A week or so had passed since the unfortunate incident with Magnus and his (former) eye.
Whilst Magnus, and the rest of his cohort, were relatively quick to forgive, Leman Russ kept on muttering about the cowardice of "magic" and other such fancy powers. He felt as if his honour had been affronted. Not to mention a team mate had been injured. His grumblings went mostly unnoticed, as Fulgrim was quick to reassure Weiss all was well.
And so it was that Team RWBY was walking down the hallways of Beacon relatively trouble free. Of course, there was the small matter of tests, exams, classes and other such school related issues. However, given that they were currently in between exams, they were all happily waltzing down the corridors, smiling and laughing at each other's jokes (Or lack thereof, in some people's cases).
"I didn't realize that there was such an obsession with katanas all of a sudden" Blake said dryly as the laughter from the previous joke died down.
"Eh, it's and up and coming sort of thing" Yang winked. Weiss put her face in her palms whilst Blake just shook her head. Only Ruby didn't catch on, as she blinked in confusion at the statement.
"Really Yang?" Weiss moaned. Yang smirked to herself, but was interrupted when a tall, bald headed chap bumped into her.
"Oh, dreadfully sorry, my mistake young lady" They apologised, raising their hands to indicate they were sorry. Dark eyes glittered cheerfully underneath a strong brow as he stepped back from the annoyed Yang Xiao Long.
"Hey, watch where you're going buddy!" She snapped, pushing them aside without a second thought. Blake shook her head.
"Sorry about her. She's very precious about her personal space"
The newcomer raised an eyebrow.
"Is she? I couldn't tell" They deadpanned. "Alpharius Omegon" They said, extending their hand. Blake shook it heartily.
"Blake Belladonna. And this is-"
"Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee, Yang Xiao Long" They completed, smiling cunningly. Blake blinked.
"Oh, don't worry, your reputation proceeds you. I doubt it would for me"
"Well, that's always nice to hear" Weiss announced, a tad smugly.
Alpharius smirked.
"If you'll excuse me, but I have places to be" He said, nodding at the four girls before he disappeared around the corner.
"Well, he was…nice" Ruby said slowly. Yang huffed.
"Maybe if he didn't barge straight into me" She complained, tapping her scroll in frustration.
"What? The stupid things out of battery! It was working a few minutes ago! What the hell?"
"Come on Yang, you don't need it with you all the time" Ruby moaned.
"She does if she wants to text Sanguinius" Blake smirked. Yang growled at her.
"Be careful, Blakey" Yang hissed menacingly. Blake remained unperturbed as she opened her mouth to respond.
"Oh, what a shame it is. I shall have to take up the mantle of responsibility from you" She yelled, already running down the hall to escape Yang's wrath. Ruby and Weiss just stood in place with neutral expressions as Yang roared like a unchained monster and leapt after her fleeing teammate.
"Here we go again" They both facepalmed simultaneously.
XXX
Elsewhere, in the male bathroom, Alpharius was sniggering to himself as if he had just pulled off the greatest prank in the history of pranks. Part of that was true. He had in fact pranked Yang, but not in the way one might expect.
You see, dear readers, Alpharius had switched Yang's real scroll for a dead one. With a classic trick involving bumping into someone, slight of hand an unseens swap, he had tricked Yang into thinking her scroll had just ran out of battery. Now, with Yang's unlocked scroll, Alpharius would be ready to begin sabotaging it. Joining him in this endeavour was his twin brother, Omegon. The bald twins were laughing mischievously to themselves as Alpharius brandished the real scroll in his hands.
"Alright, now what?" Alpharius asked.
Omegon sniggered.
"Well, based on what we've gathered so far based on our totally not-stalkerish spy network, Yang has a thing for Sanguinius. As does Blake. Try swapping their contact details around in her scroll. She thinks she's messaging one but she is really doing it to the other."
Alpharius laughed maniacally.
"Yes! Yes!" He chuckled between breaths. Omegon smiled wryly.
