AN: This chapter is a tad longer than normal, but it delves deeper into the workings of New Mountain Glenn and how the girls are going to spend the rest of their indefinite time there.

Thanks to Spartacus400 on /r/RWBY for beta reading.

Disclaimer: RWBY is a product of Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC. All characters are owned by Rooster Teeth Productions, LLC.

Assigned

They couldn't count with days anymore, not without a sun. They counted by shifts. There were four shifts a day, each one being six hours. Rotating between work and the basic necessities, sleep and food. After each shift the city seemed to just have grown a story or so by itself, brick by brick. At about what had been around twenty-six shifts, the roofs of the buildings were finally being put in place.

Ruby and Yang were up on the top level, using new building materials to plot out the roof. The fifteen meter by fifteen meter building had risen to five levels through their hard labour. While the sisters were up top, some others were making their way slowly up the interior, laying out door frames and their doors. The whole project was moving along nicely; no accidents, no setbacks.

The refugees of Vale had come together to create thousands of five story tenement homes. Each able to house eighty people in their small area of fifteen square meters, with each level holding sixteen people in four rooms, four people in one room. To have as much space as possible between the four rooms, the building's interior had no stairs. The only way to enter your room was to climb a set of railed, exterior steps and walkways. All rooms had two bunk beds mounted from the wall, two tin nightstands, a table, one door, a wood shutter window, and one closet. There were no restrooms in the building. Tenants had to use the closest public restroom available.

Ruby had just set down the first plank of wood of the roof. She went to reach for another and as soon as she wrapped her palm around it, their overseer called them down. Looking down at the base of their creation, the girls saw the rest of their build's work force crowded around something. Yang shouted down a confirmation of their descent to the overseer and proceeded to plop down to the walkway below. Ruby followed, quickly overtaking the blonde.

Yang didn't really mind nearly being flung off the side of the walkway by her sister. She was just finally happy to see her lil' Ruby was her energized old self still; even after a week in this underground dump. The red girl yelled back to the dragon to hurry up, excited to see what was taking place on the ground level.

"Next, I have a Blake Belladonna and a Weiss Schnee!" A man called out, holding up two sealed envelopes to their recipients.

The black and white pair swiftly took the letters from the courier's hand and opened them up. Inside was a folded piece of paper that listed directions to work, work hours, your new partner, and what your new assigned job was.

"...Farm..er?" Weiss surprised, read off to herself, "I'm a farmer now?"

"And I'm your partner now, as well." Blake added, reading her note as well.

"B-But, I'm a Schnee! I cant-" Weiss could feel the faunus girl staring daggers at her from the side. It shut the ex-heiress up and made her stay true to her word, "I can do this. Because I'm willing to change."

"Unlike some" She nearly hissed at Blake.

Blake was taken slightly back by the vitriol of Weiss. She knew the girl was rough.

But damn.

Though Weiss' snotty attitude was completely smashed as a young, hooded girl sped past her, making her jump. Weiss scowled at Ruby before being pushed aside by Yang's palm.

The courier turned raised his arm once again, "Ruby Rose and Yang Xiao Long, special assignments for you!" He held up two unique envelopes, both a strange tint of blue with a red wax seal.

"That's us!' Yang directed the man's attention.

He turned to the two girls, "These were written and sealed by the General himself, I wish luck to both of you." The two letters were held out to them.

Yang quickly swiped hers and slid her finger under the cover, ready to pull the seal open. But then she noticed her sister's hesitation, Ruby's hand twitching just before the letter. Yang gave her two light pats on the back and a quick one sided smirk. Ruby returned the smirk with a small smile and pulled the letter from the courier's hands. She held it close, examining the seal.

This was right, Yang could feel it. This was when she'd keep her promise to protect her sister. She was saving her from a life of rotting underground. She was saving Ruby from herself. She was saving her life.

Yang gave her sister a nudge on the shoulder and gestured to her finger under the seal. Ruby nodded, seathing her thumb under the envelope's cover.

"One, two, three…" The tore the letter open and unfolded the message.

