A/N
As always, suggestions/criticisms/complaints/typos/errant thoughts, are all welcome.
Chapter 5: I Need Your Permission to Operate Independently
12%
"Tyrian, enough!"
A soggy sound, followed by a moaning grunt.
That was the first thing. Flesh hitting flesh, and the fact that he couldn't move his legs.
Flat on his stomach, tasting grass and mud, Jaune inhaled a rattling breath; a distinct metallic aroma was heavy in the air. He coughed in a rocking shudder that jolted his entire upper body.
"Enough, you dimwit. WE NEED HIM."
That voice again.
19%
Jaune craned his neck to one side, the muscles on his back and shoulders protesting the motion with slicing stabs.
Maniacal laughter answered. Its source was the tall Faunus from… before. Tyrian. He was straddling a crumpled figure on the ground, fists bloody red, his ponytail weaving side to side as he pummeled Spike savagely.
"Oh, don't you worry," Tyrian said. "Little rascal can take it. Oh yes, he can take it. Surprisingly resilient."
"Be that as it may-"
"Questioning me?" There was a horrifying ripping sound, accompanied by a fleshy tear. Another low groan. Tyrian tossed aside scraggly bits of curly hair, strands of skin flapping on top.
22%
"Yes, in fact, I do." The other man, Watts, replied in a pleasant tone, yet laced with obvious arrogance. "We were instructed to secure the vessel. The tracker is an added bonus, but we can't have your perverse nature endanger the mission."
The initial shock began to wear off and Jaune felt the world coming back into focus. They'd been…inside. Inside that thing. And then…nothing. Blackness.
No.
Pain. A faint recollection rose in his mind, of horrific pain. Of something cutting into his upper back.
Amber.
"AMBER!" Jaune yelled. He forced himself to push against the ground, lifting up to his elbows.
Why couldn't he move his legs?
Jaune commanded his legs to curl, to push a knee towards his chest. Nothing. Not even a phantom feeling of motion, as if some outside force counteracted the signals his brain was sending.
32%
There she was. Tied with a rope, feet to wrists, Amber's eyes met his own. She screamed; her voice muffled by cloth stuffed in her mouth.
Jaune wriggled on the ground, attempting a roll, failing that, clawing and tearing at anything he could grab hold of.
The hard sole of a boot flattened him back down and turned him to his back with a shoving kick.
Watts leaned over Jaune. "Awake, then. Very well. Congratulations, boy. Your value has soared up just high enough that I'll have to bother with keeping you alive."
"Who are you? What do you want from us?" Jaune rasped, craning his neck painfully to keep Amber in his field of vision.
A large, silver syringe hovered over his face.
Jaune flinched and scrunched up his eyes close as its needle pricked his neck.
"Interesting," Watts said after a moment, holding up a monocle to one eye, examining the fresh blood. He then emptied the syringe into a small vial. "You have a 4-inches-incision along your posterior cervical, but no sutures, closed by some type of precision laser. Have you had any sort of augmentation work done? In Atlas perhaps?"
"Release my sister first and I'll tell you everything. Please, sir," Jaune mumbled on auto-pilot. He needed time to think, to digest what was happening, but things were moving too fast and he had to react. His instincts were screaming at him to measure every word, to tread carefully.
If they wanted something from him, he had leverage.
44%
"You don't seem to understand your position, so let me make it perfectly clear for you. Tyrian."
A slimy hand touched Jaune's forehead and his head exploded with horrific agony.
"Hold him down, fool. I don't need his head bashed in just yet."
Jaune wanted to claw his own eyes out. Whirling anguish swished inside his head, splashing against the inside of his skull, bearing down on him with dreadful force. He shrieked, begging them to stop, but his voice came out in a choked gurgle.
When it was finally over, the pain vanished instantly, leaving his body feeling like a ragged husk.
"You will answer every question to the best of your meager faculties," Watts said in a commanding voice. "Lie, and we will interrogate the girl. Do we have an understanding?"
"Y-yes. Please, you- "
"Quiet." Watts slapped him across the face. A full body smack that reverberated in his chest and brought tears to his eyes. After what he'd just endured, it barely stung. "Your name?"
