Pyrrha and Mercury had had their hands full trying to kill the Grimm invading the ship.
Hypnosia, surprisingly, actually helped. Her Semblance worked on the Grimm...sort of. Grimm didn't really sleep, but they did slow down and appear to rest, and that was good enough.
Finally, some of the huntsmen passengers came out of hiding to help them also, though they were still worried about the Deimos.
But the Deimos didn't come to the ship. Perhaps they were avoiding Mercury.
Still, it was a lot of Grimm.
And they were running down the hallways, clawing at doors, while the fighters tried to get them to go back out.
A very large one made a huge hole in the stairwell that let bigger Grimm down it.
Pyrrha speared it, but the damage was done already.
The Grimm scrambled down that hole in bigger sizes now, and the smaller ones that were already in there--which looked like flying rats--got out of their way so they could try to break down the doors.
"Hey, get away from them!" Pyrrha yelled.
One broke the door to the room she knew her kids were in.
She heard Polly shriek.
The large Grimm leapt forward to get in the room.
Pyrrha used her Semblance to vault herself down the hall much faster than the small Grimm could follow its fellow, and she slammed into it with her shield, sending the little one down the hall.
She turned to the large one just in time to see Ben jab a sword into its side from where he'd been hiding around the door frame.
Polly had Davi and Franz on the bed, with a table pulled in front of them, and Jodie was holding Lux as far back from the door as possible.
The Grimm hissed and turned to smoke, thankfully leaving no trace of it.
The kids all looked at Ben, then at Pyrrha.
"Was that a straight thrust?" Ben asked.
Pyrrha laughed almost hysterically but then got a grip.
"Well, your balance needs work, but I think that will do very well for a first Grimm," she said.
"Mama," Davi squealed, "there's more of them, aren't there?"
"There's more behind you!" Polly said.
Pyrrha had already heard it coming. She turned in time to see another huge Grimm that looked like a panther, but with white horns and fangs and wings, running up the hall at her.
Pyrrha ducked as it sprung at her, using her shield to throw it over her head, and then she flipped over and jammed her javelin into its chest before it could get up.
It turned to smoke also.
The kids all gaped at her.
"This ship isn't going to be safe anymore," Pyrrha told them. "Stay close to me. We have to get back to the dock."
She could only hope the safety in numbers with the main team might protect them... It looked like nothing else was going to.
They nodded at her.
"Pyrrha!" Mercury called down the hall. "They're going down to the next level too."
"I know my opinion isn't worth much," Hypnosia spoke, "But that music you had on before seemed to do something. Why not put it back on?"
"Because your partner unplugged it," Mercury snapped at her.
"From that room, but the ship has an intercom," Hypnosia said. "Your children's chance of safety on the mainland are not wonderful right now. Better for me also, as I'm currently defenseless."
She snapped her fingers, and a Grimm fell down in front of her.
"Defenseless, yeah," Mercury said, stamping on it so that it dissolved.
"I'm not good for many more of those," Hypnosia said, wiping her forehead.
"I don't know how to hook a scroll up to the intercom," Mercury said.
"I do," Hypnosia said. "I passed my time riding this tub doing something productive."
"Well, be my guest," Mercury said.
"Give her a scroll then," Pyrrha said. "I can take care of the rest of the Grimm on this level for now."
"I can help," Ben said, stepping out.
"Benjamin..." Pyrrha said.
"Mom," he said frowning. "Don't you need help right now? What choice do we have?"
"Let the kid help if he wants," Mercury said. "He's got a weapon."
"Of course he does. We didn't let them come unarmed," Pyrrha said. "But I didn't want them to have to use it... But yes, I suppose it's better than waiting for it... You stick close to me and help, but don't go off after any of them yourself."
Ben nodded.
"What about me?" Polly asked, looking out the door. She had a sword out too--it was also a crossbow.
[You think this is funny, but keep in mind they are the same age Ruby was at Signal Academy, and she made her own freaking weapon by then.]
Jodie had the younger kids.
"I can keep an eye on them," she said.
"We'll be good," Davi said.
