Note: We have returned, and so has the plot! Not much to say this time, so enjoy.
Yang watched her teammates with anticipation. The entire room was on edge as Weiss and Blake stood across from each other, ready to duel once again. Yang had spent most of the week in a state of atrophy, drained from a difficult set of midterms, but the conflict in front of her brought her racing back to life.
"Let's get it on already, girls!" Yang cried. "Fall Break starts in twenty minutes, and I don't plan on waiting around."
The combatants were undeterred. They had every reason to stay focused. Over the past several weeks, they had tied each other at fifty-two wins, and both were eager to prove themselves. If the heiress pulled through, Weiss knew Ruby would have to develop a new schedule for her—there was obviously no purpose of Blake tutoring her if she was no longer superior. Switching out Blake for Yang was a strong possibility, as it would help train Weiss for a vastly different fighting style, but on the other hand, Yang needed as much time to study as she could afford. Blake would most likely be happy being done with the duels herself, but she made no intention of throwing the match. She wanted to beat Weiss into submission, no matter the cost. It was, in some strange way, her noblest trait.
There was, of course, the other matter on the line aside from pride. Yang could not stop bouncing in her seat as she glanced to the bag of goodies next to her: an entire bag of shriveled, bright red peppers. She was rather proud of her ability to talk the girls not it. She made sure to make grand gestures to their egos and competitive drive as she convinced them that the loser of their biggest match would have to consume one of the hottest peppers in the Kingdom, an action which she planned to record on her Scroll and watch obsessively. She personally had no idea what would be funnier: watching Weiss stamp around screaming and crying as her sensitive taste buds were lit on fire, or seeing Blake desperately trying to keep her cool as she tried and failed to withstand the heat. Hell, maybe it would be a draw and they would both have to eat. Whatever the case, it was twelve Lien well spent.
The others tried their best to pretend it was a fight similar to any other as they charged towards each other and quickly clashed blades, Yang cheering on from the sidelines. Immediately, she could see their growth since when she last fought beside them. Weiss's traditional swordplay had all but been abandoned; from her posture to her footing, to the speed at which she attacked, the once-refined fencer now attacked with ferocity, each strike meaning to deliver a harsh end to her opponent, though her balance and precision did not fade. Her glyphs had once been used sparingly, only summoned to give her a boost in speed or launch an elemental strike. Instead, she wielded three at once: one permanently locked beneath her feet to further control her movement, and two more hovering tightly around her to defend against any incoming strike. Together, they made up for her lack of Aura, and she used them to their full effect in the battle, darting around Blake from all angles and deflecting any and all attacks as they revolved around her like a twister.
Blake had improved as well. Within moments of the fight starting, she uncoiled the grappling hook attached to her weapon and began using it in combat, twirling it and launching it forward between the cracks of Weiss's defense. Her Semblance usage increased as well, and she was far less blunt in her attack patterns, fading in and out of shadow constantly, dodging behind Weiss only to feign and reappear in the front and attack. She had a higher floor to begin with, but Yang was impressed nonetheless with her study buddy. In fact, it almost made her want to join in on their training sessions,until she remembered that she was already a perfect fighter, and there would be nothing to gain. Still, they were impressive and evenly matched against each other, and Ruby would likely be incredibly proud of how far they had come together, and of the grudging respect that had grown between them through their trial by fire. If Ruby was there, she likely would have told them how absolutely stupendous they were doing.
And, to test that theory, as the battle was drawing to a close and Weiss began to feel as if she gained the upper hand, pressing Blake further and further backward, readying herself to deliver a finishing strike, the door to the gymnasium flew open and Ruby burst into the room screaming.
"Emergency team meeting!" she shouted, just urgent enough for Weiss to avert her eyes across the room to the source of the distraction. The brief moment of hesitation was all Blake needed to regain her footing, lunge forward and tackle Weiss to the ground, straddling her and pressing her sword to the heiress's throat, locking her limbs down so she couldn't move. The glyphs dissipated, and Yang clapped joyously
"Match over," Blake said with a cheeky grin. "I win." Weiss stared at her incredulously, and with a forceful huff, shoved Blake off her chest, and pushed herself to her feet, dusting off her white skirt.
