The next day, Team RWBY and Julius gathered in their room to start planning on how to make their move on the White Fang after coming back from a VERY boring class in Professor Port's.
"I thought that class was never going to end." Blake said.
"That makes two of us," Julius said, "That guy just never seems to know when to actually start talking more about what we need to know than about himself."
"Now, the investigation BEGINS!" Ruby said, excitedly jumping down from her bed.
"I'm glad to see we're taking this SOO seriously," Weiss said sarcastically.
"Hey, we have a plan," Yang said, "That's moderately serious."
"It's serious enough in my book." Julius said.
"Yeah, well your book is the equivalent of a sock drawer, so I'm not sure whether to trust it or not." Weiss said.
"Anyways," Ruby said, "Everyone remember their roles?"
"You and I will head to the CCT and check the Schnee records for any other Dust robberies or inconsistencies. Seeing as I'm in the family, it shouldn't be a problem."
"The White Fang has regular meetings to give out new orders and recruit new members," Blake said, "If I can get in, I can hopefully find out what they're planning."
"I have an old friend on the shady side of town that typically knows everything that happens around Vale. Getting information out of him shouldn't be TOO hard," Yang said.
"Thanks to my semblance, I can get around town significantly faster than everyone else," Julius said, "I'll teleport around and see if there's anything unusual or suspicious going on."
"Great," Ruby said, "Well meet with Yang tonight to go over what we found. Let's do this!"
"Yeah!" said a voice. The group turned to see Sun hanging by his tail from the window.
"Sun!?" Blake said, "How did you get all the way up here?"
"Pfft! That's easy, I do it all the time."
"You do WHAT?!" Weiss demanded.
"I climb trees all the time." Sun said, flipping into the room, "So, are we finally getting back at that Torchwick guy?"
"WE are going to investigate the situation. As a team." Blake said.
"Sorry, Sun. We don't want to get friends involved if we don't have to." Ruby said.
"Pfft. That's dumb, you should always get friends involved. That's why I brought Neptune." Julius poked his head out to see Neptune balanced on the ledge outside the window.
"Sup," Neptune said.
"How in the heck did you get up here?" Julius asked.
"I have my ways. Seriously though, can I come in now? We are REALLY high up."
Rolling his eyes, Julius teleported Neptune inside the room.
"Alright," Ruby said, "Julius will be going alone since no one else can keep up with him. I'll go with Weiss. Sun, you go with Blake. And Neptune, you can go with Yang since she doesn't have a partner. Everyone good?"
Julius unholstered his pistols and twirled them around: "Locked and loaded." He said before flipping them back into their holsters.
"Showoff…still impressive though." Sun said.
"Actually, Ruby, maybe you should go with Yang. After all, she is your sister." Weiss said.
"But, Weiss, who would go with you then?" Ruby asked.
"I guess…Neptune could go with me."
Ruby laughed: "Nah." And she dragged Weiss out of the room.
"But…! BUT…!" Weiss protested on the way out. Julius rolled his eyes in amusement.
"Welp, I guess that's our cue." Julius said, "Let's roll!"
…
Moments later, Julius was on the roof of a building in Vale City, watching the people below. So far, he had seen nothing, just people going about their business; either the White Fang were REALLY good at hiding, or they weren't in this area. Julius decided the latter was more likely, and was about to move on when something caught his eye; in the alleyway across from the building he was on, someone was trying to get his attention, and, as Julius looked closer, he could see it was a girl with black pigtails. Sighing in frustration, he teleported down to her.
"This better be good, Neo." He said.
Neo motioned for him to follow her down the alleyway. Once they got far enough, Neo dispelled her disguise, revealing her true looks.
"Alright, now what?" Julius asked.
"Now," said a voice from the side, and Julius turned to see Roman appear from the shadows.
"We finally have a chance to talk in person." Roman finished.
"Roman," Julius said, "nice seeing you in person too."
"I assume you got Neo's message from yesterday?"
Julius nodded: "I ran into those two as well. There's a third person with them too; a woman with black hair and orange eyes. It's Cinder, isn't it?"
"Not quite sure what she's doing in the school itself," Roman said, "But yes, that's her."
Julius kept a mental note to keep a closer eye on those three now.
"Was that all you needed to see me for?" Julius asked.
"Almost," Roman replied, "I just wanted to make sure this little underground venture of yours is still intact."
"Trust me, it is," Julius said, "We even got a new member. A powerful one."
"Really?" Roman said, "how powerful are talking?"
"Powerful. Real big shot fighter from Atlas." Julius said, referring to Slayer, though he refrained from mentioning the truth of where Slayer came from at that moment.
