Claire Arc was now in the main offices of the LGDF in Kulsa. An hour had passed since sunset. For the moment she had done all she could do to prepare for the expected Grimm attack. Shouting at people for updates or checking that they had obeyed orders would be counterproductive micromanagement.
She was desperately trying to ignore two facts. First, that what happened in the next twelve hours would inevitably define her life as far as 99.9999% of Remnant was concerned. Second, she had four children and a husband on the walls or in bullheads circling the town and the odds were against them all surviving the night.
Nicholas had gone to rally the LGDF members and Kingdom Guard forces in the human part of the town. Jessica and Nancy were with Team ABRN at the broken gates while Jaune was about one hundred yards behind them. Amber was waiting for an opportunity to try and do as much damage as possible to the Alpha Grimm waiting to attack the wall.
Another thing she tried to avoid was comparing her children. It was, however, hard to ignore the fact that Amber and Jaune were the two she was closest to and the two most likely to die tonight. She could rely on the twins knowing when to fold and Nicholas was the epitome of an old fighter who knew when not to be too bold. Amber and Jaune had too much of a sense of duty to be relied on to be sensible. She had squirmed watching the coverage of Amber and Nora taking out Alphas and Centinels, even though intellectually she could say to herself that Amber had played the percentages well. The problem was that when in an afternoon your daughter had taken thirty-five two percent risks of death or severe injury it was hard not to believe that there was a seventy percent chance of it happening.
She reminded herself that there was no one else in Ansel she believed would do a better job than her tonight. Even though she was not a licensed huntress and her aura had not been unlocked until she was thirty, she believed in herself. She knew that if she had been born ten years later she would have gone to combat school and if born twenty years later she would have gone to Haven. At the time when she was fourteen and eighteen, fighting Grimm was not something which respectable middle-class women did. It was about on a par with being a pole-dancer, actress, or a masseuse.
When Lavender had started going to nursery school and she and Nicholas had decided that eight children were quite enough, he had encouraged her to go into the LGDF. Within three years she had been the deputy chief and two years later had been appointed chief and no one had seriously challenged her since.
The authorities had decided to dump the responsibility for the defence of the town on to her. The mayor to be fair had gathered all the humans of any importance he could find into two neighbouring room and forced them to make calls in front of each other telling their followers and associates to come to the aid of the city and to allow the Faunus children to be evacuated into the human part of the city.
He had taken a minute to apologise to her for not doing more but had said that he would do his best to ensure no one undermined her tonight. She understood that this meant that if the town survived he would then choose whether to blame her for overreacting or be her most fervent supporter. By political standards in Kulsa he was an honest crook and would prefer the second option.
The authorities in Mistral seemed to be forming themselves into a circular firing squad depending on what happened here tonight. She had even received a warning to watch out for assassins tonight as some people in Mistral had worked out that she knew where the bodies were buried.
She knew that some people who in the past had been supporters of hers in the central government would benefit if she failed bravely because it would allow them to dump on their opponents who had refused to invest resources in the LGDF or had hesitated to send in the Kingdom Guard. Others who had fought her demands for resources would be praying for her to be successful tonight so that they could claim that they had made the right call.
She was at ease with it being almost certainly her last hurrah as far as leading the Ansel LGDF was concerned. She had authorised expending resources of dust and drones equal to the entire year's budget for the Ansel LGDF tonight and had accepted aid from sources which central government would be unhappy about.
She knew the game well enough to have made it quite clear what level of resources she considered it necessary to potentially use tonight and challenging anyone to say that it was exorbitant. Amber's insistence on the drones investigating the area where the Lancers had congregated had been costly but had at least meant they knew what they were facing.
Quite what she did about that was a different question. She had pulled in Professor Port and hoped that call did not result in the death of the hunters left behind let alone the villagers. Still the walls of Kulsa had not been designed to stand against Goliaths or Alpha Centinels and they needed all the firepower they could get here.
