XxX-XxX-XxX

Official Supporters:

Fanatical Fucking Reader, ScrubLord Yoda

Compulsive Reader, The Impossible Muffin

Commissioner, Gib, Espa Cole

If you want to be on the Supporter list, PM me for details or join our private server for details. Hope you enjoy reading my stories, please leave me a comment to let me know if you did, or where I can improve. Link here, where able to be seen : /2UZncAm

Second link here, remove ( and ) and it SHOULD work : D(i) (slash)kfhkfUb

I have a kofi account now, too, under this name for those interested.

Beta(s) :

XxX-XxX-XxX

Requested by:

Scrublord Yoda

XxX-XxX-XxX

Two things surprised Jaune as the night passed he and his friends, new and old alike, by. The first was two-fold, in that vegetarian pizza courtesy of the only other man in the room, was… Actually fairly good, even if he wasn't in love with the peppers he used to replace the spice of the pepperonis. The other half of that was the sheer amount of the pizza that the lithe man could put away all on his own. Which was an entire pizza, minus the single slice he offered his leader to sample.

And it was one of the small slices, too…

The other thing he learned was even more surprising, though. And also came in two parts. The first was that Nora had the luck of the Dark Brother on her side, and a shockingly keen mind for strategy besides. But even more hilarious, forcing a smile to his face even as the small woman glared at him, was Weiss' performance…

"Go to jail?!" She hissed as she pulled the card off the little pile and blinked distraughtly. "B-But I just got out of that section of the board!"

"Yep." Nora smiled, playing with one of the hotels she'd built on every single property along that edge idly. Shooting the girl a haughty look, the Valkyrie added, "And hey, don't worry. I'm sure you'll roll out next turn."

"And have to go down your highway of crippling debt!" She whined, hiding her face in her hands while Ruby moved her piece to Jail. "I should never have traded you those two for Boardwalk…"

"Nope, but you did~!"

"They have the highest rent!"

"It's a noob trap, Weiss-y." Yang nodded, out of the game since half an hour past and reading something on her Scroll while she lounged on one of the beds.

"And you walked right into it." Blake smiled, sitting beside her partner's head and reading whatever the blonde was. When she hummed, the blonde scrolled and the Faunus sighed. "No, you twits, Menagerie is not autocratic…"

"Isn't it, though?" Weiss grumbled quietly, pouting while Nora rolled. They were the only two left in the game, now, and Nora was massively in the lead. But she was stubborn and wouldn't relent, simply pouting while everyone ate and chatted amongst themselves. "The title is more or less hereditary, and the Chieftain sets the policy. No?"

"Well, yes…" Blake admitted with a sigh, but also with a small smile, as if she were happy and exasperated at the same time. "But it's a touch more complicated than that. The Chieftain sets the national goals, and overarching policies, yes. But they are bound by a constitution, and if enough of the council of Menagerie challenge a decision, it can be struck down."

"Then it's authoritarian." Weiss affirmed, rolling her dice and frowning at the five and four that came up, leaving her imprisoned. While Nora took her turn, landing on one of Weiss' properties as she passed Go! and paying the rent out of that, Weiss went on. "It's simply Authoritarian, but with a few loose controls in place so it doesn't go too far. A dictatorship with just a dash of democracy, for flavor."

"Better than corporatism."

"A bullet from a blue gun is the same as a bullet from a purple one, Blake." She sighed, "They both shoot the same. And whoever's shooting probably shoots straighter than you do, too."

"Someone's catty." Ren chuckled, "Sore loser?"

"The only catty one here is Blake." Weiss murmured before she blinked and her eyes widened, "No, wait, that was an acci-"

"Racist bell!" Ruby cheered, flashing behind the Schnee and ringing the cowbell loudly over her head while petals trailed around them both. Weiss cringed and Ruby bent over to give her a hug, booping her on the nose while she flushed, "Only two today so far, though. You're doing so well!"

"I'll melt that damn bell one of these days, so help me…" She murmured, rolling a double, finally, and bouncing out of Jail… And right onto Nora's hotels. Sighing, the Schnee flopped back on the floor and groaned, "I give up!"

"Yay!" Nora cheered, grabbing Weiss' money and bouncing to her feet, throwing it up in the air and cheering, "I'm makin' it raaaain!"

