Ascendancy: Phase Two - The Land of Wolves

by Titanmaster 117

(Dark RWBY fic. Minor and major character deaths) Three months have passed since the fall of Atlas, and Remnant is slowly beginning to rebuild. But the Second Great War is not yet over. Dark forces have begun to align themselves together, and as enemies emerge from the darkness to do battle with them, the heroes of Remnant must ask themselves, "How far will you go to justify evil?"

7. Cull part 6: The Inspection

Main theme: Enemy by Imagine Dragons and J.I.D
Arc theme: Can't Trust Anyone by Jeff Williams
Theme: The Cunning from the Destiny 2: The Witch Queen Soundtrack

---

In the light we may provide
There would be shelter from the dark
Until there is no more

Haiku written by a member of the House of Lucentia

---

The last ship entered into the belly of the beast, lowering its landing gear and landing on the steel surface below. Puddles of rainwater began to form around the lowered legs and wings as the storm outside continued to rage and bellow like a starved animal with food dangling before it. The ramps lowered themselves onto the ground and out poured the soldiers within, coloured in armour that differentiated from white and red to a black stark canvas. They walked in silence and formations, guns in hand and pointed down at the ground below them. They marched with confidence, a veil of stoic professionalism around them as they moved, the white-armoured soldiers more than the red and white.

And yet, as they walked into the wide hanger bay and marched towards their destination, they couldn't help but smile at the music that filtered through their helmets and flowed into their ears from the two at the side of the room.

There once was a ship that put to sea
The name of the ship was the Billy of Tea
The winds blew up, her bow dipped down
Oh blow, my bully boys, blow (huh)

The soldiers smiled behind their helmets and began to sing along to the chorus.

Soon may the Wellerman come
To bring us sugar and tea and rum
One day, when the tonguing is done
We'll take our leave and go

The two singers in the corner, one with a wooden guitar in hand, the other kicking her legs against the wooden box that she sat on, smiled in turn.

She'd not been two weeks from shore
When down on her a right whale bore
The captain called all hands and swore
He'd take that whale in tow (huh)

The soldiers joined in the chorus once more.

Soon may the Wellerman come
To bring us sugar and tea and rum
One day, when the tonguing is done
We'll take our leave and go

And then, they sang all together.

Da-da-da-da-da
Da-da-da-da-da-da-da
Da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da

The soldiers and singers laughed and cheered together from the brief jingle, their spirits briefly lifted from the annoyed depressive state that they had been in when they had been pulled from their stations in the kingdom below just to come to Beacon for a seemingly meaningless troop inspection.

And the two singers in the corner, Jaune Arc and Melanie Malachite, smiled at each other at their success in cheering them all up.

"How the hell did you talk me into this?" Melanie couldn't help but ask as she leant back on the box and rested herself on the steel wall behind them, "I mean, really? Why did I agree to do this with you?"

"You wanted to show off how much your singing has improved, that's why," Jaune smiled at her as he sat on a smaller box next to hers. He took a moment to tune the guitar in his hands as he continued, "You wanted to show off. You always want to show off."

Melanie looked down at him from her box, and Jaune took a moment to gaze at her casual gear. She wore a white turtleneck short sleeved jumper with a cyan outline and lily and red feather accessories in her hair, black trousers (with the imprints of kneepads down the middle of them) running down her legs and ending in plain white shoes with red laces, and long red sleeves from the shirt underneath her jumper running down her arms and ending in red fingerless gloves (when did she start wearing so much red?). Jaune meanwhile wore a simple pair of jeans with a black shirt, blue shoes, and a white and gold hoodie. He had never been into fashion as much as the others, anyways.

"Slander. Slander that is," Melanie commented, "Absolute and nothing but."

"Oh, don't be so dramatic," Jaune said to her as he put down his guitar, "And don't pretend you don't love the attention that they give you."

"Well maybe I do, but you don't have to be so confrontational about it."

"How am I being confrontational?"

"How are you not?"

"Don't be like that," Jaune added, "Don't be all finicky about it. I'm simply making an observation."

"No, you're making an attack on my character, of which I am doing the same. Deal with it."

"As should you."

"Oi, sod off before I do."

"Maybe that's the point."

"Har har har."

"Yeah, I know. I'm hilarious."

"Hardly."

"I think you're doing great!"

They both jumped and looked to the side to see Ruby looking at them (how long had she been standing there?), dressed in her own casual gear, that being a pair of ripped jean shorts and stockings, and a black jacket over a red sleeveless top. It looked good on her, but he had assumed that she would've been wearing her overalls and protective gear from down in Beacon's old Forge. Come to think of it, shouldn't she be down there right now? Why was she here?

"Ruby, what are you even doing here?" he repeated the question to her, "I thought you were dismantling those old Hephaestus Armoury weapons we recovered."

Ruby's eye twitched at the mention, but it was something that needed to be done. Those old Hephaestus Armoury guns were a logistical nightmare. They swallowed up dust with every round that they fired, and the Flechette Launchers wasted precious metal with every shot. They were dust and metal eaters that emptied out entire crates worth of stuff by the day. Maybe once upon a time, when dust was much more plentiful in the Victorian Era before the First Great War, they would've been more useful as weapons, but now, they guzzled down too much dust than was needed, and weren't cost prohibitive at all. The components and dust that went into them were better off with other projects and material (he knew that Mei Dei and the Constructors had been eager to get their hands on the plasma generators inside of the Pulse Rifles in order to replace the aging dust batteries in multiple appliances and vehicles that they were using). So now, the ornate relics of an age of empires and progress were being dismantled and stripped down for spare parts, and then smelted for the waste metal to be used elsewhere. It was almost sad in a way, but Jaune had never really cared much for history, and they needed the parts. He was sure that Oobleck was throwing a fit over this, though.

Ruby answered his question with a tearful sigh, "We finished early. Everyone else is getting ready for the troop inspection. Besides, I couldn't stay there and... watch all those sweet babies be taken apart and melted down like waste! They're precious weapons and needed to be treated as such!"

"They're expensive pieces of crap, and they're not even that good," Melanie said to her before muttering, "'Course, burning Grimm alive with those guns is pretty sweet, but-"

"But they're also war crimes waiting to happen," he suddenly realised that Neon was in the hanger bay with them (okay, he needed to start being more aware of his surroundings). He looked to his side and saw her watching them from a few feet away, crossing her arms as she walked over to them in her casual getup - that being a pink skirt and shirt underneath a pale blue zipper jumper - her tail swaying behind her as she moved. She quickly added on, "A shotgun that fires flechettes into a person and rips apart the flesh, and a rifle that literally burns people alive from the inside out? Those are walking war crimes and a half, and we're all better off without them."

Neon was right, of course. Using them on the Grimm was one thing, but firing them at people was something else entirely. They were much more useful as spare parts than actual weapons in their arsenal.

"You're right Neon. Of course you are," he looked back to Ruby, "Sorry that you had to endure watching those things-"

"Babies! Precious babies!"

"-All get melted down, Ruby," he continued despite the interruption, "We'll get you some other cool toys later," Ruby seemed to perk up at that (Jaune was starting to get better at reading facial expressions as well as habits) as he turned his head to the side and asked Neon, "What's up? What're you down here for?"

Neon gestured to the exit out of the hanger bay, "Final calls are being made for the troop inspection. Everyone's gathering up. I'm just making rounds and letting everyone know."

Jaune nodded to her, "Good luck with that," before turning to Ruby and Melanie and going, "No turning back now, hey?"

Melanie grumbled, "Not at all," the three of them had been the most vocal voices against the troop inspection taking place, but not the only ones. Practically all of the personnel within Beacon Academy, even within the Beacon Militia itself, had been against it from the start. However, all of the army's official High Command (that being the former teachers of Beacon Academy, leftover army commanders, and essentially any remaining functioning adult in any form of leadership that hadn't died from the battles prior) had voted in favour of it, and whilst the unofficial High Command of the Militia (that being Jaune, Melanie, Ruby, the rest of the former team leaders and important personnel) might've been against it from the start, there was ultimately nothing they could do about it.

They all muttered and sighed, and as Neon ran off to go find the others and inform them of the troop inspection, Melanie jumped off her box (dubbed as Melanie's throne in Jaune's mind) and went, "C'mon guys. Destiny awaits."

Destiny awaits.

Wasn't that an uncomfortable phrase?

---

Harrower was awake.

Leadpipe looked through the sliding door to Beacon's infirmary - the bay had been renovated and expanded since Beacon's reconstruction after the Surge - to see the lumbering green and yellow Techion lean upwards against the metal slab that he had been resting on, his damaged components and metal coverings covered over by temporary slats of bronze and silver steel. The other patients in the infirmary were either asleep or resting wearily on their own beds, doctors and nursing staff running between them and delivering them medicine and care.