Recipient: Ruby Rose

Assigned Partner: Yang Xiao Long

Assignment: Scavenger (Arctic Wolf Initiative)

Description: You are one of the sixteen lucky persons to be selected for the Arctic Wolf Initiative proposed by Doctor Bartholomew Oobleck. The Initiative plans to send groups of eight members to all areas, far and wide, of the surface in order to collect usable metals for tools and machines. You and your partner will be equipped with state-of-the-art, extreme environmental suits that will allow you to walk freely among the surface. You and your partner will be given one of these tools to share between the two of you: A crowbar and a sledgehammer.

You will labor in the Arctic Wolf Headquarters located near the smeltery area at the far end of New Mountain Glenn. A normal work day will consist of six hours, exempting surface runs, where you will assess your next scavenge operation, keep your equipment clean and functional, and maintain the lorry.

You start as soon as you complete the construction of your tenant complex.

"Oh my…" Ruby's eyes shimmered.

"Looks like you'll be getting that wish of yours after all." Yang folded up her note and tucked it under her arm, "You ready to get back up there?"

"Yeah…" Ruby sped toward the tenant complex, tugging at her sister to budge.

Yang nearly toppled over, "What are you doing, Rubes?"

"Come on!" The ecstatic girl said, "Let's get back up to the roof and finish so we can get out from this hole!"

Once the building had been complete, the old Team RWBY began making their way down the main strip. Ruby danced around the three in her excitement. Yang was simply smiling, while Weiss and Blake gave each other the evil eye.

"Ruby, could you quit it?" Weiss spoke up.

"Leave her alone, Ice Queen," Yang nudged her.

Weiss snapped her head around, "I told you to stop calling me that!"

"Whatever, Ice Queen."

"Come on, guys, lighten up!" Ruby practically sang.

"What is there to lighten up for?" Blake interjected.

"Uh…" Ruby thought for a second, stopping her prancing, "We don't have to lift concrete bricks anymore!"

Weiss blinked, "But now I have to lift a hoe for hours and hours. Great. That's so much better."

Blake sighed, "Do you just complain about everything?"

"Like you can say anything, Blake."

"Excuse me?" The faunus' eyes narrowed,"At least when I complained about something I tried to do something about it!"

Yang put up a hand, "Guys…"

"You didn't exactly do it well," Weiss emphasised

"You did not just say that," Blake felt her fists tighten.

"Guys." Yang popped in again.

Weiss craned her head, "What are you going to do? Punch me?"

"What you just did, you little insensitive brat," Her feline ear twitched, her teeth were gritted, "Shows that you can, in fact, absolutely not chan-"

"GUYS!" Yang's shout interrupted Blake's, "SHUT UP!" She huffed.

The blonde pointed at the two instigators, "I don't know what exactly changed in the past week, but when we first got down here, you two were perfectly fine! But lately you've been at one another's throats! Whatever's happening is between you two, you need to figure out; fast. We can't survive down here if we're going to tear ourselves apart. Now, I don't care what you do, you can talk, murder someone together, whatever it takes to get whatever this is fixed. Can you do that?"

Weiss and Blake looked at each other and sighed. They turned back to Yang and nodded.

"Good. All I want is for you two get along and be happy. I'm not saying you have to screw each other or something like that. Just get along! Can you please do that?

Another nodded from the adversaries.

"Good. Just dandy. Let's get to our jobs. Come on, Ruby." Yang turned forward and didn't look back, leaving the two girls stunned.

Ruby simply just stayed quiet while she processed the entire ordeal.

"I'm...gonna go...with her…" The short brunette darted off.

The black and white pair gave one another a glance and scoffed.

"Why are you on my case so much? Especially when you haven't changed at all! This, this-thing we have, whatever it is, it's obviously a two-way street. And If I'm going to progress as a person, you either have to get far away from me or get on the same page. So, what will it be, Blake?"

Blake gritted her teeth together, thinking to herself. A nervous gulp traveled down her neck. Looking at Weiss to reply, their team leader shouted out,

"Hey, guys, come here! Now!"

Panning over, they saw the sisters sprinting to a crowd. Weiss sighed before nudged her head in their direction. Blake just nodded and they took off after their teammates.

"Wait! You imbeciles!" The ex-heiress shook her fist.