"We can scare the Grimm away," Franz said.
Lux was thankfully happily asleep right now; she could sleep through anything.
Pyrrha wished Jaune was there so this decision wasn't just on her.
"Hey!" They heard Jaune suddenly.
He came around the hall.
There had been some Grimm at that end, but he'd already stopped them.
"Yang, Neptune, and I came to help deal with this," he said, seeing the others. "Nothing we do against the bugs is helping, so we're doing this... Are all of you kids okay?"
"We're fine," Polly said.
"Ben just killed a Grimm," Jodie said proudly.
Ben looked shy.
"Oh, really? That's awesome," Jaune said. "Pyrrha?"
"I'm all right, Jaune." Pyrrha smiled faintly. "Better now that you're here."
"You two make me sick," Mercury said.
"Agreed," Hypnosia said.
"You don't get to say that," Mercury said.
"Hey, isn't she a bandit?" Jaune said.
"She's helping right now," Mercury said. "It's in her best interest to make sure the Grimm don't eat her. We have an idea for getting the music back on. Since you're here, why don't you help clean out the ones that just went down the next deck? The doors aren't holding very well now. Emerald is still in sick bay with that medic, and the other kids are down there too who aren't up here."
"I know," Jaune said crossly.
"Then get with it," Mercury said.
"I can go with Jaune," Ben said.
"We can go with Pyrrha," Polly said.
"I suppose so," Pyrrha said. "If that's all right, Jaune?"
"Normally, I'd say no, but I think it's safer than leaving them here when there's no door or wall or anything," Jaune said. "But Lux..."
"You just said it isn't safe to say put," Jodie said. "We'll be okay. You two are crazy powerful, right?"
"In a way, this is kind of exciting," Polly said. "We've never gotten to see you in action before. We've just heard the stories."
"I guess that settles it," Jaune said. "We can meet Yang then. Pyrrha, Neptune said he can do something about the aquatic Grimm, and you're the one with the long range weapon..."
"I'll go help him." Pyrrha nodded. "Let's hurry."
They all ran different directions.
Mercury and Hypnosia went to the nearest intercom that was working, and she began to hotwire it to the scroll. After a few minutes of working on it while he kept the Grimm off her, she was able to get sound.
"All right, better pick a good song," she said. "Why does this music bother them anyway?"
"Who knows?" Mercury said. "It's a trick my teachers taught us. I guess the good energy counters the negative energy that draws the Grimm."
"Interesting," Hypnosia muttered.
Meanwhile, on the deck, Pyrrha had killed most of the Grimm out of the way on the way back up there, and was set to keep any more from getting down there.
Neptune was on deck using water to shove the aquatic Grimm away.
"Come on, just leave already!" he yelled at them. "This is not your property!"
Davi ran up to him before Pyrrha could do anything to stop him.
"Go away, Grimm!" he shouted down. "We don't want you here!"
Franz joined him. "Get away! We're not afraid of you!"
"Boys!" Jodie called. "Err..." She hefted Lux.
One of the Grimm came lunging along the deck at her.
Polly shot it with her crossbow, and it fell down dead at their feet.
Jodie looked at it, kind of sick, but then backed up carefully. It turned to smoke.
Pyrrha smiled. "That was a good shot--get down!"
She saw another huge flying one coming their way.
She threw her weapon through it and then levitated that into another one, hitting it down and then leaping to kill it too.
Peering off deck, she saw a huge flock that was going towards the city.
"Oh no," she said. "They're going to attack the people."
"Well, of course they are!" Neptune said. "They're primed for it now...crap!" He shoved water and caught some of the amphibious Grimm that were climbing onto the back and tossed them back into the sea, hard, against the ship hulls, killing some of them.
But he was getting tired.
Pyrrha looked after the flock, then she held up her hands, straining. Her Aura flashed into view.
The kids watched in awe as all the metal lying on the decks of the ship around them rose into the air till it looked like a swarm of bees.
Pyrrha then yelled ,and it flew after the Grimm, impaling them with dozens of small metal objects.