"That's not real money…" Weiss growled, flushing and watching the Valkyrie bounce around the room regardless. "And must you flounce around like that? It's… Indecent."

"I don't what I want~" Nora laughed, "And don't be mad just because you like it~!"

"I-I don't like it!" The Schnee almost shrieked, rocketing to her feet and closing on the Valkyrie, one long finger pointed in the grinning woman's face. "How could I possibly like someone flouncing around like no one can see her… A-Assets moving! It's indecent!"

"Weiss has a cruuuuuush~" Ruby taunted, bouncing along behind Nora's bag to grab a can of Grape while she shrieked and went after her.

"I can't believe Weiss actually lost Capitalism Simulator." Yang snickered as she rolled off the bed and started cleaning up the game, absently watching the Schnee and her partner tumble to the floor in a flailing mess of limbs, hair and skirts. Smirking knowingly, she called out at the flailing mess, "Her neck is ticklish, Weiss-y!"

"Yang, don't help heeeeaaaaagh!" The wrestling match ended quickly once Weiss' fingers got to work, setting the younger woman flailing and writhing to try and escape from her partner's dancing fingers.

"Okay, kids, that's enough." Yang called after a couple minutes. With a sigh, Weiss rolled off her partner, laying on the floor in front of the door and heaving for breath beside her. Rolling her eyes, Yang said, "Two minutes to breathe, then Weiss, you get to run Monopoly back to the social room."

"But-"

"You lost fair and square!" Nora pointed out with a smile that turned wicked as the Schnee looked to her. Winking, she added, "Now you have to take your punishment~!"

"I-I-I'll take it now!" Weiss stammered, face as red as Ruby's cloak as she shot up, snatched the box away, and vanished through the door.

"So…." Blake started, smiling and folding her arms under her bust. "What level of gay panic do you think that was?"

"Four."

"Seven."

"Eight."

"What's gay panic?"

"Oh, you sweet, adorable, innocent little murder hobo." Nora sighed, flopping onto the floor on Pyrrha's other side and using Jaune as a pseudo-wall to trap her. Grinning, she wiggled her eyebrows and said, "Don't you worry, I'll teach you plenty!"

"U-U-U-Um!"

"Jaune!" Mort hissed warningly when he opened his mouth to speak, "You intervene and I will never forgive you!"

"Okay, okay!" Jaune laughed as the Mistralian practically crawled over him to escape from the laughing Valkyrie. Pushing Pyrrha back down in her spot with one hand, he pointed with the other and said, "Down, Nora, before you break Pyrrha."

"But that's the point-"

"Ren, please leash your pet." Jaune sighed, before he realized what he said and snapped out a quick, "Leader's orders, no more teasing Weiss or Pyrrha!"

"Oh thank the gods…"

"But Jaaaaaaune!"

"All of my hate…"

"At least for the night." He added, smiling when Pyrrha whined pitifully and looked to the sky as if searching for rescue from the gods themselves. None came, of course, and Jaune smiled, "Hey, I bought you the night, didn't I?"

"I suppose I should be grateful for that…" Pyrrha sighed as he got up and walked over to the snacks again, searching for a piece of pepperoni and sighing when he failed.

"Oh, grab me a slice too, Fearless Leader?" He waved a hand over his shoulder to show he'd heard her and she moved on, talking to Pyrrha again. "And I'm just poking at you, P-Money, no worries! If you didn't turn as red as your hair and get all shy whenever I did it, it'd be less fun, ya know."

"Pst." Mort hissed, "Take notes, Jaune. Just ignore 'em and they go away! Ruins their fun."

Sometimes, he really wished he'd gotten a normal sword...

"And how am I actually meant to help that, exactly?!" The champion arena fighter squeaked in a way that sounded very much like not a champion arena fighter. The whole of the room at large laughed at that and Jaune saw her hide her face in her hands, whining loudly, "Why am I the target every time…?"

"You aren't." Jaune said as he returned to his seat and let Nora raid a couple slices from his plate. "Weiss was the target, what, ten minutes ago?"

"Mhm!" Nora nodded excitedly, forcing down the bite she'd already ripped out of her pizza and adding, "And for the same reason too! You're both just so frickin' adorable when you get all flustered and shy!"

