Debating on whether or not I should take the next two weeks off for the holidays.
On with the show.
RWBY Watches Classic Movies
Chapter 55
Sienna stood in her seat, her torso poking out of the open roof of her jeep. She only did so because she had her cousin, Ajay Sidhu, the man who had approached her about this job, driving and there was nobody in the world who she trusted more. Behind her, the convoy of trucks chasing a herd of herbivorous dinosaurs, mostly Gallimimus and Parasaurolophus, and other assorted smaller and larger dinosaurs, while a few men on motorcycles sped ahead.
"Cycle, break off a stray from the herd and flush him to the right." she ordered into the radio headset she was wearing. "Snaggers, stay ready, he's bringing them out to you." She started flipping through a packet of descriptions of all the dinosaurs on the island. "It'll be a pachy- uh pachya, ah screw it, the fat head with the bald spot. Friar Tuck."
"Yeah, that's about accurate." Ruby chuckled.
"What dinosaur is he talking about?" Weiss asked her.
"Pachycephalosaurus. Late Cretaceous herbivore. Best known for a piece of bare, solid bone that extends up from its head."
"Okay…"
"You'll see what I mean if it makes an appearance."
One of the cyclists sped ahead to find the target, passing by a Parasaurolophus, which roared at him in agitation. Seeing his target, he passed underneath a Diplodocus in order to reach him.
"Stop. Stop!" Another mercenary, a human man with long brown hair told his driver. Both men clambered out of the jeep. "Pachycephalosaurus."
"Okay, now watch."
"I am, Ruby, I am."
"Carnivore?" the driver said, worried.
"What? No, no, herbivore. Late Cretaceous."
The Pachycephalosaur was busy trying to get out of a circle of men and women holding metal and wire lassos while Cycle circled around him. It was about the size of a man, walking on two legs with a beaked mouth and domed, bony head protrusion.
"See that distinctive domed skull?" the long-haired man said to his fellow as they crept closer, "Nine inches of solid bone. Now, careful. See, the Pachy's neck attaches at the bottom of its skull, instead of the back of its head, as with reptiles. So, when it lowers its head, it lines up directly with the backbone. Which is perfect for absorbing impact."
To illustrate the point, the Pachy rammed its head into an open car door a man was using as cover. The man tumbled back into the car, nearly falling out the other side, while the Pachy looked at the two men approaching it and growled. Sienna pulled up as the two men were getting the hell out of Dodge.
"Snagger, Friar Tuck's on the loose. Just about to cross your path." She said over the radio before signaling Ajay to follow the escapee.
"Okay, remind me to never mess with one of those." Yang said.
"The more I watch these movies, the more I'm really glad these guys went extinct." Blake said.
"And that there aren't any Grimm around like them." Coco added.
'Interesting. Looks like I have some research and development to do when I return to my castle.' Salem thought to herself.
At her word, a specially designed truck pulled up. It was based on the standard military Humvee, but was modified to have a large open-topped cage in the back, extending firing seats on either side, and a large folding metal fork on the front. As it approached the Pachy, the seats were pushed out, with men armed with lassoes sitting in each. One of them managed to loop his line around the Pachy's neck and let him run ahead. In the back, a man with another air rifle fired a dart at the Pachy, while the man next to him started to real their prey in. The truck came to a stop as the wire pulled taught and the Pachy tried to escape. Another pair of Trappers looped lines around the Pachy's neck on either side to hold it in place as the metal fork unfolded and held the helpless dinosaur in place.
Meanwhile, Nora's group sat on a rock formation overlooking the valley. Sun ran ahead and placed a small sonic dish to pick up sound better for his recording, while the rest of the team and Rin looked out over the valley as dinosaurs ran across the plains, motorcycles mixed among them and cars and trucks chasing after them.
"Corsac, get in the outrigger." Sienna ordered as she lifted up the door to her jeep and leaned out a bit. "You're coming up on a carnia…"
"Say again, Sienna, say again, a what?" a man in the passenger seat of another car asked over the radio.
"God, not this guy again." Sun groaned.
"I sense a story behind that disgust." Neptune said with a raised eyebrow.
"He was a part of the White Fang presence on Menagerie." Sun explained. "Him and his brother were kind of ambassadors to Blake's dad. It's kind of a long story, but the abridged version is that shit hit the fan, his brother died and he is in prison as far as I know."
"You left out the part where they led an assassination attempt on my parents." Blake said with a scowl at the screen.
"And set the house on fire." Ilia added.
"Hey, I said abridged version, didn't I?" Sun said in his defense. "And didn't you guys start the fire?"