The Grimm all vaporized.
"Goshdang, that was cool," Neptune admitted.
"Well, right back at you with that wave," Pyrrha said.
"Yeah, but it's not enough," he said. "The ship is all right, but we can't keep them off the whole island, and there's the other side too."
Yang, Jaune, and Ben came out of the lower deck right then, driving out the last of the Grimm who'd gotten down there.
"Don't worry, everyone's fine," Yang said. "The Grimm didn't get in the rooms before we caught them. This kid isn't too bad."
Ben grinned.
"Well, we do train a lot..." Jaune admitted. "He's leagues better than I was at his age."
"In your defense, you hadn't actually used a sword yet at his age," Pyrrha said.
"I thought Dad was a prodigy," Ben said.
Yang snorted.
"He had a lot of raw potential," Pyrrha said.
"Translation: he sucked, but your mom has the patience of a saint," Yang said.
"I didn't suck..." Jaune said. "I mean...completely."
"It's not fair to compare him to a genius like Pyrrha anyway," Neptune said.
"I'm pretty sure we're evenly matched now," Pyrrha said. "I might have trained more, but Jaune has much more raw power and reach than I do. And he heals so much faster. I don't know if I could beat him so easily."
"I don't care even if you can," Jaune said. "We're not supposed to be fighting each other. We're a team." [If only more married couples remembered that.]
"Geez, Nikos, that reminds me that we've never had a rematch," Mercury said.
"Anytime you want," Pyrrha said. "Maybe I'm a little rusty these days--you might actually stand a chance."
"Pshaw, I just wouldn't hold back this time," Mercury said.
"If I choose not to use my Semblance, maybe," Pyrrha said.
"Yeah, it's pretty funny that you want to challenge the girl who could lay you out just by flipping your feet around," Yang said.
Mercury didn't like to be reminded of this and glared at her.
"Uh, hello..." Hypnosia said, "Grimm?"
The music had just come on.
Well, it worked. The Grimm stopped attacking the ship right away...and the island was the weaker target by now.
"It should be safe here now," Pyrrha said, with relief. "We should go help on the mainland."
"Hey, look." Jaune pointed up. "The Deimos..."
Some of them had moved farther away from the ship than before, even from the dock.
"Out of victims?" Mercury guessed.
"Maybe, or maybe the others finally found a way," Jaune said. "Come on, let's find out."
They all rushed for the plank.
Hypnosia looked at the kids.
"So...?" she said weakly. "Your parents are cool."
Ben and Polly held up their weapons.
"One move, and you're dead," Polly said.
"You're going back to the brig," Ben agreed.
"Her Aura is pretty low." Jodie held up a scroll with her free hand. "I bet she can't even use her Semblance on all of us if she wanted to."
The other kids crossed their arms at her.
"Precocious little brats," Hypnosia muttered sourly.
* * *
The others had been killing as many of the Deimos as they could...but they never seemed to really get any less... Was it because more had just kept coming this whole time?
Winter flew into the air with a summoning to see what was left of the city and reported that, as far as she could tell, at least half the people in it had to have been bitten already.
It had only been about two hours since it started, maybe longer if you counted when they'd first seen them.
"At this rate, another couple hours and everyone will have been bitten," Raven said. "The people who haven't been must still be hiding. Where could they be hiding?"
"The cellar, I bet," Blake supplied, covering two of her four ears. "There's hurricanes here every year. People usually have them, no matter how poor they are."
"So maybe some people won't get bitten at all," Weiss said. "If they leave."
"Why would they leave? They only have to wait them out," Raven said. "Grimm don't have to eat or sleep. Clearly their mission here is to infect everyone. They won't go until they do if someone doesn't make them."
"Well, we did what Winter said." Sun shrugged. "Are people attacking each other?"
"Of course they are," Winter said. "But, there is some sliver of good news: The people here aren't armed that often...and most are too afraid of each other to have a proper fight. I saw some injured but few who were dead. And the ones who are children are not the ones who are the most hurt, surprisingly. I suppose they have an easier time finding a place to hide... But the toxin does last many hours. It will only get worse if it's not stopped...and they could be bitten again."
