Sure enough, Ozpin showed up later that day with a knock on the door to have a meeting with James and Qrow in person.
When they arrived, James and Qrow had been in James' office, doing their best to get things ready for Ozpin's inevitable visit. While James was clearing off the pinboard on one side of the room, Qrow had decided to make himself comfortable in James' computer chair as he thought about what would even happen once Ozpin showed up to make more plans for the job ahead.
When Ozpin knocked on the door, James excused himself for a moment to make sure that he had everything that he was going to need. Qrow was left to wait in the office and couldn't help but groan. This was the part where things were going to start to fall apart. Qrow didn't have anything to do with planning this job, and because Ozpin didn't know that he was going to be there it was going to be a problem.
Normally, Qrow would have been much more okay with being the unknown factor. But with Ozpin, he wasn't so sure. They carried threats that were all their own, vague as they were. Qrow couldn't help but be afraid.
Qrow had to wait there in James' office for a few minutes, but soon enough James and Ozpin entered the room together, with each carrying a mug of coffee, and James carrying a second one that he set down in front of Qrow without a word. A quick glance at the drink told Qrow that James had fixed in the way that Qrow normally liked it.
Ozpin gave Qrow a look, seemingly almost surprised by what was going on. Ozpin had probably already picked up on the fact that they had company when James had made a third drink in the kitchen. "Qrow." Ozpin said as they took one of the two seats that were still left in the office. James took his seat and made himself comfortable as well and leaned back into it.
"Hey Oz." Qrow greeted their leader as he leaned back in his seat a little bit more. "Sorry to be a surprise."
"A pleasant one, if the truth must be told." Ozpin commented. "Though I must say, I have a few questions about why you are here." They blinked and stared at James directly, and Qrow didn't miss for a second the way that James went completely rigid over Ozpin's comment. James wasn't comfortable with this either.
In fact, Ozpin probably knew exactly what was going on. They probably knew exactly what specific nerve they were attacking at the moment. Qrow almost wanted to say something, but he decided not to comment on it. If he started feeling like he needed to say something, then he was going to. It just depended on what James had to say for himself.
"Qrow is here because he's been down on his luck lately." James spoke up, locking his eyes onto Ozpin and giving them a death stare of sorts. There was a definite power play at work, and Qrow didn't know what he wanted to do once things got going. Maybe he was going to need to stay out of the way.
Maybe not.
"That's rather interesting, James." Ozpin commented before looking at Qrow. "So where were you staying last week?"
"With my family." Qrow said, his eyes narrowing slightly. "They were missing me and I figured that the least I could do was make sure that they got to see me for a bit."
Ozpin's gaze travelled over to James as they tried to figure out what was going on there. It was awkward, it was a situation that James needed to deal with, but Qrow knew that he could only do so much on this front.
"Very well." Ozpin commented before looking over at James. "I suppose that we have some work to do, though I must say-" Their eyes strayed over to Qrow. "I wasn't suspecting that there would be company."
"We have work to do." James said, doing his best not to comment on the other thing that Ozpin had said. "I thought that we should discuss placement throughout the plan."
"You are aware that what we did last time probably won't work, right James?"
"i'm well aware." James answered all too calmly. "Though I do think that there are some parts of the plan from last time that worked out rather well."
"And what exactly would you include in that?" Ozpin asked, peering over their mug of coffee to watch James carefully. "The infiltration was..."
"Not the infiltration." James answered, raising a hand to stop Ozpin. The right hand, Qrow realized quickly. "I'm referring to the getaway." For a second James' hand trembled before James balled it into a fist and set it down into his lap. Qrow swallowed, realizing what James was doing instantly. James was talking about doing something again that had almost cost him his life. And James was doing everything in his power to hide his fear.
"You may have to jog my memory." Ozpin answered before their eyes flickered over in Qrow's direction for a moment. "And it may do well to fill in the gaps for Mr. Branwen, seeing as he wasn't yet a part of our..." Ozpin paused with a low hum. "Organization."
Qrow blinked and looked up to see James nodding slowly. "Well..."
There was a moment of hesitation before James slipped behind the desk with Qrow and leaned over his body so that he could access something on the desk. Qrow would have edged out of the way, but instead found himself penned in by the sheer size of James' body.
James opened one of the cabinets in the desk and reached in to remove a worn black notebook that reminded Qrow of the small one that James liked to carry with him to their meetings. He closed the drawer once again, and then James was gone, and Qrow had his own space again.
