Chapter 2: Seeds of Doubt

The day after the Breach…

Adam sits behind his desk in the manager's office of the White Fang's warehouse hideout that is just outside of Vale, rubbing his temples as he processes the events leading up to the Breach. After listening to the one of the few White Fang members that managed to escape getting captured or mauled by the rampaging Grimm has made him unsure what he should be feeling at the moment

"Uhh… Sir? Are you okay?" The grunt in front of him asks very nervously but all he gets in response was Adam holding up his index finger to signal that he needed more time.

Should Adam be confused on wondering how the base was discovered by four teenage huntresses in training, a Beacon Academy professor, and a dog?

Should he instead be grieving with the rest of his cell for members who lost their lives during the incident?

Should he be happy that he wasn't there for the incident or that he and the rest of the White Fang cell he commands doesn't have listen Roman Torchwick's racist name calling for a while or the fact he now knows that Blake is in Vale?

Or should he be furious at the fact that the fiasco known as the Breach was caused by a small oversight, like a hole in the ceiling of the Mt. Glenn base that led to the surface that wasn't sealed and/or concealed properly which led to an intruder accidently falling into the base leading to the rest of intruder's group to the base which leads to Roman launching explosive filled train a week and a half earlier than planned leading right into the Grimm breaching the inner city of Vale and to the arrest of Roman Torchwick himself?

Adam lets out a sigh as these emotions swirl inside of him and causes the grunt that Adam nearly forgot was there flinch defensively. "Am I in trouble, sir?"

"No, no you are not in trouble." Adam says wearily. "I am giving you today and tomorrow off to recover from what happened. Dismissed."

"Thank you, sir!" The grunt hastily salutes then rushes out of the room. Immediately afterwards, Adams second-in-command, a bear Faunus by the name of Andre Felt, walks into the office and sits down where the grunt used to be.

"Adam."

"Andre."

"What happened?" Andre asks, seeing Adam's current state

"A hole." Adam angrily whispers with his head buried in his hands, deciding that anger is what he should be feeling right now.

"A hole?" Andre repeats back confused.

"A FUCKING HOLE THAT SOMEHOW EVERYONE MISSED FOR PAST YEAR WE'VE BEEN THERE!" Adam yells out, slamming his fists down onto the desk. "AND AS A RESULT, TORCHWICK FUCKS EVERYTHING UP!"

"How did he fuck up?" Andre inquires, cautiously backing up in the process.

"When the first intruder, this "Little Red", fell down the hole that should have been found during the initial inspection and somehow she survives the fall. And what does Torchwick do when he finds out Little Red was caught…" Adam dramatically pauses for moment. "HE SIMPLY TOYS WITH HER AND DOES NOTHING ELSE!"

Andre is taken back by this. "What?!"

"Oh it gets better. Weiss Schnee was a part of the second group of intruders who came in search of Little Red." Adam exclaims.

"Oh you got to be kidding me." Andre groans in response.

"He could have ordered the grunts he had with him to tie her up and use her as a potentially valuable hostage to be against the other intruders! Then with Weiss Schnee in our grasp, we could have brought Jacques Schnee and the SDC to their knees."

"But instead this Little Red escapes and Torchwick launches the train early to prevent it from falling into hands of the Atlesian Army." Andre worriedly says in a calm voice. "Thus leaving us dead in the water until either us or our business associate, Cinder, comes up with something."

Adam slumps in his chair exhausted. "That sums it up."

Andre inspects once and an idea forms in his head. "And because of what happened yesterday, all of our contacts within the city have gone silent, fearful that they may be discovered."

"So what?"

"Since Cinder and her three pets haven't shared any information about the current situation in Vale, we are currently flying blind as well." Andre calmly explains.

"What are you suggesting, Andre?"

"I'm suggesting that you go for a walk, clear your head, and find out what is happening in Vale."

"No." Adam flat out states. "We have dedicated scouts for this sort of thing."

"Adam, I was outside when the grunt telling you what happened and I heard him mention Blake being a part of the group of intruders." Andre puts out there. "The cell needs you to be level headed for the times to come and you are the most experienced one out of all of us."

Adam grits his teeth as he begrudgingly accepts Andre's logic. "And last time I checked, General Ironwood considers me more of threat than you, Adam." Andre adds.