"No, you're remembering that wrong, right Ilia?"
"Umm…." Ilia hesitated under the glance from Blake and the glares coming from her parents.
Sienna just tossed her packet out the window. "The one, the one with the big red horn. The pompadour! Elvis!"
"Ha! Take me out Carter." Corsac said to his driver. He tightened the straps on his harness as Carter pressed a button on the dash and Corsac's seat moved out of the car beneath him. When it was fully extended, he shouldered his rifle, took aim at the nearest Parasaurolophus and fired. The mighty beast roared in pain and broke off from the pack, letting him know he had hit it. "Okay, bring me in, Carter."
When he had been brought back in, the car stopped, and Corsac exited to oversee the capture. He was a tall man with sharp features and a ball cap on, the only clue of his Faunus heritage being a grey wolf's tail poking out of his pants. It swayed behind him as he shouted out orders to the Trappers.
"Go for the legs! The legs! Watch the tail!"
Sienna's car pulled up, the lady herself exiting along with Salem, who watched in amazement as the Trappers worked. The Parasaur roared as it reared up, taking the two men who had ropes around its neck with it. they tumbled as they hit the ground, another pair of men taking their ropes from them. What the dinosaur didn't notice was the woman who had run a rope around the front of its feet. As it roared once more, the trappers pulled its feet out from under it, making the beast come crashing down.
From their perch, Nora's group watched with sorrow and disgust.
"So, what's the endgame here?" Weiss wondered aloud. "They go to all this trouble to capture dinosaurs, but why? What's the goal?"
"To start another park, of course." Nora said, obviously.
"Where? They can't really do it on this island. Construction would be a nightmare with all the dinosaurs still running around. And I doubt they would do it on another island after what happened on the first one."
"Then the most logical option is to do it on the mainland." Jaune concluded. "At least that way they have more room to evacuate to if things go sideways. It would just have to be set up away from major settlements."
As the day wound down, Ajay called Sienna over to the tree line. When she approached, she saw a massive three-toed footprint, easily as large as her entire torso. She looked to Ajay who simply shrugged.
"Burke!" she called out. The man with the long hair and flannel clothes looked up. "Come here." He ran over to her and looked down at the print. "Do you recognize this track way?"
"Yes, I do." He said, "Tyrannosaur."
Sienna looked to Ajay and smiled. She walked back to her car and began putting together an elephant gun. She was just finishing up when Salem rolled up.
"Ah, Sienna." She said genially as she got out of her car. Sienna didn't respond as she pulled out a long metal whip, strapped it to her waist and walked off. "Excuse me! Where do you think you are going?" Salem said as she stormed after the impudent Faunus woman.
"To collect my fee, Ms. Ozpin." She said with a vicious smile, "To collect my fee." Salem accidentally stepped in a muddy puddle while following Sienna. She looked down and saw her boot in the middle of the T. Rex footprint and put the pieces together.
"Still not used to that." Ozcar shuddered at the name.
"Ah, suck it up ya big, immortal baby." Qrow jeered. "I got Mom of the Year for a sister but you don't see me bellyaching about it."
Meanwhile, Corsac took out his canteen and poured the contents on the back of his head, allowing the refreshing chill of the water to run down the sides of his face, onto his back and chest. He heard a loud chirping near him and looked down to see another of the small green dinosaurs from the beginning of the film. He pulled out a collapsible cattle prod as Burke ran up to him.
"Oh my God! Procompsognathus triassicus. Found by Frass in Mantle in 1913." He said excitedly as he pulled out a journal from his satchel.
"Ha, I was close! Got the family group right, at least." Ruby cheered.
"Tell us about it then." Blake said, "Is it an accurate replica?"
"Hmm, it looks like it. Procompsognathus was a pretty small boy, about ten inches tall at the hips, and weighing only a couple pounds."
"And we can assume it's a pack hunter, based off what we saw in the beginning, right?"
"I would rather presume." Weiss corrected. "Presumption is a supposition based on probability, while an assumption is one without evidence."
"NERD!" Yang and Coco said together.
"Is it dangerous?" Corsac asked.
"Uh, no, I wouldn't think so." Burke said with a shake of his head. "The Compy has mostly been presumed to be scavengers, like jackals."
"It weirds me out." Corsac said with a smile. "It's like it's not scared."
Burke shrugged. "There've been no visitors to this island. It has no reason to fear man."
Corsac gave it a shock with the cattle prod and the Compy shot off into the foliage, screeching in pain.
"Now it does."
"What the fuck, man?" Ruby yelled indignantly.