"That doesn't count. I was clearly distracted," Weiss said, irritated.
"That's your fault for taking your eyes off your opponent in the heat of battle," Blake shrugged. "In a real fight, you can't afford to lose focus."
"This isn't a real fight, and that was dirty," Weiss protested.
"I don't know. What do you say, Yang?" Blake asked expectantly.
"Oh, that totally counts," Yang cackled gleefully. "Weiss, time to pepper up."
"I am not eating one of those things," Weiss growled.
However, before the argument could progress any further, and before a single spicy pepper could be consumed, Ruby sprinted over to them and planted her feet in the center of the group, waving her arms frantically.
"What part of 'emergency team meeting' do you not understand?" she asked frantically.
"What could be the emergency?" Yang asked carelessly. "Fall Break starts tomorrow. There can't be any emergencies during a week off from school. The School Gods forbid it."
"This is super important!" Ruby emphasized. "Wait here!" Without another word, Ruby dashed back to the entrance and returned moments later dragging a worn-out Velvet Scarlatina behind her. The upperclassman was still warm and friendly, however, and carried a laptop underneath her arm as Ruby planted her in the middle of the room, showing her off like a trophy.
"Hello, everyone," she said meekly. "How were midterms?"
"You know, same old, same old," Yang said passively.
"We can talk about that later," Ruby said hurriedly. "We need to talk about the huge discovery we've just made."
"Huge discovery?" Weiss questioned.
"See, a while ago after we saved CFVY from the Emerald Forest, I asked Velvet to help out a bit with our…" Ruby lowered her voice. "G-R-I-M-M problem."
"There is literally no reason for you not to say Grimm right now," Blake muttered.
"Anyway, I asked Velvet if she could help me do some research into the Grimm and try to find out anything more about them?"
"I can't believe you still want to think about that thing," Weiss shuddered. "Honestly, I'd rather just forget it ever existed."
"Come on, don't tell me you don't want to know," Ruby insisted. "That thing almost killed us. Considering that, and what Ozpin and Professor Goodwitch tried to hide from us, we can't just ignore them."
"I'm can testify to that," Blake stated. "If it's something they are so desperate to keep a secret, it has to be important."
"That's what I thought," Ruby stated. "And so that's why Velvet has been secretly working for me for the past month to uncover whatever she could about the Grimm. Velvet, tell them what you found."
"Uh, right," Velvet said, opening up her laptop and scanning through her notes. "So, when Ruby asked me to help look into Grimm, the first thing I wanted to do was see if there were any more sightings of Grimm across Vale. I figured that it was unlikely there would only be one, so I looked out for any stories of mysterious sightings of creatures in small villages, or sightings of strange black liquid, or cases where people had been disappearing without explanation."
"And… what did you find?" Yang asked excitedly.
"Well, that's the weird thing. I found nothing," Velvet admitted. "No stories, no spottings… absolutely no Grimm activity over the past several weeks."
"So, you came all the way here to tell us this why?" Weiss asked, annoyed.
"Because I didn't just find nothing. I found less than nothing," Velvet stated. "See, when my teammates first got lost, I was going through a very difficult time. I had considered at one point going into the Emerald Forest myself in order to look for them. Before I did, I performed some research about missing person investigations to maybe learn some things before I went off on my own. One of the stories I came across in my research was about an elderly couple who lived in a remote village. The day before my friends went missing, the man had vanished into the woods, and the woman claimed that he was dragged away from their home by some kind of giant monster. At first, I thought it may have been some animal or she was making it up, but after everything Ruby told me about the Grimm, I decided to take a look at that case again. Except, well, it wasn't there anymore. All information pertaining to the case had vanished from the internet without a trace."
"That's… disconcerting," said Yang.