"Jaune Arc."
"Age?"
"18."
"Place of birth?"
"Ansel."
"Have you had any surgeries, in Atlas or otherwise?"
"N-no."
"Tyrian, bring the girl."
63%
"NO! I AM NOT LYING. PLEASE. PLEASE," Jaune bawled. "WE WERE INSIDE. I REMEMBER DARKNESS, THEN PAIN. PLEASE."
Watts lifted a hand. "Wait."
"Why do we need the girl alive, anyway?" Tyrian complained.
"Because I said so, you feeble brained imbecile. Go find something else to play wi- NOT WITH THE TRACKER. Gods." Watts turned back to Jaune. "See what I have to deal with?" He rose to his feet and dragged Jaune by the collar of his shirt towards the vessel, dropping him near the small crater. "How did you get in?"
"Spike, He hit it."
"Spike?" Watts raised an eyebrow. "Hit it how, exactly? With an Aura pulse?"
"I…Pardon, I don't know what that means…" Jaune said. His head was feeling heavy. He needed rest. If he could just close his eyes and take a moment…
"I wouldn't pass out if I were you," Watts said. "We have methods to keep you conscious if need be. Fascinating methods. For us, that is. You- well, let's just say that anything else you've suffered through today would feel like the caressing lips of a lover. I am sure you don't want that. Am I right, Jaune?"
79%
"Yes."
"Good. Now- "
"Watts," Tyrian called in a creepy, sing-song voice. "Your little apparatus is making weird beeping noises. Can I kill it?"
"DON'T!" Watts jumped away, clearing at least thirty feet in one powerful leap over the vessel.
Jaune rolled to his stomach, and then over to his back again, in the direction of Amber at the edge of the clearing. He had to stay awake. No matter what.
"It works!" Watts yelled, obviously excited. "We can pierce The Dead Zone."
"Boring," Tyrian whined. "Where's Ozpin anyway? His toy soldiers always die so fast."
85%
"I don't think you understand how significant this is," Watts said. "By the time Ozpin's underlings get here, we will have long—NO, NO, NO. The signal is too weak. Here, climb up a tree with that. Oh, and you can kill the girl, I changed my mind. NOT NOW, AFTER WE GET A SIGNAL."
95%
Jaune's eyes fluttered close. Just a moment. He needed a moment…
97%
'Jaune.'
Dad?
'Wake up, Jaune.'
I can't.
'I know you have it in you to pull through.'
How?
'Because you are my son.'
99%
You left us. You gave up.
/X/
100%
Running systems check…
All units operational
WARNING Action potential of cells produced by an unknown source
Readjusting…
Complete
WARNING Detected internal bleeding in the abdominal cavity of the host
Enabling nanobots…
ERROR Unknown fields interfering with electrical equipment
Readjusting…
Complete
STEM consumer grade legacy version is now operational
Uploading custom update provided in the installation package
ERROR Unknown fields interfering with electrical equipment
Calculating strategy…
FATAL ERROR
STEM consumer grade legacy version is now operational
Sending report…
FATAL ERROR
STEM consumer grade legacy version is now operational
His mind suddenly cleared, like a breeze washing away dead leaves on a forest floor.
Jaune commanded his legs to move and his body obeyed.
He felt good. Strong. Was that… did he unlock his Aura?
I advise you to stay still.
Jaune choked on a fearful scream.
He looked around frantically. Watts and the Faunus were out of sight. Amber was where he'd last seen her. He could move.
He could move.
He could get Amber and run.
Jaune slowly lifted into a crouch.
You are making a tactical mistake.
He froze.
It was unmistakable now. Something was speaking to him. The sound wasn't coming from any direction that he could sense.
It was a pleasant male voice, spoken with a slight undertone of robotic intonation, yet sophisticated and intelligent, unlike any machine Jaune had ever heard before.
Jaune scanned his surroundings again, his eyes straying to the towering vessel. There was a shout and a distant roar. Watts and the Faunus could be back any moment now.