Sienna and Ajay crept through the jungle, following the trail left by the footprints, guns at the ready. The trail led them to an isolated clearing littered with bones and half-eaten corpses, occupied by a single small dinosaur that was currently tearing into a side of meat.
"It's the Rex nest." Sienna whispered. "That infant's probably only a couple weeks old. Never left the nest." The infant tyrannosaur tore off a piece of meat and looked up at the pair. It sniffed a little, but apparently sensed no threat as it returned to eating.
"Weirdly enough, it looks kinda cute." Weiss said.
"Did Zwei just find his replacement?" Yang teased.
"You bite your tongue, heathen!" Weiss teased right back. She loved that mangy, flea-bitten mutt too much to ever, ever replace him.
"My little sister has certainly changed since going to Beacon." Winter mused aloud, now sitting with the rest of the parents since Taurus had left.
Sienna looked behind her. "Offspring that young, parents won't leave him alone for too long."
"So, build the blind here, wait for the buck to return?" Ajay asked.
"No." Sienna said, "No. The nest is upwind, and so are we. When he comes back, he's gonna know we're here without us even having a chance. No, the trick is to get him to come where we want him."
"That sounds like something they should teach at Beacon." Jaune said, "As far as I can tell, we just use our own styles to beat the enemy into submission. No larger tactics ever employed."
"Why bother?" Coco asked. "If the dumbasses are gonna charge at a woman wielding a mini gun in her purse, why stop them?"
"You're more the exception than the rule, Coco." Velvet said.
"Traitor." Coco grumbled.
That evening, the infant tyrannosaur lay in the middle of the nest, tied down by ropes and howling into the night. Nearby, Sienna and Ajay sat in a tree, guns in hand and ghillie cloth draped over their shoulders. Sienna glanced back in the direction of their new camp before returning to the task at hand.
Salem's camp was bustling, with men and women walking about doing evening chores, or helping to set up a mobile CCT connection, while others were throwing food into the cages that held the day's catches. Nora's group watched from the cover of a nearby ridge next to a waterfall.
"So, this is why Ozpin was in such a rush to get you guys here." Nora said, "He knew they were coming."
"I'll give them this, they are well-organized." Leonardo said, "Those are some major league toys."
"Yeah, maybe I should ask to use their phone. Their dish is bigger than yours."
"So, these people wanna build another park here?" Rin asked, still confused about everything, "Even after what you said happened at the other island?"
"They're not building anything." Nora said, "They're taking these animals out of here, back to the mainland."
"Pick up that phone, cuz I called it." Jaune cheered.
"Uh, guys," Sun said as he started rooting through his bag, "I think I should tell you that Ozpin told me these people might show up. He figured we'd be done by the time they got started, but in case that plan fell through, he did send a back-up plan."
"What back-up plan?" Penny asked.
"Me." He said, taking apart a hand-held bolt cutter and stowing it in his vest.
"Oh, I like it when people are ominous like that." Sun said with a grin.
"I think we can all agree that Blondie's people are about to have a very bad night." Neptune said with a grin of his own.
Down in the camp, Salem was making a business proposal by video. She was pacing around a well-lit tent, in the middle of which was a diorama of a coliseum. In the back corners were poster board pictures of concept art for the stadium diorama, and off to one side were a pair of cages each housing a compy. As she spoke, she started to gain more of an audience from around the camp.
"Simply put, InGen is seeking limited partners to defray some of our expansion costs." She said, pacing around with a filled champagne glass in hand. "The prospectus you've been given by the board explicitly details our projected hardware and construction expenses and, as you can see by my two friends here, the software is already fully-developed." She knelt by the Compy cages and they growled at her. "Pardon my pun, but one could say that it is 'up and running.'" She stood back up. "In a moment, I'll take you on a stroll through the camp, and you'll see some of the larger, more impressive specimens."
"The way she's making that pitch triggers me greatly." Weiss said with a shiver.
"Why's that?" Ruby asked, concerned.
"Reminds me too much of my father, all cold and calculated like that."
"She taught me everything I know." Cinder said coolly, so that only the back row could hear.
Unbeknownst to all, Sun and Penny crept into the camp no problem and took cover by the nearby cage holding a Stegosaur. It howled at their presence, so they quickly walked around to the front of the cage and pulled out the deadbolt holing it closed.
"You don't bring people half-way around the world to visit a zoo." Salem scoffed. "You bring the zoo to them, and Attika is the perfect site. Despite not experiencing a Grimm attack since the Great War, the city maintains a strong, professionally trained militia and has a long legacy of churning out some of the greatest Huntsmen and Huntresses in Vale's history, the Arc family first and foremost among them."
