We are back!

Late again, my apologies, but here's the next installment of TLH! More info later, but for now, let's dive in!

Oh, and also, potential trigger warning. Be careful of that.

Chapter 4: AND THEN THERE WERE SIX

"Can't believe I'm saying this… but I'm bored."

Nora sat in the "comfort" of her fort, her surroundings only illuminated by a spare flashlight.

"And Ren and Yang went back out into danger like fools, thinking I was scared and pathetic and whatnot. Incredible… some of my worst performances of my career and they never doubted it for a second."

She leaned back and lay sprawled on the floor, hands behind her head.

"Although I could go back out there and face the music. Confront whatever's going on around here. It might be a little fun, actually… But how can I possibly be expected to handle a murder mystery on a day like this?"

Nora sighed. "This is the fourth hour since the whole damn thing started. It's pretty tough coming up with different things to be afraid about. If I go for the whole night, I'm probably going to have to just pretend to be comatose from fear, so I should make my time here count."

Grinning, Nora continued her soliloquy.

"The key to faking out the friends is holding yourself like you're cold. It's a good non-specific reaction; I'm a big believer in it. A lot of people will tell you that a good phony scare is a fake cold sweat, but, uh... you get a nervous best friend like Ren, you could wind up with him thinking you've got a fever and fretting over you. That's worse than a murder mystery. You fake a being scared, and when you're crying for mommy, you shiver a bit. It's a little childish and stupid, but then, so is murder."

She frowned. "I am a little bit nervous, that's wasn't bullshit. Hell, it sure beats the exams we just took, especially that Vacuoan Socialism exam. I mean, really, what's the point? I'm not Vacuoan. I don't plan on being Vacuoan. So who gives a crap if they're socialists? They could be fascist anarchists, it still doesn't change the fact that there's some guy – or girl, not judging – just running around killing errbody."

Nora shrugged and stood up, skipping around the huge space inside the fort. The dim lighting made her glee look slightly more like insanity.

Which was fitting, seeing how she was talking to herself. Or, from a different perspective, perhaps, to you and I.

"Not that I condone fascism, or any -ism for that matter. -Ism's in my opinion are not good. A person should not believe in an -ism, he should believe in himself. I quote the raven: 'Nevermore-' oh wait, that's not right… ahem. I quote General Ironwood: "I don't believe in Ozpin, I believe in me." Good point. After all, his army did save Vale from being overrun by Grimm. I mean, so did I, but I still can't make pancakes to save my life."

She whirled in a cutesy little pirouette. "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."

Suddenly, she heard a knock on the front of the fort, and her blood froze cold.

"H-hello…?" she murmured meekly.

A chair from the fort wall was shoved out of the way, and light shone through the hole in the fort, as well as Ren's impassive face. "Were you just misquoting 'Ferris Bueller's Day Off' just now?"

"Uh… maybe…?" Nora grinned sheepishly.

Ren shook his head. "There's a murderer on the loose, and all you can do is make movie and literary quotes?"

"Yup!"

Ren sighed. "Alright. I'll see if I can find anybody else. You hang tight, alright?" With that, he set off again.

Nora shrugged and turned her head slightly with a wink. "While I might agree with Ren a bit on that, I'm pretty sure the writer's just going to keep using me as a cop-out to stretch his artistic prowess over the readers. After all, he sure uses the word 'philistine' a lot, but I'm pretty sure he doesn't even know what it means. What a dickhead."

Blake meandered aimlessly past classroom after classroom, with Weiss's words still weighing quite heavily on her mind. As much as she didn't want to admit it, they bothered her a hell of a lot more than she was inclined to admit.

The cat faunus flinched and tried to shake herself free from her thoughts. The words kept repeating in her head, no matter how hard she tried to block them out, to the point where her whole stream of consciousness was experiencing a mental tunnel vision. All other thoughts about killers and riddles were drowned out as Weiss's biting affronts pounded Blake's mind again and again…

I would cut you down like the filthy fucking animal that you are… They will arrest you for killing my friends, and they will lock you up in a cage far away from us all, where you belong… Once a criminal, always a criminal…

A huge pressure suddenly weighed on Blake's chest, and she gasped in pain, falling to her knees. She clenched her fingers as the hall began to spin, and she keeled over to try to keep herself from growing even more nauseous, but to no avail.

