For Want Of A Nail

by MasterofMasyaf9000

The beating of a butterfly's wings can lead to the whipping of a tornado. A world of bloody evolution is forever changed with the most minute of choices: What if Adam Taurus had never joined the White Fang?

2. Fortune's Fool

"He who delights in his solitude, is either a wild beast, or a god."

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Chapter 1: Fortune's Fool

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The forest had the appeal of a forgotten land, one which had been long lost to the ravages of time. The isolated forest remained in a capsule, untouched by the essence of man, while the dark shadows of the voluminous trees twisted and towering over Adam, as the bush and greenery that had consumed the hard regions of the jungle, concealed the land from beneath the vibrant portals of the open sky. Only a light breeze slipped through the trees, the brilliant green leaves shifting in its wake.

Left. Right. Left. Right.

The same monotonous motions drove him to cross miles and miles in his ceaseless wandering. Even as he felt his knees pop with each step, and the bones along his feet creaking with each stride, he continued. Seeming more machine than man at times.

At least, that was how it had felt to him as he travelled. The passage of time was hard for Adam to keep track of these days.

His grand exodus had been rather less thrilling than he had envisioned. He hadn't exactly been expecting weeping widows or fireworks, and after his split from Blake, he didn't really want them. No, the further he got from the magical island of tainted memories and hypocrisies the better, as far as he was concerned, a thought that had persisted long after he had stepped off the docks into southern Anima and had begun his travels.

He hadn't had a particular destination in mind, and no place to call his own, so he'd just… started walking. His first instinct was to avoid settlements where he could, and that had served him reasonably well for the most part. He wandered, living largely off what he could catch, or scrounge from the grasslands and jungles, only occasionally stopping in towns and villages on the rare occasion he chanced upon them and couldn't find any food worthwhile, or felt the rarer impulse to sleep in a bed instead of making a bed in trees for a change.

Fortunately, he had some experience surviving in the wilderness, and while it had been some time since he'd had to put any of those skills to actual use, it had meant that said food had, at least in theory, been less hard to come by than he'd feared it would be. That, had been in no small part due to the very first lesson he had ever learned about survival outside of the settlements. A water source, especially freshwater, inevitably meant that game would be drawn to it to drink. Game meant food. As such, his wanderings had followed the River Mita north — a large freshwater river that flowed from the mountains into the sea — upstream for the most part where he could.

Sure enough, he'd found a slew of edible prey in short order. The odd wild buck or doe had made an appearance, taking the chance to drink at the river without being hunted by roving Beowolf packs. Rabbits too, were commonplace on the steep slopes of moss and grass, and he'd even seen the odd grouse scurrying out of the bush or taking to the air as he got too close to their nests. Unfortunately…

While he had indeed learned the fundamentals of survival and hunting, he had been a child at the time, so not only was most of his knowledge second hand (his mother had only allowed him to do so much at that tender age) it had been nearly ten years since he had truly needed to apply any of the survival skills that he had been taught in the snowy reaches of the northern continent, and it had taken a while for him to relearn them. Even more so, he had no practical way to hunt most of the prey he found himself surrounded by. Deer were fast; so was he, and Adam didn't doubt that he could run one down on a stretch of level grassland if he pushed himself. But they had much better footing on the steeper slopes, and were just as fast and sure-footed moving through the dense jungle's knarled roots and thickets, as they were the plains. They'd have run rings around him, and exhausted his stamina well before he'd have any chance of overpowering them for a kill.

The first part went double for the rabbits, who could all but disappear in the blink of an eye into burrows and natural crevices faster than he could say "lunch". And the less said about the grouse and the other birds he'd tried to catch, the better. His distinct lack of wings left him at something of a disadvantage in trying to cut off their escape, and they would always see him approaching from the ground.

And if all of that wasn't enough, he hadn't taken into account how the difference in climate between Solitas, Menagerie and Anima would affect his foraging. As a consequence, he was largely unfamiliar with most of the plant life in the dense jungle, and since he was unable to tell what was edible and what was not, it made foraging a largely useless cause, unless the rare event occurred whereby he did come across plant life he recognized for certain wouldn't poison him.

He'd been ready to lose his temper, yet he hadn't been prepared to swallow his pride and move into a settlement. That would be admitting defeat, and he was stronger than that, damn it. He didn't need help. What he really needed to succeed was a gun—something that he could pick them off with from a distance with. Even the playing field. Or failing that, something like a projectile or something. A bow and arrows, or knives or— Adam shook his head. Those had always been more his mother's specialty. Secondary to her skill with a blade, but she'd mastered them nonetheless. He'd always wanted to learn, especially the secret to her exceptional aim with deadly projectiles: but it was among the few things she had refused to teach him. Adamantly put her foot down on it too. He'd spent long parts of his childhood puzzling out why, and he didn't think that it had anything to do with the fact that his depth perception wasn't what it had once been.

Although, he reminded himself bitterly, it wasn't as though he'd have the chance to ask her again anytime soon.

In any case, Adam Taurus was nothing if not resourceful, and eventually he had been able to recall the parts of training he had foolishly considered of lesser importance all those years ago; how to move silently over terrain, as well as how to construct working snares. Inevitably, those efforts had borne fruit; after several days without food, he had returned to check them, and finally sat down one night to smoked rabbit at a smoldering fire.

It was among the most satisfying experiences of his life. On a few days, he'd even been lucky enough to catch a fowl in his snares. Those were the days he truly ate well.

But most pleasantly of all, the further upstream he travelled, he'd also found there were a good deal of fish to be caught too. And those at least, he had no issue in catching. The birds dancing above him in the treetops moved to follow a group further into the forest. It was strange behavior for this time of day, but sensing no immediate danger, Adam followed their path. Moving a low hanging branch out of the way, he looked out into a small clearing. He was in the right place.

A single frigate bird soared over the mangroves, its own colours lost in the chaos of the emerald canopy above it. Above him, the river dipped steeply downward into a waterfall, cascading downward along a series of jagged ledges that had created a sort of natural staircase. A curtain of white water was frothing and foaming, thousands of gallons thundering down from one level to the next.

The fall flowed into the rest of the river, pooling between the banks, composed largely of mud and dry earth, and hemmed in by massive boulders and tree trunks on both sides. He had chosen his spot well. He had considered climbing around the rock face to the top of the waterfall— he had the athletic ability to do so— but that would have done him no good; the current was too strong and the banks too steep atop the waterfall. Even if he'd been able to see his quarry moving with the rapid currents beneath the frothing water, much less catch it, his method of doing so ran the risk of over extending his reach, and falling in.

At which point, he would quickly be overwhelmed, and would have to choose between the delightful door prizes of either drowning to death, or being swept off the edge of the falls and having his skull split open instead. And even if he survived that with aura, he'd still likely get a lovely dose of hypothermia for the bonus round consolation trophy. Naturally, he'd made the wise decision to give those a pass. Adam set his duffle down at the edge of the river bank where the current was a little slower, yet, still overhanging somewhat deep water, if at least a little shallower than where the waterfall ended.

The nearest trees simply disappeared into the water, the roots trailing down with ugly-looking rocks behind. Using one of the sturdier twisted roots to steady his balance with one arm, he did his best to loosen the tension in the other before moving again. 'Fishing, he thought, kneeling and plunging his hand into the chilling currents of the river, was both easier and more difficult for him. Easier, because the skill was much fresher in his mind of late, and difficult… namely because of how he'd learned it.

It had been Kali Belladonna who had taught a nine year old Adam Taurus how to catch fish with his bare hands; as he had sat alone at the end of a pier, waiting for his mother to return from another White Fang meeting. He hadn't liked being at the Belladonna mansion even then, but his mother had refused to leave him at home by himself and so had brought him along to her meetings. While she discussed her business with Ghira and the other members, she had left him to 'play' with some of the other children. In hindsight, it should have been obvious to him that joining the White Fang was untenable from then, He'd hated the other children. They were loud, annoying and unbearably naive. Always talking around him instead of to him, always staring at his bandages and scars.

They hadn't liked him either. He'd known that from the moment he'd been left in the room with them. They had very different interests, and they thought he was weird for not wanting to play their childish games and wanting to go home and train instead.

He'd still tried —really, he had— for her sake, attempted to be well behaved for as long as he could, but as children were wont to do, and knowing a lost cause when he'd seen one, he had inevitably escaped, climbing a support beam when no one was looking and using it to escape the room via a window that lead outside, hoping to find entertainment elsewhere.

Once he'd made it down to the ground, he had travelled some distance from the house, wandering unnoticed until he'd reached the water—a mostly deserted fishing inlet west of the mansion. The few other fishermen there at the time had ignored him, and so he'd stayed there, sitting out on the end of the fishing dock and staring out into the water.

He'd been planning on just waiting out the meeting and sulking on his own, and for a while, it had worked. That had been his first time he had ever crossed with Kali Belladonna, suddenly popping up as if from nowhere from underneath the water, a fish flapping uselessly on her head and a bamboo trident in hand.

The child had stared for a moment, gawking at the absurdity of what he was seeing, before bursting out laughing, trying to control his snickers. From there, they had gotten along quite well, and she had decided to keep him occupied by teaching him the best ways to catch fish. His mother had been in near tears by the time they had come back to the mansion near dusk. She hadn't let him out of her sight for days after that, had refused to let him touch Wilt and worst of all, he hadn't been allowed to train at all for a whole week apart from "The Post".