The bulky Techion was hunched in on himself, looking down at the floor as the likes of Lavender Nera (a girl that used to dress like a witch. Now a nurse thanks to her healing semblance, she was able to keep a little of the black ensemble that she once wore, along with her pointed hat and wooden staff), Velvet Scarlatina (a second year that had been part timing as a doctor as well as a Huntress before the Initiation Massacre), and the resident Techion doctor known as Medico (coloured in whites and reds and with orange luminescent patterns covering his body) continued to tend to their patients. Harrower turned his head to the side, looking to Lavender and going, "How much longer do I got to be in here, doc?"

"Not a doctor," Lavender mumbled to him as she tended to a Wolf Faunus with a nasty burn across his leg, running the green glow of the glass sphere at the end of her staff over the injury and watching it begin to pave over and heal with new flesh. As her work finished, she then said out loud to Harrower, "And you won't have to be in here any longer. Just long enough to miss the troop inspection."

Harrower laughed, "Lucky me then, eh?"

"Yeah, lucky you," Lavender rolled her eyes as she turned to him, "You don't have to deal with that farce of an event."

"You know only one of us has to go down there?" Velvet asked the green-haired and eyed girl as she finished administering an antiseptic to a patient with an open wound. Leadpipe watched her hand the patient off to a pair of surgeons, letting them wheel him off into another room before she turned to Lavender and continued, "We've got the exception from attending the inspection because of our status as medical staff. Healing and patients and all that. Only one of us has to go down there as a representative."

"Oh, so you're volunteering? Good."

"Wait, what? When did I- oi! Who said anything about me volunteering?"

"Medico, tell Velvet she's volunteering."

"Velvet, you're volunteering."

"Oh my- are you serious?"

""Yes.""

"...Oh, fine," Velvet grumbled as she crossed her hands together, "Fine, I'll go down there... bloody wankers."

Leadpipe kept his chuckle at her comment to himself. He had been part of a physical rehabilitation class in the three months before the Surge, and Velvet had been one of the medical staff looking over them during that short period of time. Back then, Velvet had been more shy of a person. Timid, even. However, nowadays she seemed to have more or less grown out of that kind of attitude. Maybe it was the fact that she had been promoted into a leading figure in the Beacon Militia on part of being part of the medical team. Maybe it was the fact that she now held life and death in her hands now. Maybe she was just growing as a person. Maybe she was just getting more and more frustrated with each fool coming into the infirmary with dumb injuries from dumb accidents (he remembered when someone came into the medical ward before he left Beacon after accidently throwing a flashbang into themselves. The tongue-lashing that that particular idiot had received from Velvet was something that he would hold to himself for all his life).

Whatever it was, Velvet had been growing more assured of herself. More confident. That was a good thing for a nurse to have, really. Leadpipe just wished he knew where she got it from. If he had some of what she had, then maybe he would've been more useful to everyone back in the Farmlands a few days ago.

Back when Harrower had been shot.

"The fuck are you staring at?"

Speaking of which...

Leadpipe was jumped out of his stupor as he looked back to Harrower, who had now turned his head towards him, his crimson visor glowing red with light against his silver faceplate as he gazed at his lither white, blue, and purple counterpart. Leadpipe felt the red lights covering his back and legs intensify for a second as he pulled his hands up and shook his head. His crimson visor gave a glow of its own.

"Oh, er, I wasn't-"

"You were staring," Harrower interrupted him, "You were staring hard."

"Oh, um, sorry," Leadpipe muttered out loud, "I just. er... um..."

"...You what?"

"I just... wanted to see how you were doing.

Harrower stared at him. Leadpipe stared back. Harrower kept staring. Leadpipe placed a hand on the doorframe next to him for balance.

"...I got shot," Harrower remarked in a low drawl, "I'm doing peachy."

"...Is that-"

"Sarcasm? Yeah, it fuckin' is."

"Oh..."

"...Anything else?"

"Er," he paused, trying to look for his words, "I just wanted to say... something."

"'Something' what?"

"I just... wanted to say... thank you."

Harrower's head tilted. Leadpipe imagined him blinking underneath his metalic helm, if he even had eyelids, or even eyes, to begin with.

"...'Thank you'?" he said it like he wasn't expecting it. Or wasn't use to it.

"For saving my life... back in the Farmlands..."

"...Hn."

Harrower grunted and looked away from him.

"You could've saved yourself."

That was true. It was hurt to think of, but it was true. Leadpipe found his hand gripping around the doorframe.

"Are you guys done?" Leadpipe jumped in place as he looked to the side and saw Velvet standing besides him with her arms crossed, changed out of her nursing uniform, being a royal blue scrub top and trousers with an ID badge in her chest pocket and a stethoscope around her neck, and into something more reminiscent of her old Huntress outfit that she wore before the Surge, being a white lab coat (that had a personal symbol, being that of a brown heart with stitches running over it superimposed over a red cross) over a dark black and brown shirt, tight black jeans with brown edges and ends, and black boots with brown laces.

"Ah, sorry, I-" Leadpipe moved out of the way of the door, "Sorry."

"Oh, it's fine, it's fine," Velvet said as she moved through the door, "But it's not visiting hours. You should get out of here."

Leadpipe hummed to himself in response, staying in place for a few moments (much more than he would've liked himself. It made him very uncomfortable) before turning back into the infirmary and going to Harrower, "See you around...? Maybe...?"

Harrower snorted, "You don't live here anymore. I fuckin' doubt that."

"...Right," Leadpipe sighed out as he turned around and-"

"But you ain't that bad."

He stopped. He turned his head to look at Harrower as the bulky Techion kept his gaze to the side.

"You're better than Schnee, at least... that counts for something."

"...Thanks," he mumbled in uncertainty.

Harrower said nothing else.

The door to the infirmary closed shut, leaving Leadpipe unsatisfied with the end of their brief conversation.

Velvet stood next to him for a few moments, and then turned to leave. However, she stopped herself and said, "For all his unpleasantness, Harrower raised a good point: why are you here? You quit. You don't live in Beacon anymore."

"Ah- oh. I came in when- when Harrower got shot protecting-"

"Protecting you in the Farmlands, I know," there was that found confidence in herself again. Where could he find some of that, "But why are you here?"

"Um," he stayed silent for a moment afterwards, trying to find his answer, "I didn't... feel safe down below. Not after we were attacked in the- in the greenhouse, and... Blake let me... let me stay in her room."

Velvet looked at him for an uncomfortable amount of time before she said, "Huh... didn't think she would..."

"...Didn't think she'd do what?"

"...It's nothing."

Leadpipe could guess as to what she was implying, "She's a lot nicer when you get to know her, you know. You just need to get to know her to see that. A lot of people make that mistake."

Velvet stayed silent for a while before sighing, "Do you want my honest opinion, Leadpipe?"

He wasn't expecting her to say that, "Er... sure?"

"Blake is bad news."

He took a step back from her, "Hey, that's- what?" his voice rose an octave higher, "I just said-"

"I know what you just said," Velvet cut him off with, "And I believe you when you say that, but... but what you know as a person might not be the same as the person they really are."

"What does that mean?"

"You want me to be frank? The first time I met Blake Belladonna, she glared at me. Glared. It was the day before the Initiation Massacre-" Leadpipe flinched at the memory and Velvet unconsciously began to rub the elbow of her left arm. The artificial muscles and servos that had been built into her arm after the Daughter had stabbed through and broke it seemed to itch within her skin, "-And I was talking with Coco. She passed by us and saw me, a Faunus, happily talking to my friend, a human, who just so happened to be flirting with me at the same time."

Leadpipe couldn't help but chuckle slightly at that. It was no secret to anyone - even himself - that Coco. the resident fashionista of Beacon Academy and the Beacon Militia and notorious breaker of girls' hearts, held a monstrously large crush on Velvet for as long as they had known the two of them. It was always fun to watch Coco try to pick up Velvet and take her out of a date, only for Velvet to turn her down. Velvet had confessed to someone (it didn't matter who. Word travelled fast around Beacon Academy's student populace, the first years more specifically) that she herself was just as much a lesbian as Coco, so a relationship between them could certainly work.

But unfortunately, as it turned out, a relationship couldn't happen between them. Velvet apparently didn't believe in inter-team relationships, and apparently her religion played a big role into her decision as well. She was a believer in the faith of Azul Primus (a fabled Faunus deity who supposedly travelled across the globe and united all the scattered tribes of Man into one kingdom, bringing about the end of the Dark Times and ushering in a new utopia before he and his White Fang left Remnant for the stars above), and apparently her religion had a big emphasis on marriage and relationships, and breakups and divorces were considered a point of shame in it. Once she got into a relationship, it would have to be for life, otherwise she might disgrace her family and theirs as well. So if she did get into a relationship, she and her partner had to be one hundred percent percent certain that it would work, because if it didn't then the two in the relationship would either be miserable for the rest of their lives or be forced to shame their families in parting their union.