"And not just that story. I searched back months, but I couldn't find anything even remotely associated with the Grimm. That's what I mean by there being less than nothing. It's almost as if—"
"Someone is actively wiping all the evidence," Blake said knowledgeably. "Now I wonder who would have the authority and the motive to do that?"
"That's not all that's missing," Ruby interjected. "Yang, do you remember that fairy tale Mom used to read to me before bed? About the Huntsmen and the Grimm?"
"I heard it pretty much every night, so how could I forget?" Yang moaned, trying to repress the memories of meaningless childhood resentment.
"After Velvet told me that she couldn't find anything about the Grimm, I decided to do some of my own research to see if I could at least find out more about them from the fairy tales."
"You were seriously looking to picture books to learn more about the giant monster that tried to eat us?" Weiss protested.
"It makes sense in theory!" claimed Ruby. "Those fairy tales are the only knowledge about the Grimm we have, so it makes sense that they have to be based on something, right? Besides, we could barely hurt that thing with our weapons, so trying to find out other ways to kill them is a pretty solid goal. So, I decided to try to buy old fairy tale books that had Grimm stories in them, and guess what happened?"
"They were gone, too," Blake said with a nod.
"Exactly," Ruby said intently. "I searched on my computer and in the library for any fairy tales about Grimm, and they no longer exist. They had just completely disappeared overnight, without a trace. Not only that, but we found out that a few weeks ago, there was a recall order put out on a large number of fairy tale books as well, saying that a lot of these old books had been lined with hazardous chemicals and they had to be returned to the government for safety. So, not only can we not buy any new books, but we can't even rely on the old ones either."
"It's a pretty good tactic to suppress information," Blake said knowingly. "If you erase the things you don't want people to see, eventually they'll start to doubt themselves and forget that it ever existed. It's been a strategy to keep the people in line for ages. Of course, Ozpin would resort to doing it if he didn't want knowledge of the Grimm getting out."
"But someone would notice, right?" asked Yang. "Like, everyone won't just forget that those stories exist."
"Not immediately," Blake stated, "but most people aren't going to care. They'll be so immersed in their own problems that they won't notice if a few fairy tales go missing, or if a few people on the outskirts of society vanish. The people in charge can get away with anything as long as they don't make it inconvenient for the commoner."
"So, where does that leave us?" asked Yang.
"It leaves us with no clear path forward," Ruby said disappointedly. "If Ozpin's trying to keep the truth secret from us, he's doing a pretty good job. We won't be able to do any more research like this, not when the Kingdom controls all the information. That's why I've come up with a different idea: I want us to go back to the Emerald Forest."
"Are you out of your mind?" asked Weiss. "The last time we went down there, not only did we almost die, but we almost ended up getting expelled. You really want to go back?"
"It'll be different this time," Ruby promised. "The Grimm isn't down there anymore, and I want to get CFVY and JNPR to go with us. I know that Beacon probably cleaned the forest out, but maybe they left something behind that we can use to get us some answers. I figure it would be worth a shot."
"What exactly do you expect us to find? A clump of hair? A dead body? How is any of that supposed to help us?"
"I'm just brainstorming here," Ruby said defensively. "It's not like we have any better ideas at the moment. We could do it over break, and no one would know about it."
"Oh, that's a big no from me," Yang stated. "No offense, but I have no interest in dying over my Fall Break. I plan on drinking forty root beer floats and watching some movies."
"Yeah, abut that," Velvet added suddenly, "I know Coco said she would help you with whatever you needed, but if it's over Fall Break, we won't be able to help you. That's when we're doing our Huntsman Partnership."
"You're Huntsman… what?" Ruby asked, surprised.
"Ruby, do you really not know what the Partnerships are?" Weiss scolded.
"To be fair, I have no idea what the Huntsman Partnerships are either," said Yang. Ever the friend, Velvet took a seat next to the firecracker, and with a few keystrokes, pulled up the informative page on her laptop.
"The Huntsman Partnerships are one of the most well-known events for second-years at Beacon. They're technically optional, but pretty much everyone ends up doing them. It's our first taste at real-world experience since starting at training, so it's a pretty big deal."