The memory almost brought a smile to Adam's face in the present, remembering how his younger self had loathed that particular brand of training. It had involved him balancing on a narrow stump by either one foot, or as he'd gotten older, performing a handstand with one arm. The task, or torture, as he had referred to it, was to stay on the post for a full hour. This was a difficult enough task in itself, but his mother would complicate matters by throwing pebbles, which later graduated to throwing stars once he had better control of his aura, with expert accuracy in attempts to knock him off, which he was expected to dodge without falling to the ground.

If he was unfortunate enough to get hit, or worse, hit the floor, he would receive up to five extra minutes on the post for every object he was hit with, and up to a full half hour for every time he met with terra firma. She loved him, yes, but none of that love came through during training, no, it did not. But he was eternally grateful. And now he'd never have the chance to say how much.

His thoughts turned to the Belladonnas again reluctantly, the brief respite of happiness once more giving way to resentment, and then finally, a resolute numbness, as he pushed his emotions aside and set about his task. Spear fishing wasn't much use to him; depth perception and judging distance was a real conundrum to handle when you had to factor in moving targets and reflections. And so, Kali had taught him a way that would prove far more effective. If he couldn't catch the fish, he'd make them come to him.

He remembered her words, as though that day from the distant past had been only hours ago.

"The fish won't come if you're too warm. They scare really easily. You have to be patient. Lure them in…"

The idle thought occurred to him now that this had been Belladonna's plan for the Taurus family all along. Show just enough kindness to get them to trust, before grinding them both into the gutter like good little dogs. Yet another warning he'd seen and chosen to ignore. The water began to bubble around his forearm.

"What a disappointment of a son you are…"

The green canopy spun around him. The trees had all blurred into one another. He swore and jerked upright again, water dripping off the side of his face and his shock of what he was doing drowning the building flickers of rage that had threatened to overtake him. Fish didn't like warm water, and if he lost his temper, he'd lose his meal ticket with it. Finally, he was able to calm himself, using the numbness of his arm and the cold water to stabilize himself, and in short order, the bubbles and heat faded.

And not a moment too soon.

A dark shape cut through the water, tentatively circling his hand at a distance. He unclenched his fist, and crooked his fingers back and forth, as if he were beckoning it. Imitating a worm—

When it got close enough, he struck. Jamming his fingers into its gills, he seized it, whipping it free, and refusing to let go. It squirmed and splashed, and with it being so heavy, Adam was forced to use the speed of his momentum and his aura to avoid being hurt. He knew from personal experience that some fish had sharp gill plates and all fish had pointy gill rakes. If he hadn't had his aura, he'd have bleeding fingers by now. But Adam had been prepared.

"Dig your finger at the gill pit to get your hands to reach the heart."

It's thrashing had grown weaker now, it's lifeless eyes staring up at him blankly. By then, it was simply a matter of time. Soon enough, it did die and once he had gutted , scaled and allowed it to roast over a fire, his thoughts began to drift from the past to the more immediate future.

He loved the jungle, for all his problems. It was peaceful, it was quiet and best of all, it was remote. No-one bothered him, and it was much easier to master his temper when there was no hypocritical pieces of shit to evoke it. What more could he want? Living like a hermit had suited him well.

Until now.

Those reasons were legion, but the most important, and irritating being, that he was running out of money.

At first, he hadn't cared. He hadn't thought it was a problem at all, in fact. After all, he didn't go into settlements much, if at all, and lien was next to worthless in the wilderness. Even so, it hadn't been as though he had spent frivolously. His purchases had largely been invested in food, hunting supplies to craft his snares, shelter, and very little else.

He had no real love nor use for Dust, having found his blade to be more than sufficient enough to deal with the inevitable Beowulf pack or occasional lone Ursa Major he came across when traveling through the wilds, proving little challenge to him in the slightest. That had meant that while other travellers, Huntsmen and civilian bodyguards alike were stuck with paying expensive local fees in order to maintain their equipment, he had no such worries.

And even if he had, he'd be damned if he willingly fed the Schnees his rapidly dwindling lien, simply on personal pride alone, if nothing else. One would think that he could survive well enough, under those conditions, at least for a time. He certainly had thought so.

But the facts were the facts; He was running out of lien.

And while that wasn't a problem, to make matters worse, food was running scarce now too. He'd gotten lucky today, but with the changing seasons, the trout would be migrating soon, and with the only sources of reliable food he could catch fast dwindling, he couldn't count on the appearance of more any time soon. He was going to have to move on.

Sure, he knew, had always known, that it would happen inevitably; he couldn't live on the Menagerie scroungings he had acquired forever. But Gods forgive him, he thought they would at least last longer than they had! Not even a lousy few weeks had passed and he was all but destitute.

Adam supposed he could blame that at least partially on the attitude to faunus on the mainland of Anima. While not as overtly hostile as say Atlas or Mantle, he was not yet blind enough to miss the dirty looks, muttered slurs and glares he would occasionally receive as people saw his horns. It wasn't entirely out of the question that they would deliberately hike up prices out of spite. The thought of it made him bare his teeth in outrage, brief as it was, as he emitted a sharp scoff of derision and unconcealed contempt flared within him. All the more reason he preferred taking his chances with the Grimm. They'd eat you, but they at least had the temerity to be honest about it.

The time alone on the ship and the endless hours he spent out in the wilds had provided him with plenty of opportunities for introspection, on a lot of things. For one thing, his reflections on his past experiences, and a good few of his present ones, had started to reaffirm him that he'd been right about humans. He quickly found he preferred the forests and jungles to the company of other people; human and faunus both, though that was probably just as well. The idea of surrounding himself with other people hadn't been appealing before he'd left.

Why would it have been any less repulsive now?

The thing was with Grimm, was they didn't choose to be that way. Grimm were wicked by nature. Or so they said. Humans weren't that different. The only real difference, was that unlike Grimm, they reveled in what they did. They went out of their way to deceive, and betray those with less power than them , for no other reason than because they could. They needed to have someone to look down on, and in all honesty, if it wasn't for the faunus, it'd just be someone else.

Learning to accept the idea that humans were bastards by nature, rather than nurture, had ironically made it far easier for Adam's hatred of them to lessen over the years. His mother, as optimistic as she was, had called it a good thing, thinking he had learned to forgive them, that he might have wanted to work towards peace. It couldn't have been further from the truth, in hindsight.

But it was now, in his increased interactions with them, that he realized that there was no changing them. You could beat a dog with a stick until your arms fell off, but it wouldn't magically turn into a horse, and that wouldn't change even if you just asked it nicely. He hadn't understood it until now, but he'd long given up believing that anyone could, even before he'd lost his mother. If he hadn't had a single positive experience with a human in nineteen years, it was hardly going to happen now. Just one more reason not to join the White Fang.

Even if the faunus were worth the effort and struggle, which Menagerie and Belladonna had proved unequivocally that they weren't, there was nothing anyone could do to stop humans from being the petty, spiteful, vindictive wastes of life that they all already were. There was no point to it. And so, he had learned to compromise, though, maybe differently from most would have hoped. He hadn't made a point to go out of his way to attack them, or to try and stop them from being themselves.

But that didn't mean he wanted anything to do with them.

He didn't want to be equal to humans, or beg them to be something they weren't capable of. He didn't want them to see him as one of "the good ones" or for other faunus to try and claim solidarity with him so they could manipulate him into their agendas. He wanted to be left alone. And for as long as they left him in peace, they could do as they damn well pleased. And if they didn't… well. Maybe Wilt would be a better negotiator than he was.

If what he'd experienced was truly the sum of their parts, if that was all any of them were.., then it was just as well that he had washed his hands of all of it. He'd seen enough of humanity to make that call. Despite that, Adam still occasionally felt; an increasingly large part of him would like nothing more than to cut them all down personally, as the wrath that was rapidly becoming his trademark began to boil in him, but as quickly as it came, he banished it back to the recesses of his mind, attempting to return to that peaceful place of cold indifference.

He didn't have time for them, or their deluded sense of superiority, and he certainly didn't have the luxury of anger. He had more pressing and immediate his dwindling supply of lien, he would be lucky if he could get a stiff drink or meal at his next destination. And that was to say nothing of whether or not he could find any shelter or have any money left over.

All of the villages and towns he had encountered, even those most afflicted by the Grimm since he had arrived in Southern Anima, had inns for weary travelers. Spare space and rooms ,however overpriced and despite the general subtle and less subtle hostilities he had been subjected to, were far more abundant outside of the cities, and money was usually enough to keep the locals at least somewhat accommodating, if not civil.

He doubted the cities would be so amenable.

But that was a risk he'd have to take.

---

By midday of the following day, he'd travelled at least several miles— at least he felt like it— and had stumbled on a small village, where he'd managed to get his hands on a map of Mistral and Anima, which after the first day of aimless traveling, he was loath to admit that yes,he did actually need. Though getting his hands on it had been decidedly more inconvenient than he had anticipated, given that the only store owner in town that sold the fucking things was openly anti-faunus, and he was forced to resort to paying a frankly ridiculous price for it.

