AN:
Chapter Title: A Pirate?
Arc 1: Regular People Chapters
It was Monday morning, about nine thirtyish, the sun was out even though it was a little cloudy. Serqet and I were stepping off the Airship onto the Beacon grounds. My mother had messaged me at five this morning saying that she had been in Vale since Sunday and would be coming to the school today to visit me and meet my team.
Serqet was dressed in the same outfit she had been wearing on our first date, the blouse and long skirt. Whereas I was wearing a Norse style navy coloured tunic with these brushed golden and tealish lining around the neck, wrist and waist past it, along with this I was wearing these light black pants that reached my shin, along with some sneakers.
My outfit was courtesy of my girlfriend as we went out shopping yesterday when I made note of not really having much in terms of normal clothing. Thankfully it appeared my incident on Friday night appeared to have worked because we weren't attacked or kidnapped or whatever those people might have done had I not shown my strength I guess?
Hopefully going forward I wouldn't get any trouble from them, when I did look through my wallet though the lien I had in there was missing but nothing else, and my Scroll was otherwise fine from what I could tell and when I had Serqet go through it she said it was as well.
We found the rest of my team standing around talking with Shamhat… so it was more likely that she had approached them and was saying something they didn't quite understand.
Pyrrha looked at us like we were some sort of saviours when I said hello drawing the attention of my flowery friend who had this to say to me before she left after placing her wreath crown on Serqet-
"There are two wolves following you." At this point I just accepted what she had to say at face value and didn't think very hard about it.
When she was gone, Serqet asked.
"What was she on about?" Giving a confused expression as she glanced to the rest of us for explanation, none was given.
"Probably-" I was cut off.
"AZRAEL!" My sister's voice howled out so loud I was sure everyone at Beacon and in Vale heard it.
Following her yelling it I decided she wasn't going to bring our mother to the group despite definitely having spotted us in the first place, so I just directed our group toward where I could see my sister's head above the people who had just parted like a waterway.
"Hathor's Udder- she's dressed as a fucking pirate." I heard Serqet say behind me, getting me to focus my attention on what my sister was wearing.
I had to agree though, she was dressed like a pirate.
To explain she has darker skin than mine, her eyes are deep blue and sort of glow in the same way mine do, or I suppose mine glow like hers. She was fairly athletic and curvy which accompanied with her height made her slightly imposing. At the moment though she had her jet black hair down to her waist and she was dressed in a loose white button up blouse one size too large for her with a wine red sash around her waist with black loose baggy pants and knee length brown leather cross wrap boots.
So yeah Pirate.
My mother was about as tall as Yang was, and otherwise my sister was a carbon copy of her, they could've been twins if you didn't know any better. But my mother knew how not to dress as a pirate.
She was dressed in a chiton I believe it was called, it was a long purple sleeveless dress with two pins over the shoulders as well as a belt around her midsection. Other than that she was wearing leather sandals and had a satchel with her.
Oh right, I forgot the most important part was their one foot tall same colour as their hair Jackal or Wolf like ears, they put Blakes to shame in size. Though panther ears weren't exactly as large so it wasn't like it was much of a competition. Aside from that both my mother and sister's lower half of their hair had blue highlights in them naturally, but it wasn't like I could say much on that front considering my hair was coloured like graphite.
"This is your team then?" Mum asked when we stopped in front of her, she wore a warm smile that made me feel relaxed and realise how tense I was.
Priscilla had her left hand resting on the hilt of her macuahuitl on her hip, it was basically a massive flat bat with segmented blades on either side of it that were stacked up it a centimeter apart. I had seen her use it once and she turned it on causing the segmented blades to go around it like a chainsaw- she had cut down trees with it like they were made of cloth.
It was an insane weapon, she didn't like some of the parts of Huntsmen life though which was why as far as I knew she wasn't one anymore and just did more menial mercenary work for frontier towns for basically nothing just because she wanted to help people.
Before I could say anything to my mother though she dragged the other girls off with her leaving me with 'Cilla, 'Qet and- Anastasia? When did she get here?
Well those three were catching up, I was brought along with them as they started walking around the school grounds at a snail's pace. I did want to actually talk with my mother but I suppose she would be here for another five days so I'd have time then.
The older woman I was walking along with eventually asked me a question that came out of nowhere. It made me wish I had just gone to a shopping mall on my own to have a panic attack.
"Does this Manus guy have a girlfriend?" were the words that left my older sister's lips that made me stare at her incredulously even if she couldn't see my expression. I felt like she knew how I had reacted to it.
I really didn't need anymore of my friends or people close to me to become family in some odd way, but I didn't see a way that she would accept a bold-faced lie about the man in question's relationship status being taken.
