#th-dusky

✧ Dusky | | semi-selective, RWBY multi-muse rp sideblog with a focus on antagonistic muses both canon and OC! Tasked by Twilight. ⚠️ Trigger warnings for varied dark content, including abuse, fascism, and racism.

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So, a bargain had been struck.

In exchange for information — how to leave the Manor unseen, how to get to Mantle just as undetected, the contact information for someone Jacques “knew”, and more — the youngest Schnee sibling had asked Weiss for total and unrestricted access to things the middle child had no use for (mainly any of their dresses without stupidly revealing necklines, and their cosmetics). Whitley had even tossed in a suit or three, seeming oddly inclined to ‘sweeten the deal’, as it were. The half-blind Hunter couldn’t help thinking that the accord benefited Whitley far more, but done was done.

Weiss was here, in a suit sans jacket that had belonged to their younger sibling an hour or so ago, and it felt like the world was tipping on its axis. The oddest thing about the whole interaction with Whitley, had been the unexpected embrace the two had shared, standing in the opening of the library passage… but Weiss couldn’t handle more than one world-altering event at a time. They could deal with it… Eventually. Being who and what they were, the shorter Faunus spoke flatly, although the flapping of their hands probably (hopefully?) softened the blankness a bit.

They had set down their suitcase at some point — which contained the bare essentials, dust, and everything needed to care for Myrtenaster — in order to facilitate said stimming with their hands. “…You’re a shark, too.” Another compulsive teeth lick, this time exposing the jagged, serrated points. “I was always told we were hunted to extinction…” Far too lucrative a commodity to protect — hunted for eyes, and teeth, and scales, and fins, and blood. The kind of Faunus whose people floated in red waters, bodies sold in parts. Frowning and rocking side-to-side just a little, another stim to accompany their flapping hands, it also came with the ever-present awkwardness that accompanied them — defined them, some would say — on land.

Lanky and wiry, bony and far-too-thin, even despite standing at 4’10” without heels. A third lick of their teeth, and Weiss half sighed, the deep breath fluttering the gills at either side of their throat; completely uncovered to flex in the open air for the first time in at least ten years. “…I probably shouldn’t be surprised Jacques systematically lied to me for my entire life,” the smaller shark muttered. Although, even Beacon’s library had said about the same… Not the point. “What do you want from me?” Blunt, certainly, but after the past few months… Weiss would probably spend a long while just relearning how to breathe.

The joys of being retraumatized.

It was a trap, everyone knew it, but feigning ignorance was something else she had learned quickly; something everyone ought to learn quickly, when dealing with Father… Something she was beginning to realize her older siblings couldn’t do, no matter how hard they had both tried; although through no fault of their own.

That had been an almost intolerably awkward interaction with Mother, a woman Whitley barely knew… Between incoherently intoxicated and pleasantly drunk, Willow had explained (her understanding of) autism to her youngest daughter, which had prompted the new Heiress to do her own research into the matter; if anyone asked, she could have passed it off as “know thy enemy”.

But that wasn’t the point. The point was what Father had planned, what she could do about it, and to untangle how she felt about it. The joys of walking a knife’s edge, every day life in Schnee Manor… (Her tail twitched, but not where her ears were. Weiss said she was born with lop ears, but Whitley didn’t know what they felt like. After two disasters, Father wasn’t taking any chances, and had them removed.)

…Again, that wasn’t the point.

Weiss narrowed their eyes at Jacques, nose wrinkling, while the pupil of their blue/sighted eye contracted to a slit. (The last bit always happened; his all-white suit and bleached hair were a brightness they couldn’t stand.) Although they knew he wanted them to look him in the eyes, the backdrop of his blue shirt made his tie easier to focus on… not to mention that, unless he forced them to, they couldn’t make eye contact with him anyway.

Head tilting and braid singing, arms crossed over their chest, the newly-minted Hunter spoke immediately; beginning to slightly rock from side to side as they did so. (A stim, but not particularly discomfited, just yet.) “…That’s strange,” the shark began, unintentionally reverting back to the way they had been taught to speak — mouth moving just enough to be distinct and intelligible, but not enough to show their teeth. “Given that her taste is always in question, since she married you and never left.

“And Ruby makes me happy — something you never cared about when it came to Mother.” A neurotypical person would have realized their words were just begging for a physical altercation, and so chosen them more carefully, but the Great White Shark Faunus wasn’t and so didn’t. But by the grace of gods they still didn’t know if they believed in (Ozpin’s flashback had only touched on the Brother Gods), Weiss said nothing else, habitually locking their jaw.

As quiet as Jacques expected — demanded them to be, for once. A strange combination of fighting and submitting, which seemed to underscore everything they did, these days. Apparently, mental health — and especially so trauma recovery — wasn’t a straight line, as their therapist from Beacon kept reminding them, whenever they got frustrated over their ‘lack of progress’. Weiss wasn’t sure they believed Aki… But that was irrelevant.

Whatever Jacques would do was.

Truth told, she had only ever tolerated Jacques Gele because he had made Willow happy, at least in the beginning. She had tolerated Nicholas’ logic of choosing the devil they knew, when it became abundantly clear that Willow had neither the interest in nor the stomach needed to run the Company. They were both still alive, after all, and by that point it had come to light that Winter and Weiss would be much better heirs; Winter for the title of Duchess, Weiss with the character necessary to balance moral uprightness and profit. (Perhaps it was too much to ask of a seven-year-old child, but they already clearly already had the determination and drive for it.)

But then Nicholas had died — suddenly, but not entirely unexpectedly — and the balance had nearly crumbled. Wilhelmine was busy with the funeral, as well as everything private and social that was expected after the death of a ducal consort. Willow, after the traumatic birth of their youngest, had completely dissolved into the alcoholism that had been building over the years since Weiss’ birth. (Wilhelmine refused to be ashamed of choosing her grandchildren; Willow had made their bed.) Winter was doing her best to teach Weiss about death, while handling both her own grief and that of her younger sibling.

And Jacques…

Jacques had clearly been quietly plotting, when not engaged in feigning public grief for his father-in-law. Wilhelmine berated herself for not having seen it sooner, but now that she had, she was putting her foot down. “This does not belong to you,” she stressed, voice and gaze colder and harder than Solitas’ tundra. “The Company does not belong to you, so I will ask you again — just who do you think you are, Jacques Gele?” So long as she drew breath, the Schnee Dust Company would be held in trust for Weiss until they reached majority, the administration of which would pass to Winter if Wilhelmine died before then.

The ink on that, at least, was dry.