Velvet was saving herself for that eventual relationship, so she couldn't pursue one with Coco. Velvet loved Coco as much as Coco loved Velvet, this Leadpipe knew, but she didn't know if such a relationship between them could work out, so she was holding herself out. Plus, they were in the middle of a war, so there wasn't really any time for the stresses of romance when they were busy trying to save the world.

He looked to Velvet, and said, "Go on."

She did, "We were talking, and Coco was flirting, and we passed by Blake. I didn't know her name, but I could recognise a Faunus hiding their traits away when I saw one. I gave her a wave and a smile, and she just..."

"...She just what?" Leadpipe asked in confusion.

"...She just glared at me," Velvet answered, "Glared, like I had offended her somehow. I was confused. I wanted to ask why she was staring at me like I had killed her pet, but she stomped off before I could," she paused, "It was only later on that I realised why she had been glaring... it had been because I was a Faunus, and Coco was a human."

"...That's it?"

"That's all that it was. She glared at me because I was being friendly to a human. She hated me for being friends with a human."

Leadpipe paused, staring at her for a long time as he tried to come up with a response to her claim.

It... it wasn't wrong. She wasn't wrong. Not really. Blake had always been... cagey around humans, her teammates especially. She had always been more trusting of Faunus rather than humans. Leadpipe had just put it down to past experiences, but the way that she stared at the humans around her, the gazes and stares, the narrowed eyes and frowns and snarls...

Leadpipe couldn't say that Velvet didn't have a point.

But even so...

"You're wrong," Leadpipe said to her, "Blake's a good person. I know she is. If she wasn't, then... then she wouldn't be helping me out so much," Leadpipe levelled his visor to her eyes, "You don't know her like I do."

"...And you don't know her like she does."

Leadpipe had no reply to that.

"...Just be mindful, alright?" Velvet said to him as she turned around and left, "That's all I ask."

And with that, she was gone, leaving Leadpipe to his own thoughts in the hallway.

Alone once again.

…

He decided to head down to Beacon's underside hanger bay. He had no right to attend the troop inspection when he no longer had a place in Beacon, not after he'd quit the Beacon Militia. He would stay down in the hanger bay and hitch a ride on the first ship out of the old academy.

It was the least that he could do.

(He wondered as to where Blake was, though. He hadn't seen her in days.)

---

Velvet hoped that Leadpipe would take her words to heart.

She sighed as she walked down the various hallways and corridors of Beacon Academy, down to the soaked troop inspection below. She peered out a window to see the troops of the three Guards of the Beacon Militia standing in rows and regiments in the rain down below, surrounding the circular auditorium (now with added plates and armour thanks to its reconstruction from the bombings from the Ascendant Court during the Surge) in a rounded blockade, sectioned into circles of red and white and black. She could spot the numerous Crimson Guardsmen slacking in place, tolling their heads from side to side and muttering to each other in annoyance at having to stand out in the rain, the White Guardsmen staying professional but still fidgeting in place as their feet sloshed in the water beneath them, the Obsidian Guardsmen standing so still that they were barely there.

It was an uncomfortable sight for her. She was a former second years of Beacon Academy, and had been in the school for over a year and a half. As such, she remembered what it looked like before the Second Great War began. She remembered the idol ponds and grass fields, the archways and stone pavements, and gothic towers and Victorian Era stonewalls and architecture. She remembered all the history that had been placed into the old academy, all the living memories that were woven into the tapestry of Beacon itself.

Now it had all been paved over by industrialism, broken apart by the Ascendant Court and clumsily put back together by the reckless militarism of Beacon's new ruling elites. Now in place of the old relics and history of the academy were gun turrets and spotlights, factories and armouries, troop barracks and recycling pits, all the things that the Hunters of old had been made to stand against.

Their nobility that had replaced the military had become a military in of itself. Quite ironic, in a dark sense.

Velvet turned her head away from the ugly sight and continued her march through the hallway, turning around a corner and passing by a trio of patrolling AK-PDs as she kept herself to herself.

Blake was bad news. This she knew. Even if she hadn't heard about the standoff in the auditorium the day before the First Years went to the Sleeping City, she would've found the woman to be suspicious enough on her own. Blake struck Velvet as bad news. Really bad news. Everything about her was cagey and secretive, and the fact that she hid her ears behind a damn bow didn't help her opinion on her. Velvet didn't like it when Faunus hid their traits from others. She might've been meek herself back in the day, but that didn't mean that she tried to hide her traits from others. It felt like a coward's decision, to try and hide amongst the humans as one on them and not the other. She could understand why they would do something like that (no matter what people said, there was still a lot of segregation out there in the world. Some people would rather keep living in the days of the Rights Revolution, unfortunately), but that didn't mean that she had to like it.

Not only that, but the way that the onyx-haired, golden-eyed Faunus looked at others, how she stared at them, looked at them, glared at them...

She remembered seeing the woman's eyes, themselves slit like a cat - no, a predator. Pupils are responsive to emotion. They contract or expand based on what the person connected to them is feeling. Happiness, love, affection. The pupils expand. Fear, anger, hatred. The pupils contract.

Hers didn't move at all. They expanded slightly around Leadpipe - a feeling of familiar comfort. She wondered what that meant - but around everyone else? They remained tiny dots, fix slits. Cold and miniscule, as if she hated everyone and everything around her.

Blake wasn't as mysterious as she liked to think.

Velvet hated her.

She hummed. Perhaps Leadpipe was right. Maybe she was misjudging her.

But then again, maybe not.

She sighed again, and continued her walk. With any luck, this troop inspection wouldn't take long.

Knowing their luck though, it would probably be the exact opposite.

---

The air was cold and wet, and the rain that continued to pour down onto them threatened to worm its way into their armour through the groves and nicks between the plates as their feet caught water and sloshed through the deepening puddles beneath them.

It was better than no protection against the rain, at least.

Ruby wore the same custom armour as she had back in the raid against the Dust Barons in Communo, but now Jaune and Melanie were outfitted in their own gear as well, complete with all their weapons and equipment on top of it.

In contrast to his old armoured outfit during his days as a student, where he had been the equivalent of a walking armoury with all the weapons attached to him, Jaune's armour and weaponry was now much more streamlined and simplistic. His gear was a modified version of the standard Beacon Militia armoured suit, being plain white all around, though he had wrapped grey plates of armour around each section across his limbs, and added grey armour plating across his chest as well. Golden markings covered the extra grey plates, running along the sides of the metal and patterned by rosy laurels. Once more he wore a belt-cape around his his waist, and had an ammo belt around his chest where he had holstered his new ML-15A carbine, as well as adding ammo pouches to his spaulders. Across his head he wore his helmet, the visor goggles glowing a deep blue and the cheek pits coloured a dull golden. A binocular attachment rested at the top of his head, and a golden stripe coloured the fin on the top of his helm, the coloured line stretching down the middle of the front and back of his helmet. The body glove of his armour was a deep black, and extra plates of leather and metal armour was wedged in between the gaps as best as they could, affording him extra protection but not at the expense of his manoeuvrability. Attached to his left arm was a collapsed shield, folded into itself into a black slab of metal. His original shield had been shredded back in Atlas, forcing him to get a new one. On his right arm, the scroll that he had order- asked to be built into the armour of his arm gave off a faint sapphire glow. At his waist, locked in a plain white sheath, was a sword that he had no name for.

It wasn't Crocea Mors. It could never be Crocea Mors. His family sword had been broken apart in Atlas when Amity Coliseum (Coliseum? Colosseum? Whatever) crashed down into an army of Ascendant Court Grimm below. Its blade had been parted from its handle and guard, split open like a plastic toy.

As it turned out, it had been designed to split open, and the inside of the sword held ancient scriptures and writings within, hidden behind a language that was so old that it was almost untranslatable.

However, there had been something that they had been able to make out during the rushed translation, though whether or not it had been accurate was up for debate itself.

It was possible that the scriptures on the inside of his blade were talking about something called the Elsewhere.

Just before Miltia Malachite, his first partner and Melanie's sister, died during the Initiation Massacre - just before she opened her arms and allowed the Brothers Grimm to kill her - she had told him that she would meet him in something called the Elsewhere, and he had been racking his brain as to what she had meant by that. What was the Elsewhere? Was it some sort of afterlife? Was it a metaphor for something that he just wasn't getting? Was it something else entirely.

He had no idea. He wished he did, but he just didn't have any idea as to what it meant at all.

("Did we ever find out what the markings at the bottom of Crocea Mors meant, did we?" Jaune asked Melanie and Ruby once as she looked at an image on her scroll.

"Not yet," Ruby said as she stared at the image of Crocea Mors' exposed blade end. She had snapped that picture back in Jewel when they were looking over the hiltless blade and trying to figure out what it meant.

