Orb looked through the universes, hoping to find something a little more action filled. "Ehh, this will work."
"Oh?" Qrow asked. "What is it, Orb man?"
"A scene from the ARCN universe. It's kind of funny if you like flat out violence." Orb responded as Qrow settled in.
"Great! I love flat out violence!" he whooped, raising his glass.
Yang leaned over to her partner. "I swear he's not my uncle when he's like this."
Blake only patted Yang on the shoulder, a knowing smile on her face.
"Shhhh, it's starting!" Wiess said,
The scene opened up with Jaune looking around the Schnee mansion. He looked immensely disappointed. "You know," he said to no one, "it is somehow, somehow gaudier than I imagined it."
"It's a Schnee thing." Sebastian's voice came from another room. The gunslinger walked in, having even more guns strapped to his back. Four distinct stocks on the right side, three on the left, and an unknown amount of handguns strapped to his belt.
Ruby made a confused face. "Why does he need so many guns? It seems really heavy to just lug around a dozen guns at once." she asked Orb.
"He doesn't like Mechashift weapons." Orb answered simply
Ruby gave a humph sound. "Well, that's just stupid." she pouted. Mechashift was cool! Every huntsman should use it!
"A Schnee thing? Well, I guess that would explain the use of literal silver in the fucking walls?" Jaune said, palin disgust on his face.
Wiess looked like she was personally insulted. "How dare he-! The absolute gall to insult my family's home-!"
"Wiess." Winter commanded, shutting the younger Schnee up. "Calm down. It is literally someone's personal opinion on something as unimportant as interior decoration."
Wiess gave a small sputtering sound, before making a indignant huff, collapsing down into her chair.
Jaune did a spin around the room, a wide shot showing how incredibly massive it was. "I mean, look at this place! It's fucking huge! If the old man is this wealthy, why the hell does he need students to protect him? Why can't he hire actual huntsmen? And where the hell are Rasheem and Nikori?" Jaune complained, throwing his arms up.
"You want to go back to the refugees." Cortez guessed, Jaune nodding a confirmation. "As for Rasheem and Nikori, they're exploring their newfound openness to interspecies relationships."
Jaune shuddered at that.
Ruby raised her hand, wanting to ask a question.
"Yes, Ruby?"
"What does Jaune have to do with refugees?" the reaper asked, lacking context for the comment.
Orb took a breath in. "the atlas council has taken to hiring outside huntsmen to assist with the surge of refugees from Minstrel due to revolution-"
"Again? Really?" Pyrrha exclaimed, being uncharacteristically interrupting. She rectified her mistake. "Sorry, sorry. Please continue."
Orb gave her a look "As I was saying, With refugees come high tensions and internal issues. How do you feed them, give them shelter, etcetera etcetera. And with that comes grimm. So atlas hired some cheap labor huntsmen and mercenaries to deal and ensure that the refugees, which consist of mostly escaped SDC workers funny enough, are safe and managed."
Ironwood raised an eyebrow. "And the Atlas forces are not enough?"
Orb shook his head. "The council decided that it was not worth spending their forces or resources to protect the migrants. While they have ample forces, they don't want to be bothered by it."
Ironwoods mood soured immensely at that. Orb decided to not tell him that he was one of the driving forces due to his own paranoia about the degrading world situation.
Jaune looked around, his displeasure evident on his face. Whitly walked into the room, looking almost scared.
"Yo, Whitmister, what's up? You look like your father called." Cortez said, greeting the heir.
Witley gave him a flat and depressing look.
"Oh shit, really?" Jaune asked, already concerned. "You want us to go with you?"
Witley gave a small smile. "No, I will be fine." He said as he went up stairs and vanished from sight.
Jaune and Sebastian stood there, Sebastian rubbing his cold, frost blue eye.
"You want to follow him?" Jaune asked, looking at his gunslinger
The brown clad man nodded, already moving up the stairs. The two heard an angry Jacques Schnee yelling. The door blocked out a lot of the sound, but it would seem that he was particularly angry about Whitleys decision to be a good person. The phrase "They don't deserve free things!" and "You can't just give money away like this!" were heard yelled. A slapping sound echoed in the sudden silence of the house.