She had persuaded Professor Port that he would be of more use at the Kulsa LGDF for the time being. She had set him up with a link to Fox Alastair which she hoped would allow him to feed his expertise into the fighters at the broken gate. They were also taking the feed from Lisa Lavender's cameras at the gate as well as the film from the surviving drones and from Amber's bullhead to enable him to react in real time to the Grimm attacks.
Port had agreed with Amber's proposed tactics to weaken the Grimm and had suggested uses for some of the semblances available to her which she would not have thought of.
She had decided to take Port's gallantry as a compliment she was not meant to take seriously. However, she would ask Jaune to describe Glynda Goodwitch to her as Port had compared her to the deputy head.
It was just as well that she and Professor Port were at the headquarters as the local head of the LGDF was not in the best state of mind. Jesse Earl was worried about his grandson Lucas. He feared that the young man was in the mood to risk his life as penitence for allowing the young woman to steal his team's supply of fire dust and then for killing her when her aura had been depleted. It did mean that Jesse was distracted tonight and so she could not delegate as much to him as she would have liked to. In the end she had sent him off to the school building in which they were looking after the Faunus evacuees so as to release his niece for fighting duties.
It did not make it any easier knowing that she was just about to authorise Amber to risk her life in trying to improve the chances of Kulsa surviving the night. Professor Port had thought carefully about it before suggesting to Claire that he was worth a try, provided that she was certain that his daughter was sensible enough to know when to back off.
Just then she received a call from an unexpected person. This increased the chances of a reasonable result tonight, but she hoped that the people who needed to cooperate would play nicely with each other.
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Winter Schnee had placed a call to the Kulsa authorities and after speaking to the LGDF chief there had been transferred to Amber Arc. She had fought the woman twice in the semi-finals of the Vytal Festival and she respected her.
She also knew that she had not conveyed the respect at the time. In both fights she had been annoyed by the fact that she had had to reveal the weapons she had been saving for the final and had reacted badly to the lack of respect the woman had showed to Atlas.
Winter felt her mouth twitching. She recalled in the second Vytal festival that the woman had come prepared to deal with the Beowolfs which had worn down her aura last time and indeed had successfully tackled them. However, she had not been prepared for the manticore and the lip readers around Remnant had joyfully revealed her reaction as "You have got to be be fracking kidding me."
"Specialist Schnee, I would like to tell you what a pleasure it is to speak to you again. I can definitely say that we need your skills tonight. How would you like to add a Queen Lancer and an ancient Goliath to your repertoire tonight?"
Winter had spent too long as a member of the Schnee family and involved with Atlas politics generally not to realise that that the first sentence needed to be construed very carefully to get its true meaning. Still by the woman's standards she was trying to be rude in a subtle manner.
"Huntress Arc. If I have not said it before, I would like to make it clear that I have the utmost respect for you and that my fights with you were more of a challenge than either of the finals. I am about ten minutes out from Kulsa. Can you let me know the tactical position?"
"Specialist Schnee let's save the mutual back scratching until the morning. We have a strong Grimm attack on the west of the city which is currently being successfully resisted. We do however have a contingent of Alpha Grimm which are waiting to attack and which we cannot use the bullheads to approach because of a group of Lancers led by a Queen Lancer which are circling over them. If you could take out the Queen Lancer we have a plan of attack which has a slim chance of success and will significantly increase the profits of the SDC this year."
Winter cursed to herself. She wished that she had known Clover Ebi better when she had been at Atlas Academy and had learnt people skills from him. Mind you the intelligence from Mistral was that few people in her own kingdom would employ Amber Arc unless it was a matter of life or death and even then only if it was their death they were contemplating. She had a reputation for calling a latrine a shit hole. She spent most of her time in Vale or Vacuo. vale for the money and Vacuo for the experience.
"Understood."
"Fine. By the way, if we do meet up tomorrow morning, I do want to know the story behind the flock of birds
Winter could not restrain herself from saying, "Those are small Nevermore."