"What, is it like an internship?" asked Yang.
"Sort of, but much shorter," Velvet kindly explained. "It takes place every year over Fall Break. What happens is that students are allowed to pick a professional Huntsman team to be mentored by, and they pick and choose an assignment to go on together. Getting to work alongside an actual Huntsman team is an incredible opportunity, and I'm so thankful that my teammates are recovered enough to go."
"Why are professional Huntsman teams willing to partner up with a bunch of students?" asked Weiss curiously.
"The school asks them to. Huntsmen and Huntresses work for the government, and since Beacon is a Kingdom-sanctioned academy, they probably don't have much of a choice."
"I thought Valian Huntsmen were more independent than that?"
"It's weird and complicated," Blake explained. "Basically, Vale gives its Huntsmen more freedom than other Kingdoms. The way Huntsmen make their money is through government salaries, with higher pay going to those close to major cities. It's the top teams of Beacon that usually get assigned to those regions, so we have no chance in hell of getting that kind of money, but that's a different story. Anyway, what usually happens is a person will call the police to report a crime, and if the crime is deemed sufficient enough, then it will get sent to a regional Huntsmen Guild, and members there can take up the case if they want. Alternatively, you can just hire Huntsmen directly to help you if you need help faster, but that usually requires a lot of money. In layman's terms: weird and complicated."
"No wonder Vale is such a trash heap," Weiss bemused. "Atlas is infinitely more structured than that nonsense."
"It comes with the fascism," Blake shrugged in agreement.
"But Blake did give a pretty accurate description," Velvet spoke up. "That's how we get Huntsman Partnerships. Because Beacon and the Kingdom are so closely related, the regional Huntsman Guild gives us access to all the cases that they have in their queue, and their members agree to help out the school to help train new Huntsmen and Huntresses. I'm pulling up a list of the cases right now? Here, check it out."
With that, the conversation about the Grimm ground to a halt, as Team RWBY gathered around Velvet's laptop. To be fair, Ruby was aware that they weren't getting anywhere, but she still felt some remorse over how her discoveries fell upon deaf ears. Still, the prospect of learning more about Huntsman traditions was an exciting one, and she couldn't help but be enthralled as Velvet brought up a page containing a list of a hundred contracts, neatly organized and displayed. For Ruby, it was beyond impressive; each case was clearly marked by the task requested of the Huntsmen, the name of the person or police department that set the request in, and the location of the request, as well as a set of icons that, if clicked, revealed additional relevant information. A money icon to display if and how much money was put forth for the completion of the request. A check mark to indicate if a team had taken the assignment. As Velvet scrolled down the page, Ruby couldn't help but marvel at how pretty it looked, and secretly wished she could someday make something so elegantly structured.
"This case right here is the one we're taking," Velvet said, dragging her mouse to a case in the middle of the page. "As the top team in our class, we got to pick first. It's a direct request from a man named Animo Litigi, in the City of Vale. He wants help finding the people vandalizing his thrift shop. He's willing to pay three thousand Lien for the service."
"Damn," Yang whistled. "I hope you get to see some of that."
"I think we only get paid in experience," Velvet said sheepishly. "It's a bit funny, actually. I wanted to take something more stress-free, but Coco was determined to pick something with a lot of action and mystery. She said she wanted to get her blood pumping again. Sometimes, I don't know how I put up with her."
"You know, we should probably start thinking about the Partnerships, too," Weiss stated. "It doesn't hurt to be prepared."
"What other kinds of assignments are there?" asked Yang impatiently. Velvet scrolled further down the page, and for the first time, Team RWBY got to see their future up close. The assignments were wide-ranging, from clearing out a clan of bandits to making deliveries of important goods, to capturing rowdy wild animals. It was good, honest busywork, and despite its simplistic nature, it was hard to deny a certain charm about it. The direct requests were always more fun to look at, and the price was hefty, usually ranging anywhere from one to ten-thousand Lien per request. Combined with a yearly salary, it was enough to make Ruby realize how it was that her father managed to afford such a nice house for them.