"It's only been three months since we figured out that the writings meant something," Melanie added in turn, "Those kinds of translation works are expensive as hell and take years to work out. It's only been three months, Jaune, and there's not exactly a real prescient to translate a bunch of old scriptures, is there?"

Jaune paused, before answering, "Yeah, I guess.")

Well, it wasn't like it mattered right now anyways. The hiltless Crocea Mors was all the way back home in Jewel, now in the possession of May Zedong - a fellow survivor of the Initiation Massacre and a heterochromatic Silver-Eyed Warrior with only one silver eye - and Rui-Arc Sara - a child soldier with a split personality and former spy for the Ascendant Court, now turned against her former masters and adopted into the Arc family - who were now, as far as he knew, staying with the rest of his family in the Second Arcadia manor. It was safe there, with his family. He hoped so, at least.

He couldn't bear the thought of wielding it. Not now, at least.

He would take the blade up once more when he was ready.

When he was a hero worthy of it.

(And he'd do anything to be that hero.

Anything.)

He looked down to his other side, briefly glancing at Melanie. She was kitted out in her own unique gear, that being a heavily customised version of the standard Beacon Militia armour. Much of the armour was beefed up around the arms and legs, with extra pads curved around her limbs and coloured a bright silver, glowing blue lights running across them and separating them into blocks and patterns. Blades ran down the backs of her heels whilst enlarged gauntlets covered her hands, knuckledusters embedded in them with hummed with a bright white light. Vents laid slotted into the gaps in the armour, ready to expel any excess energy that her semblance accumulated. The rest of her armour was coloured bright white with cyan luminescent patterns running through them, and crimson laurels colouring their edges and sides. Her boots were heavy and metal and coloured in white and red with black soles, and her helmet was a plain white with a cyan visor and red colouring across the fin and sides, as well as a pair of red and white fins on the side of her head connected to a round piece of metal patterned like a flower. On her back, a pair of stubby metal fins poked out of her back, short and thick and glowing with cyan light against their white frame, and a white and cyan-lined belt-cape with white holsters for her ML-17s and throwing knives, and red lines stretching down the sides in a vertical pattern, slicing the white into rectangles.

Most members of the Beacon Militia weren't allowed such a level of customisation in their armour as Jaune, Ruby, and Melanie, but they in particular existed in the division of the military organisation that belonged to the former students and Hunters of Vale. Because of their status and power, as well as the necessities of their semblances, this had allowed them a certain degree of freedom in terms of modifications and customisation to their standard issue gear. Jaune and the girls sat on one of the highest rungs of that preverbal ladder as former team leaders however, and as such were granted even more freedom for armour modifications and paintjobs in order to identify themselves and their ranks as leading figures within the private military organisation.

Jaune didn't need to see her face (he was still learning expressions) to know that Melanie was annoyed by what they were doing. The quick march and hands balled into fists at her sides spoke as much. During their brief dishwashing days, Melanie had made it a habit of expressing her distain for this troop inspection. A distain that the rest of them shared. This whole inspection was pointless, and yet no matter what they said, High Command had still decided to push forwards with it. It was an exercise in futility and nothing more.

The constant downpour of rain didn't help their frustrations.

Marching through the rain as it bleated down around them, the three of them (protected from the rain by the plastic raincoats covering them) finally reached the bulbous amphitheatre as someone waited at the door and ushered people inside. Jaune recognised the man at the door as Flynt Coal - Melanie and Neon's former teammate before all the teams broke apart - dressed in his own armour set, sporting minor paint applications that resembled a black vest running over his back and torso, a blue chestplate, black armoured limbs, and a white helmet with a black top and blue ring running across the bottom of the helm. He pushed himself off the wall he was leaning on under the cover of the small roof above him and waved. Jaune and the others waved back.

"Hey Flynt," Jaune said to him as he and the others pushed themselves under the slight cover above them and pulled off their raincoats, shoving them into a display rack that folded into the walls and left them to dry off, "What're you doing out here?"

"Oh, you know bossman," Flynt said to him with his usual blasé attitude to things, "Welcoming everyone in and all-"

(Everyone but DJ. He was still missing. Jaune had asked High Command to put an alert out for him, and they had, but so far nothing had come of it.

He wished he knew where the Techion was. He hated being out of the loop like this.)

"-Shadestep's inside gettin' the audience into their seats 'n' stands."

"Do we know how long this idiocy is going to take?" Melanie asked with a huff in her voice.

The casual mirth that seemed to surround Flynt evaporated instantly as he looked down at his former team leader, "You callin' me an idiot or-"

"This entire farce, Flynt."

"Then I don't know, do I? How am I supposed to-"

"Alright," Jaune said as he got in between the two former teammates with his hands raised. Melanie and her former teammates had never got along when they were together, and even less so now that they were separate from each other. It would be best to break them up before whatever argument that would inevitably crop up escalated into a brawl, or something along those lines, "Enough, both of you. Let's just get inside and-"

[BWEEP BWEEP BWEEEEEEP]

An enlarged bullet-like shape sped out of the amphitheatre doors and-

{TSCHE-CHU-CHU-CHU-TSCHE}

-Transformed in the air, spinning and unfolding itself as a bright blue optic glowed in the centre of its head and turned to them. It was a small drone with a pair of fans on flexible arms connected to either side of its body, readjusting themselves as they held themselves within crimson metal rings and buzzed in the air like a bee. The droid's small main body, shaped like a bullet in reverse, was coloured a shining bronze as four fins extended outwards in an X-formation, connected to the body of the droid by a mechanical arm each. A small data spike nested itself at the top of the droid's body, and a smaller fin jutted out of the back of the drone. The droid buzzed and whirled around in the air and let out a chorus of bleeps as it hovered above them all.

"Eri?" Jaune asked. The small drone buzzed and beeped in response.

Eri was a little drone that had been made after the Initiation Massacre by Nora, as a gift for Pyrrha. Eri wasn't her actual name though; it was actually AR-1, or Ares in honour of one of the old Mandarin Emperors of War (the name given to the greatest warriors of their time, who made it their life purposes to master the art of conflict and combat). However, Nora liked to call her 'Eri' instead, and the alternative name had just stuck. Eri had been with him and the rest of Team JNPER (Nora had shoved her initial into the name so that she could feel more included) since their formation and had stuck around long after the team broke up. She had consistently been the key to the team's greatest victories, from the Sleeping City to the Fall of Atlas, and rebuilding her body had been one of his top priorities when returning to Beacon, as it was for Nora, her creator and 'Mother', as well.

Eri around wildly in the air, and then used her four long bronze arms to wrap herself around Jaune's shoulders in a tight hug. The little droid cooed as she held him tightly, and Jaune couldn't help but smile and pat her on her square head. Eri was always an affectionate little thing. It was one of the many things that set her apart from the lifeless automatons that now patrolled the halls of Beacon and the streets of Vale.

The little drone released him from her grasp, and Jaune took the moment to pat her on the head, or the metal square that her optic rested in, at least. Eri cooed in response, and Jaune asked Flynt, "Is there anyone else waiting for us?"

"We're still missing a few. Neon, Blake, and a few others. I'm just waiting on them."

Jaune noticed that DJ hadn't been included on that list. That much went unsaid.

He hummed in response to Flynt's answer, "Ah, don't bother waiting out here. Get yourself inside and out of the rain. It's time for us all to see what all this humbug is about."

"That's not how you use the word."

Jaune turned his head to Melanie, "What?"

"Humbug. It means deceptive behaviour or false talk. You're not using the word correctly."

"Really?"

"Yeah. It would've been better for you to say, I don't know, 'Fuss' or something. That would be better to say... actually, no, it wouldn't be better that way, because we already know what this fuss is all about. So, what you said actually makes no sense on a grammatical level."

He sighed, "Why are you always like this?"

"Why do you always use such bad grammar?"

"Why are we not going inside yet?" Ruby quickly butted in with, though there was a slight sharpness to her voice that Jaune barely caught, "because as much as I like the outside, I don't like the rain as much, and I don't think it'll be good for Eri or our electronics."

Jaune paused, and then realised that she was right. The rain might short-circuit Eri, and he doubted that any good would come from keeping Ruby and Melanie out here any longer than they had to. The two of them were cyborgs now of course, with Ruby's left eye having been cut out by Templar and the Choir of Silver in the Sleeping City, and Melanie's spine and nervous system in her arms had been burnt to hell and back by her own semblance during the same confrontation. They were protected by their armour, of course, but even so, he didn't want to take that chance.

Jaune nodded to her, marched through the doors, and then said, "Alright then, let's see... augh, let's just get this over with."

"Better."

Jaune, Melanie, and Ruby walked through the doors and into the Amphitheatre, and Flynt followed after them. Eri floated above them and twirled in the air.