Skidding to a halt before the back of the crowd, or what seemed to be mob, they were able to peer over the heads of the civilians to see what was drawing all the attention. It was General Ironwood, standing behind a podium on the now complete platform. He raised up his hands, trying to settle the angry crowd.

As it simmered, a member of the mob shouted out, "What's happened to Remnant? It's been a week and we've heard absolutely nothing from you!"

"Now," Ironwood sighed. He looked terrible, almost as if he had aged ten years in the matter of a week. Dark rings hung under his eyes, and he was struggling to keep them open. His hair had turned mostly grey. And he was slightly hunched over as his posture degraded.

"I understand most of you are anxious," The General went on, "We ourselves still do not know what happened."

"That can't be true!" Another crowd member piped up, "You've been sending up scientists and all sorts of equipment through that damn elevator! You can't say you don't know anything!"

Ironwood scratched his neck, "The data collecting on the surface has become...difficult. Instruments are being damaged in the lethal weather conditions, data is being corrupted, we cannot currently make any assumptions based on incorrect-Hmmph!" He dodged a stone that was thrown at him, "-fractured data."

"Not even the slightest idea?"

"I am sorry. We have no further information at this current time. Now, if you will," Ironwood checked his scroll, trying to keep his head low as more people took up items in their hands to aim at him, "Please join the rest of your coworkers at your newly assigned jobs." He turned away and walked from his podium. New members of the New Mountain Glenn police force taking guard of him as the crowd threw whatever they could grab at him.

The mob disturbed Ruby, it bothered her as how some could hold so much anger to someone who has only done their best to perform to, as if they don't care that they're even alive right now.

Ruby froze as she nearly scared herself to death.

She didn't care that she was alive when they first arrived here.

Her eyes stayed wide upon her realization. She took a sharp breath in and flexed her fingers. She grabbed her sister's shoulder and whispered, "Come on, let's go…" She spun around and planted her foot onto the ground.

Ruby paused for a moment, still holding on to her sister. She turned slowly back to Yang.

"Thanks…" Ruby said softly before running off.

Yang sighed and smiled to herself, "Dork.." She snickered to herself before taking chase.

Weiss looked over to see Ruby and Yang had disappeared for a second time.

"They did it again!" She looked back at Blake only to see her walking away, "Hey!"

"Come on, let's get going." The faunus called back.

"Say something before you leave!" The ex-heiress whined and followed Blake.

"Here are your tools," A man behind a kiosk dropped a pair of hoes into their arms, "You will join the other cultivators in row C, getting the land ready for the seeders. Hoe the land every few inches or so."

The two girls looked over their new tools as if they were some sort of jewel.

"What are you two waiting for? Go." The man waved them along, "I also recommend you get some more suitable clothes for this job next time."

They sighed and nodded before turning to follow the rest of the workers sent to the underground field. Weiss did her best to find a comfortable position to hold her new tool, finally settling on propping up on her shoulder.

She craned her head up to Blake, whom was relaxed in her stride. Something wasn't quite right with her; while she looked perfectly fine, being near her emitted a strange feeling of anxiety. And earlier, she had started an argument between them through a single comment. Not to mention the hostile comment was backed by what seemed to be the most vile acid ever conceived. Yes, Weiss had spoken to her before, and while the ex-heiress' words were bitter, they were needed. As Weiss has learned over time, you cannot be subtle with Blake; only straight forward and blunt. Either something was just wrong or Weiss had rubbed the faunus a bad way. And Blake was one to hold a grudge.

"Blake?" Weiss asked

"Yes?" The taller girl replied rather plainly.

Weiss chewed on her teeth for a moment, "Look, I don't know what happened back on the main strip, but I'm sorry...If I said anything that offended you…"

"No, I'm sorry," Blake abruptly interjected, "I've been thinking about what you said last week and the more I think about it, the more you're right. I shouldn't have snapped on you. I've just been handling this situation poorly; typical Blake…"

"Come on," Weiss responded, "Don't be too hard on yourself. This situation isn't the most preferred," She looked down to the ground, watching her feet move against the stone, "But since you have been thinking about what I said," Weiss started again, glancing up at her partner.

