Disclaimer, I do not own RWBY
Chapter 3: Dark Clouds
"It's not part of any existing mech production line? You're sure about that?" Jaune spoke into his scroll, frown deepening by the second.
"…"
"I see. Is it possible these are defects? A messed-up production batch?"
"…"
"I see. Damn, thanks anyways. Keep looking into it, I want to know where those parts came from and who they were meant for." Jaune sighed and looked at the ceiling.
"…"
"Ah, that's the thing, isn't it? I don't know. And I don't like not knowing. I just… have a real bad feeling about those mech parts."
"…"
"Yeah, thanks again, if you find anything, contact me immediately. Right, I'll see you around." Jaune hung up and tossed the scroll on his desk. Pinching the bridge of his nose and massaging it, he could feel a migraine coming on.
"Trouble?" Grey asked, standing in a corner shrouded by shadows.
"Maybe. Those parts are an unknown, and unknowns are dangerous." Jaune replied.
"Which brings us to the Pyrrha Nikos issue." Jaune groaned and screwed his eyes shut. He needed coffee in his bloodstream asap to ward off the headache.
"Ugh, can barely get anything out of that kingdom, those Crown bastards are acting up again."
"Do you want me to go?" Grey asked.
"No. Could be a trap, but damn, I need more eyes in there." Jaune growled angrily. Vacuo was pretty much the same lawless frontier it had always been. Shade had some power and the council had even less, but criminal gangs ran rampant all the same, each fighting for scraps and showing no loyalty to anyone but themselves. And unlike the Mistralian mob or Atlas's mega corps, buying them off was nearly impossible.
A knock at the door made Jaune look up and shelve his plans for Vacuo for the time being. "Yes?"
"Boss, it's Pete, uh, there's a Ms Sustrai here to see you. Says she has an appointment." Pete's voice came from outside.
"No, she does not have an appointment. But whatever, send her in." Jaune sighed.
The door swung open and Emerald strolled right in, without a care in the world, only pausing to shoot Grey a wary glance before taking a seat.
"Don't tell me you're here to hire me for another job." Jaune's thin smile belied what he thought of the idea.
"You're upset for someone who made a nice chunk of cash for so little effort." Emerald ignored Jaune's blank stare.
"Little effort? I don't think you know how troublesome it is trying to fence sixteen tons of hardlight dust. I still have half of it sitting pretty and wasting space." Jaune replied.
"And that sounds like a you problem. But I'm not here about a new job, it's been a month since I asked you to look into Agent Orange. Tell me you have something." Emerald got right to her point.
"If you're expecting me to have everything you want for you, I'm afraid you're going to be a bit disappointed." Jaune shrugged.
"If you're lying to me, I'll-"
"What reason would I have to lie to you Emerald? I'm an info broker, my intel has to be trustworthy or I'm not going to get any business. I told you already, Agent Orange is a ghost story, trying to dig up information is like trying to mine dust in a cloud." Jaune interrupted.
"But… that's not to say I'm empty handed. I did find a few things sorting through old reports. Most of it was redacted or destroyed but I managed to retrieve some data."
"Oh? What is it? Tell me already!" Emerald leaned in closer, eager to hear the rest.
"Turns out, you were right! But not right enough." Jaune replied.
"Huh?" Emerald blinked in confusion.
"There wasn't one Agent Orange in Vale seven years ago, there were at least two." Jaune held up two fingers. Reaching for a stack of files in a corner, he grabbed one and leafed through it until he found the printout he was searching for. Removing it, he handed it to Emerald.
"What's this?" Emerald squinted and struggled to make sense of the document. It was a photocopy of a report that had been partially burnt.
Much of it was illegible, but enough was there to make out the fact that it was a communique to General Ironwood regarding the successful induction of Agent Orange. Then after a garbled mess of scorch marks and holes, more details about Agent Orange being deployed on separate missions.
"This… this is…" Emerald held the sheet of paper in her hands like it was the original Vytal treaty itself.
"Where'd you find this?"
"I'd… rather not talk about it." Distaste filled Jaune's face and he looked away.
"If you found this, then there might be more!" Emerald insisted.
"There really isn't, at least not where I got this from." Jaune shook his head.
"You don't know that!"
"Of course I do, I'm not going dumpster diving again Emerald. I already have the council on a leash with the dirty little secrets I know about them. They really, really, don't want me having more leverage over them. As soon as I started poking around, they had everything burnt to ashes, this was the only thing relevant to Agent Orange I managed to get. I had to pull that scrap right from the council archive's furnace and let me tell you, that was not a fun experience." Jaune replied.