The amphitheatre was packed to the brim, and Jaune and his group had to push their way through the former students and Beacon Militia Guardsmen gathered around the sides to meet the other team leaders and important figures and officers that made up the core of Beacon's High Command. Up in the rows of seats above, Militiamen officers from all three main branches were gathered alongside former Hunters and people that Jaune could only assume to be government officials for the new Valerian council, dressed in black suits and ties and with clipboards and pens in hand. They looked stoic, almost uninterested or bored with everything that was happening around them. Jaune found himself a little annoyed at it.

He spotted Ren and Nora in the small crowd of important former Hunters, alongside Skipjack, Coco, Mei Dei, Velvet, Tusks, Gretchen, Razor, Weiss, Ciel, and-

Esper?

Yeah, there was Esper standing with the crowd, looking as proud and smug as ever as she stood with her hands at her sides. Up in the stands, their former Professor Arthur Watts was staring down at her, proudly. It still gave him the heebie-jeebies.

Nora looked tired as she slumped in place. She must've been working overtime on training her Winter Maiden powers. Ren had his hand on her shoulders for support. He led the group towards them, and they stood alongside the group. They both wore armour sets across them, with unique paintjobs and custom mods. Ren's armour was green and black in colour, with a green chest and limbs, black torso, and green helmet with black cheek pits and a pink visor, as well as a pink line running down the right side of his head. A pair of black holsters sat on the sides of his white and black coloured armoured legs. His armour had barely any mods to it other than the holsters at the side and the knife and sheath attached to his right spaulder. Nora's armour, however, had much more in terms of customisation. Being the Winter Maiden gave her as many chances for custom mods and extra protection as the former team leaders. Her armour was primarily pink and white in colouration, though there was extra silver armour wrapped around the limbs and chests. A Warhammer sat on her back alongside a pair of mortar cannons (similar to the ones that she used back with her old armour after the Initiation Massacre, back before it got slagged in Atlas), and an ML-15A carbine with an underslung grenade launcher attachment was holstered across her chest. Her helmet was white and pink with an orange helm - a stripe of pink colouring the fin - and her visor was glowing a bright blue alongside the blue lines going along the barrels of her backside mortar cannons. The plates and comms scrolls attached to her bulky lower arms gave off an equally blue hum and glow. The both of them were holding their helmets under their arms.

"Hey," he said to Ren and Nora as he took off his own helm and held it under his arm. They said their hellos as well, and he asked them, "How's the training going? With the Winter Maiden powers?" he didn't bother hiding the fact that Nora possessed the Winter Maiden powers. It was an open secret at this point amongst the Beacon Militia staff, and it wasn't like she wasn't protected at all times. She was safe in Beacon, this he knew. They all were.

Nora cracked her head from side to side as she sighed, "It's... going good. Fine, I guess. Not as fast as I would like," she shot him a smile, "I want to get to shooting fire out of my mouth like a Thunderstorm Dragon and set fire to every Grimm that I see as soon as possible!"

Jaune laughed, "I bet you do."

"Yeah yeah, burn them all like pancakes in a pan! Except pancakes shouldn't be burnt! Now I'm angry at the Grimm for burning my pancakes!"

"Nora," Ren said with a ghost of a smile on his face.

"Sorry," she responded. Jaune smiled to her. Despite her recent inclinations to embrace her inner cynical side, there were still times when the old Nora popped out of her hidey hole to grace them with her presence. Jaune liked the old Nora. Jaune missed the old Nora.

He decided to change subjects, "How's food production going?"

Nora's smile turned downwards, "It's... going slow, but steady. We're still clearing out rubble from the Farmlands and the farmers down below have already set up a few fields, but it's going to take a long time to pitch up the rest of the old farms and factories, especially with all the wild animals and possible saboteurs running about the place. Vegetables take a long time to grow, after all."

Jaune nodded in understanding. He knew how long it took to grow food in the fields, especially poor ones. He had grown up on a farm, of course. He knew how it would take weeks, even months, for fruits and vegetable plants to grow in the ground, and the Beacon Militia had only just finished setting up the first of the fields in the Farmlands.

"And... about..."

Nora looked away as well. This time, it was Ren who said, "No, we still haven't found Pyrrha. Not a trace or speck of her or Morado."

Jaune frowned and took in a breath, "Right, right, I... thanks."

Three months ago, when Jaune and his group had returned from Jewel to Beacon, Pyrrha had gone missing. No one knew where she had gone, and no one knew if she had left Beacon without a trace of her own accord, or if she had been taken. But what they did know is that, for whatever reason, she had left Eri - her personal drone partner made by Nora after the Initiation Massacre - and all her equipment behind, as if she had never been given the chance to recover it, so that supported the latter option more than the former.

In this case, there was only one person who could be behind this possible kidnapping that Jaune could think of: Pyrrha's father, Morado Nikos.

He had... heard things about him, and no matter the differences and tensions between himself and his second partner... he didn't want to imagine her being in his grasp once again.

The stage in the end of the auditorium lit up, and Jaune, and everyone else, was shocked to see someone that hadn't left their room in three months step out.

Headmaster Ozpin.

The man hadn't changed his outfit or style. He was still wearing his dark coat over a green shirt, and he still wore his glasses and held his strange cane in his hand. However, he looked tired and bedraggled. His hair and clothes were dishevelled, and there were dark bags under his eyes. He looked like he hadn't slept in days, maybe even longer. Just what the hell was he doing in his office? Everyone around him seemed to be thinking the same thing, and questions and concerned murmurs began to flood the wide hall and replace the casual conversations that had previously reigned supreme.

Then, as Glynda Goodwitch and Hazel Rainart joined him on the stage, he began, "Good day to all of you," his voice was scratchy. He sounded like he hadn't slept in days. He definitely looked the part, "As I am sure you are all aware, the new Valerian council has ordered that our... organisation," he stressed the last word like it was an offense, "Relinquish its authority over to the new governmental body of our kingdom. Whilst I am aware that there are those amongst us with disagreements as to this decision, I am afraid that this change of authority, as was said before to many of you, is a necessary step towards ensuring a safe future for our kingdom. A military that exists outside of the boundaries of a governmental body cannot, and will not, be allowed to rule over a nation."

There was a murmur of annoyed agreement in the auditorium around them. Ozpin wasn't a popular leader - hiding away in his office for quarter of a year would ruin anyone's reputation - but no one could deny the wisdom in his words. He was the headmaster of Beacon Academy before it all went to hell, after all. He had to have had some wisdom stored away in him, otherwise why was he headmaster in the first place?

But then Jaune remembered what the Daughter had told him about Ozpin back in Atlas. About how his real name was Ozma, about how he was technically immortal, about how his soul passed between host to host like a parasite and overwrote the people that he inhabited, and about how he had lived for thousands of years in order to unite the world and bring about the second coming of the gods...

One of the relics to bring about said return of the gods (that he knew of) was in the hands of the Ascendant Court, and the rest were in Ozpin's care. From what the Daughter had said, when the Brother Gods returned to Remnant, they would either destroy the entire world, or enslave them. He had no reason to trust the Daughter or believe anything that she said, but still, it begged the question: just what the hell was Ozpin doing in that office of his? Why had he hidden away for so long?

Just what was he up to?

"But now, we must move forwards towards this shared goal of a better Vale, hand in hand with each other," Ozpin began as he and the former teachers at the stage stepped to the sides, "And so, in order to reach that goal, it is time for us to make friends with each other. So now, it is time to meet our new government."

The new council walked out of the gap and onto the stage. Gods, most of them looked so young. Just how many experienced politicians and leaders had been killed during the Surge three months ago? There were only a few older looking figures amongst them, but he supposed that age didn't always equal experience. He eyed the new council members, twelve in total, most of them slightly nervous and cowed slightly as they entered the stage, with at the front of the pack...

The visage of a tall man with red hair and emerald eyes, a permanent scowl on his face as he looked ahead of himself to nothing at all.

Jaune recognised him immediately.

"Morado!" he called out, and the crowd and councillors above turned to him in surprise. Morado ignored him. He growled, and the first words that, without thought, left his mouth were, "What the hell have you done with Pyrrha?!"

He was the one who took Pyrrha. He had to be. She had suddenly gone missing without a word or note in the middle of the night, and the only other explanation to her disappearance was that she ran off on her own, but with Morado here, that only threw more suspicion onto him and the idea of him abducting her. He was the person with the most reason and motivation to commit such an act, and from what Pyrrha had told him of him and her relationship with him back in Atlas, then there was no way that he was going to let Morado off without getting Pyrrha back.

This time, Morado had the decency to turn his head towards him and stoically ask, "Is there something you would like to say, boy?"

Boy.

Boy.

He had called him a boy.

This bastard had dared to call Jaune a boy, as if he hadn't seen things that would undoubtedly make men like Morado shake in their boots and beg for mercy.

