"You know, you told me that your sisters cared about you." Blake crossed her arms, looking at the boy laying in bed.
"They do." Jaune said weakly. The cat faunus raised an eyebrow.
"Do they show their care by torturing you, or is it just Pazi that does that?" Jaune groaned and slowly lifted himself up, wincing a little as the metal ball inside his eye socket rattled around a bit.
"Pazi's just mad at me. She never liked me talking back to her."
"Who doesn't?" Blake smirked at Jaune, who waved a hand at her. Getting himself off the bed, he checked his metal arm, closing and opening his fist, relishing the feeling of having both arms again. Even if one of them was screaming from the agony of being forcefully reattached and modified by his sadistic sister.
Ignoring Blake's rhetorical question, he nodded gratefully at her, smiling. "Thanks for keeping watch over me." She nodded back, not bothering to say a word. After Pazi had decided that everything mechanical about Jaune was nice and fixed, she departed with a firm hug, explaining to Blake that she needed to watch over Jaune to make sure there were no complications.
Blake pulled out her scroll, dialing the number that Pazi had given her yesterday night.
"What in the Dust do you want at this time of night?" Came the static filled, pissed off voice of Pazi, her eyes rimmed red with lack of sleep. Blake blinked uncertainly at the screen, quickly checking the time, even though she was sure that it was early morning. Blake said so, and Pazi blew out a grumpy breath, peering at the wristwatch she was wearing.
"Damn thing's broken again." Pazi muttered, before looking carefully at Blake again. "Whaddya want?"
Blake shifted uneasily from one foot to the other, eyes flickering back and forth towards Pazi and Jaune, who had an inquisitive look on his face.
"You told me to call you when Jaune wasn't in his 'wussy half-coma' anymore."
Pazi scoffed, rolling her eyes. "Please. It usually takes twenty-four hours before Jaune snaps out of it after I take care of him." Blake answered by turning the scroll around, revealing a sitting Jaune, waving slowly at Pazi with his automail hand. Pazi's eyes widened before her face left the screen, glasses fixed in place.
"Give me a minute, I'll be on my way." She said quietly, before unceremoniously ending the call, leaving a bemused Blake and Jaune standing there.
"…What was that all about?" Blake looked at Jaune who shrugged at her, not knowing the answer either. Blake's ears twitched a little, rotating around her head as if trying to escape her skull.
"You're not wearing your bow." Jaune pointed to the top of her head, before realizing that it was pretty obvious that she wasn't. Blake nodded.
"With most of the people gone for the break, I didn't think there was much of a chance that anyone was going to walk into your room. And the bow is really uncomfortable sometimes." Jaune laughed at that, shaking his head. They sat there in silence for a little while, waiting for Jaune's sister to arrive.
"So, what're your plans for the break?" Jaune finally broke the ice, looking at the quiet girl. "Anything special planned?" Blake shook her head.
"Probably going to catch up on my reading. I've been neglecting it lately, with all of the crazy fighting and stuff." Jaune nodded. "What about you?" Blake asked, head tilted to the side.
"A-actually, I was going to do some experiments with the stone, and I was sort of hoping that you could help me if I needed a hand." Blake's ears stood up straight in surprise, but that was the only indication that she was caught off guard by the offer.
"Well, I wasn't really planning on doing anything during the break anyways." She said finally, before narrowing her eyes. "You aren't planning on transmuting my body in any way, are you?" Jaune couldn't help but glance up and down at Blake due to the question, but quickly shook his head.
"No. Just need an extra hand or two if I run short. Or decide to blow my arm off again." Jaune said jokingly.
"Well, that would be really unfortunate now, wouldn't it?"
Jaune hadn't heard the door open up, but apparently Blake did, jumping to a nearby bed and wrapping herself up with the sheets. Jaune turned to see Emerald walking through, a small smile on her face. Jaune was going to say something snarky back, but anything that he had planned to say died in his throat as he saw the state of Emerald.
There were bandages covering almost every part of her open body, from her arms and legs to her midriff, something he noticed when she shifted and her shirt rode up. There were a few rare spots that weren't covered with anything, and those revealed splotchy bruises, along with a few cuts and scratches. Her face was a little better, but there were still a few darker spots that showed evidence of her getting pummeled.
For there to be so much damage on someone who has Aura…
"What happened to you?" Jaune breathed out, making Emerald wince at the question.
"My, uh, leader. She made a bad call during one of our missions. I took the brunt of it. But, how about you? I swear I heard your girly screaming last night. Wanted to check up and make sure you weren't dead." Emerald smiled, which was hard to do with parts of her mouth a little swollen, only able to manage a hard grimace that didn't look right on her face.
"I-yeah, I was getting my arm reattached, but that's not important!" Jaune gestured for her to come closer, which she did reluctantly. His hands rose to gingerly touch a bruise left on her cheek, making her twitch in brief pain.
"Sorry." Jaune murmured, before continuing on, examining the injuries. Emerald backed away after a minute, head low.
"It-it's alright. My Aura should be able to heal it up in another day or two anyways."