"That's why it's foolproof," Raven said. "Mala's plan was genius, in its own horrible way. How long can we expect them to not bite us?"
"Guys--" Oscar looked up. "--Ruby's waking up."
"Really?" Qrow said.
"Maybe it wasn't a powerful drug after all," Weiss hoped.
Ruby was stirring.
"There's the others from the ship," Blake said. "I guess it's stable again at least..."
"Hey, look, there's Royal and Cinder now." Sun spotted them. "I hope they have good news."
"Not likely," Qrow muttered.
Royal and Cinder were still holding hands when they walked up, which got them some odds looks from Weiss and Blake, but no one else was in the mood to care.
But Royal began to explain that he seemed to be able to to help people resist.
"And Cinder said she figured something out," he said. "But she wouldn't tell me what it was. Said it'd be better to tell you all together."
"Well, don't waste any time," Winter said hurriedly. "What is it?"
Cinder seemed back to normal.
"I think there's a way for people to resist the toxin," she announced in her typical dramatic but cold tone. "If you are able to rally long enough to act against the fear, it jolts you out of the power of it."
"It's...possible," Oscar said. "I remember when Oz and I were still...joined, he startled me out of it, and I resisted, and that made it better, once I got through with it, but I had the staff too."
Ruby blinked slowly and opened her eyes. "What happened? Did someone hit me?... Ow...my head..."
"Take it easy, okay?" Oscar told her.
"We could never get these people to rally," Raven said. "They are not even able to listen to us."
Cinder shook her head. "I don't know what else there is to it."
"How did you figure this out?" Mercury asked curiously, with an odd smirk.
"I just did." Cinder frowned at him.
"Even if that worked, we'd have to clear the air of the Deimos to even attempt it," Winter said. "And--" She paused suddenly.
The wind had suddenly picked up.
The night had been totally clear before, save for the Grimm in the air, but they all glanced up and saw the moon--now whole, as they were still not used to seeing--was covered in thick clouds.
The wind increased.
"What is this?" Blake said, shivering suddenly. "The forecast was clear, I know. I checked it this morning because I knew we were arriving."
"Well, the forecast is wrong a lot..." Sun said.
"It's getting stronger." Weiss hugged her jacket to her sides as her hair started hitting her in the eyes.
"Maybe we should get off this roof," Hazel said.
Everyone rushed to do so.
["Song of Storms"--Rozen]
The wind continued to pick up and got so strong it was howling.
It all happened so fast, it was like one of the gales that blow up at sea and stop quickly, a strong one.
But it got so strong, shingles were blowing off roofs, and debris that had been left by the panicking people was tumbling around.
Everyone leaned on the walls to stay in place, but even though the wind blasted them roughly, nothing hit them that was worse than a few pieces of plant leaves.
All over, they heard people screaming at the new threat and running for cover...but when they were focused on the storm, they couldn't be fighting each other, and soon most of the yelling was drowned out by the wind.
And then it began to rain and blow at the same time.
The most unexpected thing that happened because of this was that the Deimos themselves, being small, were shoved in the wind first one way and then the other, and then the rain came and been to fall in such huge drops that they were pounded into the ground.
Then the rain turned to hail, though in Menagerie, even in late Autumn, hail was extremely rare, a once in a decade occurrence maybe.
But hail it did.
The hail crushed the Deimos into jelly, and then rain washed them away so that they could not reform.
What were not smashed into the ground were swept out to sea by the wind, and presumably they were destroyed there by the weather, because no one ever heard of them biting anyone else.
The hail fell near the group but didn't land on any of them. They were mostly undercover anyway, and Winter formed a glyph shield, but really most of it didn't even come that close.
Neo had her umbrella up over her and Roman, and they were holding hands also.
No one could hear each other speak, so they could only watch and exchange puzzled looks.
Then...as quickly as it had started, the storm slowed and stopped, and the moon reappeared a few seconds later.
The air became warm again, and the hail all melted in a few minutes and trickled into huge ruts and down into the sea, taking a lot of the remaining sludge with it.