Another growl, "You already know what I mean you piece of-"

"Jaune, stop it!" a hand grabbed hold of his. Ruby's voice sounded off, "Please!"

"Causing a scene here will only create problems for all of us," a hand took his other. Melanie's voice was calmer in comparison, "Now back off. Leave him for now."

...Dammit, they were right. Of course they were.

Jaune frowned and let out a groan but allowed Ruby and Melanie to take their hands off his as he looked up and narrowed his eyes at the Nikos patriarch. The man went back to ignoring him. Glynda looked like she had been a second away from intervening but stood down, shooting Jaune a glare of her own. Ozpin was as still as ever.

Jaune felt embarrassed but stayed silent.

Questions would come later, as would answers, even if he had to beat Morado senseless in order to get them.

…Wow, that was a lot darker of a thought than he had intended. But it got the point across.

Morado, for all his worth, turned his head forward and said, "For months, the Hunters and army of Beacon Academy have protected the kingdom of Vale from Grimm and criminal alike," he paused for dramatic effect, "For months, you have been there to protect the people of this fine kingdom from any threat that may encroach on it. For months, you have been the hand of law and order when there was none to spare. It is a terrible burden to have, but it is one that you have carried for all your days since the Grimm attacked our walls."

There was a murmur of agreements in the crowd. A sense of pride and accomplishment washed over the people of Beacon Academy, both former Hunter (in-training and professional) and soldier nodding their heads and clapping their hands in cheer at his words. But it was a murmur of agreement, nonetheless.

Morado was not a popular man. In the last three months Jaune had spent fighting against the Dust Barons and worrying about Pyrrha's disappearance, Jaune had been conducting his own investigation in her father, trying to find as much as he could about the man in order to find any connection that he had to Pyrrha's kidnapping. It hadn't been an easy task. The global CCTnet had collapsed when Atlas fell to the ground, and the New Dawn were still attempting to re-establish communication lines and feeds between the kingdoms and allied settlements across the world. That meant that information was a lot harder to come by nowadays, and the local CCTnet in Vale had proven to be not as sufficient a source of information as it once served as, especially when Jaune had been researching the conflict between the House of the White Wolves and the SDC. So, much of the information that he had gathered about Morado was word to mouth and random trivia spoken in past conversation, as well as Pyrrha's account and... attitude.

To talk about Morado Nikos and his daughter, one had to talk about the Nikos family in general. The Nikos family was one that had apparently lived for thousands of years in name and legacy and had a distinct history as pit fighters and tournament champions. The first champion of the Nikos lineage, one Aeneas Nikos, had supposedly risen to prominence during the Age of Dragons, when she slew a fabled Wish Dragon (or an Ahamkara, or whatever they were called) and used its magics to wish for her legacy to live on for a thousand years in honour and glory (or so the legends go). Since then, they had survived as the shining champions for many of Remnant's finest fighting pits and battlefields, slicing their enemies in twain across every battlefront and leading the armies of light into victory after victory.

In fact, apparently the Nikos family has been the reigning champions of the rings of battle and gladiatorial arenas for a millennium since the beginning of the Kingdoms and the ending of the Age of Dragons, dominating any opponent that came upon them, either in the ring or in the field of battle, and creating a lineage of champions that would reign over all for years to come.

Or so the story goes, after all.

However, from what he'd heard, that millennium of prosperity for the Nikos family was coming to an end. The magics that supposedly protected the Nikos' name was waning in power, as evidenced by Pyrrha's fall from grace and the controversies around Morado. Jaune had never been too sure about myths and fables (he supposed he was more agnostic than anything else, though he was a believer in the stories of his own family's legacy), but considering all the revelations that the Daughter had dropped on him - along with Ruby a week after the fight in the Sleeping City - about the Gods, Ozpin, Salem, the Relics, and so on... well, Jaune had no choice but to believe it.

(He wondered if there was an afterlife. If the Gods were real, then surely there was one as well, right? Miltia mentioned something called the Elsewhere before she died. Maybe that was it. He wondered if she was up there, looking down on him? Would she be smiling at what he was doing? What would she be thinking?)

---

"Not yet," Miltia said to herself, "Not yet."

---

Jaune sighed and looked up to Morado as he continued. Like said before, Morado was currently embroiled in a whole host of controversies, according to the various people that he asked. None of them had been able to paint him a clearer picture of it than the more famous Nikos family history. He imagined that Morado was famous enough - and rich enough - to cover up the allegations made against him, but there were still rumours that floated around the place. Hostile attitudes towards his opponents, whispers of family abuse and overeager ambitions, prioritisation of his family name over anything else...

And then what Pyrrha had told him, back in Mantle...

Morado was bad news, to the nth degree. On his own, he would be bad news, but now that he was on the council...

How did he even get on the new Valerian council in the first place?

"Now, that burden is to be shared with us all," Morado continued as if there had been no interruption at all. He sounded bored with everything around him, much like the governmental officials above them, "Ozpin is correct in his words: we must strive to be one nation instead of splitting ourselves in two. We must be one Vale to move forwards into the future."

Another conceded murmur of agreement. Morado might be blunt and curt with his points, but he wasn't wrong. That just made Jaune angrier.

"From this day forwards, the Beacon Militia shall become part of the Valerian government and military structure," Morado continued, "No longer shall you be holding the task of keeping Vale together yourselves. This is our kingdom, our world, and it is time for us to reclaim that world as one force, and one people."

If he was expecting an applause, he didn't let it be know.

"But before we can do that, we must first take into account the troops that we have at our disposal in order to win this war," Morado finished, "And such inspections require a more personal touch rather than skimmed over on a scrollpad. We shall start with the officers and notable figures first. I hope to see all of you," his eyes briefly turned to Jaune and glared, "At your very best."

Jaune glared back.

Great.

This was going to be hell.

---

Neon marched through the halls of Beacon, ushering the last few stragglers down to the auditorium and demonstration below. Her rollerblades (she wasn't in her armour yet, and was still dressed in her casual outfit and rollerblades) glided across the floor as she ticked off names on her scroll and hummed to herself.

Two more Crimson Guardsmen were leaving the cafeteria. She pointed to the grounds below and ordered them down, and they quickly ran off to join the demonstration below. Two more missing persons down. Only two to go. A White Guardsman and Blake Belladonna.

And speaking of which, there was the White Guardsman, quickly shoving on his helmet and running after the two Crimson Guardsmen that he had presumably been sitting with. Another name down. Almost all nonessential, unneeded, and available personnel were down at the troop demonstration below. The only one left was Blake.

Blake...

Neon skirted through the lonely halls as she switched out the list of names on her scroll for the opening chapter of another new entry of The Hunter's Tale. Cipher had been away on a break, after all (Neon's dishwashing punishment), and had a lot of catching up to do. She'd make her latest entry about the troop inspection. It probably wouldn't be much to write about in terms of action, but that didn't mean that she couldn't make it - and the merger with the Valerian council - a little more exciting. Dialogue and descriptions were funny like that.

Blake creeped her out. Neon was sure that the onyx-haired woman had called her 'Rebecca' not too long ago, and that was a name that she had tried to bury a long time ago. How did Blake know that name? How could she know it? Was it just Neon's imagination, or was it all the more real?

It didn't make sense to the ginger-haired girl at all, and that terrified her.

Where is that girl? Neon thought to herself as she continued to move through the corridors. The silence flooding them sounded so hauntingly lonely against the pitter-patter of the heavy rainfall outside. The lights embedded into the walls and ceiling above seemed low and dim. Shadows stretched across the walls. Her scroll painted her face a pale shade of blue, Seriously, she's like a freaking ninja or something, And where the hell is DJ as well?

No one had seen DJ in days. An official report had gone out as to his disappearance, but so far nothing had come of it.

She frowned to herself. She was getting really worried. DJ was dedicated to his work, yes. But this was just on a whole 'nother level.

She groaned in slight distress. She had to trust that DJ knew what he was doing. If he went off the grid like this for so long, then he surely had his reasons. DJ was always an obsessive paranoiac, but more than that, he was cautious and attentive to details. She forced herself not to worry.

DJ could take care of himself.

At least, that's what she told herself.

As for Blake, though...

Neon grumbled to herself and continued on. Blake was an oddity. She never liked to make herself known, and always clung to the shadows. What's more, she was such a jerk to everyone. So hostile and the like. She always glared at her, made everything out to be a race thing, and seemed to take pleasure in the suffering of those around her. She seriously ticked Neon off, and as much as she would like to stay civil with the woman, said woman just refused to make it possible.

She sighed and pocketed her scroll. Great, now she was too frustrated to write anything. Even when she wasn't around, Blake was still a jerk.

It didn't make sense to Neon. She'd seen Blake's profile. She'd been born into Vale to a pair of librarians, hence her fondness for books (one that she didn't display much during her time in Beacon, not that Neon had seen her much), and had been civil supporters of the White Fang before they turned violent. Blake's profile depicted her as passionate about her beliefs, emotional, and shy as a button. Almost like May Zedong from back in Jewel.