"...I have decided I am going to challenge you in Goodwitch's next combat class." Pyrrha decided firmly with a confident smile. "Perhaps a bout will teach you not to tease me so much. Hmm?"

"Oh, you wanna get all hot and sweaty and wrestle with me in front of eeeeeveryone?" Nora chittered, watching the Mistralian stammer out a nervous denial and grinning widely, "Little tip? Don't try and turn the teasin' around on me. You'll have to come down to my level, and I'll beat you with experience."

"Nora, that saying is about arguing with idiots…"

"And pervs!" She nodded, smiling when Jaune shot her a confused look. Sitting on Pyrrha's other side, she inspected her pizza idly and rambled, "What? I know what I'm about. I mean, I'm not that bad, like, no creeping on anyone or anything, but… Eh."

"Oh my god, she's so conscientious, too…" Mort sighed, "Jaune, I might leave you for her. No hard feelings?"

"It's just fun and games." Jaune added quietly, doing his level best not to glare at the sword leaning against the wall beside him. "She's not bothering you, though, is she?"

"Yeah, am I?" The woman asked seriously, "Cuz I can back off, if ya say to. No hard feelings for it either."

"What?" She blinked, "Um, no, it's just…"

"You're not very well socialized to deal with this kind of stuff." Jaune pitched and the woman nodded happily for the explanation. Bringing his knee up to his chest, he rested an elbow on it and sighed, "Yeah, I'm kinda the same. Most of the time, last couple years, I haven't really had to deal with people a lot."

"You were a frontiersman, right?" Yang asked suddenly, sitting up and meeting his gaze flatly. When he nodded, she asked, "What's that… Like."

"Well…"

"And I don't mean the watered down version, either, where you talk about fighting all the big monsters and roasting rabbit while you watch the stars." Yang rushed to clarify, rolling her eyes and smiling genuinely. "I think everyone here wants to know the detes, too, Jaune. You're the only one that's been out there, doing what we wanna do, so… Hit us with some facts."

"If you're all sure…"

"We are." Ruby nodded, looking to Blake and getting another nod. "We wanna know what it's really like out there."

"Maybe you all should wait for the Schnee, then?" Mort whispered in his ear, "She'd probably enjoy learning about this as well."

No sooner had he translated the sword's words over did the door open, the young heiress stumbling in with a couple pizzas and another game balanced in her arms. She glanced at the far more serious faces in the room for a second, and then sighed and ambled in. Blinking owlishly, she turned, kicked the door shut, and carried everything over to start setting it up.

"So," she started while everyone was staring at her, "does anyone want to tell me why it seems like the mood has died?"

"Blake lost one of her nine lives." Yang quipped, and then blinked as Ruby vanished in a spray of roses. Turning, she shouted, "Don't you frickin'-"

"Racist bell!" Ruby cheered, ringing it loudly in the air and grinning eagerly, "That's one point for you, Yang!"

"Oh my god, someone else has points?!" Weiss smiled, "It's not just me!"

"Relax, Weiss-y." Ruby smiled, bouncing over to put the bell back on a shelf and beaming a smile at the Schnee. "Yang has one, and you have forty-seven. I'm sure eventually she'll catch up to you."

"If we ever find your mute button that is." Blake smiled, flicking along her Scroll while she read. "I'm certain you have one somewhere."

"I volunteer to find it!" Nora smiled, raising her hand eagerly like a kid in class. "Might take a while, but I'm sure it'll be time spent really well!"

"Oh my Stars, you lech…"

"I asked Jaune what it's like being out there, doing what we want to do when we get outta here." Yang finally cut in, answering Qeiss' question finally and showing just how interested she really was in his answer. Smiling, she gave Weiss a playful look and added, "And Lover Boy's first thought was apparently that you would miss out."

"Oi!" Mort snapped, "Stealing my thunder?!"

"It was just a thought that crossed my mind." He sighed, shrugging off Yang's smirk, Mort's hiss of agitation, and Weiss' flushed face all in one go. "I just figured it was a good idea. I don't like explaining the same thing over and over again, ya know?"