Coming out to the street and then getting on the roof again to see what had happened, the group saw that the Deimos were all gone, and Menagerie was actually not that much damaged by the storm...and the people who were sodden all over now were not fighting each other, though they were still very much afraid.
"Well..." Meridian said, finally breaking the silence, "I guess that took care of that problem. Maybe we should try Cinder's idea now?"
They all glanced at each other, then Ruby said, "There's still other Grimm attacking."
There were still some left.
"And there's more kids who still had the Grimm injected into them..." Blake said.
"Maybe now that the Deimos are gone, I can use my Semblance to help snap people out of the effects," Meridian said.
"Maybe I can too...?" Royal wasn't sure.
"We can try to see if they can be talked out of it now," Weiss said. "Maybe without the Grimm there to make it worse, it'll work."
"Maybe play more music if we all take our scrolls out?" Pyrrha said.
"Well..." Raven said, when they looked at her, "I guess that sounds like a plan. Better than nothing. All of us older huntsmen will round up the people and try to get them subdued. That will be the hard part."
"Easier now that those things are gone though," Qrow said, lifting his scythe.
They all split up.
* * *
It was a long night.
Though the Deimos were gone, and Ruby and Mercury made short work of the other Grimm with some help for their team, the poison effects did not pass immediately.
Many people were still panicked and violent. The storm had stalled them, not stopped them.
However, with no more Deimos around, the group was able to ask the Menagerie people who had escaped being affected to help them corral the others. Most of the others were friends and family.
With some guidance from the team, the Faunus who knew each other were able to get through to some of the people who must have had a slightly higher resistance to the Deimos' effects and at least convince them that they were not their enemies.
The worst cases the group had to lock inside until the effects passed, but this was more doable once they had backup.
Blake finally found Gira and Kali, who were not bitten and were able to getting more Faunus to help them.
The huntresses who were still alert were able to help too.
Even so, there were far more people than the team could cover and some still went missing or got hurt.
When dawn finally came, the city of Kuo Kuana was in a pretty bad state. [Fun fact: Kuo Kuana means 'rejected'.]
But compared to what had been expected, it was in good condition, because it was still standing and mostly intact on the inside.
The death toll that Raven was attempting to tally, with some help, was less than they thought. Less than 100 people had been injured seriously in the panic, and a lot of those had been their own doing, not their neighbors. There were maybe 20 cases of that... It was still too high an amount for such a close knit community as the Faunus to not feel was an atrocity...but still...
There were at least 300 injuries, running from minor to more midrange.
And they found 4 more kids who'd been injected with the bugged shots.
But, miraculously, none of the kids were killed or even that badly hurt. No Grimm had eaten them. They were able to remove the shots without much fuss.
The kids were still deeply upset, and it would be a long time before they got over it...but they were at least safe.
Blake was just returning to the ship for a much needed rest that the others insisted she take because of her condition, when the captain of a different ship came up to her.
"Miss Belladonna-Wu-Kong?" they said.
"Yes?" Blake was expecting more bad news.
"Sorry to bother you, ma'am, but...we were wondering, did you have anyone with a Semblance that might have started that storm?"
"Semblance?" Bakle said. "No, it was too big for that."
"It did seem that way, but there were so many of you, we thought maybe it was possible. We heard you're powerful with weather."
"Not that powerful," Blake said. "Why would you think it was us?"
"Oh," the captain said, rubbing his hat, "well, we were watching the weather scanners at the time, trying to see if we'd be able to leave, if we had to, and that storm was nowhere. It's like it came out of thin air... The weather in these parts is a little weird, but still, I've never seen a storm blow up that fast and then stop just like that. Weird day."
Blake stared. "Yeah...weird...or maybe miraculous."
"Maybe... Well, I won't bother you anymore." The captain saw how tired she looked.
Blake just shook her head in amazement.
* * *
By mid morning, everyone was so dead on their feet, Raven and Winter finally decided they needed a break.