"So, did you accomplish your part of the mission?" Alpharius asked. Omegon nodded.
"Yep. Swapped out Blake's scroll as well earlier today. Did the exact same thing. So when either party messages Sanguinius, its each other, and messaging each other messages Sanguinius"
The twins chuckled between themselves at their devilry.
"Now, all we need to do is to leave this bathroom separately, and each one of us can replace the fake scrolls of our targets with the real ones. If you take Yang and I take Blake it will make it appear more organic. We don't know how the other got the scroll so if they've caught on, unlikely as it may be, we will genuinely have no idea how we got it. No level of scrutiny on their part will lead them on unless they know there's two of us"
Now, this might seem like an unnecessarily protracted effort to play a prank on two (or three) people, but Alpharius and Omegon really did have nothing better to do with their time. After all, it's not like they had any other use for the fearsome intellects and cunning thinking.
XXX
Cegorach chuckled in the haphazard hallways of the webway.
"Heh. Good one universe"
XXX
"So, shall we commence phase 2?"
Omegon nodded.
"Lets"
The twins fist pumped each other, then departed. Omegon left first, leaving a ten minute window for Alpharius to exit. They went opposite directions in the hallways as they tried to divine a way to plant the real scrolls in the girl's possession.
Maybe he could break into their room and put it in the charger port when they weren't there…
"Hehehehehehehehe" Alpharius rubbed his hands together in the manner a super-villain might as he plotted on his throne of darkness.
"Perfect" He whispered to no-one in particular, really doing himself very little favours to make himself appear sane to any potential observers.
XXX
"Oh, come now, madness is just the spice of life!" Shouted Cegorach suddenly as he was dancing down the webway. Several Harlequin's travelling with him jumped at the sudden outburst and looked at him strangely. There were many legends of the sanity of the laughing god being…sort of non-existent…but this level of self-awareness was somewhat unprecedented. Maybe it was a test…
XXX
Several hours had passed since the first part of the prank had been completed, and now Alpharius was commencing step 2…or were they using phases earlier? Wait, was that his idea or Omegon's?
He honestly couldn't remember.
"Eh, it's not like anyone can read my mind" He chuckled, causing the laughter of several extradimensional cosmic intelligences.
Alpharius had devised a really cunning and utterly, totally, completely and entirely fool-proof plan. He would wait for the girls to leave their dorm, then scale the walls of the dormitory, sneak in via the window (People rarely locked their windows) and swap the scrolls out. Then they would let the fun commence…
Of course, this plan was only fool-proof so long as no one questioned why he was scaling a dormitory to gain access to the window of an all-girls team's room, but hey, who would do that? So long as he climbed fast, no one would bother him.
Or notice him, to be exact. People don't question what they don't see…
After all, it's not in people's nature to look up.
Alpharius hefted himself up along the drainage pipe, arms pulling himself upwards like some sort of super agile ape as he navigated the sheer wall with a grace defying his size. He moved vertically upwards as fast as one might walk on a flat surface, the trick being performed without any hint of effort or self-doubt. Alpharius sniggered to himself as he reached the window, pulling gently out on the rims.
It swung open.
Stepping into the room slowly, he glanced around to confirm (Even though he already knew) that it was empty. Heh. Perfect. No one was here. Treading over the soft carpet to the work desks of BY, he unhooked the fake dead scroll which was stuck in the charging port for a futile attempt to reenergize it and swapped it out for the real deal, albeit sabotaged.
Alpharius noticed that Yang still had her fake scroll here.
Had Omegon yet to perform his side of the deal?
Frowning at his twins lack-lustre commitment to this prank, Alpharius was about to leave when he heard a sound that made him pause in his tracks. The door lock being moved.
Rapidly moving to the window as quickly as he could, he froze in place when the lock turned and the door swung open to reveal…Omegon?
"Brother! What are you doing!" He hissed.
"What? I'm here to swap the scroll around in their room! Last thing they would expect!"
"But that's what I did!"
"So?"
"So get your own creative license you thief!"
"Hey! I came up with this idea first!"