Wiess and Winter flinched at the sound, instinctively holding their hand to their face.
Ruby pulled Wiess close to her, patting her shoulder. "It's ok. He's not here." she said, hoping to comfort her parter. She really did not know what to do with friends with crippling life issues.
Jaune looked angry as hell. "Sebastian?"
"Yeah man?" Sebastian said, already loading up a dual pump shotgun.
"Shovel."
There was a change of hands and jaune prepped to bust into Jacques office. The door opened, Whitley holding his cheek and nose, which a small trickle of blood poured down. Jaune saw red as the space around him turned visibly darker. The blonde stormed into Jacques office. Jacques turned to him, putting on a face of professional dislike. "Mr. Arc, how may I-" he never had a chance to finish his sentence.
You see, Jacques Schnee was by no means a short man. Not tall, hovering somewhere in the 5 feet 8 inches area, and most certainly on the portly side of the BMI index.
Jaune Arc, on the other hand, is a 200 pound 6 foot 2 powerhouse who fights and slays grimm on a regular basis.
Jaune Arc was currently one arming Jacques by his fat neck up against the wall.
Everyone's face straightened out into one of jaw clenched shock. Not only was Jaune strong arming arguably the most influential men in the world, but he was doing so without a second thought.
"Mr. Schnee." He said calmly, evenly. "I have been hired to keep you safe from many people. And I promise you that you won't die by anyone but me." Jaune said, pushing the businessman further into the wall. His glass topped coffee table cracked as the encroaching darkness oozed from Jaune "But there is something you should know."
Jacques gulped, looking with fear in his eyes at the knight.
"The world does not need you."
The silence that reigned over the audience was palpable. Roman gave a low whistle.
"Damn." Neptune said wide eyed
"The world has never needed you, nor will it ever. You are disposable, replaceable, despicable. Do not ever, ever make the mistake thinking you're worth more than the lowest of beggars. Because trust me, you're not."
Jaune held him there for a moment before letting him fall to the ground, where he rose shakily to his feet, gasping for air.
Emerald blinked. "Well, that was…"
"Scary?" Mercury put in. "intimidating? Down right fucking terrifing?"
"Yeah."
Cinder, meanwhile, being the fucking psycopath she was, was distincly aroused. Neo shared the sentiment.
Shame that sexual attraction is not a suitable replacement for well founded relationships based on trust and mutual respect and love.
Jaune turned his back, seeming to start to leave. The shot zoomed in on Jacqueses face as it assumed one that every man knows. Getting hit in your junk, hard.
Every man winced as the camera moved to a side angle, where the shovel head that Jaune had asked for earlier was firmly planted in between Jacques Schnee's legs.
"And by the way." Jaune said, bringing the shovel back. "If!" Slam
"I!" Slam "Ever!" Slam "See!" Slam "You!" Slam "Hit!" Slam "Whitley!" Slam "AGAIN!" Slam. "I will make you wish you were back at this moment. Got it?"
Jacques only whimpered as he cradled his nuts. "Glad we understand each other. Cortez, let's go."
The two of then left, Cortez fishing in his pockets. "RASHEEM! NIKORI!" Jaune yelled. There was the sound of scampering as the two faunus slid into view.
"Yes, Capitan?" Rasheem said, giving a haphazard solute.
"Find Whitely. We are leaving this place as soon as physically possible. Cortez, send a message to-"
"Already done, dictated and sent." the gunslinger said, putting away his scroll.
Nikori gave a squinted look at the gunslinger. "What the fuck- how the fuck do you do that?"
"Do what?" the gunslinger asked, confused. Nikori gave him a look.
"You know exactly what I mean! The whole acting before orders are given, telling where bullets are going to land, You know!"
Sebastian just looked at her, before shrugging. "Anyway, Whit's in his room, nursing his newly broken nose." Cortez said, leading the way.
He always seemed to know where he needed to go.
"I will never understand how he does that." Rasheem said, shaking his head.
