"We stocked up on groceries before the storm," her father said, his right hand holding the bottom of a large skillet, causing the bacon and eggs to sizzle. "So eat up, girls."

Blake glanced out the window behind him at the raging storm that had nearly been her end. The freezing rain was still pouring and she was just in time to see electricity to shoot across the sky. A clap of thunder rattled the cozy cottage, and despite bracing herself and folding back her ears, she still flinched.

Her former partner scooted her chair closer. While the faunus wasn't scared of thunderstorms, loud noises always made her uneasy, and rain in general put her in a gloomy mood. Cold, wet, and hungry was something she was all too familiar with.

"We're calorie machines," Yang said, bumping her shoulder playfully. "Dad and I pretty much burn them off with our aura, and Rubes is just as bad if not worse with all the running. Or have you noticed?"

Blake turned away from the window with a lopsided grin. "I've noticed. Weiss couldn't have gotten overweight at Beacon even if she tried with all the calories we burned a day. And it was a good thing you always carried around protein bars, because the two of you got just a little cranky when you were hungry."

"With Weiss how could you tell?" she said humorously.

"And now that I think about it, your sister carrying a dozen or two cookies wherever she went probably saved our lives. I'd hate to see what she's like on an empty stomach. Speaking of which, where is Ruby? I keep looking out the corner of my eye expecting to see a cloud of rose petals before getting tackled and crushed by a bear hug."

Taiyang turned away to look out at the storming skies, and Blake glanced at her former partner who was studying the table with faux interest. The atmosphere around the once inviting kitchen changed, and she suddenly found herself wanting to slink back into the shadows.

"Rubes snuck out of the house a few weeks ago," Yang whispered, almost as if she were talking to herself. "She left Dad a note saying she's going to Mistral, and that Jaune, Ren, and Nora are coming with her. They're gonna meet Pyrrha at Sanctum. She's been staying there while her ankle heals..."

Blake's breath caught, unable to look away. Ruby leaving her big sister was the last thing she would've expected, and all that time alone it had comforted her to think that her former partner was with the one person who could bring joy to her life no matter how bad the day.

"She waited until I could take care of myself, and-" Yang gestured toward her father. "Let's just say when I got home, I was a mess and an accident waiting to happen, but Rubes took care of me. Just like old times..."

The blonde took a deep breath as though it were painful and swallowed. "After awhile though, she started talking about wanting going to Mistral to find those lunatics, and asked if I'd be alright without her. I lied," her voice cracked, and she struggled to blink back tears. "I told Rubes to go, that other people needed her more than I did..."

When Yang regained her voice, it was fragile and almost childlike sounding. "Rubes saw through me through. She gave me a big hug and kissed me on the cheek before she left, and told me that she loves me more than anything and that I'm the best big sis in the world, and that she'll come back. Zwei's probably curled up on her bed right now, where I was when I saw you..."

The room was silent except for the popping of grease and the occasional sniffle from Yang, who absently rubbed her cheek with an unsteady hand. Shaking her head, she wiped her eyes on her top, grief and brief flashes of anger filling them, but whether they were towards herself or her sister, Blake wasn't sure. However, the faunus wished above anything they were directed toward her.

"You're burning it," Yang commented. When there wasn't a response she cleared her throat. "Dad!"

"Huh?" He turned around and followed where she was staring, taking a moment or two to understand. "Oh, sorry..."

Taiyang scraped the skillet's contents onto two plates on the counter before cracking open several eggs and laying out more strips of bacon. Meanwhile, his crestfallen daughter watched him closely before giving their guest an expression that may have been an apology of sorts as well as something comforting.

'Don't worry about it,' Blake quickly translated, a brief flare of aura helping both the translation and in following the instruction. Even after all their time apart, she could still read her former partner's aura better than her own.