But he'd gotten it and he'd moved on. That was what was important.

His boots crunched along the dead and dying leaves underfoot with a steady rhythm as he padded through the thick forest that was Mistral's wilderness. The sense of shifting seasons and the beginnings of the autumn hung thick and heavy around him, making him grateful for the thinner leather of his jacket. The humidity of the forest was something he should be used to, with having spent so much of the latter part of his childhood on a tropical island, but here, it seemed to cling to him like a limpet. It seemed to serve only to make him more irritable day after day, with the damn roaming Grimm he was forced to deal with while traveling only amplifying his feelings of uncomfortable discontent.

After a while, he had started to work out what it was. He was restless. Adam loved battle, the idea of testing his skills to their limit, and there had been few, if anyone who had been able to challenge him in Menagerie. He'd had sparring partners occasionally, Sienna most commonly showed up to his home to indulge him in sparring, but even they rarely shared his passion, or his intense interest in improving their own skills the way he did. The only one who had ever truly been able to entertain him… who had ever been able to make him overjoyed through combat, had been his mother. But that had been before.

Now that he had cut himself free, he didn't have any of that. Of course, he trained relentlessly since he'd been out in the jungle, whether it was practicing his katas, training his body, or even honing his agility by running makeshift obstacle courses through the treetops and moss covered branches. It was a fine way to spend his time, and there were even plenty of Grimm to kill when he got bored that seemed to drag behind him like a black anchor. But that got old real fast. It wasn't even that he didn't enjoy the conflict or the chance to use his blade. He relished it, even. But he wanted more.

Maybe it was something wrong with him, but he never fully understood why people feared Grimm the way they did. They moved freely, without rhyme or reason but they lacked any kind of individuality. They were legion , but lacked both the will and intellect to take advantage of that fact.

Freedom without individuality wasn't strength at all—and as such, he could, and did, cut any one of them down without thought. It didn't matter if there was one, five, or fifty, hell, it probably wouldn't matter if there were five hundred; a single swing of Wilt was all it took to turn them into dust on the wind, great or small. The idea that Kingdoms actually paid people for something like this; and claimed them to be heroes for it to boot was something that Adam just couldn't wrap his head around. It was glorified pest extermination; a child could do it, given a decent chance. There was no satisfaction to be found fighting mindless shadows, no fire that burned in his blood, or lightning that coursed through his veins at the sight of a worthy opponent.

He might as well have been fighting roadkill for all the challenge they offered.

Adam may have abandoned whatever fleeting desires he may have had to join the White Fang, and begun his quest to make peace with his general sense of contempt for the world, but seeds of discontent remained. That tiny part of him that spoke to him in his quiet moment , between the shame, the anger and sorrow. Something in him that thirsted for purpose cried out within, rearing its unbidden head with every step, and what exactly it would take to slake that thirst however… well, that remained to be seen.

The snap of a twig at his back brought him out of his musing, deep in the underbrush. He halted, right hand going to the hilt of his blade and his left to his sheath. While he laughed at the so-called "fearsome" Grimm, they were far from the only predators that prowled these lands. Of the non-human variety, there were plenty of wild animals afoot that would have had no problem in attempting to sever his ties to his mortal coil.

He'd seen that the very first time he'd considered fishing along the river further downstream, when, of all things, an alligator had rocketed out of the mangroves – thick bushes, half-floating on pools of stagnant water – onto the opposite bank of the river, clamping powerful jaws around soft feathers and bone armor alike, crushing them with a series of sickening cracks and crunches, and dragging a whimpering adolescent Nevermore under the churning water. That was yet another mark against Grimm; even wild animals were known to make short work of them too, although Adam had to wonder about just how that worked. When they took a bite out of a Grimm, did it just dissolve in their mouth, or did that not happen until after they killed it?

It hadn't hung around long enough for him to find out, which was a crying shame, because he would have loved to face a foe like that in combat, but on top of that, if the people of the villages were to be believed, almost all of them had aura of their own, no doubt awakened in the violent conflicts between predator and prey that persisted throughout the natural world. What's more than that, a precious few beasts even had semblances of their own, a fact that had made Adam very excited to meet one.

But as with so many things in his life, he once again found himself disheartened.

He had yet to encounter any bandits or any of the semblance beasts, much to his private disappointment. He had heard rumors about the former too. Muttered warnings in dark corners of taverns by gossips about violent gangs of thieves that plagued the wilds beyond the walls of civilization, swarming like locusts ,slaughtering travelers and pillaging as they saw fit. He'd mocked them as the kind of wives' tales they were at first; as little more than the overactive imaginations of fools. Here, though, in the shadows of the forest , surrounded by hot air, fallen leaves and overgrown roots, his heart trembled with anticipation and, dare he say it, the faintest of hopes. He might finally have something to cut his teeth on for a change.

"This may be fun..." he grinned, lightly tightening his grip on his sword in his right hand. Could whatever was lurking challenge him? Push him to the very edge?

He wanted to know.

Silence reigned.

The Ursa flew from the tree line , in an explosion of muscle and ebony fur. A drooling maw filled with snarling teeth, it descended from the sky with fury in its eyes and claws. It had caught its prey alone, and by surprise, or so it had thought. It would be its final mistake. In a single motion, without turning to meet it , Adam drew his blade in a swift upward slash and sliced it clean in two, causing the two halves to fall ungainly to the ground behind him. It slumped on the ground, neatly bisected, as black blood now stained the crimson blade.

'Another waste.' He sighed with abject dissatisfaction.

Pathetic and predictable. And to think he'd almost gotten his hopes up. Wiping his blade clean on what remained of the furry corpse, the swordsman sheathed his blade into its home with a flourish behind his back. He glanced back impassively over his shoulder, thoroughly unimpressed.

It hardly seemed worth the time to kill ones so low. An insult to his blade and to his skill.

He sighed, annoyed with himself.

Adam looked at his hands, at the spare powerful shapes of the muscles and tendons bunching under his pale skin, the long shapes of the bones. He made a fist with his free hand and released it. Old scars caught the light, showing clear and white where they crossed each other again and again. More of them chased their way up his exposed forearms, themselves shadows of his past.

Could he really describe his current existence as a life? Wandering the wilderness as some kind of vagabond? The solitude suited him; that was true, but having to choose between fighting weakling beasts, allowing his skills to stagnate until he finally lost his mind and rammed Wilt through his own chest or submitting himself to the contempt and disrespect of every vain and self-serving parasite that walked Remnant in order to conform? What meaning was there in any of that? He was no closer to finding a genuine purpose than when he'd started out. A fact that made him no better than the weakling he'd just dispatched.

Working his way through the dense foliage, he snarled his complaint to the fast darkening sky.

But it just wasn't in him to give up. He didn't know whether it was stubbornness or sheer desperation, but in spite of everything crashing down on him, he wanted to keep going. Somewhere in the world, he would find it; a reason to fight. To lift his sword. He had to believe that. He just had to keep searching for himself; even if it meant trawling through the filth of civilization again.

As much as his existence was a hollow one, Adam clung to life with a viciousness and tenacity that would have made lesser men shudder. Perhaps it was a gift, perhaps it was a flaw. But he did not believe in giving up without a fight. He would cling tooth and nail to this new path of his.

He just had to keep walking it.

---

It was early evening by the time Adam finally trudged his way into the city of Kuchinashi. The sun hovered briefly on the horizon over the valley that held the city, then dipped below. Gradually as Adam travelled the final few miles, the clouds rolled in – first red, then mauve, silver, green and finally black as if all the colours in the world were being sucked away into an endless abyss.

It was completely bizarre and out of place. That was his first thought on the city from the outside. Those huge gray walls had been constructed in the middle of all this unspoiled nature, and they had no right to be there. The traditional stone architecture wasn't exactly ugly, but all the same, it was an incongruous blot on the valley, a monotone scar on a sea of green. An apt metaphor, if what he'd heard was true. He'd made a point to associate with as few people as possible on the way here, save the aforementioned necessities, but even he knew of the reputation of the lawlessness of the city underneath its beautiful, cultured veneer.

Despite being the second largest city on the continent, aside from the capital, Mistral, the Mistrali government had long since ceded any true control of Kuchinashi to various mafia gangs and criminals, having only the scant token law enforcement, and appearance of being under their authority in name alone. It would be easier to count the grains of sand in a sandstorm as to count how many Mistrali officials were accepting bribes from the syndicates. It was an open secret, even all the way back in Menagerie. Not that Mistral itself was much better, by all accounts.

He didn't know how long he intended to stay. Despite the uncertainty and frustration he felt, the sense of futility he had felt had dulled to a degree. A part of him felt it was almost right to be in a city again. Adam made sure to crush that shred of his being with all the malice he could muster. Once he was done spending some time here, he'd leave again. Maybe north, to the capital. Or failing that… there was always Vacuo, once he made some more lien. The world was his oyster— although Atlas and Solitas could kick rocks, and he couldn't say he saw much appeal in Vale. Something about the place just rubbed him wrong. He did not know where he was going, or who he would become, or what he would do. But he knew that he needed to find himself now more than ever, and find himself, he most certainly would.

