Follow-up to last week's cliffhanger...

Without further ado...

Start Chapter 11

Jaune's grateful that his teammates visit the next morning, coming to check in on him, because it gives him an excuse to stay in his room, to just… try and focus on something that's not his soulmates impending execution.

Gods, even thinking about it has his hands shaking, his lip quivering.

He feels so helpless. So small and pathetic.

"Jauney?"

He looks up to see Nora leant over him, her hand outstretched towards him, but not touching him. Like she doesn't want to intrude, but still wants to be there for him.

He really doesn't deserve Nora; he can't help thinking. Nor Ren either, even if he and the other boy have been having differences recently.

"So, they're really…" Ren shakes his head. "It's… I'm sorry, Jaune. I don't know what to say."

He knows it must be hard for the boy to empathize with him in this scenario. If Jaune had been a different person, perhaps more vengeful, he might've taken his anger out on him, yelled, and screamed about how really, isn't this just what Ren wants?

But he doesn't. Because at the end of the day he can't blame Ren for his position. Not with everything Cinder's done.

Even if he knows now that he wouldn't turn on her, not with the things he's seen. Cinder's done what she's done not out of any real choice, but out of some faux necessity, and Jaune's fairly sure that if he'd been where she'd been… he'd have done the same.

Perhaps that makes him a bad person, but… he doesn't think so.

"How about we go and visit Pyrrha?" Nora suggests, turning to the both of them and searching for approval in their eyes. "After all, that'd give you a way to get out of this room!"

"Yeah, but… they'll probably have cameras, or listening devices or… or something set up in Pyrrha's room." Jaune says, shaking his head. "I want to, it's just…"

"You could call her scroll."

Jaune looks up, seeing Ren holding his own up. "She'd answer you, and it would make sense for her to not want to put her phone on speaker in the middle of a hospital room with other people."

It's… actually, it's a great idea. Nora nods her head as well, clearly in on it, and it only takes Jaune another thirty or so seconds to pull out his scroll, dial his partners number, and hear her voice ring out through his speaker.

"Hello?"

"Hey, Pyr." He says, his voice sounding weak even to him. "Uhm… there's sort of a…"

"A situation…"

He takes the next five or so minutes to explain current going's-on to his teammate and earns a series of shocked gasps and 'oh no's' for his trouble. By the end, Pyrrha at least understands their position, the way that the four of them have knowledge that they're most certainly not supposed to.

"So… what are you going to do, Jaune?" Pyrrha's voice comes through the scroll tinny and echoing.

"I don't… what can I do?" Jaune feels the need to say, because it's been a question in the back of his head ever since he's learned the truth. "What am I supposed to do?"

None of them say anything, though Nora places her hand on his shoulder, and pulls him close. Jaune can't help the way he leans into her, and wraps his arms around her waist, accepting the embrace.

It's warm and comforting, and he appreciates the girl now more than ever for her efforts.

"I… am perhaps not the best person to ask this question." Pyrrha speaks. "After all, the moment I was faced with a difficult decision myself, I threw myself at it and attempted to defeat it on my own. And you… remember how that ended up. But at the same time… I can't help thinking that… maybe that's what you should do?"

"Huh?" He says, even as he pulls himself out of Nora's hug. "Pyrrha, what do you mean?"

"You… care about Cinder, right?"

"Y-Yeah."

"Well… does anything else matter, then?"

"Huh?"

"I'm saying that… gah, I can't…" Pyrrha's voice suddenly grows frustrated. "I'm afraid that there may be prying ears, if you're catching my drift."

And Jaune gets it, just letting out a small sigh himself. "Yeah, I… understand."

"What I'm saying, without actually saying it, is… perhaps in this case, what you have to do isn't what should be done."

Jaune… he sort of gets what the girl's saying,

Jaune's eyes widen, even as he feels a tiny flame in his chest, one that's been building ever since last night, grow just a bit hotter, just a bit warmer.

"I… I think I understand, Pyrrha."

"Mm. I'm glad. I… don't do anything too reckless, but… at the same time… I'd understand if you did."

"I can't believe you're actually encouraging me here," Jaune laughs, rubbing the back of his neck. "You of all people. And here I was thinking I'd have to argue with you guys for hours to convince you."

"We're behind you, fearless leader." Nora says beside him, cracking a smile. "No matter what, we follow your calls."

"Well, not 'no matter what'," Ren says, before Nora glares his way, and he rolls his eyes. "We'll follow most of your calls."

Jaune can't help it, he just laughs, a free little laugh that has his shoulders shaking with mirth.

"Alright… Pyrrha. We'll talk to you later, ok?"

"Mm. I'll wait to hear from you."