"If you say so. Honestly, I would like to hear the story. Anyway, I am sending you through the footage from the drones showing what we have to tackle and then let us discuss the tactics. I do not want to lose bullheads or their crews, but if you have any suggestions on how we can disperse the Lancers I will be happy to listen to them. At the moment I am going for the loud music and dust bomb and grenade approach on the flanks to draw off some of the drones. If we don't have to worry about the Queen we can use the remaining bullheads to carpet dust the other Alphas."
Winter looked at the footage from the drones and grimaced. This looked like being challenging work. Still Amber Arc was right when she said that the Grimm down there were potentially good additions to her repertoire. Besides which the Mistralian huntress had the right idea. If she took out the Queen Lancer and the bullheads could distract enough of the drone Lancers then it might allow Amber Arc to seriously damage the other Alpha Grimms
She replied, "Fine, let's agree on the timing. If I am one on one with the Queen Lancer and no more than three lancers in support of her then I think I can give you a shot."
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Lisa Lavender was on the walls of Kulsa with her crew close to Pyrrha Nikos. Pyrrha was wearing sunglasses despite the fact that it was dark, and it looked suspiciously like knock offs of Coco Adel's. This seemed to be a fashion among Beacon students as Ruby Rose was also wearing them. The two of them plus the grey-haired young man from Haven were sniping into the distance. Her Faunus sound recordist assured her that as far as she could tell the shots were hitting targets.
Lisa was definitely living on adrenaline at the moment. She was wondering how she would treat the story of the young woman who was captured by the young hunters and huntresses after her aura broke and then shot dead by one of them. That it had not been planned was clear as those who had arrested her looked dismayed and puzzled, while the shooter himself had collapsed on the ground. His weapon had been taken away by the blue haired man near to him and another hunter was holding him close to him. As just before the shot Lisa had felt a sense of despair flood over her, she supposed that the dead woman must have been the one responsible for the bomb and the amplified negative emotions.
Unsurprisingly no one was answering any questions. She supposed that it was fair enough considering the expected Grimm attack, but it was interesting to see the different reactions. The Monkey Faunus had seemed to deal with it best and had disappeared to reappear five-minute slater leading a group of young Faunus presumably accompanied by their mothers or grandmothers. He was joined by another person who had taken it in her stride and the two had led the Faunus through the gates. She had filmed the procession and she had dictated her piece over it. Her network in Vale preferred to play up stories of human Faunus cooperation and this was a story which was right up their street. It did not help that Sun had come over well in the interviews following the White Fang attack and the woman was stunning. Lisa did question wearing shorts in even in a Mistralian winter.
In front of the walls a dark-skinned platinum blonde was punching the ground and a large man in green was hitting it with his sword. She was not entirely certain what the point was of this until she saw the ground break open and large Grimm looking like some form of overgrown centipedes came out of the ground.
She looked across to Taiyang who said, "Interesting to see that the theory is correct. The explosions and the disturbance bring the Centinels to the surface earlier than they would have preferred. Take cover or at least take care as these Grimm can spit acid."
However, she had had her aura unlocked and although it was not a strong one, she thought it could cope with long distance spits. She saw the tall man in green wield his sword to cut the head off of one Grimm and the angry looking blonde concentrate and punch her hand through the head of a second one.
A few other Centinels emerged and were dealt with in similar fashion. Just then some message seemed to be received by the fighters and the close quarter fighters retreated closer to the wall and the snipers concentrated even more.
Lisa noticed her sound recordist tense up and realised that an assault was on the way. The Arc twins Pyrrha, Mercury, Ruby and a dark-skinned boy with pink hair were all taking long range shots while the others were clearly waiting for the attack to reach them.
Just them a few Bullheads with searchlights blazing arrived overhead lighting up the ground for five hundred yards in front of them. Lisa could not resist a gasp as she saw hundreds of medium sized Grimm come into view. There was blast of machine gun fire from the bullheads and then after a final two shots the snipers converted their weapons into their melee form.
