When they were strong enough to move, Sun led the group of fifty Vacuans, plus Bertilak, back through to the place where the tunnel branched off in four directions. The mine rumbled and groaned around them, in constant danger of caving in.

“That way,” Bertilak declared, pointing in one direction with confidence. Sun eyed the wicked mace hanging from the man’s belt and tried to remember that he wasn’t an enemy—or not one worth dealing with right now, at least.

Bertilak’s tunnel took them to a dead end, though. The tunnel had completely collapsed here, and Sun hoped it hadn’t been a mistake to let Bertilak take the lead. What would his team think if they could see him now?

“Velvet?” Sun called. The ceiling trembled. What if his friends were under this mess?

“Shhh,” Bertilak said. “Don’t give away our location. I’m not interested in joining this grave.”

The other Vacuans lagged behind, but at least they were moving, and their slower pace allowed them to notice details that Sun had missed. One of them picked something up and asked, “Does this look familiar?”

It was a dagger with a wavy blade.

“Octavia?” Sun called, looking all around the passageway.

He heard a groan close to the cave-in. A boot stuck out of the rocks, still attached to a foot, and a leg … but it belonged to a man, not to Octavia or Velvet. Sun started digging, anyway. This was going to take forever.

Then other hands began lifting the rocks off the mound with him. The people he had just rescued, some of them barely able to stand on their feet, were helping him dig out someone they didn’t even know. Sun smiled, and they kept working. This felt like a different kind of teamwork.

After thirty minutes of hard labor, the group uncovered a body—an unconscious, sturdy-looking man who was part of the Crown’s group, judging by the scorched armband on his arm. Then they found a second body, under him, sheltered from most of the rocks. This person was also alive, and soon Sun recognized Octavia Ember.

She opened her eyes and tried to move. “Ow,” she said. Then she bolted up, grimaced, and said, “Velvet?”

“She wasn’t with you?” Sun asked, helping her to her feet and trying not to panic.

“She was standing right there.” Octavia pointed in Bertilak’s direction. The Huntsman was crouched over a hand sticking out of the rock pile, holding a sai.

Bertilak grabbed the sai trumphantly. “Aha! There you are, Red.” He tucked the sai into his belt and drew his mace, bringing it over his head. “This is what you get for stabbing me in the back.”

“Stop!” Sun closed his eyes and one of his clones flashed into existence beside Bertilak, grabbing the mace before he could bring it down on the buried body in front of him.

“Cute trick.” Bertilak shook the mace free and faced off against Sun’s clone. “But don’t cross me, kid.”

“That isn’t Carmine,” Octavia told him. “She was standing over there during the explosion—she was closest to the avalanche.” The spot was several steps away from the body.

Bertilak sighed. “Even with extra Aura, Carmine couldn’t have survived that,” he said. “Or if she did, she must be out of air by now.” Maybe he wouldn’t get his revenge after all.

Sun raced across the room and started digging faster to get to Velvet. Everyone else pitched in to uncover her, quickly but gently. “Help us!” he shouted at Bertilak.

Bertilak grinned. “You missed a spot.” He put his mace on his belt and eased himself back on a large boulder. “Ahhh.”

When they finally freed Velvet, Sun didn’t like how fragile and still she was. With all the care he could manage, he reached down and lifted her out.

“You’re not supposed to move her. Something could be broken,” Octavia said.

“She’s fine,” Sun said. “She’s going to be fine.” He just kept telling himself that.

He removed her camera from its holster on her back and laid her down gently on a flat surface.

“Come on, Velvet,” he said. “If you’re hurt, your team is gonna kill me.”

“Always worried about yourself,” a tiny voice said. Velvet smiled.

“Oh, thank the gods,” someone from the crowd said.

Sun sprawled next to her. “Velvet? You okay?”

She opened her eyes wider and spoke more clearly. “Anyone get the number of that Atlesian Paladin?”

“That was at Beacon,” Sun said, crestfallen. Velvet’s brain must have been all scrambled from the explosion …

“I know. I’m just messing with you,” she said, struggling to sit up. “Now when someone says ‘it hit me like a ton of bricks,’ I know exactly what that feels like.”

She looked around at the gathered people, the ones Sun had freed. “Oh good, you’re all safe.”

Sun smiled. “Always worried about other people first,” he said. “But I’m not sure I’d call us ‘safe.’ This place is going to come down at any moment.”

“I’m sorry! That’s all my fault.” Velvet explained what had happened in the fight against Carmine and Gill, plus their last-ditch effort to stop them.

- RWBY: Before the Dawn, Chapter 19