Good in to Great

by th3g1ng3rn1nja

It was a desperate time, Remnant was on the edge of war. Jaune Arc just wanted to do his part and help as best as he could, but was getting rejected from everyone. Until he unknowingly proved himself in a way he had not expected. He was given the chance that nobody else was, the chance to become something more; something Super. MCU; Captain America AU

Hello everyone; not everyone's favourite ginger (DAMM YOU NORA) here had an idea wrote the idea down and just kept going and before I knew it this was here, I have split it in to chapters, but i have split it in to sections as I think this would be easier, I prefer to have it all put out in front of me and not have to wait for the next chapter as the cliff hangers for RWBY Volume 5 and 6 kill me every time so I thought it would be nice to give you everything.

(Tiny little head-cannon I have thought of, back at Beacon when they were all late for their first day of classes, Jaune and Ren are shown to be a lot faster than Nora and Pyrrha is way at the back, I like to think this became a running theme and when asked about it by Weiss because 'How could some dunce be faster than Pyrrha Nikos' she just blushes and mutters about Jaune having a nice bum, with Nora saying 'Renny always runs ahead of me, I like it'. I like to think team JNPR is two powerful warrior goddess' trying not to go full yandere on their men. Nothing to do with the story just something I thought of while writing this intro.)

I love Captain America, he's a man I aspire to be, he does the right thing and he sticks to it, it might be hard but he does it because he knows it is right. Jaune I believe to be the same, he will do the right thing for the people he loves.

The reason for the title is a little play on the story of Cap, he is said to be a great hero, when all he wants to be is a good man.

This is my second ever story posted on this site, the first was marvel themed as well, but focused a lot on Jason Grace as Thor in Infinity War. If that sounds interesting check it out please.

DISCLAIMER: I OWN NOTHING

Without further ado; please read, take breaks when you see fit, eye strain is a thing and please review.

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Prologue

Unknown POV:

"Nearly 60 years ago, one of the most terrible things and simultaneously greatest events in both; human and Faunus history occurred; the great war.

"This war spanned 10 years of conflict and pitted the kingdoms against each other in some of the most violent ways known to man. Brother thought brother, families were divided, trust that had been built up between the kingdoms and its people, was shattered like glass. For 10 years the fighting raged before coming to a peaceful end.

"Throughout the war technology advanced and was used in very creative ways, innocent people died, villages were destroyed and the Faunus were subjected to cruel fates. These were the consequences of Mantle and Mistrals actions to quell emotions, in hopes to exterminate the Grimm. Vacuo did not take kindly to these methods and fought for the freedom to express their emotions as they viewed them an important part of their society, Vale joined in the hopes to gain the freedom for the people as well. Soon it seemed that the war might end, but in the favour of oppression and not of choice, that was when the most incredible thing happened.

"Vale decided to try something desperate to help them in their fight, create a super soldier, many candidates were selected for the process but only one managed to catch the professor's eye, someone that he believed could inspire others, so he gave the young man a chance, to turn good into great.

"This man's name is Jaune Arc, he is the reason nobody has seen a Grimm since the very end of the war, and this is his story."

---

Chapter 1: Not for normal men - Dr Watts POV

Dr Arthur Watts was not what most people would call intimidating at a first glance. He was tall, towering over those who approached him, but he was thin at the same time, however it wasn't an awkward combination as it suited his style as a doctor and a scientist. His blue suit remained immaculately clean all day every day everywhere he went, it seemed to be incapable of becoming ruffled. His hair was short and well-kept and his moustache was trimmed and almost covered his whole mouth. His appearance was strange to see but at a glance he did not look intimidating, however nobody glanced at him, they averted their eyes and looked everywhere he was not.

Some believed it to be his secret super power: the ability to strike fear in to the heart of others and that if you looked into his eyes he would show you something so terrifying that you would drop dead on the spot. Others think that he is a machine hell bent on destruction of the planet and subjugation of its people.

They are all wrong; the real reason that he is so terrifying and feared by everyone, is the story of his rise to such a high ranking position in the forces of Mantle. It is said that he killed all of the other officers that were considered for the promotion of scientist supreme. Most consider it to be legendary, and that every story should be considered true, but there are those who think it to be speculation and myth meant to scare people in to following his commands.

Naturally Dr Watts would deny these accusations and play them out to be nothing more than a series of unfortunate accidents that have occurred on the other officer's behalf's. 'They were stood too close to the rocket as it was being test fired and as a result were burnt to a crisp', 'they should of checked the vehicle over fully before taking it out for a test drive around the track' and his personal favourite 'for someone who claimed to be my intellectual superior, he should of realised that the pin had fallen out of the grenade, somebody should make a note so it does not happen again'.

Regardless of the theories and the stories, most if not all of the troops were completely terrified of him, and all of them obeyed his every command for fear of becoming one of the stories themselves.

So when he said "we are going to a very specific village in the south of Mistral to collect something of extreme importance" then it meant that everyone should already be at the village, have it secured, all of the Faunus rounded up to be sent to Haven and the rest of the people ready to be questioned if necessary and killed if needed.

Upon the arrival at the Mistralian village, the Doctor took a moment to look around and observe the surroundings. He noted the high walls that were meant to keep the Grimm out, no doubt they were also very thick. The buildings were all either 1 or 2 stories high and they were all neatly packed together lining up nicely along the street, it even had a little river flowing through the middle. This village might have been considered a beautiful place before Dr Watts' troops had arrived as several houses were now razed to nothing more than rubble, several bodies of various sizes lay in the street riddled with bullet holes and cuts, and there were the signs of a small fire starting in the corner of the village that would probably grow to engulf the entire village if left uncontrolled. With all of the death and negativity heavily set in to the air, it would not be long before the Grimm were to make an appearance.

Dr Watts' eyes then landed on the building that he desired, it was impossible to miss and stood out among them for its size and the age of the building as it was most likely constructed long before any of them were even born or dreamt of. The church stood higher than the other houses and was comprised of different stone work.

The doctor strolled calmly through the carnage and destruction of the village, heading towards the church he had identified, stepping over bricks and beams from the buildings that had collapsed, along with the occasional dead body that lay in the street. His troops lined up behind him and as he reached the door and one of them stepped forward to reach the door and knocked once, then twice and then a third and final time.

Then came a deafening silence which was interrupted by a voice calling out to the small army "The house of the lord will not allow entrance to a man possessed and proud of his sins"

The soldier then stepped away from the door allowing Dr Watts to move in front of it.

"Good thing I am a man of science" replied Dr Watts. His crisp, clean voice cutting through the silence, and even though he said the words without raising his voice in the slightest, all of the men behind him heard, and the man inside, heard him.

The doors were then kicked open by Dr Watts and the troops behind him shot forwards to secure the church and find the person who had spoken out.

"Well this is a, nice establishment" commented Dr Watts, thinking out loud while taking in the interior of the church. The walls were made of cobblestone, much like they were on the outside and they had shelf's lined up across the walls filled with different books, all of which were worn and used. There were several wooden pillars stretching up to the roof of the church to help support the roof and the structure of the building and stretching from the pillars were beams going across the ceiling with several candle holders dangling precariously from them.

The windows all showed various images of Monty Orm, the being that this church was obviously built to pray to. Truthfully Dr Watts did not understand religion and the idea of putting your faith in to a being with the power to do anything but had never been proved to exist was baffling, however religion had been around almost as long as humanity and Dr Watts doubted that it would be going anywhere any time soon so it had his respect. The images showed Monty battling the creatures of Grimm, some where he stood alone glowing brightly, one where he looked to be preaching to a crowd of people and one where he looked to be controlling another person's motions but the candle light made it difficult to identify how he was doing it.

"Sir we have the man who denied us entrance" said a faceless solider, his expressions and features hidden behind the mask that all of his troops were outfitted with.

"Bring him to me"

"Yes Doctor" the solider then disappeared into a side room and then returned with another and being dragged between the both of them was the man who had 'answered' the door. Judging from the clothing he was clearly the preacher or vicar of the church.

Dr Watts motioned for one of the troops to hold his head up so he could look in to his eyes, it's always easier to see a person soul if you look through their eyes.

"You were a fool" began Dr Watts never taking his eyes from the preachers. "Anybody who would try to stand in my way is a fool, you especially to think that you could try to stop me from reaching my prize. No man, woman or monster can stand in our way and nobody ever will once we have the relic."

"You still have to find it don't you?" spat the preacher trying to maintain some control despite his current situation. "So I would hold off your arrogance if ugh-." The rest of his sentence was cut off as one of the soldiers punched him in the stomach.

"What you mistake for arrogance is merely a man telling the truth. Nothing can stop me and soon nobody will ever try to, simply out of the fear of our power."

The preacher just groaned and tried to catch his breath from having been sucker punched, it felt as if the soldier had broken his stomach if that was possible.

"Sir we found the tomb!" said a soldier who had just come running into the room from the stairway that lead to the crypt.

Dr Watts allowed himself a smug smile and stroked his moustache proudly. "Excellent, good work trooper. Would you be so kind as to lead the way and you two bring our host along, I am certain he would love to see the future as he won't get another chance to otherwise."

When they reached the depths of the crypt, the trooper lead them through a short side hallway towards a sarcophagus that was lying upon a stone table. 'The masonry is indeed impressive; the carvings are quite astounding as is the fact that they have survived so long. Almost a shame to destroy it, almost' thought Dr Watts.

"Remove the lid"

Several of the soldiers moved forward to try and pry the lid off, but none of them were able to lift it or even budge it as it was sealed tighter than they had previously thought. The Doctor gazed on at the men trying to lift the lid and sighed to himself.

"All of the tools and equipment that I have bestowed among you, my loyal soldiers, and yet you are defeated by a lid."

"The lid is completely fused with the rest of the coffin"

"Sarcophagus, child. It is a Sarcophagus; and I did not ask for an excuse, so do not give me one, and am I understood?"

"Yes sir"

"Splendid. Now step away and I shall open it myself as it is clearly above far both your intelligence and your skill level"

Dr Watts then took three strides over to the sarcophagus from his position on the wall and then stood at the head, admiring the craftsmanship up close instead of at afar. Reaching down with one hand Dr Watts managed to find a suitable crevice for his hand to grab on to and then he ripped the lid straight off, flinging it towards the opposite wall where it smashes into and then shatters to rubble. The soldiers that were down in the crypt were all glad that the masks they wore hid their shock and their fear of the strength and power that their leader possessed in his body, the preacher simply looked on with fear.

"It would appear that the training of my troops need to be improved upon, as you lack the ability to perform a feat that my left arm is capable of" said Dr Watts, his tone made it clear that he expected no response, he simple wished to point out his success and the others failure.

The disheartened troopers shrunk under the comments and the implication of being weak from their leader and they all moved back to a safe distance, lining up against the walls of the tomb. Hopefully he would not decide to break them for their failure as easily as he broke the lid.

Now that the lid had finally been removed, it was clear to see that a faint glow was emanating from the box, this glow then began to steadily envelop more of the room in its light as Dr Watts had begun to lift the item from the out, and as he was lifting the item out he had started to smile, relishing in his victory.

The item that Dr Watts currently held in his hand was a cube, of course everybody could see that and they also could see that it shone a brilliant blue light, however that was not all that the item seemed to be capable of. The item looked to be drawing in the energy from the surrounding air but not emitting any energy what so ever. This reaction appeared to have an immediate effect on the troops present in the room and on the preacher as they all felt like they were being pulled towards the item yet they were not moving, the ground beneath them did not seem to be solid and the strength in their bodies felt like it was being sapped away. This made all of the people present feel very uncomfortable in the situation, in fact only one person seemed to be completely fine and unaffected by the change in energy surrounding the cubed item.

Dr Watts held the object higher and let the smug smile fully take over his face as he presented the item to the preacher.

"At long last I finally have what I have been searching for, for so long. And as soon as I learn how to properly use its power it will then live up to it's name; The Relic Of Destruction!"

"B-but sir aren't we meant to be looking for a rare dust crystal?" stuttered one of the soldiers stepping forward slightly and wearily staring at the so called relic.

"Yes that is what I told the council, however I clearly had other plans in mind." Replied Dr Watts lower the relic to eye level so that he could inspect it better for any damages.

"What we are here for is infinitely more powerful and useful to our cause. This relic will change the tide of the war and it will change the very fabric of the world that we know. Everything in this world will soon be moulded into my vision and my vision only." Said Dr Watts, already plotting his next moves to ensure his victory, he just had to get rid of a few lose ends before he could move forward with his plane but it wasn't anything that the Barron could not handle, after all he was the deadliest assassin around.

"It won't work for you; it is not for normal me. It is only to be welded by those of great power and you are nobody of the sort" stated the preacher feeling satisfied that he may have shattered the 'good' doctor's dream for just a second.

Dr Watts walked over to the preacher and wrapped his hand around his neck and then proceeded to lift him off the ground slowly strangling him and squeezing the life out of him.

"I am well aware of the old legends and rules, however I think my science may be a tad more successful at solving problems and getting results than your faith, speaking of which, I hope you made peace for everyone" and then Dr Watts simply squeezed extra hard crushing his windpipe and snapping his neck making the preachers body go limp in his hand. He then proceeded to drop the man and step over his body and head up the stairs back to the chapel. 'Fitting that he is already in a tomb' he thought as he neared the entrance to the building.

"Sir what do we do with the survivors?" asked one of the troopers in front of the villagers.

"Kill them; there can be no witness' and we can take comfort in that they were acceptable causalities in the name of science."

As Dr Watts continued to walk towards his transport all he could here was the sound of gunfire and the screams of the people as their last breath left them.

---

Jaune's POV

REJECTED

"Oh come on! Is there nothing you can do to accept me, please?" exclaimed the short blond as he received his test results back.

"Sorry kid but you failed the tests quite spectacularly actually, and that means you have been deemed unfit and it is my job to make sure that you are clear that you cannot register for the army." Said the medical examiner.

Jaune took a look down at the sheet that he had been handed back to him, at the top it read the word REJECTED in big, bold, red letters, 'obviously meant to inspire confidence in me as I have an abundance of that' thought Jaune. Then came his name, age and other relevant facts about him that the doctors needed to be made aware of. Looking down at the results he thought 'I can't have been that bad could I? Barry was probably messing with him. I think his name is Barry, could have been Benny, focus Jaune, results.'

"Eye test: fail. In my defence the board was really far away and the room had a light in the corner of it that flickered throughout the test so it gave off some weird shapes and made a lot of the letters look different so my eyes are actually quite good, you just need to sort out the light and I'm good to see stuff" Jaune said, reading out the results to the doctor and trailing off towards the end as he grew progressively less confident.

"I was in the room with you and the light didn't flicker, you just kept blinking. Keep going blondie." The doctor replied, staring at Jaune.

"Fine Barry"

"What did you call me?"

"Benny?"

"My name is Steven; it says it right on my name tag if you look closely. I recommended glasses kid."

"Ah, my bad? Sorry Steven."

"Just save yourself the embarrassment and keep reading kid, I have outlined all of the areas where you failed to meet the desired results of your examinations." Steven said, shaking his head and letting out a little sigh at his misfortune.

Grateful for the chance to escape this awkward conversation and recover some dignity that he had defiantly lost, so Jaune turned his eyes back to the card that he held in his hand determined to at least try and change Doctor Steven's mind.

"Lacks any substantial muscle tone and thus would not be able to endure military training, I have muscle okay it's just more toned and lean like a runner or a swimmer, yeah a swimmer." Jaune said weakly, desperately trying to prove his point.

"My grandmother has more muscle on her than you do kid, I'm not even exaggerating."

"Well that's not emasculating in the slightest, but the rest of my medical looks fine I don't see any problem what so ever." Jaune said, finally pleased about something on the sheet.

"It's double sided; the rest is on the back." And there goes the moment, just as quickly as it came.

Turning over the card Jaune saw that the back had a whole list of reasons why he is not suited for the army:

Multiple accounts of fractures across the body; fingers and toes to name a few.

Underdeveloped muscle tone.

Asthma.

Allergic to most forms of dust, some of which are used as casing and rounds in common weapons.

Dysfunctional immune system; white blood cell count is low

As Jaune finished reading it felt like most of his hopes and dreams of being able to serve his country and help end the war were being thrown off a cliff and surviving, or more accurately launched off a cliff, and having a spear thrown at him and still surviving. Sometimes he wondered why he even tried; because it just seemed that he failed every time.

"Based on just your asthma you are ineligible to even be considered for enlistment. Sorry kid but I'm saving your life, you'll thank me for this later."

Jaune mumbled his thanks and then stood up off the examination table that he had been sitting on and walked out of the room with his head hanging low, as he neared the exit to the building he placed his examination sheet in the bin as it would be of no used to him except to remind him of his failure.

Walking through the city of Vale, one could not help but feel a tad bit intimidated by the size and scope of several of the buildings and the sheer amount of people that were wondering through the streets at this time. Cars drove around at a multitude of speeds; several airships were flying overhead delivering supplies to different stores, the sunlight gleaming off the windows on to the paths and the roads while basking the building in a certain glow that made them seem all the more taller.

Fortunately the city seemed to prove incorruptible as the war raged on around it, holding back the dread and the despair of the outside and retaining the hope and joy of the people. Several smaller villages far outside of the kingdom, more towards the outskirts of the continent had already fallen to the combined forces of Mantle and Mistral, and one village had been completely taken over by the Grimm as the inhabitants had been fearful of being attacked next. The army from Vale had managed to remove the forces from those villages and reclaim their property; however the enemy had taken most of the people prisoners and had them transported to Mistral. Due to the retaliation of the attacks this had forces Mantle and Mistral to focus more of their assaults on Vacuo.

Together the might of Mantle and Mistral had proven to be too much for them and they had successfully managed to take over the top quarter of Vacuo with little trouble before the army of Vale stepped in to help. The conflict was going slow as Vales army was stretched pretty thin across their kingdom and that of Vacuo's, but still they persevered to fight the oppression.

'But I won't be able to help them' Jaune thought sadly. 'I tried my hardest and I fell far before the finish line, maybe I should just go and be a farmer or something, I might actually be good at that.'

Jaune finally arrived at his apartment building and stared up at it. The bricks were old and showed a lot of wear and tear, the windows dusty and stained with several that had cracked and the wood looked like it was completely rotten. In a perfect world it would have been condemned and torn down a long time ago and yet it passed all of its examinations and provided a home for a number of very nice people, including him despite what everyone else said about it. The building stood its ground and held its self-high and said to the world 'I'm going to do my thing here, you can move around me'.

Maybe Jaune was reading too much in to this, it was just a building after all and couldn't really say anything after all. 'If this place can tell the whole world to move around it then maybe there is hope for me yet. I could find a top secret military program to help me fight' thought Jaune.

He chuckled softly to himself out loud at the thought of him being chosen, no program would accept him even if such a thing existed.

Later that day, Jaune decided to head out to the carnival to maybe see if he could use the famous Arc charm on some ladies. His dad used to say that all women looked for in a man was confidence. While he was wondering around the carnival he noticed a recruitment flyer that was almost conveniently place there to catch his attention, it had a map draw on to the bottom of it supplying its location, after taking a quick look at the map Jaune had it already memorised in his head so he set off in the direction the flyer pointed.

When he entered into the sign up area he saw that he was the only person that was in the building. Taking a look around he saw several motivational posters that were probably meant to hype up the populace and inspire those to do their best, Jaune wasn't really a fan of those types of posters, as they seemed to be false advertising of what war actually is. He also took notice of a mirror that had a background of soldiers, presumably saying that you could stand with others to help.

A loud cough interrupted his examination of the room and the internal monologue that was about to play in his head, prompting him to turn towards the sound. It seemed that he was not the only person that was in the room, as there were two other people; one was a tall older man with well-kept grey hair, a grey moustache and a brown suit along with a gaze that made it looked like it he was peering through your soul, the other was a younger man with tanned skin, messy black hair and looked like he would rather be somewhere other than here.

The younger of the two walked up to him at the elders silent request and held out his hand as a greeting, placing a smile on his face that didn't quite reach his eyes and seemed sad for some reason.

"H-hello, my name is Nick. What may I ask brings you here?" the young man, now known as Nick asked Jaune.

"I'm here to sign up for the army" 'again' "This is the right place? I'm certain I memorised the map correctly."

"You are in the right place." Nick confirmed "why do you want to join?"

"Why?" asked Jaune a little puzzled at the question, the other times he had tried the people had told him to stand in line and wait for his turn.

"Yes why, forgive me for saying but this doesn't exactly look like it would be the best choice for you to take."

Jaune sighed and turned his head to look at the mirror that was next to him. He took a look at his mid length, messy hair that was way to blonde for anyone and made him stick out like a sore thumb in a crowd, pale blue eyes, his skinny wire frame that was a body and lastly the thing that infuriated him the most, the fact that he was way too short.

"Yeah it does seem like a bad choice for me, but there are men and women going out there and risking their lives to fight for what they believe in and save whomever they can, who am I to not do anything to help them out, if I can save just one life then that's a success, so please, just let me help. That's all I want to do." Jaune said passionately.

Saying it out loud and telling another person, it felt good. It felt good to have a purpose and a reason for him to do what he wanted to do. Mantle and Mistral seemed determined to wipe out any and all traces of individuality and choice, as they believed that emotion was not something that people needed since it was what the Grimm preyed upon. They had invaded villages and killed people; maybe if he was there he could have changed something or done something to help save a life.

Looking away from the mirror and taking a glance at Nick, Jaune saw that he was staring at him with an interesting expression of disbelief. 'It had been said with meaning and drive, everyone else had just gone on about the glory they would receive, the stories they could tell and that a women loves someone in uniform, but this guy, he's something different, something new' Nick thought to himself.

"Well, well, well." The older gentlemen behind Nick said, surprising Jaune and then moving forward to stand side-by-side with him. His mouth turned up into a slight, warm smile.

"It would seem that we have found someone to help us out. My name is Professor Adam Watts, and I think we are going to have a very interesting time together."

---

Chapter 2: The best man – Dr Watts POV

"Gentlemen, gentlemen I can personally assure you that we are on track for all of our projects that we have been assigned. My science division have also begun to make some additional tweaks to the designs that have already been made to ensure that they all function at above optimal capacity, and I personally have made some incredible discoveries regarding mechanics and have adapted it in to my troop's amour, making the Deathstalkers more formidable than ever." Dr Watts boasted.