"Fair enough, neither do I." Weiss nodded, sitting back down at the little table and setting, of all things, Chutes and Ladders down. When everyone shuffled over and gave her a look, she asked, "What? I happen to like this game, thank you very much. I haven't played it since I was a child, but..."

"Fond memories?"

"Yeah, Blake." Weiss nodded, "Fond memories. Also, I bought extra pizzas. So…"

"Fair enough." Jaune laughed, leaning back against the wall and raising his hand, "Too many of us to play at once, so I'll sit out and talk."

"I'll sit out as well." Pyrrha added, "I'm more one to watch than to play, I'm afraid. At least until I know how to play well enough to, well, stand a chance."

"Sore loser?"

"No, Nora, I'm just…" The woman paused, searching for a word, and finally settled on, "Competitive. It comes with the territory of my upbringing, I'm afraid. I can stand to lose, but I prefer to lose for failing than for ignorance."

"I'm out, too." Blake said, lounging out across the bed when Yang hopped off to play the game. Raising her Scroll, she explained, "Reading."

"Cleaning." Ren said when his turn came around and he stood, marching over to do damage control on the snack line.

"Okay, so we're down to a good number for this then." Yang nodded, watching Weiss set up the board and waving a hand at Jaune. "So, spill the beans. What's it like out there, wanderin' around and beating shit up for money?"

"You make me sound like a mercenary…"

"Aren't Hunters kind of like mercenaries?" Weiss asked quietly, before she could catch herself or anyone could say anything. Flushing suddenly and raising her hands to wave the insult she'd suggested off, she rushed to say, "I-I mean in the sense of taking money to fight or protect as part of a contract. That they fight Grimm is incidental to them taking pay to do it, after all."

"So by definition, Hunters would be at least a kind of mercenary. Like a shark is a kind of fish, regardless of its differences to others." Blake murmured, sitting up pursing her lips as she considered it. "I mean… Father has warriors on retainer just to fight the Grimm. What, then, would separate them from Hunters?"

"Training." Jaune offered simply, "I didn't have a degree. But they hired me anyways. Never for the same amount of Lien, of course, but… Well, they either didn't have a Hunter to hand or couldn't afford one."

"So they paid you." Blake said, "Like… A mercenary."

"They have a point, Jaune." Mort whispered, deathly serious all of a sudden now that the time called for it. "You really were basically a mercenary with a pretty specific type of target. At least, you know… Most of the time."

"I… Suppose so." He sighed, pursing his lips and sighing. "I just don't like the image the word conjures up, I guess."

"What image?" Nora asked quietly, just as serious as Mort and just as sudden about it. Two peas in a pod, those two were At least, aside from the whole 'magical sword with a soul trapped in it' aspect.

"I dunno, really." He shrugged, scratching at his chin and waving his hand at the air unsurely. "Some smiling jackal of a man, walking out over a handful of Lien? Someone that would refuse a job because the offer wasn't good, no matter what happens to people?"

"Did you ever do that?" Nora asked quietly, "Leave people behind that way?"

"Of course not!" He almost snapped, drawing a raised eyebrow from the sharp ginger. Taking a deep breath, he explained, "If someone would die, I'd deal with the Grimm either way, if I thought I could. The price never mattered, there. Not to me at least."

"Well," Mort sighed, "I feel attacked."

"Then that oughta put a knife in what you imagine when you hear the word." Yang said simply with a wide, beaming smile. Crossing her arms under her chest, she shrugged, "If you're a merc, and you are in the same way we're all animals-"

"No, that's a technical term." Blake rushed to say, "Don't ring the bell."

"Ah." The Rose nodded, disappointed, as she set the bell aside. "Oki dokey, then."

"Anyway, since you're a kind o' merc, then you know of one that doesn't do that already." Yang shrugged, "Anyway, that ain't exactly what I asked about, Jaune. I wanna know what it's like. What I'm gonna be doing out there."

"We." Ren pointed out quietly, "What we all will be doing out there."

"Well…" They wanted his honesty, so he supposed he didn't have a choice. Gesturing for Ren to pitch him a can of soda and catching it when the young man did, Jaune sighed. "It's a lot of walking, for one, with nothing going on. Or riding, I guess, if you have a horse or a car or something. Or the Lien to hire a way."

"Shouldn't be a problem for us." Ruby smiled, elbowing her partner playfully, "Eh, bestie better than the restie?"

