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Scrublord Yoda
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Pyrrha's spear punched out from behind the safety of her shield and into the glass front that made up its face. It sparked and spasmed, its obvioiusl ruined cpu sending confused signals to arms and legs which spasmed and shook until she wrenched it free and backed away from the fall machine. Its two fellows followed after her, stepping around their fallen brother and raising their shock batons high. Grinning ferally, she stepped in and to the side to break the left one's blow. As it staggered back she turned and swung her spear around, using the flat of the spearhead to crush the faceplate of the other. As that one staggered back she turned back to the first of the drone and hurled her shield at it with enough force to nearly cleave it in two at the waist.
It sparked and fell, whining and sparking and flailing until its power finally failed. As it died she danced into the other's guard and laid a palm on it, then slipped around it and hurled it away with her Semblance. It smashed into the wall some thirty feet away with enough force to shatter metal and glass that fell away in glistening little shards.
Pyrrha wrenched it back towards her and braced her spear, offering it up as a spit unto a pig. It exploded around the metal head, showering her in sparks and shrapnel, and she grinned. Hurling it away, she felt the adrenaline running through her like lightning. Like life itself, pumping pure power and bliss across her entire body.
Then, stabbing into her like a knife from the dark, unexepected and painful, she thought, 'She wouldn't have fallen for that…'
And like that very knife, it cut to the quick. And away went her warmth…
"More!" She demanded, using her Semblance to call back her shield and turning to stalk back to the edge of the training arena. "Send me more! And this time, more than three of them! I want a real-"
"Pyr!" The voice was loud, and frustrated, but didn't sound angry. Still, she stiffened and spun on her heel, looking up into the stands. Shaking his head, head asked, "Do you know what time it is?"
"No." She answered, adding a belated, "Lord."
"It's mission picking time." Jaune chuckled, waving at the lockers for her to go get changed. "Nora said to tell you that if you made her miss out on anything fun, she'd make you pay for it."
"How, exactly…?"
"No idea." He answered, voice carrying around the great, empty room. She couldn't see it, but she could hear the raised brow in his voice when he asked, "Do you want to find out?"
"I suppose I do not." She chuckled, turning to head into the lockers.
"Pyrrha." His voice dragged her to a stop and she half-turned back to him, head cocked to the side. Quietly, enough she could only just hear him, he asked, "Are you alright?"
"Yes." She'd lost plenty of times, as she'd said. "I was just… Working out some frustrations on the preferred targets, as I said I would be. That's all. You needn't worry about me, Lord."
"Yeah, well…" She sensed he wanted to say something else, for a moment, before he waved her off and turned away. Over his shoulder, he called, "I'll meet you at the selection area, then. And I'll tell Nora you're on your way."
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By the time his team were finally all together, a quarter of the hour their class had been given to pick out a mission that appealed to them had passed. He and Ren had found comfortable spots on the lawn to sit, beside the broad avenue that ran through Beacon and in the shade of a cluster of tall trees. Trees that were speckled by clusters of dark brown and orange and red leaves, falling intermittently as the cold breeze hit them. Some limbs had already gone bare, higher up on the tree, and he could see the grey of the sky for it.
It would have been relaxing, and peaceful.
If not for Nora pacing at their feet, snarling, "Team PYPL got the Grimm extermination mission I wanted!"
"They were third years." Ren pointed out, "And only second years and up are even allowed to take it…"
"Technicalities!"
"Come on." Mort rasped, "Just scoot me down a few inches… It's so short! Friends do that kinda stuff for each other, right?"
"Not really…" Jaune sighed, shaking his head at the both of them and adding, "Pyrrha will be on her way. Getting out of armor takes a few minutes, you know. And I'm sure there will be plenty of jobs you'll enjoy left."
"How do you know?"
"Because you want to hit Grimm." Jaune explained shortly, "And there will never be a shortage of Grimm to hit. Even on something simple, like what we should be doing."
"Why are we locked into that, though?" She asked irritably, finally stopping at his feet and waving a hand at him. "You literally have been out there, hunting Grimm. Why the actual frick can't you, of everyone here, get out there to do it some more?"