She was obviously concerned over her despondent father, and doing her best to be strong for him. Yang had once told her that the man fell into depression shortly after her mother died, but had gotten better over the course of the next few years thanks to having another little girl with another woman. That is until the death of her mother. That was when he shut down almost completely in front of his daughters, with the eldest finding herself having to take care of him and her sister, becoming like a second mother to her. It had only been recently that their father had gotten back on his feet, but it seemed to Blake that he had faced more than a few stumbling blocks since their last and only meeting.

'And you left them,' she spat at herself. 'You knew what happened to their dad, and you knew it would happen again. How did you know the same thing wasn't going to happen to Yang after you abandoned her?'

Blake turned her head gasping as a sharp knife twisted in her rib cage, but glanced back when a plate stacked with slightly crispy bacon and scrambled eggs was put on the table before her. Her glass of orange juice was refilled, and she blinked several times as if unsure what she was supposed to do. It wasn't until another plate was set beside her that she picked up her fork. "Dig in, Blake."

She wanted to savor every mouthful, but her empty stomach demanded that she keep shoveling it down or face serious consequences. She hardly paused for air, and didn't even stop when a stack of pancakes were dropped on her plate. A bottle of syrup was slid across the table and she eagerly poured it atop her meal. If she focused on her body's physical needs, then she could forget about everything else.

After she had eaten half of her plate with no signs of stopping anytime soon, food started being scrapped off her former partner's plate and onto her's. She tried not to notice how awkward the blonde's fork looked in her left hand, and simply thanked her with her mouth full, continuing eating though at a less ravenous pace. Yang watched in almost fascination of her, hardly believing what she was seeing while only occasionally picking at what she had left, and continued to fill the other girl's plate until she began to slow.

Once the faunus had done all but lick the plate clean, which she may have done if an audience hadn't been there to watch, Blake leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes sleepily.

"Thank you, Mr. Xiao Long," she sighed, her belly feeling like it may rupture. "You're a fantastic cook."

When he didn't respond, Blake cracked her eyes open to see the man's lip twitching and his brow furrowed, unsure how he should respond to the compliment.

"Dad, could you give please us a minute."

Taiyang hesitated, but solemnly glancing at his daughter, he nodded. Before he could make his way out of the room however, he turned his head.

"Thank you," he said to the startled faunus with misty eyes. "Thank you for saving my baby girl."

Without another word the tall man walked away, a door closing down the hall, and no sooner did his daughter move to the other side of the table so they could face one another, or perhaps so the black haired girl would be out of striking distance. By the way her left arm shook, the blonde might not have trusted herself...

"Blake, why did you leave?" She didn't sound angry, merely curious, and hurt.

Her best friend didn't answer, or perhaps couldn't answer. She brought her knees up onto the chair and hugged them against her chest, suddenly cold as if she were back in the freezing rain.

"Alright, if you can't tell me why you left, could you at least tell me why you came back?"

Again she said nothing, only stared at the limp arm while making brief glances at the girl's chest. She still remembered how the blood felt when covering her arms, and how it pooled around them even while still pouring out...

"Are you alright?" the faunus squeaked, frightened like a small child and immediately scolding herself for being so stupid to ask such a thing.

'Of course she's not alright. Look at her!'

Yang was taken slightly aback, clearly having thought she'd be asking all the questions, but hesitantly followed her gaze.

"I'm having surgery the week after next to hopefully fix the arm. Doctors wanted to see how much of the nerve damage would repair itself before they went putting in metal plates and synthetics. My aura needed to get to a point where it's fixed everything it can and thinks everything is fine, otherwise it could reject the surgery and they'd have to go with a full cybernetic. It still might happen, and that would mean losing-"

She didn't finish, and Blake stared tearfully at the deep, ugly scar a couple inches above her elbow, almost encircling the entire arm.

"They called it a miracle. The only thing that kept my arm attached after he cut through the bone was my aura and whatever was left my muscles and-"

"Don't," Blake whimpered, hanging her head between her knees as the tears began flowing.

"Icky stuff I don't remember the name of because I sucked at biology. Or was that physiology?"

