Yang waited until her team had all fallen asleep before she snuck out and headed for the training building. Her team had opted for the modern huntsman license program so they had left for a few months while the curriculum was written. This was her first night back since and she was on her way to train with James. It wasn't too hard since there wasn't really a force watching the halls at night but, she was still careful not to make too much noise.
Once she had made it to the training building she moved a little more freely. She found the room that she knew James worked in last year and so she opened the sliding paper wood frame door before she took off her shoes and walked onto the mat.
The lights were off and it was hard to see but she could tell that the room was empty. She made her way to the center of the room and looked around. Hanging on one wall was a black and white picture of an old man. There were words under it but she couldn't read them in the dark.
Instead, she headed for one of the two doors she saw. When she slid the door open it lead to a bathroom. And when she slid the other door open she saw that it lead to a bedroom. She slowly made her way into the room and looked around. She didn't see anything but there was a computer open with a word document on the screen.
She squinted to read it but when she did it read. "SURPRISE!"
No sooner had she read it that a hand grabbed the back of her shirt and pulled her backward. She went to turn to her left in order to chamber her right hand for a strike when an arm wrapped up from her left armpit and across her chest before a hand grabbed the right side of the back of her neck. She felt a leg sweep out her left leg and she was violently thrown to the ground, her head bouncing off the floor hard.
She managed to roll onto her right side when a right hand reached under her neck and grabbed her left collar. She went to fight the hand when it pulled tight as a knee came to rest on the left side of her neck.
All at once the collar of her shirt and the wrist of her attacker pulled tight and cut off the blood flow to her brain. She knew that she needed to get out of this or else she would pass out but whenever she tried to move she was stopped until she tried to keep rolling to her right when she was forced onto her belly and the knee was moved to the back of her neck.
She could hear herself trying to yell for help while she was choking. All that came out was a sick grunting sound. She was on her own and so she kept fighting trying to get her hands between her neck and her shirt right up until her vision faded and she lost consciousness.
Yang woke up looking at James as he held her feet up. "We need to stop meeting like this," he said as he handed her a glass of water. She drank the water and said
"James, there was someone here. They attacked me and…"
James cut her off with a wave of his hand saying. 'Yeah, that was me. I couldn't see you in the dark and assumed the worst."
Yang understood what he meant. She had just walked in without saying anything so he was right to worry. "Sorry about that," she said getting to her feet. "I wanted to do some training if that is okay with you."
He nodded and said. "Sure, first I need to ask if you know how what ukemi is?"
Yang shook her head to say no and James responded with. "It is the art of falling. And it is the first thing I will teach you," he tossed her a white cotton gi saying "Let's get started."
…
Jorge was sitting at his desk when Raven came in with a worried look on her face. "Did you check your email?" She asked.
Jorge hadn't so he quickly opened his account and saw that Raven had sent him a hyperlink. He clicked on it and a video loaded. It showed a woman that was crouched behind a parked car. She seemed to be waiting for something and it was soon clear what that was. The man who seemed to own that car had just reached it. He slipped his key into the lock and turned until there was a flash of all the lights.
Then she pounced. She vaulted over the hood of the car and when the man turned to see who it was he was rewarded with a shoe landing squarely on his face. He was staggered and before he could react the woman grabbed him from behind and in a quick fluid motion broke his neck.
His body instantly went limp as the life drained from his corpse. She laid the body in the backseat and searched it for the keys. Once she had them she got into the driver seat and drove out of the camera's view.
Jorge hadn't seen her face but he knew who it was. It was Cinder Fall. He would need to talk to Orin about why she was still alive later. But for now, he had an appointment. It was a young man from Atlas named Henry Marigold. He had asked to meet with Jorge shortly after Jorge became the headmaster of Beacon.
He needed some time to get to Beacon which was odd but Jorge wasn't going to judge him if he wasn't running to this meeting. He had arrived in Vale a little less than a week ago and his appointment was today.
The door of the elevator opened to reveal a tall and lean boy with grayish blue hair. He had the golden eyes of the Marigold family while he at first glance looked well dressed. A further inspection yielded that his clothes were all wore and had begun to tear at the stitches.
"Mr. Marigold, please come in. How may I help you?" Jorge had a good idea as to why he was here but he still wanted to give him a chance to speak for himself.
He calmly strode across the room and when he arrived at Jorge's desk he reached into his jacket's inside pocket and withdrew a black and white photograph.
