For those who have not read my other stories Team LLAC are an OC team who were originally designed to allow me to explore some of the underdeveloped themes of the show and to bounce off a more nuanced version of team CRDL without taking the main characters too far OOC.
Pyrrha wondered what she had let herself in for. She had enjoyed fighting the Grimm and defending the convoy while Lisa Lavender had been thoroughly professional and so dealing with her had been as pleasant as any media dealing could be. The airport situation had required a little bit of improvisation, but she had good reasons for cutting her time there short which only the most unreasonable of her fans would not accept were valid.
However, she was now about to get involved in politics which was something he had tried to avoid. At age fourteen it had been easy to say, "I do not know enough about this subject to make any sensible comment." but she was now nineteen and could not get away with such claims to innocence.
On the plus side, she knew what the right result would be. Her job was to protect civilians from the Grimm, and it did not matter whether the civilians were human of Faunus.
She also believed that Faunus should be treated fairly. Four years ago, it had been more out of a sense of noblesse oblige and that Faunus were sort of younger siblings. Her time at Beacon had confirmed her growing suspicions that the differences did not justify any assumption of superiority.
Blake was at least as intelligent as anyone else in their year and her and Weiss's discussions surrounding Dr Oobleck's history and politics lessons had certainly expanded Pyrrha's awareness.
Team JNPR's only loss last term had been to a half Faunus team with the main damage caused by the telekinesis semblance of Anne, a pig Faunus, and the strategy devised by Leslie, the Lynx Faunus. Amusingly the muscle which had created the debris which had allowed the telekinesis semblance to take out her team was down to Lydia, an upper middle-class human. She had been amused by the reversal of the stereotypes although she and Jaune had spent hours on planning how to ensure that the team LLAC strategy would not work again.
She smiled to herself. She had wanted a challenge and to prove that her skills had a real-world application and that she was not just a combat arena bully. Today taking out the Alpha Ursa before she had even landed had been incredibly satisfying.
However, after a term of listening to Dr Oobleck, she suspected Jaune's father was correct in saying that helping persuade the mayor to call and enforce a curfew in the area next to the Faunus quarter was the most valuable service she could provide today. Nicholas Arc seemed to think that her mere presence in the room would suffice. She thought he was being too optimistic and that she would have to be more persuasive. She just did not know how she could push the man to do the right thing and there was only thirty minutes before the meeting.
She decided that she would play it by ear when she arrived. She had not met the mayor, but she had met government people and sponsors in the past. However, she had relied on agents and her mother to push back on demands as she found it hard to say no to requests which were not obviously wholly unreasonable. Jaune had said that the mayor had been to combat school and had an unlocked aura but had not gone to Haven. He was of an age where that did not necessarily mean that he lacked the ability but who could know for certain.
Nora, Coco, and team RWBY had made fun of her last term for instinctively apologising for existing. Unfortunately, that was part of her character and again at age 14 been a gracious and humble winner had met with the approval of her family, sponsors, and the public. She realised that now she was older, it actually wound people up more than Yang's exaggerated dance of victory when she beat someone or Cardin's fist pumps after bludgeoning an opponent to defeat. Cardin and Yang's reaction meant that the victory meant something to them, and Cardin had learnt how to celebrate without taunting his defeated opponent.
Anyway, the die was cast, and they would soon be on the way to the mayor's office. She squeezed Jaune's hand for reassurance and for once he squeezed back.
They both let go as they saw Lisa Lavender and her crew leaving the LGDF headquarters, "See you two later," said Lisa. "We are off to interview Sun and Neptune." She nodded at the journalist and retreated into her thoughts.
Another problem of being Pyrrha Nikos was working out who she could safely talk about boys with. She realised that talking to Nora about these issues risking setting off a landmine as the talk about her and Ren being together but not together/together begged so many questions.
She had enjoyed being able to speak to Weiss and Coco about the problems of being wealthy and being in the public eye. However, neither were good candidates to speak to about relationships.
She had decided against talking to Coco not because Coco preferred women but because she knew Coco's advice would be if you can't be good, be careful and to watch out for people who wanted the image and not the person. She suspected that Coco would also be astute enough to work out that she was not talking about relationships in general but about Jaune in particular. Besides which she had heard other second years talking about how Coco seemed to have taken a vow of celibacy this year.