"I'm starting to wonder why my hometown keeps showing up or getting mentioned in these movies." Jaune said, eyes narrowing.
"It is a mystery even to me, Mr. Arc."
Penny and Sun worked quickly, hopping from cage to cage and opening them quietly. A baby Triceratops here, the Pachycephalosaurus next, then a baby Stegosaur- perhaps the very one Penny had interacted with earlier that day. They took their time when they came across a fully-grown Triceratops, who huffed into the dirt when they approached, spreading dust everywhere. Sun took out his bolt cutters and told Penny to stand back while he broke the lock.
"My foolish brother knew this," Salem said, continuing her pitch, "And before he ever dreamt of an island, began construction on an amphitheater near the coast, at the InGen Waterfront Complex. But, he abandoned it, as he often does, in favor of something far grander and, ultimately, impossible. And so, the facility sits, unused, unfinished, when it could be completed, and ready to receive visitors in less than a month."
Supposedly, the Triceratops didn't like that, because he/she burst through the back of the tent and flipped over the car that housed all the radio equipment, sending everything flying and the people scattering. It then turned around and charged back out of the camp, clearing the way for several Compys, a Parasauralophus, a Gallimimus, and the Pachy. All the while, Corsac watched as explosions went off and fires spread. One such explosion sent a wrecked car flying.
"Well, that went from zero to super-sonic in a hurry." Sun chuckled.
"What'd I tell ya? A very bad night." Neptune shook his head.
"It was at this moment, that guy knew, he fucked up." Weiss said in attempt at a joke.
"Fuckin' beat me to it." Yang chuckled.
Sienna heard the explosion and looked back to see the fire. Looking up, she saw the car incoming on their hide.
"Ajay, look out! Jump!" she yelled before she and Ajay jumped from the tree, guns in hand and rolled to the sides in time for the car to fall at the base of the tree, right where they had been standing.
Meanwhile, Sun had heard the baby Rex crying in the nest. He waited until Sienna and Ajay had left before he ran up to the baby. He saw the state it was in and decided to free it and try to help it.
Back at the camp, Corsac was hauled to his feet by a pair of hunters, eyes locked with Sienna as he rose. He shrugged off the hunters and swallowed a lump in his throat.
"That's the last time I leave you in charge." Sienna said, her voice ice cold as she and Ajay moved past him to help restore order to the camp.
Near a small river, Penny waited in the moonlit darkness for Sun. She heard movement from the water behind her and turned to see Sun emerge from the river.
"Sun." she said, walking up to him. then she saw the baby Rex wailing in his arms. "Oh my God. Are you out of your mind?"
"Shh! He's got a broken leg." He said hurriedly. "Let's get him in the car before they hear us."
"Are you out of fucking mind? Do you have any idea what that is!?"
"Just quiet down and open the door."
"You're insane!" she said, as she opened the door. As Sun tried to get the baby situated in the back seat, Penny looked in the direction of their camp. "Ah, man. Nora's not gonna like this."
"Only if it endangers my daughter in any way. Or upsets her at all." Nora said, though her team knew the unspoken threat and promise those words held.
Phew! This was an interesting one to write. In my initial draft, I wrote decided to keep the original Dieter character, since I couldn't figure anyone expendable enough to replace him. Then, I'm going through it again, adding in the dialogue, and it occurs to me, 'that's right, one of those guys fits the bill. they seem like guys Sienna would trust in a limited capacity, and I don't like them very much anyway.' So, now when I'm writing dialogue, I have to remember to change every mention of Dieter to Corsac.
As for the latest RWBY episode, the only thing I really have to say about it is that I think Yang and Blake made the right call in bringing Robyn in on Amity.
In more mainstream news, I'm going into Star Wars 9 with rather subdued expectations. Personally, the sequel movies have been 50-50. Episode 7 was good, even if it was almost beat-for-beat Episode 4, and Rogue One was a great tie-in movie. However, Last Jedi was enjoyable, but the absolute toxicity that followed it greatly diminished it, and Solo was just something that shouldn't have happened. It kind of ruined Han's character for me, getting rid of some of the mystique that was such a great part of his character. Hopefully, when they decide to make new movies in the future, Disney will dip into that Extended Universe they nuked. Imagine what they could do with a series of Old Republic movies. Like, seriously, give us a KotoR movie!
Be sure to Follow, Favorite, and leave a Review, and I will catch you later.
EDIT: shout out to alert reader axel100 for alerting me to a few missed Dieters, which have been rectified. Thanks man!
Next Update: TBD, possibly as late as 1/7/2020