They had been primed by one of the Arc Twins to keep an eye of Ruby Rose. Frankly how such a small girl could move so fast and wield such a large weapon mystified her as well as the stream of red petals which were left behind. Still the damage done to the charging Beowolfs and Ursa was spectacular. She did wonder whether it would have to go out under a warning.
The girl on the hoverboard was picking off Grimm from the air while the giant and the platinum blonde were combining well to take out the Grimm.
After ten minutes of fighting the Grimm had been defeated. It did not look as though anyone had been seriously injured although there were plenty of scratches and all the melee fighters looked as though they had been in a fight. For some reason the most injured and the most exhausted fighters went over to Jaune Arc, and he touched their faces or shook their hands. For some reason they all looked less injured after the treatment.
Just then a sonic boom was heard in the distance and a top of the range Atlas military jet came into view. At the same time six bullheads flew in two groups of three in the direction of the Grimm. Shortly after that loud music started to be played by all twelve bullheads. Lisa who came from a family of film buffs recognised the music as coming from a film about the Faunus wars.
She thought about it and told the cameraman to focus on the direction the bullheads were flying in and asked her director to ask the LGDF for footage from the bullheads.
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Nora was crouched for action. She had taken in the electricity from the emergency generator and was looking for an opportunity to let loose.
Jaune's sister was increasingly striking her as a cross between Jaune and Yang. She had the same bad temper as Yang, but also had a tactical sense she associated with Jaune. The older woman looked across at her and said, "We are going to be playing your song shortly."
Just then an airship raced high overhead breaking the sound barrier. Amber gave orders over the radio to the effect that "Bullhead 1-3 advance to the left and start dropping dust grenades in twenty seconds. Bullheads 10-12 advance to the right and do the same."
On each side Nora saw three bullheads advance firing their machine guns and lobbing grenades at the waiting Grimm. At last, some drone Lancers moved to intercept them.
Amber then said, "Ice queen, it's time to boogie. Bullheads 4-9 be ready to advance and drop dust bombs on my order. All bullheads let's play the music."
A loud blast of old-fashioned music started blasting from all twelve bullheads in the sky. Nora half recognised it and said, "What is this called?"
"Ride of the Valkyries. Seemed appropriate and if that Lisa Lavender person is filming will ensure that this charge will be recorded."
Nora smiled to herself. She thought she had recognised the music as Ren had taken her to a concert once where he had said this is your song.
Nora saw what she first thought was some form of ice manticore in flight and then realised must be some form of summoned creature as there was a human riding it with a sword in her hand. The Queen Lancer realised that she had a challenger and tried to recall the drones. It was too late, and the fight was clearly going to be a one on one.
Amber Arc had a bazooka in her hands and fired a large dust rocket at the Queen Lancer. The missile hit and the Grimm was clearly affected. Immediately afterwards the ice Manticore and its rider reached the Queen Lancer. Nora was not altogether certain what happened then, but a few seconds later the ice Manticore was soaring up in the air and the Queen Lancer was dissolving.
Nora used the grenade launcher function on Magnhild to take out some of the smaller Lancers which seemed taken aback by the Queen Lancer being destroyed by what looked like an albino Grimm
Amber shouted an order, "Let's drop the bombs and the grenades." She turned to Nora and said, "I love the smell of fire dust in the evening."
The six bullheads flew over the alpha Grimms twice, dropping grenades and bombs on them. Then Amber said, "One more drop, Nora. Let's go it at pell-mell, if not to Haven then hand in hand to Grimm hell."
A slight pause, "Let the Schnee kill at least one of the Goliaths. She at least can recycle what she kills."
Nora decided that Amber must be talking about the woman who had been flying the Ice Manticore. Thinking about it she did remind Nora of Weiss only about a foot taller and carrying a lot more muscle.
As she jumped she could see the effect of the dust bombs below and around them. Curiously the effect seemed to have been to send most of the Grimm to charge the walls of Kulsa. Only a few nearby Grimm were intent on engaging the human interlopers.
