Chapter 8 Dead end
(Silver's Perspective)
The next morning after a light breakfast, we went to go talk to the ones in charge of the Atlesian military base, unfortunately we got the gates slammed in our face as a refusal to our small chat.
"Come on! You didn't even hear us out!" Yang yelled grabbing the bars. The two guards who I will call Tweedle dee and Tweedle dumb only said.
"Our orders are clear: The Mistral-Atlas border is closed!" Dee.
"Please!" Dumb.
"Have a good day!"
"But-" Yang then got interrupted by both these idiots.
"A good day!" I wanted to kill them so god damn bad.
"Hey, if you don't wanna believe that I'm friends with Ironwood-" Qrow started.
"General Ironwood!" They snapped back I groaned loudly.
"Yeah, General Ironwood, then fine. But look, we have Weiss Schnee with us and we're trying to get her home safely." He told them the two guards looked to one another.
"Approach!" The called my ears began to hurt from standing near them. I looked back my team were sceptical, RWBY were desperate at this point, Qrow, Maria and Cole looked done with this bullshit, Oscar was the only one with hope still in his eyes.
"Very well!" They both yipped surprising everyone.
"You may speak with our commanding officer!" Dumb said.
"We will fetch her at once!" Dee continued I rolled my eyes as they both turned and ran off to find the commanding officer.
"They were... kind of-"
"Super weird? Uh yeah." Ruby finished Blake's sentence.
"Guys, we should start thinking of ways to get to Atlas if these stooges don't help us." I whispered to my team to which I got three nods and I could only guess what diabolical scheme Night would think of.
"Hmm." It was Maria we all turned to her.
"Well, I... may know this commanding officer..." She told us.
"That's good, isn't it? If she's your friend, then maybe she'd be more willing to help us." Ruby smiled, I got a bad feeling about this
"I wouldn't exactly call us... "friends"." Maria told us.
"Acquaintances?" Weiss asked.
"Not quite."
"Colleagues?" Blake guessed.
"Warmer." We were told.
"Enemies?" Yang guessed next.
"That's the one!" Maria cheered almost.
"Wait, what?" Oscar exclaimed I sighed to myself realising that this is going to end horribly for us.
"Oh, yes. I come through here about once every ten years to get my eyes checked up in Atlas. You bring outside cashews on one flight, and suddenly you're placed on the additional screening list for life!" Maria explained.
"You've gotta be kidding me..." Qrow groaned.
"Now, now, let's not give up hope yet. Maybe she's dead!" I couldn't help but laugh at that.
"Introducing!" Oh, fuck they're back.
"Special operative!" Dumb.
"Caroline Cordovin!" They both introduced this short statured woman, around Maria's age in an Atlas uniform.
"Witch." Caroline spat at Maria.
"She-Devil." Was the response.
"Hm. I've seen you've chosen larger contraband to smuggle this time." Caroline hissed.
"Oh, Cordo. You know they say time changes people, but I see you've still got that stick right up your-" I knew where this was going, but Ruby quickly interrupted.
"H-hello! Miss, uh, Cordovin. My name is Ruby Rose, and I was wondering if you would hear us out about-"
"I've already heard what your other little friends had to say, Miss Rose." With that she suddenly went on the attack.
"What are you doing back here?! I thought I told you to leave!" She yelled I turned to see Jet and Sky holding back Ray.
"And I told you we wouldn't rest until you let us through!" Ray yelled.
"Nice to see you again as well!" Jet nervously smiled and waved trying to appear somewhat polite.
"I want to apologies for her, she's a bit of a bit-" I groaned as I hit the floor now cradling my stomach from Neo's jab.
"You civilians are clearly incapable of comprehending the importance of our mission here in Argus. So, allow me to say this slowly, with smaller words: This base, that relay tower, the very safety of Argus are all gifts from the glorious Kingdom of Atlas! And it is my duty to uphold them, as only I have the wit and tenacity for such a task." She exclaimed as I got back to my feet.
"Such wit!" Dee.
"Such tenacity!" Dumb.
"I want to kill them all." I signed.
"Don't you dare. Not yet anyway." Neo signed back.
"Or maybe Atlas just wanted to get you as far from the kingdom as possible." Maria joked, I snorted and slapped my hand over my mouth.
"You're just like the rest of these Argus ingrates! This city wouldn't even be here if it weren't for our Atlesian ancestors, and what do we get in return? The entire world is ready to put a knife to our throats!" She yelled I felt a growl erupt from my throat.
"Please, we know your kingdom had nothing to do with the Fall of Beacon. We were there." Ruby explained.
"That is an understatement." I told her she winced remembering what happened.
"No one's happy about the Atlas borders or embargo, but I know General Ironwood is just worried. It's why we need to talk to-" Weiss began
"The General is no coward! Atlas is strong. If all the kingdoms plan to make us their enemy, then so be it! Atlas will prevail!" Oh my god I just want to kick her back to Atlas.