This Blake Belladonna that Neon knew was aggressive, violent, sadistic at the torment of others, and confrontational about racial matters. That girl had gone through a sharp turn of personality if she had ever seen it. So inconsistent. It was almost like they were-

Neon froze in place.

It couldn't be...

"Found you."

Neon spun her head around to the voice, "You-"

{SLASH}

{SPURT}

Blood splattered against the wall. Neon gagged and tried to form words, but all she got was blood in the mouth.

Her attacker had just slashed her throat.

She fell to the ground and her aura flared. A pink glow overcame her. The slice through her neck began to glow as Neon pushed pressure onto it and began to try and heal the wound. Blood continued to pour out like a faucet.

"Don't bother trying to use your aura. You'll bleed out soon enough."

Neon tried to form words, but began to choke on her own blood.

"This is what you get, you little traitor. This is what all who betray our cause deserve. You're going to die here, today, like the rat you are."

Neon gave no reply. She couldn't. Her mouth foamed blood.

"There is one more traitor within these walls that I must take care off. One who is traitor by blood and name. Don't bother trying to stop me. Don't bother trying to save yourself."

Her attacker laughed.

"You'll be dead long before-"

{FWOOSH}

One second Neon was there, the next she was gone, a splatter of blood on the floor and a rainbow trail flying through the corridor.

"...No matter."

Her attacker laughed again.

"We'll be done here soon enough."

The figure walked down the corridors, leaving the room behind them smeared in red.

---

Lavender sighed as she looked out the window briefly. The rain continued to beat down on the window as the black storm clouds rolled on by. The light of Beacon's medical ward suddenly felt a little two artificial on her clothes and hair and skin as she finished injecting a dose of painkiller into the wrist of a comatose patient before handing him off to a pair of surgeons to be operated on. The lamps above and around her were appropriately dimmed to the weather outside, casting thin and thick shadows across the white-coloured walls that stretched up into the ceiling.

Nearby, Medico seemed to notice her slight pause, but she continued before he could comment on it.

"What's eating you?"

It wasn't Medico who spoke up. Lavender turned her head to look at Harrower as the gruff Techion stretched his arms and hung his legs over the side of the metal slab that was his bed.

Lavender snorted, "It's 'What's eating at you', not 'What's eating you'. There's an 'At' in that sentence."

Harrower grunted, "You sound like Malachite."

"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?"

"You figure it out."

Lavender decided to ignore that comment before she asked, "Why do you wish to know how I'm feeling?"

"'Figured I'd be polite fer once."

"And?"

"An' I'm bored, alright? Is that better?"

Lavender nodded, "If you're so bored right now, you can always head down to the troop inspection downstairs. They're probably missing you a whole lot."

Harrower snorted, "Fuckin' better..." before adding, "'M not that bored."

Lavender smiled, "That's what I thought."

"And you never answered my question," Harrower added after her. So she hadn't.

"I want the rain to go away, alright," Lavender added after a moment's pause, "There. I want the weather to change. Happy?"

"...Huh."

"What?"

"'Figured you'd be more - what's the word? - philosophical about it. Contemplative, I don't know."

"'Contemplative'? About what?"

"About all the bodies around you, I guess?" Harrower actually sounded slightly awkward, "Like, about life and death and all."

Lavendar could see where this was going, "No, I don't think about it. I used to when I was younger, but I've made my peace with the topic. I can't save everyone so I'm not going to beat myself up over it," she shrugged, "That doesn't mean I'm not going to try and all, but still, I've made peace with that fact a long time ago."

Harrower looked at her, "That's kind of fucked up."

"To you, maybe. To me it's just life. Sometimes good things happen, sometimes bad things. We doctors and nurses have to deal with that fact more than anyone. We're the ones who make sure that people get their happy endings, and sometimes we don't get to do that. We damn well still try, but sometimes it doesn't work out. I got that drilled into my head a long time ago."

"What? You have some traumatic past or something? Some deep seeded motivation built outta some tragedy or somethin'?"

"None. I was born into a family of doctors. Lived in comfort for all my childhood before I decided that my skills as a doctor - as well as my semblance - were much better off helping those who help everyone," Lavender shrugged, "That's my story. Learnt right, was fed right, was right. The only trauma I got in my life was, well, was six months ago. Back during the Initiation Massacre."

Lavender mused to herself that not everyone needed a tragic backstory to motivate them. The problem with the people at Beacon was that most of their pasts were nothing but. She had yet to meet a person whose personality hadn't been born out of some deep seeded personality disorder born out of some childhood trauma.

It was depressing, to say the least.

Harrower clearly had no such sympathies, "Sounds like one hell of a time."

Lavender gave him a dead stare, "Yeah, it was Hell alright," she looked at the bulky green and yellow Techion, "What about you?"

"What 'bout me?"

Lavender shot him a levelled expression, "I've spilled my guts out for you. The least you can do is the same."

"Ain't got no guts left to spill," Harrower tapped his metal abdomen, "And you didn't do much spilling of anything."

"That's because there's nothing much to spill," Lavender groused, "I lived a peaceful and boring life surrounded by people I loved until suddenly the Ascendant Court attacked and it wasn't so peaceful and boring anymore. That's my life," she pointed to him, "You're a Techion. You have to have-"

"No reason to tell you," Lavender jumped and spun her head around to see Medico staring at her, shooting her a disapproving look despite his faceplate and glowing blue visor being as unemotive as ever, "Patient confidentiality, Lavender. If he doesn't want to tell you, he doesn't have to," he turned his head away, "Now shift gears, will you?" there was that Techion slang of his, "I need you helping me with this patient. We need to get this guy some penicillin before we drain his wound."

Lavender looked at him before nodding, walking over to a tray next to the bed that Medico was standing over and pulling out a needle filled with penicillin. Taking the time to inject the needle into the arm of the bed's occupant, she dispensed the needle's contents into the patient and helped Medico to wheel the bed back into its corner. They would need to wait for an hour or two to let the antibiotic settle into the comatose sleeper before they drained his wounds of any infections. She would like to get it done as soon as possible, but that would have to wait.

"My parents were Wolves."

Lavender blinked, then turned around. Harrower didn't look at her as she asked, "What?"

Harrower snorted, "My parents were White Wolves, all the way back when they weren't all violent and shit. Before the Acolytes' time an' all. Was with them when I was just a baby. Little kid. Was at the protests and everything. Didn't know what was going on, just knew that there was a sign for me to hold and a few words for me to chant," he snorted, "Atlas didn't like that. First time we protested in Mantle, they pulled out the tear gas and water cannons. Mass arrests all around. My parents spent a month in the hole, and they had to bust themselves out. I spent my time in the same damn shithole."

"...They threw you in prison when you were a child?" Lavender asked after a long silence.

He laughed, "Yep. Teenager, technically, but I did see some kids there as well. Big, small, boy, girl, Faunus, a few friendly humans, the works. Shipped us down to the mines. Half of us got out, the rest didn't. They're probably all dead now," he snorted, "That's the thing about Atlas: all its pretty lights and sights are just a cover. Look underneath and you'll see all the puss and rot. I'm glad it went down in flames. It deserved to."

"...You don't have to... tell me this. You don't have to tell us this."

"I want to."

"Harrower-"

"I almost died a few days ago, lady," Harrower interrupted, "Got a taste of death itself. If I don't tell you now, then I never will. I don't want to take this shit to the grave."

"...If that's what you want."

"It is."

Harrower sighed before continuing.

"Second time we protested, it was right outside Jacques Schnee's gates. Right on the SDC's doorstep. This time, they didn't bother with nonlethal methods. They called in their SchneeFall goons - their corporate cops," he simulated a deep breath, "Seven people, doc. Seven people died that day. Seven people. Protesters. Innocents. Atlas treated it like it was nothing."

Lavender sucked in a breath of her own. She knew that Atlas, before its fall, was a place of intolerance for the Faunus. Everyone knew. It wasn't unheard of to see a news story on the CCT talking about another young Faunus being shot by Atlesian police and the protests that followed afterwards. Those tragedies became common enough for them to feel normal, just another feature of the newsreel alongside quarterly reports and weather updates. It was horrible that such an event could be treated as if it were to be expected at this point, but it had been an unfortunate state of being for Atlas before it all burnt down to the ground.

"So that's why you hate Weiss..." she said after a long pause.

Harrower grunted, "Don't matter how much she may lie to everyone, to herself even. She's still got Schnee blood in her. In my mind, that makes her just as guilty as her old man."

"The sins of the father."

"You could say that."

Lavender couldn't say that she agreed with his notion. A person should be judged by their own merits, not by the actions, for good or bad, of others. For Harrower to say that he would make his judgements of Weiss based on that of her father... it left a poor taste in her mouth.