"Because I…" Jaune stopped, unsure of what to say for a long moment. Or rather, very sure of what he wanted to say, but unsure of how to say it without sounding… Well, cowardly. Or selfish. Finally sighed and settled on, "It's complicated, Nora. And honestly, I'd be more than a little happy to just have a simple job out in some town."
"Guard duty, perhaps?"
"Maybe." Jaune shrugged, "I know that a lot of towns have militias that like to bring in Hunters to drill them about how to fight Grimm."
"What's that like?"
"Mostly just talking to them about how fast they are, the best spots to stick a spear, the like." Jaune shrugged, closing his eyes and just enjoying the cool but not quite cold air. "I've done it a few times, and mostly they just want to know about common types. Beowolves, Ursai, Nevermore."
"That sounds so boring that I would probably die." Nora pouted, pacing up past his head and, oblivious of Mort's cackling, plopping down beside Jaune's head. Reaching over to brush his hair straight with a hand, she complained, "I just wanna do some fighting, darn it…"
"Can I ask why?"
"You can ask, but only Renny knows."
"Ren…?"
"It's… An anniversary, of sorts." Ren explained cryptically, voice a bit… Distant, as he explained. "For something that was bad in every way except for the two of us coming together through it. It's a rough time. Nora likes to get through it by breaking things, preferably of the dark, furred variety."
"And Ren likes to get l-"
"Nora." The young man growled, sitting up and shaking his head curtly to cut her off. "That happened once. A long time ago."
"Yeah, and you seem not to want it to happen ever again, too…" Nora growled under her breath, only just loud enough to be heard. Jaune's brows furrowed but when he sat up, mouth opening to ask if she was alright, she suddenly beamed a smile and bounced back up to her feet. "P-Money! Youuuuuu're late!"
"I-I'm sorry?" The woman stammered in surprise, working her hair into a ponytail as she walked. "I jumped into a shower before I came. I was… All sweaty, from my training, you know? It felt improper to, um, smell as such? I'm afraid that I don't know how such things work outside of the Arena..."
"A-Ah." Nora stammered and then laughed awkwardly, rubbing the back of her neck. "Yeah, I… guess that's fine. But come on! Let's see if there's anything good left!"
Pyrrha laughed when Nora grabbed her arm, dragging her off while Jaune and Ren sighed and stood to follow. He flicked a worried look to the other man, but Ren only smiled and waved him off. And Nora wasn't saying anything either, talking Pyrrha's ear off about a time that she and Ren had stayed in a village out around Mistral and had to fight a few Creeps off when they came sniffing around the farm, so he figured that everything was fine enough.
Or if it wasn't, he wasn't about to find out anytime soon.
The auditorium was still crowded when they finally got there, by students and faculty alike, but there were still plenty of crowds and lines clustered around and leading up to the dozen or so terminals that had lowered down from the ceiling. Each had four large holo-screens projected a bit away from each other, framed by thin but sturdy metal, and he remembered from an emergency drill a while back that they could move into various shapes - typically a larger square - and lower to give emergency directions. In other schools, he figured those would have been evacuation orders and directions.
But the examples they'd been shown had been orders on where they needed Hunters to go to fight.
It took them another solid twenty minutes, but eventually, they got to the display and Jaune punched in their names. After a few seconds, it chimed quietly and a synthesised, feminine voice spoke while blue words stitched together on the screen, lit up where he could press them for input, "Hello, Lord Jaune Arc, of Team Juniper. You are applying for team missions, yes, no?"
"They know it's kinda hard to hear the voice with everyone talkin' and doin' their own stuff on their screens, right?"
"Nora…"
"What?" The woman scoffed, "S'true, Renny."
Jaune rolled his eyes and punched the 'Yes' option and, after a moment, the voice asked, "Do you prefer Combat, Support or Reconnaissance type mission assignments?"