She tried to clutch at the floor, the carpet, anything to make the chest crushing pain go away, but there was nothing in grasp – the fire extinguisher had rolled out of reach as soon as she had collapsed. Her breathing ran ragged, and it took all she had to fill her lungs with air, but doing so just made her chest hurt even more.

It was as if her heart was trying to escape her chest cavity, and all she could do was curl into a quivering, moaning ball and pray.

"Am I… going… to die?"

At last, when she thought she couldn't bear it anymore, her heart slowed to a more manageable pace, and suddenly she could breathe freely again, to which she greedily filled her lungs in relief.

As the room ceased to move and her vision came back to normal, she realized with a start that she was drenched in perspiration. The carpet floor had drained most of it, but there had been enough that she could feel the cold, wet carpet against her skin as she lay on her side, trying to get a grip on what had just happened to her.

She remained in a fetal position; for how long, Blake knew not. The cold sweat made her shiver as it dripped down her face, and her thoughts raced at a thousand miles per hour, such so that it would've been impossible for her to form a coherent sentence at the current moment.

She shut her eyes, hoping some form of sensory deprivation would slow her mind down and allow her to think, if just for a little bit.

The first intelligible word that formed came to her in the form of Ruby's voice.

It was her name, spoken softly and waveringly.

"Blake…?"

It took the cat faunus a few seconds to realize that the voice was coming from an external source.

She opened her eyes.

Ruby was kneeled in front of Blake, concern and worry etched on her face.

What caught Blake's eye was that all that concern and worry was shrouded by absolute despair.

It seemed as if Ruby had been crying. Hard.

"R-Ruby?" Blake's voice was hoarse from disuse, and she pulled herself into a sitting position with much effort.

"You look like you've been through hell," murmured Ruby.

"I could say the same for you," Blake replied. "What's wrong? Well, besides the obvious."

"I… I found…" Ruby lowered her head, her voice cracking. "They got Yang," she said quietly, almost in a whisper.

Blake's eyes widened, and she suddenly felt weak again. "No. No way. They couldn't… how? Yang wouldn't… she wouldn't go down that easily…"

The redhead was unable to form a response. Instead, tears streamed down her face as she sobbed silently.

The cat faunus felt own tears began to well up, and she did the only thing that seemed appropriate.

She embraced Ruby.

That simple gesture was enough to set the waterworks off.

Ruby cried. She cried and cried, buried into Blake's shoulder as they held each other close.

And Blake could do nothing else but cry, too.

First Sun, then Neptune… and then the person she had grown the closest to over the last year. Gone, in the blink of an eye.

When would this wicked game ever end?

There are a lot of things to be said about being tall as a human being. In a lot of cultures, it was sometimes likened to represent a person's power; in fact, until women began wearing them, high heels were specifically designed for men to boost their stature and air of importance (and, unlike the tidbit about the church mice, this is, in fact, actually not complete bullshit).

The argument did arise, however, that being a tall peasant did not bring you any such power. You were just the person who could get the pots off of the top shelf, and once stools were invented, no one gave a shit about how tall you were. You might even be called a freak for being so goddamn tall. Freak.

Suffice to say, Weiss was neither a freak (arguably) or a peasant. In fact, the only problem she had regarding height was that her own height was inversely correlated to her power, which, with all efforts currently focused on the serial killer at bay as opposed to the working conditions of Schnee Dust Company employees, meant absolutely nothing.

The relevance of the previous paragraphs was not in vain, however, for Weiss currently found herself wishing for a stool.

The window she was trying to break was simply too high up for her.

But, stubbornly, she kept jumping and trying to land a blow on the window with her bare fists.

Both very stupid ideas, to be sure.

But you tend to make stupid ideas in the midst of a murderer.

Weiss tried. And she tried again. And again once more.

Each attempt was almost shrugged off by a very uncaring window.

Weiss growled impatiently, her temper reaching a boiling point.

She prepared herself for another jump…

"What are you doing?"

The sudden voice startled the heiress, skewing the trajectory of her jump, and she landed flat on her bum with a yelp.

"Couldn't you give me anymore warning than that?" Weiss grumbled.

"My apologies." Ren strolled over to her from out of the shadows. "It's just that… that was quite the amusing sight to behold. I was a bit puzzled as to what it was you were doing."

"What do you think?" Weiss narrowed her eyes. "I'm trying to escape!"

"By… hitting it with your fists?" Ren raised an eyebrow. "Aren't you a singer? Why don't you try to shatter it with your voice?"

