Queen to E1 / Ground Zero I
Summary: Have a little faith. You'll know what you need when you need to know it.
I've been thinking of doing something like this for awhile now, and with Diamond Eclipse currently on hold (laptop with the latest chapter on it died, for those that don't know) I figured why not? This chapter is going to start out a little slow since it's borrowing heavily from the show, but bear with me.
I'm not entirely sure what the 'regular' length of these chapters will be right now, or any clue how many chapters it will have. But this multi-chap for my funny rare pair will not be sticking to canon. So the good news is Volume 5 doesn't matter for the end game (see what i did there? no? ...i'll just go sit in my corner).
"Allright. Hmm, alright."
For a whisper it was oddly loud, and noticeable in an otherwise silent library.
"Yang Xiao Long, prepare your kingdom for battle!" Ruby shouted, shattering the 'peace' that had been present in the air before.
"Bring it on!" her sister exclaimed with just as much enthusiasm. And the silence was slain, in the most dorky manner possible.
"I deploy the Atlesian Air Fleet!" Yang gasped dramatically, clutching at her... bosom, of all things. "Looks like I get to fly right over your Ursi and attack your walls directly!" The dork began to make airship noises.
A just as dramatic gasp as the first one echoed from her sister. "You fiend!"
"And since Atlas is part of Mantle my repair time only lasts one turn."
Then there was the 'evil' laughter, again. "Pretty sneaky, sis. But you just activated my trap card!"
"Whaaaat!?"
"Giant Nevermore!" Yang's fist met the table, scattering the playing pieces. Didn't they know they would have to fix that before continuing so they didn't get confused as to where the pieces were beforehand? Fucking amateurs. "If I roll a seven or higher fatal feathers will slice your fleet in two."
"But, if you roll a six or lower, the Nevermore will turn on your own forces!"
"That's just a chance I'm willing to take."
It was pretty easy to determine which side of the line the dice favored with the red head's wail drifting through the stacks of books. "Noooooooo! My fearless soldiers!"
"Eh, most of them were probably androids."
"Goodbye my friends... You will be avenged."
"Not until I draw my rewards, which are doubled this round, thanks to the Mistral trade route!"
"Bah!"
"Oh, and what's this? The Smugglers of Wind Path!?"
"Bah! Bah, I say!"
"Looks like I'm taking two cards from your hand!"
"Have you no heart!? Nooo," Ruby whined, defeated.
"Well Weiss, it's your turn!"
"I have... absolutely no idea what's going on." Well that made two of them. Granted, this was a lot more confusing having to listen to because they decided to play a card game in a fucking library. He may not be studying, but he had been trying to concentrate on his task before the four of them came bumbling in here. Okay, mostly just blondie and hyper red wings, but still.
Yang slid over to look at Weiss' cards. "Look, it's easy! You're playing as Vacuo which means all Vacuo-based cards come with a bonus!"
"That sounds dumb." Agreed.
"See, you've got Sandstorm, Dessert Scavenge-Oh! Oh! Resourceful Raider! See now you can take Ruby's discarded air fleet-"
"Nooo," the mentioned 'weeped rivers' onto the table.
"-and put it in your hand!"
"Okay?" It was clear Weiss was having a hard time wrapping her head around such a ridiculous game.
"And since Vacuo warriors have an endurance boost against natural hazards, you could use Sandstorm to disable my ground forces and simultaneously infiltrate my kingdom! Just know that I will not forget this declaration of war." Yang slid back to her starting position.
"And that means?"
"You're just three moves away from conquering Remnant!"
"Ahahaha! Yes! Fear the almighty power of my forces! Cower as they pillage your homes and weep as they take your children from your very arms-" His brow raised. That got dark quickly.
"Trap card."
"Huh?"
"Your armies have been destroyed."
"I hate this game of emotions we play!"
"Stay strong, Weiss. We'll make it through this together."
"Shut up! Don't touch me!"
"Alright Blake, you're up!"
"Huh? Oh, ummm... Sorry, what am I doing?"
"You're playing as Vale, trying to conquer the Kingdoms of Remnant."
"Right..."
"Hey! Can I play?" The other dork seems to have found his way to their table, and from the looks of it his teammate stole his comic to force him to study. And now he was trying to escape that duty for the time being by joining in RWBY's game.
"Sorry Jaune, we've already got four people."
"Besides, this game requires a certain level of tactical cunning that I seriously doubt you posses." He still wasn't sure why the ice queen was such a bitch to Jaune, but Mercury had only been at the academy for a week now. He would just figure out the reasoning later if it became necessary - or out of boredom, probably out of boredom.
"Uh... you attacked your own naval fleet two turns ago." Yang pointed out.
"Hmph!"
"Bring it on, ice queen! I'll have you know that I've been told I'm a natural born leader!"
"By who? Your mother!?"
"And Pyrrha!"
"Hello again!" Was that suppose to be a slogan or something? She said it quite often.
"Come on, let me play your hand for a turn."
"I'm not trusting you with the good citizens of Vacuo!"
"Why not!? You've trusted me with way more important stuff before! I mean you told us all that Blake is secretly a fau-" Pyrrha zipped over in a flash, covering Jaune's mouth
"Fun-loving person whom we all admire and respect!"