Then, as the page was drawing to a close, something caught her eye.
"Wait, scroll back up for a second," Ruby instructed. Unsure, Velvet did as she was told, slowly scrolling in reverse until Ruby's finger darted forward and pressed against the screen. "That icon—what is that?"
The icon in question was a new one: a bright, red exclamation mark in a circle, standing out starkly against the calm blue backdrop of the page. Velvet tilted her head, searching through her memories.
"Oh, that," she said cautiously. "Um, I think that's a sign for a hard referral." She clicked on the icon, and upon reading the description, nodded her head. "Yeah, it means that this case had previously been sent to the police, but they openly turned the case away. Usually, bad cases are just left on the backburner, but this can happen sometimes if the police don't want any association with the case for any reason."
"Not just the police," Yang said, pointing further at the description. "It says the case was also rejected by two other Huntsman Guilds. That's pretty harsh."
Ruby looked at the assignment carefully. Unlike most of the other requests on the page, it was absent almost all icons, save for the icon for the referral and the symbol for a direct payment. Curious, she read the foremost details of the case: Retrieving a Stolen Possession—Zelina Zaripova—1001 Brookside Street, Vegis Province.
"Vegis Province?" Ruby pondered aloud. "That's almost on the other side of Vale. Why would she put in a request here at Beacon?"
"If everyone else rejected her, why not?" Weiss speculated. "Or, maybe she just wants the best Huntsmen available?"
"Check what the rest of the request says," asked Yang. Velvet clicked on the assignment, and a short box of text appeared in front of her, which she quickly read aloud.
"At the end of last month, my home was broken into and a family treasure was stolen from a safe in my living room. The treasure is a rare book that has been passed down my family for generations and is highly valuable to me. I'm requesting that a team of professional Huntsmen assist in discovering the culprits and returning the book to my possession." Velvet backed out of the page and dragged her cursor to the last remaining icon. "That's all it says. I wonder how much money she's offering."
Velvet clicked on the icon, and when the number popped up on the screen, and every person in the room felt their eyes nearly pop out of their skulls.
"One hundred thousand Lien?" they screamed together.
"That… that has to be a mistake, right?" Weiss asked, stunned. "I mean, who would even offer that kind of money to retrieve a book?"
"The better question is: Why isn't anyone taking that money?" Yang asked, jumping out of her seat. "It's one hundred thousand Lien to find some lady's stupid old book. Every Huntsman on the planet should be jumping on that contract."
"Maybe they think it's fraudulent?" Velvet suggested. "It does seem like a suspicious amount of money."
"Or, maybe they're refusing to take it because of the obvious thing you haven't mentioned yet," Blake said suddenly. Since the beginning, she had kept her distance from the others, sitting with her arms crossed away from the computer screen, listening tensely as her teammates lost their minds. She spoke with the same level of calmness and contempt that was expected of her. "Take a look at her name. Zaripova—that's a Faunus surname."
At once, the mood in the room darkened, and a sudden pang of guilt rushed through them. Yang's ambitious smile faded, and as the dark reality of the world reminded her of its place, she took her seat again, speaking somberly.
"Oh."
It was all she felt appropriate to say on the matter. Velvet cleared her throat, trying to expel some of the darkness.
"Of course. How could I not realize it?" she asked with a sad yet knowing smile. She adjusted the fake set of bunny ears on her head and let out a long sigh. "Poor woman. That probably means she'll never get her belongings back."
"I don't get it," Weiss said boldly, shattering the atmosphere. "Are people really so hellbent on hating Faunus that they would turn down a hundred thousand Lien?"
"Would you take the assignment?" Blake said accusingly.
"For that kind of money? Probably," Weiss suggested.
"I'm glad to see that your greed offsets your bigotry," Blake sneered. "Most people, though, would rather burn all the money in Remnant than see a Faunus get treated like anyone else."