Weiss was irritated by Jaune's persistence and clearly suspected anyone who claimed to be interested in her was really interested in the Schnee money. Pyrrha had read enough of the scandal mags to realise that Weiss had reason to think that her father had married her mother for the business rather than love. Therefore, she thought that any man who approached her was a wannabe Jacques and had no hesitation in saying that anyone who approached Pyrrha had similar thoughts. Oddly, Weiss did not think Jaune was a gold digger but was simply deluded.
Speaking to Ruby about such matters did not seem appropriate. She was two years younger than her and was also clearly more focused on weapons and living up to her mother's reputation. Besides which Ruby clearly liked Jaune as a friend and forcing her to think about whether she liked Jaune as anything more would be unfair. As it was, it had taken an excess of peer group pressure to convince Yang that making jokes about Ruby enjoying playing with Jaune's weapon crossed the boundary from teasing banter into cruelty.
She had thought about approaching Yang but had realised that she was almost as scared of relationships as Pyrrha was. She talked a good game and flirted outrageously, but in the end the man she ended up dancing with at the end of the evening was Russel Thrush. Russel and Yang were good friends but neither of them seemed inclined to push it further.
That left Blake, Anne, Ren, and Lydia as possible sounding boards. Blake was not someone who talked about personal matter and after realising that Blake's surname was Belladonna rather than Nightshade, Pyrrha understood why. What little she had said suggested that her previous experiences with men had not been good.
Anne was someone who never talked about her past although she sometimes tensed up when she heard even a mild Mistralian accent which she did not recognise. Besides which it was almost as obvious as Nora's attraction to Ren that Brede enjoyed Anne's company and his reaction at the end of the fight at Junior's to the sight of a blood-stained Anne (none of which was her own) removed most of Pyrrha's residual doubt. Considering the Campion family had thought Lydia was unacceptably bourgeois the idea of him consorting with a poor Faunus risked causing a major diplomatic incident. Pyrrha did not know whether Anne realised it at all or whether like Ren she was trying to deny it to herself. Anyway, another person with whom it would be self-indulgent to discuss relationships.
Ren was someone who could be talked to on most matters, but she was certain his advice would be to remain good friends. Besides which if she and Jaune made a go of things it would make it difficult for Ren to ignore Nora.
That left Lydia. Unfortunately, she had been the other person Jaune had pursued last term, albeit only when Jaune was inebriated. Unlike Weiss, Lydia had been amused by the attention and had tried to deal with him without hurting his feelings.
Despite this she had been the most useful person to speak to, albeit indirectly. She had reported back on Leslie's briefing after one of the leadership training sessions at the start of term when he had told his team about the warnings on the dangers of team relationships. Jaune had neglected to pass on this advice although she could understand why.
At a girl's evening with Nora, Yang and Pyrrha when they had been planning their next few karaoke evenings she had responded to Yang's provocations by saying that for the time being at least she was focused on becoming a huntress and that relationships would only get in the way.
Lydia had opined that Jaune only repeated propositioning her and Weiss because they were both guaranteed to say no. She added that she also thought Jaune only spoke to her when he was drunk because he was a little frightened of her. Lydia had said that she thought Jaune was fundamentally a good person, and the ladies' man spiel was clearly nonsense. This at least reassured Pyrrha that she was not totally insane at being attracted to the man.
What now made more sense was the tall blonde's amused riff on Jaune's courtship technique. "Fair enough, at least he is not handsy. However, why on Remnant he thought that telling me I reminded him of his mother was likely to make me more receptive mystifies me. Sorry, should not have said that. At least he does not compare me to his sisters."
Having seen Chief Arc in action last night and this morning, she saw the similarities. A steely determination to do the right thing combined with enough charm to ensure people did not mind being bullied into doing things.
She also thought she saw why Jaune had defaulted to treating her and Yang as friends. Pyrrha realised that there was part of her which wanted to be like Amber Arc who had been one of her favourite huntresses when growing up. Indeed, her mother and agents had had to fight hard to persuade her that she should keep the impersonation down to the ruthless fighting style and not her public persona.
The little she had seen of the twins had fitted in with Jaune's stories and the sense that they had a similar sense of humour to Yang, albeit with their actions being consistent with their words.
She then paused. Her ruminations about her non-existent love life had suggested a route forward with the mayor. She just had to channel her inner Amber Arc.
Just then the signal was given that it was time to go to see the mayor. Nicholas Arc looked serious and stressed and Pyrrha wondered what had happened in the last half hour.