Jaune chuckled nervously. "Right... that." Right, a secret. The bow made it quite obvious what she was trying to hide, not to mention her status as a faunus. All other faunus in the school would know just by looking at her. Not to mention any human that had a brain. He seriously doubted it would be that shocking if the school - or anyone else for that matter - found out. What was the point of hiding such a thing anyway? She must have grown up with her ears out and in the open before, so why hide it now? Not that much could have changed between when she was a child and now. Humans and faunus were still at odds with each other, yet you didn't see the faunus usually trying to hide their species. It seemed cowardly to him.
"Ladies... Enjoy your battle." Jaune bowed.
"'Sup losers?" Mercury's gaze drifted back up from his scroll upon hearing someone else adding on to the endless noise. At this point it didn't seem like he was going to get anything done. He snapped the scroll shut, setting it on the table as he looked at the group through an empty space in the book shelf.
"Hey Sun."
"Ruby, Yang, Blake, Ice Queen." the monkey-tailed faunus known as Sun greeted each in turn.
"Why does everyone keep calling me that?" Typically it's because the person being spoken to is a cold bitch.
"I never got a chance to formally introduce you to my old friend."
"Uh... aren't libraries for reading?" One would think.
"Thank you!" a member of team JNPR shouted from the table behind them.
"Pancakes!" What the hell is wrong with these kids? Or that team for that matter?
"Shut up. Don't be a nerd." Sun reprimanded his old friend.
"Gigigi. Intellectual. Okay. Thank you." Yeah, that first part sounded like something an intellectual would say. "I'm Neptune." Ah, a name for another idiot.
"So, Neptune, where are you from?"
"Haven." Neptune stepped closer to Weiss. "And I don't believe I've caught your name, snow angel." What sort of pick-up line was that?
"Um... I'm Weiss." She fell for it? Or she just had crappy taste in guys.
"Are you kidding me!?" Jaune whisper-yelled. Hm, had he tried to use something similar to hit on her before? Sheesh, you dodge one idiot to sub-comb to the next.
"Pleasure to meet you."
"I never took you as the board-game-playing type." Sun had evidently lost interest in his friend, since he was now looking to Blake. It was so obvious he liked her that it was almost sad when she shot him down.
"Right... well I think I'm done playing, actually. I'll see you guys later."
"Women."
Well, this had gotten extremely boring very fast, and he still needed to catalog the data he had acquired for Cinder. Even though he didn't particularly want to... he would have to go back to the dorm to finish up.
~ / ~
"That girl was the one giving Roman trouble?" Emerald asked in the safety of Cinder's dorm room. Their own rooms were across the hall.
"Yes," Cinder replied, looking at something on her scroll.
"I was watching her and her friends earlier. It's hard to believe she could do anything to slow his operation." Mercury was laying on his back, staring up at the ceiling. "I think he's incompetent." He glanced towards Cinder. "Why do we need his help again?"
"You know why." Cinder snapped the scroll shut, finally looking at the two of them.
"If he's the best criminal here in this rotten town what does Vale need police for?" He didn't expect an answer to his question, and he didn't get one.
Cinder slid one leg across the other. "What about her team?"
Emerald sighed. "Nothing special. It's like Merc says, 'they're a bunch of idiots.' There's Ruby their leader who got in two years early, but I'm pretty sure that's because she interrupted one of Roman's earlier robberies. She's nothing but a nuisance for repeatedly sticking her nose in where it doesn't belong, but not much of a threat to the real operation since she only knows about Roman. Her semblance is speed. Her weapon... you've seen it. I did confirm that she is one of Qrow's nieces like you asked. So going after her would make him come out of the woodwork, but... that would go against the plan.
"Then there's her partner, Weiss Schnee. Heiress to the Schnee Company, someone that has more of a reason to be going after Roman for stealing her father's shipments of dust. Yet it's her partner that's more concerned about it. Her semblance is the same as the rest of her family, summoning and glyphs. Though, no one in the school has mentioned seeing her summon anything to her aide in practice. It might be that she only uses it against Grimm. Other than that... shes uses a modified rapier as a weapon, is the one with the least stamina in the group. Unlike Yang she can't take a heavy hit, so out of all of them I would say she's the one to be the least concerned with-"
"The fact that she's an heiress to a global company isn't something to be concerned about?" Mercury ignored the scowl Emerald shot at him, keeping his gaze on Cinder. "Yeah, she can't put up a very long fight like blondie, but that doesn't mean you can just ignore her."
Emerald allowed a few seconds to pass, glancing from him to Cinder before going on, "As I was saying. Blake Belladonna is Yang's partner in the group. A cat faunus. Her semblance allows her to leave behind a copy of herself, but it can't move or actually do anything so she uses it as a decoy most of the time. I couldn't find anything on her past. She didn't attend a training academy before coming here, and considering how there wasn't much in the records I would guess she was raised outside the kingdoms.
"Yang on the other hand is Ruby's sister. Another niece of Qrow's, which makes her as just as big of a nuisance as her sister. She's hot-headed and enjoys fighting. She supports her sister as leader of the team even though she's younger than her. I didn't find out what her semblance was, but her usual fighting style is hand-to-hand." Emerald paused. "Is that enough? Did Roman need to know anything else in case they showed up again?"
"No." Cinder gave a dismissive wave of her hand and the two of them got up, heading for the door. Emerald reached it first, unlocking it and slipping out of the room to go across the hall. "Mercury. A word." He stopped in the door frame, glancing over his shoulder before grabbing onto the handle and pulling the door closed once more.
The lock slid back into place.
I will be keeping the rating as T for now, but it may increase later.