He was currently showing around a council member of the Mantle and Mistral union, a general of the Mantle army and a general of the Mistral army. Dr Watts had greeted the three men at the entrance to his mountain base and given what he believed to be a very intuitive tour of his headquarters, however they were repetitive in their questions and Dr Watts hoped the explanation he gave put an end to the questions.

They had just come for the hanger where they had all taken a look at the variety of tanks, bikes, trucks, and aircraft that had been designed and created by his team of scientist. Before that they had been in the weapon testing laboratory, which had considered of various modified melee weapons equipped with long range capabilities.

However, the first stop that they had taken on the tour, was Dr Watts's personal favourite destination to take any visitors or meet anybody that displeased him; the Grimm enclosures. This allowed the three 'important' visitors to view the variety of creatures that the Deathstalkers had managed to capture, ranging from low level Grimm like Creeps and Beowulfs, to higher level threats like Boartusks (which were notoriously hard to catch and contain) and Ursa, there was even a single Nevermore that was weighted to the ground in the final container. What really got the attention of the visitors was the new unnamed Grimm that wondered in its space as it proved too dangerous to be put near any other Grimm and it was easier to study it out in the open. Dr Watts took a great deal of pleasure in the look of fear on the councilmen's face, the way the Mistral general took step back in terror and the noise of panic the Mantle general when he looked the creature in the eyes. They had witnessed the raw power of the beast and its sheer strength against three of their armoured tanks, suffice to say, they would need to build more tanks.

Currently they were heading back to Dr Watts' main office and private laboratory where more of his extreme testing took place. They were on their way back so that they could continue their business and discuss any orders they needed, such as weapons or amour for the militarises.

"It is as we said earlier Arthur" the Mistral general began. "We have been sent to personally oversee the development of the weapons and vehicles that you have in development."

"And to make sure you are still obeying the wishes of the council, and not attempting to satisfy your own curiosity" added the Mantle general.

Dr Watts stopped walking down the corridor and turned around to face the two generals, the council member had stopped further down to inspect one of the Deathstalker troops standing guard outside a door. The guard tilted his faceless mask down to look at the council member who was immediately startled and then started walking at a faster pace to catch up with the others.

"I think you will find that I am doing both, come gentlemen, my office has all of the answers to your many questions" Dr Watts said, before continuing his walk.

Once they reached the study they quickly noticed the heavily secured, reinforced doors and the two armoured Deathstalkers standing guard outside the door. After Dr Watts gave them verification of his identity they stepped aside and opened up the door for them.

The Doctor was then very quick to walk through the door without checking to see if he was being followed by the others. Meanwhile they all exchanged glances between each other and then stepped in to the office together. The moment they walked through the door it shut behind them with a loud bang that echoed throughout the room and caused them all to jump slightly. This loud bang was also accompanied by a quite click that nobody seemed to hear.

Taking a look around the study to take in their new environment, they first noticed the massive window that showed the valley of mountains and the forest that surrounded the mountains. In front of the window was a large desk with paper strewn across it, obviously this desk belonged to Dr Watts. There were other tables around the office and all of them had various different weapon designs on them not unlike the weapons they saw earlier, however these were much more advanced; a spear that appeared to mecha-shift in to a rifle, a rocket launcher that could be held as a club, a pistol with a sword sheath and lastly a double bladed axe with a barrel as the handle.

The table that Dr Watts had walked gone up to had an advanced turret sitting upon it being powered up by a strange blue energy that was flowing in to it via a tube coming from a little cube to the side of the table being held within a glass container. The whole design looked like it was from the future or had come straight out of a science fiction novel.

'If this is the source of the weapons power, then why is it in a glass box? The Mantle general thought to himself. 'This is obviously a serious flaw in the design; the good Doctor must be extremely arrogant to display power like that. This will need to be rectified when someone more humble takes over.'

"Now gentlemen, this is what I was working on last week, locating a source of power that could give life to my designs and cement me in the very history of remnant. Allow me to present to you one of the lost Relics, and this particular relic can destroy anything you could imagine, wipe it from the planet, never to be seen again." Dr Watts said, beaming at the blue cube, revelling in the fantasy of destruction.

The other three all shared looks of disbelief between them before the Mistral general stepped forward asking the question on their collective minds.

"What?"

Dr Watts sighed to himself; the moment had passed now thanks to the lack of understanding.

"Long ago, there were two brothers, two Gods-"

"Oh don't tell me this is another one of your ridiculous fairy tales that you believe in." Interrupted the Mantle general, ignoring the look of anger that Dr Watts shot in his direction.

"They are nothing more than myth and nonsense used to help children get to sleep."

"But as with all myth there has to be a fraction of truth, does there not? So please try to keep an open mind. It's not like there is much up there anyway." Replied Dr Watts, taking extreme satisfaction at the look on the Mantle general's face, once he realised that he had been insulted.

"However, if you lack the mental capacity to imagine, then let me show you a fraction of the Relics power."

"I think we have seen enough Arthur." Said the councilman; speaking up for the first time since they entered the office. "Our collective reports back to the rest of the council-members will show that you are irrational and insane, as you clearly do not mind putting others at risk to achieve your goals. And since we have been here you have not once given any indication that you care about our cause, we seek to stop the Grimm, and you wish to learn from them."

"True I care not for your idea to quell emotions of any sort. I simply wish to be worshipped as the god I am, on that note goodbye." Dr Watts then tapped a button on the turret and it whirled into life, locking straight on to the councilman and shooting out a bright blue beam that hit him squarely in the chest. The moment the two connected, they both disappeared. Not in a flash of blue light, not by fading out slowly and they didn't make any sound. One moment they were there and then they were gone in an instant.

The two generals stared at the place where the councilman had been stood, with looks of horror and shock taking over their features; however this did not last long as the Mantle general charged straight for the window, pulling his fist back as thought to punch straight through it. The turret was quick to lock on to him next and fired its second shot directly at his back; the last sight of this world that the general was able to take in was the mountains and the sun slowly setting behind them, before he was erased from existence without a sound.

Meanwhile the Mistral general had dashed over towards the door and was desperately trying to wretch it open only to find out that it was sealed completely shut and would not budge, then the sound of silence came to his ears as he realised that he was the last one left. He quickly hit the door as hard as he could one more time, but all of his strength was useless, then the fear set in as he realised that not only was he the last one, he was trapped with a man capable of eviscerating him from existence. As he turned around to see his doom he locked eyes with Dr Watts, who had a smirk on his face that sent shivers down his spine.

"Is that fear in your eyes general? I always believed the warriors of Mistral to be completely fearless, to only strike the fear into others." There was the sound of a mechanical whirl as the turret locked on to the Mistral general. "Perhaps I was wrong"

Then the shot came and the general was wiped from the face of remnant. The shot had been so powerful that it had also managed to take the door to the heavens as well as the general. 'Well maybe not the heavens, probably more down south' thought Dr Watts.

The two heavily armoured guards walked through the hole and stood in the office waiting for the Doctors next orders, they were then joined by another guard who appeared to be carrying some sort of envelope. All three of them were nervous that the Doctor might test the weapons power on them next, however their masks showed no fear.

"Please send a message to the council that there members will not be returning as they have all been the victims of a terrible accident." Said Dr Watts; moving towards his desk so that he could watch the sunset and the rise of the moon. The broken moon always fascinated him as there was now story on how it ever got to be like that, it just always has been for as long as anybody can remember.

"It would seem that they stepped too close to one of our test subjects and as a result they were all eaten by it, my sincerest apologies to their families and friends." Continued Dr Watts; making sure to grin evilly out the window.

"It is most unfortunate that these accidents occur, like this and that they seem to be happening increasingly often, but science requires sacrifice, and these are necessary sacrifices. By the way please make sure that the labs at Haven know that they should be receiving updated plans for weapons to design, and then notify Haven that I will be arriving there after they have received the plans and have begun manufacturing the weapons, as I wish to see the progress they will be making and also pick up some test subjects."

"Of course Doctor, it will be done" replied the trooper with the envelope.

"Excellent, now what news of the professor?" asked Dr Watts. The trooper simply steeped forward and then handed over the envelope to Dr Watts and said

"He is in Vale, Doctor, stationed at a recruitment office."

Jaunes POV:

"Thank you Nick, I shall take it from here." The older man said, ominously.

'Take what from where?' Thought Jaune, 'Is the old guy going to do the tests on me, or is he going to be the one to throw me out? That would be humiliating.'

"Would you please follow me young man, I believe that we would have much to discuss." The old man said, with a genuine smile on his face. Possibly to show that he meant no ill intent, although it did look a little bit strange like he wasn't all there or that he was really excited.

"O-oh, okay. Lead the way sir" stammered Jaune, scratching the back of his neck and looking down at the floor and glancing at the older man out of the corner of his eyes, purposefully not making eye contact so that he couldn't tell how nervous he was feeling, however the lack of eye contact might have given off the appearance that he was nervous. 'Confidence son, always be confident, women like it and men respect it' is what his dad used to say, too bad that he lacked the confidence to even try to be confident.

The old man pivoted swiftly on the spot and then began walking down a hallway, which Jaune assumed lead to the testing rooms, and maybe an office or two, with Jaune quick on his heels. As they walked down the hallway Jaune noticed that they had gone past several of the rooms and they had turned a corner to end up in front of a door with a plaque above it saying 'Professor Watts'. From that piece of evidence and the fact that the older man had a set of keys in his hand that he was now sorting through and the entering in to the lock, Jaune concluded that this was his office, ' and that girl in the bookstore said I didn't seem like the clever type, ha jokes on her'.

The door opened and the now reconfirmed professor (Jaune had defiantly not already forgotten his name, it was Steven,yep, wait no it was Watts, need to remember that) walked inside; motioning for Jaune to follow. Inside the office was a simple desk with a chair behind it and another in front of it so two people could sit across and talk with each other, there was a computer on the desk and some papers as well and there was also a chess board with all of the pieces on various different squires halfway through a game.

"So this is your office. It's nice and simple, anymore and you would get distracted a lot, lucky you don't have a window viewing the carnival." Said Jaune rather nervously, only after he had finished what he said did he realise that there was a long silence afterwards and that made him feel even more awkward if that was possible.

The professor walked around his desk and took his seat, smirking slightly at the sheer awkwardness that was radiating off of the poor boy, after taking in the whole image of the boy he motioned for him to take a seat opposite him so he could get to the reason he brought him back here.

"This is not your first time attempting to apply for the army, is it?" Asked the professor; not really asking as he was already aware of the answer. He simply wanted to know if the young man would be honest with him or if he would try to lie.

Jaune's eyes widened comically and locked straight on to the professors, and then he began to chuckle nervously and wave his hands about in front of him, as though trying to wave away the accusation of the professor and attempt to prove that he was innocent.

"No, no, no, no. T-this is my first time, uh you must be thinking of someone else, I have no idea what you're talking about."

"Has anybody ever told you that you are a terrible liar?"

Jaune sighed; clearly he was really easy to read. "Yeah, that's what everyone always tells me."

"I wouldn't necessarily believe that to be a bad thing, honest men are quite hard to come by in a dishonest world, and they are especially hard to come by these days."

"Thanks, I guess."

"You are very welcome, now I am sure that you have several of your own questions to ask, most noticeably asking who I am, but I would like to ask one of you before we go any further, what is your name?"

Jaune considered this for a moment; he didn't know who this person was, apart from the name Professor Watts (Nailed it) that the plaque had reminded him, but the name didn't match any face in this side of town, Jaune might not be good at remembering names but he had a great memory for faces, and right now he could not remember seeing his face anywhere.

"You are right sir, I have no idea who you are, well the plaque above your door said Professor Watts so I know that, but to answer your question, my name is Jaune Arc, and it's nice to meet you, more formally I guess."

"Well as I already said so out in the front and what you managed to see above my door, my name is professor Adam Watts, and the pleasure is all mine Mr Arc."

"Ugh, please call me Jaune, Mr Arc was my fath- actually he just liked to be called Andy to everyone else and I just called him dad."

"Very well then; Jaune it is."

"Thanks, your accent doesn't sound that Valean. I hope you don't mind me asking, because I know that home is a touchy subject for a lot of people these days, but are you from somewhere outside the kingdoms?" Asked Jaune; looking down at the table focusing on the white knight chess piece, thinking back to his home and his family.

"Mistral" said the professor after a brief pause "I'm from Mistral."

"Oh, anywhere specific or can you not really remember?"

"The village where I lived was over taken by the military when the war began, and since then I have worked in the centre of the kingdom and then I left and came to Vale. It's much more civilised over here, you get to be yourself rather than who they want you to be."

Jaune took a moment to consider what the professor had just said and how he had said it. It seemed that some of the people in Mistral might want things to change back to how they were, this is not the strangest thing that he has ever heard; for example there are some people here in vale who support the Mantle and Mistral act of removing arts as well as some other forms of entertainment, such as books, plays and films.

As though he was reading his mind, the professor leaned forward with a smile and he asked "do you find it be peculiar that a person from Mistral could be in favour of something so simple like the pleasures of a film?"

Jaune smiled and replied "no I don't, every person should have the freedom to choose, not to have their kingdom choose for them."

"Hmmm." Was all the professor had to say to that as he leaned back in his chair grabbing a bottle from one of his desk draws and then taking a little sip from it. Jaune stared at the professor, slightly confused, okay very confused, by what he should replied to that. Was it a good 'hmmm' or was it a bad 'hmmm' he needed to know and it looked like the professor was not going to say anything unless provoked. Finally Jaune could take it no longer and he cracked.

"So was that a good 'hmmm' where you were pleased with my answer or was it a bad 'hmmm' where you are now wondering why we are still talking? Because I have several mixed messages here and I am really confused."

"You don't need to be worried, nor do you need to be confused in any way Jaune. That was a good 'hmmm', I am pleased that you are so accepting of where I am from, even though I am just another stranger from a whole different kingdom, a kingdom which has in fact declared war upon yours."

"Well strangers are just friends that you haven't met yet, my mum used to tell me that. Saying the last part out loud sounds a little dumb though, but it's how it happened."

The professor raised an eyebrow and chuckled slightly at the very child-like acceptance of someone.

"You have a good head on your shoulders Jaune. I'll tell you what, I happen to know a general in the Vale military and he is gathering together a group of men to that he wishes to put through a very specific type of test. They will be subjected to an experimental procedure and then be used out in the field to help the other forces and I am considering you for one of those spots, but before I go ahead and approve anything I would like to learn your motivations for opposing Mantle and Mistral."

Jaune took a moment to consider this offer, on the one hand it all sounds way too good to be true and it might not be safe to go through an experiment that he doesn't know the results to. On the other hand he had been given a chance, even though it was a relatively small chance, to go out there and actually help people in need, he could finally be of some use to his kingdom and the people, live up to his family name.

"They're attacking my home, forcing their ideas on to my people and behaving like bullies, and I don't like bullies, never have and never will. And I know I'm not the biggest guy around, or the fastest, or the strongest, hell I'm probably not even the smartest but if there is a chance to fight and stop them then I'll take it. Even if it means I don't make it back."

After those words left his mouth Jaune immediately winced and wanted to undo what he had just said, to take it back straight away and lock it up, but it was how he felt and if he answered anything less than honestly the professor might take the chance away from him.

"Do you want to kill them for invading your home?"

"No, I don't want to kill anyone, no one should want to ever kill someone, and these people are just pawns being used by the real threats, and they shouldn't be killed, they should be brought to justice. This way people can see that death is not the answer, it's never the answer."

The professor thought about what the young man in front of him had said and then decided right there and then, that Jaune Arc would be the first person to undergo the transformation, and if he was the only one to succeed then the professor would count it as his greatest triumph, something that they could both be proud of as he would be happy to have made a force of good and Jaune would be able to help people.

"Well the plan so far has been to send all of the big guys out to intimidate the enemy, but that went wrong and no one has tried anything different for a while so maybe it's time to send out a little guy to see if they can do better. Know of anybody that wants to give it a try?" asked the professor with a sly smile on his face.

Jaune's eyes widened up and a big grin over took most of his face. "Thank you so much sir, you won't regret this."

"I know I won't"

"So has this test, experiment thing been successful? Has it been tried before?"

"Yes. Once."

---

Chapter 3: the little guy - Jaune's POV:

"So this whole boot camp, training thing. How long do I have to be here for exactly? I wasn't exactly sure when packing." Jaune asked.

He and professor Watts were currently traveling to said boot camp that had been established in the emerald forest, several kilometres away from the kingdoms walls. From what the professor had explained to Jaune before they had left, the camp was responsible for training groups of men and women for very specific roles in the military. He neglected to explain what the roles were or provide any information on what group he would be in or how long he would be at the camp for.

Jaune of course knew that he was volunteering for an experimental procedure but he didn't know if that put him with the infantry forces or maybe even the Special Forces.

The professor tilted his head to the side as though he was thinking over how long Jaune would need to actually be here for.

"A week at the most; quite possibly longer. Maybe even less than a week." The professor replied, before turning to look back out of the window.

Jaune also looked out of the window, gazing at the forest as they drove by. Even though it was passing by quickly and Jaune did not manage to get a clear look at the scenery, he could still tell that the forest was a beautiful place. Apparently there had been rumours of an ancient civilization that lived deep, deep within the forest. However nobody has ever found any proof of this and the Grimm usually drive off or kill anybody that goes too far in to the woods.

"Are there others like me that have been chosen?"

"I can imagine that the general stationed at the camp has several that he has handpicked, yes."

"Do you think the others have been told about the whole experiment, thing like how you told me professor?"

"No, I told you because you are the person that I want to undergo the transformation. The general also needs to make his pick and then we need to agree on a suitable candidate."

"So I'm your favourite?" Jaune quipped, with a smirk plastered on his face in a rare moment of confidences.

"Well I haven't meet any of the others so I think we are getting a fair bit ahead of ourselves, do you not think so Mr Arc? Besides I am sure that the others with have redeeming qualities about them that make them likeable." The professor said, turning his head to once again glance out of the window and view the passing scenery.

For a short while it seemed as though the rest of the journey would past by in comfortable silence, however Professor Watts seemed to have more topics that he wished to discuss.

"Tell me Mr Arc; what do you know about the beginning of the war?"

Jaune scratched the back of his head in thought and looked up at the roof of the vehicle, as though hoping to find some answers up there that he could use in the conversation.

"Uh I think it all started nine years ago, or ten years ago, not too sure on that and it was because Mantle wanted more control over the other kingdoms. I guess they saw themselves as the most advanced and thought they were best suited to lead everyone, Mistral joined them, Vacuo disagreed and they attacked and that's when Vale joined in defending Vacuo. The rest as some would say is history." Jaune finished. He believed that he was right it's what they told him in school and what he had heard from several different important figures when they came on the radio broadcasts.

"To a certain degree that is correct, Mantle would like more control and convincing Mistral to join was relatively easy considering the trading that goes on between the two of dust and other resources." Professor Watts said.

"I'm going to take a wild guess and say there is more to it than trading."

"And you would be correct. While Mantle and Mistral traded resources, they also traded knowledge of how to utilize dust and how to survive best, after an incident involving the Grimm, Mantle came to a conclusion that, if it removed the arts and repressed self-expression to better control its citizens' emotions, it would be safer from Grimm. I will admit the theory is sound and it could possibly work and it did for a time but who would want to live in a world without choice.

"Mistral complied with Mantle's wishes to an extent, as they saw it as a much better alternative than to lose the alliance that they had managed to build up over the years, banning the arts and self-expression everywhere in the kingdom except for within its central power."

Jaune was listening to the professor's words with extreme interest, history had never particularly been his best subject but he knew some of the basics. Right now he was engrossed in every little detail that came out of the professor's mouth and he had some questions.

"So how did Vacuo get involved, they have a massive ocean between them and Mistral on one side and they have Vale on the other side, and Mantle is closer to Vale than Vacuo is."

"You see this is where your information is now incorrect, it was not Vacuo that made the first move against them, it was Vale. They were already unhappy with Mantle using Faunus for slave labour and this must have been the last straw for the council. The very first conflict between the two sides occurred on a small island just above the continent, called Vytal. I am still not sure who won that battle, but it attracted a lot of Grimm. Vacuo was then pressured into choosing a side by the combined forces of Mantle and Mistral. However it realised that if Vale fell then nobody would be left to oppose them, so the people quickly destroyed the embassy of Mantle and of Mistral that were set up near their capital. They then formed the alliance with Vale and together pushed all other forces back out of Vacuo."

Jaune sat in silence, thinking about what he had just heard and how affected everyone involved, obviously he knew that Vacuo was quite rich in dust and so Mantle and Mistral had set up camp there to try and mine for some of that dust to use for the protection of their people, however the continent that Mantle is on was also quite rich with dust as well so they most likely still had a supply of it for their side of the war. The one thing which bothered Jaune the most about the conflict was the Grimm and what happened when they turned up.

Did the armies fight together? Did they just let the Grimm kill the other side and then finish off whoever was left? Or did they still fight each other and then the Grimm were the only ones left.

"You said that the Grimm turned up for the battle of Vytal, have they turned up for the other battles as well?"

The Professor sat back, closed his eyes and then nodded "yes they have turned up to almost every single one I believe" he sighed.

"Then what happens when they show up?"

"Everyone stops fighting one another and they fight the Grimm, much like how it used to be, however people are to stubborn to talk about their problems, but fighting is so easy."

'Well that makes sense' thought Jaune 'I really need to try and help'

The jeep rolled to a stop and the sounds of voices outside the vehicle indicated that he was at the base, whatever nerves that he was feeling at the start of the trip had now returned with a vengeance and then amplified to extreme levels, it seemed that the conversation and the information that he now knew had both made him slightly calmer and also brought them back quicker.

The doors to the back of the jeep opened and Jaunes senses were filled with that of the outdoors, completely fresh and natural, now that they were not moving along at a speedy pace Jaune could now take in the full view of the forest, and it was breath taking.

The trees stood taller than many of the buildings in the city and they were a magnificent brown with lush green leaves creating a vast canopy with the sunlight poking through at various intervals. 'I would hate to be stuck up in one of those trees; it looks like a long way down'.