Yang gave her a slight grin but it only seemed to make the tears come quicker, and it fell without much resistance as if her face were glad to be rid of it.

"I did put up one hell of a fight though," she mused somberly, leaning back in her chair. "You know, this is the first time I've talked about that night with anyone. Not even Rubes."

"You shouldn't have done that!"

At this outburst the blonde frowned and her eyes became more serious. "He was going to kill you, Blake." The faunus tried to interrupt but her former partner talked over her with the first hint that she was struggling to control her infamous temper. "Your blood was dripping off his blade, and I've never been that angry in my life. I was going to kill him, or I was going to die trying."

"And you nearly did both," Blake sobbed.

Yang didn't seem particularly bothered, but she did have to blink something from her eye. "I'm sorry you couldn't save what was left of him, of the friend you used to know. But I'm not sorry I blew a hole through his chest, especially not after he made one in mine."

Bile rose in the back of Blake's throat, and her stomach threatened to expel all that she had eaten.

"And I would gladly do it all again in a heartbeat to save your life, Blake. Life without you hasn't been worth living."

The faunus let out a tormented wail that she could no longer hold back. A familiar warmth surrounded her that she tried to repel with her own aura, but her powers failed to respond.

An arm wrapped around her and a body pressed close, their heads touching. "I never thanked you for saving my life, Blake. You left before I had the chance." The blonde's tears fell onto her cheeks, staining them as much as her own. "You weren't in any shape to save me, but you kept me breathing when I couldn't do it myself, and you kept me from bleeding out long enough for the paramedics to find us."

Yang lowered her voice and tightened their embrace. "When I woke up in the hospital, the doctors didn't have an answer for how I survived other than it was another miracle, but I knew it was you. I could still feel your aura in my veins and your soul keeping mine from leaving, and it broke my heart when Rubes and Weiss said you had just left the room, because I knew you were gone..."

She shared all of her anguish in her aura, not leaving anything out, and it was all too much for the faunus to take.

"But I knew you'd come back to me someday." The blonde paused for a moment, letting her aura out now in brief waves. "Blake, I promise I won't get angry or upset, but tell me, please. Why did you leave?"

She tried to speak but unintelligible whimpers and sobs came out.

"Blake..." she whispered.

"Because she's selfish..." said a bitter voice across the table.

Yang slowly turned, holding her best friend protectively. A feminine figure made entirely of darkness sat in her former seat, its most distinguishable trait being the silhouette of cat ears atop its head.

"Blake?" Yang asked cautiously, not taking her eyes away. "Since when can your shadow talk?"

"Since she began hating herself even more than she did before," the faunus' voice answered. "She named herself after a poisonous flower, and that's what she is to everyone around her. Poison..."

"Don't you dare say that about her!"

"She believes that she deserves to be punished for what she did, and so that's what she does to herself..."

Yang's eyes began to burn, and it took all her restraint not to reach over the table and grab the shadow by the throat.

"These bruises." She raised her best friend's arm, who avoided her gaze. "You did this!?"

The shadow slowly nodded, staring at herself in contempt.

"I thought these were from Grimm! Getting you dressed, I saw claw marks all over your back! And it looked like something tried breaking your ribs!"

"Something did break them," the shadow answered cruelly, holding up hands that more resembled claws. "And while she rolled on the floor of the cave bleeding, screaming and crying, I'd start all over again to remind her of what she did to y-"

Yang slammed her hand against the table, causing the plates and utensils to bounce.

"Do you have ANY idea what I would do to the person if I found out they did you this to you!? Blake, look at me!"

The faunus raised their head, shaking, and surprised not to see crimson staring back at her, as well as by the tears running down her face.

"I haven't been able to sleep most nights because I can't stop worrying about you! There are days where all I do is sit in bed and cry my eyes out because of how much I miss you! And now-" She pointed at the shadow. "And now you're telling me that you've been beating the hell out of yourself? Torturing yourself? Starving in the cold with your semblance using you as a punching bag? Blake..."