He placed the photograph on the desk and said. " I am looking for the people in this photograph." he tapped the two figures in the photograph and waited for Jorge to respond.
And respond he did. " And why should I know where they are, and why should I help you find them?"
Henry seemed to be getting annoyed with the way Jorge was handling the situation but he needed to have Jorge help so he pushed past it saying. "If you would like I can make sure you are compensated for the effort."
Jorge knew he was lying but he let him keep going. " I need to find them, please sir."
Jorge knew why he was looking for the two in the picture and he knew why he couldn't let Henry find them. It was at this moment that team RWBY decided to ignore the standing protocol and simply walk into the headmaster's office.
No sooner had Henry seen them than he turned and drew a pistol that he had hidden in his vest and leveled it at Blake. Who in turn began to look for the nearest cover. Before anything else could happen Weiss rushed forward and shoved the gun away from Blake and began to fight for control of the weapon.
The rest of her team soon joined in and once they had wrestled the weapon from him Weiss yelled. "What the HELL is wrong with you?"
By now Jorge had gotten out of his chair and was holding the young man back as he screamed. "YOU MURDERED MY FAMILY, YOU ANIMAL WHEN I GET MY HANDS ON YOU I WILL FUCKING DECIMATE YOU"
While he was shouting his voice was nearly breaking and there were tears in his eyes which prompted Weiss to step between the two of them and ask. "What are you talking about? Blake hasn't murdered anyone!"
By now the blind rage that was consuming him a moment ago had passed and he was simply staring with eyes that could pierce steel. "Over a year ago your friend attacked a train. They destroyed everything on board. My family's entire fortune was on that train, and it was all destroyed in a moment. We lost everything"
Now it was Ruby who stepped in, her face a mix of shock and anger, as she asked. "So you just tried to kill my friend because you aren't rich anymore? Are you kidding me?"
Henry gave an empty chuckle that sent a chill down Ruby's spine. "Do you know what happens to an Atlesian family when they go from being successful and prosperous weapons dealers to being impoverished?" he said. Ruby wanted to answer but she didn't have one so she stayed silent. " My father lived for about two weeks before he was killed by a car bomb on his way home from the factory he had just gotten a job at, my mother was with my uncle when this all started. We still had some security forces but they were having to be let go one after another as we ran out of money to pay them with."
By now he wasn't looking at anyone or thing but staring into nothingness. It was a look Yang had seen on Jaune and it made her sick to see it again. "When the white fang assassins came they fought valiantly but died for their effort. I had known some of those men since I was a boy barely able to talk." Ruby was getting ready to wilt so he turned to give Blake the same thousand-yard stare saying. " And now I can't even afford to give their families the death benefits they were promised. Nine of my best friend's are dead because of that day. Five of them were the guards who were there and the other two where my mother and Uncle. Thankfully for my mother, my uncle killed her before they found them. He had to use his last bullet to do that so he was taken alive. My baby sister and brother came home from school and were taken too."
Whatever he had been seeing it was getting worse as his eyes were misting again. " I was away at an internship when this happened, I almost wish I was there so that I could have died with them." he was crying now, his shoulders shaking slightly. " do any of you know what it's like to have to identify the bodies of your family after they had been raped to death and then mutilated."
Now Ruby was crying herself. It was her damned empathy she was always like an emotional sponge just sucking up whatever feeling was most present. he didn't seem to notice so he kept going with his empty stare bore through Blake's soul. "After that, my Father and I moved to a small working town named Argus on the edge of Atlas. He got a job at a nearby factory as an engineer and I went to school under a changed name. When he died I lost all of my sense, I tried to kill the next Faunus I saw. The damn beast seemed to take pity on me and just left me broken in an alley. From there a young couple took me in and got me back on my feet. They meant well but I couldn't stay, I had finally found out what I was meant to do."
Now his empty gaze was replaced with one of pure hatred and determination and his voice was an unsettling calm as he said. " I am going to kill you, your friend in that photograph and any animal that gets in my way"
He shook free from Jorge and walked away. When he reached the elevator he half looked over his shoulder and said, "Headmaster I now understand why you won't help. I hope you all burn in hell."
As he closed the elevator he turned and gave Blake one last soul stabbing look. She knew that she hadn't seen the last of him. And everyone knew it.
Once the elevator had left Blake broke. She fell to her knees sobbing. She was quickly swarmed by her team, all of them trying to console her telling her that she didn't do this. It was with tears in her eyes and a lump in her throat that she said. "But I did, I attacked that train, I killed that boy's family."