"As far as I'm aware he's not spoken for, I imagine you want me to call and see if he could come and meet you?" I said with a sigh as my shoulders slouched, my sister was a wonderful woman and person, and he was a great person all the same but him becoming my older brother wasn't really on my list of things I wanted in this life- but ugh he she had done a lot for me so I wouldn't keep her from attempting to claim Manus.
In the meantime of me calling my friend and mentor/tutor Ana left us saying she had reports to make up for Ozpin on the students she counseled over the past three months and what their progress was like. Priscilla was listening in closely on what was being said between my friend and I, though Serqet was telling her about the fact that someone had pickpocketed it from me on the friday, she skirted around the details of it and just said I managed to get it back somehow.
I realise I ought to clear something up about, whenever I try to remember the face of the woman who pickpocketed me, it wasn't the girl who I tracked down, the problem there was that both women had the same lines and I could tell they were one in the same for it. But that meant she had an illusory Semblance which added to why when I was there demanding my things back she hadn't moved from in front of me but her lines were making their way toward me.
I'd never met someone with a Semblance like that but now I know that people aren't moving but their lines are, there's an illusory Semblance at play.
While we waited for my friend to show up I remembered something I wanted to tell my sister.
"Priscilla you know Diarmuid right?" I asked, looking up at her.
"Skadi's younger brother yeah." She nodded, Skadi though? Fuck why hadn't I thought of that?! That's so much easier to say than Scáthach.
"He wanted me to pass on that she's going to be coming to watch him in the Vytal Festival Tournament at the end of the year, so he thought you'd want to know in case you wanted to catch up with her." I was aware of my sister's thoughts on the tournaments, so I don't think she'll stay around to watch them as much as she'd stay around to enjoy the festivities and hang out with her friends.
She grumbled as her brow furrowed looking around us presumably to see if she could spot Manus, which made us both realise that Serqet had just walked away while we were distracted.
"Alright well when does the festival start? I'll come and stay in Vale while it's on- wait. Actually I think Mum and I were already going to be there because Castus said his team had applied for it." Her eyes suddenly brightened more than they already did when she spotted something.
I presumed she had figured out where Manus was so I looked in the direction she was looking and found the mammoth of a man walking toward us waving a hand.
"How've you been keeping up with playing your Oud by the way?" she asked as the man approached.
"Well enough, I haven't played it since a field trip to the Forever Fall forest though." Her eyes cast themselves to me with a hint of somber in them.
"Did something happen?"
"Ah well a person from another team nearly died and I had been playing it before I was sent out to help search for her." I answered thinking back to the time.
"Really? Who was she?" Her tone became curious.
"Weiss Schnee." I didn't really think much of it and refused all of the girls' attempts to reimburse me for helping and I ended up settling on her owing me a favour because she had been very incessant about repaying me for it.
Though she hated mentioning it and it had somehow gotten out as a rumor that she was nearly killed by a single Beowulf despite my account also floating around about the actual amount which was five or six of them that I personally ran into.
"The Weiss Schnee?!" Priscilla looked at me wide eyed.
"I was playing that song about sailing-"
"The Old Solitas tribe one?" She immediately bounced back with moving past the Weiss thing.
"Yeah, I was showing it to my team because I suggested that or the one about the soldier... though Manus is actually-" My sister cut me off.
"I noticed." There was a moment of silence before she said. "Do you think he's any good in bed?"
I looked at her with a twitch in my eye.
"Why in the name of Bastet would I know that?!" I damn near yelled at her in a squawk.
She laughed to herself. "What? I thought it was a good question, just because you're embarrassed about that sort of stuff doesn't mean I care- just like how you answered Serqets Scroll while you two were mid-"
"Whoa! Stop that I don't need to hear more! I've been trying to forget that since it happened!" I actually yelled at her this time, my voice cracked and it made me sound like a squawking bird.
"Oh? Did you not like Serqet? Or was it because I asked-" cutting her off again I waved my hands at her to stop as Manus actually reached us and took the moment to take in the situation.
"If I'm interrupting anything I can go?" He asked, looking a little concerned.
"You aren't, we were just discussing my brother's sexual exploits" I slumped, I really wanted to die.
"I hate you." she slapped my back and laughed while Manus didn't know whether to join in or look apologetic. "Anyway Manus this is my sister Priscilla, Priscilla this is my friend Manus- Oh look is that Serqet bye!"
I said as I rushed over to where my girlfriend was returning from the toilets.
[Introductions]
I didn't see my mother until very late that afternoon while I was talking to Nereius in Howitzer's workshop, we had been going over my current design when my Mother appeared behind us asking what it was we were working on. After informing her she looked at it before introducing herself to my friend and he did so to her,
Eventually I decided that I'd had enough of looking at it and Nereius went on his way saying to call for him if I wanted help, leaving my mother and myself to talk. So I guided us to the roof I went up to all the time and we sat down on one of the benches next to a planter.