Qrow watched James retake his seat and flip open the book, seemingly looking for something in particular before finding it. "Our getaway-" James began to explain before passing the book to Ozpin. "Was separate cars, all identical, all wired to explode when we needed them to." James blinked and looked up at Ozpin. "We took different directions and did our best not to get noticed, and if something went wrong we were meant to maneuver for each other's safety."
"You do realize that part of this plan backfired, don't you James?" Ozpin and James' eyes met, and there was definite tension that Qrow didn't want to get between for a second. "You almost-"
"A freak accident." James answered, his voice too quietly. "There was..." He shook his head. "It doesn't matter. The point is that it was working, the police didn't know where to go, and everyone was able to ditch their cars and get back to the safe zone when they had a chance to jump to public transit."
"That's not true, James."
"It was a freak accident." James reiterated. His jaw was set and completely tense, and Qrow couldn't blame the guy for it. He knew that this sort of thing was already hard to talk about for James, and he couldn't even begin to imagine what he was going to have to deal with later on.
Ozpin blinked and leaned forward in their chair, just slightly enough so that they could get some leverage and meet James' eyes. "And you insist that this is the best way to do this?"
"Yes." James answered quietly. "I do."
Ozpin let out a heavy sigh and leaned back in their seat. "Very well then. I'll make the arrangements." A pause. "Do you still want them ready to be..."
"Yes."
Qrow looked between Ozpin and James. He had more than just a few questions sticking in the back of his mind that he couldn't exactly go ahead and just voice, not yet at least. There was too much awkwardness, and it seemed like he was stuck in the middle of two people who were doing their best to fight and see who had the most power in this situation.
For the first time, there was nothing that Qrow could imagine about all of this going well. If James and Ozpin were going to try and subtly fight their way through every question like this, then he was going to have a lot to deal with in the future. A part of him wanted to reach out to Roman and Junior so that he could let them know what he was hearing, but Qrow wasn't sure that he could quite go ahead and do that.
He didn't know if telling people the plans being made ahead of time was considered compromising them.
If it was, Qrow didn't want to be the one making things get worse and worse for them. Everyone needed to be able to feel secure once a job got going. It was just that now he was in the middle of seeing what it was like when these sort of jobs got planned.
"So I must ask," James said as he flipped from page to page in his book in search of something. "Is there are a particular reason that you want to attack this particular bank?"
Qrow raised an eyebrow. That wasn't the sort of thing that he'd been expecting to get brought up in the room. Sure, in the past there had always been some sort of speculation on the reasons for which they were doing the things that they were, since it rarely focused on cash alone. The gas stations had been about disrupting a particular business, the banquet had been about trying to sink the Salem Group.
What could this have to do with anything?
"Well," Ozpin began, a slight smirk quirking at the corner of their lips. "I'm just attacking the many businesses that Salem has her hands in, and there are a lot of them."
Qrow blinked. Had they been attacking the same person all along and nobody had realized it? Maybe it was a matter of nobody quite being willing to go ahead and ask the questions about what they were doing. The gas stations had been about Grimm United, Qrow remembered. The banquet had been about the Salem Group itself.
So the bank...
"Very well." James said, his voice cool. Qrow blinked and glued his eyes to James' face, just trying to figure out what was going on in his head. this was one of those times where James seemed to lock down all of his feelings in favor of going ahead and taking control through a lack of emotion. Qrow was sure that he'd see something after when James bothered to let it all out again. "So why the second bank of Atlas?"
"Well," Ozpin paused. "It's where Salem's personal accounts seem to be held." They blinked. "Not to mention that she has some power in the management levels."
"Connections, then."
"Yes." Ozpin answered. "In this case, the bank is owned by a Dr. Arthur Watts, I'm sure you'll be able to find plenty of information on him. He's been using questionable business practices for a while..."
"With all due respect," James began, "Every company has questionable business practices."
Ozpin hummed quietly, almost like they didn't quite know what they wanted to say to James at that. Qrow supposed that if he was put in that position he wouldn't quite know what to say or do either, but to see that from Ozpin was weird. Normally they held themself in a way that made them seem unshakable.
Probably because it was a way for them to guarantee that they held power over everyone else in the room when it came time for them to have meetings. Qrow couldn't blame anyone for that, but now that he was in the room with James and Ozpin alone, and nobody else, it was weird watching the fight.
The struggle between the two of them was more than just a little bit subdued.
"I suppose you are right." Ozpin commented quietly as they folded one leg over the other. They kept their eyes glued to James the entire time. "Though her business tends to be a bit more corrupt than others."