She, Jaune, Nicholas Arc, Jesse Earl and Marian Ultramarine were ushered into the mayor's office. The mayor was a grey-haired man who was tired and looked even more stressed than Nicholas Arc. He did greet them all by name and as usual on such occasions a photographer was around to take a picture of him shaking Pyrrha's hand. He only had one aide with him and that one looked like a relative.
Marian Ultramarine took the lead. She was the senior member of the LGDF present and Pyrrha gathered that she and the mayor had long been sparring partners.
"Mayor Blanc, our latest reports are that Grimm are converging on the city from all sides including alphas and Beringel. Amber Arc and the licensed hunters are doing their best to take out those ones and the smaller ones which threaten the walls, but this is dangerous work and requires the bullhead pilots to land quickly when picking them up. I and Chief Arc are extremely concerned about the delays at the airport. The turnround for refuelling is taking double the time it should and the broken-down airship on the runway means that the larger airships can neither land nor take off. If that blockage lasts another two hours then the number of the Kingdom Guards we can fly in tonight will be severely restricted."
The mayor looked up and said, "I will do what I can. However, you know the realities here, Marian. I have persuaded Orville to call up the competent people he can trust and believe that we can reduce the turnaround times."
Pyrrha was stunned by this. The city was threatened by Grimm and the mayor was implying that people were deliberately sabotaging the efforts to defend the city.
"Thank you, but what about the broken-down aircraft."
"Unless one of the people you have brought in is an airship mechanic then my bet is that airship will miraculously repair itself just after it is too late to fly in the Kingdom Guard in sufficient numbers to make a difference. It will also be too late for the journalists and TV crews from Mistral City to arrive."
Nicholas said, "I hear what you say, and you are probably right. I will give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that you are not a party to the sabotage. However, that makes it even more crucial that you impose a curfew and call on the police to keep the area close to the Faunus quarter free of demonstrations."
"Chief of police Scarlet has advised me that in his view a curfew will cause more tension and stress than not calling one and that having that many police next to the Faunus quarter is unlikely to make the inhabitants feel any safer"
Jesse said, "Do you really want a massacre in Animal Town tonight? Because not imposing a curfew increases the chances of that happening. You know as well as I do that some of our fellow citizens are planning to stand on the human side of the walls and do their best to threaten and frighten the Faunus. They believe that they can attract the Grimm to attack the Faunus quarter."
"I have heard rumours to that effect. Sounds nonsense to me." The mayor, however, avoided eye-contact.
Nicholas said, "I and my family have been fighting Grimm for generations. We know better than you and police chief Scarlet about what attracts them."
The mayor looked up and said, "I hear what you say. I also know the people of this town better than you do. I am not going to give an order which be disobeyed by my people and the police. I am afraid that it is up to the LGDF to get us through the night without the city walls being breached."
Jesse said, "That is a failure of leadership. It is your job to persuade people to do the right thing."
"I would take that more seriously if you could keep your nephews under control. They may claim that they are being ironic, but you know what message driving around in a car called the General Lagune painted with a flag from the Faunus Wars gives to people round here."
The old man reddened, "Beau and Lucas are good lads."
"They are huntsmen in training who are immensely popular round here and a lot of people believe that they are harking back to the good old days. Unlike us, no one under forty has no memory of the Faunus Wars or the period before."
Marian intervened to stop Nicholas saying anything. "George, I know that your career has been based on saying things to get elected which allow you to be more moderate in practice. Do you really want to tarnish twenty years of public service with risking a slaughter of the Faunus?"
"I believe that the walls will hold and that the LGDF and the hunters here will deal with the Faunus capable of breaking them."
Nicholas growled, "You are asking my family and hunters to put their lives at risk to save your sorry ass."
"Nick, your wife sent you here because you understand emotionally how we think in a way she only gets intellectually. Do even you know how dreadful things have been here in the last four years and how angry and frightened people are? They want payback against the White Fang and if they can't get the White Fang any Faunus will do."
The mayor looked across at her and Jaune, "I do not know whether you realise how popular the scenes of you two fighting and defeating the White Fang in Vale were here? Bluntly the White Fang has killed and kidnapped with impunity here and crippled the local economy and we have not laid a finger on them. They even blew up an airship of special forces who had been sent in to tackle them."
Marian moved to intervene, but the mayor cut across her. "Fine, Marian. There is no evidence that any of the local Faunus assisted the White Fang just as there is no evidence that the plane stuck on the runway has been sabotaged by human supremacists. Facts aren't important here; it's what people believe they know that matters."
