"One Loss, One Win"

Once again being stuck after classes were over, Team Amethyst begrudgingly sat by and waited for their professor. Aside from maybe a handful of other teams doing tasks for extra credit, they were certain that they were the only ones forced into after-school work every day simply to scrape by.

Today was rather cool compared to most days, the heat was still present as the sun sunk over the sea of buildings, but considering how hot Vacuo could get during this time, it wasn't so bad. Even if the weather wasn't merciful, they were told to wait outside in a small courtyard just outside Shade. Much of the academy's student body moved on with a free afternoon without the four members of MTST, not that they'd make much use of it anyways, but eventually the one person they waited on finally arrived. He wasn't alone, by his side was a woman with fair skin, dirty-blonde hair, and a set of cat ears that told them that she was a Faunus. She was familiar to only one of the girls. While the rest of MTST simply took one glance at her and couldn't care less, but Maron couldn't help but sit up straight after recognizing the woman.

With a look of disbelief on her face, the blonde took her team by surprise when she pointed a finger at the Faunus and yelled, "What the hell!"

"So, he's got a girl with him, so what?" Came Tenne's response.

"You don't understand, I've seen her before!" Maron tried to explain.

"I don't think we should interfere with the professor's personal life." Tyra suggested, jumping on the back of Tenne's comment with her quiet voice.

"Sinna?" Maron looked to her for support, of course not receiving much more than a glance.

She was about to go on about the incident she witnessed only a few days ago, but the Huntsman and Huntress already arrived. "…just remember about that favor!" The woman said cheerfully.

"Yes, yes, I know. We can catch up later, right now, here they are." Steele said, introducing the new arrival to the poorly ranked team. Steele started, "Girls, thanks to the council being a little skeptical of my word and reports, they want a third party to witness as proof. Lavi, Team Amethyst. Amethyst, Lavi." He introduced.

"So, this is the group of poor souls unable to get by." Lavi said with hands behind her back and a warm smile to her playful remark.

"No! Oh, no I'm not going to comfortably with this!" Maron protested, standing from her seat with all eyes on her.

"No need to make a scene." Steele said.

Maron looked around to check if there was anyone else listening in on them even if the chances were slim to none, "I witnessed her kill someone!"

"You remember that?" Lavi asked, "Maybe I'm getting a little sloppy…"

"And this is exactly why you should keep away from trouble right now, can't you just follow the rest of your team's example?" Steele questioned, already pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration. "Look, we have six days to work on your standing with the school. Six." The man explained.

"Wait, so you knew about this?" Asked a concerned Maron.

"Well I did say that you didn't need to know, plus a mission is a mission. Sometimes a Huntsman just has to get their hands dirty for the mission, especially in Vacuo where we're responsible in keeping the kingdom's peace, security, and it's people safe."

"Can we go now?" Tenne interrupted from behind Maron.

"Of course!" Lavi was quick to answer, then putting a hand on Steele's shoulder to get his full attention, "Come on, why don't we get started?"

He nodded, looking to Maron to say, "Not another word about this today alright? We've got more pressing matters."

- (-) -

With both the older Huntsmen catching up in their own conversation up front, Maron and her team only tagged behind to be led to their destination just outside the city. Though Shade could provide the room for the team's sparring match, it wasn't as 'natural' as fighting out in the field. So, here they were, venturing past the safety of the city just to be physically beaten and thrown around like nothing more they were nothing more than combat practice. Again.

"Do you three really not care that she killed someone?" Maron asked the rest of her team. Looking for at least one person to see the logic behind having the new girl spectate them.

"Look, Maron, even if it was outright murder- which we were just told that it was not and that it was a job- there nothing we can do." A somewhat tired Tenne explained, "For all we knew she might as well be his wife, just look at them!" She finished, gesturing to Steele and Lavi whom appeared to be walking rather close together.

"Yeah, plus it's not like we would even be able to confront her. We can't even defeat the professor…" Tyra reminded.

"She's not his wife! He doesn't live with anyone else." Maron stated.

"Why and how do you know that?" Tenne asked.

"I stuck around after we got back from our trip to see what he was planning to do with that case of Dust we retrieved and just happened to stop by his place along the way." Maron explained.

"Yeah, I'm just not going to ask any further."

For some time, the four remained quiet, not knowing how to recover from the somewhat awkward conversation, but eventually, they arrived at their destination outside the city.

"Alrighty, this should give us plenty of room and we won't end up destroying the training grounds in the process too so it'll be a win-win." Steele said to the group. He and Lavi shared a few words before the woman spoke up.

"Of course, I'll be watching from the sidelines so have fun!" She said to the whole Amethyst, knowing full well that their chances at success might as well have been zero. Lavi weaved through the team, but even with Maron on high alert for any suspicion, she couldn't necessarily see anything distinctive enough to call her out.