Jaune was silent as the three of them followed their guide. He learned long ago to not ask questions like that.
The scene cut to ARCN in Whitley's room. Jaune was holding ice to Whitley's face.
The schnee siblings grimace, hating seeing their sibling hurt. While he was an asshole, being molded to be a mini Jacques Schnee, he was still their brother.
Orb, however, was all for cutting toxic family members out of people's lives.
"So, we are getting you out of here." He said simply. "Pack you bags, and pack lightly." Jaune commanded, checking Whitley's now damaged face.
"Already done." Cortez said, dropping two suitcases at his feet.
"HOW THE FUCK?!" Nikori yelled, gesturing to the cases.
"Me and Rasheem packed for him while you guys were talking." Cortez said, opening up the duffle bag. "Here we have a selection of useful dusts, clothes, Atlas Army Knife, Food, Comics, Books, Scroll, Porn-"
Whitley blinked. "I'm sorRY, WHAT?"
"Atlas army knife, food, clothes-" Cortez continued, pulling them out and showing them to the group.
"No the last thing." Whitley said, still pale.
"Oh? Yeah, it's a bunch of playboy. Not the best, and most certainly not my style, but it's what I found."
"WHERE!" Whitley practically screamed, looking horrified.
Cortez shrugged. "They were in your dad's office." he answered simply. "Got them off of his desk."
At this, The Schnees looked horrified, while Yang was laughing. "Oh my god! Oh my god!" she wheezed. "Papa Schnee just got caught."
Wiess shuddered. "Please don't ever refer to my father as "Papa Schnee" ever again."
The group was at a loss for words. "Right. Can we leave? Like, now?" Jaune asked, already grabbing Whitley's stuff.
"Uhh… yeah." Whitley said, just a little overwhelmed.
The scene cut to ARCN + Whitley walking around a refugee camp, just outside of an inactive dust mine.
"I thought the refugee camp was… bigger." Whitley asked, looking around.
"It is." Rasheem responded. "Most of them are in the mine."
"Is Atlas infrastructure really that bad?" Ren asked, concerned.
"No. it's not." Ironwood said definitively. He would have to check, but Atlas was the strongest nation in the world, surely they should be able to deal with a bunch of migrants.
Whitley paled at that. "I'm sorry, the refugees?"
"Yes."
'Are in an abandoned mine?"
"We had nowhere else to go."
"So a mine was your go to spot?"
"No, but Atlas wouldn't let us set up camp in the parks in Mantle."
Whitley sighed. "Of course. Is there any dust left over?"
"No idea. Probably not." Sebastian responded. "Nothing's blown up yet, and no one's complaining of being ill with any lung issues."
Whitley pointed to the opening of the mine, which was a cave with some wooden scaffolding and huts on top of them and to the sides. "A mine? It's a fucking cave! I can't believe the refugees are being held up in this! Mother of Oum Almighty!"
All four of team ARCN turned to look at the Schnee with wide eyes.
Cortez and Nikori broke out into a wide smile.
"He cursed! Our boy cursed! Oh Jesus de Montoya, someone get the cámara!" Cortez laughed as he pulled the Schnee into a hug. Nikori joined the gunslinger, smothering the silver haired blonde on both sides as he struggled against the huntsmen.
"Let! Me! Go!" he said, finally squirming his way out of the hug.
Winter thought about it, and she could never remember when Whitley had ever gotten a hug from anyone.
And that was a sad thought.
"Nikori, Cortez." Jaune sighed, crossing his arms. "Let Whitley go. He's not used to hugs." The two let go of the Schnee.
"Now come on. Abuela Casabarra needs help with something I'm sure."
The five of them walked through the tent city, ARCN being greeted incredibly warmly by the refugees.
Arslan was, meanwhile, serving food with the rest of her team. A ladle full of some kind of food slop. She heard laughing in the crowd in the tent city.
Pyrrha raised an eyebrow. "Arslan is in this, again?" She knew of the brawler, having had some good fights with the lioness from her tournament days
"Esmeralda, what are they talking about?" Arslan nodded to the crowd.