"How have you been Azrael?" she asked simply looking into my eyes as I had taken off my mask while we were up here alone.
I slumped down into the chair "I feel tired, these last few months has been enjoyable for the most part, but I really underestimated the amount of work I'd be doing here." feeling her hand on my shoulder I looked up from having been staring at the ground.
"You're doing well though?" she posed the question and I nodded, my actual grades were a little above average of the students in my classes. "Do take time to breathe and look to me or the gods if you're feeling overwhelmed, I'll always be willing to hear about everything no matter what it is."
She meant if I killed more people, she knew they weighed on me and despite my looser perception of our gods my mental fights with the idea of being judged by them.
"I- I wanted to kill someone recently but kept the urge down, it felt like my eyes had taken over and surged my mind with thoughts- no a hunger to take life like those times I mentioned when I was younger." It was something of a side effect we had assumed, that these eyes hungered for the death they were so close to.
"Tell me about what happened."
And so I did, I talked about how the night started and how it ended for me, though I finished it as I returned to Serqet's apartment.
"So you blinded a colleague or partner of this thief?" she questioned when I was done.
"Yeah when I dropped this woman I used this knife I bought specifically for using with my Semblance." My decision to buy the Khukri was something I stood by because when I was in a position where I didn't have my other weapons it was something I could have hidden on me as a last resort.
"Hmm" Mum hummed thinking about what was said. "Have you been practicing with your Oud?" she said changing topics.
"I've played it once since getting here, I was thinking about getting a normal guitar instead though since some of the songs I've learned don't go with the sound of the Oud." Which was true, I was looking into it when Serqet and I went out on the weekend.
"You did choose songs that weren't meant to be played on it Azrael." Her laugh was somewhat refreshing, I couldn't really tell why, but it did.
We continued to talk into the early hours of the night before I walked with her to the Airship dock and rode the Airship down to Vale at which point we parted ways. I finished the night by saying-
"Thanks Mum, this helped a lot."
[Winding down]
It was midday Tuesday now and I was in Mauzer's looking at the guns in all the displays with handguns, Submachine guns and smaller Dust casters. I'd never used a Dust caster before, but a lot of them looked like talisman, wands and chimes. The bigger ones were either built into swords or were these five to six foot tall staves with similar types of chimes and talismans built onto them.
I was looking for a replacement handgun or submachine gun that fit my requirements for what I wanted, so my tangent about Dust casters aside I actually didn't want one.
One of the guns I was taken with at the moment was this submachine gun called a 'Calico 950a' it was an interesting gun, but it was relatively small enough for me to be able to use it easily and it was fit with some of the higher caliber handgun ammunition and its magazine was a fifty round helical drum that was slotted into its top.
So it had a really good capacity meaning it would last quite a while before I needed to reload, which would mean I didn't need to carry like ten magazines on me at once, instead maybe only four spare at most.
As for one of the other gun's I'd been looking at was a shotgun like I've mentioned before and originally wanted, the one I was currently looking at was a range of pump-actions in the ballpark of 12 and 10 gauge shotguns because the power behind them from what I had tested in the store's gun range they had could put down an Ursa in a single shot depending on where you hit them.
Which led me to one of the shotguns I had spotted and used because something about it was so insane that I wanted to see it for myself. It was a 4 gauge, that thing nearly tore my shoulder off even with my Aura.
Anyway, my wallet was going to be quite a bit lighter after this, though part of that was because Priscilla had come along with me and coaxed me into buying her a set of Dust infused trench knives.
And that was how I really learned how expensive Dust weapons and infusible items could be.
While I went through several of the guns that caught my attention I was making note of anything I thought could be put into that custom weapon I'm putting together.
Though all this weapon talk reminds me of someone I met a few weeks ago, his name was Hati and he was possibly one of the scariest people I'd ever met. He had a reputation around Beacon as being The Wolf of Brigade, I didn't know too much about how he got that nickname/title, but from what I saw when he was traversing the gun course with his team I could understand why his team let him go in on his own and acted in support.
He was a few inches shorter than me and wore this big suit of high tech looking painted black armour with a mask that had these glowing red eyes, most particularly he had this large backpack that had two spare barrels attached to it for replacing when needed. The barrels were for this machine gun he used by holding its bipod out to the side to stabilize it when he fired, and he had a big kite shield sized plate over his left arm with an indent in it for the belts of one hundred bullets he pulled out of the metal backpack he used to sit them in his MG42 I believe it was.
The way he fought through the gun course was walking in front door with the somewhat heavy sounds of his metal suit clanking as he pushing through doors and then there was sounds of bbbbrrrrrrrrrrdddddddddd or that was the best way I could describe the sound of his machine gun tearing a hole through the targets giving his team time to do whatever else.
Anyway I was just reminded of him because I saw a gun like his on the wall and it sent shivers down my spine.