"No! Damnit!" Emerald cursed.
"But I do have something else for you too." Jaune said.
"Eh?"
"Look, I don't have anything concrete to back this one up, only thing I have to go on is the fact that that document was in council's archive at all. If you're not interested in my speculation, it's fine too." Jaune offered.
"Go on." Emerald prodded.
"Alright. First off, Agent Orange is an Atlesian spy, always has been since the Great War. Second, there was at least some level of collaboration between Vale and Atlas over this, maybe even involving the other kingdoms but I have no evidence of that yet. If there wasn't, this document wouldn't be in the council's hands, and if it was Vale intelligence that dug it up, it wouldn't be rotting in the archives." Jaune shrugged.
"That's… true." Emerald nodded, the logic was sound to her.
"And this leads to the biggest bit of speculation. Agent Orange, either one or both of them aren't from Atlas." Jaune dropped the bombshell.
"What?"
"Yeah, it's sort of the reason why I didn't believe you about Agent Orange at first. Every Atlesian present during the Vytal Festival was accounted for. Everyone. Both those that came in legit, and those who used backdoors. None of them had the chance to be Agent Orange. Hell, even Atlas's other spies were snooping around elsewhere, nowhere close to Cinder's operation." Jaune said.
"So… if Agent Orange existed and it couldn't have been an Atlesian, then they have to be recruited from a different kingdom." Emerald finished for Jaune.
"Pretty much, which is where that cooperation between Vale and Atlas comes in possibly. It's a nice little shell game they had going on, everyone looks at Atlas, no one pays attention to the other kingdoms swiping the stone in the background. Genius." Jaune chuckled.
"Who else would know about Agent Orange in that case." Emerald furrowed her brows in thought.
"The old Vale council maybe, if they weren't as incompetent as I remember them to be. But then, they're all KIA during the supreme court bombings. And again, that leaves me with Ironwood as the only person in the know." Jaune sighed.
"I'll keep looking into it of course, just don't get your hopes up too high."
"Rgh, fine. I waited seven years for my revenge, I can wait a little longer." Emerald grudgingly accepted.
"Now, about your end of the bargain." Jaune narrowed his eyes at Emerald.
"Haa, fine I guess I can give you a bit more since you did get some results." Emerald huffed and scratched at a nail.
"After Vytal, I drifted across Remnant, made a few connections here and there, some in Atlas, some in Mistral and some in Vacuo. A few months ago, I… ah, let's just say had to repay a favour for my 'friends' in Atlas. Wound up in Vacuo to settle an old score."
Emerald shrugged and withdrew her scroll and forwarding several files to Jaune's own. He picked it up and glanced at the images with a frown. "The Crown again? Those nutjobs have been getting pretty uppity lately."
"They're not all bad, well back then at least, I don't know what the situation is like now." Emerald said.
"Oh?"
"Some kind of power struggle was going down while I was there. Split em right down the middle, Gillian loyalists on one side and an unknown opposing her. They were grabbing anyone useful to throw into the meat grinder, I was there to get those who wanted out, out." Emerald said.
"And you ran into Pyrrha there?" Jaune asked.
"Ran into? No, no. I never saw her, but Gillian's people did. Tried recruiting her for their war, it didn't go so well for them." Emerald's words made Jaune's frown deepen.
"I see… that is… concerning." Jaune admitted.
"Worried she's coming after you?"
"Eh, you could say that." Jaune shrugged.
"Maybe you should have done a better job the first time." Emerald replied.
"I did do a perfect job the first time. Poisoned her drink then stabbed her through the heart. There's no surviving that." Jaune ran his hand through his hair and ruffled it in frustration.
"Yet somehow she's back from the grave in Vacuo of all places, god damnit."
"Yeah, well people you kill have a problem staying dead." Emerald said after a moment, recalling their heist.
"Huh?"
"Back on the train, the first guy you killed. His body wasn't there when we went back to check on it." Emerald said.
"What." Jaune's tone was flat enough to be used as a runway.
"Mmhmm, three bodies should have been in the last car, I counted only two when we got back. Either someone stole that particular body and ran or it got up and walked off. Pick your poison." Emerald said.
Jaune held her gaze for a few seconds before his forehead crashed into the desk. Slamming it against the table a few more times, a long-suffering sigh tore its way from his throat. "You have got to be fucking with me right now."