During his musing, he caught sight of something wriggling against the wall. It was dark, but not so dark that his night vision couldn't make out what it was. For some reason, known only to the gods, the people of Kuchinashi had elected to pin a wild warthog to the top of the wall, gored and hanging by a piece of rebar jutting out between the stones. It's low squeals told Adam that it had likely been there for some time, and was at the end of its energy reserves. His first instinct was revulsion. He knew fundamentally that human cruelty had no limits, and that the idea of being surprised by their capacity to inflict suffering for the sheer pleasure of it was akin to being surprised by a sunrise, but for a few precious moments, he was truly taken aback by the needless of it. He could understand killing to eat; he'd done it himself after all, but this just seemed… unnecessary.

Before his disgust could fully manifest itself into anger, his vision suddenly sharpened. His shock didn't leave, but his repugnance began to transmute into sheer hilarity. For it wasn't a warthog at all that was in its death throes, but a Boarbatusk, squealing and squirming like the very creature it was patterned after. Adam stood stupefied for a moment, his feelings mixed. On one hand he understood the intent; to serve as a warning to its brethren. It was a principle that he agreed with even, though it was far more likely to be applied by him to faunus or humans who didn't know when to give him his space, if anything.

But on the other hand… it was idiotic as all hell. More than that, it was pathetic. Who exactly was that supposed to frighten? Grimm on average, were far too dim-witted to feel anything akin to fear or consequence (a trait they shared with humanity incidentally) so the purpose was quite honestly, lost on Adam. In the same vein, he again found himself asking why at all anyone found them intimidating. Even more so than that, a Boarbatusk was a weakling among weaklings, even by Grimm standards. It was as though whichever pinhead had captured the thing was bragging about winning a fight with a handicapped dwarf.

Rolling his eye in disdain, Adam moved on.

Four armed guardsmen had stood on either side of a gate, waving lines of people in and out of the city. The 'out' line was far shorter, though that was to be expected at this time of day , he supposed. Few people wish to play fast and loose with their lives by courting Grimm or more likely, any of the other carnivores of the jungle in the dark. It must have been the end of the guards' shifts or near to, because the dullness in their eyes spoke heavily of fatigue and disinterest. At least, that's what he hoped it was. Knowing the reputation of Mistral, it could just as easily be that they were drugged up to their eyeballs.

In either case, it was none of his business and Adam had passed into the city with the dwindling line and nary a sideways glance. Which was all for the better to be completely honest. He wasn't sure if he could have dealt with inane questions about his travels, especially when he didn't know the answers himself.

Beyond the gate, he found a vast plaza, with a fountain that effortlessly spouted water into a pool in its centre. The courtyard itself appeared to be surrounded by several large cherry blossom trees, their pailish white and pink petals falling and resting on the surface and water below. Moving closer to the fountain , Adam could catch glints of gold moving underneath the wet petals. Fish, he realized, as one splashed near the pool's surface, startling a young child who had been standing nearby. In the distance, the remnants of the sunlight reflected off the tiled pagoda roofs on the skyline.

The connecting streets were filled with people, tourists and natives alike, milling around under the blossoms, laughing, and drinking.

Adam mused for a few moments near the centre of the plaza, silently watching the people that passed him in their gaudy ensembles, no doubt to enjoy the city's nightlife. He wondered if there was even a single one of them worth five seconds of his time. He could hear the endless humdrum of conversation in the streets; laughter, arguments, haggling about insipid nonsense. In all honesty, he had conflicted feelings. They were loud and annoying, the same as any other human or faunus he'd met. And yet, he had to admit, he questioned if he had at last grown tired of the sound of his own voice for companionship.

Ramen stands were strewn across the city , and Adam soon found himself drawn to one by his hunger. His stomach growled in protest and anticipation. Shoving a hand into his pocket, he groaned internally. He had less than two hundred lien left, and Gods knew how he was going to find somewhere to sleep. It would have barely gotten him a night's board in the frontier villages, to say nothing of buying food again in the immediate future.

He knew better than to try and find board in one of the nicer districts of Kuchinashi. Even if he hadn't been a faunus, there was no way they would allow a peasant in their midst, if the sneers he had received in passing were any indication. Which left the question of where he was going to sleep for the night once the gates closed him in for the night. So lost was he in his musings, that he didn't notice the impatient grey haired vendor tapping his ladle against the makeshift counter.

"You want to eat or not?!"

Adam blanched with embarrassment, taking a seat on the rickety wooden stool outside of the stand and ordering, a cry of silent objection coming from his mind as he counted out the lien for his purchase. Fortunately, the Vendor was by all accounts, a professional, and from what Adam could tell from his cursory study of his facial features and body language, did not appear to have faunus prejudices; or at the very least wasn't displaying any open hostility, though he was wary all the same. He watched him work like a hawk, not wanting to run the risk of having his food poisoned simply because he had been too trusting. He could almost laugh at the irony. Escaping one ignominious death, only to die another.

In what felt like mere moments, a piping hot bowl of ramen noodles and broth were placed unceremoniously before him along with a pair of wooden chopsticks.

He shoveled away the ramen with impressive speed using his chopsticks, grateful to finally eat a hot meal. He could barely taste them, his mouth was so full and his eye watered as he tried to chew. His body rebelled viciously , afraid he would choke. But hunger forced it down regardless. When he had finished, he downed the soup at the bottom of the bowl and exhaled in content before standing once more.

He knew for a fact now that it was unlikely, if not impossible for him to find somewhere to sleep with his current funds, if it wasn't before. He also knew he should regret wasting his dwindling lien on the meal, but the satisfaction he felt in his stomach, however temporary it may or may not be, prevented him from doing so completely.

All the same though, a roof over his head was still preferable to none.

As he began to wander once more into the crowds, he briefly entertained the idea of attempting to gain entry to one of the inns in the more affluent districts anyway, simply out of contempt for the people who ran them.

Ultimately however, he decided against it. It would garner him nothing save, albeit righteous satisfaction of causing bigoted dreck a minor inconvenience, and he didn't have the luxury for personal satisfaction quite yet. Quelling his ire, and stifling an unexpected yawn, he instead chose to continue simply wandering the streets for the time being, in the hopes that providence might loom on him favorably, or at the very least, he figured out something for himself.

Adam looked up at the cloudless sky. Even without his keen night vision, he could see several buildings towering above the in the distance, but one in particular stood out to him. A nine-story pagoda with curving wide eaves towered above the other buildings, it's corners each holding tiny lanterns that glowed a soft yellow in the night. It would be cold, given the season, and already the chill had begun to bite at his exposed forearms, but perhaps he could chance sneaking under one of the eaves for the night?

It would be no trouble to summon the agility to scale up to the rooftops, and he would be high enough to avoid the risk of being noticed, especially in his dark clothing. He'd assuredly wake up stiff, sore, and with patterns from the intricate tiles embedded into his flesh, but he would mostly be protected from the elements, save the event of a very strong wind.

Not necessarily a comforting thought, but again, better than nothing. 'So this is what it's come to…' he exhaled. His pride flared at the idea, this was beneath him damn it, but he knew in his heart that his options were all but nil.

That didn't mean he was eager to do so just yet.

His wandering through the city streets had unknowingly led him farther and farther from the plaza and gates of Kuchinashi, and as such the environment had slowly changed, becoming even less familiar than before. Gone were the noises of the crowds, as the mask of culture and beauty slowly fell away before his eye. The streets now by contrast, gloomy and unpleasant, filled with flickering lights and near silence from the people he passed; gaudy lighting designed to highlight the skimpy kimonos to the hundreds of different perfumes all thrown haphazardly together akin in some twisted funhouse mirror of his former surroundings. Colorful lights played on dirty walls and greasy streets. The entire area was clearly in disrepair. Vines crawled unchecked along the crumbling plaster that enveloped window sills and Adam, despite his natural night vision, soon found himself lost in the labyrinthine streets and alleys.

He could not shake the sensation of eyes on him as he travelled, and he kept his hand tightly on his blade as he walked. If some idiot thought they were going to rob him, he was more than in the mood to teach them the error of their ways if it came to it.

A flashing neon sign sneering into the bleak avenue he was on was all that marked the bar's name.

"Charlotte's Web."

If Adam had to be honest, it looked more like a demolition zone than a web, to judge from the condition of the building from the outside, but then he supposed, that was why he hadn't been the one to name the place. There were no anti-faunus signs on the door, or walls, and as such, he deemed it, well , he was hesitant to use the word'safe', to enter.

Rough wood splinters buried themselves into his palm as he made to open the rotting wooden door, and as for the shoddy and faded paintwork that haphazardly coated it, in some bizarre attempt at disguising the rot, he was not thoroughly surprised when he pulled his hand away from the wood to see large flecks of brown paint crumble to the floor and stick to his flesh as the door gave way to allow him entrance .

Any further opinions that he may have formed upon entering the building proper were immediately subsumed by a solid wall of noise. Laughter struggled to overpower the jukebox. Conversations swirled in a dirty cloud of smoke, the stench of cigarettes heavy in the air. A sharp smell of drink intermingled with the former acrid scent and combined, they wafted towards him, like a dust cloud on a desert horizon. His enhanced senses recoiled in disgust, but his legs seemed indifferent to the vile smell and trudged forward regardless, in desperate need of rest. Stepping over a body laying in the doorway and narrowly avoiding the pool of blood and vomit underneath it, the swordsman trudged into the bar, one hand tightly on the hilt of his blade.