The clearing that they had ended up in had been converted in to a make shift base with several different tents and some wooden buildings and a flag pole that was in the centre of the camp, there were lots of people all running to and from the different tents some standing around at attention and there were others doing exercises in different groups. You could hear the sounds of gunfire as some people were obviously doing target practice at the back of the camp, and there were also the shouts of people giving orders to the people exercising.

"Well you can't say that they lack organisation" Jaune said as he observed all of the people doing their various activities.

Professor Watts 'hmmed' in agreement and then began heading over to one of the other tents leaving Jaune standing their holding his bag. After realising that he had been left alone then he did a little jog to catch up to him on his way to the tent.

After they both entered, Jaune say a tall, dark haired man with broad shoulders and dark blue eyes with a serious looking face, probably didn't smile often.

The professor stepped forward and shook the man's hand smiling at him slightly while the man offered him the very slightest of nods.

"General Phillips, it is good to see you again."

"Watts"

"May I present to you Mr Jaune Arc, he is my top candidate for the program and your newest recruit in the Valean army." Said professor Watts; gesturing to Jaune who in turn gave a little wave.

The general looked Jaune up and down about three times and then looked between Jaune and Professor Watts several times, and then he started to laugh…

And then he didn't seem to stop laughing for a little bit longer…

He was probably laughing for at least a minute, or maybe two minutes, Jaune tried to not feel hurt, he really did, however he had always possessed a very fragile ego.

'I guess he does smile more than I thought, and I guess he also doesn't like the idea of me being in the program.'

"Well at least he has a sense of humour?" supplied Jaune leaning towards the professor to inform him of his discovery. Professor Watts was less than impressed as he only replied with a shrug of his shoulders, his eyes never left the generals face as he patiently waited for him to finish.

Soon the generals laughing came to a halt and he then steadied himself against the desk behind him in the middle of the tent. His face was a little bit red and he was almost struggling to catch his breath from the laughing bout that he had just had. Professor Watts chose this moment to step forward and try to get an actual conversation going with the general.

"General I have chosen Jaune for this program myself, I believe him to be the best candidate suited for the tests."

The general raised a single eye brow "You cannot be serious Watts, look at him."

"Trust me, he will be your choice at the end of the week." Said Professor Watts; feeling extremely confident in his decision. Jaune however was a now feeling even more nervous and also slightly scared about how much faith professor Watts was placing in him. He just hoped that he could measure up to it.

"Is that so? Well why don't we see what the little guy can do, shall we?" The general then stood up from the desk that he was leaning on and pushed passed professor Watts and Jaune to exit the tent from where they came in, the two followed him, one with interest and the other with slightly less interest and more fear.

They ended up in front of a group of four soldiers standing outside one of the wooden buildings, when they saw the general walking over to them they immediately stood to attention.

"Winchester, front and centre!" called out the general, he didn't shout it out but it wasn't said normally. Jaune wondered if he would ever have a commanding voice that sounded like that one day.

A very tall man who looked like he was covered in muscle stepped forward. He easily towered over Jaune by at least a foot and a half, possibly two feet. He had copper coloured hair that was short and the front was spiked up, he looked the part of a soldier.

"Let's see what the little guy can do against a soldier. Arc was it? You are going to fight Winchester; he will be in the same group that you would be put in to so this should be a good bout."

"Wait, wait, wait" cried Jaune stepping forward and waving his hands around to get everyone's attention. "You want us to fight?" he questioned pointing from himself to the hulk of a man that was his opponent.

"Yes." Replied the general; as though he was answering the most simple of questions that a person could ask, like 'would you like a drink'.

"Now let us wait a minute here general." Said professor Watts; stepping forward more directly in to the general's line of sight and speaking calmly. 'Finally the voice of reason!' thought Jaune 'please tell them their mad'.

"Surely they are not going to fight just here are they? You must have a designated sparring area that your men use to train against each other, if not then at least let the fight take place away from the building so that it won't be damaged."

'And there goes the voice of reason' thought Jaune, face palming at his misfortune.

"Indeed we do Watts, please follow me." Said the general. "Your friends can come as well Winchester, after all the more the merrier."

Then the general took off at a marching pace with Winchester and his three friends following the general, presumably heading in the direction of the designated training area. The professor followed the group walking happily alongside Jaune who in contrast was walking like a man who knew that he was as good as dead.

The arena had a very simple design; there were several chairs and benches presumably for spectators so they could be comfortable, and they formed a circle around a dirt patch in the middle where the fighters would be. The only change that Jaune would make to the makeshift arena would be to have a couple of mats on the ground so that when your opponent hit the ground they wouldn't be hurt to badly, however Jaune doubted that Winchester cared about that as much as he did. Since Winchester was the one that was knocking him around and throwing him to the ground.

"Ahhh" screamed Jaune as he was again thrown across the arena and smacked into the ground hard enough to create a little cloud of dirt from when his body impacted the ground.

"Fight the big guy, you'll be fine, well I don't feel damm fine" Jaune muttered under his breath as he rolled over clutching his stomach from the times that Winchester had punched him there.

Meanwhile his opponent had decided to be gracious in his little victory and celebrate with the spectators. "And that was with my left hand. What should I do next? Head butt him?"

'So gracious'. Jaune slowly and shakenly rose to his feet, his whole body was aching and he probably looked like a mess, he could feel the bruises already beginning to form and he defiantly knew that he probably would not be able to move in the morning, or the next morning either. Yet he had to do his absolute best, the professor had put his faith in him and he needed to prove that it was not misplaced, he could tell that he would be disappointed in him if he didn't give it 100%.

"Wow, getting back up for more, gotta hand it to ya, that's pretty ballsy, but you should really learn to give up." Said Winchester, strolling back over to Jaune and cracking his knuckles.

"I can do this all day." Jaune retorted breathlessly.

"Okay tough guy, take a swing, I'll give it to ya for free." And then Winchester leaned forward and tilted his head showing the right side of his face perfect for a left hook. Seeing this opportunity, Jaune swung with his right fist putting all of his weight behind the punch, surprising Winchester as he was not expecting a punch to come from the other direction and hit him squarely in the face right on his nose. Winchester didn't actually think that Jaune had it in him to throw a punch so he was a little taken back by the action. The force of the punch was pathetic, he would hurt himself more by shaving or walking in to a door frame, however the shock of actually being punched was enough to make him take a step back and move a hand up to his nose.

Sensing a good opportunity to maybe try and get a few more strikes in to turn the tide of the fight Jaune decided to take another swing while Winchester was distracted, but that plan was thrown out the window immediately as he simply blocked the left hook with his right arm and gripped the inside of Jaunes forearm, to make sure that he couldn't escape. Winchester then proceeded to launch his assault with a smile, first came an uppercut with his left fist straight to Jaunes jaw, making his head snap back. This strike was then followed by a straight cross to Jaunes stomach causing him to double over and almost fall to the ground as he had just had the wind knocked out of him, but Winchester wasn't done with him as he grabbed him by the collar and lifted him so they were eye to eye and then he head butted him, making sure to put his full strength behind the blow, and the result was Jaune being flung backwards to where he had previously landed.

'Well at least I managed to get in a good punch, even if he let me take it' thought Jaune as he stared up at the clear blue sky. This view was then clouded by Winchester who was snarling down at him, probably in disgust. He raised his foot as though to stamp on Jaune to finish him off, however he never got the chance as another figure appeared right next to him and pulled him away from Jaunes prone form.

"He has had enough Cardin, back off." Said the newcomer. Apparently that did not sit well with Winchester as he decided to take a swing at the Jaunes saviour. The man didn't even show a look of surprise at the attack, in fact he actually looked a little bit amused at being assaulted.

He was quick to lean back away from Winchesters strike and then retaliate with his own series of attacks, the first of which was a quick body punch to the stomach that had been left open from the swing. This caused Winchester to move his hands to his stomach to clutch it in pain and bend over. Jaunes saviour then proceeded to deliver a left overhand strike that came down and caught Winchester across the face, right where Jaune had previously punched him. This forced Winchester to almost fall down as the man seemed to be putting a lot of force behind each of his strikes, and he didn't look to be finished yet as he grabbed Winchesters head and pulled it down just as he raised his knee up smashing it in to his nose with a sickening crunch that the man seemed to find satisfying as he smirked when Winchester collapsed to the ground.

He then made to try and get up but the man kicked him square in the chest causing him to fall back and smack his head on the ground and then he just lay there groaning hands on his face with blood trickling down his chin, probably from his nose or a split lip.

"Well, looks like Cardin can dish it out but he can't take it." Said the man as he walked over to Jaune, and then held out his hand offering to help him up.

"Y-yeah I guess not." Replied Jaune thoroughly shaken, making sure to take the hand that was given to him, and using it to pull himself to his feet. Now that he was stood up Jaune could take a good look at the man properly, he was tall, but he was nowhere near Winchesters height so he was about a head taller than Jaune was, with a slim build, but clearly he packed some strong muscle as he was able to deliver impactful blows against someone larger than him, he looked to be older than Jaune and had a kind face and eyes which suggested he had years more wisdom behind them than his age, what really drew Jaunes attention was the colour of his hair, his hair was a white colour. It seemed that the man noticed where Jaunes eyes had gone.

"Yes I can imagine that it is strange to see a young man with white hair, allow me to introduce myself, my name is William, William Ozpin. I am the leader of the Howling Beowulfs, a small commando unit, the best of the best so to say."

"T-that sounds really intense" breathed Jaune "Should you be telling me what you do if you're supposed to be some kind of secret agent?"

"Well after the program I am certain you will be joining us."

"Wait, wait, wait you know about the program? I thought it was top level, high secret stuff."

"Oh I'm sure it is, but I wouldn't be doing my job right if I didn't know about the something so secret." Said Ozpin with a little smirk plastered on his face, his eyes gleaming with mischief.

While the two had been having their conversation, the rest of Winchesters (now known as Cardin, the name being as ugly as he is) friends had come and helped him out of the arena and together they had stumbled out back to where they were before. The professor had stood up from his seat and begun to make his way towards the duo, and the general had followed him, shaking his head and muttering to himself, probably about the pathetic display the Jaune had given.

"All right I've seen enough, captain you should be preparing for your mission not helping recruits, so go." Ordered the general as he addressed Ozpin; sorry captain Ozpin.

Captain Ozpin saluted the general and then turned on the spot and marched out of the area without glancing back to say goodbye.

The general then turns to Jaune and said "This week you will be pushed to your limits and beyond, tested against others and examined by myself and professor Watts. This will happen alongside the other candidates. It will not be easy, if you want to leave and save me the some trouble then do so, but if you want to stay then you need to impress me and so far I am very underwhelmed.

"Am I clear?"

Jaune looked at the general straight in the eye 'well I only have my dignity to lose, so what's the worst that could happen?' he thought

"Where will I be staying?" asked Jaune

Professor Watts smiled "due to your late arrival, you will be staying with me. Grab your things from the truck and I'll take you there."

After Jaune left limping out of the area, the general let out a sigh and ran his hand down his face. "This seems like a lot of effort for a little guy Watts, are you sure he'll even survive the procedure?"

"I have the uttermost confidence"

"There has to some other reason for choosing him, what's your angle?"

"Redemption."

Dr Watts POV:

The doctor paced around his study marvelling at the power of the relic and it's potential to change the world. As of right now he had only been able to harness small portions of the relic's power to destroy the generals and the council member. That alone had taken a considerable amount of research and a lot of experimenting; however it was a massive step in the right direction.

Legend stated that only a select group of people could harness the power of these relics, from simply touching them. They could then utilise the full destructive power of the relic and they only had to think of the thing they wished to destroy and then it would be wiped from existence forever.

Dr Watt's intended to bypass the specifics of who needed to use the relic so that he could hold it and use it, and no wizards, maiden, god, goddess or sliver warrior was going to stop him from achieving his goal, but that was for latter on in his schedule. On the agenda for today was to rid the world of his brother so that he could not create any problems that could put a stop to his plans. The doctor finally stopped pacing and addressed the other occupant in the room.

"It seems that your skills were not overestimated, being able to sneak up on me is no easy feat." The doctor called out to the dark room. Then a figure appeared out of the darkness and took a seat opposite the doctors desk propping his feet on the desk and leaning back with his arms behind his head and closing his eyes in a very relaxed manor.

"You can thank my father for that; it's the only thing that I thank him for. Although one professional to another, train your men better, I know that you heard me the moment I entered to room 3 minutes ago."

"You flatter me, the target is my brother" This caused the newcomers eyes to open and he tilted his head in thought before giving a shrug of indifference; a jobs a job, it's not like he didn't kill his own father so who was he to judge?

"Straight to business, I can work with that; send me the details and the payment." The figure then stood up and walked back towards the darker side of the room disappearing from sight, the only sign that he was even there was the faint ringing of metallic clanks as his boots met the floor.

---

Chapter 4: power - Jaunes POV:

"Ugh" moaned Jaune.

The whole week had been a complete and utter disaster for Jaune. He had tried everything to impress the general, the professor and everyone else in his little training group, but he kept failing or coming last in all of the exercises; usually quite spectacularly in some cases. The first major embarrassment was when he got stuck halfway up the climbing wall, not really his fault as the gaps were way too big for him. After captain Ozpin had put Winchester in his place during their first encounter, he had decided that Jaune should pay, so every time they had wrestling or hand-to-hand combat sessions he made sure to throw him around, and his cronies made sure to do the same every opportunity that they had, however he always got back up to try again. He thought that weapon and dust training had gone quite well, until the one called Sky had swapped level one dust to level three dust, causing his rifle to explode when it was fired, luckily he wasn't the one to fire it as it happened when it fell of the table, but he still could feel the judgement from the others. The cross country run wasn't too bad as he only had to do half of it, he could understand the benefits of running and maybe if he could just do it for himself it would be enjoyable but good god was it a strain. The reason that he only had to do half of it was because he beat the little challenge of getting the flag, how nobody saw the little pin at the bottom of the flag was incredible, he was certain that gained him some good marks. The exercises that they had done earlier had made him ache and ache and ache. The general also thought that they had not quite suffered enough as he threw a grenade straight in to the middle of the group to see what would happen, the reaction was immediate as everybody scattered and ran from the grenade to take cover, meanwhile Jaune decided to dive right on top of the grenade. If it were to go off next to the supply truck then the resulting explosion of gunpowder and dust would cause the entire camp to be decimated.

Jaunes first thought was to save the camp because in doing so it would save the lives of all the men and women that were here. He did not know if this action was enough to make the general impressed or not but he had to try everything to make sure the general would choose him for the program.

After a few minutes of lying on one of the camp beds, the tent flaps opened up and professor Watts proceeded to walk through, carrying with him two glasses and a bottle of what Jaune could only guess as alcohol.

"And how are you this lovely evening Mr Arc?" questioned professor Watts with a massive smile on his face glancing down at Jaunes prone form.

"I hate you" groaned Jaune, though not actually meaning it.

The professor let out a quiet little chuckle and then sat down on one of the chairs in the tent, opening the bottle and pouring some of the liquid into one of the glasses and then took a small sip and then a larger one.

After the professor had finished the contents of the glass he was quick to pour himself another drink, and look at the exhausted young man in front of him with admiration and a little respect. Professor Watts took another small sip from the newly refiled glass and said "you know Jaune; you have managed to impress me this week, trying your absolute hardest at everything and really pushing your limits."

"Thanks, I wanted to impress the general. Guess I should have tried harder."

"Well I would offer you a celebratory drink but there is a chance it would affect the serum tomorrow so I shall not." Said a very nonchalant professor; casually taking a sip of his drink.

Jaune's eyes shot wide open and he turned his head to stare dumbstruck at the professor, he slowly began to sit up; his eyes never leaving the professor throughout the whole ordeal.

"T-tomorrow? I've been chosen? Me?" said a completely dumbstruck Jaune, eyes and mouth wide open in sheer disbelief.

"Indeed, now I suggest that you rest tomorrow you gain a power that will inspire greatness." Replied the professor.

Jaune cocked his head to the side and looked at the professor, not with a surprised gaze but with a more questioning one and maybe even a slightly concerned one.

"And what is this power that I will be given?" questioned Jaune, now fully sitting up on his camp bed and leaning forward as to better engage himself in to the conversation. The question came across as curious, maybe even hopeful but the truth was; Jaune was scared.

"Ahh, excited to finally be strong enough to make a difference? To rise above the rest, and stand out in a crowd? Maybe even teach Mr Winchester and his friends a lesson or two in humility? Or maybe even something a bit more personal, such as trying your luck with the ladies?" Questioned professor Watts, with a ghost of a smile on his face and a look in his eye which told Jaune that he was searching for an answer that was very specific; an answer that would confirm that professor Watts had made the right choice in choosing Jaune.

"I-I want to know how to control it" said Jaune softly. "I want to know how to control it. To make sure that it won't hurt anybody, to use it to protect those who cannot protect themselves and help where ever I can." By the end of his speech his hands had curled in to fists and every word that had left his mouth previously was said with a firmer voice and a drive of purpose that Jaune had previously lacked since he had started training and saw just how under prepared he was and how out classed by everyone else he was. Meanwhile professor Watts took a swig of his drink and then grinned, he had his answer.

"Well Mr Arc you continue to both amaze and impress me with your conviction and your drive to do good, I hope that one day you meet a set of like-minded individuals that share your beliefs." Said professor Watts, happily. "You will be happy to hear, that the power given to you is nothing that you could not control. The serum will enhance everything that you are now, you will be stronger then you thought possible and faster to boot as well, you may even be able to take a punch without being sent flying" added professor Watts jokingly as an afterthought. "In short, it will turn you from the good man you are now in to something great, a hero." Professor Watts said softly, almost breathing it out.

Jaune was not sure why he said 'hero' or said it so painfully, Jaune did indeed want to be a hero and so far this power or enhancement as the professor called it was something that he could easily control and use to help people, but professor Watts looked like he wanted to say more, so Jaune was content to let him finish.

"I don't know if you remember me saying this Jaune but you are not the first person to go through this experiment, the first was actually my brother, Dr Arthur Watts."

"I didn't know that you had a brother." Said Jaune leaning forward more, now even more interested in where this was going.

"Not many do. He was one of the first to completely join with Mantle and Mistral in there scheme to effectively control the world, in fact that is all he ever wanted more power and more control, I doubt that he even knows what to do with it when he has all of the power that he so desires. He does not understand the value of power, because he has always had it throughout his life, which is why I am glad that you know the value of it."

"I don't think I know the value of power, I barely paid attention in science class" said Jaune rubbing the back of his neck of his neck smiling sheepishly at the professor.

"Not that type of power, this is more than any lesson in school." Professor Watts sighed. "What I mean is that you asked me how to control it before I told you what it was, maybe that is not understanding its value, but it still means that you have a respect for it and it shows that you do value control." Pointed out the professor, Jaune looked at him thoughtfully for a moment before nodding in agreement.

"Okay you got me there, you can continue with the story about your brother, sorry for interrupting." Said Jaune cautiously, trying to make sure that he could find out some more information on how Dr Watts lost control of the power or if there is a side effect that turned him evil.

"Very well, we began our experiments and testing before the war had begun, back when Mistral and Mantle were merely trading partners, this gave us plenty of chances to try out a variety of dust components alongside various chemicals and numerous biological materials." The professor paused for a sip of his drink and then smiled slightly.

"I can still remember the look on Arthur's face the day that we found the correct reaction, however by this time the Mistral and Mantle forces had begun there combined assault on the rest of remnant and I quickly burned all of my research notes and destroy all of the vials of the serum, I had already remembered everything perfectly, but I did not want anybody else discovering this power.

"However just as I had finished burning everything, I found my brother lying on the table with an empty vial that I had missed. At that point I knew that I needed to run, Arthur had already expressed what side of this war he was on and now I know the lengths he would go to achieve victory." After professor Watts had finished speaking he took another sip of his drink, closed his eyes and leaned back against his chair, resting his head and then wiping away a tear.

Jaune sat there and gazed with sorrow at the professor, he had run because he was terrified that he own brother would maybe try to hurt him, or even worse kill him. The fact that a family member could even be so cruel and callous was alien to him, he may not always get on with his family but he would never go that far.

"D-did" croaked Jaune "Did the serum make him attack you?" questioned Jaune after he found his voice.

"It might have." Professor Watts answered, opening his eyes and leaning forward so he could be eye level with Jaune, and lock eyes with him. "Yet as I have said you will be enhanced, this means your character and your defining qualities."

"So this means my jokes are going to be even better?" asked Jaune with a smile.

"Well they would have to be good to start off with" Jaune's smile promptly disappeared faster than it came after being destroyed by the professor.

"You are a good man Jaune, you help people out around the camp, you keep trying at everything even if you fail you keep getting back up and trying again and again and again. That is something that the world needs. It's a good thing that it will arrive soon, and you will not just be a good man but you will be a great solider. Just remember to keep trying and know that you are a good man first and a solider second." Said professor Watts, placing a hand on Jaune's shoulder.

Jaune smiled and said "I'll remember and I promise you that this test will be a success, I am done failing, and an Arc never goes back on his word."

"Failure is how we learn Mr Arc, and it is part of what keeps us humans humble and makes us determined to reach new heights"

"Do you write down these inspirational sayings and practice them in private or is there an age where they just become a part of you" questioned Jaune

"Get some sleep Mr Arc, STRQ industries will not appreciate you falling asleep and then drooling on their equipment" replied professor Watts, as he stood up and moved over to his side of the tent to also get some much deserved rest.

"Just promise me one more thing Mr Arc, whatever happen I want you to stay true to what who you are, not a great solider, but a good man."

"I will."

Tomorrow was a big day after all.

---

Chapter 5: 'family business' - Assassin's POV

At around the middle of day the kingdom of Vale was an extraordinary beautiful place, the sun gleamed off of the building windows basking the streets bellow in an unearthly glow, the statues around the city seamed to double in size and this made the people feel a lot more safe as they were giant monuments of knights, gladiators and soldiers that were doing heroic things. The park was always a sight to behold in the early morning as the sun was low enough to shine off of the water at the perfect angle to block out some of the buildings in the back ground, making you feel like you are in a vast and never ending oasis. The streets of vale were never not going to be crowded as a result of the beauty of the city and the many opportunities that it provided for the inhabitants. They were absolutely packed with families buying there weekly share of food, clothes so that the younger ones would have something to grow in to and any other household necessities that they could require to maintain their relatively simple lifestyle, old friends who were meeting after a long time spent apart and now they could finally catch up and talk about 'the good old days' once again and finally new people who had come from far away villages to bear witness to this glorious kingdom and were just now meeting each other for the first time, ready to start a new chapter in their simple, ordinary lives.