"Atlas will prevail!" Dee and Dumb will go too.
"Do you guys seriously have to do that?" Yang said obviously unimpressed with these two stooges.
"If Miss Schnee has truly come to her senses and wishes to return to her family, then, of course, the Atlas military will escort her home. But the kingdom will not be responsible for her "friends" of... questionable character." She glared at Blake then at Ice and myself. EXCUSE ME BITCH!
"What's that supposed to mean?" Weiss snarled.
"It means we're done here." She smirked.
"Now hold on one damned second." I snapped as the gates closed trapping my hand.
"God damn it not again!" I yelled in anger, I sighed undoing my glove, rolled up my coat sleeve and began to bend the gate in order to give my arm more wiggle room.
"I don't..." Weiss began.
"Weiss. I told you we wouldn't leave your side for a second. We'll find a way to Atlas. Together." Ruby smiled putting a hand on Weiss' shoulder. I then saw Qrow walk away.
"So... where are we going now?" Ruby asked.
"Yeah, what's the plan?" Sky asked.
"The plan? The plan just got shut on our face three times over. I'm going for a drink." Qrow growled I groaned softly knowing we'd never get him back on board as my hand finally popped out of the gate.
"Uncle Qrow, I really think we should try and come up with something... together."
"What's his problem? It's not your fault we can't go on." Jet smiled.
"If he's gonna be a jerk then we'll just come up with something without him. I mean, we've got Ozpin with us! He usually knows what to do." Sky smiled, Oscar looked down at the ground as WBY gave each other troubled looks.
"What is it?" Ray asked.
"Let's head back, you should be sat down for this." I told them as I flexed my hand to get feeling back into it.
When we got back Ruby started explaining everything.
After explaining what we had initially hidden from them, Jet punched into a wall leaving a spider web like crack in the wall.
"Jet!" Ruby yelled.
"Everything we did was for nothing!" He argued, he barely knew the kid, but I know where he's coming from, he was speaking for Sky.
"That's not true." Blake piped up trying to calm the situation down.
"Really? Cuz it sure does sound like it." Ray growled, I got to my feet feeling the tension in the air.
"I, um..." The black cat fell silent.
"If Salem can't be killed, then how are we supposed to win this?" Sky asked, she seemed close to tears.
The silence was deafening.
"Wow... Great plan everyone!" Jet snapped sarcastically.
"Look, none of this is great, we know. But we're not the bad guys here." Oscar said, he probably should have kept his mouth shut.
"Are we sure about that?" Jet growled glaring daggers at him.
"What?" Oscar asked.
"He's in your head, isn't he? Did you already know about this?" He barked as he began to step towards Oscar.
"He didn't know any of it!" Weiss tried to defend him.
"How much longer can we even trust him?!" Jet's voice grew louder I began to move to get between him and Oscar.
"How do we even know it's really him?! What if we have been talking to that liar this whole time?!" He closed the gap, I pulled Oscar behind me and gave Jet a hard shove to the chest nearly sending him flying across the room.
"No need to be so hostile, the boy is innocent so calm down before things get ugly for you." I glared down at him and got a similar look back, he then got up and left, I heard his room door slam shut.
"Is he... going to be okay?" Yang asked.
"I don't know!" Ray yelled as she got up and left.
"I think it would be best... if we had some time to think." Sky whimpered, tears rolling down her cheeks.
"Best idea." I told her as she too left the room.
As the day went by, I had explored the rest of this giant warehouse conversion. How Fenrir afforded all this still had me baffled.
I had come across what I guessed was a small sparring room and to my greater surprise, was a well-kept forge, it was small, had one sander, an anvil one furnace and a power hammer. I whistled to myself stroking off the dust from the anvil, I then found a note from Fenrir.
"If you use this forge, please keep it tidy."
I sighed and removed my jacket, gloves, vest and over shirt. I started up the forge and drew out what my new weapons would look like, I had lost my shotgun in the blizzard so now all I had was the damned axe I found.
The sweat that dripped from my brow as I struck the now heated metal, I wanted to use the power hammer but something from deep within me kept me from placing my hand upon it.
The hot air burned my lungs as I worked, the only moisture I had was the salty sweat that coated my body as I created the cruel edge of an axe, cooling it in a vat of oil I turned to the metal inside the forge. I felt my stress wash away with each strike of metal as I forged a new sword.
I had forged the hilt instead of casting it to save myself some days.
I left the forge determined to finish my new weapons tomorrow, I smiled seeing some of my blacksmith muscle returning however when I left, I noticed that something was wrong, Neo was sat outside waiting to which she signed.
"Get a shower quick, Oscar is missing we're splitting up to cover more ground." I nodded and ran to grab a shower and some clean clothes.
This kid would be the death of me. I quickly dried off, pulled on my outfit and left quickly the cold air hit my skin, my ears folded immediately due to me not drying my hair.
It was so cold...