A fair few patrons of the bar gave him a number of looks. Some wondered if he had anything worth stealing. Others assumed him some kind of huntsman wannabe. The rest didn't give a damn either way. None of the looks were terribly friendly. He ignored them all, and gave the room a cursory glance for somewhere to sit.

He was immediately met with several coarse wooden tables, battered leather bar chairs, and no less than three broken arcade machines. 'Well, beggars and choosers, I suppose'. He thought to himself, as he moved towards his chosen seat.

His final thought on the matter was that all in all, Charlotte's was without a doubt, a den of debauchery and alcoholism for the great unwashed of the city and that the entire structure looked a missed bribe away from being condemned. So maybe he'd fit right in. At least for the time being.

The bartender was a faunus; young, though, possibly a little older than he was and very attractive. He might not have cared much, if at all, about people in general, but he wasn't blind. She grinned flirtatiously at him as she approached, her bushy tail wagging slowly as she approached his corner of the bar, having claimed a seat near a window under a broken light fixture. "Heya, handsome. You lookin' for something in particular?"

Fuck it. If he was going to be poor, he might as well not be poor and sober.

"Just some whiskey; neat."

He didn't feel like mentioning it was damn near all he could afford.

And damned if he didn't need something to pep him up.

As she left to get his drink, the bull faunus buried his head in his hands and fought the urge to scream. Looking around the room, he noticed the wall opposite him holding a statuette of two oxen clashing their horns in battle. Adam felt that it was a mockery of some kind. Or maybe it was just the general frustration twisting his view on reality.

Who knew?

The bartender returned in short order with his drink, and he couldn't have been more grateful. Back in Menagerie, he hadn't drunk often, both for fears of being caught unawares while intoxicated, and not setting a bad example in front of Blake. He'd been curious once, of course, and had on occasion, managed to sneak out and swipe the occasional drink at Sienna's insistence when he'd believed his mother wasn't looking. It had been an enjoyable experience but had ended rather less favorably than he had hoped then; he'd wound up falling asleep after three hard shots, and had awoken to find himself divested of his shoes, and subsequently forced to walk home in the heat of noon with a headache that felt rather akin to having an anvil drop onto his skull.

He hoped that this time would be more favourable.

She took notice of the blade on his hip as he counted out the lien to cover the beverage. "You a huntsman, handsome?"

She was fishing. Adam snorted and shook his head with a small grin. Him, a huntsman. Riiight.

That would be the day, wouldn't it?

She looked him up and down, her curiosity back now that the man had loosened up. At least she knew she wasn't bothering him.

The bartender gave him a matching smile. "Rough day?"

"More like rough week."

Adam's face was inscrutable as he looked at the drink in his hand with the kind of curiosity only someone who had seen worse things could manage. The look on her face seemed to want him to elaborate, but he was in no humor to do so, at least not right now. She seemed to understand this, after a few short exchanges, but yet seemed completely unperturbed, continuing to smile, as if he had told her a most interesting joke. Finally, she returned to the bar, and Adam was once more alone.

He nursed his glass for, well, he couldn't tell how long, allowing himself to be immersed in the hubbub of the other denizens of the bar. Perhaps the background noise would help him think of a plan, at the very least. Truthfully, Adam didn't really have a plan for what happened after he left Menagerie. All he did know was that he couldn't bear to stay there. Not if he wanted any hope of making peace with his loss, or holding on to something resembling sanity. He'd hoped that he'd have found something resembling a endgoal in the three weeks and some change that he'd been away from Menagerie and wandering through the villages of Anima, but he was just as clueless as the day he'd left. And now here he was. Destitute, and soon to be starving, with no idea where his next meal was going to come from, with barely enough money to even drink his sorrows away. Go figure.

He downed the alcohol with a vengeance, reveling in the burning of the liquid in his throat. Maybe that huntsman idea wasn't that bad. He wasn't good at much else besides fighting, and he supposed he could suck up dealing with three other random jackasses for however long it took to get a license and never have to see them again. Sure they'd be about as weak as newborn kittens, but maybe he could find some fun there. Gotta be better than starving at any ra- Oh who the hell was he kidding? He was fucked. He could already hear Blake's condescending laughter in his ears.

'This is what you abandoned our cause for? Abandoned me for? To die like a nobody in the middle of nowhere? You're pathetic.'

"Shut up." He growled aloud at his inner voice. The last thing he needed was crap from his own imagination when he was already in a foul mood. His body would do a perfectly good job of telling him how much he'd screwed up on its own, thank you very much.

His forehead met the wood in front of him with a solid thunk, allowing himself to be lost in the din and the heavy miasma of smoke. Even if he did entertain the idea, despite how fucking stupid it was, he'd have to disregard it out of principle, if nothing else.

Their main job mandate, as Adam understood it, was to protect those that couldn't fight for themselves from the Grimm. Sure, they obviously couldn't be that good at it, given how Grimm still existed, and he'd bet good money that if he handed an infant a bread knife they'd manage to kill at least sixty of the halfwitted vermin before sunset, but that was the job description. Protecting people like the humans who had done their level best to make his life and his family's a living hell, and the backstabbing farmyard fodder who had facilitated his suffering out of avarice and cowardice.

The only person he cared to protect was gone, and he couldn't in good conscience commit himself to enslaving himself to the people who had made it so. That was the entire reason he'd left Menagerie after all. And for all his loathing of humanity and faunuskind alike, he would rather be consistent in his contempt than pretend to be something he wasn't. He'd have to try something else. The question was… what?

Adam's eyes flicked up from the table to the twin oxen. "Any suggestions, gentlemen?" The twin bulls of course, being that they were statues, didn't answer him, remaining locked in their eternal clash of strength. He snorted in a combination of amusement entwined with disdain at the obvious futility of even asking. "Figures. Was worth a try, I guess."

Just this once, he'd like to have some good luck.

"….worth a lot… reward money..."

His faunus hearing perked up at the apparent answer to his silent prayer, as he raised his head slightly from the cold table. He hadn't imagined that, had he? Curiosity aroused, Adam began to focus. It wasn't as easy as it could have been, what with the din of numerous other voices crowding out the conversation he was trying to eavesdrop on, but he was fortunate enough to be a faunus, with all of the benefits therein, to say nothing of the fact he was desperate and determined.

'And broke.' His brain chose to remind him helpfully, as if the burning hole in his pockets or the growling of his own stomach hadn't conveyed the message to him thoroughly enough. Grunting in frustration at his unruly thoughts, his eyes scanned the room from his darkened corner, searching for where he had heard that most promising snippet of information.

Finally he saw it; a group of men huddled around what appeared to be a bulletin board. They didn't look like much, certainly not fighters, even in this poorly lit hovel, at least from where he was. None of them really had the build for it. Stocky. Fat. Beerbellied. He wouldn't bet on them being huntsmen, or criminals, not that he could afford it if he could. He paid careful attention to the way they moved. They moved slowly. Sluggishly. He could assume they were drunks, but if the past had taught him anything, it was that assumptions were usually followed by misfortune. Then again, as the saying went, if it looks like a Grimm….

He zeroed with his senses on the conversation further, subtly feigning an acute interest in his empty glass.

"I'm tellin' ya , man! We could do it! Think how much we could get!"

The second one laughed at the absurdity of the suggestion.

"As if! He'd kill your fat ass, and us too. Anyone with a bounty that high ain't someone to be messed with!"

"For ten and a half grand?! I'd take that chance. It'd be one hell of a fight."

Ten and a half thousand lien. The rest of the conversation almost didn't matter to him. Maybe it was the liquid courage in him, but Adam swore he could already taste that money. It was as good as his. Hearing the word 'fight' only made him more excited. The thought of a real potential fight, not merely swatting aside mere weakling stray Grimm, stirred something passionate in his blood. It was like lightning in his veins, making his hair stand on end. And for perhaps the first time in days, a real genuine smile spread across his face.

He was drawn from his fantasy of what he'd spend his soon to be acquired reward on by the niggling urge of his brain ruining the party. Again. He needed to keep listening. So with a half hearted snarl, he did just that.

Annoyingly, the conversation had moved on to some inane drivel about a card game they'd been playing the other night, the three men meandering towards a table away from the board and Adam was about ready to put his head through a wall, swearing violently under his breath. He continued to eavesdrop for about as long as he could stand, hoping they would return to a more interesting topic, before tuning out entirely once more . There was nothing for it then. He was going to have to get a look at that board himself.

With a sigh, he rose to his feet and began to navigate his way across the room. Moving away from the window was a mistake. The powerful scents quickly overwhelmed his enhanced senses once more, the open window no longer shielding his nose from the ash and cigarette smoke. Combined with the drink he'd had, it took a few solid seconds to fight down the urge to vomit successfully.

After finally steadying himself, Adam looked around, his face flush with embarrassment. The rest of the bar hadn't noticed his little slip up, still totally engrossed in their own conversations to notice a trivial thing like him, though upon scanning the room, he was unfortunate enough to lock eyes with the bartender, who met his gaze with a very amused smile. Her eyes told him everything.