"Literally all of us are combat types." Ren cleared his throat and Nora threw and arm around him, laughing, "Hey now, Mister, you can kick some ass-"
"Miss Valkyrie!"
"-ets. Furry, bony assets." Nora added belatedly, chuckling anxiously as the headmistress stalked by, rolling her eyes wearily. When it was clear that the woman was obviously too busy overseeing affairs to give her yet another detention, Nora let out a breath and grinned. "She loves me."
"I don't quite think she does." Pyrrha said quietly while Jaune punched the red lit 'Combat' option.
"One moment." The voice chimed brightly, "Calculating aptitude scores and compiling mission profiles in accordance. This may take some time."
"Gods," Mort rasped from his waist, "all these beautiful women around, and they couldn't hire a better voice for this contraption? If you insist on making every damn thing talk, at least make it sound nice."
Jaune, for an entirely new reason, chose not to respond to the spirit's words.
Finally, the screen in front of him blinked and a list of about twenty mission offers scrolled onto the screen for him. Each had a rank, though none rose above D, and the name of the place or person offering it. In almost every way, it was as if they'd simply shoved one of the old wooden boards he'd seen at dozens of villages and forts into the digital world and thrown it up on screen. That was why he knew what to look for, and what to avoid.
"Unknown target, two disappeared teams... Camps found with no signs of struggle…" The summary alleged desertion, because they'd been given half-pay up front. It made sense, but they wouldn't have left their camp unattended that way. And more than one team? He knew what could cause that and scowled, dismissing the mission with a growled, "Apathy…"
No one needed to ask what those were.
He had a feeling everyone knew the same way he did… A dread reputation.
Finally, he found one that sounded right for them, and smiled, "How about this? Small mining town down south and west, mines metals. They're having trouble with a Goliath."
"Isn't a Goliath somewhat out of our field?"
"It's a younger one, apparently." Pyrrha explained, leaning over Jaune's shoulder to read. He could hear the excitement in her voice, and feel it in the way she leaned against his back, one hand on his shoulder, "To strike down even a young Goliath is… A mark of some reputation, to say the small of it."
"Which would make her feel better, Jaune, my boy." Mort pointed out, "Whether she knows it or not, I can see the doubt."
That was foolish, and Jaune wanted to argue Pyrrha would never be so foolish. But… The way she'd been training gnawed at him. And he knew that people who lost a fight hard enough might lose confidence, whether they realized so or not. So maybe Mort was right. Whatever the case, Jaune wanted to fight it, too.
The reputation would be great… And a thing he would need, in the near enough future.
"So everyone's good on this one, then?" He asked, not quite able to fight the smile that was stretching out on his face. "A Goliath probably has a few smaller Grimm around, so we'll need to to culling Hunts first. It'll take a while…"
"Renny and I can rough it with the best of 'em." Nora grinned toothily, squeezing her partner with what had to be an uncomfortable amount of vigor. Ren grunted, but raised a thumb and nodded regardless, used to his partner's antics. Nodding in turn, nora asked, "P-Money, you up to-"
"Oh, Gods and Grimm, yes." Pyrrha was practically salivating, staring off into space. "If Nora shatters on of its rear knees, it would be forced down… If i could brace my spear in place…"
"The ole hammer 'n nail?" Nora asked, grinning the same way Pyrrha was. "It worked in Initiation…"
While Nora and his Shield fell into muttering, Jaune sighed and accepted the mission. Then he turned and asked, "Ren, which would you prefer tonight, pizza or fried rice?"
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The next couple of days passed in a preparatory haze. Bags were packed and then inspected by teachers, ammunition was brought in and handed out, and dozens of Bullheads swarmed the landing pad, carrying the earlier year students off to their missions ahead of them. Then came tests on their knowledge of plants, geography, first aid - everything that a Hunter would need in the field, and that Beacon wanted to be completely certain their students knew before sending them out. Whether or not a Hunter was with them to supervise, a student could still eat a mushroom they would regret.
People were… Intelligent creatures, like that, and Jaune knew that it paid to be careful rather than to simply have good insurance.
And lawyers.