Jorge placed his hand through the pile and rested it on her shoulder saying. "NO, you didn't. All you did was make what happened more likely. It was still wrong but YOU didn't kill anyone."
He knew that she would still blame herself for what happened but Jorge also knew that she needed any support she could get. She hadn't really thought about what would happen as a result of her attack. She most likely thought that since they were only doing financial damages then no one was really getting hurt.
What she had forgotten was that the White Fang had placed a bounty on the heads of several major businessmen and their families. Now she had to think about everyone who had died because of that.
Jorge silently returned to his desk and began to type up a warning to all staff that henry Marigold was to be escorted off of campus A.S.A.P. with that done Jorge sent Galmaron an email telling him to be expecting a visit from Blake soon.
In the absence of Glynda, he had become the defacto psychologist. He wasn't certified but he had seen it all and knew what he was doing.
He saw that they were getting ready to leave so he called out. "Yang," when she turned she saw him offer her a stack of letters. Her face brightened slightly even as she tried to hide it. They were from Jaune and had been waiting for them. Since he was always moving around some letters arrived sooner than others so Jorge would hold them for a few weeks until a coherent series of events could be understood. This time he held them for the entire break with was a few months so the backlog meant she was getting quite a few.
She walked over still trying to seem too eager and took the letters before boarding the elevator with the rest of her team. They journeyed to their room in silence. When they arrived Blake went and sat on her bed saying. "I know you all want to help but right now I need time to think."
They all understood so they headed their separate ways with Ruby and Weiss going to the armory and chemistry lab respectively and Yang heading to the library. Her muscles and joints all ached from training with James last night so she wanted to sit and read, namely, she wanted to read the letters Jaune had written her.
She sat down in her favorite bean bag chair and removed the rubber band holding all the letters together. She found the one that was dated the farthest back and unfolded it.
Dear Yang,
I have just had one of the weirdest target renditions ever. I was able to narrow down the location to a bar and while I was there I was approached by a woman. I wanted to tell her that she wasn't going to get anywhere when I noticed that SHE was my target.
I let her keep going for a few hours until she was very drunk and we were some of the only people in the bar. She eventually tried lead me outside. And I let her, right until we were in the parking lot where I slapped the handcuffs on her.
It was fun to watch her run through a cycle of anger, then excitement, until she realised that I was arresting her. Then she went back to angry. It was by far the most fun I have had in a long time.
I thought that I would be ready for whatever this assignment could through at me but I guess I was wrong, well that is all I have to say for now. I hope you are reading these. I know that I have no right to hope so, not after what I said but the fact remains. I miss you. I miss Ruby, Blake, Weiss, Pyrrha and Luke . And I miss you
The last section of writing had since been scribbled over. She wondered what Jaune had written that he had wanted to keep to himself but she knew that she couldn't find out now so she put the first one down and picked up the next one.
Dear Yang,
I don't know anymore. I have been tracking down Ozpin's underlings for a while now. Whenever I catch up to one I do everything I can to take them alive. But I guess that I shouldn't be two surprised that Ozpin wouldn't work with folks who would come quietly.
I have been hunting and hunting but there always seems to be more of them. And the more I kill or capture the more the others start getting ready. I already have a few new scars from all of this. And I have lost some good men too.
The worst ones are the ones who decide that they won't fight fair. They take hostages and if i can't kill them fast enough they kill the hostage. Sometimes they realize that they won't get away so they kill the hostage to force my hand. Then there are the ones that are simply monsters. I won't make you carry the weight of what I have seen them do but. It got worse than usual recently.
One of them learned who was working with me. A local sheriff named Griffin. They went after his family, I had to help him bury his wife and two sons. I have been where he was and I knew that he wasn't going to come back from this so when I left I took most of his ammo. I was just making it to my bike when I heard the gunshot.
I still lay awake at night thinking about the silence that followed that gunshot. I didn't bury him, and I regret it to this day. But I couldn't face him again, my quest had killed his family, and it had killed him.
The tone of the letter and the way it ended made Yang want to hold Jaune. She knew that he was going through a lot and he desperately needed someone to hold him close and tell him that the world with keep turning.
Cardin had told her about what happened that night in the gardens. The night Jaune almost took his own life. And it only made her want him here more. If he kept going like this then eventually he would break again and she shuddered at the thought of what may happen if he broke while he was alone.