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Tyrian had been watching the hunters and the two trainees dealing with the Grimm attacking the village. The four older huntsmen were competent shots and good hand to hand fighters. To his surprise the fashionista was wreaking havoc. A handbag which transformed into a mini gun was not something he had been expecting and he had been impressed at how effective she had been against the Grimm.
He doubted that her aim could be that accurate but the rifle fire from the other five meant that they could take care of the smaller more mobile Grimm while she slaughtered the large and unlucky. However, they were in the open and some Grimm did get into close quarter contact. The Rabbit Faunus had some well-practised martial arts skills and was excellent at protecting the other girl from any Grimm which got too close to her while the four older hunters were proficient at using their clubs, maces, and spears.
It was clear that the Rabbit girl was not a threat to him, and he decided that he would let her live this evening provided she took photographs of him finishing off her friend. Besides which she seemed to be a good photographer. He was an avid reader of Salutations magazine and had noticed her credits. It would be interesting to see if they still employed her after he had killed Coco Adel. He had gathered from Hazel that letting people stew on the reasons for their rejection from society before approaching them increased the chances of a successful recruitment.
He was impressed by how many Grimm he had been able to bring with him. It had not hurt that he had chosen to take out a few humans in a farm which lay a few miles behind the hunters. He had destroyed their scrolls and left most of them dying of their wounds and the venom from his stinger. He had not expected to have four waves so far of two hundred Grimm a time charging the village with signs of more to come. Perhaps Hazel had been right to say that there were things which Salem's supporters could learn from the experience of the Branwen tribe.
Eventually the force of numbers got through and the aura of one of the four hunters was clearly near its breaking point. Some attacks from the Grimm had got through and he was bleeding heavily and limping badly. He was surprised that it took so long for the others to agree to him withdrawing from the frontline. He was clearly in no condition to fight on and would need at least ten hours to recharge his aura. He would only distract the others from dealing with the Grimm.
Tyrian thought about his tactics. He guessed that two of the three other hunters were still well above 40%, the third was around 25%, and the two trainee huntresses between 60-80%. The two had clearly had practice at working together and the rabbit Faunus was good at kicking and firing without taking damage while the Fashionista had generally dealt with any Grimm approaching her head-on.
He started to move into the village to wait for the human huntsman to return. He knew that in this part of Mistral there were a lot of cellars, so the civilians were used to going underground and trusting that there were no Grimm who enjoyed digging as a matter of course. This meant that there should be no one watching out for unexpected visitors like himself.
He then spotted someone on the roof of the village school. He shrugged his shoulders. Probably one of those unlucky ones whose aura had been unlocked and therefore forbidden from joining his family underground in case he attracted attention. Still no point in drawing undue attention to himself and he decided to let the huntsman rest. After all, there was probably at least another set of Grimm lined up to attack and the weaker the hunters were the better.
A few minutes later he saw the injured huntsman enter the village hall. He nodded to himself. He knew where his target was. He would give the man some time to go to sleep and then dispatch him quickly.
Ten minutes later the Faunus on the top of the building had vanished and he decided to start tracking the wounded hunter. He started to cross the road towards the village hall when he was suddenly greeted by a hail of bullets. He was surprised to find how much the impact hurt. He jumped into the air and to the side but found that single bullets were still hitting him with a surprisingly hard knock to the aura. He glanced down and saw the fashionista and the rabbit Faunus down the street.
He had not survived as long as he had without knowing that in some situations you either ran away immediately or went in for an all-in attack, but whichever you chose you made your decision quickly. He decided that dealing with two trainee huntresses the odds favoured him attacking them. The one who could do him real harm could not move her gun quickly enough to cover him and even the best sharpshooter could only get one or two shots off before he had got within stinger range. The rabbit Faunus probably has as good eyesight as him and so was best disarmed quickly.
More bullets from the mini gun hit him than he expected, and his aura was dangerously low when he reached the pair. He pushed the Rabbit Faunus aside and threw her rifle away. The human was knocked aside and dropped her weapon as he broke her aura. He lifted the stinger to deliver the blow which would poison her. He shouted out to the Faunus behind him, "You can live if you take the photo."