In the end I left Mauzer's with the Calico I was looking at and brought some Dust ammunition to load into the magazines I got so that when they were stacked inside every second bullet would be a different type of the main elemental Dusts' i.e. Fire, Lightning and Ice. As well as those Trench Knives for my sister since she was with me.
I went from the substantial amount of Lien I had before the school year started to about a third of what I had to begin with, which was still a lot, but I'd need to budget it out seeing as I wasn't working every day anymore and there wasn't much in terms of work around that I had seen.
Now though I was carrying the gun case in my right hand and all the ammo and spare magazines in a bag on my left while my sister walked next to me with her new knives on her hips in their sheathes without a care in the world for the fact that I was currently quite encumbered. It wasn't actually too heavy but it was annoying that both my hands were taken up by things, so I was probably going to have to use my wings in place of my hands.
"You wanted a guitar right, we should go to one of the music stores nearby, I know a good one." My sister suggested and all I had for her was to stare blankly at which point she laughed. "I still can't see your face, moron."
Right.
Sighing, I gave in. "Sure you know the city better than me anyway." I motioned to her to lead the way.
As I walked alongside her down the footpath through an area that had a lot of stores in it most of the people we passed either stared at us or gave us a wide berth going around. It reminded me that not only were my sister and I already anomalies but even amongst supposedly one of the more tolerant places to be they strayed away from people like us.
I was wearing my Cat mask today because Priscilla wanted me to, whereas I didn't really care all that much which I wore.
"You could always ask Mum to do her thing with a pair of sunglasses." she idly commented looking at me out of the corner of her eye.
"We did try that, they kept braking so Mum tried it on one of the masks at the temple and we settled on them since they worked." I explained to my sister who hadn't been around back when it happened, I think she was at Beacon during that time.
"Oh." She hummed.
After a few minutes of silence between us she asked a question.
"Tell me about your team- BYSN."
"Well there's Pyrrha, like you saw when you and Mum showed up. She was the one with red hair and green eyes, apparently she's a world renown tournament fighter but I never listened to those broadcasts on the radio so I had no clue." I tried to think of more to say about the girl. "She's very kind, strong and compassionate- but she's definitely too kind for her own good and has gotten roped into conversations with people or topics she isn't interested in far too often."
"What about dark and gloomy?" Priscilla said as she motioned to her own ears, and I should have figured she'd see through Blakes poor excuse for a ruse.
"Blake isn't too much more different than you're imagining, she's a bookworm who enjoys her solitude, doesn't enjoy loud things for obvious reasons and very few times have I ever really seen her get fired up or antsy other than when I approached her about being a Faunus. I still have no idea why or how she gets along with Yang so well."
"Yang's the blonde then?" I nodded.
"She's also got a pretty straight forward personality but has her moments of seriousness that have made me respect her a great deal and is why I'm glad she's our leader, she's always planning and pushing us ahead with Manus to get everything done and more."
"Now tell me about your tutor, I've got an idea of what he was like after our conversation when you ditched me with him, but I'd like to hear what you think of him." She questioned as we walked into the store she was leading me to where there were rows and racks of hundreds of instruments.
"Hey Diarmuid." I said seeing my friend in the middle of putting some instruments out on display while dressed in what I could only assume was the store's uniform which was a dark steel coloured polo shirt with black jeans and dress shoes. Doing this also allowed me to ignore answering anything about Manus for the time being.
The colour of the shirt was actually quite similar to the graphite-like colour of my hair.
"Oh Priscilla, Azrael. What are you guys up to?" He continued to fiddle with the display getting it into position.
"We're here to buy me a new guitar, I have an Oud but it's not really meant for any of the songs I know so its sounds don't match up very well." After giving my explanation he nodded, humming to himself.
As my sister was about to walk away he stopped her.
"Priscilla, did Azrael tell you about what I said about Scáthach?" His golden eyes sparkled almost when he spoke to her, it was something I had noticed whenever we hung out.
"He did, tell her I'll be around for the festival." Her eyes narrowed slightly before she continued. "Is she still out in the frontier towns?"
Diarmuid chuckled to himself "Yeah she is, I haven't actually seen her in person for a year- the only way to get in contact with her is by sending letters." he sighed.
"She still doesn't have a Scroll then?" my sister shook her head, rolling her eyes when my friend nodded.
With that though she walked off into another part of the store and I was left with him.
"You're working here then?" I said turning back to him as he led me through the store to the guitars.
"Yeah Gráinne's father owns this place and offered me the job while we were on break." He said it in such a way that I felt like I should've known who that was.
"Who's Gráinne?" So I asked about them.
"Oh? Haven't you met her? I thought you had? She's my girlfriend and is why I'm always asking for your help to get me away from those girls at Beacon who chase me." I watched as he pulled out one of the guitars from the racks while speaking.
AN: