Volume 4 of RWBY seems to suggest that the villains are a tight-knit group while the good guys suffered from in-fighting. Yeah, this story's putting a stop to that. Really, all it takes is good communication and you can solve about 95% of your problems. Disclaimer: I don't own RWBY or Devil May Cry.

Chapter 26: Forces Joined

Ruby raced after Weiss as she headed for the Beacon Academy docks, where her sister's airship has just docked. "Winter!," she called out to the young woman who disembarked, along with several Atlesian Knights. Winter saw her younger sister running towards her and smiled. "I thought you'd be rushing here the second you saw my ship. I saw your fight earlier. You still have a long way to go, but I will admit I was impressed with your teamwork. So, this must be Ruby." She looked over to the red-head, who rubbed the back of her head nervously.

Weiss nodded. "Yeah. She may not seem like much, but she is a capable tactician when it truly counts. I hope you're okay with me getting passed over as team leader." Winter gave a dismissive shrug. "The decision ultimately falls with the academy headmasters, and I've never known them to choose wrong. Besides, a good leader doesn't necessarily make a good team. I watched several teams during yesterday's fights that failed due to bad teamwork." Weiss nodded. "Thanks, sister. That makes me feel at ease. So, what are you doing here?"

"I can't discuss it here," Winter replied, "Ironwood told me about you and several other students becoming 'Junior members', so you'll find out when we reach Professor Ozpin's office. That said, I intend to stay until the tournament's conclusion." She then smiled. "Oh, and Whitely says hi." To Ruby's surprise, both sisters started giggling. As the trio started walking, accompanied by the Knights, Winter started discussing things. "General Ironwood mentioned the change in security, calling in assistance from both Vacuo and Mistral. I must admit I was a little surprised, but it does sound practical. So, Weiss, how have you been?"

"I've definitely been enjoying my time here," Weiss said, "It was slow going at first, but I've managed to make quite a few friends." Winter then smirked. "And one boyfriend, if Father's talk with you is any indication. I'd like to meet Mr. Vasilias for myself is possible." Weiss sighed, knowing she'd wind up embarrassed when Winter met Neptune. Still, there was little she could do about it. "You'll likely be seeing him when we meet with Ozpin." Meanwhile, Ruby had gotten ahead just as someone else came up to the group from behind.

Without a word, the figure, Qrow as it happened, took out the Knights walking furthest from the group. "Hey...," he called, clearly half drunk, "Ice queen." Weiss whirled around and yelled, "Why does everyone insist on calling me that!?" Qrow shook his head. "Not you, kid. Your sister." Winter narrowed her eyes. "So you're in town too." Qrow smirked. "Yeah. I saw that gaudy ship of yours and decided to stop by." Winter glared as she approached Qrow. "You do realize you just destroyed Atlas military property, right Qrow?" Weiss became confused. "Wait, you two know each other?"

Winter sighed. "Unfortunately." Qrow chuckled. "Aw, don't be like that. I thought we parted on good terms. By the way, couldn't help but notice all the other, non-Atlesian security forces. Guess Ironwood's become a different type of sellout. Or maybe he just lost faith in his ability to protect the people." Winter started to really get mad. "Just where do you get off saying things like that?" Qrow shrugged. "Just impressed Ironwood finally found his common sense. Makes me wonder what took him so long. Or maybe someone found it for him." Winter calmly drew her sword. "Better silence that tongue before I do it for you."

Qrow smiled and pushed back his bangs, suddenly looking a lot less inebriated. "If you think you can, go for it." Taking the bait, Winter shot forward at a speed that could rival Ruby's Semblance. She made several sword thrusts at Qrow's head, but he calmly dodged each one before brining out his sword Bloodborne. The two then clashed for a few seconds as Ruby noticed the crowd gathering around them and hurried to where Weiss was. "What's going on?," Ruby asked. Weiss pointed to the fight. "Some lunatic is attacking my sister."