Jesse said, "I know about your nephew, George…"
"My nephew James was an asshole who worked for Atlas Gold and no doubt enjoyed tormenting the Faunus workers. Still his parents did not deserve to see their son after being thrown out of a bullhead and having the letters WF branded on his forehead."
He paused, "James is not the problem I have. The problem is that there are families in this city with their own James's who still tell stories about their relatives being honourable men who would never hurt or ill treat anyone. Those families have friends who see how much hurt is felt and that no recourse has been available."
Nicholas said, "Is there anything you can do to reduce the numbers on the street this evening and tonight?"
"I am open to suggestions. Jesse, if you could get your nephews to keep their friends away from the walls that would help. There are some influential people who want payback and for the Faunus to leave town but who might blanch at a massacre. I can call them and warn them of the consequences, but they may not be able to order their people or talk many of their friends into staying at home tonight."
He paused and then continued, "I can go on the local radio calling for calm and asking people to stay at home, but that may perversely be interpreted by some of my supporters as a veiled suggestion to get on the streets and riot. People hear want they want to hear and disregard the rest."
Marian said, "Chief Arc is prioritising the bullheads coming in from Ansel to deliver the Kingdom Guard and use them to garrison the walls separating the Faunus sector from the human sector. She is also ensuring that they are fuelled at Ansel to cover the round trip."
Pyrrha glanced at Jaune who was looking rather shellshocked at the cynicism expressed here and the fact that the LGDF representatives and his father accepted that the mayor had a valid point and were simply investigating how they could mitigate the issue.
She said, "What happens tomorrow, Mayor Blanc? What if the walls fall and the Grimm get in?"
"I am hoping that they do not, and the Kingdom Guard can come in and keep the peace."
"But what if they don't. They still teach us about the Kulsa massacre, do you really want another greater one on your watch?"
"Of course not, but it won't come to that." The man's eyes flickered. It was clear that he was uncertain about this.
Nicholas Arc nodded at her and said, "There is a TV crew from Vale in the city and currently they are next door at LGDF headquarters. Do you want footage of your people trying to incite a Grimm attack on the Faunus quarter played all over Remnant?"
The mayor blanched and said, "Chief Scarlet has the power to detain them for their own protection which I have no doubt he will use if he thinks about it. In the absence of footage people in Mistral will believe that the Faunus caused their own problems by their cowardice."
Pyrrha said, "I have spent the last four months in Vale. Lisa Lavender is one of the top journalists there and this will not go unnoticed."
"I have a choice of evils. Upsetting people in Vale is one of the lesser ones." The man looked uncomfortable.
He said, "Jesse, Marian, if you can convince me that there is a good chance of getting the citizens to behave tonight I will take it. My bet is still on the walls holding and people feeling ashamed tomorrow. You also know what will happen if I do declare a curfew and order the chief to lock up people who break it. Chief Scarlet will refuse to obey and will be elected mayor next year."
Another pause and he said, "I have kept a lid on this city for the last four years. If Mistral had supported the administration in Kurohari, I would have been able to continue to do so. What scares people now is that Raven Branwen will take over Kulsa next and put Sienna Khan in charge. Enough know what really happened in the Vacuoan mines to fear that even if she is not a monster the press tells us she is, she is entitled to feel that payback is justified. It is also one thing to acknowledge that Faunus are not that different from humans and another to have them running the city."
Jesse said, "But Mistral will not allow Kulsa to fall."
"People in Kurohari said the same thing two years ago."
Nicholas said, "The fact that my wife persuaded the authorities to send in the Kingdom Guard shows that Mistral does believe that Kulsa is worth saving."
"You and I believe that. We do not have time to convince everybody else. Most people think we in Kulsa are seen as blue-collar trash by the Mistral elite and are an embarrassment they could do without."
Pyrrha asked to be excused from the meeting and went to the toilet. She took a deep breath and decided on what her next step would be. She was betting on the mayor not being an evil man but simply a weak one or at any rate one not strong enough to deal with the present circumstances. She also had seen him looking at her with a mixture of hope and fear.
She swallowed hard and tried to remember Dr. Oobleck's lessons. She had to bet that the mayor wanted an excuse to do the right thing rather than just looking for a semi plausible reason to do nothing. She also needed to give him something which he could use to call the important people in Kulsa to use their influence. She opened up her scroll and called Lisa Lavender and then her mother.