She hangs up almost immediately, and Jaune leans back, letting out a breath that seems to go on forever, the entirety of his lungs pouring out.

"Well, then. I guess now we try and think up a–"

And then someone knocks on their door.

All three of their heads turn towards it, and Jaune immediately feels a chill run down his spine.

He's not sure who it is, technically. But… he's got a pretty good idea.

"Just a moment." Jaune calls out, standing up from the floor and padding his way towards the door with carefully calculated steps.

When he opens the door, it's to see a virtually indistinguishable man to the one he'd spoken with a few days ago. Another Atlas intelligence officer.

Now, the warm smile on the man's face causes Jaune's own smile to briefly falter, his skin to crawl, his hand on the doorknob to shake.

Jaune's been expecting this, really. Honestly, he'd been surprised it'd taken someone this long, what with Qrow busting his way in and destroying the cameras they'd been using to monitor him.

"Ah, hello." Jaune says, for lack of anything better to say.

"It's good to see you, Mr. Arc." The man says, somehow managing to sound completely genuine. "Ah, and your teammates are here as well. Wonderful. I understand that your final teammate is recovering well?"

"Yeah. She's doing better." He says, trying to read into the man's ever word, and, predictably, failing fairly miserably. "We were just talking with her, actually. It was good to hear from her."

"Mm. I imagine it must be, her having come so close to death as she did."

Jaune can hear Ren let out an angry breath behind him, though the man in front of him doesn't seem to catch it.

"Oh?" The man leans into the room, which immediately sets off little warning bells in Jaune's head. "My, oh my. What happened to your alarm clock?"

Jaune's muscles tense as he does his best to not react to that. Because isn't that just the question of the hour.

Immediately, he thinks up a suitable enough lie, and he realizes that he has to answer within a second, or else the man in front of him will grow far too suspicious, will perhaps suspect the truth of him.

But Jaune can't know the information the man is working with. Had the camera been something that had given them a live feed? Would they already know that it had been Qrow who'd broken it, and thusly are only testing his intentions based on his answer?

He mentally cuts himself off, realizing that such thought are pointless. Ultimately, he's working off of limited information. He can't possibly make the right choice. It's best, Jaune thinks, to lie, and hope that they too are working off limited information, than to tell the truth, and potentially rat out one of his only allies.

And only a few hours into this whole experience, Jaune understands that he's not entirely cut out for a life of espionage.

"Ah, Nora and Ren slept over last night, and Nora had a nightmare in the middle of the night. She thought an Ursa had broken into our room somehow and smashed the thing with her hammer." Jaune sighs, pretending to be put upon, and luckily for him, his teammate seems to get the memo.

"Hey, I said I was sorry, okay!?"

"You need to control your imagination, Nora," Ren sighs. "And you're paying Jaune back."

"What!? That Ursa should pay him!"

Jaune wonders how the man in front of him will react, whether or not he'll buy that excuse, though it seems he won't be getting an answer to that.

The man in front of him reveals nothing about his feelings, just laughs at their 'antics'.

"I see, I see. My, I remember my own academy days, those were certainly something." The man speaks, before reaching up and straightening his tie. "Well, we'll have another brought to your room."

"That's great, thank you." Jaune does his best to feign gratitude. "Uhm, if you don't mind me asking sir, why did you come by?"

He's pretty sure the man had come by to question him, to read into his intentions, but in case it's something else, well, he doesn't think it'd be terribly untoward a question to ask, and besides, he also doesn't much feel like having to deal with the man, either.

The faster he can be rid of the man, the faster that Jaune can go back to focusing on his conundrum.

"Ah, yes, forgive me, I got distracted." The man says, smiling in a disarming way, one that makes Jaune want to draw the phantom sword from his waist. Only he can't. Crocea Mors is placed against the back wall behind him.

"I was coming to let you know that we'll be moving Cinder to a more secure facility."

Jaune's blood chills in that moment, both from anger and surprise. At the very least, he doesn't have to disguise the latter, since the news should be a shock to him.

"Really? Is something happening?"

"Well, simply put, we're moving her so as to better contain her and the power she holds. We just wanted to let you know so that you got to say goodbye." The man says, somehow smiling while lying to Jaune's face. "After all, I understand the two of you are soulmates, no? I would certainly want to see mine own off, no matter what crimes she may've committed."

"Yeah." Jaune says, barely able to hold back the vitriol in his heart from showing on his face. "Thanks."

"Mm. I'll leave you all to it, then." The man says, nodding his head their way. "Have a good day, Mr. Arc. Team JNPR."

And then the man's gone. Jaune finds that he can't quite shut the door quickly enough.

