"Again? But- oh! oh I get it, no! No, you're ok don't worry, I'm not that other Yang!" she replied, waving her hands in front of her placatingly with a hopefully disarming smile. "I know this probably isn't gonna make sense, but I'm a different Yang, promise? Was she the one who hit you guys?" She asked with a concerned frown as she looked down at Ilia's stab wound with a wince.
Yang pulled her hands back close to her chest and scrunched her face up with a confused frown as she tried to process that sentence. "The train to Argus? But that was..."
"Oh-" Yang's hands froze for a moment as her aborted hug was suddenly put back on mission, a look of surprise on her face that gave way to a soft smile. It wasn't one people usually saw, considering her head was usually on their shoulder during a hug, but way her arms hooked around and held tight, but not too tight, gave the same warm and protective aura through the contact anyways. She didn't know what went wrong with that other Yang, but she'd always be a protector first and an ass kicker second, and that meant emotionally just as much as it did physically. These arms were made for holding, and Yang was always proud to continue her solemn duty with them.
"I realize we don't know each other that well but, there's some things I was thinking about that I wanted to say. From one team leader to another. I know that bad things do happen, sometimes no matter how hard you try to stop them. I know what loss can do to people. If we gave up every time we lost, though...we'd never be able to move forward. Never be able to see what might be lying beyond the pain of that loss. Never be there for people who might be lost without us." Ruby moved to the side and lowered herself to sit down on the floor next to Watts' chair.
"The thought of breaking up your team...I can't say whether you should do that or not. Whether it is right or not, it's not my place to judge. Maybe it is something that needs to happen, at least for a while, so that the four of you become stronger or better people than you were before. It did happen for us, my team. After we suffered our own heavy losses, our decisions and circumstances pulled us apart. And when we finally came back together, we weren't all the same people we were before. Of course, your team and mine aren't quite the same, hah, and you all have your own radically different issues to work out but...I personally think you guys have the potential to be just as brave, and kind, and noble as any other huntsmen team. Maybe not like the righteous hero from some cheery fairy tale, but good enough. I..."
"...I just think it would be a shame if you decided you disbanding your team was a permanent thing."
Mercury hadn't even twitched throughout the entirety of the Jinn's manifestation, a breathtaking, once-in-a-life experience he never could've even conceived of being in the room for a day ago. That was how much he truly, sincerely did not care anymore. As Watts took a seat and the plans for an imminent departure seemed to dissipate in the wake of the knowledge bomb, Mercury made a noise squarely between frustration and disgust before tossing his bag to the floor with a heavier-than-necessary thump, storming out to go do some shadowboxing. If the rest of them weren't ready, whatever.
He was gonna make sure he was.
"Why would I do something so childish?" He drawled, a bit of the bite back in his tone for a moment before he rubbed his eyes. "...Either way, I suppose I'll have some time to think about. Even if we left now, which I'M NOT SURE WHY WE'RE NOT DOING THAT-" He called over Ruby's shoulder to the room in general with an irate frown as the underlying stress jittering deep in his bones briefly surfaced."...Just Ruby is fine." She pointed out, feeling a little weirded out that he was calling her Miss Rose. She wasn't a teacher or professor or doctor or anything close to those to earn a formal greeting like that. Neither did she think she was that far above them as being referred to that way implied she was. She was the same age as many of them after all, just a huntress like them trying to push through all the struggles in her path. After he got through all he needed to say, she just looked at him in a thoughtfully curious way. "You know, that reminds me of something I once read in one of my teammate's many many books. What is better - to be born good, or to overcome your evil nature through great effort?" She repeated word for word. "If you're right on that, on how you think about yourself, which I'm not necessarily agreeing with, but if you are-" She looked over to him with an easygoing smile.
"-then I think that only makes you more admirable, not less. You're fighting yourself as much as you fight grimm, or any bad guys. You went to Beacon, brought yourself out here on a mission that like she said-" She nodded vaguely over in the direction of where the Raven who brought the relic was standing. "-is bigger than any of us. I don't know your exact reasons, but I believe if you didn't want to go through with any of it...you wouldn't be sitting here with us, trying to make a difference. You kept real smart people from locating us, upgraded a bunch of your allies' scrolls to try to keep that from happening in the future...if you truly wanted to be gone? To give this up? You'd just be gone. That big brain of yours probably has a dozen ways to ditch us all without even a chance for someone stopping you. Maybe even end with somebody unknowingly wearing a kick me sign on their back." She snickered despite the situation. "Right?" Ruby looked away from him right then.
"Besides-" Her eyes flitted from Yang to the two Ravens to everybody else in sight. "-do you honestly think you're the only huntsman in history with anger problems, or jealousy, or self-doubt? Trust me, you never want to see my sister when someone messes with her hair. And they aren't here right now, but the early days with my partner and one of my friends who leads a team of his own? They had plenty of the other two feelings, enough to go around and share."