The aging tigress mother looked over her shoulder. "Oh, you haven't heard? The Paladin is back." she smiled, taking her slop with a smile. Arslan's eyes widened. There was only one man who had the name of Paladin. And he hated it.
Arslan dropped her ladle, leaping over the outdoor soup kitchen counter.
"Madam? Where are you going?" the Esmeralda asked as the Lioness of Haven ran into the crowd, looking for the blonde knight. It was not hard to find him.
"JAUNE!" She yelled.
Jaune tilted his head as he heard a familiar voice yelling his name. He turned to see a familiar face rushing towards him. Jaune's face brightened as he opened his arms. "Arslan!"
The two collided, jaune wrapping up the brawler in a spinning hug. "I'm so glad you're ok! I was so worried when you took that escort job!" Jaune said, taking in a deep breath of his girlfriend's scent.
Ruby and Pyrrha grumbled at that, their eyes flashing dangerously. Yang gave an audible growl.
Neptune thought about something. "Orb, if Arslan has been a key figure in the last couple of them, why isn't she here?" he asked the existing thing. What was Orb?
Orb thought about it. "Because she is not important to your universe's story."
Neptunes brow furrowed. "Oookay?"
Arslan looked up at her lover, who was easily a head and a half taller than her. "You worried the hell out of me with that last stunt. Say it."
Jaune groaned. "Do I have too?"
"Yes." Arslan's eyes narrowed. "You decided it would be a good idea to try and fight a giant fucking icicle crab and scare the living shit of me. Now say it."
Jaune rolled his eyes. "I mwissed you my fweisty wittle wioness." he said in a cutesy voice, rubbing her head. She gave a happy sigh, leaning into the blonde's chest. "I mwissed you too, my pawadin."
Pangs of jealousy hit several of the audience members. Why was someone so unimportant getting all this screen time?
Jaune separated from Arslan, taking her by the arm. "Soo, which tent is yours?" the blonde asked. Arslan shrugged. "Me and my team-"
"My team and I." Jaune corrected out of habit. Arslan rolled her eyes.
"Me and my team," she continued, "just got here. We don't have a plot yet." the Jade Lioness explained. Jaune nodded.
"You know, Archon got one of the buildings as our plot. With actual rooms and beds and shit. You could bunk with us." the knight offered.
"You sure? I would hate to intrude on the Bromance you and Cortez have going on."
Ruby raised an eyebrow. "Bromance?" she asked, being unfamiliar with the term.
"Yeah, bromance. Extreme brotonic relationship. Kind of like your father and Qrow." orb explained for the reaper. Qrow raised is finger in protest, before thinking about it.
"Ehh, that's fair." He admitted, taking in more alcohol.
How the hell is his liver still functioning? Orb thought as he squinted at the huntsman.
Jaune laughed as he led Arslan though the tent city, arms linked. "Nah, he won't mind. Certainly did not on the road."
Arslan smiled, remembering fond memories.
"Just like Budaphest." She sighed, leaning to Jaune.
"You and I remember Budaphest very differently." Jaune said as they approached a small two story building. "Home sweet home." Jaune sighed, giving Arslan a tour of the house. The house had a kitchen on the bottom floor, along with a living room and a bed room with a bath. The living room was transformed into sleeping quarters for some refugees, and the upstairs had four bedrooms. One was, at the request of Jaune, opened up for Arslan's team to sleep in. ARCN had bunked up in one room. The other two were used for other refugees.
The scene cut to night time. The room was illuminated by a couple candles spread around. ARBN was forced to join ARCN in their room as a couple refugees had gotten sick, and an actual room was necessary for their recovery. Arslan and jaune were on one of the beds, Arslan at a 30 degree angle, head resting in the nook of Jaunes neck. Cortez was sitting at the desk, absentmindedly cleaning out his guns. Bolin looked over his shoulder, a face of fear etched into his expression.
"Dude… What the shit." Bolin asked. "Why do you need so many guns?"
"Because Mechashift is unreliable, and it means I can one V one the Atlas Army." The gunslinger said, loading up his Pump Shotgun. With a jolt he froze, staring into space.