Growling under his breath, Adam quickly turned away, his face now as crimson as the hair on his head, and stalked towards the board with a purpose. Moving through the wall of bodies, too irritated with himself to spare half hearted apologies on people he'd shoved aside a little too roughly, he reached his goal, snatching the weathered sheet of paper from the cork board it was tacked to. As poorly lit as the room was illuminated almost solely by what rapidly retreating natural light came through the windows, and the blinking lights of the arcade machines, and dilapidated light fixtures, he was still capable of studying what he had now confirmed was a bounty poster.

'One Levi Myst. Also known as the Tarantula. Should be considered armed and dangerous. Wanted in connection for the murder of several unarmed men…'

Ignoring the block text for an instant, his eye was instead drawn to the image printed on the poster.

It was not a face that could be described as classically handsome.

A simple glance at the black and white photo told him that. His face was highlighted with age and experience and a heavy set jaw liberally scattered with what appeared to be a nearly full and speckled greying beard.

He had dark hair, in an untamed and messy style, and a long diagonal scar across his left cheek. Adam's eye roved over the paper, absorbing every detail.

While he was doing so, he stopped, seeing a detail of minor interest. Adam caught a glimpse of his bare arm and noticed a small spider themed tattoo on his left shoulder rolled his eyes. Could this guy be more of a cliche? He supposed it didn't matter. Cliche or not, money was money. And if the Mistrali government were offering up that much for him, then he might as well take advantage of it.

Though he did notice that it didn't say why the reward was so high. He thought about it for a moment, before dismissing that too as his stomach growled. It was none of his damn business. The last thing he noticed was ironically enough, the largest part of the text. 'Wanted Dead or Alive'.

Dead.

In spite of himself and his previous anticipation, Adam shuddered from an unnatural chill. He had never taken a life before. He knew how to of course. He had been trained well, and had never feared conflict, be it from anyone or anything. But that was far from his only complication, even if it did come to life or death.

Reluctant as he was to admit it, he had not reached the height of his own potential, even if he had yet to encounter man or beast who could match him in battle. His semblance was a personal point of embarrassment for him. Not because of its lack of utility in combat, but because he had very little control or command over it, especially in the heat of the moment. He had only awakened it within the past few months before he'd left, and he didn't believe he was anywhere close to unlocking its true latent possibilities, and had next to no idea as to its limitations.

And then he'd lost it.

Ever since his mother's death, part of his soul had been missing, in both a figurative and literal sense. He'd formed desperate theories, trying to make sense of his situation, but he couldn't prove anything conclusive. The common story went that aura was a physical and spiritual manifestation of the soul. Taking that as a literal truth, it stood to reason that any significant emotional trauma or instability could impact one's semblance. Even his. Just another scar that Belladonna had left him with.

But— no. He corrected himself. It wasn't that he'd lost it. That would have implied it was gone. Rather he'd felt like something was always holding it back. Something he couldn't control, couldn't see. The worst part? He knew it was there. He'd felt it in those moments. Moments of vexation at the ease with which he defeated the wild Grimm he met on his travels, moments where he'd heard one too many remarks about his faunus heritage, or seen someone staring at him just a little too long expecting his pity, where the power within him, born of his endless well of suppressed rage broiled, almost writhing for release. Yet whenever he reached out for it, it was as if a door slam in his face, leaving him cold and shivering.

It was a source of endless frustration, and he had hoped by keeping up his training, it was one that could be resolved, but so far, he'd had no luck. The bottom line was, he was broken, and he wasn't sure that he could ever be repaired . It was the only conclusion he could draw.

That said, it wasn't as though his skills had completely dulled in the time he had been away from his former home. They had after all, been more than sufficient to dispatch all of the foes he'd encountered until now. 'True.' Some dark corner of his mind remarked. 'Even if the few he had encountered were just fodder who weren't worth the dirt they'd crawled out of.'

But this man… Adam didn't know him. And with not knowing your opponent, came danger.

He looked at the cold print for a moment, before breaking out into a self satisfied smirk.

He just needed to have faith in his superior skill, and that bounty was his. He had trained relentlessly from all but the moment he could walk to acquire the fighting ability he possessed, and it was not unreasonable, in his humble opinion, to have just the slightest confidence in them. He had never needed to rely on his semblance to win a fight before. He didn't see why that would change now. And if he really was as tough as his bounty suggested? Adam's grin grew wider. Well that would be just fine by him.

He honestly couldn't think of any other way to put all of the years he spent training to better use. After all, it wasn't as though worthy opponents who were actually worth fighting were just going to come to him. At least then he'd finally have some fun. Maybe it would even…

"No. Let's not go that far."

But it was a chance.

Adam folded the poster and tucked it into his jacket. Whilst he could rely on his memory generally, if he was truly going to attempt this, it wouldn't hurt to have a point of reference for what his quarry looked like when he came across him. He would have strode out of the bar right then and there, had he not felt a heavy hand clamp itself on his shoulder. Immediately the young man balled his fist, before turning around slowly turning to see who it was that had impeded him.

"Where do you think you're goin, mongrel?"

The man who had spoken was a man of an impressive bulk. He stood several at least a head taller than the young swordsman. He smiled unpleasantly, a gleam of ugly teeth on perhaps an even uglier face. A foul smell of drink emanated from his mouth as he parted his maw and the faunus crinkled his nose in disgust.

It was the kind of smell that stopped you thinking. All that was left in his brain once the smell reached him was an automatic desire to retch.

He shrugged off the hand and made to continue on his way. Whatever this was, he had no time for it. Let the knuckle-dragging parasite entertain himself. He was met with a punch to the small of his back that sent him stumbling into a table, and he barely managed to stay on his feet.

"I asked you a question, you filthy animal!" The ape roared, flecks of spittle flying.

Blood pounded in his ears as Adam tried desperately to avoid reaching for his blade, intense emotions rushing through him like a current. He focused on the background noises. The music, the laughter, the hum of the broken lights. Anything to keep him away from his rage. He did not speak, for fear of losing his tenuous control. Unbidden, the thoughts of all the indignities he had suffered over the past few days roared within, his every instinct crying to finally cut loose.

He had worked so hard to keep his temper under control. He'd avoided people as best he could, and put up with their ignorance and intolerance when he was forced to interact with them. But now, his thoughts were a simmering pot, slow burning, ready to bubble up at any moment. They didn't have to respect him. They didn't have to like him. All they had to do was leave him be. And they were too fucking stupid for even that.

It was then, that the straw that broke the camel's bastard poked him in the chest and spat. A wad of spit collided wetly with his cheek. The cretin even had the temerity to smile, mocking him wordlessly as it began to congeal.

The fire and brimstone within his soul could no longer be contained as Adam finally gave in to his impulses in an explosion of violence. Quicker than the lash of a whip, he grabbed the offending hand and bent it back to the drunkard's chin sharply. His aura flared unconsciously, surrounding him with an ominous crimson shroud of energy. His one visible eye glowed with blood-red power and malice, as he wiped the club of spit from his face with an eerie calm.

Adam's hand slowly constricted on his opponent's wrist, a part of him reveling in the pain that slowly warped the man's face. His last remaining shred of patience having finally withered away, he spoke, with a cold and bitter edge, a tone that cut as sharply as the blade he was itching to pull free.

"Which arm do you want to lose, left or right?" When the words were uttered, the circle of men took a few tentative steps back. It seemed like they were about to run away, the shock of being defied by an animal being so incomprensible. His companion's face contorted in abject fury. He swung forwards clumsily with his free limb.

Briefly looking over his shoulder, Adam caught the movement, and his lips upturned with a sinister grin. Despite the lack of two eyes, he had long since trained himself to compensate for the shortcomings that came with being a cyclops, using his hearing to detect movement in his blind spot. His elbow soon found a nose that would never be straight again with a satisfying crunch and was duly rewarded with a resounding yelp of pain. His assailant staggered back.

At that moment, without releasing the first man's wrist, Adam twisted up on his left foot, driving home the upper part of his right foot into his attacker's stomach. The man didn't even have time to cry out, before he crashed through the wooden table, and hit the floorboards hard as they snapped under his weight. His eyes rolled, and he went limp.

Adam had to admit, for a single instant, he felt just a little better after that.

Refocusing his attention on the one who's limb he held captive, Adam increased his grip once more. "I asked you a question." He sneered. "Or do you want me to choose?"

The third man who had until this point had merely watched in stunned horror, had more sense than his companion's, it seemed, Adam noted, watching the aforementioned man slowly stepping away from the scene and attempting to meld with the other patrons. A shame, since he would have liked to have blown off some more frustration. His companion however, was less enlightened.

"You bastard! Let me go, you dirty barnyard—!"

He writhed in Adam's steel grip, desperately trying to wrench himself free.

"Have it your way."

A sharp twist and a wince inducing snap of bone had him screaming in agony. Now that Adam was done, he glanced at the big man on the floor with a mixture of disgust and a deep sense of satisfaction.

It felt good to be superior to someone else. It felt good to be in control of something. It felt good to be free.

By this time, the bar's patrons had begun to take notice of the exchange, but Adam didn't care. Either they stayed out of his way, or they joined their friends in the emergency room. It didn't make a difference to him.