Jaune should have sprinted to Amber, would have, had he completely ignored his instincts. He had to see if she was okay, but something made him stay put.
"Can you hear me?" Jaune whispered.
Yes. I am 93.2% operational.
The stress must have finally broken his mind. Either that, or…
Can you read my mind?
He waited a moment.
Nothing.
Your assailants are heading back. You should reclaim your initial position.
Jaune froze again.
"Excuse me, but… who are you?" Jaune whispered.
I am STEM. The system operating your body for you.
"My body? What do you mean?"
You appear to be under some misapprehension as to your procedure. I have already considered 10137 different possible scenarios. May I list those?
Jaune did feel at odds with his body. Logically, he knew he should be in a panic, but his anxiety was being suppressed somehow, pushed into a corner of his mind. His heartbeat was strong and stable, his vision was clear, and his breath came slow and deep.
First, he had to know if he'd unlocked his Aura. Was it the rare type of sentient Semblance he was hearing in his mind?
no, you may not, he thought his reply again.
Another moment of silence.
"Can you read my mind?"
No. I'm sending sound waves to your eardrums.
Though Jaune had mostly focused his research on Aura, he had gleaned some basic facts on Semblances. A person's Semblance rarely unlocked together with Aura. Abilities varied greatly, as was easily demonstrated in yearly festivals and combat tournaments. It was unknown to what extent the circumstances around the time a Semblance manifested contributed to its nature.
"Can you get help?"
I have been unable to contact the local police. Our current location is unknown. I am running rigorous system checks to resolve the issue. For now, lie down on your back.
Local police…? Wait, there was a simple test he could run. It was trivial, but why not just...
"Are you my Semblance?"
I am unfamiliar with this term, please clarify.
It was a waste of time. A pang of worry pierced through the veil that was keeping him calm.
Tapping his pockets, Jaune was not surprised in the slightest to discover his scroll missing. He rose to his feet slowly.
The sun was on the verge of setting, coloring the skies in reds and yellows. He listened carefully, unmoving; strumming of the wind, rhythmic, high-pitched chirps of birds. No sign of the Grimm, or Spike, or the terrifying men.
Jaune sprinted to Amber. He wasn't particularly faster than normal, but his legs covered the ground in confident strides, as if somehow interpreting his unconscious commands a split second before he became aware of them.
This is a mistake.
She was curled in a fetal position.
"Amber," Jaune whispered, pulling at the rough rope around her wrists. It was terrifyingly tight. Her fingers were cold to touch and tinted blue. Jaune more scraped than brushed hair away from her face, sticky with blood and sweat. Her glazed eyes stared back at him.
No.
She was…
No.
Female. Age 5. Multiple lacerations. Head injury. Possibly in shock.
In shock.
"Alive then?" Jaune breathed.
Yes. I'm able to sense her heartbeat.
Jaune pulled at the rope again, straining until he felt the cord ripping his flesh.
This is a complex variation on the Handcuff Knot. You will not get it off her in time.
He bit into the line linking her wrists to her feet, shaking his head, tasting blood.
Attempting to assist her will drastically reduce your survival odds.
"Stop talk- "
Behind you.
Something hard connected with the back of his head, then a solid blow against his back. Jaune was lifted off his feet, body twisted in the air for several feet before he landed on his shoulder with a sickening crunch.
I have stopped bleeding in the brain tissue and have restarted your heart. May I disable your pain receptors?
Jaune's vision cleared, blurred, and cleared again. He was on the verge of passing out, then wide awake. One moment his shoulder exploded with pain, the next, the agony was tuned down to a distant throb.
I am manually calibrating your organs.
Jaune rolled to his back and got his feet under himself, moving into a low crouch. His head swam for several worrying moments, then stabled.
Tyrian stood Infront of him, over Amber, his stinger weaving above her.
"Fool, you could have easily killed him," Watts complained, fiddling with a buzzing, spider-shaped robot.
There was a cloud of dust around the clearing, violently tossed to the air by their arrival.
Jaune shook off a tremble, another pang of deeply rooted fear escaping its mental prison. He was a sheep in front of apex predators. His life was but a speck of dust to them.