"Uhh… Seb? You ok?" Bolin asked. Cortez shot straight up, grabbing his firearms.
"Grimm, southwest from here, 232, 2.5 miles from here. Large pack, and heading this way." He said. "Arcon, let's go! We got bastards to slay!" and he was already one foot out the door.
Ironwood squinted. "How can he tell? Does he have a radar semblance or something?"
Orb smirked internally. Sebastian Cortez had no semblance at all, he just flat out used magic. "Sure, you can say that."
Jaune sighed. "Ars, love. Up."
Arslan grumbled, but got up. "I still don't understand how Sebastian does that whole prediction shit."
Nikori shrugged. "No idea either. By the way, Whit's hanging out with the night guard." she said as she got her spear ready.
Nadir just looked around at Shades well known ARCN. they were the equivalent of Beacons RWBY or the new JNPR. Nadir was of the opinion that ARCN was actually better. More battle hardened, more organized, more dangerous
Ruby smiled. "See! I told you we were the best!" She nudged weiss. Wiess just gave a sigh, but was smiling.
"I would expect nothing less." the Schnee said. "Although, Arc's team being just as good was sceptical to her though.
Arslan smiled. "All right! Auburn! Let's get going. Can't have Arcon fighting alone." She barked, wrapping her fists.
"You me you can't have your boyfriend fighting alone." Rheese chuckled, already moving toward the door. Arslan flushed at this, stammering a counter. Jaune laughed, giving a kiss to the top of Arslan's head. "Love you to, Ars. now stay safe ok? Can't have you getting hurt."
Arslan gave a happy hum at that.
The eight of them left the building, Cortez leading them as he knew where the Grimm were.
The scene cut to them walking in the woods, quietly coming up on the horde. Cortez collapsed to a knee, pulling out a sniper rifle with the downwards movement, the move as smooth as butter. "Cortez, what are we looking at?" Rasheem asked, prepping his dust.
"Six Majors, one class four Chimera, A class four Syber, and 40 or so minors. In addition, there is a secondary wave with several deathstalkers, three of which are class four as well."
Qrow whistled. "That is a lot of grimm. Can eight huntsman really take that on?" Qrow asked, knowing it would take about a team of huntsman to take on a Class four grimm.
The rest of Arcon rushed forward with Auburn. The battle started as the camera zoomed in over Sebastian's shoulder, down the barrel of his gun and the scope. It lined up on the the Syber, right in the neck. The trigger was pulled as the camera zoomed forward, following the bullet though the air. The tree behind the wolf like grimm exploded into black gore as the shot tore though the grimms neck. It still stood, but had suffered significant damage. From there, it showed Nikori jumping from the shadows, stabbing at the grimm. It zoomed from Nikori's view over to focus on Jaune, who has one handing the longsword, a two handed weapon, with ease. He was side by side with Arslan, facing off against the three headed grimm. The chimera was very angry at the duo. Rasheem was in the background by Cortez, teleporting his allies into and out of combat and dust effects from odd places. They fought like madmen. They fought like warriors.
Qrow nodded in approval. This team Archon was a machine. No, they were more than that. They were monsters on the field. Auburn was not bad as well, but they paled to the knights squad.
The Chimera reared back, it's chest glowing red.
"Oh, that is not good." Adam said. While he did not like humans, it did not mean he liked grimm. And he could tell when something was bad. Bright, glowing red grimm? That was bad.
It exhaled, spewing fire at the knight. It engulfed him, the light blinding anyone that would look at where Jaune stood.
"Jaune!" Ruby yelled, concerned. Aura was particularly ineffective against fire and incedaries. Pyrrha gripped her chair, the empty soda cans crushing under her semblance. I will have faith in jaune. He's clearly a good fighter in this one. I must have faith in him. Pyrrha thought to herself.
The flames died out, and a figure emerged from the flames. Jaune was most certainly fine. His left arm was grasping a deep purple ethereal shield, flames of void crawling up his arm and shoulder in a swirling pattern. "Are you done?" he sighed.