Unfortunately, there was one young man who did not share the thoughts of those around him on the street, as he was much more focused on the task that he had been given two days prior; to kill professor Adam Watts. Usually this task would be an easy one for an individual such as himself and to carry it out his way he would have slipped in to the military training camp under the cover of darkness and taken the professors life while he slept, if he were to meet any resistance along the way they would fall to his vastly superior skill, however that was not the case with this specific task as there were additional objectives that he needed to complete before he could execute his target, and thus he was forced to wait as they moved incredibly slowly down the street, he had many virtues yet patience was not the one that he prided himself on, most clients wanted the job to be done as soon as possible, however his current employer was not like most people as he was coming to find out.

As he observed his targets he was unsure as to why the professor insisted on walking to where ever they were going instead of just travelling by car or a military jeep, it would get them to where they needed to be much faster and safer than them being out in the open. What he was even more baffled by than the professors complete lack of preparedness for this journey, was the twig that was walking along beside his target. He had read through the details of the task that he would need to carry out and the Doctor had informed him what the target was going to attempt to do to a specific candidate of their choosing and if he was being completely honest the whole serum thing was all a bit pointless to him, why give those who were weak a chance to be just handed strength, it was something that you earned through hard work and determination, the most incredible thing was that the target had evidently chosen the twig that was walking beside him right now. Why use somebody so pathetic, so wimpy, so weak and just so fragile? Looking at him was actually making the assassin feel sad, the reading that he had done suggested that the serum injection was an incredibly painful process that pushed the body to its limits, and right now it looked like the twig had the same limits as the little girl that had just walked passed him holding her father's hand and pulling him along, she could probably lift more weight than the twig could but that wasn't really saying much.

All of his thoughts on the target and whoever he chose to be subjected to the pain did not really matter at the moment, as they were just his opinions on the task; of course he was allowed to have opinions on the jobs he took so long as he carried out what he was doing. Luckily for him part of the task was to wait until the experiment was completed so that he could assess the results and notice if the twig had any changes or if he even survived his trip through the painful process and then he got on to the main task of killing the professor, but not before he delivered the message to him from his brother. That part was stupid to him; targets didn't need to know who was killing them it wasn't like they could change anything from the afterlife, assuming there was one. After he had eliminated his target he would then escape and disappear before returning to the doctor and reporting that he had completed his mission, simple and effective, that's all a plan needed to be anything more and it becomes a play or a dance and he hated both of those things, though he did reckon that he could probably watch an entire play and come back to this spot and they might have reached the end of the street with the speed that they were going.

Speaking of which, it actually seemed like they had finally reached their destination, the simple bookstore on the very corner of the street. The blond twig then looked as though he said something from the way his hands and head moved about; however the primary target looked like he just ignored whatever the twig said and instead walked straight in to the store, and after a brief second of contemplation was followed by the twig. The assassin then decided to seek a better vantage point so that he could view the interior of the store, so he quickly walked down the street and leaned on the wall opposite the store looking through the large window to see the inhabitants.

There was an old man behind the counter and if the twigs head was anything to go by he was having a fast conversation with the primary target, maybe it was a sort of secret code to confirm identities to make sure that they were not being infiltrated, the assassin did not have time to follow a code so he would have to sneak in without being noticed. As their little conversation came to an end the old man gestured for them to follow him in to the back of the store and the primary target did so with a bewildered twig following him. Pushing off the wall he crossed the road and entered the store, a little ding signalled his arrival and he quickly ducked behind some shelves as the old man came back out to inspect the noise and greet the new customer. The assassin quickly grabbed a book from the shelf and hurled it at the opposite end of the store knocking a big pile of books over and causing quite a mess; this prompted the old shopkeeper to hurry over and start tidying up while muttering under his breath. While he was distracted the assassin quickly slipped out from behind the shelf, vaulted over the counter and disappeared in to the back room before the old shopkeeper could notice anything had happened behind him.

In the back room the first things that he noticed were all of the boxes that were piled up but none of them were against the furthest wall which also had an electrical panel on it and upon further inspection he found a lever that was hidden off to the side of the panel After pulling the lever down the wall opened up to reveal a set of doors. After passing through the doors he found himself in a small lift that only had the one button on the wall to his left, so taking a leap of faith he pressed the button and the lift began to slowly descend. When the lift stopped the assassin presumed he had reached the bottom of the shaft as he was now faced with a new set of doors that he then cautiously went through and then found himself in a long, well-lit, bright white corridor with doors lined up along either side. 'No guards at the bottom of the shaft or any patrols, this might not even be that fun.' Thought the assassin, however just as he had finished thinking what little challenge this would actually be one of the doors handles twisted, overcome with a sense of urgency, the assassin was quick to move to one of the other doors and dive right in once he had served the room to make sure it was clear of any threats. 'A storage cupboard, fantastic' he thought dryly 'nobody would think to look for a highly skilled assassin who is here to kill one of the smartest men on Remnant in here.' Glancing out of the door he observed the two new inhabitants of the hallway, a girl with long dark hair and blood red eyes and a boy with messy blond hair, blue eyes and what he probably thought was stylish facial hair.

"-Ven, it's just one date. What is the worst that could happen?" said the blond boy waving his hands around as though to try and keep the dark haired girls attention on him.

"Ugh, let's just head to the testing room, my brother and Summer will be waiting with the test subject" replied the dark haired girl exasperatedly.

"Okay it's a little creepy to here you talk about some guy like he is just a lab rat, but back to the original topic; is that a yes or?" asked the blond boy trailing off awkwardly, scratching the back of his neck and looking anywhere but the dark haired girls red eyes.

"Yes it is a yes, if you do a little dance in celebration when I turn my back on you I will know and I will kill you, understand?" said the dark haired girl threateningly, even the assassin felt a chill go up his spine at her words, sure he could face down an entire room of some of the deadliest killers and worst of the bad guys but he wasn't stupid; an angry woman was something you just didn't mess with and for this blond guys sake he should realise that.

"Yes ma'am" said the blond 'looks like he realised it' thought the assassin with an approving nod of his head, hell hath no fury after all. They both quickly disappeared down the hallway towards the testing room that the girl had mentioned earlier, this would be where the target would most likely be found as he would not stray too far from his precious little twig. Wanting to follow them as soon as possible he waited until the rounded the corner before he went to leave the storage cupboard. However someone else came around the corner and this person was armed with a gun and a baton, 'clearly there security was not a lax as I first thought it to be, it still could be improved' thought the assassin. The guard was heading straight to his hiding place, obviously he wanted something from inside the room or was just going to check it out, either way this obstacle would need to be incapacitated before he could move on.

The door swung open and the guard stepped in to what he believed to be an empty storage cupboard, yet what he did not know was that one of the most deadly people was hiding right behind the door waiting for the opportune moment to pounce. The guard took another step forward and reached for some item on one of the shelf's in the cupboard and this is when the assassin made his move, first he struck out with a forceful kick to the back of the guards left leg causing him to buckle and fall down on to his right knee, simultaneously throwing his head back and flailing his arms about in surprise, not expecting anybody to attack him while grabbing extra toilet roll. With his head tilted back from the odd angle of his fall this presented his neck at a very opportune and extremely vulnerable angle which the assassin immediately took advantage of in an instant, wrapping his left arm around the throat and then moving his right arm to the back of the neck, and then began to apply pressure by squeezing his arms closer together crushing the guards throat in the process, making sure to keep using his forearms as opposed to the crock of his elbow as it would finish the job quicker. This efficient tactic and the speed of the attack left the guard unable to do anything to stop his loss of consciousness as he clawed at the arms his throat for a second before he blacked out. The assassin kept the pressure on for a second after the guard went still and then slowly released his arms and lowered him to the ground and after making sure that he was still breathing he took a quick glance outside to make sure that there were no more unwelcome surprises waiting for him in the hallway, once he had deemed it safe enough, he exited the room and closed the door behind him breaking off the handle and leaving the guard unconscious lying in the middle of the cupboard. 'The contracts only for the target, this means I am not being paid to take anybody else's life so there is no point doing it for free' he thought to himself as he headed towards where the dark haired girl and the blond boy had disappeared to around the corner in search of the testing room.

After spotting two large doors at the very end of the hallway with windows at head height he thought that this would be a good place to start off with his search, so making his way over he glanced through the window on the right door and saw a green lit room with several computer consoles dotted around as well as additional generators meant to supply power to them, probably in the event of a black out occurring or if the tests they ran used up the power that they had in the building. In the very middle of the room was a pod/table where the twig was standing in front of looking extremely pale, or even paler than he thought the twig could get, he also took notice of the other inhabitants of the room; the blond boy with the blue eyes from before and the dark haired girl with the blood red eyes were both there standing next to the pod with the girl holding a clipboard close to her chest, along with those two were a dark haired boy who also had blood red eyes and a strange necklace on with a cross but not hanging by the top instead it was tilted, he was kneeling down next to one of the generators and the other person in the room was a short girl with dark hair with red tips at the end of it and shocking sliver eyes that were unlike anything he had ever seen before in his life, she was busy typing on one of the consoles facing away from the door.

Then he spotted the target, he was standing to the right of the twig with his hand on his bare shoulder no doubt providing moral support, now that the assassin was closer to his target he could observe him more closely and what he saw almost made him laugh out loud, the picture and the information that he had been given had showed the targets full height and body shape and that had not changed over the years apparently so it was easy for the assassin to pick him out of the crowd, but what had changed was the facial hair; his target had grown a moustache. Making him appear exactly identical to his employer, so it would almost be like he was assassinating Dr Watts instead of professor Watts, that would not be a problem, Dr Watts was a massive pain in the arse and he always wanted to knock him around a little bit just to see the smugness fade from his eyes and be replaced by fear.

While he was musing in his thoughts the assassin was then quick noticed the twig step forward and lie down on the pod/table and the target moved to his side and was no doubt imparting some final pearls of wisdom on to the twig before the pod thing closed around him and blocked him from sight. 'I hope you cherished that memory professor that was the last advice you are ever going to give' thought the assassin as he quietly opened the door and slipped in to the room taking cover behind one of the many computer consoles, nobody noticed as they were all too busy with what they were doing or focused on the pod sealing over the twig. Once the pod was completely sealed his target moved over to the short silver eyed girl and gave her an encouraging smile and a nod as though saying that they could begin.

"Okay team" proclaimed the silver eyed girl with a high voice that just screamed innocence and optimism. "It is time to get this show showing, er on the road, yeah. So Raven how are his vitals?"

"Articulate as always Summer, and medically speaking; he is a mess. I am almost afraid that a sneeze could kill him" said the dark haired girl, now known as Raven.

"Fantastic" 'obviously this Summer girl has very selective hearing' "Qrow, energy levels. How are they and will they hold steady throughout the procedure?"

The boy with dark hair stood up and pulled out a flask from his breast pocket and took a swig from it before answering "Good and who knows" he said with a deep gravelly voice that screamed 'I don't really care but I have to do this'.

"Great" 'again with the selective hearing, you're doing great shorty' "Tai, pod mechanics. Everything working at optimal levels?

"212% Positive boss lady" said the blond boy known as Tai turning around and giving the silver eyed girl also known as Summer a double thumbs up with a goofy grin on his face which caused Raven to sigh in disbelief, Summer to giggle and Qrow to take another sip from his flask, 'He looks a bit too young for drinking, but I did start killing at 13 so who am I to judge' thought the assassin. The Target just looked over all of them with a wistful smile and a pained yet happy look in his eyes, perhaps reminiscing of other memories. 'Good they will be some of your last' thought the assassin.

"Mathematically, this is completely incorrect, and too much power might result in an explosion that could kill him and take us along with it" said Raven in a monotone voice while gazing impassively at Tai who's smile quickly vanished as she finished talking.

"Rae, let me have this, please. I mean, I am taking you out for dinner later after all." Said Tai; his smile returning.

"YOU ARE DOING WHAT WITH MY SISTER!" shouted Qrow chocking slightly on the sip he had taken from his flask and throwing his hands in the air alternating between looking venomously at Tai and disbelievingly at Raven.

"Well looks like we are all ready to go Professor Watts, just say the word" said Summer smiling up at the target.

"Fantastic. Are you ready Jaune!" the Target yelled to the twig in the pod.

"I guess it's a bad time to say I need to toilet right?" came back to nervous reply from the twig also known as Jaune inside the pod. 'A poor attempt at humour to mask his fear, this boy has no confidence so he is no fighter that's for sure, so why was he chosen?' thought the assassin.

"Flip the switch Summer, he's ready." Said the target; stepping back slightly and placing his hands behind his back; positively bouncing on the balls of his feet in anticipation.

Summer, the silver eyed girl, took hold of the leaver behind her on the console that she had been working on the whole time and before pushing it up she took a deep breath and closed her eyes, before opening them and pushing it all the way to its limits. Once it was fully engaged the pod began to hum with power and a section to the side opened up with a small slot and the professor produced a small vial from his pocket, containing a bright blue liquid. After slotting the vial in to its place the slot closed up and then nobody could see what was going on any more. The target then turned around to the one called Tai and asked him is the serum injection was successful and that it was flowing into the twig, Tai then checked the side of the pod looking at several things before saying that the serum had been drained in to the different tubes and injected in to the twig at various points across his body. The target then asked about his vitals and Raven said that there had been a brief spike but that was because of the needles that had gone in to his body, but other than that no change. The target then asked Qrow about the power levels and that's when it happened.

Just as Qrow was about to reply a brilliant bright light burst from the pods window, enveloping the room and steadily growing brighter and blinding the inhabitants or the room, so much so that Raven had shielded her face behind her clipboard, Tai had thrown his arms over his face, Qrow had ducked behind one of the generators and Summer had just squeezed her eyes together as tightly as possible. The target had held his hands in front of his face and even the assassin had taken to only squinting at the harsh light. Due to the blue liquid, the assassin speculated that the light that was coming from the pod should actually be blue, but instead it was completely white, the purest and most powerful white that the assassin had ever seen before in his life. Then they all heard it, the sudden explosion of light in to the room had somehow distracted everyone from something else filling the room, a horrible blood curling scream that ripped through everyone's ears. Now as an assassin, he had heard his fair share of screams, there were the 'save me' screams, the 'falling' screams and the 'scared' screams to name a few, but he had never been one for torture, he killed people plain and simple, he wasn't that much of a monster. But this scream, was something else and he pitied the twig for what he was going through.

"JAUNE!" screamed the Target, trying desperately to get through to the twig and make sure he was okay.

"Qrow pull the plug shut of the power! Tai open up th-" began the Target shouting orders at the others before he was cut off by the twig, who despite being in pain still managed to have a good grasp of what was happening outside his pod.

"NO, KEEP GOING! I CAN DO THIS! I PROMISE! PLEASE LET ME KEEP GOING!" shouted to twig, his voice sounding a little bit deeper than before, but that was probably from the pain of the procedure.

The Target struggled to look at the pod in disbelief, because of the light but he still managed to, before motioning for the boys to stop what they were doing and let it continue. The Summer girl then looked between all of the others, again with great difficulty because of the blinding white light, before finally settling on the Target and she shouted over with fear clear in her high voice.

"HOW MUCH MORE OF THIS CAN HE TAKE?"

Then it all stopped, the deafening screaming had ceased and now an even louder silence had followed.

The blinding white light that had managed to cover the room had disappeared, but it was still difficult to look at the pod without hurting your eyes.

The Target swallowed and then let out a breath he had unknowingly been holding in before he turned to Tai and wordlessly asked him to open up the pod so they could see what had happened to the Twig. After shaking his head and croaking out a 'sure thing boss man' to the target, Tai stepped forward and then began to fiddle with the panel on the side of the machine before pressing a button to open the pod. Very dramatically the pod moved to a standing position and then the doors opened and smoke began to flow out of the pod slowly revealing the twig, and when everyone saw him they all looked shocked; the test had worked.

Before the twig had gone in to the pod he had been a short person of around 5 foot 5 inches, with gangly limbs and his entire body was terrifyingly thin and looked like he could snap at any moment. The person who had come out of the pod was completely different to the twig; he looked like he stood at 6 foot tall, give or take a couple of inches, the rest of his body had now grown to match his new height and was now no longer odd looking instead his new body was stacked with muscles that looked like they could throw a car, or at least lift it up a car and that made him take up a very intimidating and imposing figure, if he wasn't currently looking like he was completely out of it. 'He's big, but I've thought bigger' thought the assassin as he plotted out the route that he would take to his target through the others if necessary.

The target moved over to him and so did the boy called Tai and they both grabbed him by the sides and then pulled him out of the pod and in to a standing position and then Summer, Raven and Qrow all moved to stand around him to inspect his new body, ask him how he was feeling and to bring him a t-shirt to put on, in that order.

"This is incredible, his heart rate has lowered considerably from before the test and has become stronger by far" said Raven, slowly as though she didn't believe what she was actually saying.

"Whoa, I guess that means the pod really works, points for mechanics" says Tai excitedly pumping one of his fists as the other hand still held on to the no-twig as he put on the t-shirt that Qrow had given him. This test was obviously a very clear success, which means that the observation part of the assassins contract had been completed and now it was time to fulfil the main part and then get out of this laboratory and get the rest of his payment.

Making sure that everyone's attention was on the not-twig and that he was to focused on his new body and adjusting to the changes, because if the assassin had to guess, his entire cardiovascular system had been improved meaning that this was probably the first time that the not-twig was breathing probably, and he was high on oxygen and all of its good stuff right now meaning that he would be heavily distracted. So it was time to make his move, it was time to end a life.

The assassin was quick to vault over the console that he had been hiding behind and quick as a flash sped over to the group that were still around the pod and were still unaware of his presence in the room, he was quick to choose his first target to incapacitate and moved in to a stance behind the boy called Qrow and delivered a powerful front kick to his back that sent him towards the not-twig and Tai knocking all three of them to the ground. After completing his front kick with his left leg he left it forward and sent an equally powerful spin kick to the Raven girl, and his heel managed to catch her around the side of her head sending her spinning and collapsing on to Summer causing the smaller girl to be crushed under her and pinned as she struggled to move the bigger girl off her. The assassin then turned to face the Target and gave him a smile and said "Hello there." This caused the Target to back pedal and trip over his own feet in shock and fear and fall to the ground so that now the assassin was smiling down at him menacingly.

Realizing that Tai and Qrow had both now stood up and the not-twig was still on the floor, trying to get used to breathing properly and maybe find his centre of gravity, along with the strength to stand, the assassin turned back to the two boys and held out his hand and beckoned with his fingers to say 'come get some'. Qrow was the first one to make a move as he moved forward and threw a right hook that the assassin ducked under and simultaneously brought up his knee in to Qrow's stomach, making him bend over before the assassin removed his knee and delivered a downwards punch right across Qrow's cheek at the same time as he swept his legs out from under him knocking him to the floor where he banged his head against the hard tiles knocking him out cold. The moment he hit the floor Tai charged forward with a Right cross that was easily deflected by the assassin and then followed up with a left cross after the first failed but that was promptly deflected as well, then Tai switched up his offence by going for a kick to the shin to try and distract the assassin, as his foot connected with the shin, Tai felt a lot of pain and was left hoping on one foot clutching the other in his hand which made the assassin's smile even bigger. Wanting to end the fight quickly the assassin front kicked him in the stomach making Tai bend over and almost fall due to the lack of balance but the assassin was faster and performed a back flip kick which caught Tai under the chin and made him fly in the air for a second before crashing in to the floor next to Qrow groaning in pain before succumbing to the darkness of unconsciousness. Now the assassin knew that the flashy move was a bit over the top and he should probably save them for impressing the ladies after all the basics were for battle, but with these amateurs and the lack of a threat they posed he could enjoy himself.

Turning back to the Target he walked over to him and grabbed him by the throat lifting him up to eye level and then drawing the knife that he kept hidden on his back and he delivered his message he was told to give the Target. Truthfully he didn't see the point in giving someone a message right before they were killed, it wasn't as though they could do anything as they died except realise they were wrong and nothing could change that. This was all coming from a business point of view, maybe if he made a kill personal then he would say something, but you know what they say 'the customer is always right'.

Just as the assassin was about to bring the knife down straight on to the targets carotid artery, a hand shot out like a bullet from a gun and caught hold of his wrist, squeezing it with enough force that the assassin dropped the knife due to the pressure and strength behind the squeeze. Turning to look at who had stopped his murder so he could dispatch them and return to his job, the assassin was slightly surprised to see the not-twig was up and keeping him from completing his job. Just as he was about to elbow the not-twig and begin a brutal counter offensive that would surely give him some alone time, the not-twig grabbed the back of his shirt with his other hand and then pulled him off of his target, the assassin was then knocked off by the sheer strength and force of the throw that the not-twig used to send him flying back against the computer console that Summer had been stood in front of for the whole procedure.

Shaking his head to clear his vision and remove the daze of being thrown against something hard the assassin was quick to stand up again and assess the new obstacle to his target, after all he had been hit by bigger harder people, people who knew exactly what they were doing and groups of people and yet he was still standing as he always would, so this obstacle would be no different. Looking at him now it was clear that he stood at just a couple of inches taller than the assassin and maybe a little bit broader, but that just gave the assassin more to hit. The not-twig was also still trying to adjust to breathing properly and he was taking deep breathes and still looked a little bit dazed and unfocused, as he stared at his hand is disbelief and fascination.

"Well that's not what I thought it would be like" muttered the not-twig, before looking up at the assassin "Who are you?" he asked puzzled.

"You first" growled the assassin, still a little sore at being surprised by an amateur.

"Jaune Arc and I don't know why you hurt these people or why you tried to hurt my friend, but it stops now" said Arc breathing heavily between every fourth or fifth word.