She wanted to keep reading but the last letter had left her feeling drained. So she headed back to her dorm. When she arrived she saw Blake was on her scroll talking to her parents. She had gone back to visit them during the break from school. It had done her good so now she was talking to them. She was still clearly upset by what she had been told.
Her parents seemed to more interested in making sure she was okay that whether or not she had been involved in terrorist actions. It reminded her of her own trip home during the break. Her and Ruby went back and forth between Patch and the Arc cabin during the break. Their father missed them but so did Mama Arc.
Her father had found himself in the position to offer counsel to both his children. His first wife had left him and his second had died. And his oldest daughter's first love left her and his second's had died.
Weiss had actually stayed at Beacon. But that was because of Raven and Galmaron.
Yang smiled when she thought of how that had happened. Before the school closed for a few months to finalize things, Raven and Galmaron had taken on the role of teachers. Raven taught combat class under the name Mrs. Telmarvak (a fact Yang was not okay with) and Galmaron taught dust chemistry and history while Oobleck was on medical leave (something about getting shot in the kneecap).
At one time Weiss had a question for Galmaron so she went to his office during his office hours. She forgot to knock and instantly regretted it as she saw far more of Mr. and Mrs. Telmarvak than she ever wanted to see.
When she went to Jorge he told her that they were volunteers and that he couldn't afford to fire them so maybe she should go to them when they aren't working.
She thought she was being very sneaky when she knocked on their door at eight pm but she was shocked when Galmaron opened the door and invited her in. They sat down at the table and Weiss noticed that there were table settings placed. She had accidentally come to them right before dinner and she was going to excuse herself until she noticed that Galmaron had sat her down in front of a third place setting.
While she was thinking about this Raven brought out a large pot that seemed to be filled with soup. She ladled them all out some and before Weiss knew it she was having dinner with her teachers.
After a few bites Galmaron asked her "Now Weiss what was your question?"
Weiss suddenly remembered that she had come here to get an answer for a question she had in one of her labs. "Yes professor…" With a wave of his hand Galmaron cut her off. "Please, we aren't even in class call me Gal, or even Gail. I answer to both at this point."
Weiss nodded before she continued "With my dust reaction lab my results all show that I have much higher amounts of energy being given off at an inconsistent rate and I don't know why."
Galmaron ate a spoonful of soup and thought for a moment before saying " did you use ice and fire dust?"
Weiss already had an answer which she offered " no, that wouldn't work according to the fifth and seventh postulate of dust chemistry. so I actually applied the fire to air dust why?"
He thought for another moment and said. "How hot was the fire?"
Weiss thought and remembered saying. " I had it at four hundred degrees Fahrenheit."
Galmaron nodded once saying "There it is, air dust has a very high activation temperature. According to the sixth postulate since the heat, while high wasn't high enough to activate the air dust in time you effectively supercharged it. So it kept on building up energy that was most likely set off by any number of independent variables you have no control over thus giving you the inconsistent and extremely high results."
Weiss wanted to slap herself. How had she forgotten one of the simplest rules of chemistry? She also wondered if she should leave. But she realized that she was now apart of dinner and to leave now would be rude.
...
Yang smiled as she remembered the day she found out that Weiss had been sneaking out to have dinner with her mother and her new stepfather. She was still getting used to that part.
Yang sat down on her own bed as Blake said goodbye to her parents and hung up her scroll. "So," Blake said rolling over to look up at Yang's bed. "You got mail huh."
"Yep," Yang said not wanting to discuss the matter further in case Blake didn't approve of her reading of Jaune's letters.
Blake didn't offer any words she simply rolled back over and tried to take a nap. Naps were a surprisingly common thing at the new Beacon. The courses were mostly physical training. If you weren't on the range learning how best to use whatever you long weapon of choice in a tactical capacity, or working on your weapons, you were with one of Professor Port's hunting parties. Which were just a party of three to eight students that went out into the emerald forest with one of Port's advanced students? They would find small groups of Grimm and then the advanced student would teach about how to handle them.
And any time not spent doing that was spent training in the hand to hand to dueling wings. All that was left was enough time to eat and sleep. And after all of that most students had no trouble sleeping.
Yang wanted to get some sleep herself since she had a hunting trip in a few hours but she thought better of it because she wanted to read a few more letters. She found the next one in sequence and unfolded the dried out and sun damaged paper. That meant that Jaune was still in Vacuo when he wrote this letter.