His knuckles are white as he finally removes them from the doorknob, his jaw clenching rather painfully, even if he can't quite bring himself to stop.

"Jaune… are you okay?"

"I don't know." Jaune says, shaking his head. "I just… I just don't know."

The last thing Jaune's expecting is a second knock on the door he'd just turned his back upon.

Immediately, anger, fury, rage fill his veins, and he rounds back on the wooden construct, wrenching it open and meeting the infernal man on the other side with a very feigned smile.

"What do you–" He stops, his eyes widening slightly. "Wait… Qrow?"

The man gives a weak, lopsided grin. "Oh, uh… hey kid. Were you… expecting someone else?"

"I… Yeah. It's… complicated, I guess."

"I'm open to listening, if you want."

"…Yeah, sure. Come inside."

And so, the man does.

Honestly, Jaune isn't really sure why Qrow Branwen is being so kind to him. It isn't like he's a particularly important person, or someone who the man should have much of a connection with, but nevertheless, he listens to what Jaune has to say, to the circumstances of that damned bastard coming to see them, lying to his face about Cinder's fate…

Finally, Jaune has had enough. He decides to just ask.

"Why do you care, anyways?"

Both Ren and Nora go wide-eyed at that, though the man in front of him doesn't visibly react to Jaune's rather rude words. No, if anything, he seems almost amused.

"I mean… Cinder… she…" He can't bear to meet the man's eyes as he says what he does. "She killed Ozpin. She murdered so many people. She's… she's…"

"Ah, well… it's a bit complicated." Jaune's almost thankful when the man cut's him off. He doesn't think he'd have been able to say anything else. "I suppose for one, you're a friend of my niece, and that gets you in my good books automatically, but… more than that… You remind me a bit of myself, I guess."

Jaune looks up, in complete disbelief. "Really? Me?"

"Yeah." The man says, but there's a hint of melancholy hanging about his voice as he pats his knees and stands back up. "I'll… well, how about we take a walk? I'll tell you about it?"

"Uh… okay." Jaune says, standing up and turning back towards his teammates. "uhm… I'll see you guys in a bit, then."

"Yeah."

"Mm."

And then the two of them are off.

/

Some part of Jaune understands that the reason they're walking across the courtyards of Beacon is so that they're not overheard. So that no one can listen in. Even so, he finds himself gazing at the building that'd once been his home, that is still his place of residence.

He looks up at the great Grimm wyvern, frozen in place, deprived of color, atop the central tower.

"Not exactly the most elegant statue."

Jaune nods his head rather weakly, still not really sure why they're out here. Well, might as well ask. "So… why'd you wanna' come out here? Other than to avoid anyone listening in."

"Ah, yeah… right." Qrow sighs. "So, uh… you've got this look in your eye like you're gonna' do something stupid."

Immediately, Jaune tenses up, and he rounds on the man beside him with a bit of suspicion hanging about his frame.

"I don't have any idea what you're talking about."

"Yeah, kid, sure." Qrow says, shaking his head. "Listen… I'm probably not the best person to go giving you advice. Gods know I'm all kinds of fucked up in the head, but… I went through something you're going through now. Or, well, something you're hoping to avoid, I should say."

"What's…"

"The death of a soulmate."

Jaune's face goes white as a sheet, even as he's rooted to the spot, unable to keep himself moving. Qrow takes a few more steps, resting a meter or so ahead of him.

"I… is that why you called me… to… to prepare me for it…?" Jaune says, unable to look at the man. "Because if you expect me to just accept what's going to happen, then–"

"If you honestly think that's what I'm going to tell you, you're a bit dumber than I thought you were." Qrow says, turning his head to glance at Jaune from over his shoulder. "But I don't think that's it. You're lashing out. You're angry. I get it, trust me kid, I've been there."

Jaune's teeth clench together, even as he looks at the ground below him, his fists scrunching up into tight balls.

The sunlight just ahead is illuminating the both of them, painting them in the soft yellows and pinks of sunrise.

"So, what…?" Jaune says, feeling pathetic. "So… what do you want to tell me, then?"

"Hmm… A story, first. Then… advice."

"…Alright. Let's hear it."

"Okay… so…" Qrow begins, letting out an exhausted sigh. "A long ass time ago, I was a member of the Branwen tribe. It's… a bandit tribe, operating out of Mistral. Not exactly the best place to grow up."

Jaune doesn't say anything, just lets the man speak.

"Eventually, the higher-ups got the brilliant idea to train some of their ilk to kill Huntsman, just about the only people who could stop us. That was me and my sister. They sent us to Beacon, we made friends, I went native, my sister… sorta did, sorta didn't. Anyways, at the end of it all, I was… well, I was a different person than when I'd left."