The four girls were about to get ready for a brawl, but Steele had something else in mind, "Sinna, just you."

"You can't be serious." The aforementioned girl said.

"Deathly, but you will fight alone one way or another." Steele ordered.

"We both know how it'll end."

"So, you want to give up already? Disappointing, I would have thought you'd have at least learned from past mistakes but evidently you're nothing more than a glorified weight the rest of your team has to drag around."

"Wow that's a deep wound!" Tenne exclaimed. Maron half expected a retort from Sinna but sadly, as amusing as it might have been, there was nothing from the raven-haired girl.

"I already told you, my family-"

"Has a renowned line of Huntsmen and Huntresses, I'm well aware, but you're the black sheep of them all. You can't keep up with academics, so there goes most of your learning." Steele interrupted as he started stepping into Sinna's personal space, "You have absolutely poor social skills, so there's no connections you can rely on." Another step, "And finally, one could see that you are quite literally the worst Huntress Vacuo has to offer. Even the newly enrolled students from primary have greater skill and determination than you do." Another step, "So let me say again that the others in your family, every single one that graduated, were right about you, you are a disappointment. To yourself, your school, and especially your family name, 'Kytao'."

Maron and the others felt the sting, but no matter what they said, Sinna didn't so much as acknowledge them.

"For all of that," Sinna began with a wavery voice, a trembling hand squeezing the handle of her ninjato, and her teeth grinding together, "You will apologize, or I'll kill you in my name…"

Steele was unfazed, looking down on and straight into the watery, crimson eyes and uttered the response that finally set Sinna off, "You can't even kill a Grimm."

Sinna dashed forward, straight into a kick that smashed into her chest and sent her tumbling a little way back. She tried again, this time for a stab, but in an instant a hand wrapped around her wrist, another around her shoulder, and Steele threw her over his shoulder straight down on her back. The third time, Sinna tried to swipe at Steele's legs, but found her blade quickly stepped on by a boot while another met with her chin.

"Oh, now you're eager? If you had this kinda fire in you to begin with we wouldn't be her in the first place." Steele taunted, picking up the blade and tossing it back at Sinna.

"Why don't you use that weapon of yours finally?" Sinna asked, demanding to not be treated so lightly even with her stamina starting to run low.

"Because, you aren't worth it."

The one-sided fight kept up for several minutes with the rest of Team MTST only able to watch in a fit of shock and horror. The Huntsman was never like this as far as they could remember, and frankly it was a little too much to watch.

"Steele, I think you're pushing it too much!" Maron shouted from her seat in the sand. No response. "Professor, I think Sinna's had enough!" Maron yelled out again only for her words to fall on deaf ears. Her teammate was quite battered at this point, a few scraps, bruises, but Sinna just kept getting up. Maron thought that she could see a few cuts made from when the man used Sinna's weapon against her, cuts that actually starting to trickle small droplets of red and still Sinna kept going. The leader of the team could tell that Steele was keeping himself on the defensive as he had done with her only a few days ago. "Steele!" She cried out again as Sinna struggled to pick herself up this time.

"You ever shout into the void, knowing you won't receive an answer?" The sweet-sounding voice of Lavi asked from behind.

"What? Whatever. Just take a look at her she could get seriously injured at this rate." Maron said worriedly.

"I thought you didn't consider your team as 'friends'?" She asked another question.

Maron looked back at Lavi, she kept her eyes on the fight in front of her, light smile unfading, and icy eyes as menacing as when Maron first saw them. "Why aren't they listening?" She asked the Faunus.

"Because they can't hear you." Lavi answered, raising a finger to show three strings tied around her finger, each leading back and tied to the three girls' arms.

Maron ripped it from her arm and grabbed her weapon. "Maron, wait!" Tyra tried to stop her, but failed.

The team leader rushed to the scene after seeing Sinna broken and on her knees, barely having the strength to catch her breath. Quickly drawing an arrow from her quiver and firing upon the Huntsman, Maron was about to use the distraction to push Steele away from Sinna, but her small plan failed when he grabbed the arrow, and threw it at Maron's feet. The arrow exploded into a ball of air that knocked Maron off her feat and straight into the man's arms where he made short work of disarming her and pinning her to the ground, Maron's arm raised behind her and at the mercy of Steele.

"Maron?" Said Steele.

"Yeah?"

"Why are you interfering?" He asked.

"Because I have to."

"You'll only get hurt in the process." He warned. He was about to make his word true, but by Maron's luck, Steele was forced to release her to block an attack from Tenne who challenged him.

The force of the impact was enough to send the Huntsman's feet skidding just a little bit in the sand, but it was definitely not enough to put him down. "Dammit Maron, you can never just leave things alone, can you?" She asked.