Ruby gasped. "That's awful." As she turned to look at the fight, she said, "How would do such a-and it's my uncle!" She became instantly excited as Weiss looked flabbergasted at the revelation. "Kick her butt, Uncle Qrow!," Ruby called out. Weiss was confused at first, but then called out, "Teach him respect Winter!" Meanwhile, Mercury was passing by the crowd, at first uninterested in the fight. However, he saw Qrow out of the corner of his eye and did a double-take. "Oh sweet Dust...," he muttered as he hurried off.

Meanwhile, Winter had finally managed to get a good hit on Qrow's jaw with the hilt of her sword, but he shrugged it off with a smile and a glint in his eye. He then leaped into the air and brought Bloodborne down. Winter quickly used her glyph Semblance to leap out of the way as Qrow hit the ground, tearing up the courtyard with just one blow. Winter landed right outside on the lawn, but Qrow quickly followed her, his attempted slash cutting down one of the lampposts.

Winter jumped over the attack, landing on the wide blade. Smirking, she leapt again and clung to one of the exterior archways of the courtyard. Qrow eyed her for a bit before rushing after her, firing off the shotgun in his weapon. He landed on the opposite archway, the two running parallel as Qrow kept firing. Winter then created a quick mist that covered her form. Qrow waited for a moment to see what she would try, but put his guard up when he saw her flying right at him, sword pointed in his direction. She hit a switch on the hilt, releasing a separate, shorted blade.

Qrow blocked the assault, and the two fell to the courtyard, continuing their clash. After a fierce assault that knocked Qrow back a few feet, he smiled and started to reconfigure his weapon. However, he suddenly saw something and canceled it, then taunted Winter to make her next attack while he put away his weapon. Winter hesitated for a moment, then charged in headlong. She stopped however, when she heard Ironwood call out, "Schnee!" She turned around to see Ironwood standing there, Penny not far from him. "What's going on here?," Ironwood asked.

Winter sighed. "Sorry, Sir. I wound up letting my anger get to me when he insulted our military." Ironwood noticed Qrow and sighed. "Good to see you're finally back." "Indeed," came Ozpin's voice as he, Glynda, and Leonidas walked up to the scene. "Geez Qrow," Leonidas said, "You're lucky I'm a nice guy, or I'd have you arrested for public inebriation. Again." Qrow shrugged. Ozpin chuckled. "All right, everyone. There's a sanctioned fight happening at the Colosseum that has much better seats, and popcorn. So if you would kindly break this up?"

As the crowd dispersed and Glynda started using her Semblance to repair the damage, Ruby leapt at her uncle. Grabbing his arm, she called out, "Uncle Qrow! Hi." Qrow chuckled as Ruby ecstatically said, "Did you miss me? Did you miss me!?" Sarcastically, Qrow replied, "Nope." He rubbed Ruby's head as Ozpin walked over to them. "I think we'll be having an additional discussion in my office." Qrow blinked, then bent over to whisper to Ruby, "I think I'm in trouble." Ruby grinned. "You did kinda tear up our courtyard."

Later in Ozpin's office, Qrow saw there were more than Ozpin, Glynda, Ironwood, Leonidas, and Winter there. Ozpin had allowed Ruby and Weiss to follow them, plus the rest of their team was already there. Penny was joined by her own team, plus there were Teams JNPR, CRDL, SSSN, and SLVR. "Nobody told me there was a recruitment drive," Qrow said, "Did you guys finally talk out your problems while I was gone?" "Depends," Leonidas said with a smirk, "Have you actually gone a whole minute without downing some kind of liquor?"

Qrow blinked and looked around. "We do have students here..." Yang chuckled. "Me and Ruby sometimes refer to him as our 'Drunkle Qrow'," she said to Blake, making her burst out in laughter. Ironwood cleared his throat. "Regarding your earlier... Confrontation... I take it you are least somewhat aware of what we've been doing." "Yeah," Qrow said, "And despite my earlier quips I really am impressed. So, does this mean you've finally stopped arguing and started making some headway?" "Yeah," Leonidas said as he brought up his scroll, while a large vid-screen popped up.