"Then why didn't you do it first!"
"Because I was distracted by…other matters!"
"Such as?"
"I was keeping track of Team RWBY to know when you did your swap!"
"But I never said I was going to swap it out on their persons!"
"I just assumed you would!"
"But that's what I thought you would do!"
Alpharius and Omegon sighed.
"Well, no matter, all's done, let's just leave…"
They were rudely interrupted when the sound of running water came from the bathroom, followed by the door swinging open to reveal an underdressed Blake getting ready for her shower, clad in naught but her towel…
Alpharius froze.
Omegon paused.
Blake blinked.
"Uh…"
"Er…"
"Who…"
Omegon dove for the window. Alpharius sprinted for the door. However, despite having immense grace and coordination, this all went horribly wrong when both twins decided that the best means for exit was the other ones means of entry. As a result, the both ended up tripping over each other and falling flat on their faces.
Blake watched this entire scene unfold without her expression changing.
"Normally, when I imagine tall, strange bald guys in my room when I'm getting ready for a shower they tend to be more…coordinated then this" She deadpanned.
XXX
Slaanesh giggled to himself/herself/itself as he/she/it reclined on their throne.
"Oooooooohhhh, how lewwwwwwddddd" He/she/it moaned, stroking their sides as they watched the scene play out in the mirror.
Khorne growled in anger at Slaanesh's choice of viewing and went to find something else to do. Tzeentch was busy playing a game of chess with Cegorach, a game in which both sides seemed to be cheating. Slaanesh wasn't too familiar with the game, as it doesn't offer enough thrills, but even he/she/it was aware that there weren't meant to be twelve dozen other boards rotating around the main one. Nurgle was busying himself by ranting about how someone named Kaldor Draigo had decided to open up a webway gate to a Necron tomb world underneath Nurgles throne, which led to a constant string of Gauss lasers firing at him every time he went to sit down. Pft. How irrelevant.
Slaanesh had more interesting things to concern him/her/itself with.
XXX
"Cinder…we shouldn't be here…this place is weird" Emerald whispered fearfully as they eyed the small crowd gathered around them.
"I'm not afraid of some loonies dressed all in red gathered around a stone altar" Mercury whispered to her smugly as Cinder raised her hand for them to be silent.
"I was told that you were in charge of this area of Vale" Cinder said clearly to the assembled group. A ragtag cluster of some thirty or so cultists were gathered around a stone altar that had been raised in the middle of this former farming village. A victim was ensnared upon it even now, blood running down miniature tributaries as they twitched feebly, a pitch-black knife run through their heart.
The figure presiding over this horrific act nodded.
"We are indeed" They intoned in a voice that sounded like a thousand snakes whispering in her ear. Cinder stepped forward.
"And you came to take this town by your dedication to this…what did you call your…faith, again?"
"Our faith is the only faith. Our faith is the Old Faith" The man said, smiling a cold smile.
Cinder stepped closer, holding her bow by her side.
"I was told you would make ideal allies"
"The Old Faith helps those who helps themselves"
"And we do to. We came here merely to wonder if you were content to rule over isolated hamlets in the wilds of Vale or if you desired something…more"
"The Old Faith offers us more than material land or power. It offers us more than you could ever know"
"And yet here you are."
"And yet here we are" The man agreed.
"Let's do this simply. I can offer you more. So much more than…this" Cinder said, gesturing at the distasteful scene around them. The man smiled calmly.
"What do you offer that we could need?"
"Why, the kingdom of Vale. Cinder Fall" She smiled, extending her hand to the leader of the cult, noting the eight-pointed star tattooed on his forehead for the first time.
The man took her hand and smiled in return, shaking heartily. Cinder noted how cold his hand was. As if he were dead…
"Kor Phaeron"
Dun dun dun!
Tune in tomorrow to see what else comes from completely out of left field!
Also, shout-out to MrGreen37 for still keeping faith in me. They guy is a great fan. Hats off to him, audience, he deserves a standing ovation for his dedication to this series!