The other girl couldn't answer, merely sat there weeping until someone laid her head on their shoulder.

"If you ever hurt yourself like this again, I'll..." Yang couldn't finish, nor could she think of a proper threat. "Hurting my family is the worst thing anyone could ever do to me, Blake. They can cut, stab, and shoot me all they'd like, but don't they dare lay a finger on you, Weiss, or Ruby."

The faunus wrapped her arms around her former partner's waist and buried her face in the crook of her neck, all the while Yang played with her tangled mess of hair or tickled her back.

"Blake," she whispered softly. "I can make a couple of guesses why you ran, but none of them compare to how much I've missed you. If you thought you could make me hate you or think I was better off without you, you were wrong. I love you, Weiss, and Ruby more than I could ever hate anyone or anything. You are all my baby sisters, and I'm the only one allowed to try and beat some sense into y'all for being stupid, alright?"

Her best friend snorted, and Yang felt her nod. "Good, now that that's over with, why don't you tell me why you came back? Even if it's because you wanted some of my dad's cooking, I won't be mad."

She was silent, and suddenly felt terror as the other girl withdrew slightly.

"Yang?" she whimpered, following her movements afraid to let go.

"I wasn't talking to you." The blonde pointed at the shadow which now was a mirror image of the faunus, and it gazed at the original with burning contempt in its amber colored eyes.

"She didn't come back because of you," it seethed. "She's selfish and can't think of anyone's pain but her own. She's spent all this time feeling sorry for herself, not you, the person who nearly gave their life for her and has been nothing but compassionate. You didn't care that she was a faunus or what atrocities she may have done with the White Fang, and time after time helped her when she couldn't help herself. She. Doesn't. Deserve. You..."

The shadow leaned forward over the table as though it might attack, and Blake buried herself into her former partner, practically crawling in her lap crying, but who didn't move a muscle at the threat.

"She came back because she couldn't live with her own guilt anymore, that you nearly died because of her, not because she was thinking about what kind of hell you were going through. The only time she ever thought of the hell she put you through, it was in hopes that you regretted ever saving her life that night, or that the two of you ever met. But sometime during that storm, Blake realized she could either see you one last time, or die alone with the person she hates the most. I wanted to die in your arms, Yang, just like you did mine."

Yang swallowed and looked down at her best friend cradled against her.

"I believe you," she said at last, "and I don't love you any less, Blake. There's nothing you, Weiss, or Rubes could ever do to make me not love you."

The faunus let out a loud sob and the other girl brushed her dark hair to the side.

"You and I share a soul now, and it sounds like you used your half to bring me back from the brink. Blake, I know things about you no one else possibly ever could, and I know what kind of wonderful person you are even if you don't want to admit it yourself."

"She's broken," the shadow murmured, eyes looking down at the table. "I'm broken. She has nearly all her aura but refuses to heal herself, and now my soul is splitting apart. She hates herself, and I hate her, and she hates me. We're broken..."

Blake let out a whimper and wailed as her former partner suddenly untangled herself from the embrace and forcibly moved away from her. She watched blinded by tears, begging her not to go, as she walked around the table. Coming to a halt, Yang knelt beside the shadow and touched her cheek.

At first, the afterimage simply felt like her best friend's aura in solid form, but slowly the faunus' instincts and subconscious took over so the facade's cheek began to feel more like smooth skin, and even its clothes felt like what she was actually wearing.

Yang laid the shadow's head on her shoulder and wrapped an arm around her. "Then I'll fix you, and make you better than ever. I'll love you, even when you don't love yourself, and I promise I won't ever stop, Blake. That's not something any of us deserve, it's something freely given that doesn't expect anything back."

The kitchen then became engulfed in light but Blake didn't have to shield her eyes. A flame lit within her as the most brilliant soul in the world traveled inside. She resisted getting lost in the aura, but its owner was too strong and too determined to prove something to her.