Jaune's eyebrows furrowed, lips tightening into a frown. He didn't agree with how dismissive Emerald was with her wounds, but it was obvious that she didn't want to talk about it. With a reluctant nod from Jaune, Emerald tried to pretend as if nothing happened, smiling at Jaune again.
"I was just making sure you were alright." Emerald repeated. Jaune nodded.
"Yeah. My arm got chopped off during the mission. Lucky it was the metal one, huh?" Emerald laughed, nodding.
"Sounded like a rough mission."
Jaune rolled his eyes. "Tell me about it. Even when I try and get away from trouble, it seems to find me and chop off my limbs." Emerald shook her head in amusement.
"Well, maybe you can tell me about it when you've got the time. Glad to see you're alright then."
"Yeah. Glad to, uh. See you too." Jaune said awkwardly, trying hard to keep his eyes focused on hers and not the numerous injuries that she was sporting. With another few meaningless exchanges, she waved him goodbye and departed, meeting face-to-face with Pazi.
"Uh. Hello?" She offered awkwardly. Pazi didn't say a word, eyes critically examining the girl. There was a dismissive nod, and Pazi stepped to the side, letting the girl exit. Waiting for a second until she couldn't hear Emerald's footsteps anymore and looking at Jaune.
"You should be careful around her."
"Why?" Jaune wasn't going to just let her say something like that to his friend. Pazi scowled, marching up to the boy.
"Because I have a bad feeling about her. Call it my big sister intuition, or maternal intuition, or whatever. She's suspicious."
Jaune scoffed at that, but took a step back to distance himself. "How would you know? You didn't even talk to her."
"I don't need to talk to her to know she can't be trusted. Just keep an eye out on her, alright?" Jaune nodded, if only to placate his sister than actually agree on what she was saying. Pazi raised an eyebrow, somehow doubting that Jaune was taking her seriously. Pointing with her chin, she asked, "What's wrong with the kitty?"
Jaune turned to see Blake kneeling beside a nearby bed, covers wrapped around her head.
"She isn't wearing her bow." Jaune assumed, something that was solidified with a nod from Blake, who rose up and pulled the sheets off from over her head, placing them back onto the bed.
"Tsk. I'm still not sure why you would want to hide something as adorable as those cat ears but… I guess I'm not one to talk." Pazi turned her attention towards Jaune, eyeing his automail. "Huh. The arm seems to be working fine. Everything looks to be alright. How's the eye?"
"It's a little wobbly." Jaune replied back, standing still for his sister.
"I'll have to tighten it later then. Everything else is… in good condition then?" Jaune nodded, which made her frown. "Then why are you up right now?" Jaune shrugged a little helplessly.
"Maybe I'm building up some resistance to the pain?" Jaune offered helpfully. Pazi rolled her eyes.
"Didn't sound like that when I was reattaching the arm." Pazi scoffed, blowing some hair out of her face. "No, you still dealt with the pain like a baby. And in the half a dozen or so times that I've done this with you, it's always taken at least a whole day before you came through." Jaune shrugged, unable to find a suitable solution.
"You aren't… taking any drugs, are you?" Came the suspicious question, something that Jaune was quick to reply to.
"No, I am not on drugs, Pazi." Came the flat answer. She stroked her chin thoughtfully.
"Well, something's altered your body in a way that I can't tell. And I'm not sure I'm okay with that." Pazi tapped her chin. "How much blood can one lose before they die?"
"You are not taking my blood. Or cutting me open." Jaune said firmly, glaring at the girl. She waved at him, dismissing the unspoken accusations.
"I'm not going to experiment on you, dear brother. I don't have the tools required to do so. Tell me, you aren't carrying anything that could alter your body or Aura, would you?"
Jaune almost shook his head as a negative, but stopped short, pulling out the blood-red stone that he had taken off of Mirisu's body.
"I've got this." The Philosopher's Stone, an absolute unknown that even he knew nothing about. What Jaune didn't expect was for his sister to react so violently, backing away several steps and gasping, almost overdramatically. Jaune knew better though. Pazi wasn't the type of overdramatize anything. Dust, if anything, she'd be accused of her lack of care in most cases.
"Put that away. This instant, do it now." Pazi commanded, something that Jaune was all too eager to do, putting it back in his pocket.
"Do you know what this is Pazi?"
The woman calmed down, shaking her head. "No."
"No?" Jaune looked at Blake, who also looked confused. "Why did you look so scared if you don't even know what it is?"
"It's like I said Jaune. I don't need to know what it is to know there's something wrong with it." She almost spat the last words out, her face twisted into disgust.
"Wrong with it? Pazi, this is the key for me to get my arm and eye back." Jaune argued, pointing at his pants pocket. His sister looked uncertain, glancing at it again.
"I… don't know Jaune. Something about it disturbs me." Pazi shook her head, clearing her thoughts. "Whatever the case, be careful with it." Jaune nodded.
"I was planning to. I'm going to do a lot of tests to make sure everything's alright with it."
Pazi still had a doubtful look on her face, but nodded reluctantly. "Very well Jaune. Play it very carefully. I have a feeling that… I feel that if you do the wrong thing with it, it could end us all."
Jaune had nothing to say to that, wordlessly nodding towards her.