"I see," Roman said, stroking his chin in interest, "Then, I guess we're in good hands."
"For the moment. Let me know the second Cinder decides to try something funny."
"Something tells me you'll figure it out before I do, but sure. You have any idea what she's even planning?"
"No. That's what worries me."
Neo snapped her fingers to get the two's attention, the signed to Julius: I could try hacking the system to see if I can find anything.
"That's actually not a bad idea, Neo." Julius said.
"What'd she say?" Roman asked, "I'm still rusty with the whole sign language thing."
"She wants to try looking through your secure files to find anything."
"Hm. It might work. I'll see what we can do. Now we should probably be going; I got a White fang rally to prepare for."
Julius nodded: "Do that. Thanks for the info, it's nice to meet in person once in a while."
"That it is, Julius," Roman said, "Neo, if you would."
Neo nodded and snapped her fingers, then, her and Roman shattered away as her illusion was dispelled; Julius assumed they had already left. Turning back down the alley, he noticed Slayer walking down the street; it looked as if he was looking for something. Julius teleported up behind him.
"What're we looking for?" he asked, startling Slayer, who whipped around and instinctively punched Julius across the face.
"Owwww!" Julius said.
"Oh, it's you." Slayer said, "Please don't do that again."
"After that hit, I wasn't planning to." Julius said, massaging his cheek.
"You alright?"
"Eh, I've been hit by worse. So, where's Penny?"
"That what I'm looking for. She decided to go off on her own and didn't tell me. I take my duty as a bodyguard very seriously, plus, she and I have started becoming friends."
"You two?" Julius said, "Weren't you all frustrated at her before."
"I was," Slayer replied, "But over the past few weeks, she and I have started to see more eye to eye more. Granted, she's still a bit overly curious, but there's this other side to her that I've started to see that's…different. I can't quite explain it, but I've started to come to like her a lot more."
"Oooohhh," Julius said, smirking, "What kind of "like" do you mean?"
"What do you mean?"
"Are we talkin like, as a friend, or 'LIKE' like?"
Slayer blushed under his helmet as what Julius was asking became clear: "Uhhh, that's not what I meant!. I mean, she is cute and all, but that's not…"
Julius was still staring at Slayer with the smirk.
"FINE. Yes, I like her in that way."
Julius chuckled: "Relax. I know how it feels."
"You got a crush too?"
"Oh yeah."
"Who is it?"
"Blake."
"The cat girl from the docks?"
"That's the one."
"Huh, I can actually kinda see that."
Before they could talk further, two Atlesian guards ran by and noticed Slayer as they did.
"Hey! Slayer!" one of them said, "We found her! She went over here!"
Slayer nodded: "Bout time!" then turning to Julius, "I gotta go."
Julius nodded, and Slayer ran off with the guards. Julius was thinking of following them, when his eyes came upon what looked like a crime scene in another alleyway. Teleporting over to get a closer look, he came upon investigators looking over multiple dead bodies. What got his attention is that the bodies belonged to White Fang soldiers.
"I've never seen anything like this," one of the officers said, "These slash marks aren't from any weapon I've ever seen."
Julius looked closer at the nearest body, and saw a massive gash in the torso. It clearly wasn't from a sword; it was too wide of a wound. As Julius looked around, he notices similar slashes in the walls. He quickly snapped a picture with his scroll and moved on; the team would need to see this.
Meanwhile, Slayer had ran far ahead of the guards and was heading down the alleyway as fast as he could. Turing a corner, he saw Penny standing alone in the alley.
"Penny!" he said, getting her attention as he ran up.
"Do you have any idea how long I've been looking for you?"
"Sorry, Slayer." Penny said, "I was so excited to go into town I forgot to tell you I was going."
Shaking his head, Slayer waved it aside: "What matters is that I found you. I take my job as a bodyguard seriously, you know."
That's nice, I guess." Penny said, "At least you're one I'm friends with."
Just then, the two Atlesian soldiers ran up. Slayer waved at them, saying: "I can handle it from here."
One of them nodded and motioned for Slayer and Penny to walk back with them. As they did, Slayer leaned over to Penny: "Please let me know where you're going next time."
"Of course," Penny said, "Sorry."
"I already said it's okay. I'm just glad I found you."
"Alright then," Penny said, "So, do you have any plans for when we get back to the room?"
"I don't know. Did you have something in mind?"
"Actually…" Penny said, running through a list. Slayer rolled his eyes in amusement; she was a bit wacky, but he was truly glad he found her. Maybe he really did like her. He couldn't quite figure it out yet, but he was becoming more and more certain that was why he felt truly happy whenever, he actually spent time with her. For now, however, he just planned to see where this friendship would go from here…