But finally, they had everything in order, and were in waiting to take off for parts unknown. Or, well, at least unknown to them. And it couldn't have been a better day for it, either. The sun was shining, the breeze was warm and tasted of faint salt, and even Nora's mischief had been kept to the 'dully troublesome' variety for the last handful of days.
"Is it on straight?" Pyrrha fussed, tugging at the mantle he'd given her. It was hemmed in bronze, and made of a dull creme collar, and his twin crescents stood out boldly on it. And it was hanging perfectly, too, of course.
Weiss had helped her with it.
But still she fussed, drawing a sigh out of him, "It's fine, Pyr. Why are you so stressed? No on is going to judge you either way."
"No, they would judge you." Pyrrha growled, shaking her head when he raised his brows at her. "What? Protecting you means more than just keeping the red inside of you. Reputation matters in nobility, no?"
Damn.
She had a point…
"Still." He sighed, "It's perfectly straight, and in line with your armor. Fussing won't help anyone. Just relax. And I'm the Lord here, so just do it for me, alright?"
"As you say…"
"As I say." He was alright with flexing his authority if it made her relax, at least a little. Checking the time, he called over his shoulder, "Nora, you have everything?"
"Mhm!" The Valkyrie nodded, toting a small crate on her back by way of a couple of thick, corded ropes. Ren was behind her, carrying a much more modest green bag that was probably packed with cooking utensils, if Jaune had to guess. Beaming, Nora rattled out, "I got smoke grenades, stun grenades, flash grenades- Oh! Incendiaries, thanks to Weiss-cream."
"Weiss gave you incendiaries…?"
"I begged her not to." Ren sighed as he answered, "Pleaded, even. On hands and knees."
"Oh, pish posh!"
"Pish posh…?"
"Shush, P-Money!" Nora hissed, waving a hand haughtily, like she was fanning herself. "Oh, when you see what I can do with these babies~ I have half a mind to melt that big ole elephant's face right off!"
"And set the forest alight…"
"Oh come on, Renny!"
"It's time for our flight. Come on, Juniper." Jaune said through a chuckle, shaking his head off and toting his own little brown bag. Paths were clearly marked leading up to equally clearly marked landing zones, and they fell in line behind him as he followed number forty-two.
All went smoothly and quickly and, inside a couple minutes, they had their things stowed in the transport's belly and were finding their seats. As Jaune made to go up the ramp he paused and turned a look on Vale. It sparkled in the bright sunlight, and Jaune could see the next round of transports coming from the city to Beacon, to ferry its students near and far on their missions.
It was beautiful…
And yet, looking at it, he was filled with anxiety. Anxiety he couldn't place.
"Jaune?" Pyrrha's voice dragged him out of his own head, his own anxiety, and he waved her off as she asked after him
"I'm fine." He shrugged, falling into a seat and fishing out his Scroll. Frowning, he sighed, "Damn it…"
"Sup?"
"Scroll's dead." He answered, closing it and sliding it into his pocket. "I'll charge it when we land. No worries."
"Aww, hate when that happens." Nora sighed, offering him one of the ear-buds plugged into hers. "Music for the ride?"
Shrugging, and in dire need of a way to pass the time, Jaune nodded and took one of them, then huddled down with his friend to listen to… Oddly enough, a smooth, old fashioned track of jazz.
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Cool Dude :
Google Translate?
Jaune's conclusions and assumptions in the moment aren't necessarily facts.
Mentioning that he was a Faunus is incredibly in character, particularly to offend a racist pig in your class and in context of Faunus inventions being stolen by Humans. In a war that directly lead to the Rights Revolution, precipitated by said racist pigs doing what they do. There's a litany of logic to her pointing it out, is my point. Especially since it's true.
Not really. How many Hunters do you think could one on one tanks, just as one example? Or for another, how do you think slow moving tanks would fare against Grimm? What wins a war are tactics involving equipment. That side then enshrines their own tactics as the way forward.
Errant means similar to 'quest'. You have Google if you want the fun nitty gritties.