"Jaune Arc huh? I'll make sure that they put it on your tombstone" The assassin quipped before charging towards Arc, intent on knocking him around a bit to show his target that his creation is flawed, imperfect and human.

What followed the charge was a brutal yet well planned and thought out kicks, from the obviously angry assassin. The assassin opened up his combo with a low left roundhouse kick heading straight to Arcs right knee, intent on knocking him off balance to open him up for more devastation blows. The attack made Arc drop down to a low stance, falling on to his right knee as he tried to support himself. The assassin was pulled his leg back and then using the ground as springboard he struck out with a mid-level left roundhouse kick designed to catch Arc around the temple and knock the not-twig back on his arse so that he could finish his target and then escape before any reinforcements could arrive to complicate things.

What the assassin was not prepared for was Arc to raise his arms and block the roundhouse kick with both of his arms, taking away the momentum of his kick. They were both clearly quite surprised, the assassin that someone was strong enough to stand up to the force of one of his kicks and Arc that he had managed to block the attack in time. Arc pushed the assassins leg back and the assassin simultaneously pulled his leg back and using the combined force he suddenly pivoted and turned Arc's counter in to a spinning side kick aimed at his stomach that connected, and despite all of the muscle he had gained, his stomach was still weak to metal boots with an astonishing amount of power behind them and because of this Arc made a very satisfying grunt of pain that greatly pleased the assassin. He then followed the kick up with a left jab pushing his head back and opening up his throat so that the assassin could finish him off, but he was not prepared for Arc to recover from the strikes so quickly, as Arc through-out a wild right hook which caught the assassin in the ribs with an alarming amount of force, startling the assassin and making him bend over slightly, and Arc took advantage of the momentary pause in assault to start his own attack plan, continuing with a left cross to the stomach pushing the assassin back slightly and then as he rose back on to his feet he managed to deliver a right uppercut under his chin lifting the assassin off his feet and slamming in to the floor back first, the assassin then performed a back hand spring back on to his feet and then realised that he was in fact back next to the computer console that Arc had thrown him up against and he felt a flash of anger go through him 'time to stop underestimating him and end it' thought the assassin bitterly.

Inside his mind he was thinking about killing Arc in a load of grizzly ways, but his outward appearance decided to play it cool, so he then tilted his head and nodded slightly, as though he was impressed with the very messy, haphazard and ridiculous counter attack. He then decided to speak to his opponent, true he was on a tight schedule, but he finally understood something, this was personal and he was not going to let someone who was a twig two minutes ago beat him.

"Not bad, unpolished, untrained, and very simple, but an adequate job."

"Seriously who are you?" asked Arc standing up straight and awkwardly raising his fists and staring at the assassin in disbelief, like he couldn't believe what was happening.

"I guess it doesn't really matter since then next time you see me it will be to kill you, my name is Mercury Black, or if you want my official title Barron Mercury Black, master assassin."

Arc looked at him with narrowed eyes and then shakes his head from side to side.

"Sorry, never heard of you" says Arc slowly, almost like he was embarrassed to not know about an assassin, which puzzled Mercury. 'What is he talking about?" thought Mercury.

"Those are the words an assassin loves to here, it's like sweet, sweet music to my ears"

Barron Black then launched himself at Arc with a devastating right axe kick, starting with his leg up high and bringing down hard enough to break the bones in Arc's leg, however Arc had managed to side step to the right out of the way of the attack, so Mercury's leg just went straight down in to the ground, cracking it and throwing up a little bit of debris. Arc stared at the spot where Mercury's leg had struck, relieved that he had managed to avoid something that strong, however this relief was short lived as Arc was then struck by a smooth left spin kick which knocked his guard down leaving his head wide open perfect for Mercury's finishing move, a right jumping roundhouse, using the momentum of the left spinning kick to propel his body around to complete the strike, and with so much power behind the strike it forced Arc to fly right back and crash into the pod that he had just come out of moments before, falling to the floor in front of it.

Arc then clutched the side of his head obviously in pain, as a metal boot connecting with that much strength would be enough to knock anybody out for the count, but it as the fight had gone on, it seemed that Arc was not just anybody. Standing up on shaky feet Arc stepped forward and threw a right hook punch aimed very clumsily at Mercury, which the master assassin used an inside blocking technique that he had learned years ago as a little boy and was about as basic block as you could get, he then followed this strike up with a reverse punch to Arc's face, further disorientating him and then to finish the fight off for good Mercury jumped up and performed a powerful drop kick to his opponents chest which sent Arc flying back into the pod and toppling over it and crashing on the floor behind the machine, smacking his head hard on the floor, knocking him out cold for good. Mercury meanwhile had managed to turn the drop kick into a back flip and landed back on the floor with his boots creating cracks and sending up little sparks as he slid slightly. Mercury then glanced over his shoulder, smiling sinisterly at his target, who throughout the fight, had stayed where he was on the floor, either out of fear, shock, awe or curiosity to see if his little science experiment would perform to his pleasing.

The master assassin then strolled over and picked up his knife, still grinning at the target who was now backpedalling furiously trying to put some distance between the two of them, but to no avail.

"Now, where were we professor?" asked Mercury coldly, with one hand shooting out to grab the front of the targets shirt and lifting him up to eye level. "The Doctor says hello, he missed his little brother."

The target locked eyes with the master assassin and summoned what strength he possessed to keep his gaze on the dead eyes of the assassin. "I don't fear death." The target proclaimed, which he probably thought was quite brave of him, yet Mercury saw right through the brave mask, he was afraid.

"Don't fear it, fear it, it makes no difference." Said Mercury offhandedly, plunging the dagger in to the targets heart causing his eyes to shoot open wider than they had been before, as the target had moved from fear, straight to terror and then the light left them.

"It comes to us all in the end" finished Mercury, pulling the knife out and then stabbing through the targets neck as well to make sure of his death, 'never be too careful' he thought to himself, it was one of the lessons his father had taught him long ago.

Mercury then dropped the targets lifeless body and watched it hit the ground with a resulting thump. And at the same time an alarm suddenly blared from the room and the lights all started flashing red and casting a blood red shine on everything in the room. Looking around Mercury say that the silver eyed short girl had managed to get the Raven girl off of her and had made her way over to the wall where a fire alarm was located, smart.

Mercury gave her a little wave and then sped over to the doors that he had managed to sneak in through to witness the experiment, his contract was complete and he didn't need to stay any longer than he needed to be. Passing through the doors he noticed four men walking towards the testing room, no doubt going to make sure that the scientists were all leaving, but the moment they saw him they froze, understandable because his shirt had blood on it and he was smiling like a mad man, they then started moving towards him a lot quicker than before, drawing their batons from their waists.

"Fantastic response time boys, shall we dance?" Mercury quipped before readying himself for combat.

The first guard swung a baton straight at his head, to which Mercury ducked under the pathetic and dreadfully slow swing, punching guard number one in the stomach making him bend over. Guard number two attempted to try the same thing as his buddy, but he was so slow and Mercury was far quicker than they were, and he rolled over the back of guard number one who was still bent over. This put guard number one in-between Mercury and guard number two, Mercury then deliver a knee kick to guard number one hearing the crunch of his nose as it connected beautifully with his face, taking him out of the fight, and then following the knee kick to guard number one with a front kick to guard number two, which pushed him up against the wall, slamming his back into it and then Mercury struck out with a palm strike to guard number two's face, causing his head to crack the wall slightly from the force of the attack and effectively and brutally taking him out of the fight. Turning to the last two guards Mercury gave a little shrug and pushed some dust off his shoulder.

"Well come on then, not going to leave me hanging are you?"

The remaining two guards then decide to charge Mercury together intent on maybe overwhelming him believing that together they stood a chance against this mysterious blood stained individual, however Mercury had other plans. He dashed forward and jumped at them before they had any time to react and wrapped his legs around the neck of guard number three and his arms around the neck of guard number four, then using his momentum from the run and jump, twisted and threw them towards the ground smashing their heads against the floor and then rolling with their bodies he continued running forward as though nothing had happened.

As he saw the doors that would take him back up to the shop, the cupboard door that he had briefly been hiding in, opened up and the guard he had knocked out earlier stumbled out still gripping his throat, and without missing a beat Mercury ran straight past him and punched him as hard as he could around the side of his face and completely floored him again, 'Not your best day at the office is it?' he thought as he continued in to the elevator and then pressed the same button and just as he had hoped the lift began to ascend bringing him back up to the shop, which he very quickly ran out of and into the crowded streets of Vale disappearing in to plain sight. Another lesson his father had taught him, 'at least he was good at something, well that and dying' thought Mercury.

---

Chapter 5: wasting away - Jaunes POV

After the surprising death of professor Watts at the hands of that supposed master assassin, Barron Mercury Black, the general had ordered STRQ industries to relocate to the makeshift military base in the emerald forest, and Jaune had gone with them as he was still technically a soldier. The general had also ordered them to make more of the serum that transformed the twig that Jaune had been before in to the man that he was now. However it turns out that not a single member of STRQ industries knew how to recreate the serum as the professor had kept the formula a secret, he had left no notes or alternate batches or any sign of ingredients lying around in his tent that could point them in the right direction of creating more batches of the serum to give to the other soldiers.

Realising that Jaune would probably be the only successful creation of the experiment for the foreseeable future, the general was quick to remove him from active duty so that he would remain indefinitely at the military base where STRQ industries could perform a number of tests on him to try and see if they could find any clue of how to make the serum. The took a lot of his blood and ran it through various different tests but so far nothing conclusive had managed to come up that would point them in the right direction.

Despite all of the tests that they ran the members of STRQ industries were still positive that they were going to crack the metaphorical code that was Jaune's DNA and find some kind of key or clue that could allow them to produce more of the serum. Jaune did confess to the others that he felt like he could be doing more to help rather than sit here like a lab rat.

"I can now move without feeling tired, the other day I walked up the stairs of the lookout tower and by the time I reached the top I still had my breath!" says Jaune excitedly

"Do you usually run out of breath walking up the stairs?" asks Tai, struggling to keep the grin off his face.

"Uhh yeah I used to, but now, not so much" said Jaune sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck.

Tai's roaring laughter filled the tent where STRQ industries had set up shop in the military base, and caused Jaune to slump his shoulders slightly before letting out a slight chuckle at himself, for once getting tired for walking up the stairs, it was a fairly ridiculous thing to get tired for, but looking back Jaune didn't really see it as a bother, it just was what happened and he had grown to get used to it. Speaking of getting used to things, because of the amount of tests that STRQ industries were running on him Jaune had now gotten to know them all pretty well, he knew that Tai and Raven were dating (something a certain brother who shall remain nameless was not happy about in the slightest), Qrow kept a flask on him at all times, but it was in fact filled with water, he just wanted everyone to think it was alcohol because it made him look cool, and that Summer had a massive sweet tooth and was rarely seen without a type of candy or chocolate on her person at any given time. For the first time in a while Jaune was almost comfortable, he just wanted to be able to do more, to help others instead of sit on a table while his friends/scientist poked and prodded his body looking for clues to recreate a super serum.

This morning Jaune decide to take a walk through the camp before heading to STRQ industries tent to begin his daily tests, recently he had taken to reading books on strategy and tactics as they were very interesting, he had even played Raven at chess a few times, finding out two things, 1) either he was really good or Raven was really bad and 2) Raven was a very sore loser as on her third loss at the game to Jaune she ended up flipping the board and hitting him with it until Tai came to his rescue, after he had stopped laughing with Summer and Qrow, like the good friends they were.

As Jaune was walking through the camp and thinking back to the chess matches, he came across the generals tent, and thought about stopping by and asking the general again if he could maybe go out and do something more, 'who knows maybe today he would be in a good enough mood and say yes' thought Jaune trying to stay positive. When he got to the tent he was about to call out and ask for permission to enter when he heard voices talking so he opted to wait and see if there was an opening in the conversation where he could ask for permission, it was rude to interrupt after all.

"-to report that captain Ozpin is MIA as of today" finished the general, sighing to himself and rubbing a hand down his face as he reached for the bottle behind him on the desk, it looked like it was going to be one of those days today, the general just hoped that this was all he had to deal with. Jaune then burst through the tent flaps causing the man typewriting to almost fall out of his chair, and stood to attention in front of the general, a look of determination in his eyes, a look of hope.

"Where is he missing sir? I can go with a team to find him and bring him back, or to at least confirm that he is dead." Proclaimed Jaune excitedly, his mind already working on a plan of how to get his friend back, and thinking who he could take with him, 'finally a chance to actually do something helpful' he thought.

The generals expression turned from a defeated and tired look, to an extremely angry and enraged look that just screamed Jaune was about to be in big, big trouble.

"Now you listen to me very carefully priva- Mr Arc" began the general, his voice calm despite his angry appearance. "You have no right to barge in to the tent of a superior officer, and I don't care how special the professor thought you were, because it does not give you the authority to demand anything of me." He then took several steps towards Jaune, who stayed rooted to the spot and in attention. "You will not be going anywhere with anyone to do anything, and you especially won't be doing it as a leader as you are currently, a test subject, not a soldier. A test subject." The general then took another step towards Jaune, steadily closing the distance between them. "And even if I agreed to this pointless mission, Ozpin was leading a team to rescue a load of faunus that were trapped at some prison called Haven Just outside of the kingdom of Mistral, so as far as I am concerned they are acceptable causalities of wars." The general was now eye to eye with Jaune searching for any sign of disobedience in his eyes, apparently finding none he walked back over to his desk and that was when Jaune noticed a map on the desk which pointed out the location of several key places that the scouts had managed to gather when searching the Mistral land.

"Now don't you have some tests to go and have done on you, maybe the next super soldier will actually obey my orders instead of questioning them like a good soldier should" says the general without looking up from his paper work.

"Yes, I do sir" and then Jaune turned on his heel and promptly left the tent, his next few step clear in his mind. He quickly walked back to the STRQ industries tent and burst through flaps and saw Tai and Raven… in a rather compromising position. Realising they had a visitor they stopped what they were doing and then they all stared at each other, before Jaune very quickly turned around. By then he heard the two of them disengage from their exceedingly fierce make out session. Jaune took a few deep breaths and shock his head so that he could clear the image from his head and then he turned around to talk to them about why he had gotten here so quickly.

"W-where are Summer and Qrow?" Jaune stuttered, while looking anywhere but the two people in front of them, one who was trying to fix her hair and the other who was trying to look a little bit ashamed at being caught, but was grinning like an idiot.

Raven chose to stay quiet, while Tai coughed to clear his throat and replied with "They're out the back, Qrow wanted to test something and Summer wanted to see what it was."

"Alright, then lets head out there, we need to talk and I need your help, when you put your shirt back on Tai." Said Jaune

Once the four members of STRQ industries were all gathered outside the back of the tent, per Jaune's request, Qrow looked at everyone before turning to Jaune and asking the question that was on all of their minds.

"Alright, buddy. What's with the meeting thingy? We do have tests to run you know." Says Qrow; folding his arms over his chest.

"I need your help to get me to Haven, it's just on the outskirts of Mistral, I can point it out on a map that I saw in the generals tent, but I need you guys to get me there. Don't you own a plane or a boat that could transport me over?" asks Jaune desperately looking at all of them individually in the eyes.

"Umm, Jaune not to point out the very obvious here, but that sounds a lot like an extremely dangerous and unapproved mission. What happens if you get caught?" asks Tai

"What happens if you die?" This question came from Summer and caused Jaune to close his eyes and let out a deep breath, it was true the risk was great, but the reward would be so much greater and it would save lives and if he did happen to die or get captured then so be it.

"It doesn't matter what could happen to me, there are men and women trapped over there and I have to do something too, anything to help. I am tired of wasting away here at the camp. Ozpin was nice to me when I met him, he was respected around the camp and the professor said that he was a good man. And the world could use more good people in it." Said Jaune; with unrivalled passion and certainty.

The four looked at each other, saying more with their silence and glances than they could with their words, and when they came to some sort of agreement it was Summer who chose to speak for the group.

"You're going to go even if we say that you shouldn't, aren't you?" Jaune nods "Alright if we're going to do something stupid let's at least be smart about it, Qrow you can prep the plane, we'll be flying low and under the radar. Jaune point out exactly where it is on the map and Raven will take it from there, Tai he'll need a weapon of some kind and you will also need something to wear, something to protect you and I'll handle that. After all of that is done we'll meet at your tent Jaune, now let's go STRQ." Ordered Summer.

One hour and forty-five minutes later, Jaune and STRQ industries were comfortably seated in the plane that they owned, flying through the night sky quickly and quietly. Jaune was quite excited because he had never been on a plane before and never again did he ever want to experience the sensations that this death trap provided. The shaking, the vibrating metal sounds, the shaking, the height, the shaking, the engine noises that sounded like they could cut out at any moment, the shaking and the dips and turns that Qrow was taking were all too much for him, he remembered a story his late father had told him about the famous Arc motion sickness, apparently he had thrown up on his mother's shoes when they first met. Jaune true to the Arc legacy had already thrown up several times, and he hoped that he had no more in the tank to give, but apparently his stomach did not get the memo and kept churning violently, the first couple of times Tai had been amused, and now… he was greatly amused and had starting roaring with laughter at Jaune's plight like a good friend, meanwhile Summer was glaring at him like it was his fault.

"If you throw up on that armour, I won't ever let you forget it." She said threateningly

"Understood" Jaune moaned, Tai let out another laugh, very clearly enjoying the whole thing.

"We are nearing Haven, and they don't seem to have spotted us yet, so all is good." Said Tai.

However, just as the universe was listening and decided to mess with them, the moment that Tai had finished talking explosions could be heard all around the plane causing the shaking to get even worse than before, it seemed the Mistral anti-air defences proved to hate Jaune's motion sickness. Qrow managed to avoid every single shot that was fired, a true testament to how good a pilot he was, living up to the name Qrow as he was weaving through the sky creating an impossible target to hit. However despite the excellent flying done by Qrow, Jaune knew that they had no chance of landing safely so he would have to jump so that they could turn around and get back to safety, and as he was falling he could figure out a way to land safely using the weapon that Tai gave him, or maybe the enhancements to his body would protect him as he fell. As he walked over to the planes side door he picked up the weapon and strapped it to his waist, still a little unsure about it but, during the first thirty minute of the flight Tai had given him the run-down of the weapon and how to use it. He then opened up the door and the wind whipped him in the face, immediately making him cover his eyes to avoid getting tears in them from the sped they were going, he also made sure to send out a quick prayer to Oum and hoped for the best before he-

A hand reached out and grabbed Jaune's arm pulling him out of his thoughts, and stopping him from jumping out the door.

"What are you doing?!" shouted Summer over the wind

"I'm going to jump, and then you guys can turn around, hopefully I'll think of a landing strategy before I hit the ground!" yelled Jaune back at her

"I have one, it's called a parachute you idiot!" screamed Summer. Realisation immediately hit Jaune like a hammer to the legs and he did indeed feel like an idiot, a very big one for missing something so startlingly obvious. He then reached over for one, as they were right there by the door, further making Jaune feel stupid, Summer then shouted something else to him and pointed to his weapon and then to her ear but by that point Jaune was more focused on what he was about to do to pay attention to her. He made sure that he was wearing it correctly and then jumped from the war-zone that was in the sky, in to the war-zone that was going to be on the ground, but on the bright side he didn't have to be on the plane anymore.

Jaune would like to say that he felt no fear, absolutely no fear and that he was of sound mind upon his speedy decent, however he screamed the whole way down, he screamed like a little girl and the words that were going through his head would probably make a sailor blush and his mother smack him upside the head. Even as he pulled his parachute he still screamed, although not as loud, and the words going through his head had subsided, but not that substantially.

Once Jaune had safely landed back on to the sweet, sweet ground, he took in the forest around him and made sure that the armour that Summer had outfitted him with was still undamaged and on him and that the weapon that Tai had given him was still functional and attached to his hip. He then set off in the direction that he had spotted a road before he disappeared in to the trees, hopefully the road would lead him to somewhere important and then from there he could find a way to Haven and rescue captain Ozpin and the faunus soldiers that had been imprisoned. As he sprinted through the forest he eventually noticed the road that he had spotted with two trucks heading down the road, they appeared to look like military vehicles and were roughly heading in the direction that the plane had been flying before Jaune decided to jump out, and so Jaune increased his speed to reach it the road just as the trucks were passing by, he then leapt and managed to leap on to the back of the second truck as it went by, he then climbed around and entered the rear of the vehicle and then he hid behind some of the boxes that were in the truck and waited for it to arrive at its destination, hopefully Haven prison.

When the trucks finally came to a halt and the engines were turned off the back of the trucks, flaps opened up and then a man wearing an all-black suit made of body armour, and a mask which had red slits for his eyes and breathing apparatus on the lower half of the mask entered the truck, he then proceeded to check some of the boxes in the truck, and went passed Jaune's hiding place in search of what he was looking for.

Jaune saw this as the perfect opportunity to try out the new weapon that Tai had made for him, so he took the weapon off his hip and then slotted it around his wrist, like the gauntlet should be worn, pulled back the pump to cock it, and then he levelled the weapon at the back of the man's, head aiming down his arm to make sure he wouldn't miss. Taking a deep breath before he fired Jaune decide to count down.

3

2

1

Nothing. 'This isn't right, is this how I want to save lives, by taking others?' Jaune lowered the shotgun gauntlet, and removed it from his arm and placed it back on to his hip, maybe someone else will be comfortable using it, but that's not who I want to be. Coming out from behind his hiding spot, Jaune crept up behind the man and grabbed him by the shoulder, turning the very surprised man to face him and once he was facing him, Jaune punched him around the face as hard as he could to try and knock him out, this resulted with him cracking the armoured guards mask, almost shattering it and the guard himself dropping like a marionette with his strings cut and hitting the ground with a thump. Safe in the knowledge that that guard would not be getting up for a while, Jaune very cautiously exited the back of the truck.

Looking around it was clear that he was in a loading dock of some kind, and while there were guards patrolling around the perimeter of the loading dock, none of them had noticed him yet, and none of the workers had noticed he was there either, so far so good. Spotting a door on the back wall Jaune very quickly made his way over to it, avoiding the guards and all of the workers on the way. Passing through the door, Jaune was faced with a hallway with only one door at the end of it. Being the curious person that he was and also wanting to find out more about this new environment before he could free his friend, Jaune approached the door and peered through the window and quickly spotted that the area passed the door was quite clearly a prison centre, there were people in cages and some of them were handcuffed to the bars. Taking another look at the door Jaune noticed that there was a distinctive lack of a handle, instead there was a little slot where one should have been, clearly meant for a key of some description, a key which Jaune did not have.