"Am I just a bank now…?"

"No, you're a partner with very deep pockets." Ruby smiled, "Anyway, Jaune. You were saying?"

"Yeah, anyway, once you get to a town they… Well, some of 'em have a board of jobs they need doing. Pest control, repair, so on, normal stuff. Those will have a section for people like me. Well, us, I guess." He shrugged, because that bit really didn't matter. "At those ones, you grab a job you like and find the person who put it up. Talk out your pay, unless a price is listed and you're fine with it, and then off you go to do it."

"Sounds normal enough…"

"It is." He nodded, "Issue is whether or not the description of the job is actually accurate to the job."

"Do people lie on 'em?" Yang asked, "That can't be legal…"

"It's not, and they don't." Jaune answered, "But when that was posted and when you find it might not be near to the same day. And things change. Or maybe they just didn't know what was actually going on when they hired you in the first place. Either way, if you take a job and it goes wild, they probably won't pay extra."

"That's rude…"

"Maybe." Jaune shrugged, "Some of 'em don't because they can't, though. And it's hard to know can't from won't without offending someone. And getting a bad reputation, too, which can make things so much worse."

"Sounds about right for business ventures." Weiss muttered, hitting the spinning and smiling as it spun. Childish game it might have been, but hey, Weiss was enjoying it at least. Even if it was probably just for nostalgia. "Reputation is king in the corporate world. If you become known for changing the deal after all is said and done, even if you believe you're right to do it, people will talk."

"And not charitably, either." Blake added, "Keep going, though. What's it like aside from that?"

"I dunno…" He sighed, thinking for a while and then saying, "Dirty, for one."

"Dirty…?"

"Yeah, Weiss. Dirty." He chuckled at her confused, off-put face and explained quietly. "You spend most nights out there, sleeping in the woods. Maybe you can haul tents, or bedrolls, maybe not. Maybe you lost them. It doesn't matter, you're still out there, in the sticks. Days between a bath in anything but a river, days of hard rations and whatever you can scrounge… It's hard."

"Really are selling this job here, Arc." Yang snarked, "Like, I almost wanna dig for the receipt, you know?"

"Yeah, it's bad." He laughed, "But… It's nice, too."

"It is?" Weiss asked, raising an eyebrow, "You make it sound like a fresh, new kind of hell I didn't even know existed."

"Thinking of backing out, Schnee?"

"Not on your life, Belladonna." She answered hotly, cocking her head to the side and smirking thinly. "Just… Rethinking my lack of a personal tent. And drones."

"It sounds bad, but there's... Something about it that makes me miss it." He sighed, staring up at the ceiling in thought. "I don't know what. I was always cold, unless I got a fire together. Triomphe couldn't carry a tent, between me and my armor I was already being a dick to the poor thing, so I slept outside. Still, I miss falling asleep under the stars with a stomach-full of whatever I could catch or carry… It's oddly satisfying, living that way."

"It… Actually sounds it." Yang nodded and clapped her hands, "Okay, curiosity's good for now. Time to stomp Weiss again before bed!"

"Oi!" The Schnee squawked, "You were first out in Monopoly!"

Smiling, Jaune let his head lean back to watch the girls play while Pyrrha watched him. After a moment, she bumped her arm into his and, smiling still, he returned it. Tonight had gone pretty well, all things considered. And he hoped it was a sign of things to come.

"Hey." Mort whispered, "See if you can look down her blouse!"

The gods owed him a good omen… Or twelve.

XxX-XxX-XxX

It was not a sign of things to come. XD

Hope you all enjoyed a lil' bit o' word-building!

XxX-XxX-XxX

Smokey panda :

Kinda took two! Though this one had a solid hunk of word-building, background talking and characterizing.

Codfix1998 :

Got it in one, lol.

Sebine (Chapter 10) :

The Deathstalker is an ambusher, that was clever enough to use downed Initiates as bait to do an ambush. I leave to the reader's imagination what could have happened to their escort, based on this info.

Hirshja :

It was a hundred words short, but because I didn't have anything to fill it, short of putting all this into it. Which, uh… No. Regardless, I'll state clearly that everything is fine, sans what happened a few months ago and the natural issues from that.