Jaune nods, though he's admittedly a bit unsure how this ties into… anything.

"Well… kid… the odd thing is that I actually knew my soulmate pretty early on in my life. They, like me, were a member of the Branwen. They were… a complicated person, though I guess those in glass houses shouldn't throw stones, eh…?" His laughter is pained, rimmed with grief and longing. "I… when I went back… I only did so to tell them I was leaving the tribe… and to make it clear, you don't really get to leave the Branwen's, so to speak. Anyways… I tried to get them to come with me. Tried to get them to leave. And do you know what happened?"

Jaune has a guess. "They didn't listen?"

"Yeah. Worse than that, they screamed at me, and called me a liar, a traitor, a bastard… all sorts of things. And then they said they'd make it so the tribe would never let me go. That they'd hunt me to the ends of Remnant as a turncoat. And I… I told 'em good luck with that." Qrow's eyes betray the pain lurking inside of him. "Hah… good luck… from me. I was mad, but deep down, I thought… I think I thought they'd be better off alone, where my semblance couldn't affect them, and…" The man bites down on his bottom lip. "I should've… I should've gone back, or stopped, or tried to convince them further, but I didn't. I was mad, and upset, we both were, and…"

"…What happened?" Jaune says, despite knowing that this story can't have a happy ending.

"Well, to control the tribe's actions, they needed to be leader. Only way to do that is to challenge the current leader for control of the tribe. Challenges like that? In our tribe? They're to the death."

Jaune's eyes widen. "Then…"

Qrow just nods, ever-so-casually, and it's in that moment that Jaune understands the man's sorrow.

"Yep. They dueled the last tribe leader for control of the clan… and they lost. Old leader killed 'em, blade through the throat. Just like that."

Jaune has no idea what he's supposed to say, if he's even supposed to say anything. What can he possibly…

"I felt it happening, y'know?" Qrow keeps speaking, looking out over the edge of the courtyard, out unto the rebuilding Vale. "I tried to get back there, tried to move, but I… I didn't make it in time. I can still remember feeling my throat fill up with phantom blood, trying to breathe, and knowing that was them, and…" Qrow's eyes glaze over, and a few seconds go by before Jaune clears his throat, which is enough to snap the older man's mind out of whatever vision he'd been trapped within. "Thanks, kid. I… haven't thought about this in an awful long time."

Jaune just nods, but it's a wan, weak motion.

"Hah… it's almost funny. My sister… she became the tribe leader less than a month later. Killed the bastard in a real nasty way. I… we've never been very close, but she… made it slow. Made it hurt. I think… she was doing that for me." Qrow laughs somehow. "Course, with her, getting a straight answer is like pulling teeth, so…"

Jaune just… "…Why are you telling me this?"

Qrow sighs, before turning around, and looking Jaune in the eyes.

"…Don't end up like me, kid. Don't live with regret. If you have an idea, and I can tell that you do… do it. Even if it's stupid, even if it's… well, something Ironwood and the council, hell, the whole of Vale, would want your head for doing, if you think you should do it," Qrow states as he steps up to him, and stabs his finger right at Jaune's heart. "Then do it."

Jaune's… he's honestly just blown away. He doesn't know what to say once again, or if there's anything he really could say.

"…Thank you, Mr. Branwen."

"Just call me Qrow, kid. Branwen's an add-on I've never really liked." Qrow states, shooting him a roguish smile, even if it's bogged down by the weight of all his years. "Oh, and I never really told ya', but thanks. For being a friend to Ruby when she needed one. She talked about you sometimes. Said you were reliable."

"I…" He's blushing from the praise, but he's still able to smile up at the man. "Tell her thanks from me, for the exact same thing."

"Hah. A'ight kid. I will." Qrow states, even as he puts his hand on Jaune's shoulder, and then steps by him.

And then he pauses in place, the steadily rising sun illuminating his back, his hair and coat billowing in the wind.

"Oh, and…"

Jaune turns to look, and almost flinches away from the man, away from the raw seriousness hanging about Qrow's expression.

"The passcode for Cinder's door is 45171. But if anyone asks?"

Jaune's blood runs cold, even as he forces himself to swallow on the spittle hanging about the back of his throat, takes a deep breath, and then utters…

"I took a lucky guess."

"Heh…" Qrow chuckles under his breath. "Ruby was right…"

And then he's walking away. But not fast enough that Jaune can't catch the last words he speaks.

"Clever kid indeed."

End Chapter 11

Well then, we've got our plan.

Will it work? Eh. Who knows (I know).

Anyways, see you all next week!