Luckily for Jaune, there were three guards in the prison, two of them were walking down the hall and had just passed each other, and the other was stood in front of the door with his back to Jaune, oblivious to the blond watching him. Now all he needed was a plan, this was something that he knew he would be able to be good at, not being the strongest or fastest kid he had to be a smart one. 'shame that didn't really happen in school, always was terrible at history' thought Jaune 'but at least I can make up good plans on the spot, It is how I have managed to prank all my sisters, well that and being annoying, got to have a backup defence, but enough about that time to put my plan into motion'.

Jaune knocked loudly on the door. Once, twice and then thrice. And then stopped, mainly because he wasn't really sure what came after thrice or if thrice was the correct term to use or it was just saying that he did it a third time. However the loud knocking managed to draw the guard closest to the door attention, who then drew a very weird shaped key from his pocket and inserted it in to the door causing it to slide open and the guard stepped in to the opening, but Jaune was waiting ready for him and he lashed out grabbing the front of his shirt and pulling his around and then slamming him in to the wall that he was pressed up against as hard as he could, making the guard bounce off the wall and smack into the floor, out for the count. The loud smack of human against metal drew the other guards attention, as did the lack of one of their trio, so they began to walk down the hallway heading towards the open door, which is when Jaune picked up the guard he had knocked out rifle and then threw it down the hall, straight in to the face of the furthest guard down the hall way with enough force to send him tumbling back in to one of the cages, the other guard turned towards him with a very surprised shout, but was soon cut off as Jaune charged through the door and tackled the guard taking them to the floor and striking them with a powerful punch, completely shattering there mask, he then turned to the other guard but saw that a prisoner was strangling them, Jaune quickly stood up and pulled the prisoners arm from the guards neck and then he punched them across the face, this time only cracking the mask, but still sending the guard to a violent but effective sleep. He then removed the keys that were jingling from the guards belt and unlocked the cage, 'Seems like they don't want to be so high tech for all of their locks, do they?' thought Jaune.

"Free your friends." He said to one of the prisoners, before going to grab the keys off of the second guard. That was when he noticed something that really unsettled him, the guard was a woman. He had tackled and punched a woman. Really hard, 'yeah, mum's not going to be happy about that one, neither are my sisters, oh gosh dad's going to be disappointed in me as well, he always told me to respect women and I don't think hitting them is very respectful, that's going to wear on me for a while' thought Jaune.

Realising that all of the cells were now open and the prisoners were all free Jaune turned away from the unconscious woman and to the group, noticing that every single one of them was a faunus he decided to put on a smile to make them feel more at ease. This must of worked as one of them stepped forward and looked up at him, he was quite a short guy about five-foot-fiveish compared to Jaune's six foot one inch frame, however the muscle that was compacted onto this man was incredibly intimidating, 'he probably has the same amount as I do, and he had to work for it' thought Jaune.

"Thanks for the early release, who are you?" he asked with a very gruff voice, the kind you hear after seeing someone smoke a million cigarettes. Staring at Jaune with a little bit of admiration and apprehension.

Jaune could understand both of those reactions since he had dealt with the guards very quickly and with an alarming amount of force, as well as the amour that Summer had given him made him look like a knight, well the top half of a knight. He had the chest piece, shoulder pieces and the gauntlets, but no helmet or greaves.

"My name is Jaune; I'm here to get you guys out"

"I thought we would be counted as 'acceptable casualties' of this marvellous war" scoffed the short guy, with more sarcasm and snark than Jaune thought possible for one man to produce.

"There is no such thing" says Jaune passionately

"Glad someone cares enough, the names Tuckson and I assume you have a plan on how to get us out captain?"

"I'm not actually a captain" said Jaune sheepishly rubbing the back of his neck, to which Tuckson shrugged like he couldn't care less about Jaune's rank.

"However I do have a plan: we riot."

"Is that it?"

"Yeah I'm serious. I doubt that you guys are the only prisoners locked up here in this place, so go and find others, try to be quiet about it. Grab as many weapons as possible and then head down to the loading docks, I think I saw some tanks down there, and make some noise."

"Okay, I think we can handle that, where will you be during all this cap'n?"

"I'm going to find a friend, an actual captain named Ozpin."

"They have interrogation rooms on the highest floor maybe to break the cliché of evil basements, but the doctor would take people up there and interrogate them for hours."

Jaune shuddered at the thought of what Ozpin might have been subjected to, but then steeled himself, he had to be strong, overcome fear.

"Okay, I'll head up and grab him and anything that might be useful and meet you guys in the loading docks when you start making some noise. Free anyone and arm up, GO!" Jaune then started heading back to the door he came through when he heard Tuckson say

"You heard the captain, let's get going"

"I'm not a captain" muttered Jaune before he disappeared through the door.

"Hey tricky! You reckon that he actually had a plan or did he just make it up on the spot?" asks one of the other faunus, directing the question at Tuckson.

"I have no idea bub." Replied Tuckson "And stop calling me tricky!"

"The name fits, we all saw you walk out of that mortar blast like it was nothing, you're a tricky guy to kill, besides its alliteration." Said another prisoner, while several behind him murmured there agreement.

"Grr, just shut up and follow me" growled Tuckson marching off in the same direction that Jaune had disappeared, with the rest of the prisoners following him in search of their comrades and weapons to help them escape.

Meanwhile Jaune had managed to make his way up 4 flights of stairs surprisingly quickly, now that he came to think about it, he had managed to run all the way through the forest with a lot of speed and without getting out of breath by the time he grabbed the truck, it seems that the new enhancements were working wonders on him. If he did run out of breath on the way up to the stairs it would be very an embarrassing rescue' he thought to himself smiling slightly despite his current location of a war prison.

As Jaune reached the very top of the building, he could tell this because there were no more stairs leading anywhere, he cautiously exited the stairwell and found himself in the interrogation room, no hallway leading down to it, no locked door, just the room itself, to further add to the odd design there was a massive skylight on the ceiling basking the room in the glow of the moon and right in the middle of the room lying half naked on a table that he was strapped to, and looking beaten beyond words, was captain Ozpin. Jaune quickly rushed forward upon seeing his friend in such pain and then ripped off his bindings and tried to wake him up as quickly as possible.

"Captain? Captain? Ozpin? Ozpin can you hear me? It's me Jaune Arc, I'm here to rescue you" Now Jaune knew that you shouldn't believe everything that you read in books or hear over the radio, but that being said he was still desperate enough to try and it probably wouldn't hurt if he did it gently anyway, so he slapped Ozpin around the face and then poured some water from his hip flask on to his face as well to try and wake him, and it managed to work.

*coughcoughcough*"wha-? Where am I? Where's my shirt? Where are my men?" asks Ozpin getting progressively more desperate with each passing question, and his eyes were darting all over the room before settling on the far wall and then focusing on Jaune.

"Captain it's me Jaune"

"Aren't you a little tall to be Jaune?"

"The experiment worked and it gave me a little growth spurt, but that's not important, captain you are in some kind of war prison called Haven, I have already managed to free some of the other prisoners and I told them-" Jaune began to explain before he was promptly cut off by something very noisy and extremely distracting.

KABOOOM!

'I guess I did tell them to make it loud' thought Jaune smiling to himself.

"That your doing?" asked Ozpin turning to Jaune with a deadpan look.

"Kind of, but it is the signal that we need to move" Jaune said urgently lifting Ozpin to his feet and letting him lean against him for support.

"Not without him I don't think" groaned out Ozpin at the sudden movement as he clutched his stomach, his face contorting in agony.

"Who?" questioned a very puzzled Jaune, who was quite certain at this point that Ozpin was probably delirious from the physical and maybe even psychological torture.

"He's talking about me" came a deep, rumbling voice from the shadows. Jaune did not scream, he just let out a pre-emptive battle cry. "He doesn't want to leave without me, because he knows what we go through here."

Feeling a bit disturbed by the sudden disembodied voice coming from the dark side of the room, Jaune decided to step closer to the source, pulling Ozpin alongside him since he was unable to stand on his own and Jaune would be reluctant to leave his side under any circumstances. After letting his eyes adjust to the darkness, Jaune took a good look at the person who had been held captive alongside Ozpin, and who he saw both shocked him and scared him a little bit. Since the transformation Jaune had grown, standing now at a relatively tall height and he had also filled out with a lot of muscle. This man in front of him made him look tiny; he made him look like he did before the transformation, Jaune felt like he was back at the camp looking up at Winchester for the first time when he saw this man. He truly was a monster and Jaune wondered how he had managed to be captured and who had managed to capture him, so they could avoid them on the way out.

The man was hanging from the wall by his wrists from thin metal cuffs that were drilled into the wall, completely shirtless and has several cuts across his torso. His hair was long and shaggy, and his beard looked scruffy and untrimmed as though he had been here for quite a while. He looked like he had been through more pain than Jaune could ever imagine, yet the fire in the man's eyes burned bright and screamed 'I'm not done here yet'.

It was at this point that Jaune decided to make a friend, because after all strangers were just friends that you haven't met yet.

"Hi, I'm Jaune Arc, I've come to rescue Ozpin and anyone else who is a prisoner here" said Jaune placing Ozpin gently on the floor and then moving over to one of the bindings on the man's arms to start freeing him. He started by moving towards the captive's right arm and took the cuff in both of his hands and then pulled it seeing if it was as strong as he thought it was. Surprisingly Jaune managed to pull the metal completely apart and cause it to snap in half, Jaune then turned to the other cuff and repeated the process, and was still surprised that the second cuff also snapped in two. Now free from the cuffs the man's arms fell to his sides and he almost collapsed to the floor but caught himself and ended up on his knees. The captive then tilted his head up slightly and looked right in to Jaunes eyes, and then locked on the hand that he held out to help him up. After a couple of seconds where Jaune started to feel a bit awkward with the hulk of a man gazing straight in to his soul, he final took Jaunes hand and raised himself to his feet. 'To break those chains, he must be strong, stronger than me.' thought the hulk of a man, 'That earns my respect'.

"Thank you, human. Most of your kind would have left me chained to the wall."

"Those who shout the loudest are not always right. My dad told me that, said he learnt it from somewhere that I can't remember right now."

"Your father was clearly an intelligent man. And it is good to know you follow in his footsteps. My name is Ghira" says the gentle giant bowing slightly at Jaune.

"Nice to meet you Ghira, now what do you say we-" start Jaune before another massive explosion rocked the building, the sounds of gunfire now more pronounced than ever.

"My sentiments exactly Jaune Arc" replied Ghira already pre-empting what Jaune was going to say, he then moved over to Captain Ozpin and picked him up and held him comfortably in a bridal style and made towards the door to the stairwell. Stunned for a second by Ghiras strength, but then remembering that he is a big guy Jaune follows after the two quickly.

As they make their way down the first flight of stairs, they hear the sounds of footsteps heading up towards them and the shouts of several guards asking what is going on and how the prisoners escaped and if the king is loose. Before any of the enemies made it in to sight Ghira placed captain Ozpin on the stairs and then cracked his knuckles, rotated his shoulders and shock his head before letting out a quite growl that steadily grew louder. The moment the first guard rounded the corner Jaune barely made it two steps before Ghira shot past him and shoulder barged the man, sending him flying in to the walk making it crack under the force. The second guard tripped on the stairs and let out a cry of surprise, which turned in to a chock as Ghira picked him up the throat and was about to throw him down the gap in the stairwell where he would hit the bottom and surely die, when Jaune managed to catch the guard and then hold him by his arm before pulling him up over the railing and punching him around the face to knock him out. The third guard managed to activate her weapon, which turned out to be a club with electricity sparking from the end of it, she then swung in a horizontal arc at Ghira, who caught her hand and then turned the club back towards her and began to electrocute her with her own weapon and might have killed her if Jaune hadn't stepped in and pulled the weapon away from her and pushed Ghira away from the unconscious guard.

"Why did you stop me?" growls Ghira with unconstrained furry glaring at Jaune, in a way that would make lesser men flee from him in terror. Jaune was not one of those men.

"Because they are not worth it." Says Jaune shakily; looking back at Ghira with uncertain eyes. They then stare at each other for a beat and Ghira sees the determination in the man in front of him and he remembers that he owes him for setting him free.

"Fine, if you do not wish for me to bring them justice. Then I shall not. But I am only doing this because you freed me, and this is as far as my loyalty shall go." Says Ghira before leaping over Jaune and tackling the forth guard that had just appeared and then breaking his arm. Jaune let out a breath he did not realise he had been holding in and then headed straight after Ghira to help him clear out any more guards so that they would not be attacked when carrying captain Ozpin outside and risk putting him in danger.

As two more guards came up towards them, one shouted out stop confidently and then caught sight of Ghira lunging at him and it turned in to a scream as he was tackled and sent crashing in to the wall with Ghira holding him up by his chest. The second tried to punch Ghira but the moment her hand connected with his back all it did was cause her hand to crumple and her to real back in shock before Ghira delivered a powerful uppercut and made her perform an unwilling back-flip. Jaune came to a halt at the bottom of the stairs and stood in awe, it seemed he was useless in this escape, so he quickly made his way back up to grab captain Ozpin and then went back down to the bottom of the stairs where Ghira was standing ready at the door that would lead them back out in to the hanger that Jaune had come through. Just as Jaune was about to kick it open a hand grabbed the back of his shirt and he was flung back across the hallway with captain Ozpin, leaving Ghira stood alone at the door.

Jaune hit the floor hard and made sure that captain Ozpin was on top of him and the he would not take any of the damage. After stopping himself, Jaune sat captain Ozpin against the wall and ran back to where Ghira and the other man were fighting. As Jaune approached them it was clear to see the Ghira was outmatched, he might have been a fast man, but the new comer was catching every punch that was thrown his way and managing to strike hard enough to cause Ghira to be lifted off the floor and when he missed he was leaving dents in the door and the walls.

'The door!' thought Jaune 'If I can get him in front of the door then I can tackle him through it and we can escape in the carnage outside'

"Get him in front of the door!" Jaune shouts as he sprints towards them at full pelt. Ghira looks over and sees what he wants to do and smirks slightly and directs the fight back over to the door. Just before Jaune reaches the duo Ghira leaps away and runs towards captain Ozpin and Jaune manages to shoulder check the man and together they crash into the door breaking it off of its hinges and snapping it in half, resulting in the two of them being sent skidding in to the middle of a war-zone.

As the two of them get up and face each other Jaune takes in his opponents appearance; he is tall, taller than Jaunes current height, with a slender build. His hair is slicked back and his moustache is neatly styled and trimmed. However what drew Jaune in were the man's eyes; they were full of rage and pure evil, just looking sent a shiver down Jaunes spine, but that's not all he looked very familiar which also unnerved Jaune.

"A boy. This is what passes for Vales military. This will be even easier than I previously anticipated." Says the man with a deep rich voice, that sounded like he was used to delivering great speeches about commanding people and other important things like that.

"Maybe but for now you might want to duck" says Jaune as the evil moustache man gets hit with the other half of the door making him sprawl on the floor. Jaune looks to where Ghira is now stood with captain Ozpin over his shoulder and together they make a run for one of the trucks that some of the prisoners were standing around taking shots at the guards that attempted to get close or to try and kill them. Jaune was quick to spot Tuckson standing at the top of a nearby tank, what was strange was that Tuckson was waving at him, so Jaune decided to wave back.

"BEHIND YOU CAP'N!" yelled Tuckson over the sound of the bullets and the occasional missile or rocket that flew through the air.

Turning around as fast as Jaune could he saw an object hurtling towards him that he managed to dive over in the nick of time as it managed to scrape his foot, he then landed in a roll and stood to his feet and was promptly punched in the face causing him to back pedal and bring his hands up in hopes of defending himself from the next attack. Jaune then successfully managed to duck the next punch and shove the assailant away from him giving Jaune space to throw his own punch that hit the man around the face. They then stood there facing each other.

"I actually felt that one boy. Am I right in saying that you were subjected to my dear brothers so called 'super solider serum'?"

"You-u, Your-r-r professor Watts' brother?" stammered Jaune, now he could see it, they were so alike, but they couldn't be any different if they tried. It was all in their eyes, they were worlds apart and that brought Jaune a little comfort knowing that this was not the same man as his friend.

"Indeed I am. I can tell from the way that you move, as well as the force from the impact when you took me though the door that my dear brother shared our little secret formula with you." Says Watts standing with his hands behind his back and head tilted to the side. Completely calm and casual despite the battle raging around the two of them and Jaune stood with his fists raised in the air.

"From what Dr Watts says it was more his formula than your's, and you stole it from him. He gave it to me." Says Jaune

"And yet I am quite obviously the most successful experiment that he had ever created because of his serum, you do not appear to be anything special." Says the man

"Say's every girl I've ever talked to" replies Jaune before bullets riddle the floor in front of the man forcing him to jump away. Jaune looked around and saw captain Ozpin weakly holding a machine gun aimed at the area where Watts used to be. Jaune then took this opening and made a dash towards the nearest vehicle that the prisoners had managed to steal and dived on the back of it just as they started to pull away.

Gripping on as tight as he could Jaune climbed up so that he was now ridding in the back of the truck with several other prisoners, among them in the back of the truck was Tuckson and they were soon heading down a dirt track that was going through the woods. Then a terrifying howl pierced the night air sending shivers down the back of every man and woman in the convoy of vehicles.

Beowulfs burst out of the woods and started chasing after the trucks, some cut away and headed up towards Haven, but the majority seemed to be drawn towards the trucks.

"Next time I'm getting on the first truck" growled Tuckson as he cocked his gun and aimed it down at the approaching Grimm. "GIVE EM HELL GUYS!" he shouts as he opens fire on the following hoard managing to take out several of the Grimm, soon everyone in the back truck is shooting at the Grimm keeping them at bay for now. However good things rarely last and the Grimm started to realise that they were not going to be able to do a straight up assault so they started to try and climb up the side of the truck to get to the tasty people in the truck.

The first Grimm that managed to leap up and climb up the side almost took a swipe at one of the more injured prisoners and they were consequently unable to defend themselves and would have been killed had Jaune not jumped forward and punched them as hard as he could with his metal gauntlet which made a massive dent in the side of the Beowulfs head, completely caving it in and making them shoot away from the truck, dead as a doorknob, and fall in the path of another Beowulf and tackle it taking out two for the price of one. Jaune was then quick to turn around as fast as he could and threw a left uppercut at the Grimm that had climbed up the other side causing its head to snap back and make the Grimm fly off the side and fall in to the path of another Grimm. Jaune turns to see how everyone else is doing and notices a Grimm fall away from Tuckson with three horizontal holes in their chest and black smoke coming from all of them.

"Damm captain where did you learn how to do that?" asks one of the fellow prisoners everyone turns to Jaune slightly distracted he is the only one to notice the Beowulf leap from the hoard and land at the back of the truck and swipe at Tucksons back. However before he can connect the strike Jaune moves forward and pulls Tuckson away before performing a powerful front kick which send the Beowulf hurtling over the edge of the truck breaking its back in the process and also bending the back edge of the truck.

"I'll cover the sides, everyone else needs to focus on the rear, the more of them you shoot the easier time the other trucks are going to have, currently they have not had to deal with and Grimm and I would like to keep it that way, so let's do this, for us and for them!" commanded Jaune with a stern authoritative voice. 'I really hope I sounded confident out loud because I thought I sounded a bit like an idiot' thought Jaune privately.

The rest of the ride went as smoothly as it could with Grimm trying to kill you every second. Jaune was moving from side to side in the truck punching and kicking Grimm as hard as he could, sometimes he would grab a gun from one of the others in the truck and use it to shoot some of the Beowulfs in the trees but after doing that a couple of times Jaune realised that guns really are not his thing, so he decided to stick to his fists and a metal pole he had found in the back of the truck. Soon the hoard began to thin out, however this turned out to be the start of an even bigger and even deadlier challenge, something that was going to take all of them to overcome.

---

Chapter 6: Captain? – Jaunes POV

"I am sad to report that Mr Jaune Arc is confirmed to be missing in action. The end" Said general Philips as his assistant finished typing up the transcript.

"Who should I have the letter sent to sir?" asked the assistant. "He didn't list any family in his enlistment form nor did he list any contact at all other than professor Watts."

The general frowned and then let out an audible sigh "Why don't we give the letter to STRQ industries, they can each frame it and hang it on their wall to see the achievement that they have managed; send a government funded asset that cost more than I will earn in 10 life times to his certain death. Which is absolute genius! Because we can always make more! Oh wait, no we can't! Because the only person who knew anything about the formula is dead, and the test subject is either dead or in enemy hands!"

Then general took a sip of whiskey from his desk and noted that the noise outside his ten had increased a lot, and then turned to address the four people that were stood in front of him, trying their best to look composed, and not let their fear and unease show.

"You four are severely lucky, if we did not require your services then you would all be court marshalled for disobeying orders, stealing property and unauthorised take off in a military zone. As it happens we need you so none of that is taken in to account, but I hope you can live knowing the death of this young man is on your heads."

Qrow opened and closed his mouth but no sound came out, for once he didn't have a sarcastic remark for the general. Tai stayed still looking at the ground unable to meet the eyes of anyone in the room. Summer was trying her hardest not to cry. Raven on the other hand was craning her neck to try and see the commotion that was happening outside of the tent.

"I'm sorry Branwen am I straining your attention? Do you have something better to be doing at this time? AND WHAT IS ALL THAT NOISE ABOUT OUTSIDE!?"

"That is what I was trying to work out before you started shouting General. I believe it would be in the best interest to go and see for ourselves." The moment the words are out of her mouth the general bursts through the tent flaps and marches out into the middle of the camp with STRQ hot on his heels. What they then saw was a parade of people marching towards the camp with a tank and several trucks mixed in with the mass of people heading towards them, and leading the group at the front still dressed in his amour was Jaune. There were close to three hundred men and women that were coming in, most of them were armed with strange looking guns and others had the more traditional rifles, some were sat on the side of some of the tanks and it would appear that the trucks were reserved for the more injured of the group. This meant that there were a lot of injured as they had five trucks in total with two tanks. All being lead by Jaune Arc, with captain Ozpin following closely on his right hand side.