Brief images of a dark haired woman standing over her, calling her name. Another of a young woman in a white hood singing. A little girl wearing a red hood and crying. A pair of gravestones in a cemetery that she rarely visited. A beach that was her retreat away from all responsibility. Boys she thought were cute. Classrooms she fell asleep in. Even her favorite foods, songs, and little moments she cherished, like the team being in the dorm room together. Everything. Everything that her former partner was flowed within her, and she cried out at it was too much too quickly. Normally it was just fleeting thoughts or emotions shared, but Yang was set out on a mission to share her entire being with the girl so that she would finally understand.

Blake forgot herself, and instead found herself lost in the soul of Yang Xiao Long, the person who could turn the darkest night into the brightest day. The person who cheered up a gloomy room just by walking in, and never went a day without giving the people she cared about a hug. The first person to tell a runaway stray without a family that she was loved...

Eventually the light and the most wonderful sensation began to fade, and when her vision returned Blake saw the other girl on her knees with sweat on her brow, struggling to breath. The shadow was gone, returned to Blake where it belonged, and she could hardly keep her head steady as the two souls began separating.

"Thank you," she gasped, crying her last tears. "Thank you..."

"Heh, don't mention it," Yang gasped, using the table to stand back up.

Blake tried to stand up as well but wound up slumping against the table, ready to use her empty plate as a pillow.

"What do you say we go upstairs?" Yang picked up a small strip of bacon off her plate. "Zwei will thank me for this."

"Hmm," the faunus half-moaned, her body heavy but an incredible weight lifted off her chest and shoulders. "I'm fine, really. That just, wow, Yang."

The faunus laughed to herself, giddy from the emotional high and smiled as she was lifted up by her partner and put her arms around her.

"You're exhausted, and so am I." She took a couple of deep breaths, groaning a bit while she awkwardly adjusted their weight. "What do you say to a couple of drinks for old time sake?"

"That sounds really good actually," Blake murmured. "That'll make saying a few things easier, and I have something I need to ask you..."

(A/N: Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed. I really loved writing this chapter, and I hope that shows. With Blake's guilt and everything she's done to herself after running away, I wanted to make her as sympathetic as possible while still keeping to the core character. In my other stories, Blake's battle with guilt is one of her more prominent themes, and I hope that battle came to a nice "culmination" here. For Yang, it was really important to me that she got the love and support she needed from Ruby, who only left when she knew her big sis was strong enough, and only after Yang told her she and their dad would be alright. Of course she's hurt and angry, which we may see more of in the next chapter, but she loves her sister and friends more than anything. My interpretation of aura is a bit differently than the show, in that it's your soul literally being worn on your sleeve, and for teammates/partners it means you share the most intimate part of yourself with them. A team is not made up of individuals, they're simply a shared soul. And Yang shares her's the most openly of her team, and isn't afraid to show what they all might be ashamed or shy of.

Adam's dead and Pyrrha's alive, which means "Nothing bad ever happened" I suppose. I didn't want to grieve anyone unnecessarily who may be a fan of her's, and if I'm going to write a story where a major character is dead, I wish for them to have a major impact in it. Plus and it shouldn't be a surprise, if I indeed write a Volume 3 pseudo-novelization someday, Pyrrha's gonna make it out okay. As for Adam, I thought if he and Yang killed each other, or tried to at least, it would make Blake that much more emotionally devastated. I also wanted some sense of finality to her story, and for Yang as well having killed Adam in a sacrificial manner to protect Blake. I suppose I wanted you to feel "satisfied" by Yang and Blake's stories as though this was their epilogue, but I hope you've enjoyed this and what is to come in the finale. There's still a few loose ends to tie up, and I think Blake has a thing or two that she'd like to say. I hope you enjoy, and I can't thank you enough for the support you've shone me.

All credit goes to my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, who has blessed me with this story and wonderful readers like yourself. God bless)