"Can't help it." Maron answered.

Steele took his weapon from his back, waiting for the two challengers to ready themselves, "Last chance to back out." He said, glaive now at the ready. Neither budged. "It's always a fight with you two isn't it?"

Tenne was the first to make a move, going in with an overhead strike that Steele simply avoided to target Maron. Both of their polearms clashed together, the only reason Maron hadn't been utterly destroyed was thanks to Tenne providing backup behind Steele even if it didn't achieve much else. The man threw a back-kick right into Tenne's stomach, spinning around to gain momentum to slash at Maron. Maron's staff was knocked out of her hand and as it did so, Steele grabbed it and swiped at her feet with the blade of his own weapon about to thrust into Maron had it not been for Tenne's quick thinking and a good throw of her mace.

Maron kicked Steele away from her, but that only ended up with him continuing his streak on an unarmed Tenne. Unlike Maron and the others though, Tenne could fight hand-to-hand in combination with her semblance. Frozen like a statue, Steele's glaive stopped dead in its tracks upon impact with Tenne's forearm. She managed to snag a few punches before being tripped off her feet and kneed in the stomach. Maron would've charged right into the Huntsman's exposed back, but saw the blade spin around and cut the air centimeters away from her face prompting her to fall to the sand too. With a foot firmly planted in the center of her chest, Maron grabbed Steele's ankle in an attempt to push it off but he was far stronger than her and that was just with physical strength alone.

Maron was once again saved by someone else, this time Tyra- who before was grateful that she didn't have to fight- planted two fists on the man's back and knocked him off of Maron with a burst of air assisting her. Sinna too returned this time slashing as much as she could at the man before having him grab her by her shirt's collar and smashing her into the ground. He was about to finish her with a punch to the stomach but was stopped when his fist met Tenne's. Both their hands met one another again and again with the girl only able to block until finally being pushed into Tyra.

Steele was about to bring down his glaive upon them but a red-tipped arrow hit his hand and, feeling the intensity of the heat, he was forced to let go and watch as his weapon stab the sandy ground. Maron felt an elbow into her stomach when she tried to lunge at the man, but that didn't stop her from bringing her staff around him. She pulled the staff as close as she could, even though it meant having to press herself uncomfortably close to his chest. She looked to Tenne and Tyra who were just getting up, hoping they were fast enough to take advantage of the situation, but the moment she glanced over, Steele grabbed just outside Maron's own grip and spun himself out of her grasp. Stealing her weapon right out of her hands and shoving her away.

Maron could hear the other two desperately try their best but with one without a weapon and the other not fully willing, defeating them was only a matter of time. She punched the sand in frustration, but something metal caught her eye: Steele's glaive. The girl grabbed it, finding it far heavier than her own staff but it was usable and that was enough for her.

By the time Maron had readied herself she witnessed Steele finish off Tyra with a swing of her stolen staff.

Their eyes met, one: cold, the other: determined, both waiting for a fight.

The two met half-way, their respective weapons fighting for their opponent but in the end only one of them was proficient enough to adapt to the weapon they wielded.

Steele used the extra speed and light weight of the weapon for an agile fighting style, dodging and deflecting, even occasionally sliding on the ground to get behind Maron. Even as the metal met each other once more, the victor was already established when Maron couldn't find the time to attempt to go on the offensive. The man managed to get behind his student once more, stealing an arrow from her quiver that she carelessly left equipped. Once Maron realized this, she spun on her heel to try and slash at the man, but in her attempt she failed. The weapon in her hand seized, her forced to the ground with Steele on top of her, an arrow in his hand that loomed over her face. The fight practically ended in an all to familiar position of defeat.

"I said you'd 'only get hurt' didn't I?" Steele asked again between breaths, taking his weapon back and releasing the girl from under him as he dusted himself off.

Maron used her staff as a crutch to pick herself up catching her breath as well, "That was harsh, even for you. Besides you said it yourself, we're a team, we'll lose together if we have to!" She shouted, looking back to the rest of her team that were struggling to help one another up to their feet, Sinna in particular who, for the first time in the whole year she had known her, smiled when Tyra was helping her up. Maron looked back to find a content smile on Steele's face.

"Yeah, you definitely are a team." He said, calling for Lavi who sat quietly on the sidelines as she had said earlier. Whatever he had in store and planned for them, Maron was sure her team could get through it one way or another.

It was then that Maron started putting things together in her head, and whether it was true or not, her mind came to one conclusion: this was all part of the plan, that scheming-

"Come on Maron, let's go home." Tyra interrupted her thoughts, Tenne right behind her carrying an injured Sinna. Maron could only look at the Huntsman's back, still taken aback by whatever it was Steele had made them accomplish.

A.N.: Little by little!

As always, enjoy!

~Firetoast312