"Don't patronize me, Ren," snarled the heiress. "I'm going to get to the authorities, explain to them of our current situation, and tell them who the killer is!"

"Oh?" Ren raised an eyebrow. "You know who the killer is?"

"I do." Weiss folded her arms triumphantly. "It's Blake, obviously."

"Oh… okay." The dark-haired boy frowned. "Not who I would've expected, but do go on."

"Oh, I will!" Weiss proclaimed. "After all, she's the only one of us with a background in a terrorist organization, so there's your dead giveaway! Plus, she's sneaky, she's very smart… I can't think of anyone else who would commit such an atrocity!"

"You'd be surprised," murmured Ren. "For what it's worth, I don't think Blake is someone who has any reason to kill anybody here. Sure, she was a criminal, but she was specifically a non-violent criminal. I can't see that kind of change happening in her so quickly, or anyone, for that matter."

Weiss hmphed arrogantly. "So that's it? You're going to throw away our one good lead because you think that they would never kill anyone? Fine. Go do… whatever it is that you were doing. I'm going to get out of this God-forsaken place, just you watch me!"

"I'd rather not," responded Ren, his expression unchanging. "At this rate, you'll have to wait a few years to grow another couple inches before you actually reach that window, and by then, you'll probably have starved to death. So sorry, but I've got better things to do, and if you're going to run away instead, be my guest."

Ren set off down the hallway, and Weiss glared after him.

"I don't need your help anyway," she muttered under her breath, before turning back to the window above her, preparing to jump once more…

Or maybe not.

Weiss sighed.

"There has got to be a shorter window." With that, she stomped off impatiently, unaware that every window in Beacon was probably taller than her.

It was going to be a long evening for the heiress.

"And remember that time Yang punched through a giant robot like it was nothing?" Ruby laughed melancholically.

"Yes, Ruby. Of course I do," smiled Blake in return, although she was quite certain that it came out looking like a grimace instead.

The two were sat against the school walls, with no tears left to cry. Instead, they reminisced about the person she was and the memories they had of her.

It was the best they could do to cope with the loss of a teammate. A friend. A motherly figure, when there was none otherwise.

"Right," Ruby sniffed. "I just… I can't believe that she's… well… actually gone."

Blake did not trust herself to speak and smiled instead; for behind that smile, her own crippling doubts coupled with sudden shock of Yang's death threatened to attack her once more.

The red-haired girl heaved a shuddering sigh and she slowly but steadily rose to her feet, forcing back the creeping feeling of anguish back down her throat. "There's no use just standing around. Yang would be furious if we just sat here and moped over her. We've got to go do something about this… for her."

Ruby reached out a hand to help Blake up, which the cat faunus gladly accepted.

"So… what do we do?" Blake inquired, the uncertainty and pain reverberating through her voice.

Ruby smiled faintly. "We should move out. We've got a murderer to catch, and we've got three friends and family members that we need to bring peace to." The light had begun to return in her bloodshot eyes, as well as a fierce determination that Blake could've sworn she had seen in Yang many times before.

"Right," Blake replied to her team leader. "For Yang."

Ruby beamed. "For Yang," she echoed.

"What do you think the others are doing right now?" inquired Jaune nervously.

"I'd imagine they'd be doing the same as us," replied Pyrrha with a slight smile. "There's really not a lot more that you can do with a murderer on the loose and the whole school under lockdown."

"I guess… I guess that makes sense," agreed the blonde. "But… I don't know, maybe some of them escaped?"

"I highly doubt it," replied Pyrrha, waving the torch around to shed light on their surroundings. "Beacon was built to be an impenetrable fortress, if the time ever came to defend it. Problem with that is, since it's made to keep all hostile forces out, it also serves to keep the allied forces in."

Jaune frowned. "Wouldn't that be problematic?"

"Not if going out means certain death."

Meanwhile, Weiss found a stool.

That was a joke.

Because she didn't.

Sucks to suck.

"Ahh… right." Jaune nodded thoughtfully. "It's a little strange that we haven't seen anyone yet, don't you think?"

"It really is," Pyrrha agreed. "We've been wandering the school for heaven knows how long, and although Beacon's quite a mammoth facility, I would've imagined we would've run into something by now."

"You don't think… you don't they're all dead, do you?"

Pyrrha shivered. "I'm holding onto hope, Jaune. I really want to believe they're all still alive."