She returned to the meeting which did not seem to have moved on. She apologised but said that she had had to call her mother. The mayor stared at her and shrugged.
She then said "Deputy Chief Ultramarine, should Jaune and I join Professor Pink in the Faunus quarter? I don't see that we are much use here and we can brief Professor Pink on the situation. Lisa Lavender also wants to interview me properly. By the way, Mayor Blanc my experience of government officials is that they are happier to help those who do not embarrass the government."
The mayor turned his head and stared at her, "This is a private meeting. Marian you will order them not to disclose anything which was said."
Nicholas coughed, "Strictly Miss Nikos is not under Marian's command. She is a volunteer rather than a reservist or a secondee from Beacon Academy. Still, I am certain that she will not take advantage of that technicality. Miss Nikos, do I gather the charming Miss Lavender is already in the Faunus Quarter?"
"Yes, she is interviewing Sun and Neptune. Do not worry Mayor Blanc, I will reassure her that you are planning to do all you can to reduce the risk for all your citizens. I think like too many journalists she wants to ask those embarrassing questions about risking your life for strangers against overwhelming odds. I of course will repeat what I have just told my mother that it is my duty to protect all the citizens of Kulsa no matter what the risk."
Jesse said, "Do take care my dear, it would be awfully bad news for Kulsa if you died defending the city against a Grimm attack especially if some of the citizens here decide to exacerbate the position. Do warn Miss Lavender that Chief Scarlet's practical powers do not extend to the Faunus quarter so she will be relying on the protection of Deputy Chief Cotton."
The mayor laughed. "Such selfless dedication to duty will allow me to make a few more calls to people of influence. I will have no objection to you telling Miss Lavender that you told me that declaring a curfew and leaving a one-hundred-yard evacuation zone on the human side of the wall with the Faunus sector were essential parts of the plan to defend Kulsa. I would suggest that you ask her to release the relevant extracts of the interview to the MBC ASAP and before any accidents happen to the local CCT masts. Marian, I would suggest that Chief Arc should also prioritise shipping out journalists."
Nicholas Arc said, "What protection can we give you on making this call?"
"Get these two into the Faunus sector and then pretend that you ambushed me. Jesse and Marian should be with me when I call Chief Scarlet. Farewell Miss Nikos and Mr Arc Jr and good luck."
As she, Nicholas and Jaune left the room Pyrrha asked Jesse Earl for a telephone number which he happily handed over. Nicholas then bundled her and Jaune into a large car in the town hall car park which took them to the Faunus quarter. He said, "I knew it was the right thing to bring you two to that meeting. Break someone else's leg tonight."
Jaune looked at her in the car and asked, "What just happened?"
"I just gave him the excuse to do the right thing and to blame it on me. He may be right that a significant number of people will disobey him but with luck we will have reduced the numbers making trouble tonight by half."
"But what did you say which changed his mind?"
"I gave him reasons to do the right thing. Actually, your father gave me the clues."
Jaune looked puzzled and then said, "Can I try and guess the reasoning and you tell me where I am wrong?"
"Of course, Jaune."
"He needed a reason to tell those who want revenge against the White Fang that trying to destroy the Faunus quarter only was not a game worth playing."
"Continue, Jaune."
"You told him that Lisa Lavender was outside of Chief Scarlet's ability to arrest so anything which happened tonight could not be kept secret."
"Good. What was the importance of letting him know that I had called my mother and volunteering the two of us to go the Faunus quarter?"
Jaune gulped, "That you believe that there was a real risk that you will die tonight and that his bet on the walls holding was placing too many eggs in one basket? How did you know he would realise that?"
"Dr. Oobleck would be pleased to see that his efforts have been worthwhile. Your father told is he had been to combat school and one of things which they teach us there is to call your loved ones before going into battle where you think that there is a risk of not surviving."
Jaune laughed, "Why did you saying that work and not what dad said?"
"If I or Amber die defending his town and he is shown to have ignored expert advice because local opinion would not let him, then he can plausibly warn the influential citizens that Kulsa will be toast as far as the rest of Mistral is concerned."
She paused, and then continued. "Unfortunately, even if he does call Chief Scarlet's bluff and call a curfew, we are going to face the risk of dying tonight. I suspect he was right when he described what the human population feels about the Faunus here."
I have now set myself up for a few action filled chapters which will be a challenge to write. I would be grateful for feedback as to whether having chapters written from a single viewpoint such as this one and the Mercury POV chapter work better than my more normal multi POV chapters.