"I guess the natives can handle the rest of damage report," Raven said. "All of you who've been up since yesterday, go get some rest, that's an order."
"Finally, yay," Sun cheered.
"I am so tired..." Weiss agreed.
"Better go check on the ship," Pyrrha said.
Most of them went with her.
Royal stopped Oscar, though Oscar was pretty tired too.
"Hey, can I ask you about something?" he asked.
He told him about the vision.
Oscar went from exhausted to more excited.
"It's been years since I had any kind of vision of those times," he said. "They stopped after Ozpin and I separated. I had no idea anyone else would..."
He paused. A part of him was almost jealous, but then, he was glad he didn't have Ozpin's soul in his head either.
"I was just wondering how it was possible," Royal said. "And if it was true. Cinder thought it was, but I know you've had those before."
"I agree with her that it was true," Oscar said. "There might be more to it, but I can tell you something Cinder might not know: There was a friend of Ozpin's he mentioned when we ventured into the Grimm lands before, the one who wrote that guidebook to Mind Grimm and other usual Grimm that Victoria Kanap let us borrow. I think Cousin Theo still has it... She might know more about who wrote it. It sounds as if this Charles guy you saw must have been the person, the only one Ozpin knew of who got that far and survived."
"And one friend," Royal said. "But I don't know who they were."
"We couldn't understand how anyone got that close and lived after what we went through," Oscar said. "And Oz never said they knew Alicia, but he rarely ever volunteered information about her. And he was against that entire plan, so anything that might have made us think it was more possible, I can imagine he wouldn't have said."
"He was kind of a jerk at times, wasn't he?" Royal observed.
"He'd been alive too long on the same quest." Oscar had become less emotional about it in all this time. "It's easy to judge him, but we only had to deal with it for a year or so, and it nearly drove us over the edge. He couldn't take any risks that weren't his own idea anymore... In the end, he sided with us. I think we should try to focus on that."
"Of course," Royal said more meekly. "So...Kanap... I guess I should go to Vacuo."
"I don't know why--" Raven walked up behind them. "--since I didn't hear what you were talking about, but if you want to hop over there, someone should check to make sure Theo is keeping Watts on target. The fact that this entire disaster happened and Watts didn't drop a word of it to us doesn't sit right with me."
"Better send Cinder then," Oscar said. "She seems to be able to see through Watts the best these days."
Raven shrugged.
"This is an outrage," Winter commented, talking to Qrow and Hazel mostly, "that this happened under our watch..."
"You tried to stop it," Hazel said. "It could have been worse."
"A lot worse," Qrow said. "I can't believe I'm saying this, but you should try to look at the good side. The place is still standing. Last night we thought it wouldn't be."
"I am grateful for that, Qrow," Winter said, sounding tired. "But why did it have to suffer at all? And all those people who didn't need to experience being poisoned by Grimm or injected? Where is the sense?"
"I'm wondering what the bandits wanted to accomplish to begin with," Qrow said. "I think we'd better start asking them, since we're all wide awake still and we have three of the rats... Oh, and that's one silver lining we can think about--finally, we caught some."
"Better hurry before the tribe finds a way to silence them," Hazel said.
"It's odd to hear both of you trying to be encouraging," Winter noted.
"At this stage, I know the most uplifting thing to tell you is that we have a next step and it's not a dead end," Qrow said sagely.
Winter put a hand on his shoulder. "Thank you."
Then she walked towards the ship.
Qrow smiled.
Hazel shrugged.
"What? What would you tell Raven?" Qrow asked. "How's that going, by the way? I can't imagine..."
"It's going fine," Hazel said.
"Just fine?" Qrow said. "The honeymoon period end already, huh?"
"Whatever that means, it's not that different from before," Hazel said.
"Why did you agree to marry her if that's how you felt?" Qrow said.
"Perhaps we're not the romantic sort like you and Winter." Hazel thinking they were romantic was pretty funny--well, compared to him perhaps they were. "We're a good team, and it's good not to be alone. I think that's in your book. To us, it just made sense."