The closer he got the more you could see the sheepish smile on his face and the looks of relief on all of the others faces that they could finally rest, and that they were all going to be safe among allies.

Jaune stopped right in front of the general with captain Ozpin standing to his left and they both saluted the general and then stood straight to attention.

"Some of these people require serious medical attention general." Said captain Ozpin

The general had a unreadable expression on his face at those words and after a pause then said "Take them to the tents and I want a full report from the both of you detailing everything, right down to the colour of the socks that you were wearing am I understood?"

"Yes sir" they both replied. They then turned face to face with STRQ who wore different looks on all their faces; Summer was cross, Tai was impressed, Raven was impartial, and Qrow was curious. Jaune awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck and shrunk when facing the wrath of Summer Rose, nobody thought any less of him, they had all been yelled at by her.

"Hey guys? Sorry we're late, only had twenty sailors, which isn't to bad for a boat- uh Ship sorry, but five of them were injured and as you can see there were a lot of people that got in the way, so yeah?" explained Jaune, in his own special way. Captain Ozpin looked between them with uncontrolled amusement, smiling despite everything. "But I brought some new weapons for you to play with! That's got to count for something! Right?"

"Digging deeper Jaune." muttered Qrow who was silenced quickly by Summer with a look.

"Why didn't you use the radio in the weapon Tai gave you! I told you before you jumped! this way we could come and get you, but no you had to be so brave, didn't you!" she almost yelled, but not quite. Also she was poking Jaune in the chest really hard, and he was wearing amour, how did she make it hurt? That shouldn't be possible so why could she do it.

"I... Didn't know that existed?" Said Jaune taking all the steam out of Summers attack, causing her to just keep muttering 'idiot' over and over again under her breath. He probably wasn't out of the furnace yet, but at least the temperature had been turned down, maybe?

"HEY LET'S HEAR IT FOR THE CAPTAIN!" Shouts Tuckson as all of the other men and women cheer shouting out a chant of 'CAPTAIN' over and over again. one thoing crossed Jaunes mind more than any other thought at the moment 'I don't think the General would like that I am a captain, wait I'm not even a captain, how long can this go on for?'

The answer to that was very simple, it would be going on for a while, as Jaune finished filling out his report, pleading for Summer to forgive him and begging Tai to not cry so much about his broken weapon, the latter was solved very quickly when Raven smacked him and told him she would stop dating him if he kept crying about that weapon. Once Jaune had finished his report he was to attend a meeting along with captain Ozpin to report on the events that had happened inside the prison, which should be interesting to sit through, maybe the general would give him a bit of credit, because he went in on his own and came back with three hundred more men and women who could help in the fight, as well as bringing so much of the enemies equipment and weapons that Qrow and Raven were already geeking out about the science behind the weapons and what could power them.

Now that he was standing across from the desk of the general with captain Ozpin stood by his side, looking far more dignified than he felt he was, which was a lot. While he did enjoy not being winded by walking across the camp and also being able to lift something weighing more than five kilograms, however he was still uncomfortable with his new size and height, countless times he had walked into things when he remembered being able to slip past them, or bumped his head on a low hanging pole when entering tents, he also felt really off balance when he woke up in the mornings sometimes or when he stood up from being seated for a long time, so all in all he was very unsure of how to stand.

"Against my judgement." growled the general beginning what was sure to be a hurtful speech against his actions and probably him. "The council has seen you little adventure against my orders as a sign of leadership and innovation, personally I think you were just being stupid, they believe you should be given more responsibility; as they most likely think of you as a superhero, when your not. They believe that if you lead a team of our best fighters from Vale and Vacuo, the war will be shifted in our favour and then we can start fighting the real problems, the Grimm. Which everyone has forgotten about for ten years, the morons." The general sighed and ran his hand down his face and Jaune final saw him; he was tired, he wanted this over, he had lost to many good people and it was not worth it, it never was yet he still had to lead everyone, make the hard choices and do the right thing. He was right Jaune wasn't the hero, this man was, he faced more hardships than he let on and he kept going. That was heroism, when ordinary people make them selves extraordinary.

"They want you to take a group of the best that we can scrounge up from these grunts they call soldiers. Personally I would have you sent home or confined to the lab for the rest of your days, but the powers that be know whats best don't they?" he asked rhetorically "I will grant you the opportunity to pick your teammates, but they have to be approved by me understood."

"That's not a question is it sir?" replied Jaune after thinking about it for a couple of seconds, this did cause the general smirk slightly the corner of his mouth lifting up slightly.

"No son it was not. You can leave." Jaune then turned around and walked out with captain Ozpin following him close behind, a kind smile on his face.

"One last thing Mr Arc" called the general causing Jaune to stop and turn around to face the general who was seated away from him with his back turned. "In your shoes, I would have done the same. But the longer you live this life, the more you hate it when anyone else takes your risks."

"Are you saying if he din't go general, you would have?" asked captain Ozpin who had stayed behind with Jaune when he was called.

The general didn't say anything in response to that, but Jaune heard him loud and clear. "Thank you general." he said smiling slightly as he left, heading back to the tent he used to share with the professor but now slept in on his own. When he entered he made sure to duck down extra low to avoid the hanging beam so he didn't get clothes-lined. He then spied a circular object that was resting on his bed, it was at least two and a half feet in diameter and it was covered in a black wrapped parcel paper, with a note which read 'To the CAPTAIN', immediately on his guard and suspicious, Jaune looked around he ten for any clues to who might have left this here for him. As he looked at the note he discovered it was written in extremely beautiful cursive writing, meaning that the person was very elegant. Seeing no other clues Jaune very carefully pulled off the wrapping to discover that the object was actually a white shield and despite its size and being made of what looked to be a kind of metal, it was very light and hummed when ever he moved it, as though it was feeding off of the movement through the air. There was also a note attached to the front of the shield in the same style of hand writing and it said 'You wish to protect those you fight for and even those you fight against, that is the mark of a good man. This should do the job, trust me it won't fail you captain.' Finding straps on the inside of the shield he placed it on his left arm and suddenly he felt a lot more balanced than when he had since he had left the pod, just then a knife flew through the flaps of the tent and stabbed right into the ground, attached to it was another note that Jaune hesitantly plucked off the knife 'I knew it would suit you captain', this prompted Jaune to look out of the front of his tent and saw a man standing on the top of the watch tower in the middle of the camp, he was dressed completely in black making it impossible to see him if you didn't know where to look, but Jaune knew that the angle of the knife meant that he was somewhere up very far. Trigonometry was always an easy subject in maths, and while he was terrible at the rest of it he was still very good at that, as well as art and music. The man then bowed towards Jaune and leapt away into the darkness, and Jaune wondered if he would ever see someone like that ever again, before he fell asleep and dreamt of a team of remnants mightiest heroes, fighting the good fight.

The next day Jaune was walking around the camp looking for people who he thought would make excellent members of the team, his first stop was naturally captain Ozpin, the group would need a leader after all, and captain Ozpin was a very well respected member of the army, so he sought him out in the medical tent as he was technically still recovering from the torture.

"So captain, I was hoping that after the generals conversation yesterday I could count on you for the spot of team leader?"

Captain Ozpin smiled and his eyes twinkled with mischief, before he said "But surely if you are picking the members then you would be leading the team CAPTAIN?"

"Well when you put it like that..." said Jaune before trailing off as Ozpin chuckled "I guess I would be leading the team."

The next stop on the list would be Tuckson, the man was able to rally the prisoners in to a riot which made sure that so many of them managed to escape and gain their freedom, he himself had escaped uninjured and had taken to putting a lot of cocky soldiers who had disrespected the faunus in the camp, in there place in the arena, sometimes taking on four people at once, which was an impressive feat for someone of his size.

"So Tuckson as you might have heard I have been tasked with putting together a team to take down high profile targets in a very loud way. Are you in?"

Tuckson grunted in response and nodded his head slightly before taking a puff of his cigar, Jaune smiled and then started to walk away, before he turned back there was one question on his mind and it had been ever since he had met Tuckson.

"So is Tuckson your first name or your second name?"

"...Yes"

"What?!"

"What?"

Later in his tent Jaune was sitting their reading his books on tactics and strategy when Tai suddenly came bursting through the flaps, shocking Jaune and he demanded to be interviewed for the position on the team that he was putting together.

"Tai you don't need to audition or be interviewed and no; you don't need to kiss me, you and the others were already going to be on the team." said Jaune looking very confused "I spoke to Summer earlier."

"But the wizard and sideburns got an interview and I wanted to see if you would pick me faster than Qrow." Jaune face-palmed in response to that statement.

Even later that day Jaune found himself stood in front of the general as he read through the list of people that he requested to join his team of misfits, however they might have been misfits else where but maybe they could fit together here. The general had finished reading the list and placed it down on his desk before taking a deep breath and staring deeply at Jaune.

"So this is it, the team to save the world; A science experiment, a short faunus, a thirty year old who uses a cane sometimes, a scatterbrain inventor, self proclaimed gods gift to women, a wannabe alcoholic and Raven."

"Nothing bad to say about Raven sir?" asked Jaune shakily releasing a breath he didn't know he was holding

"She scares me, and I like my head on my shoulders. But you are missing the point Mr Arc, these people you have chosen, everyone will be counting on them and they don't even know it. If you succeed, you may be forgotten."

"They can forget who I am, but they won't forget why we are fighting."

"I wish you were easier to hate Arc. Here is the first mission, I don't doubt you will find more but for now, prove the professor right."

And that's just what Jaune had planned to do, even now as he stood in the forest just outside of a research lab in a village called Shion, listening in on the discussion of the four guards that were stood outside one of the doors. Proving that the intelligence was well founded. The village in its self was actually a very nice place, they were kind to point out directions to Tuckson who had originally been born in Mistral and still kept the accent, when asked where he had been born and when by Tai, he had kept silent and said it was a while ago and that he hadn't had a birthday for a long time, he then asked Tai if he could drop it to which did so while saying sorry for probably bringing up bad memories the rest of the trip was done in silence until now, as Jaune was just waiting for the right moment to make a move.

"Ares says this guy threw a car at someone, how the hell did they get someone that strong?"

"Ares is talking shit, intel says it was a bike, and he only took out seven of our guys."

"Yeah all at once, and he was throwing that shield around like a Frisbee, what the heck is that about?"

"Don't know man, things are getting weird now-whats next? A space warrior chick? An archer? Could you imagine that, fighting with a bow and arrow? how stupid do you-" what ever that thought he had was cut off the moment Jaune got the signal from Tai that the cameras had been shut down and he launched his shield straight at the current man's chest smacking him to the ground and knocking the breath out of him. The shield rebounded and headed straight up in to the air where Jaune had jumped, catching the shield and bringing it down in a hammer strike across another guards head knocking him out as he fell completely limp at Jaunes feet when he landed. Gaining his footing he front and steadying himself he front kicked the third guard against the wall of the research facility making him bang his head on the door effectively dazing the guard and then he punched him cracking the helmet and knocking him out along with the rest, the last guard pulled out his gun but Jaune was quick and grabbed it and ripped the gun out of his hands and striking him with his shield on the bridge of his nose cracking the mask and making the last fall unconscious. Jaune did notice that the first guard that he had tried to take out was still moaning on the ground, when Tuckson came over and picked him up as Qrow raced over to the wall where the door was and pulled a panel off of it and began to rewire the system to let them in. Tuckson then let punched the guard knocking him out with the rest.

"He says it is a large room, with two guards on each catwalk overlooking the construction of the weapon." relaid Tuckson to Jaune

"Super, captain Ozpin, Raven you guys get that? Cough twice for yes."

"Cough cough" came Ravens sarcastic drawl

"Okay I guess you are not surrounded as I thought, entering now. Be ready Summer."

Qrow stepped away from the door and Tai came up and handed Jaune a flash bang grenade, and Tuckson and Qrow pulled the door open completely and thats when Jaune threw it in to the air and it exploded, blinding and dazing everyone that was facing inwards. Everyone but his team mates which acted in the confusion by taking down their targets simultaneously. Captain Ozpin or Oz as he liked to be called by everyone now, although Jaune seemed incapable of calling him be anything less than his full title, moved in on the other person who was on the catwalk with him and smacked him around the head with the butt of his weapon and slamming his face against the railing, making him the only member still able to speak on his catwalk. Raven had also a person to deal with on her catwalk but she just grabbed him and threw him off the catwalk and made him land on one of the scientist that was below, taking down two for the price of one.

Tuckson entered the door first and lunged at a a man standing by the door who turned his gun and blind fired at all over where Tuckson was, however from the looks of it when Jaune entered blocking a hail of bullets that came his way from a man on the other side of the door Tuckson had managed to get missed by every single bullet. Quickly dispatching the firing Guard Jaune quickly spotted Summer who ran over to join them nodding to say her task was completed, captain Ozpin and Raven had managed to shoot down several guard that had entered at the opposite end of the catwalk and Tai and Qrow had both shot two more guards as they came in behind the two teammates up high on the catwalk. With all the guards dispatched, Raven and captain Ozpin descended the ladder and ran towards the group along with Summer and they all left the facility, retreating to the forest, three more guards made to block their exit only to have Tuckson lunge at them, one managed to get a shot off with his shotgun, but it must have been a wider spread because he missed Tuckson even at point blank range, evident by Tuckson stabbing them all with his knifes killing them. Jaune didn't like it when his team killed people and they said they didn't like it either, he made the choice to not kill anyone as he didn't want to go down that path, Tuckson respected him for it but said he couldn't come back, not when the alternative was losing more people he cared about. Jaune could understand where he was coming from, but he couldn't look when it happened.

"Someones lucky" said Qrow gesturing at Tuckson

"It ain't luck kid" he replies taking Qrows flask once they were under the canopy of trees and took a swig and spat it back out "You ever gonna put whiskey in this thing instead of water?"

"Alright Raven I believe its your turn, light it up" says Jaune while Qrow and Tuckson bicker. Summer held out the device to Raven giving her a little wink to which Raven rolled her eyes at, she truly didn't see the point of this turn thing they had going on, but she still flicked the switch causing the facility and all of the tanks that they were building to explode in a massive boom.

KABOOOOM!

'Okay that was quite cool, can't wait for my turn again.'

"Nice job Rae-Rae"

"TAI!"

"Sorry!" said Tai before quietly saying "mama." Raven then punched him, even if she did love the nickname, and was smiling while she hit her boyfriend.

---

Chapter 7: The First Hunter - Jaune's POV

Two months had past by and Jaune and his team had alternated between fighting on the front lines of the war, where Jaune had made himself known to the enemy and more importantly to all of their Allies, and they had also managed to cripple the forces of Mantle that were in-bedded in Mistral in devastating ways, as well as capture high ranking Mistral Targets, take-down multiple Mantle research bases and Mistral training facilities. They had managed to find out a lot about their enemies tactics and the weapons that they used in battle, and because of that information they had been very successful in almost every single battle for the last two months. They had recently gained information of another base that was up in the mountains and it was said to be highly fortified and contain all of the Deathstalkers and their leaders, and it might even be where Dr Watts was hiding. Since the assassin Mercury Black had murdered professor Watts, Jaune had worked out that his brother the Doctor had ordered the murder and Jaune had slowly grown to hate the man, but he also pitied him, he didn't understand how someone could have so much hate for their own brother.

Before he went to head out and gather the other members of his team and head off to the castle, the general caught up to Jaune. Ever since the first mission and managing to return so many men and women back to their families the general had started to warm up to him; Jaune actually got the general to say hello to him once, it was dark and there were a lot of people around him, and the general was also holding a slice of pizza, while on the phone to his wife and kids. Okay there was a chance he wasn't talking to Jaune but it was only a small chance. Back to the main point; the general caught up with Jaune to tell him about a possible peace treaty on the Vytal Island, right where the war had started. He had learned from one of the many members that they had captured that the forces of Mistral and Mantle had left the Deathstalkers group to fend for themselves and were planing on dealing with them as soon as the war was over, due to Doctor Watts and his extremist views and experimentation on both humans and faunus. They didn't appear to know of Doctor Watts true motive and only thought of him as a glorified scientist who had gone mad, but from interrogating several of the Deathstalker higher ranking members, those who did not kill themselves, the general was able to find out that Watts planned to kill everyone on the island and he almost had the power to do it. So with this new information as well as a new drive to stop the evil Doctor, Jaune hastily set out to gather his team, for one final mission together.

Qrow set down the plane in the area that Raven had marked out on the map and the group took to walking the rest of the way to the castle that they had spotted in the distance. Tai took the lead and was busy fiddling with his device that could take out the communication between the Deathstalkers, this would give the team an advantage as they would most likely be unable to retaliate as effectively. As they took cover behind the entrance gate they saw that the draw bridge was down, and judging from the heavy chains it would be difficult to raise so they would have plenty of time to make it through if they decided to close it up upon spoting the intruders. Summer did manage to spot several guards through the scope of her rifle that were outside the draw bridge, she believed that she could take out two of them before the others could react, captain Ozpin then said that he could take out the other two with his rifle once the signal could be given.

"I'd hurry up, cap'n, looks like we got company." Said Qrow as he pointed at four trucks heading along the dirt track road straight for the castle and towards where they were hiding. Jaune gave a nod "Do it." and they fired taking out the four guards in an impressive display of accuracy. The team then charged up the track to the draw bridge and Tai activated his device shutting off the radio frequency that the Deathstalkers used, as well as taking out their cameras making them deaf and blind. Qrow and Raven ran to raise the draw bridge as the trucks pulled up and several men in heavy Deathstalker amour got out and started charging towards them, wielding swords, guns and shock sticks, that last one was a new weapon that Jaune really did not like, his shield was made of metal and no matter how much force it could take, it still conducted electricity. Luckily Tai had taken the chance to supply him with a better hand hold on the inner of the shield so that now he didn't get shocked by anything touching his shield.

Tuckson observed the amount of men that were running towards the group and turned to his team.

"I'll hold them off and any other re-enforcement's, you guys blow this place to hell and I'll see you back at the plane." and he turned to walk off the drawbridge, but Jaune stopped him.

"Don't give me that look cap'n, first rounds on you when we get back ya hear?"

"Seconds on you then."

"Ha, like I got the lien for that, Qrow's got second." and with that said Tuckson headed off the end of the drawbridge and Raven and Qrow raised it up by activating the mechanism's at the same time, locking out the enemy and their friend.

"You guys aren't getting in there, cause I'm the best there is at this, and right now this isn't going to be very nice."

SHINK

After that they moved through the rest of the castle reliing on the map reading skills of captain Ozpin which had yet to lead them wrong, when Jaune had tried it the north of the compass had kept changing direction, most of the time it pointed to Mistral which was not north, and most recently the compass would spin around like mad going everywhere. They were cut of when a hail of bullets and bright lights came their way, Jaune used his shield to deflect the bolts of blue light and block the bullets from attacking his team, for some reason the blue energy would destroy anything it came into contact with but not his shield, and Jaune was not one to look a gift horse in the mouth or was it eye? Meanwhile the rest of his team dived behind the cover of the pillars and began shooting back at the Deathstalkers that were advancing down the large corridor.

"Captain, you and Ozpin go on ahead, we'll take care of these guys." yelled Summer over the storm of bullets flying through the air, hearing the yell of her friend Raven chucked the explosives to captain Ozpin and Tai patted Jaune on the back as a sign of good luck.

"Hold them off or take them down in Ten minutes and if I'm not back-" shouted Jaune

"Wait another Ten minutes?" guessed Qrow throwing a grenade at three guys trying to flank them and blowing them up.

"No you leave!" cried Jaune as he stepped out from behind his cover of the pillar and leading captain Ozpin through a side room that he had pointed out but was unable to take the lead as he didn't have an indestructible shield to guard him. As they head in deeper Jaune notices that the hallways become less and less cobblestone and more and more white and shiny like a hospital, or a secret laboratory. Peering through the doors at the end Jaune spies several men in lab coats fiddling with all manor of machines that he was sure STRQ could name, however he was stumped. The 'scientist' if you could call them that were walking from cage to cage and injecting the Grimm they had there with different coloured liquids, some were being given the coloured substance as food and others had it given to them as a gas, filtered in to the cages somehow for the Grimm to breathe in. The red colour made one Grimm burst in to flames for a minute before it disappeared into smoke, the blue colour made one start crackling with electricity, and it jumped around its cage as much as it could before collapsing and turning into smoke like the first. Just from watching those two Jaune and captain Ozpin could guess exactly what they were hoping to achieve in this lab.

"Whats the plan captain?" asked captain Ozpin

"I go in first, distract them, you plant the bombs where you see fit, its a big lab and if those vials have different elements in them as well as dust, this place will go up faster than me beating Raven at chess."

"She probably heard you." to which Jaune shivered, yes she had, he could just tell. Seven sisters did that to a guy.

"Time to make an entrance." Jaune muttered before he kicked the door open as hard as he could, effectively knocking it off of its hinges and sending it flying across the room in to one of the cages. luckily they were extremely tough and didn't shatter from the force of a door hitting them.

"So anybody want to tell me where I could get one of those?"

The scientist all charged at Jaune; who sighed, time to get to work. He started with a quick and fast shield bash to the first man, using most of his left side and pushing off with his right, this sent the man sprawling and knocked his head against a computer thingy, the nest two lunged at him together Jaune used his shield to force one of the men to fly up and over him in to someone sneaking up behind him and grabbed the other guy with his right hand before swinging him into the wall, that mean three more down, with four in total, only eight more. The next few moments is over and done very quickly with the remaining 'scientist' being incapacitated rather quickly, one of them spots captain Ozpin placing a bomb and tries to inject him with some green coloured liquid but Jaune throws his shield and sweeps the man off of his feet, and then catches it as it returns to him and smacks it across the face of the last 'scientist', leaving Jaune stood in the middle of fourteen injured but still alive mad scientists.