The first sign that they were under attack was a sudden rain of high explosives. Alarms blared amidst the chorus of screaming and explosions. Half-asleep guards snapped awake and fumbled with their rifles while their compatriots tumbled out of their beds courtesy of the rude awakening.
Then just as suddenly as the rain started, it stopped, replaced by heavy pounding on the main gates. Spotlights flicked on and swivelled to illuminate the area. The guards fiddled with their weapons nervously as the reinforced doors flexed and started to give under the assault.
Forming a firing line in front of the gate, they raised their guns and took aim the instant the heavy doors started bending out towards them. The pounding got louder and quicker as whoever or whatever was on the other side grew impatient and started hammering away even harder.
Finally, with a thunderous crack and ear-rending screech of machinery, the entire main gate came off its hinges. The guards backed away in fright as the heavily dented slab of metal flew several feet before crashing to earth.
As the dust settled, they noticed a figure wreathed in lightning standing on the other side. Effortlessly twirling a heavy war hammer about like a conductor's baton, a serene smile graced her face and the mismatch sent chills down their spine.
"Well don't everybody clap at once." Nora shrugged.
"Here's Nora!"
She charged.
Screams and gunfire echoed into the night sky.
"Nora's having fun." Ren muttered as the sound of battle reached his ears. Keeping to the shadows, he slipped past the panicking defenders, letting them pass without ever realising he was there.
Hearing voices coming from a room ahead, Ren glanced about before moving in and slipping a bug under the door. Hearing more footsteps coming, he retreated into the shadows then linked the bug to his earpiece, listening in on whoever was inside.
"-mean they're running away!? It's just one fucking girl! Kill her already!" A man Ren presumed to be the leader of the Raptor mercenaries shouted.
"I'm afraid your men won't be able to do that." A woman spoke softly and Ren felt his skin crawl, recognising the voice instantly.
"And what the fuck do you know doc? Shut the fuck u-why the fuck are you even in here actually!? Get out!"
"The point is, you've failed. That is Nora Valkyrie out there, meaning Lie Ren is already inside this base somewhere."
"The fuck you on abou-"
Ren flinched as several loud gunshots rang out, followed by several thuds.
"What a disappointment, it seems this operation is a bust. Hmm, then again, I might as well use this chance to collect some data. Stein, terminate Nora Valkyrie with extreme prejudice."
An unholy roar of rage was Ren's only warning before the wall exploded outwards. A hulking brute stepped through the new exit and started lumbering towards the sound of battle in accordance with his orders.
Ren watched the giant go with disgust. Mottled skin verging on grey covered his frame, ugly blue-green veins covered almost every inch of exposed skin.
Bulging muscles merged with cybernetics and the gods only knew what else contributed to his monstrous strength and weight, the floor tiles cracking under each stomp.
And the eyes, yellowed and bloodshot, the pupils an angry red that glowed with hellish light from whatever enhancements were in there.
Everything about the giant was an insult to nature and an affront to life itself.
"Nora, you're about to have company. A new Stein, she's here." Ren whispered into his communicator.
"I'll be fine. Get the bitch." Nora's reply came a few seconds later.
"Don't do anything reckless, I'll be there as soon as I can." Ren said, already on the move.
"Oh you worry too much dear. I got this!" Nora said cheerily.
Ren grunted and slipped through the hole in the wall, finding a lone woman in a dirty lab coat shoving papers into a bag. He struck immediately, launching StormFlower's grappling hook forwards to lock her down.
As though sensing the danger, she dodged away instantly with a fluidity that was almost inhuman. Turning to face Ren, she cracked a smile. "Ah, there you are huntsman. I was wondering if you were going to show up."
"It's over Schale. You're under arrest for high treason against mankind, surrender!" Ren ordered, holding his weapons at the ready.
"That's Dr Schale to you. And what right do you have to arrest me anyways? Because the councils empower you as a huntsman? What makes their authority legitimate hmm? This isn't one of your precious walled cities, you have no power here." Schale chuckled when Ren put a round into the wall behind her.
"Resorting to violence already? And here I was thinking we could discuss this like civilised people."
"Civilised? You? You're a monster and I think I'll do the world a favour by putting you down now." Ren said, StormFlower shaking in his grip from barely suppressed rage.
"Hmmph, you're welcome to try." Schale shrugged, then lunged towards Ren with blinding speed. Striking out with razor sharp scalpels, she had Ren on the defensive immediately.
"Shit!" Ren parried the incoming stabs with StormFlower's blades, aura flaring whenever the mad doctor snuck a scalpel under his guard. The flurry of blows was too fast for him to block them all, giving up on defence, he took the next several stabs to the chest head on in order to shove StormFlower in Schale's face. Squeezing the trigger, he unloaded on her at point blank range.