"Ditto."

They continued to traverse the dark, vacant hallways until they discovered a set of doors along the wall, all of which had been opened.

"All these doors are open… that must mean someone's been through here!" exclaimed Pyrrha.

"Do you know what rooms these are?" asked Jaune.

"No, I can't say for sure. Especially since there's not enough lighting to recognize this place." Pyrrha handed him the torch. "Here, you take the doors on the left and I'll take all the doors on the right."

"Wait, what!?" Jaune burst out. "It's gonna be dark in there, why are you giving me the torch? And more importantly, what if the person who's been here isn't one of our friend but is actually the killer?"

Pyrrha smiled. "Don't worry. I looked in my rooms and they all have windows. Besides, I can always use the muzzle flash of my rifle to light things up quick."

"But…" Jaune tried to object, but Pyrrha brought her finger up to the blonde's lips.

"Jaune. Don't worry about me. I'll be fine," smiled the redhead, and she embraced her partner briefly. "Meet back in five?"

Jaune sighed. "Sure. Please… be careful."

Pyrrha nodded, and she entered door number one.

It was just about as normal of a classroom as you could get.

Nonetheless, Pyrrha made a thorough search of the room, coming up empty-handed.

She moved on to the next room, which seemed quite similar in layout of the first room. With a sigh, she went over the second room as well with no results.

The third room was significantly different.

It was a rather large and cluttered storage room of sorts, and thus, there were no windows. Pyrrha furrowed her brow. Was going in worth the risk?

She sighed once more. "Sorry Jaune. But, I am a huntress, after all." With that, she carefully stepped inside, pulling out Milo and lighting the room every now and again with a shot from the rifle.

She painstakingly and arduously investigated the room, noting every detail out of place. Everything seemed in order – until her eyes found the something notable in the back of the room.

She carefully approached it, and as the sight came into view, Pyrrha felt the urge to puke.

It was a body.

As dim as the room was, the garments that the corpse wore identified it as Neptune, but the bits of his head that remained were barely recognizable.

"Oh my God," breathed Pyrrha, clasping a hand to her mouth. It took everything in her power to keep the bile from rising.

Horrified but adamant, Pyrrha made a search of the body to see if there were any clues hidden about.

To her surprise, her brief search bore fruit.

A small piece fabric, about the size of a penny, rested on the corpse's jacket. Pyrrha carefully removed it and fired a shot in the air to provide adequate lighting.

The color of the fabric gave it away.

"The murderer… oh no." Pyrrha's eyes widened, and quickly got up to bolt towards the door. "I have to tell Jaune!" she gasped, her mind racing at a hundred miles an hour.

Her right foot hit something cold, and she heard a loud snap, allowing Pyrrha a brief second of confusion… and the subsequent horror.

She felt a sharp, biting agony gnawing right above her ankle bone, and Pyrrha screamed as she hit the floor chin-first. In her pain, Milo flew out of her grasp and landed a few feet away from her.

Through the hot tears that blurred her vision, she looked down at her leg to see a foot trap tearing through her armor and cutting deep into the flesh. She desperately tried to pry it open, but the unbearable pain drained her strength and her ability to lessen the trap's bite in the least.

Out of the corner of her eye, she spotted Milo, laying a ways away, and reached out with her semblance of magnetism to pull it towards her.

What she failed to take into account were the half-dozen other metal foot traps of varying sizes that surrounded her.

One sacrificed all and then there were six.

Again, apologies for this coming out late. I'm slacking on this so bad.

I'm a bit underwhelmed at the results of the poll this week. Out of those of you that submitted, 35% of you guessed the right victim, which was expected, and a fair amount of you picked the right weapon, too, but nobody was able to guess them both right. Unfortunate, but we still need a winner, so out of those of you that picked either the right victim or the right weapon, our winner is... Thryr373! Congratulations, I will contact you for a fanfic prompt.

So I think I'm going to take a week break from TLH. I'm obviously not meeting schedule, so maybe with a week I can get a head start and pull myself ahead of schedule. TLH will continue on Tuesday, April 7th, and I think I might sweeten this week's pot prize instead of the usual fanfic prompts... so you may want to take the survey for this one ;)

To refresh on the rules, check the Notice 2 in the chapters.

To refresh on the riddle, participants, and weapons, check the Riddle in the chapters.

To take up the next survey, click the link on my profile!

See you in two weeks! Good luck!