"That was cathartic." he says to himself, just as he turned to check on captain Ozpin, Jaune was struck around the face by a very hard metal object, that sent him reeling away in pain, with his back now to the source of his discomfort he was struck again this time in the middle of his back knocking him off his feet in to the ground face first. Groaning as he got up, Jaune heard the unmistakable sound of metal clinking against the floor, and he guessed who it could be, but he still turned around to look the person in the eyes, despite how much he didn't want to.

"Mercury Black." Jaune said, raising himself up to his full height and adjusting his shield on his left arm, this fight was going to hurt and be very time consuming.

"SURPRISE! It's good to see you again Arc. Or should I use the name everyone's taken to give you these days..." said Mercury gleefully "Captain Vale. If you ask me its a stupid name, however it does make you quite patriotic, and you're all about patriotism and freedom aren't you Captain Vale?"

Mercury didn't even wait for Jaune to make some clever retort or spark up a conversation with him, he had a job to do and this was personal. He hated blonds. Redheads he could get behind, and often did, and Brunettes he liked, and if he ever met someone with Green hair he was certain he would love it, but that was just a fantasy.

Moving back to the fight, Mercury launched himself at Jaune with a double legged drop kick aiming to knock him off balance again and make it easier for Mercury to finish off a ground opponent, however his boots only connected with the shield resulting in a heavy metallic clang. Knowing that 'Captain Vale' had managed to block his attack Mercury turned the drop kick into a back-flip like he had done so many times before, but before his feet could touch the floor Arc struck back with a right front kick from the back leg, following up by shoving the edge of his shield at the area where he had just kicked right in the stomach, he then raised it up smacking him in the chin and tilting his head back dazing Mercury and final punched as hard as he could with his right hand striking the area just bellow the sternum winding Mercury slightly as he flew back and skidded along the floor of the laboratory.

"You did that move back when we first fought, fool me once; shame on me, fool me twice; shame on you." Said 'Captain Vale' who looked a little sheepish after he had finished that saying, as though he realised, how stupid he actually sounded. "Orm I sounded like my dad, I guess there are worse things."

That lit a fire in Mercury, being just like his father was something that he never wanted to be, yet this man liked the idea of being like his father, and that wasn't something that Mercury liked at all and so he growled alerting the daddies boy to his presence. Sensing that 'Captain Vale' would now know that attack wasn't enough to take him out of the fight, Mercury raised his legs blocking the shield throw that he instinctively knew was coming, and from watching his performance in the other bases and facilities that he had fought the Deathstalker he knew the shield would most likely return to its owner, so he used his other leg to hold it in place against him depriving the 'super solider' of his defence.

"Opps!" said Mercury flipping back up on to his feet and striking with a low left round house that connected with Arc's right shin, affecting his balance and subconsciously making his eyes dart away from Mercury's to look down at his left feet. This was planed as when he pulled his foot back he utilised another roundhouse kick this time from his right side and to the ribs, catching 'Captain Vale' and making him shift his guard up a little higher which wasn't good as it was evident he was strong enough without his shield to block a kick from the Master Assassin, so Mercury adapted and still balancing on his left leg struck down low with his right to 'Captain Vale's' other shin making him drop his guard for a fraction of a moment, but when you are as fast as Mercury, a moment is all you need. His right leg almost acted by it's self, and Mercury had done this move so many time he wondered if this was possible, he smacked 'Captain Vale around the head with a roundhouse kick that martial artist all over the world would bow to in a sign of respect and recognition of amazement. However Mercury wasn't done as he carried on through and pivoted on his left foot, and spun into a left back kick shoving 'Captain Vale' across the lab by a few feet and sprawling onto the floor.

"I am curious, what was your plan? Get the crap beat out of you by a Master Assassin till you died?" asked Mercury slamming his armoured boot onto 'Captain Vale's' chest keeping him on the ground and leaning over him.

"No, just to be patient." Replied the grinning man lying on the cold floor defeated. And then Mercury felt it a sharp stabbing pain in his back as two thin needles went deep in to his skin, and then 'Captain Vale' grabbed his leg still on his chest and pulled him over to the side so that he bashed into the electrical generator shocking him and causing the glass syringes on his back to explode and empty the rest of their contents on to his body, and Mercury let out a blood curling scream, at both the sensation of being electrocuted and having vials of unknown contents pushed in to his body and on his skin, before he was finally consumed by silence and lay their still.

Jaune's eyes widened and leapt forward to check his pulse and see if he was still breathing, but he was held back by the man who had injected the poisons in to the Master Assassins back, captain Ozpin who shook his head telling Jaune all he needed to know.

"No" whispered Jaune, lowing his head into his hands. He had taken a life, broken the promise he had made to the professor about being a good man, before a great solider, done the one thing that he swore he didn't want to do. Hell he had stopped his teammates at times from unnecessary killing where he could, and even save some Deathstalkers from killing themselves and being killed by each other, and here he was being a hypocrite and taking a life himself. While it was true this man had killed many people and he had killed the professor, Jaune didn't want to see him dead. He simply wanted this man to pay for his crimes and now he was free in death.

"It's okay Captain, he has finally paid for his crimes and you have made sure that you got revenge for the professor." Said captain Ozpin quietly and carefully placing a hand on his leaders shoulder in comfort, knowing what he was going though as he remembered his first kill as well and watching the light fade from his eyes.

"I'm not a Captain." Muttered Jaune "and that wasn't Justice, that was vengeance, what kind of message does that send?" asked Jaune rhetorically still looking at the body of the assassin before walking over and removing his metal amour around his glove and closing Mercury Black's eyes for the final time.

"There is a fine line between Justice and Vengeance Captain." replied captain Ozpin "That man didn't seem to know that."

"But it is still a line, and crossing it means that I am now at his level. I don't know how I can live with that." Said Jaune still crouched next to the body.

"Just because you care so much about him now even in death, and were willing to do anything to stop yourself from going that far all those other times shows that you are levels ahead of that man. He wouldn't even batter an eyelid at you, but you show him respect and you can show even more respect by saving more lives to make up for this one. And when this is over you can stand before the people and tell them of what happened and ask them to judge you, to which you can then receive your sentence and put your mind at ease. Sound good... Captain Vale?" captain Ozpin said with a small smile at the end, which got Jaune to smile a little as well.

"That name is actually kinda cool."

"It sucks Jaune."

"... Thanks for the help... Oz. You're a good friend."

"You never need to say thank you Captain, I would do anything if you needed me to. That's what friends do." Jaune held out his hand which Oz took in his and they shook on that promise and Jaune fully intended to keep that promise, and an Arc never goes back on his word.

"How touching; and excellent work on my Master Assassin 'Captain Vale', you are indeed a real super solider if I ever saw one." Came a very sarcastic drawl from around the room straight through the speakers. "Your friend did a good job at shutting down the eyes and ears of my castle for a while, but I didn't get this far by not being the smartest in the room. Now follow this instruction: Come to the roof 'Captain Vale' and come alone."

"Well that's a trap, I can follow and..."

"No, go help the others and get them out, some of these guy's are starting to wake up so they should be able to get out, and when you're far enough blow it; Captains orders."

"You better find a way out Captain; first round is on you." and then Oz runs out back towards the others and the drawbridge, and before Jaune leaves the room he turns to look back at Mercury's body one last time, a sad look crossing over his face.

"I'm so sorry."

Taking the steps that were in the far corner of the lab, almost opposite to where the door was that he had burst through to enter the lab. As he climbed the stairs Jaune looked back on how far he had come, he had gone from being a weak little boy with delusions of grandeur and a dangerous desire to help those around him, he had been so concerned with trying to live up to his family and to make his dad proud of who he was, show his mum how strong her son could be and prove to each of his sisters that he could protect them and look out for them when they needed him to. And here he was now, he had made it this far all because he was so determined to help no matter how he did it, and without knowing it he had managed to change the course of Remnants history and shake it to the core. Jaune also wondered if his family were doing okay since he had last spoke to them. He didn't let them know about him joining the army, or include them as the emergency contacts because he wanted the members of STRQ to tell them personally if he didn't make it back from the mission to save Oz and the other prisoners in Mistral, or about the changes as he was saving that for after the war so that he could surprise them with the new look he had, as well as introduce them to his friends, however the further he headed up the steps the more he prepared himself to never walk back down them, he knew that this next part was most likely a one way trip and in the event of that he had given a letter to the general in secret right before they had left and it gave instructions on who to contact as well as notes for all of them and what he had actually been doing this whole time; he hoped they would understand, but this wasn't a choice this was what was right so that meant it had to be done.

He had finally reached the roof, and thus he had finally made it to the endgame.

Up on the roof stood Dr Watts standing on the edge of the castles wall looking out in to the forest and the icy water in the distance that made up Mantle's coastline, the island of Vytal was up north as well surrounded by cold water, however the island itself was said to be more like a jungle in the south of Mistral than a desert like the plains of Mantle. While Dr Watts was looking away from Jaune, he took the time to observe his surroundings and noticed and he saw a computer console, that appeared to be quite a common thing in evil lairs, with several of its electrical wires heading towards a missile that was the size of a very large bus, meaning it wasn't like the rockets he had seen when he read those science fiction comics, but it was more realistic yet it was still quite large, he did also note that there was a little hatch near the top of the missile with a ladder leading up to it, and if all else fails he could destroy the missile from the inside before it reached his target, but hopefully it wouldn't come to that. Stopping it was all that mattered, because he knew just then and there, this missile was capable of mass destruction and not a single person would survive if that device reached it's destination.

"Welcome, Captain Vale; to the end of your world." Stated Dr Watts softly, his voice carrying over to where Jaune was without the need to be raised.

"You need to stop this, people will die. Innocent people who just want to live their lives, without all this death and destruction." Pleaded Jaune stepping forward, attempting to reason with the Doctor, as he remembered from their last encounter in Haven that he was as strong and fast as Jaune was, maybe even more so, and he would be fighting to kill, where as Jaune would not, never again.

"Why do I care about those people? Power is the only thing that matters, the only thing that should be respected, the only thing that is needed. Using this missile powered by the Relic I have seen things that you could not even comprehend, I know how small we are and how much is out there and I want it. I will have the power and I will be a god amongst men. And those strong people that survive will need leadership, from a powerful God." said Dr Watts still looking out away from the castle, not acknowledging Jaune in the slightest other than the conversation.

"That is madness, if you define yourself by your ability to destroy things, then in the end you have nothing; no power and nobody to worship you." Argued Jaune moving forward again.

"Ha, and you were to be my equal? What was my brother thinking? How could you be equal to a genius with a plan that baffles your comprehension? You were given the greatest gift this pathetic species could possible get? Such strength and yet this is how you use it, to help the weak. It's a survival of the fittest, who are you to deserve this power?" asked Dr Watts finally angry enough that he had to look Jaune in the eyes to see his response, and when he did turn around Jaune had to hold back a gasp at how alike the two brothers looked, all except their eyes. The professor had soulful and warm blue eyes, this man had black eyes that looked like a great abyss, but Jaune didn't blink. He stared back.

"Me? I'm just a kid from Vale." Replied Jaune with a small smile. That really set of Dr Watts, causing him to pull out a pistol and open fire upon Jaune. Who in turn quickly ducked behind his shield to block the incoming barrage of bullets, he also advanced at a quick pace to close the distance between the two of them as he had no ranged weapon, and if he threw his shield he knew that Dr Watts was going to be fast enough to dodge it and it would go over the edge of the castle. Once the good Doctor had finished shooting, he actually threw the pistol at Jaune and then launched himself, flying forward and punching at Jaune's shield. Naturally he cannot get through the shield so he grabs the top of the shield and pulls it down, to punch Jaune across the face and then back hand him with the same hand. Jaune retaliated with a shield bash too Dr Watts' chest and give him a right uppercut and then sliced at him sideways with his shield, to which Dr Watts leaned back away and then tackled the Captain bringing them both to the ground. After pinning him down Dr Watts began to choke Jaune with both of his hands.

"I have seen the future Captain!" Dr Watts yelled "I know whats coming, and I will be powerful and YOU! WILL! KNEEL!"

"Not... my... future..." Breathes Jaune before he kicks Dr Watts off and over him, sending him flying away from the computer towards the stairs that Jaune had come up. Meanwhile Jaune raced over to the computer and grabbed a load of the wires and ripped them out, before he then grabbed the computer and lifted it above his head and threw it over the edge of the castle wall.

"NOOOOO!" Screamed Dr Watts. However this didn't seem to stop the missile as it started to light, meaning it was going to take off and complete its job. It must have had a fail-safe built into it or something that one of the STRQ guys would know about, which meant anything that happened to the computer the missile would still head to its target; Jaune was not going to let that happen, time to be Captain Vale. Just as the missile is about to take off Captain Vale lunges at it and manages to grab on to the outside ladder and work his way up to locate the door/hatch that was near the top of the missile, which he spotted when he first climbed up on to the roof. It would appear he would have to do this from the inside after all.

Busting open the door/hatch with his shield Jaune climbs in and takes in his surroundings; sitting in-front of him was the so called Relic that Dr Watts had briefly mentioned. It glowed a brilliant and beautiful blue colour that managed to encase the whole of the room in its light despite being so small, able to fit in the palm of Jaune's hand with relative ease, he might not be able to close his fist around it, but it was still quite small. There were several wires that were all connected to the Relic and they all looked to be taking power from the Relic to distribute it around the missile. This was what was going to destroy humanity, not each other, not the Grimm, not the moon, but a bright blue other worldly object.

"Incredible isn't it?" Asked Dr Watts rhetorically "How such power can be placed in such a small and unassuming item, is baffling to even my mind. I did find that to truly and properly wield this weapon, you must have a clear mind of what you wish to destroy. This particular Relic was actually placed in the jewel room of the Gods of Valkyrie a long time ago and fell to earth because of the trickster God R-"

"There's only one God Doctor, and while he might not always be clear in his message, he is no trickster." Interrupted Jaune.

"Either way it doesn't matter, I suppose you want to know about the Relic and not the person that sent it here; When used properly and with purpose it can destroy whatever the user desires, the wielder however had to be pure of heart. I have found a way around this loophole by using science and now wield the power of the god's, and I won't let some 'kid from Vale' mess it up."

"You are no god, you're not even a person; you're a monster not better than the Grimm, and I will stop you." swore Jaune

"Very well then, shall we beat each other like savages and then you can do like all the other monsters and kill me, it wouldn't be the first life you've taken would it? Or would you prefer to continue the ethics debate?"

"Part of me want's to resolve this without violence, but you are stalling even though you will die. And I won't let that happen, you need to face justice for your crimes." says Jaune taking up his stance and raising his shield, and charges at Dr Watts who side steps his attack and strikes Jaune in the back and then across the face. However Jaune recovers and back swings with his shield that Dr Watts manages to back away from and then step back in with a left cross, which Jaune pushes down with his right arm and then gives him a very quick and disorientating back-fist jab from that deflection, catching Dr Watts right on the nose, just as his shield comes in for an uppercut, smashing into his chin painfully. With his defence all over the place and his head tilted back he is at the mercy of Jaune so he decided to follow up the uppercut with with a left roundhouse kick to the ribs, it wasn't a well executed kick and Jaune really needed to learn some martial arts to properly be able to deliver a kick to the level of Mercury, but it still managed to connect and do some damage if the groan of pain was anything to go by from his opponent. The kick had brought the good Doctors body into a more hunched over position and his hands were now down low, which meant they would be slower to raise if he wanted to block the next strike from Jaune, which was an overhand punch, that he had read about in a boxing book and now applied in to combat, this struck Dr Watts right in the centre of his face breaking his nose as Jaune felt the crunch under his metal gloved fist. The last move he did was the classic spartan kick to the chest that he used quite a lot as his advanced strength mean that most of the time, Deathstalkers and other soldiers were knocked out when they hit the ground or a wall, Dr Watts o the other hand was only sent flying back, crashing into the Relic and knocking it out of its power position. Now that the missile is without its power supply and it had been going up very high, Jaune estimated that he had a couple of second before the excess power ran out and the missile started heading down toward the ocean. Dr Watts must have come to the same conclusion, as he looked between Jaune and the Relic for a second and then picked it up with an evil smirk on his face.

"Goodbye Mr ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR-" He began to say before he realised that the Relic was actually burning his hand so he dropped it, but the burn just continued spreading up his body engulfing him in bright blue flames, Jaune could do nothing as he watched this play out, and all he felt for the Doctor at that moment was pity; this was not how it was supposed to be. Right when the blue flames reached his neck a brightly coloured and beautiful rainbow appeared in the place of Dr Watts and then just as quickly as it came, it vanished taking Dr Watts with it. The Relic dropped to the ground, still glowing that same bright blue as before. Jaune was tempted to pick it up, but he saw what happened to Dr Watts and he wouldn't be able to help anyone if he burst into flames and disappeared. But maybe it didn't work for Dr Watts because his heart was not pure, Jaune doubted his heart was completely pure however it had to be a lot purer than Dr Watts' heart, and if he could use the Relic to destroy the Grimm and the missile, he could get rid of the greatest threats to humanity saving everyone on Vytal Island and ensuring that the world had a chance for peace between the nations.

So the young Arc tentatively reached out and grabbed the Relic and everything stopped and Jaune found himself surrounded by nothing.

Not never ending darkness.

Not a bright white space.

Not by all of the people he cared about as he thought would happen in death.

Just Nothing.

"Well now you are an interesting one aren't you?" said a deep voice behind Jaune, causing him to turn to the sound and see a slim built man with longer hair than he had, but it didn't seem to obey gravity, instead it waved on its own. He had a small trimmed beard, kind eyes that spoke of untold wisdom and pain. But the most surprising part was that he was entirely blue, everything was blue, and he was completely naked as well.

"Welcome to the end Mr Arc, I only have one question for you; Who are you?" asked the man in his deep voice hands behind his back and staring right into his soul, and Jaune could feel him in his soul, this being already knew everything there was to know about Jaune, and all their ever would be to know about Jaune.

"Y-Y-You already know who I am." Jaune gulped "I can feel you in my h-head." This made the being smile.

"You are right; I do know you. And more importantly I understand you. The other one who came before you, demanded so much of me, ordered me to destroy everything that he hated, give him the power over death so that he could be a God. That is not how this works, I saw who he was when he appeared and I gave him the same question, and I hoped he would give me a different answer." said the being sadly, however this jolted Jaunes mind back to where he had been before he was shocked by the arrival of the man.

"Wait the missile! I need to go back! I have to stop it from-" shouted Jaune frantically

"-Destroying something?" interrupted the being raising an eyebrow at Jaune "I am the master of destruction, the lord of death, the king of despair. Why would I send you back to stop that?"

"Because I wouldn't be me if I let that happen!" Yelled Jaune, startling himself with that out burst, where had that come from. He hadn't even thought about what he wanted to say he just came out with it.

"Unlike in my brother or my sisters realms, you cannot lie here. You say whatever is on your mind, it is how I can decide if I will grant your request. Knowledge will tell you what you ask and Creation will give you what you ask, but my brother, Choice and I are different, we evaluate you and choose what we want to do. I will grant you your request Mr Arc; The Grimm will be no more on Remnant, but only if you stop the missile, by any means necessary. Do you understand?"

"I do." This was all Jaune could ask for, the chance to make the biggest leap forward for humanity.

"Not a perfect soldier, but a good man. I cannot say if you made the right choice, Mr Arc, nor can I wish you luck. I can only say farewell. We will not meet again." Then the man or the being if you would like to call him as Jaune would probably keep calling him that for as long as he remembered this moment.

Jaune blinked his hand out stretchered towards the Relic, what was he doing this was no time to inspect this thing; he needed to stop the missile any way he could. Luckily Raven and Summer always made sure that they all carried a small amount of explosives on their person at all times so that they could blow up tanks and other deadly vehicles if they needed to, Jaune still had some left and with all the power that was in this missile, he was certain that it would be more than enough to destroy the missile. He quickly threw all of his explosives in to the centre of the missile right where he guessed the main tube of power was, meaning it would create the biggest explosion. Jaune positioned himself next to the hatch and held up the detonator, all he needed to do was click it once with his thumb and then jump free into the ocean, maybe if he positioned his shield he could surviv- of who was he kidding, this was it.

The end of the line.

"A good man." Were Jaunes last words before he pressed down on the detonator right as he pushed himself away from the hatch and watched as the missile exploded in a brilliant blue cloud of energy that was spreading out at an alarming speed, the force of the explosion slamming into Jaune blurring his vision and making his mind foggy and the last coherent though in his head was one that he was certain was not his, but he had no clue who it was.

"A promise is a promise."

And then Jaune hit the icy water and plunged deep bellow the depths, he knew only the cold of the water and the warmth of his family and friends, and with that sharp contrast; he closed his eyes and became consumed by the call of rest.

---

Epilogue - Unknown POV

Sitting at a desk was the most boring thing at the moment for this particular individual, how he wished he could launch more of his agents into new training by having them propelled off of a cliff, it would make for excellent survival training, but his second in-command argued very strongly against it, and thus he knew it would cause the rest of his organisation to take sides between the two, and while he was officially in charge, lots more of the agents and personal feared her a lot more than him. Not that he could blame them, he was honestly quite scared of her as well. However back to the issue at hand, he needed to do something and soon, the council was already considering shutting down the organisation because of its lack of efficiency against the White Fang, the resent rise in crime around the vast kingdom of Vale and the problems that were caused by a couple of enhanced individuals that had come up in the recent years. In fact many suspected that the militarises of the world were trying to create their very own super human to fight for their own kingdom, and if one kingdom suddenly got an enhanced individual what was to stop them from invading other nations and kingdoms. The kingdom of Atlas was the worst at it as they had experimented on a young woman, needless to say she destroyed several buildings in the kingdom after escaping the military, and she was not currently hiding out on the island of Patch. They also had a team of young gentlemen they employed as enforcers, the good general Ironwood liked to keep it on the low down, but it was his job to know these things.

If the council found out about the young woman's escape or the four men that general Ironwood had then it would be the start of another war, and after 60 years of peace then-

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK

Frantic knocking on the door interrupted his train of thought.

"Enter."

"Sir you are going to want to see this." said the agent as he walked briskly towards the desk the man was sat behind and placed a folder into the hands of the director. The folder had a symbol on the front of it, Two crescent arcs, with one on top of the other.

"Finally."

---

That my readers is the end, hope you liked it please give constructive criticism if you want to no pressure.