"What is this really all about?" James asked, his eyes narrowing as he leaned in towards Ozpin slightly in an attempt to establish his physical dominance. Qrow had to swallow and force himself not to try to imagine what it would be like to be on the receiving end of this sort of behavior. He was pretty sure that he wouldn't do that well if it were to happen.
For more than a few reasons.
Ozpin didn't seem to buckle though. They locked their eyes onto James' and just leaned a little bit further back in their seat. "James, why don't you sit down."
"Don't tell me what to-"
"James." Ozpin spoke up again, this time with their voice a lot more forceful than it had been before. "Sit down and I would be happy to explain everything."
Qrow let his gaze travel between the two of them, in search of something that would be enough to decode what was going on. At this point, he was mostly just glad to be able to sit back and not get into the middle of everything that was going on. The fact that this was a conflict that was being kept almost entirely between James and Ozpin was something that Qrow was grateful for, at least on some level.
FInally James relented though. He sat down and crossed his arms over his chest in an attempt to close himself off from Qrow and Ozpin both.
Ozpin stood up and took their place at the front of the room in the hopes that they were going to be able to command the attention of the two other people that were in the room. Qrow didn't try to move himself, mostly because the most important thing at that point was just making sure that neither of them tried to get too far in the way.
Not that James was going to sit back and wait.
"I've decided on this target because of its closeness to Salem's associates." Ozpin explained quietly. "Arthur Watts and Salem have worked together for years, with Salem running her business and Watts being happy to ensure that she had any resources that she could ever possibly need." Ozpin's gaze glued onto Qrow's. "In this case, what we are dealing with is an attempt to dismantle Salem's business from the top down."
"And what good does robbing this place actually do?" James spoke up, his voice too deep and almost worried sounding. "Aside from get a bunch of money into our pockets."
"My plan," Ozpin said with a quiet sigh that almost spoke of some sort of exasperation. "Is to remove this bank from play. Once it's out of play, most of Salem's main accounts will go down with it, and at that point between the main sources of her finances will be downed. With any luck, having the bank robbed will take that down for at least a little while."
"...And then what?" Qrow spoke up, a little bit unsure that he was actually following what Ozpin was talking about properly. " Because I'm not sure that I follow."
"With the combined number of strikes that we've done against her businesses, her accounts going dark, her stations destroyed..." Ozpin smiled, just slightly. "It'll be enough to take her business down."
Qrow blinked and shifted slightly, because he wasn't sure about what he wanted to make of things anymore. "So what do you have against this lady anyways?" It was a question that Qrow had been wanting to ask for a long time, but had never quite found a reason to ask it. "Because I can't quite figure out what the endgame in this is."
He looked over at James, wondering whether or not James was going to have any idea what the answer to Qrow's question was going to be. Maybe because James had been there longer, it would mean that he was going to have an idea about what was going on.
But when he looked at James, Qrow didn't see anything there. He didn't see any sort of knowing, and when their eyes met, neither of them said anything. There was no comfort in the eye contact that the two of them made, there was only the sign that they were both feeling just as confused by everything.
James paused.
So did Qrow.
"Salem..." Ozpin began to explain. "Well, that's not her real name, for one, but she and I have some history, one could say."
"You better not be dragging us into some sort of divorce or something." Qrow spoke up, his eyes narrowing as he leaned forward towards Ozpin slightly. "Because if you've had us bombing-"
"I can assure the both of you that this has nothing to do with... romantic entanglements." Ozpin said quietly. "Salem and I used to be business partners of sorts. We had several differences when it came to our business that we couldn't patch up so easily. She and I went our separate ways, and she became incredibly successful."
"So what's your problem then?" Qrow waited.
"I watched my old partner get wrapped up in business that she and I never would have done before. I saw her begin to dip her fingers into things that she shouldn't have, and I saw her become more and more corrupted by what she was doing."
Qrow let his eyes stray back over to James as he tried to figure out what he was even supposed to say over that. It sounded like Ozpin had their reasons for what they were doing, but at the same time there was just something extremely off about their explanation. James met his eyes, but didn't say anything, just held the eye contact between them for a moment before turning his attention back to Ozpin.
However, that was more than enough for Qrow. It told him that James was feeling just as unsettled by everything as he was. Maybe this was just going to be a regular thing for them.
But Qrow wasn't just going to let this go at the mention of Salem becoming corrupt. There was still something wrong, something that was disproportionate to what had been going on.
"So your way of dealing with her business practices is to rob and attack her?" Qrow leaned forward in his seat slightly and locked his eyes with Ozpin's. They were probably going to take the chance to get out from under his attention, but Qrow needed this.