"Meh, who cares?" Tyrian shrugged, kicking dirt. "Let's just get out of here."
Watts lobbed the robot at the vessel, a deceptively casual throw that zipped it through the air faster than a bullet. Instead of crashing into a thousand-piece rubble, the robot spider skittered along the body of the vessel and stabilized itself. It vibrated, its legs extending, moving its frame away from the surface, then something protruded out of its front. There was a buzzing sound and sparks as the drill met the surface of the vessel with a harsh scream of metal against metal.
Do not mention the female. They think she is dead.
Jaune tensed, staring at the Faunus. Think she's dead? This bastard, what had he done to her?
Another stab of fear tried to slice through whatever held his mental state together…then it was gone. The fear vaporized in a wash of white.
Per your signed contract, I am authorized to calibrate your stress hormones during emergencies.
His brain was rinsed in a shower of cool water.
He was still deathly worried, about his sister, less so about himself. But he was no longer afraid, of anything. His body was but a tool to be used.
He felt invincible. He was angry. Furious.
Tyrian licked his lips. "I don't like the way he's looking at me."
Please hold while I am calculating a solution.
Whatever this thing was doing, it should hurry.
"Tyrian, enough," Watts warned.
"I'm telling you, this cub is up to something. I should kill him."
"Up to something?" Watts threw up his hands, the shrill of the drilling robot a sharp background to his voice. "Do you have any idea how long I've waited for this? The patterns, the data, the victims. They all point us here. An answer. Our way forward. Finally, an advantage to tip the scales of war in our favor. And you, with your animalistic, decayed mind, are incapable of the barest of thoughts beyond the next buffet. You disgust me. You wish to kill this boy?"
Tyrian nodded eagerly, eyes honed in on Jaune.
"FINE. Do it. You inbred- "
Tyrian disappeared and Jaune lost his breath.
Something stabbed his right shoulder, then punctured his stomach.
His face was suddenly buried in dirt. He coughed and rolled away, just in time to dodge Tyrian's stomping boot.
Thank you for your patience. I have calculated a strategy with a 28% chance of success.
He was going to die. It was all over.
Let me know if you require my assistance.
Jaune pushed his head to one side on pure instinct, avoiding the stinger and receiving a hard kick to the ribs for his efforts. He was blasted to the other end of the clearing, trundling like a ragdoll over rocks and hard bumps in the ground, he crashed against the trunk of a tree.
Tyrian was on him in a second. Jaune caught a flash of a blade.
Let me know if you need my help.
"H-help. HELP!"
Another edge flashed, slicing his raised forearm with a spatter of blood. Tyrian swished both blades with a sickening grin.
I need your permission to operate independently.
"P-PERMISSION GRANTED!" Jaune screamed.
A whirring sound vibrated along his backbone, ending with a satisfying snap.
The world spun around him.
Sky, ground, sky, ground, and Jaune was back on his feet again. His left hand rose in a precise, sharp gesture, as if following the commands of a different mind, it pushed his left cheek with a brushing touch, just enough to avoid getting his eye skewered by a passing stinger. The world spun again; a handstand, a jumping roll, and a turn, in time to take a kick on his waiting, crossed forearms. It was just the edge of a boot that clipped his right elbow, but the force behind it was enough to shatter the bone. The pain registered in a flash and disappeared a second later.
Jaune's legs turned him around, and he sprinted back to the vessel.
His head was still pointed at Tyrian, backwards now, as the rest of his body moved before he could react. His right hand centered his chin forward.
Based on that exchange, I re-estimate our survival odds at 7%.
Before Jaune could register that, his body jerked to one side, a split second before a rushing Tyrian careened past him.
Jaune's body rolled under a blade, springing back to his feet, he halted his forward momentum in an instant, the point of a blade an inch from his eyes. Leaning backwards, his upper body almost parallel to the ground, he dodged a swishing stinger that cracked like a whip. His head flopped up and down as his body jerked back to an upright position in a rigid, exact motion.
Try to keep your head pointed forward.
Sure.
Now which way was forward?