But he wasn't in control, was he? A daunting feeling began to overcome him, as understanding, regret, and an all new fury began to rise within. He didn't necessarily feel regret for the vermin he'd just put down. They deserved every bit of the suffering and pain he'd gifted them. No. He was angry because he'd broken his promise to himself. He'd allowed himself to give into his rage. The very reason he had left that damned island. The thought that this.. mewling cockroach had refused to leave him the hell alone, infuriated him beyond all measure.

His red pupil visibly dilated as his eye grew wild with a beastial fury and his grip on the limb slowly tightened once more. If they didn't understand his other hints… there were other ways to get his point across. A viscous knee met with the unlucky man's chin with overwhelming force, without a hint of remorse. Followed by another. And another. And another. And yet another. Until finally, a tooth flew from the man's mouth in a spray of blood ,forced loose by the impact of the latest violent blow, empowered by his uncontrolled aura and rattled on the hard floor.

The barely conscious man was making unintelligible sounds, desperately trying to raise his uninjured limb in his defense, his hand silently pleading for Adam to stop. The faunus was deaf to his pleas. What was the most frightening thing of all, perhaps, was that he had not uttered even a solitary word throughout his entire assault. He had simply endured his victim's screams, as though they were little more than background noise.

'How. Dare. He.'

His inner voice roared, indignant that he would dare expect mercy, as his teeth bared. His fist clenched. Why should he pretend that this thing's life had any value? Why shouldn't he just snuff it out? If anything, the little wretch was lucky that he hadn't yet gotten his tongue cleaved in half by his own teeth. But as he drew his free hand back, his hand brushed against something cold and hard at his waist. The harness of his blade. Clarity and shame hit him with a cold chill down his spine.

'Oh hell.'

What was he doing?

The untamed red aura surrounding him faded, his eye becoming its usual blue as Adam suddenly felt the heavier than usual weight of his blade on his hip, the sudden stares bringing him abruptly to his senses, as the very real reality of having to fight his way out of a hostile environment began to dawn on him.

He swallowed, breathing heavily then, almost unable to digest the fact that he had so quickly abandoned his pride again out of embarrassment for having been so weak of will the first time. The faunus recoiled slightly from guilt, but couldn't ignore the niggling sense of apprehension that had begun to crawl into his mind.

His damned temper had gotten the better of him, and now it was coming back to bite him, with far more tangible consequences. Well then. 'Have at it.' He was even more furious with himself than before for doing so, but that didn't mean he was going to lay down and die for his lapse of self control, as much as the deep sense of shame that had begun to gnaw at his soul might disagree. His left hand dropped to his blade hilt as he waited for the inevitable swarm of bodies that would surely step in to attack at any moment.

"Hey!"

A familiar voice, female, if he had to hazard a guess, cut through the remaining haze of his unrelenting fury for an instant, though he did not release the man's wrist. The woman from earlier stormed through the crowd of people, furiously staring the two of them down with a metal pipe in hand before pointing it in Adam's direction.

"You. Outside ."

They locked eyes, two viridescent eyes meeting a single sapphire orb.

Adam paused, as if considering her demand, before donning the mask of apathy, allowing it to settle over his features before shrugging, releasing the useless limb and allowing his victim to crumple to the ground clutching his forearm. He had been about to leave anyway.

Calmly and deliberately, he walked towards the exit, stepping over the wreckage of the table as he did so. He could feel her eyes boring into his back as he moved, though he did not dare turn around, for fear of revealing his true feelings.

In a matter of moments, he had crossed the room, pulling the door, and stepping out into the cool night. There had been silence for an instant.

Then, as though nothing had occurred, the tsunami of noise had resumed.

She knew she couldn't just leave him out there. His lack of money and impulsive attitude seemed like a recipe for disaster, and her neighborhood was dangerous enough as it was. And even though she wasn't particularly keen to help his sorry ass, Charlotte knew full well what it was like to be thrust out onto the cold, hard streets for the first time on your own; having no idea where to go or who to trust.

She didn't know how much longer he would survive. He acted like a punk kid with nothing to lose, one of the ones that picked up a gun to avenge someone who'd bought in a gang war and went out in a blaze of glory.

She had tried to tell herself it was none of her damn business.

Before she'd even realized it, she was following his steps out into the night.

Curse her and her bleeding heart.

---

Adam Taurus was never one for surprises, and this one was no exception.

The woman glared up at him, eyes flush with anger and irritation, her face bathed in blue moonlight shone down, a diffuse glow, lighting the world around the two faunus from pitch black to charcoal grey.

Adam had to admit, he was somewhat taken aback by this turn of events.

It had been his thinking that it was probably for the best that he got as far away from this area as possible and enacted his original plan of sleeping somewhere on the rooftop pagodas he had seen when he first entered the last thing he needed was to hang around and be caught up in violent reprisals in the near future. Though it seemed now, it was a little too late for that.

He had heard the banging of the wooden door slamming against the plaster and rapid footsteps behind him, and his blade was half-way drawn even before he recognized the flushed visage before him.

She had to be either unwaveringly brave, or utterly insane.

She stood a full head shorter than him, a fact that was more evident now that he was outside and standing at his full height, and yet, there was no fear or reservation about her, despite the fact that his hand had never once left the hilt of his resheathed blade, and a simple flick of his wrist could well mean her death.

Or rather, if she was indeed fearful of the display of wanton violence he had begun to showcase moments ago and was evidently even more capable of with his weapon in hand, it was very hard to believe she'd found it all that terrifying with the way she was stomping after him now.

He had to admire that much. Unfortunately for him at present, that admiration was offset by her belligerence, her insistence on working his every nerve and perhaps most of all, his sheer incredulity of the subject matter.

"Are you talking about the knuckle-draggers back there?"

He tried to keep his tone light, to keep his frustration at his temporary loss of control from bleeding into his voice. It wasn't perfect, but it was a serviceable imitation, at least by his assessment.

"Look, I have no idea what kind of gutter trash your usual clientele are." He continued. "But that's your problem. Not mine. If you can't keep your apes in check, that's on you."

She advanced on him like an enraged lion, pipe in hand before she caught just the barest upturn of his lips, a sliver of his teeth showing through.

He could almost physically envision the steam clouds evaporating from her ears like a boiling kettle. Was that how he looked when he had lost his temper earlier? The idea wryly amused him somewhat, in a morbid fashion. What amused him even more, was the idea that she expected him to feel guilty in any regard for damaging anything, when the entire bar had appeared to be a conglomeration of broken items when he had arrived.

He batted her hand away and made to move past her. Within seconds, she was back in his path, taking a hands-on-hips stance, in an attempt to look authoritative. It was here that Adam noticed the whiteness of her knuckles gripping her weapon.

"Anyway. Way I see it, you owe me." The annoying woman stated with finality.

"And how" Adam drawled, his mood slowly sliding from amused to somewhat irate. "Do you suppose I owe you anything?"

"You mean aside from wrecking my tables and beating up my customers?"

The sarcastic bite to her tone was not lost on Adam. "Maybe because of this?" She waved the pipe in front of his face undeterred.

"You've got a metal stick and your sparkling personality." He said, keeping his voice low and refusing to acknowledge her jibe. "I'm terrified."

Evidently affronted, she retorted."As if you're one to talk about personality!" She got halfway through jabbing one of her fingers against his chest before thinking better of it, returning it to her hip once more.

He didn't speak in response, only snorting dismissively.

She was half inclined to threaten him by yelling for help, but she knew damned well it was an empty threat. She knew from experience that the area her bar was situated in was an unofficial no-go zone, where law enforcement, or more accurately, what passed for it, was expressly forbidden to go, unless something warranting a genuine emergency occurred or they were there for… collections. A bar fight and some casual property damage in the poorest district of the city did not warrant "emergency" even if it did affect her livelihood.

She forced herself to calm down. Approaching this the way she was, wasn't going to get her anywhere. And so she made her proposal, and even more surprisingly, he heard her out.

"Tell me..." Adam let the words drag and linger in the cool air for a few brief moments, after she'd finished, long enough to get her to finally look at him fully. "What do I get out of this scheme?"

"You're new in town, aren't you?" She said, inquiringly.

Adam shrugged as nonchalantly as he could. He couldn't exactly see what it was she was getting at, or why it concerned her in the slightest, but he saw no harm in sharing that information. "And if I am?"

"So you don't have anywhere to stay?" Her grin was wide now, and he was beginning to grow wary.

"And how do you figure that?" He replied testily.

"Well….I'm guessing. But if I'm right… that means, I have something you want, doesn't it?"

As a result of her admittedly not very convincing arguments, he turned around and looked at her, with an unsettling expression on his face. He was a completely different man in the gloom of the night, and the stare made her wonder if she'd made a mistake.

Adam blinked at her. She cocked her head to the side, her chin upturned in… a challenge? He was tempted to refuse, simply out of spite, but he didn't. He was merely weighing the pros and cons in his head. Adam's glare narrowed. "And what exactly," he drawled, suddenly aware of the chill of the night, "do you get out of this little deal of yours?"

There was the slightest lump in the skirt on her right thigh that said she had a knife waiting there. It would be easy enough for her to get it, and it left Adam wondering why she hadn't gone with that instead of the blunt instrument. The slit in the skirt was primed for access, and if she had the presence of mind, she could have slipped it between his shoulder blades before he'd even turned around to face her. Or at least tried to.