Dear Yang,
I am sorry that I didn't write after my latest mission. After what happened to Griffin I kinda feel into a funk. I was in a dark place and I couldn't see a way out. I have cut ties with my former life and all of you. But I didn't know if I wanted to keep going like this. I actually found myself staring down the barrel of my own gun a few times. Once I even loaded it. I was flicking the safety on and off when I realized that I still had more to do in this world.
I found myself in a small town in southern Vacuo. One of the kids recognized my longcoat as being one of the coats worn by the Rangers. That's what the men who Jorge has been sending to find Ozpin's contacts have taken to calling themselves. Apparently a Ranger helped save this town a while back and the boy never forgot the longcoat.
He was so happy to see me. It really helped me remember that there was still good in this world. I think that with all of the evil I have been hunting I may have forgotten that. I still miss all of you, but I don't think the day will ever come that I don't. I have to go now, my target just showed up, I need to do this fast.
Yang was shocked at what she was reading. She couldn't believe it. When she realized that she was moving she was already in the elevator to Jorge's office. The door opened and she saw Jorge look at her like he was going to chastise her for failing to knock before but when he saw that way she was looking he thought better of it.
"Yang, what seems to be the matter?" he asked as he put down his pen and stood up behind his desk.
"I want Jaune brought back to Beacon!" she said. Her voice showed that she was both worried and desperate. If she could see herself then she would also notice that her hair was showing the beginning signs of lighting up.
"I can't do that Yang, Jaune asked me to keep him as far from Beacon as I could," Jorge replied as he stepped out from behind his desk. " I have to honor that wish."
Whether she meant to throw the letter she had just read or not Yang didn't know. She only knew that she violently threw the letter at Jorge who caught it and began to read. When he read about Jaune's near suicide his face turned somber. "I agree that something has to be done but I can't bring him back yet he is needed where he is."
As he spoke Jorge scratched at his beard and said. "I'll tell you what. I will try to get him a partner. Someone to be with him and let him know that the world is worth saving."
Yang didn't like that idea but it was a step in the right direction so she would settle for now. " I want to pick his partner," she said hoping to gain some kind of control over the situation.
Jorge shook his head as he said "No can do. None of the rangers know each other's real names and it needs to stay that way for operational security."
Yang was annoyed but she understood that yelling at Jorge wouldn't help so she bite her tongue and planned to work out her frustrations on one of the heavy bags in the gym.
She wanted to keep trying to get Jaune back but she knew that he was afraid of hurting THEM so getting him back would be difficult, to say the least. Instead, she reluctantly settled on Jorge's plan to assign him a partner and let that be that.
She headed back to the elevator and was at the door when Jorge said. "Oh, by the way. I have a mission for you and your team."
Yang turned to look at him more than a little confused as to why he would assign them a mission after the day they had but she could tell from the way he said it that this was important so she asked. "What is it, and where is it?"
Jorge quickly answered with. "Weiss' brother Whitley was supposed to arrive here months ago. Klein called looking for him today and when I told him he wasn't here he got worried. He said that Whitley's debit card was used to secure a dinner reservation at a restaurant tonight. I want team RWBY to go check it out."
Yang nodded and stepped into the elevator taking out her scroll and sending her team a text outlining what was going on. She just got out of the elevator when she was meet with her team's answers.
Weiss: WHAT, fine I will get my gear and meet out at the docks.
Blake: Who is Whitley, how are we gonna get in the restaurant.
Ruby: He's Weiss' little brother and I don't know.
Jorge: The restaurant is expecting you
Yang: How are you in this chat?
Yang: Seriously HOW?
Ruby: It doesn't matter Yang just be at the Docks in five minutes.
Yang put her scroll back in her pocket and headed to the locker room to get her weapons. She meet James on the way and when they passed he patted her on the shoulder and also slipped her a note. He actually did it so well she didn't notice it at first. When she read the piece of paper that was tucked into the collar of her jacket it said. " when you get the chance come to the Sambo room"
She crumpled the note and almost tossed in the nearest trash can when she thought that if he went through all the effort of getting this to her covertly then maybe she shouldn't just throw it away where anyone can find it.
She placed the crumpled paper into her pocket and got her weapons. Attaching both gauntlets to her arms she collapsed them into their bracelet form and made her way to the docks her team was waiting for her and once they were all aboard the door was closed and the bullhead lifted off.
Yang looked out the window of the bullhead to see the city of Vale with most of its lights on but devoid of all natural light. It was gonna be an interesting night.