"I'm sorry," was all that she could say.

He huffed, "Why are you apologising? You had nothing to do with it," he paused, "After that, the White Wolves turned violent. My old folks signed up immediately. They loved it. I didn't. They treated me harshly for it. Forced me onto the frontlines before deciding that their time was better off serving with the Acolytes. Wanted to bring me along with them," he snorted, "Nice people they were, truly."

"...Is that," Lavender began, "Is that how you... became like that?" is that how he became a Techion?

"What, this? Nah," Harrower tapped his metal chest, "Grimm attacked us. I got mauled, my parents got killed," he shrugged, "These things happen, I guess."

"...Ah," Lavender averted her gaze, "I see... that is..."

"Anticlimactic? Fuck yeah, it is," Harrower seemed to have a tone of acceptance around himself, "But we get what we get. Can't do shit about that."

"...Yeah, that's true," Lavender admitted in turn, before asking him, "But why did you... why did you tell me this?"

He sucked in a breath, "Like I said, almost died a few days ago. Figured I'd make a change. Be more... open about shit, I guess."

"Hm," she hummed, "Well, that's a good place to start, I guess."

"Start what?"

"I don't know. That's your call," Lavender said to him. Harrower may not be terribly pleasant of a person to be around, but there were a few good points to him at least. They'd need to work on how he judged people, though, "Actually, if you would, you can see it as a chance to-"

{KNOCK KNOCK}

"-Eh?" Lavender paused as she looked to the door.

No one usually knocked.

She walked over to the door and slid it open, "Who is- oh, it's just you. Why are you here? You're needed down at the troop inspection. And have you seen Neon anywhere?"

"...Her?"

---

Jaune watched Morado and his council goons, accompanied by Ozpin and Glynda and Hazel, marched past former Hunter after former Hunter, giving them nods and shaking their hands in appreciation of their efforts, and sharing a few kind words with them as they passed.

Or as kind and considerate as Morado could manage. He remained as tight-lipped and blunt as ever, never saying anything more than he had to. It made for a telling image of the man. He could tell the others felt the same, as Ren and Nora, and even Eri above them, all gave him pointed looks.

Then, Morado was in front of Jaune.

He glared, and passed him without a word or thought.

Jaune glared back. The cheek of him, the absolute cheek.

His fists clenched, but he forced them to relax. Next to him, Melanie took Morado's hand with a healthy ounce of hesitation, Let it go Jaune, he thought to him, Just let it go. Morado will get his soon enough.

{BUZZ BUZZ}

His scroll vibrated on his wrist. None of the others noticed. He saw no harm in taking a look at whatever new message had been sent to him and-

What's New Pussy Katt:
help

"Shit," he said out loud. Before anyone could ask as to what he had just said, he screwed on his helmet and went, "I've got to go," he ran off without another word, Eri following behind him.

"Do all of your children act so undisciplined in the face of authority, or is that just him?" he heard Morado ask, but he didn't catch Ozpin's answer. He just reached the doors to the auditorium, forced them open and-

There, in the middle of the floor, pelted by the endless rain, was Neon Katt. Her body was writhing in agony and desperation. Her hand was clasped around her throat. Blood was seeping from her mouth. Her scroll fell out of her other hand and onto the floor, short-circuiting in the rain.

"SHIT! NEON!" Jaune cried out as he pushed all his aura into his hands and pressed them both into Neon's neck, flooding her with his semblance and aura and beginning the uncomfortable process of healing the slash around her neck – because someone had just slashed her neck, someone had tried to kill her – "Neon, what happened?! Who did this to you?!"

But he never got his answer, because what happened next would change his world forever.

---

"I killed her."

---

"Do all of your children act so undisciplined in the face of authority, or is that just him?"

Ozpin didn't like the connotations behind Morado's question, but gave his best answer, "Jaune Arc is a responsible Hunter. If he chose to leave this inspection in a hurry such as he has, he must have a good reason."

"I will have words with him later," ever reliable Glynda said as Morado moved from Sora Auburn to Esper Fyre, "I promise you that."

"See to it that you do," Ozpin was not fond of being treated so disparagingly like that by Morado.

It's what you deserve.

He was more aware of that than anyone else.

Morado took Esper's hand into his own and shook it. The Faunus with a temper let out a growl from her mouth, despite her smile, as Morado said to her, "You've done well, young one. Keep up the good fight."

"Been doing nothing but," the reptilian Faunus replied. There seemed to be a glow in her belly, "Good of you to come say hi to the people actually winning your war, though. Nice touch."

Morado gave no response, and Ozpin noticed Glynda shoot Esper a look before-

---

"Just as I will now kill you."

---

"SHIT! NEON!"

Everyone's heads turned to the auditorium doors as Jaune's voice echoed out from them. Morado moved his hand down, but Esper kept her clutched tightly around it.

Ozpin saw her mutter something. So did Morado as he asked, "What was that?"

"I said it's time to die."

"What do-"

The glow in Esper's stomach intensified and burst.

People screamed.

Guns were drawn.

Esper smiled.

Watts smiled as he turned his head.

Everything went white.

{KA-BOOM}

---

Reviewer response time:

ReDestrobo: Some threats come from within, and some from without. This phase of Ascendancy shall be the ultimate testament to that...

MilitiaMasker: Yeah, I think Esper might've beaten you to the punch on that one... or at least part of it.

bosterflaming: Yeah, in this universe, interacting with Grimm matter has a lot of awful side effects on the body, both Human and Faunus. It's a nasty way to go, but there are exceptions to the rules, after all. And yes, there are a lot of moving pieces, conflicting loyalties, and hidden agendas in the cast. Now a lot of them are coming to a head whilst others are beginning to build and bubble under the surface...

ZACK2357: Sí, nuestro detective favorito tendrá que tomar esa L bastante grande, ¿no es así? ¡Y gracias por las amables palabras! Estoy planeando hacer algunas historias cortas después de este capítulo solo para ponerme al día y entrar en el estado de ánimo de escribir para esta historia un poco más después de un descanso tan largo. Sí, Ruby tiene ideales en conflicto a ambos lados de ella y Melanie se ha visto obligada a debilitarse solo para mantenerse al día con todos los demás. No es ideal para nadie.

Guest: There's death flags for everyone, my friend!

Guest (again): Are you sure...?

---

Guess who's still alive!

Yep, it's me. Sorry that I've been gone for so long. I've been dealing with a lot of personal issues. I spent most of September writing out the first beginning chapters of a novel that I want to publish one day, and after that I had started my postgraduate course in University, only to be wracked with the most terrible anxieties and worries about this and that, such as getting a job after university, and what I am going to be doing with myself afterwards, seeing as I have no idea what I really want to do with my life other than becoming a writer and novelist.

So, I've decided to take a break from university for a year and start my studies again next September, when I can have a better mind and clearer image of what I want to be in the future. That means that I'll have to get a part-time job in the meantime in order to keep myself busy, but it should also mean that I'll be less stressed and more able to pump out quality work at more regular intervals.

So, yeah, there's all that. I'll be starting my studies again next September while I take this year off to recharge my batteries and recover mentally, working through all my anxieties and gaining some experiences in the workplace on top of that. It should be a good year, so hopefully I'll be able to come out of this as both a better writer and a person.

I could've told you all of this on an author's update, but I instead decided to be nice and write you guys a lovely little chapter to go along with it.

Also yes, I did use the Wellerman song at the beginning of this chapter. I like the Wellerman song. I think it's rather nifty.

You know, one of the hardest parts of this chapter wasn't anything to do with the writing or the action or the plot twists. It was to do with Velvet's sexuality. Like, I spent a good five to ten minutes alternating between making her bisexual or just as gay as Coco, constantly rewriting that damnable sentence because I was debating on whether or not to leave her as a possible love interest to Jaune, before I eventually settled on just having her be gay and leaving it at that. As much as I find the Scarlet Knight ship adorable, Jaune has enough love interests in this damn fic as it is.

(No harems, I promised myself that. No damn harems…)

It's a silly thing to get hung over about, but that's just what being a writer is all about: you can't help but get hung up on the smaller details, and it's in the smaller details that you might change an entire story from this to that.

That's the butterfly effect for you. One small even sends everything crashing down around you.

So yes, I decided to make Velvet a lesbian. If I ever decide against this I'll just go back and change it. No harm no fuss.

I have no idea why I'm going into so much detail about this. I'm just rambling at this point.

So yep, that another chapter done and dusted, and with so many pieces now rapidly moving into place. Who's the traitor in Beacon? Who survived Esper's explosive performance? What will become of our heroes (and villains) now?

Stay tuned to find out, and on that note, please leave a review, follow and favourite, and with that all done and dusted, stay safe, stay healthy, and I shall see you all next time!

Titanmaster 117 out!