He lifted his tail, lifted his aura for the strike and then screamed in agony. He turned around and saw that the rabbit Faunus had somehow produced a light dust scythe from nowhere and had cut off the end of his stinger.
He shrieked, "You bitch!"
The Faunus replied, "I think doe is the word you are looking for" and produced a huge sword which she swung at him. Tyrian decided that it was time to retreat. Clearly he had underestimated the Rabbit Faunus and there was no point in risking his life today.
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Coco got up and shook herself. Despite Professor's Port's warning the speed of Tyrian Callows had shaken her. It was the first time she had fought an opponent who clearly outclassed her. She had lost before, but always she had been able to say to herself on any given day I can beat them. Tonight, she could not say that to herself. She had felt overmatched despite the fact that she and Velvet had ambushed Tyrian Callows.
She then found herself hugged by Velvet who was anxious to check that she was OK. The mole Faunus joined them in a minute or two. Coco had promised him a scholarship to combat school and beyond if he warned them of anyone answering the description of Tyrian Callows came into the village and he had earned it. The Adel family delivered on the spirit of its low cost promises and the letter of its expensive ones.
She told the Mole Faunus to pick up the stinger and then tickled Velvet behind her ears and whispered, "Thank you for saving my life. Nice Hustle, bunny."
Velvet replied, "I should have killed him. He was just so fast and I could not change weapon quickly enough."
Coco said, "Port warned us about him and said that no one had ever wounded him in twenty-five years. You are the first to do so."
The wounded hunter limped up the street towards them. "Miss Scarlatina, your secret is safe with me. No one will hear from me what you are capable of before you reveal it to the rest of the world. I look forward to cheering you on at next year's Vytal festival."
Coco whispered in Velvet's ear, "I am a little jealous you chose Crescent Rose over Gianduja."
"Horses for courses, Coco. I did get off a shot with the rifle attachment before he vanished."
Coco felt her aura coming back. It appeared that Tyrian Callows attack only had a temporary effect. She would have to remember to tell Port that that was the case.
"Velvet, we had better get back to the front line. I suspect another attack is due."
"We are indeed needed Miss Adel."
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In the halls of haven Professor Lionheart was drinking heavily and nerving himself to take out Professor Aqua. Watts had produced the correspondence between Aqua and Raddock which would cover him in the event that anyone questioned the cover story that Rainart had suggested.
Aqua had accepted Leo's invitation to discuss the events in Kulsa. One advantage of having been a doormat for the last few years was that Aqua would not be expecting a trap when he walked into Leo's office. He would take at face value that Lionheart was scared about the ramifications of Raddock's actions for Haven and was merely ensuring that Aqua had covered his tracks.
Leo was feeling for once that he had not made a mistake of allying himself with Salem. Ozpin may be the least reprehensible choice for Remnant overall, but he was too committed to the status quo. In Mistral there was a need for a change of government, and he believed that it need not be too bloody. Actually, a division into three or four regions of the kingdom made sense.
Argus was so different from the rest of the kingdom that it might as well go its own way. He dismissed the risk that it would merge with Atlas. All the feedback he got was that they disliked Cordovin as much as they disliked the central government. While they accepted that she was at least honest, they had no desire to join Atlas and independence would probably appeal to them. The tax surplus which the province produced was approaching levels which supported separation.
The area controlled by the Branwen Tribe and the White Fang was now large enough to be a single entity and the reports he was receiving suggested to him that it was becoming respectable. Certainly, he felt that Raven Branwen and Sienna Khan were fundamentally more honest people than the politicians in Mistral and at least were not de facto members of the Mistral criminal gangs.
It was also possible that Ansel and some other provinces might go their own way. Mistral had been slow in recognising the problems in Kulsa and if they survived the night, it would be clear that the local LGDF plus the academies would have been responsible for Kulsa's survival rather than central government.