"Fine, I'll go." Adam says with huff after a moment of consideration. He gets up from behind the desk to retrieve his coat and Blush & Wilt then proceeds to leave the office leaving his Grimm mask behind.

"Thank you and be careful out there." Andre says as Adam leaves the office with a 'you're welcome' nod.

Adam shuts the door behind him and begins making his way towards the entrance of the warehouse when he passes the planning area. Pausing at the command center, he sees a fuming Cinder leaning over a table trying to come up with a new plan while Emerald dutifully sits nearby waiting for instructions, Mercury lays down taking a nap next to Emerald, and Neopolitan sitting the furthest away from the group as she plays on her scroll. Adam shakes his head at their lack of concern for their allies and continues on his way out.

Later, Adam reaches the outskirts of Vale when he immediately notices a group of police cars in front of a tavern along with group of officers putting a group of handcuffed civilians into the back of the police cars. Seeing this, Adam nervously lays a hand on his weapon as he passes by the scene and a couple of bystanders.

"Ugh, what is the world coming to these days?" one bystander asks.

"I know right? First the White Fang have the gall to release Grimm into the city. Now common criminals think that they have the run of the city." The other bystander exclaims just before Adam is out of earshot. Adam continues on his way through the city making mental notes of the increased security he encountered along the way to distract himself from his stormy thoughts.

Suddenly, a series of gunshots ring out from a nearby alley and Adam rushes over to see what is happening. Inside the alley, he sees a group of four Atlesian Knights gunning down a group of six Creep Grimm while a pair of police officers guards the entrance to the alley. Adam makes note of the fact that Grimm are in still in the city for the near future operations before continuing on.

Eventually, Adam's stomach rumbles as he makes his way through the semi busy markets. So, Adam stops at a nearby café for a meal and overhears an interesting conversation between a dog faunus and a male human.

"Man, I'm lucky that my store sells more than just Dust crystals." The dog Faunus sighs.

"With all that has happened, you're lucky the White Fang only took all of your Dust and nothing else." The human replies.

Adam strolls up to the counter to order his meal and stands off to the side.

"Why did this have to happen to me?" the Faunus asks rhetorically.

The waitress flags Adam down and hands him his food then he goes to sit down near the conversation.

"At least you weren't the only Dust shop to be robbed by the White Fang, right?" the human shrugs sheepishly. "So… silver lining?"

"But that's the thing. My shop wasn't associated with the SDC in anyway and the dust mining company I bought from has treated all of their miners fairly. I even illegally trespassed into one of their mines just to be sure they weren't lying." The Faunus shakes his head in disappointment. "Not to mention that I am obviously Faunus."

Adam stops mid-bite when he hears this information.

A stray thought pops into the male human's head. "This sort of thing didn't always happen, right? Or am I crazy?"

"No, you're not crazy. The White Fang used to only attack shops that weren't Faunus friendly and denied service to Faunus'. The dog Faunus explains. "Nowadays, it feels like the White Fang no longer cares about the Faunus, especially after what happened yesterday."

Adam grits his teeth and lets out a barely audible disheartened sigh at the last thing the dog Faunus said. He quickly finishes his meal and cleans up before hastily exiting the café to continue his journey through the city. As he walks through the city, Adam listens to various conversations without being obvious but all he finds is rising anger towards the White Fang among the Vale's Faunus population and the general Vale population worrying about the future.

Adam eventually comes to a stop and rests against a side of a building to gather his thoughts on the current situation. He lets out a long and heavy sigh but a loud cry of pain shakes him from his thoughts. Ahead of him outside of a store, a male human clutching the side of his face and female human slowly advance towards a scared female deer Faunus.

"I said we are not a part of the White Fang!" The deer Faunus shakily exclaims as she backs up, eyeing the two humans cautiously.

"If that were the case, then why did you hide your bag from us?" the female human menacingly asks, pulling a hidden pistol from the waistband of her pants while her partner pulls out a knife.

Adam goes to rush over to the deer Faunus to defend her but a pair of human police officers rush past him. The officers quickly subdue, handcuff, and search the two humans, rescuing the deer Faunus in the process. The scene perplexes Adam as one of the officers checks on the deer Faunus without uttering a single racist comment while the other officer reads the pair of human's Miranda rights without giving in to the pair's poor attempts at trying to get out of the arrest through bribery and threats.