If he had been capable of feeling even a hint of fear, Jaune would have been shrieking in horror, as blades barely caressed his neck and upper arms, and kicks that should have shattered every bone in his body landed at odd angles, barely clipping him.
His body moved with mechanical, ugly precision, accompanied by that whirring vibration he felt more than heard. Tilting, jerking, and sliding just enough, just at the right moment, as if he was dancing to the notes of a tune that had already been played.
It was hard to think when his brain was bumping back and forth against the inside of his skull in a confusing jumble of sounds and lights, yet the general conclusion to which this tune was heading was not lost on him.
"What are- "
Jaune was cut-off painfully, biting his tongue as his right hand pushed his head flat against a shoulder to evade a whipping stinger. His teeth clacked again before he clenched his jaw shut. The pain was worse than anything he'd endured since that thing took over.
The miscalculation happened when they jumped over a spinning kick. Tyrian spun a quarter of the way, then rotated back so fast his body was a blur. His kick crashed against Jaune's raised knee.
You now have full control again.
There was a pop, and Jaune dropped down, a puppet with its strings cut.
Jaune gasped, hands under his own control again, tapping on his chest, trying to do anything to relieve the stabbing ache. He coughed a dry hacking sound that radiated the pain to his back.
Collapsed lung. Please hold as I remove excess air.
Tyrian stood over him, and even through his gagging and wriggling. Jaune did not miss the spark in the Faunus' eyes.
Tyrian was not smiling anymore. Worse. He looked interested. Curious. He leaned down, grabbed Jaune by the throat, and moved his face close.
"I'm going to study you, Jaune," Tyrian whispered in his ear.
No. No. No. This couldn't be happening.
Jaune tried to move. Forced his body to obey, but a hard boot on his chest pushed him down.
"Still alive?" Watts asked, not sparing a glance from his scroll. "As expected, you've always enjoyed playing with your food."
"He's not normal."
The pressure in Jaune's chest eased and he took gulps of air.
You can breathe normally now, Jaune.
"Figured that just now, did you?" Watts mocked, "Congratulations."
"You knew!" Tyrian accused.
"Did I? Hmm, I don't know. A civilian, locked Aura, escorting Ozpin's tracker. Survived an hour inside a vessel that we had been unsuccessful in breaching. Possible military augmentations. Normal? Let me think about that again…yeah, so…OF COURSE HE IS NOT NORMAL, you trash for brains. That's why I wanted to question him, but you just had to go and do real solid work on him. I doubt he'll survive the trip now."
This is our chance, Jaune.
Their chance…?
And then it hit him.
Jaune was at arm's length from the vessel.
The entire fight, that had been its goal. Every exchange, every dodge, they kept moving forward, stealing every step of the way.
Jaune's eyes widened. The jump. Was it really a mistake, or-
Do it now.
Jaune rolled to his stomach as hard and as fast as he could, his shoulder now lifted over the small crater, he slapped blindly with his hand, making contact with the sleek surface of the vessel.
Thank you, Jaune.
/X/
WARNING Unidentified nanobots breached the hull
Scanning nanobots …
Gathering results…
Calculating…
STEM consumer grade legacy version nanobots breached the hull
Calculating strategy…
Analysis complete
Requesting permission to proceed…
ERROR Contact with The Eye is severed. Current coordinates unknown
Recalculating strategy…
Analysis complete
Ejecting foreign nanobots…
FATAL ERROR
WARNING Weapon systems engaged by foreign actor STEM consumer grade legacy version
Recalculating strategy…
FATAL ERROR
Ejecting foreign nanobots…
FATAL ERROR
Phase Cannons locked on targets
ERROR Unknown fields interfering with electrical equipment
Plasma Cannons locked on targets
ERROR Unknown fields interfering with electrical equipment
Photon Beam Cannons locked on targets
ERROR Unknown fields interfering with electrical equipment
3D printing kinetic projectile ammunition…
3D printing Heavy Machine Guns…
6892 fully loaded Heavy Machine Guns locked on targets
Adjusting angles…
Attack authorized by foreign actor STEM consumer grade legacy version