"If it were me in her position, I can assure you that she would be doing the same." Ozpin commented all too nonchalantly as they sipped their coffee. "Though, I believe we're straying from the topic at hand." Ozpin turned slightly and looked at what James had set up on the pinboard that was located directly behind them.
There were a few things, all carefully notated and placed in ways so that each piece could be carefully connected. The main thing was a map, with pins that James had placed there to mark all of the bank locations in the city, then there were red marks that Qrow had to guess correlated with something that they were going to have to pay close attention to.
It looked like James had drawn out a number of driving routes through the city, but Qrow didn't want to mention them since it was entirely possible that James was reusing an old map from when they had made plans to attack a bank in the city before.
"Of course." James said, his jaw set as he approached the pinboard himself. "We're going to have to set up a group to do reconnaissance on the area and look over the escape routes."
"Have you thought of assignments yet?" Ozpin asked, their eyes straying over to James. "Or should I do that?"
James inhaled deeply and hesitated for a moment before speaking up. "I figured that since there were going to be separate escapes by the looks of things, it was going to be up to everyone to look over their own routes." James hesitated. "What's going to matter is how things look once we take a proper look at getting everyone in."
"Did you have anything in mind?" Ozpin hummed quietly. "Because if you intend to have Winter..."
"If she's involved, she's going to be the eyes on the outside of the bank." James said quietly. "I'm not sure that she should be getting into the middle of a big job like this one when she's so young."
"Have you considered Roman and Junior?"
"Not yet." James admitted quietly. "I figure we're going to need someone to play security there."
"In all likelihood." Ozpin commented with a quiet hum. "Junior has that sort of work on his resume enough that it shouldn't be an issue."
James sighed heavily, sounding like he wasn't feeling the most confident about what was going on, but willing to accept and at least talk about what was being put on the table for them to deal with. Qrow watched as one of his hands slid down into his pocket, and James was quick to remove a pen which he was nervously capping and uncapping as a way to keep himself feeling a little bit more occupied.
"Junior would be an easy match to get us on the inside." James commented quietly. "If we can get him installed with a carrier company..."
Ozpin turned slightly and looked over at James. Their brow was somewhat furrowed with concentration, and Qrow couldn't help but be unsure of what to go ahead and do to help with the way that things were going.
"What are you planning to do?" Ozpin asked James. "I know that you might have one of the best ins for the bank but..." There was a pause, something hanging in the air. Qrow didn't miss the way that James' shoulders went all stiff with frustration over something that hadn't been brought up just yet. He wanted to ask the question, or to at least be able to get up and try to comfort James somewhat, but couldn't do that.
Not with Ozpin in the room.
But James just sighed and shook his head before lifting a hand to push his hair back out of his face so that he could get his head back under his control. Like there was just something that hadn't been breached that they were both afraid to bring up. "Yes." James finally answered after a long while. "I would have to go back to work, I suppose."
"Do you think they'll take you back?"
Qrow blinked, a little bit unsure of what he could say. But he had questions that he needed to ask- ones that weren't going to get answered easily. He decided that it was for the best that he didn't ask it- if it was something important, then James and Qrow were sure to bring it up.
"I don't know." James commented quietly, though he glared over at Ozpin, presumably for knowing more about James than they should have. "I lost my job for going dark for so long while I was in the hospital." There was a long pause, and something that neither of them wanted to bring up to talk about. James wasn't happy with this. Neither was Ozpin.
"That wasn't your fault." Ozpin said, like they thought that it would somehow be enough to comfort James, even slightly. But it definitely didn't work- James stood there and shot Ozpin a glare of sorts that said simply I know it wasn't my fault.
There was anger in that glare. There was too much emotion that James was completely unwilling to voice. It was the kind of thing that James was sure to have to talk about later on, and Qrow knew that he was going to be the one to get to hear every word of it. Every scrap of anger and frustration…
EIther James was going to clam up and act like he was made of stone because he seemed to think that was a way to get people to stop paying attention, or he was going to let it all out at once in search of some sort of catharsis.
Qrow didn't know which it would be.
There was some small part of him that was worried for what he was going to get later on.
"I know that it wasn't my fault." James said quietly, though there was almost a growl on his voice. "But if they have any reason to believe that I'm coming back with ulterior motives…"
"Did you ever give them reason to suspect you before?" Qrow spoke up now, wondering whether or not he was going to be able to get an idea of what was going on that way.