Ren narrowed his eyes as Schale dodged at the last second, leaving the bullets to embed themselves harmlessly in the wall. Slicing at her with the blades yielded the same result, Schale effortlessly evading everything before retaliating.
"Chronos." He hissed in anger.
"You're insane."
"The side effects are aggravating I'll admit, but hardly outside of my ability to deal with." Schale replied, lunging forwards again with her scalpels.
Ren backpedalled staying out of reach of the silver blade, his mind racing to find a counter to Schale's doping. Chronos made its user perceive the world in slow motion by accelerating them, increasing their reflexes to borderline precognition.
Highly addictive and incredibly damaging to the body, the usual method of dealing with anyone suicidal enough to use it in battle was to wait them out, let the drug cripple their body from the inside then move in for the finish.
"Tch." Ren parried a stab and swiped at Schale only for her to dance away again. Waiting her out wasn't an option, Nora should have engaged Stein by now and he needed to help her, not to mention they had prisoners to rescue.
All of a sudden, Schale's movements became sluggish and she swayed about unsteadily. Not missing the window, Ren went for her throat, scoring a line across it with overwhelming force. Pale grey aura flared in response to the hit and the doctor went stumbling backwards.
"Krk, not bad, formula still needs work. Looks like that's all the time I have to play with you today little huntsman." Schale spat out a globule of blood and drew a detonator from her pocket. Before Ren could stop her, she jammed her thumb down on the switch, triggering the base's self-destruct.
The entire building shook as explosions went off beneath their feet, threatening to bring the roof down on their heads.
"Tick tock huntsman! Better hurry if you want to save those test subjects!" Schale cackled madly.
"What will it be? Arrest me and let them die? Or let me go and try to save them."
"Damn you!" Ren roared before turning on his feet and dashing out. The doctor's mad laughter rang in his ears as he sprinted down the corridors, in search of the holding cells. Biting his lip hard enough to cause his aura to flare, Ren shut out the urge to go back and bring her to justice at once.
More explosions rocked the base and cracks started forming on the walls and ceilings. Ignoring the panicking base personnel running around like headless chickens, Ren kept his ears peeled for any sign of the prisoners.
Finally, upon kicking down the door barring an emergency staircase, he heard their cries coming from below. Vaulting over the bannisters and landing on the lowest floor below. He kicked down the door and found himself staring into an inferno.
Several civilians were locked up in their jail cells, huddled up in a corner and trying to back away as much as they could from the hungry flames licking at them. Thick smoke hung in the air from the lack of ventilation and Ren's eyes watered from the sting.
He could smell something else in there too, some kind of chemical, probably from the destroyed Chronos manufacturing equipment. But no time to deal with that now.
StormFlower at the ready, he hit a switch on it, dumping his meagre supply of hardlight dust into it. Light collected along the blade, coalescing into a longer hardlight edge with increased cutting power over the next few seconds.
Slashing at the bars, he hacked through them cleanly, opening up an escape route for the trapped captives. "I'm here to get you out! This Way! Hurry!"
(Break)
Nora swiped the legs out from under a Raptor enforcer with Magnhild's handle. Doing a little twirl, she hummed happily and brought the war hammer down on the man's knees, smashing it to paste instantly.
The howl of agony tore at his comrades' morale, ripping what little of it remained to shreds. Nothing they'd thrown at her even slowed her down, shooting her only encouraged her to return fire with grenades. Taking advantage of their numbers and rushing her in melee was even worse, too many of their own received an impromptu lesson about how much pain a person could take before blacking out.
"Who's next! Come on, come on! I'm waiting! I'll smash all your legs!" Nora taunted, baring her teeth in a bloodthirsty smile. But behind her façade, she was more than a little worried, making sure to keep one eye on the base. Another one of Schale's freaks was coming and that always meant trouble.
She continued to mow down the grunts in her way effortlessly until Stein announced his presence. Busting out of a second-floor window in an inhuman leap, he landed right on top of a hapless grunt, squashing the man flat instantly.
Nora winced at the crunch but kept the disgust off her face. "You're an ugly one, aren't ya?"
Hefting her hammer and giving it a few swings, she grinned and beckoned to the abomination. "Come on tiny, let's see what you got."
Stein roared, spittle flying everywhere. His orders were clear, terminate Nora at any cost, and he would obey. Charging right through the raptors, he bulldozed their ranks, smashing the unfortunate aside with his arms or simply running them over.