"No...Unfortunately, No. I can't tell you." Blake cut her off.

"What? Why?"

Blake sighed, "It's better off if you don't know, that includes Ruby and Yang. The less you know about this, the safer you all are."

"If it affects me and the others somehow, we should know something!" Weiss exclaimed.

Blake shook her head, "No."

"Blake!"

The faunus rubbed her brow with thumb and index, "Just watch out for yourself. Okay?"

Weiss gave the the girl a confused and concerned look, "Why?"

"Just... be on your toes…" Blake eyed something behind her.

The sisters sat a group of foldable tables all centered at a one of the walls in the medium grey room with the rest of the Arctic Wolf members. On said wall, was a giant crudely drawn map of Vale and what looked be a map of all of Remnant sticking out from under the map of the city. To the left of those was a small lipped shelf just barely making it between the corner of the wall and the maps. Tall posters, maybe somewhere near a meter and a half tall, sat on the shelf, leaning against the wall longways; rolled up and banded. To the right of the maps was a blackboard that creeped out from below the maps. The visible end was segmented into three parts labeled: Route, Gear, Guidelines. Under route was a rough sketch of the surface of Mountain Glenn. Listed beneath gear was a whole plethora of equipment; 'wolf' suits, oxygen canisters, sledgehammers, crowbars, m-clamps, rope. They didn't know what some of these things were or what they were going to be used for, but they figured their questions should be answered soon enough. Then there was the guidelines, and that was what really caught the girls' eye. It started off in big underlined letters:

SCAVENGE RUN GUIDELINES

1. All gear must be triple-checked

2. You will stay in formation while traversing

3. While at a scavenge point, you must stay within 25 meters of your partner

4. Recover all usable metals (Iron, Steel, Bronze, Gold, etc)

5. A minimum of eleven kilograms must be collected from each member

6. ALL metals must be deposited in the lorry

7. The lorry is to be considered the #1 priority

It was very blunt and seemed to be a fairly standard until they got to the end. In bolded letters it said:

IF YOU FALL BEHIND

YOU CAN AND WILL BE LEFT BEHIND

It definitely ringed off a few alarms in their heads. Was the surface going to be that bad to the point they might die? It discouraged Ruby, but it also intrigued her as well.

"Evening Wolves!" Oobleck barged into the room, slamming the door shut, "Now if your job description didn't quite make things clear to you, allow me: You are now Arctic Wolves, a group of sixteen selected members to become scavengers that will return to the surface and retrieve all usable metals that can be forged into new tools and weapons for the people of the underground!" He quickly rambled on through his words before slowly saying, "Understood?"

The entire group gave Oobleck a nod.

"Alright, Good! Now, Orientation!" He clapped his hands together, "You will be split up into two groups of eight, each group going up to the surface once a week. I will be your captain, and I will join both groups for both expeditions as your captain. Once on the surface, four members will push the lorry, which I will tell you about later, while the others guard it in a diamond formation." He drew a box on the chalkboard representing the lorry, then four dots behind, in front of, and to the left and right of it to accent his description. "You'll switch shifts every hour or so. Then when we get there, you'll park the lorry in the position I select, then move outward from it, on foot. Only go as far out as a kilometer or two, then return after about an hour."

Oobleck moved over to the shelf on the left and stuck his hand behind the rolled up maps. Retracting his hand, he pulled out a medium sized metal rectangle. It was around twenty-four centimeters long and maybe twelve in width. He turned and showed it to the group.

"This is an M-Clamp! Each of your 'wolf' suits are equipped with an M-Clamp. Simply place your metal findings on it, and it will magnetically hold them for you. Understood?"

Another nod from the group.

Ruby tapped her fingers against her table as Oobleck went on about their 'wolf' suits, or 'simplified astronaut suits' as he called them. She didn't really care right now. She wanted to get up on the surface and explore, even if she had to push something called a lorry. Just get out there and out of here, away from the underground.

She wanted to see the world again.

This chapter was such a pain to write, but I did it for my readers. Please leave a review containing your thoughts about the chapter or the entire fic itself. Quite interested to hear some feedback from you guys.

But anyway. Onto Chapter 6.

Love,

~Vox