"Man… this Kingdom sucks," Yang said dejectedly. "Right, Ruby?"
Ruby said nothing. Ruby was struggling with an idea. It wasn't her fault. She was contemplating the world's hardships just as much as anyone else when a stray thought had forced it way into her head. It was a wicked stray thought, a tempting stray thought, the kind which she couldn't let go even as her instincts told her she should have. The more she thought about that thought, the more she thought it made sense, even though she knew that it did not. It was too simple. Too convenient. Too easy to dismiss. But, if it was right, then it changed everything, and before she could even decide for herself, the words had already come out.
"We need to take this assignment."
"What was that?" Yang asked suspiciously.
"RWBY, us… we should take the Zaripova case," Ruby stated more confidently.
"Ruby, we're still freshmen," Yang reminded her.
"Not literally," Ruby explained. "I'm saying that we buy some bus tickets, head down to Vegis Province, and tell Zelina Zaripova that we're students from Beacon and we're taking the assignment for her. Then, we do everything we can to help her get her book back."
"You know, when I said I would help out the Faunus, I was talking hypothetically," Weiss said crossly.
"Yeah, I'm with Weiss on this," Yang said questioningly. "It's not that I don't feel bad for her. I mean, it's really terrible that this happened, but… I don't know why we should travel halfway across the Kingdom just to help this lady."
"Can't you see it?" Ruby said, frustrated. "Think about it. This woman has her book stolen at the end of the month, exactly around the same time that we had our encounter in the Emerald Forest, and also the same time that books and information about the Grimm start disappearing everywhere around Vale. She says that her book has been passed down for generations, and I'm that as a Faunus, she probably doesn't have all that money, so she wouldn't be offering to pay one hundred thousand Lien unless the book itself was extremely valuable. What if, and I'm just brainstorming here… what if that book contained rare information about the Grimm?"
"Ruby, we are not doing this," Weiss protested.
"No, I'm serious," Ruby exclaimed. "We need to figure out what Ozpin has been hiding from us, and all of our other leads have gone dark. This could be the key that we were looking for. Don't you want to find out the truth?"
"Of course, I do," Weiss said defensively. "It's just that this doesn't seem very well thought out. We're not professional Huntresses. It could be very dangerous."
"More dangerous than taking a Grimm head-on?" Blake spoke up. "I mean, Ruby has a point. I don't just want to sit by and let Ozpin get away with keeping things from us. If this woman might have information to help us fight the Grimm—and that is a very big if—I don't see what the harm would be in checking."
"You people are crazy," Weiss groaned, slapping her forehead. Yang, on the other hand, stretched out in her seat, trying to phrase her words carefully.
"I'm not sure, guys," she said slowly. "I mean, I wasn't exactly planning on spending Fall Break taking a fifteen-hour bus ride to possibly risk my life. It just seems like a lot on such a short notice."
"But Yang, you love spontaneous adventure," Ruby reminded her. "Think of all the fun it would be to go on a real Huntress mission. Think of all the bandits whose butts you'll get to kick."
"I'm don't know. I was really looking forward to having this week off."
"Plus, if you go," Blake said factually, "you'll probably get to keep the reward money."
"Miss Zaripova, I am on the case!" Yang announced proudly, jumping to her feet.
Weiss threw her arms in the air in shock. "I can't believe you people! You're seriously planning on doing this? If you really want to learn about the Grimm from this Faunus, can't you just call her or something?"
"Sorry to say, but I don't think she'd want to talk to a bunch of random kids," Velvet said wisely. "She probably won't trust us enough unless you meet her personally. Faunus can be pretty closed off, understandably so."
Weiss collapsed her face into her hands. "I cannot believe you are doing this. There is no chance in hell I am ever going to travel with—"
The very next day, Weiss packed her suitcase underneath the bus, and sat solemnly between Ruby and Yang as the bus left the station in Vale. She would remain on the bus for fifteen hours, stewing in her own resentment as Team RWBY went off on their first official mission together. It would not end well.