For them, this sudden assault was the last straw. Their morale broke completely and the men threw aside their weapons, running for the hills. Command had also gone silent, not that they would have listened to orders insisting on a suicidal last stand anyways.
That suited Nora just fine. Her frontal assault was always meant to be a distraction while Ren got in and rescued the hostages. Dr Schale's presence complicated things, but she had faith Ren had things under control. Now, she just had to take out the walking tank before the good doctor called him back to deal with Ren.
Waiting till Stein closed into striking distance, she lashed out with a lightning-fast strike from Magnhild, bringing the hammer down on Stein's skull and knocking him aside. "Grah, got a thick skull, huh?"
Nora wrung her hand in pain as Stein got back up. Part of his head had caved in, a flat disc showing where Magnhild had struck home. The skin had torn and Nora could see a mesh of metal and damaged wiring under it.
Another wave of revulsion passed through her and Nora shook her head to get herself back in the game. Dr Schale's walking crime against nature was already surging back into the fight.
Massive fists rocketed towards Nora with surprising speed and Nora hopped backwards to avoid them. The cybernetics installed in Stein among his other modifications made him a force to be reckoned with, granting him unholy strength and speed. Every strike dug out large divots from the ground and the one time she blocked a punch with Magnhild, her arms nearly went numb from the shock.
Fortunately, his accuracy and tactics left a lot to be desired. Nora ducked under a massive arm and jabbed upwards with Magnhild's handle with all of her strength, ramming it into Stein's exposed elbow joint, fracturing it.
Throwing herself to the side to avoid the frenzied thrashing, Nora put some distance between them and started circling her opponent. If Stein was human once, he'd lost all of his humanity by this point. Just a mishappen machine of tortured flesh and twisted metal only capable of following orders and striking out like a mindless beast.
Nora dodged another reckless charge, then followed up with a mighty smash to the back, causing Stein to collapse in a heap. Within seconds, the behemoth was already struggling to get back to his feet.
"Ugh, I've hit brick walls softer than this." Nora groaned and glanced at the base. Several explosions had gone off inside and Ren hadn't contacted her since their last communique. It was worrying, the sooner she put Stein down, the sooner she could go to his aid.
"One grenade left… got some lightning dust… haaah… Ren's gonna scold me for this later." Nora sighed. Whipping out a lightning dust crystal just as Stein rose up, she crushed it in her fist. Lightning crackled around her, surging through her system in a burst of pain.
"Rrraaaghh!" Roaring from the pain, Nora hefted Magnhild for one last strike, her semblance kicking into overdrive, converting all of that electricity into pure strength.
Stein closed and she swung with all her might, aiming for centre mass. At the point of impact, she pulled the trigger, firing her last grenade to give her hammer blow that extra kick.
The two unstoppable forces collided and for a moment nothing happened. Then Stein's chest caved in and Magnhild carried through, Nora yelled at the top of her lungs and put even more force into her swing, picking up Stein and sending him flying.
He hit the dirt with a heavy thud, kicking up a cloud of dust. Nora ignored the pain and glared at the body, daring it to rise again.
Nothing.
Stein lay there, not so much as a single twitch. Nora watched it warily for a few more seconds before turning and dashing towards the collapsing base, still ready to react if Stein suddenly came rushing at her again.
To her joy, her worries proved unfounded. Stein didn't rise again and she was met by Ren on his way out. Several scared looking people were trailing behind him, the prisoners they were here to rescue she presumed.
"Nora? Stein, is he-" Ren looked up at her with watery eyes, still smarting from the smoke.
"Dealt with." Nora jerked a thumb towards Stein's motionless body behind her.
"The bitch?"
"…She got away." Ren averted his eyes and snarled.
"We'll get her next time Ren, don't worry." Nora reassured.
"Is this… everyone?"
"Yes. The rest were… processed." Ren's gaze fell to the floor and Nora bit back the curse.
"Alright, I'll call in the bullhead, we'll get these people to safety." Nora gave Ren a brief hug before drawing her scroll.
"We've rescued the hostages, need immediate medivac for them… no, some of them didn't make it… got it, the transponder is active, just come as fast as you can." Nora hung up and stowed the scroll away.
"Don't worry Ren, we'll get her eventually."
"Yeah… I guess so." Ren sighed and looked up. The night sky was shrouded by dark clouds and he couldn't see the moon or stars behind them. Thunder rumbled overhead by no rain or lightning yet.
"An ill omen."