Adam stared her down. Now? Was it now that he should free Wilt from its sheath and cut her throat before she did his? She was certainly close enough to make a move; she could just be waiting for him to drop his guard. It crossed his mind then, that maybe her task wasn't to finish him off, but to distract him long enough for an ambush. And if that was the case, shouldn't he just toss her to the floor like trash, kick in her teeth, and be on his way before her 'friends' rocked up to finish the job they tried to start earlier? Or should he accept her offer, and run the risk of being run through later? She spoke again in the second before he had completely made up his mind.

"Ever heard about not looking a gift horse in the mouth? Cause right now, you're staring." She crossed her arms and pursed her lips, doing his best to keep her expression neutral.

Adam raised an eyebrow.

"You're not going to be selling many bridges with a face like that." He shrugged one hand into his pocket, but the other was still toying with the leather on Wilt's handle. "Alright, enough fun and games. What do you want?"

"Again, staring. Which you'd think would be less difficult for you with one eye, but somehow, you're pulling it off."

"I don't even know your name."

His voice sounded tight, maybe even slightly tired, and she had no way of knowing if that was because he was putting on an act, or whether it was the perceived mental burden of his deliberating her proposal being pushed to the fore. Adam raised one of his hands to his temples and began to massage the headache that was forming, an act that earned an eye roll in response

"Fair's fair, I guess. Name's Charlotte. Charlotte Cavatica. And you?"

Finally, he nodded, much to her own satisfaction.

"I'm questioning the logic of letting a stranger into your home, but will gladly take advantage of your ill-advised charity."

He was met with silence.

"Adam." At her expectant stare, he reluctantly added "Taurus" with an discomforted grunt, sounding very much as if the act of uttering his own name had been involuntarily forced from him.

"Was that really so hard?"

"Like pulling teeth."

She smiled a poisonous smile in return. "So, do we have a deal, Mystery Man?"

Finally, he nodded. Feeling as though he were making a deal with the Dark Brother himself, Adam reached for her outstretched hand and shook it, doing his level best to ignore her grin.

The first of many stupid decisions, he feared.

---

Charlotte, if that was her actual name, had been kind enough to grant him board in the upper rooms of the bar, at least for the night. Upon his acquiescence to her vague terms, she'd wasted no time in bundling him through a narrow side street and through the back door of the very building he'd just left. After a march up a slight of stairs, she had shoved him into a room, smiled, and shut the door behind her, leaving seemingly alone. He wasn't quite sure how he felt about that just yet. If he'd had the delusion of a five star living arrangement, the view of his new lodging set him straight soon enough.

His room was every bit as dilapidated as the rest of the establishment.

The red brick was crumbling and the air within was dust-filled and stale. The environment was at least furnished, in the loosest sense of the word but almost all of it looked as though he could reasonably fear that he would collapse them if so much as as a stray breath came into contact with them.

In the corner of the room, lay a dusty bed, and an equally battle-damaged mattress, complete with what he thought was a pillow, all of which had most assuredly seen better days.

Adam knew better than to complain though. He'd dealt with far worse conditions in his life, and instead took great relief in the small mercy that the ceiling appeared to be intact meaning, at the very least, which meant that he was at least protected from the elements.

He knew he shouldn't sleep. He just met the woman, and only a fool let his guard down so easily. And he'd be lying through his teeth if he said he trusted the devious little pest that called herself the proprietor of the bar as far as he could throw her. And it was for that reason, that the first thing he did, was check every inch of the room for anyone lying in wait.

His enhanced eyes could see every outline just as clearly as if it had been daytime, and he simply pulled his jacket over his nose to filter the dust out. The wardrobe, under the bed, he even tapped at the floorboards, listening for hollow spaces. He didn't find anything, but all the same, he couldn't allow himself to be calm.

There was always the chance he had made a mistake in bargaining with her. He doubted she'd let him into her home out of the kindness of her heart; she'd all but said as much when she'd refused to elaborate on her benefit. She was clearly playing her cards close to her chest, and that meant that he had to as well. That was, if he was going to stay. The blinding blue neon glow of the lights outside seemed to almost beckon to him in the darkness, as he made his way deeper into the room. Leaning his duffel against the frame of the bed, he approached the window like a moth to a flame, setting both hands on the sill.

The thought occurred to him then, that he could simply...leave. It was a simple matter of simply opening the window and hopping out. There was no fire escape, at least as far as he could see on this side of the building, and he wasn't at all confident about escaping over the rooftops— with the conditions of most of the buildings, he'd probably fall straight through if he tried landing on one of them— but he could certainly stick the fall to the ground, if he had to. It wasn't that high, and he still had aura.

Struggling with the latch for a few moments, splinters of dry wood and paint shavings fell down onto the ledge, as Adam slid the window upwards, fighting years of rust and decay. His eye burned and watered momentarily with the unexpected rush of the cold night air. There he stood for a moment, contemplating his options. He could leave, yes, but where would he go? It would hardly be the smartest idea to leave the city, only to have to come back the next day. He didn't have the funds to rent anywhere, and even if he'd had the mind to find somewhere to break into, it would probably be more trouble than it was worth. Maybe he shouldn't look this gift horse in the mouth.

He sighed.

He'd stay. At least for now. But that didn't mean he wouldn't take precautions.

Moving quickly away from the window, he grabbed his duffle and set it down on the bed. Rummaging through it, he sorted through his belongings until he found what he wanted; a small canvas sack, around double the size of a fist tied with several pieces of twine. He took its contents, and approached the door, first listening for any approach, and then, removing the tie, he opened the bag, releasing white powder onto the hardwood floor, carefully spreading it out with his hands so as to keep the distribution even.

It was a trick he had used in the wild with dry leaves while he had first camped out, before he graduated to sleeping in trees, but the principle was much the same. At the time, he had no way of knowing who or what was out there, so when he decided to sleep, he would gather as many leaves as he could and spread them around his sleeping roll. He had always been a light sleeper, and the crunch of the leaves would alert him to anyone's approach. Here though, leaves were something of a rarity for obvious reasons, so he was improvising with the salt he used to preserve the fish and meat from his hunts. It wasn't as though he had a particular use for it, and once he had the money from the bounty, he'd certainly have the lien to replace it.

Once he was satisfied, he returned to the open window, and repeated the process there, saturating the area beneath the sill, and the sill itself. That way, if anyone tried climbing through the front for some reason, he'd know about it, buying a few precious seconds to act.

He nearly jumped, however, when he heard a loud, clanging and shuddering of metal vibrations. Looking around, startled and alert at first, he then realized it was simply the water heater somewhere else in the building below him. The rattling of the pipes that he could hear sounded too uniform to be human work.

Satisfied that he was alone, he decided to kill some time by reading a book. It was battered and weathered, dog eared in places, and the cover was wrinkled and weather spotted, but it was one of the faunus' most treasured possessions. It was a mythical account of the life of a warrior who had lived over a thousand years ago. The villain, a tyrant king named Ozymandias, was a powerful sorcerer who commanded all of the elements. His power was such could even control the wild beasts and thanks to his unmatched power became the leader of an advanced nation. From there, he became a conqueror, taking kingdom after kingdom under the wheels of his relentless war machine, for no reason but sheer pleasure. His rule was unopposed, save for a single warrior. An ninja without a name, wielding a scarlet blade, refused to kneel, fighting alone even when all others had surrendered themselves to the mercy of the king.

Ozymandias, enraged by his defiance, sent warrior after warrior after the ninja, to no avail. The book was something of a cult classic, few were interested in the tales, fewer still knew they existed, and even the edition he owned, though Adam had read it cover to cover countless times, he had found much to his dismay that it was missing several chronicles of his exploits. Ultimately, in his old age, and after the death of Ozymandias, the nameless warrior vanished into the mountains and obscurity, even having a family of his own, where they lived happily ever after.

Perhaps it was that tale that had led him to Anima.

Adam had always enjoyed the idea of the legend, the principle of it; a single man standing in defiance of the world and all its desires, not for any particular school of morality, but in accordance with his own code. In his younger days, he had pretended to be that folklore legend himself, leaping from the shadows to "defeat" the tyrant, so deftly played by an amused Evelyn Taurus, ever willing to entertain her energetic son's nonsense, though his "legendary blade" tended to consist of the nearest piece of twig or lumber he could wield. But it held even more value to him now. It was one of his mother's favorites, and even if he hadn't grown up on the tale, for that reason above all others, it had been one of his too.

Fairy tales, and uninspired crap according to some. For some reason, that girl never did seem able keep his nose out of Adam's personal life, right down to his tastes in literature. As if she had any moral high ground to stand on when she spent her life reading low-brow smut and using it to call herself an intellectual. He put the book down, carefully folding his bookmark in between the pages and listened for a moment, making sure nothing suspicious was going on. After a few seconds, he was confident that everything was still silent. Maybe he was overthinking things.

As he kicked off his boots and attempted to relax on the bed, Adam dismissed this last thought. Time would tell, and he may as well use the time he had now to start making sense of the matters that lay ahead. He lay back on the lumpy pillow, cradling his blade in his arms. If this was some elaborate attempt at having him killed, he would not be caught unawares. But when he closed his eye and felt the exhaustion finally taking over, he found himself caring little for sense.

Ever the fool that he was.