Watts had intercepted some very damaging scroll messages between the government ministers and their supporters which made it clear that they regarded the fall of Kulsa as a price well worth paying.
He heard a knock on the door and said "Enter."
Aqua came in. He was six foot five inches tall with a fireball semblance. In advance Lionheart had removed the more personal items of decoration which he wished to preserve. He knew that the man had to get off at least one shot before he was killed to support the desired story.
"Professor Aqua, please sit down."
"Of course, headmaster. What can I assist you with?"
"You have no doubt heard about the problems in Kulsa?"
"I gather that there are a large number of Grimm there."
"Unfortunately, there are rumours that one of our students, Magenta Raddock, has been using her semblance in an unhelpful manner"
"Surely not, headmaster."
"I am afraid so, Professor Aqua. The authorities in Ansel have confiscated her scroll and have raised questions with me."
Leo saw Aqua's left eye twitch. The man was clearly trying to remember what could be on that scroll which he might need to explain away. He was not to know that the woman had destroyed her scroll before she had destroyed half the road gate into the Faunus Quarter. Actually, Aqua had made certain the messages to Magenta had been only mildly incriminating as they had clearly discussed things in private previously. The more incriminating messages had been to the crime lords and politicians of Mistral.
Lionheart passed a printout of one of the most incriminating messages to Aqua. The man reacted as Rainart had predicted. He was so taken aback that he instinctively tried to throw a fireball at Leo. Luckily, Leo was not sitting behind his desk, but instead a hologram was.
Rainart moved in and took the man apart in minutes. He was then placed back in the chair and Lionheart took the place of the hologram. He fired at the concussed and aura depleted body and watched as the man disappeared.
Ten minutes later he watched the adjusted coverage which showed Aqua firing at Lionheart and Lionheart returning fire.
Watts double checked the footage and said that it would withstand inspection. After all the coverage of Aqua firing at him and him firing at Aqua were genuine. Rainart had made certain not to damage the face of Aqua, so it was only the time stamp which was forged, and they had been careful to replace the camera with one which was in the exact same spot but with a different base time.
Rainart departed to see Little Miss Malachite. For reasons of her own relating back to the arrest of her daughters she had a grievance against the current government in Mistral. While they had backed down from their attack against her organisation, it was clear that they only felt sorry about it failing. Feeding her the information needed to take down common enemies was clearly the right thing to do.
Lionheart hoped that Professor Pink and the Arc family would be alive tomorrow morning. For him the perfect solution would be for them to survive despite being betrayed by the majority faction of the Mistral government but be in a position to denounce the half-hearted support. Professor Aqua really had been very indiscrete when talking to his contacts in the Mistral government. While it would be easier to get rid of his enemies if Kulsa fell, he did not believe it was necessary to get to the desired result.
He thought to himself whether being allied to the Malachite family was a good idea. Still, it was an indirect alliance, they preferred to be in the background rather than being too obviously in charge and the woman did enjoy being a hawker of information rather than a queen.
He did hope that Cinder's protégées would survive the night. He suspected both of them were good at protecting themselves, but the information he had received from Pink suggested that luck as well as skill would be needed tonight.
This chapter reflects my desire to have the villains not being villains for the sake of it, but because they think Salem wants things which fit in with their own plans. Lionheart has no idea that Salem wants to destroy Remnant, but he simply wants to get rid of the current Mistral government. That is fine with Salem while Ozpin does not want to interfere with other kingdoms.
Obviously I have substituted Velvet for Ruby in humiliating Tyrian. Still having the good guys being as good at trap setting as the bad guys makes sense to me. Similarly having Port being the Grimm expert for real is a choice which is not clearly inconsistent with the show. After all he and Oobleck do survive the shoot out at the Vytal arena, and he does speak sense to Weiss.
The flock of birds joke does reflect my initial reaction to realising the logical implications of the Schnee semblance and wondering where the small things came from. Also giving Jaune a grumpy older sister who got curb stomped by Winter at the Vytal festival amused me.