James hesitated for a moment as he wracked his memory to try and figure out whether or not he had ever given the company that he'd used to work for to suspect that he was up to something. He was pretty sure that he'd never given any sort of reason for them to suspect that he was doing something shady on the side or behind people's backs. Never had he given any evidence that he had any ulterior motives, at least to his memory.
The most sketchy thing that he'd done was that he'd downloaded some proprietary software and found ways to use it without getting into trouble from home. He closed his eyes and sucked in a deep breath.
Qrow watched the entire time, wondering whether or not James even had an answer for his question. It was entirely too likely that things were going to end up going completely wrong- or that he might end up with too many eyes on him that would make it hard.
"I don't think there was ever anything." James said quietly, his eyes meeting Qrow's for just a second before looking over at Ozpin. "Do you have any ideas for what you want to do with Glynda?"
Ozpin hummed, a sound that Qrow was sure that he was going to have to get used to at some point. It seemed to be their favorite way to responding to anything, and Qrow was mostly willing to get used to that, as annoying as the humming might get. "I was considering getting her on the inside of the building." Ozpin said quietly. "I do believe that she would be able to play the part of a bank teller quite easily."
As for Qrow, he didn't need half a second to figure out what he thought of that. It was a fitting sort of role for Glynda, and it was probably going to be the best placement that could be managed for anyone on the team once Qrow thought about it. "I think she could do it." Qrow commented, which was enough to make Ozpin look over at him for a second. He leaned back in his seat for a second and waited. "I mean... she seems like she'd fit the role pretty well."
James turned and looked between Qrow and Ozpin, probably thinking the whole thing over for himself as well. James probably need all of the time to figure out what they were going to do, or to figure out how he wanted for these things to go once they got the job going.
If Glynda was going to end up working as a teller at the bank for a while, then it was entirely likely that it was going to make things easier on them once it was time for an escape to be made, Qrow thought. If James had as many hangups about their getaways, then it was probably for the best if there were fewer things for them to worry about.
"It's a good fit." James commented as he turned back towards the map. "It'll give us a little bit less to worry about..." A pause. "At least in theory. If she comes up as being under investigation because of what we're doing, then that'll be a concern."
"Hey," Qrow spoke up, leaning forward in his seat and doing his best to get the rest of the room's attention so that he could talk to the other two honestly about what he was thinking. "Glynda's smart. We go in, rob the bank on her first, second day there, she can leave the bank easily by claiming emotional distress over what happened and she should be getting off scot free."
The room went silent and James and Ozpin's eyes met.
James' mouth dropped open slightly and Qrow just watched as James took down a note and attached it to the side of the map.
"Qrow's right." James said, falling into parade rest almost without a thought to it before turning to Ozpin. "Are you alright with this plan?"
"I like it." Ozpin commented between sips of their coffee. "Should go well."
James nodded, and then he turned back to the map of the city. Qrow didn't know whether or not James was looking for something particular on there, just that James was doing his best to figure out how the rest of the jobs were going to go. Once again, Qrow wanted to get up to try and give James some sort of comfort over what was going on, though he was sure that it wasn't going to be much.
Maybe once Ozpin was gone, he and James were going to be able to talk things over and the two of them were going to be able to calm down somewhat.
He leaned back into his seat and crossed one leg over the other, realizing that the best thing he could do was probably sit back and wait while Ozpin and James made their plans.
For the most part, it was easy enough for him to slip into the quiet and just listen in on what was going on. He listened as James and Ozpin picked out roles for every person in the group with only a little bit of argument between the two of them.
The meeting drew to a close, and Qrow was just left thinking about what it was going to look like once it was time for them to have another proper meeting as they normally would before a job. James and Ozpin both seemed to be taking the chance to try and calm down before slipping out of the office together and heading to the kitchen.
"So, dinner?" Qrow asked, looking up at James as he fell in at the man's side. "With Oz?"
James sighed quietly. "It wouldn't do any good to cast them out completely just yet." He mumbled the words and looked over at Qrow. Their eyes met, and James seemed to have a certain sort of softness in his eyes that Qrow couldn't deny.
One that he wanted to climb into and sink into the warmth of.
He felt his heart nearly skip a beat in his chest, and just smiled at James before falling into the kitchen as they had a conversation with Ozpin about what was going to be the best for their meal that day.
Once Ozpin left, then James and Qrow were going to have plenty of time to talk things over. But for now, he wanted to be able to just relax and try not to think about work for a little bit. This was supposed to be a good time that he spent with James.
Ozpin was just there as a consequence.