"I almost envy you your confidence," Qrow said. "I had to be talked into even thinking about it, and it's so easy for my sister to just plunge headfirst into something and act as if she always wanted to do it."
"People are different." Hazel didn't care.
"Yep..." Qrow knew he wasn't going to get more of an explanation... He supposed he should just accept it and hope they were happy. He could never tell if Hazel was happy, but at least he wasn't angry.
* * *
"I know you won't like my saying this," Pyrrha remarked to Cinder as they both were heading to the ship's lower deck, "but I'm glad you're okay. I heard the Deimos bit you."
"As usual, I was one of the only ones affected by Grimm," Cinder said.
"Don't make it out like that. Royal was too. I think they attacked you because your Aura was lower from that other attack. I heard about it from Jaune." Pyrrha shrugged. "I'm sure that's all there is to it. No one else had that happen, even though we were all freaking out, so it couldn't have been a matter of bravery. But I see you made it through."
"Why should it concern you?" Cinder said, but lacked the energy to make it as scornful as usual.
"Because I choose to be concerned," Pyrrha replied primly. "Please, are you ever going to let this go?"
"Maybe." Cinder rubbed the back of her head tiredly. "Someday."
"Really?" Pyrrha was surprised. "That's good news."
"Actually, I could use your input on something," Cinder said, more awkwardly.
"You...can?--Uh, I mean, sorry, what?" Pyrrha tried to hide her astonishment, not very well.
"Your partner already told me about it, but I thought maybe the other side would be more helpful," Cinder said. "What does it mean if someone asks you to trust them before they can talk about something?"
"I..." Pyrrha was on the point of asking who it was, and then checked herself and tried to sound objective. "Without knowing the person, I'd say either they're part of a top secret assignment, or perhaps it's a difficult subject and they couldn't talk about it if you didn't feel close enough to them to hear it."
"What does that mean?" Cinder said.
"It's hard for me to explain without more of an example." Pyrrha hesitated.
"Jaune said you didn't tell him you...had feelings for him, because he didn't trust you enough yet," Cinder said.
"Well, I knew he trusted me as a friend," Pyrrha said. "But I wanted to know he trusted me as more than that... That is, when you love someone, as more than a friend, you want to know all about them. Or...well, I can't say everyone I know is like that, but you wouldn't mind knowing, even if you wouldn't ask for it. They can trust you to handle it well."
"Is there a person alive who would be relied upon to handle everything well?" Cinder was skeptical.
"I think I might see your problem." Pyrrha tapped her chin. "The answer to that is no, of course not. We all have things that make us freak out or overwhelm us... If you're very fortunate, the person you're with, forever, will not have that reaction to any in your life...but, uh, well, since I had to die before I got together with Jaune, that's a pretty extreme thing to have to get past. I thought it might not be possible. We struggled with it... I think the others had to learn how to live with me all over again, and I with them."
Cinder looked guilty.
"Don't worry about it," Pyrrha said. "I think I gained many valuable insights from that experience, things it would have taken me years to learn if I didn't have it. But, the thing is, even dying, as odd as it sounds, can break your trust with people--their trust in your judgment, for one thing. And they know you're not immortal. We can pretend people will never die...until it happens, and we can't get away from it. It's tough on love to get past the idea of loss."
Cinder seemed to be hearing that a lot today.
"Sounds easier not to care then," she said.
"Easier...well, yes, if being as lifeless as a stone is easy to you," Pyrrha said oddly. "I don't think I could do it. I've made my mistake, but I don't regret caring. We must love to really live. That's the truth of it... But trust, as you say...it's hard because we can't really never mess up."
"Well, then what's the point of asking for it?" Cinder muttered.
"I trust that there are people who, though they will make mistakes, will always come back to the right thing," Pyrrha said carefully. "That's as trustworthy as a person can be. And to trust that they will have the right priorities, even if they have their weak moments. And personally, if they have my deeper trust, that means that my particular problems are ones I know they will handle gracefully, or as gracefully as they can. So I don't mind their blunders. Love makes up for a lot. That's what I would take it to mean. I hope that helps."
That would remain to be seen.