Adam cautiously walks past this scene while trying to resist stealing a couple glances as he makes a note to himself to ask Andre for reports on the Vale police force. As he fast walks through the city, Adam debates whether or not to return to the hideout since the information he collected so far has raised more questions than answers. Deep in his thoughts, Adam unknowingly wanders into a residential area.

Out of nowhere, the sound of a child crying shakes Adam from his thoughts, causing him to stop in his tracks. He looks around for source of the crying and what he finds chills him to the bone when he discovers an all too familiar scene. Across the street in a half destroyed building, a young boy on his knees cries his eyes out next to the dead bodies of what Adam assumes is the boy's parents and about 15 feet from the boy are a couple of still dissolving corpses of some sort of Grimm as several police officers and a couple of Atlesian Knights stand guard over the scene.

A trembling Adam tears his gaze away from the scene and begins running away as a long forgotten and unwanted memory finds its way to the surface of his mind.

Rain pounds against the windows of the wrecked Taurus household as an 8 year old Adam struggles and thrashes against the police officer's arm that is trying desperately to hold him back. In front of him is the bodies of his parents lying face down in a puddle of blood. "Mom! Dad! Please, wake up!"

Eventually, Adam stops running long enough to somewhat calm down as he leans against a building to steady himself and to keep himself from hyperventilating. He clutches his left hand in an attempt to stop himself from trembling as the unwanted memories fades away.

An 8 year old Adam clutches the railing in the courtroom with nervous anticipation as the representative of the jury stands up to deliver the verdict. "On the charges of breaking and entering and two counts of first degree murder. We, the jury, finds the defendants… NOT GUILTY."

Suddenly the sound of metal and glass being crushed snaps Adam out of his memories as a terrified scream and the barks of a pair of beowolves. Looking around, he sees a pair of beowolves attacking a caved in passenger side of a car with a trapped ram Faunus woman inside in an intersection in front of him. Without thinking, he dashes towards the beowolves with a hand clutching Wilt's grip when he sees no police officers or Atlesian Knights in the area.

Adam unleashes a single upwards slash into the beowolf killing it in front of him instantly as a blond figure comes flying out of nowhere burying their fist into the top of the other beowolf's skull with what sounded like a shotgun blast. He sheathes Wilt inside of Blush's sheath-like barrel and gets good look at the blond figure standing over the dissolving corpse of the other beowolf who turns out to be a young woman with a long wild mane of luscious blond hair. The sound of sound of someone opening a car door reminds him why he was there, so he and the blond woman rushes to the driver's side of the car to make sure that the woman is okay.

"Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!" The Ram Faunus woman says over and over with tears of joy as she climbs out of the car. She pulls Adam and the blond woman into a hug when he smells a very familiar scent he recognizes from somewhere coming from the blond woman but can't put a finger on it because it is mixed with an unknown scent coming the blond as well.

"Your welcome, ma'am." The blond woman chuckles.

"But how did this happen?" Adam asks immediately afterwards.

The ram Faunus looks down and away as the relieved expression on her face becomes saddened. She begins explaining that because of Torchwick's decision to launch the train early, a Faunus hating vigilante group, that the pair of human thugs Adam encountered earlier must have been a part of, rose up in response to the police's and Atlesian Army's inaction towards the White Fang. Adam balls fists while the blond puts a reassuring on the ram Faunus's shoulder after she explains how she was being harassed for not being affected by what happened before being saved police.

Adam tunes out the conversation when he notices a police car coming towards them in the distance. "I- I should go." Adam nervously says just before turning around and hurriedly walks away.

Questions on the future of his White Fang cell swirl in Adam's head as he fast walks down the sidewalk. He shakes his head trying to get the questions out of his head but a stray thought worms its way in anyways: What if Cinder is wrong about the plan? He pauses for a moment scowling at the thought before turning into a nearby alley to gather up his thoughts.

"If only you didn't leave, Blake." He mutters to himself, leaning against a wall.

A gentle gust of wind blows into the alley past Adam's nose causing him sniffs the air with curiosity. He finally realizes why he recognizes one of the smells the blond woman had on her because it is the one and only scent of Blake Belladonna.

"Adam Taurus?" Someone asks behind him as an idea on how to draw out Blake forms in his head.

"Yes?" Adam responds with a smirk on his face as he turns in time to see the young blond woman's punch fly towards him.


Feedback and comments of any sort is very much appreciated. It would help me gauge how well I am doing and allow me to see if I missed any mistakes I unknowingly made when writing.