"Here you see the results of the Team Round of the tournament," Leonidas explained, "I don't know if you saw the fights yesterday, but some of my men did see you arrive in Vale in time for today's fights." Qrow nodded. "Yeah, I saw 'em. What of it? Seemed like a typical tournament." Leonidas nodded, then isolated the previous day's fights. CRDL had battled Team ASRE (azure) of Atlas and won. Team JINX of Atlas won against Team FLME (flame) of Haven. Team IVRY (ivory) of Shade won against Team HNTR (hunter) of Atlas. Team KOBE of Haven won against Team GRZL (grizzly) of Beacon.

Then there was the inter-academy fights. For Beacon there was Team CFVY and Team DMND (diamond) with CFVY winning. Atlas had Teams SABR (saber) and BNDT (bandit) with SABR winning. Shade had Teams MTLL (metal) and DSRT (desert) with MTLL winning. Finally, Haven had Teams FLLW (fallow) and JNGL (jungle) with FLLW winning. It didn't take Qrow long to realize what the problem was. "There's an even number of teams from each academy going into the Doubles Round."

Leonidas nodded. "While it is certainly plausible for such an outcome to occur, the very nature of the tournament renders the odds of it happening very remote. In fact, never once has it ever happened in the history of the Vytal Festival Tournament. Now, because it is theoretically possible, I didn't immediately think 'this is something our enemies' did', so I dug deeper. And then I noticed something when I checked the stats for the contestants." He brought the fights that for the teams present. What everyone saw in the room shocked them. "Wait," Ruby said, "We all had an advantage over our opponents?"

Leonidas nodded. "An overwhelming advantage, especially your team and Team JNPR. Suddenly it looked a little more like someone was rigging the tournament roster. To double-check that, I went straight to the only thing I knew would able to do that, the virus planted in the CCT. While most of its programs have been stopped, it's still linked to certain functions. And sure enough, there was a program that would let the host user manipulate the tournament to their advantage." Ironwood grumbled. "Trying to shut down the CCT, manipulating the Vytal Festival Tournament..."

"And let's not forget the attack on Amber," Qrow chimed in. Ironwood nodded. "Our enemies are striking our civilization where it hurts... The very symbols of our kingdoms' unity." Jaune grew angry. "Dad, these people... Could they be responsible for what happened to Mom?" Leonidas sighed and nodded. "I'm afraid so. They knew the Arc family would be a great hindrance to them, and so sought to cripple us." Ironwood turned to Leonidas and nodded, and the police chief brought up a picture of Team MACE as they knew them.

"Supposedly this is a team from Haven," Ironwood explained, "While we know that a Team MACE exists, Haven's records have been hit with a similar virus. They're currently swamped with clearing out their files." "Which is more reliable than a lengthy check of the students, I get it," Qrow said. He took a good look at the four pictures. "I don't recognize that girl Alice, but the other three were definitely there when Amber was attacked. What made you suspicious of them?" "That would be because of me," Ren chimed in, "My Semblance allows me to detect inconsistencies in the physiology of any living being or Grimm, and it's based on my current perception."

Jaune stepped forward. "Those three have been passing themselves off as students, but Ren's Semblance noted they were too old to be students. So, unless they've, like, been held back or something..." "I thought our infiltrators to be mere grunts working for our enemies," Ironwood said, "But if they are the ones responsible for the attack of one of our guardians, then extra steps must be taken. For now we should let the tournament continue, in spite of their manipulation. Then once they've shown their hand, we play our trump card."

Meanwhile in Cinder's dorm, Mercury was relaying what he saw. "And you're sure it's him?," Cinder asked. "Oh yeah," Mercury replied, "Guy's rather distinctive." Emerald grew worried. "What do we do about this?" Cinder shrugged. "There's nothing we have to do. They don't know who we are, so we don't have to worry about being found. And we still have control over the system, so we can manipulate the tournament as we need." She made a few commands on her scroll. "We'll be having our next battle against Team CFVY. You two should be able to handle Coco and Yatsuhashi. Be sure to give the crowd a good fight." She grinned, but inwardly the situation had her worried.

To be continued...

In for a penny, in for a pound, eh Cinder? Yeah, she knows something's wrong, but right now her plans are in motion and to back out would be a sign of weakness she really cannot afford. Read and review.