Most everyone let out a sigh of relief. "Is that a semblance? It's cool." Blake commented.
Ozpin's eyes went wide. That was magic. Jaune Arc was using magic. And he was using magic that was suspiciously similar to that of the younger, darker brother. "How?" he whispered breathlessly.
"He made a trade." Orb explained to the wizard.
Ozpin turned his head to the being. "With what?" he whispered. Orb just smiled, opting to keep that a secret.
The Chimera growled confused. Why was the thing that was suppose to be ash still standing. That was not right. It had hit the human with fire, right?"
"Great. My turn." Jaune smiled before throwing the ethereal shield. It slammed into the beast's face before richotcheing oddly to another grimm. The grimm exploded into purple light upon impact. His forearm surged with void fire as the flames swirled into another shield. This one he leapt at the chimera, surging forward with a shield bash. Arslan looped over the chimera with her rope dart, unleashing a series of Aura infused blows. Meanwhile, jaune just wacked it with a one two combo of his sword and shield.
Jaune slammed his shield into the chimera's left and face, over and over. Each slam cracked one of the faces just a little more, until a sizable dent in the mask led to a complete collapse of the cranium. The other head of the grimm screamed as the aura burn marks from Arslan marked it's skull face.
"Mother of oum, that's brutal." Roman said as Jaune used the shield as a blunt guillotine, chopping off the grimms head.
Yang just shrugged. Seemed about an appropriate amount of brutal violence from any hunter. Yeah Yang has some violence issues.
The grimm died slowly as Jaune turned to the additional grimm. The ethereal shield was thrown once more, bouncing and turning grimm into the strange purple void light. Jaune looked around at the battle field, the first pack had been dealt with. There were some bit of burning ground and trees from Rasheem's dust and Sebastian's various incidearies.
Nadir was just standing next to one of the fires, looking down at it. "What is Cortez even packing?"
"Lunch." Rasheem said flatly. Nadir looked at him.
"I ment weapon wise."
"10 kilos of heavy detonation explosive powder, 10 kilos of C4, 10 incindieary thermite grenades, 12 incindieary white phosphorus grenades, 7 EMP and shock grenades each, 5 military grade breeches, two acid grenades, just one frag left and then a couple of crowd suppressors, some net grenades and a collection of dust explosives. Oh! And I got some fusion grenades left, along with a couple of experimental canisters." Cortez said, having walked up behind the two.
Ironwood looked shocked. "He's carrying more explosives than I would trust with a well trained demolitions team. And he's packing incidearies? Really?"
"Mother of Oum! Don't sneak up on me like that. And dude. What the fuck? Incidaries?"
Cortez just shrugged. "Rasheem has portals and dust, Nikori can blast herself into the shadow dimension, Jaune is a literal paladin, glowing sword and magic shield. I got to do something cool."
Jaune sighed. "Cortez. You live like, ten seconds in the future. Don't even start with that bullshit."
Arslan leaned on her boyfriend. "Is that your semblance? Some form of temporal dilation?"
Sebastian laughed. "No. I don't have a semblance. I'm just a good guesser. By the way, the second wave is dead in…" The gunslinger said, holding up a hand of fingers. "5" one finger went down
"4" Another finger. Reese raised an eyebrow as the countdown went. The rest of Auburn took fighting positions
"3"
"2"
"1"
A large explosion rocked the world as a section of the forest went up in flames. Grimm screeched terribly in horrible pain as they burnt alive. "Mother of Oum-" Nadir started, but Sebastian silenced him. "Shhh, let me enjoy this."
The screen faded to black
Yang's eyes widened a little. "Ok, that is fucked up." She said hearing the grimm burn.
Qrow just smiled inward. He had met many hunters that were like Sebastian. Merciless, a little rough cut? Sure, but what good huntsman hasn't done something that was psychologically concerning?
"Well, that's all for the moment. I'll pull something up next. I'm thinking slice of life" Orb thought out loud, rotating slowly.
important note: I will be taking some time off of this universe to hopefully work on my other story, RMSY, a little more.