- To Serve With Honor -
Pain. Jaune's worldview could currently be summarized simply as Pain.
The sensation could be compared to a cross between a continuously inflicted third-degree sunburn and being gut-checked several times in rapid succession by a battering ram.
'Still not the worst pain I've had to deal with,' his subconscious mind had to grudgingly admit. That honor went to being shot in the face with his own shotgun without the benefit of Aura, and then being brutally butt-stroked upside the head by the stock of the same weapon. 'Heh… butt-stroke. I'll never understand how the military can use that as a serious term,' he continued to ponder drunkenly.
After what felt like several hours of every nerve ending in his skin being subjected to hellfire, the blood in his ears finally subsided enough that he was able to register gunfire and screaming.
'Oh, right… I got ambushed. Again. Wonder how the Doc's handling it.'
At some point during his first bout of being thrown around like one of the dolls that his sister Auburn liked to throw at his head in his childhood, Jaune had seen Doctor Nathaniel Grey disappearing beneath the rocky spires produced by the same pair of Rock Dust missiles that had sent him flying.
'... Eh. He's probably fine.'
Absently, he finally registered some sensation other than pain in his dominant arm, and immediately patted blindly for the holster in his waistband. His Atlas Military standard-issue ten-millimeter pistol was present and apparently undamaged. His mind quickly performed some simple Legionnaire math.
'I have one in the chamber, a full mag in the gun, and another mag in my pocket. How many Zealots can I kill today?'
He tried to move his other arm, only to be met by an instantaneous lightning bolt of agony.
'... Okay, so I'm working with a one-arm handicap. Best case is all of them, worst case is none of them, most likely case is three of them. I can work with this.'
Jaune finally opened his eyes and realized that he was partially buried in the rubble of one of the transit plaza's stone benches. Dying fires from the Zealots' follow-through Inferno Dust missiles dotted his immediate surroundings, crackling and licking at his dim, flickering Aura.
'The rocks and smoke are probably the only reasons why their sniper hasn't popped me yet.'
Through the flashes of recollection as his mind processed the events of the previous minutes, and the slowly dulling pain permeating his entire body; Jaune smiled a thin, wry little smile of nostalgia. Finally, something in his life was familiar again.
'Gods, I'm just a broken excuse for a human being, aren't I?' He pondered this for a moment, and quickly concluded that if being "broken" meant that he would continue to live for the foreseeable future, then he could live with it for now.
Rapid footfalls cut through the ringing in his ears, and a shadow fell over his sprawled form; someone shifted the rocks resting on his chest and obscuring his face.
Jaune's pistol snapped up as soon as his eyes met daylight.
A thoroughly harried man in a charcoal suit and fedora, a crimson necktie, and crimson sunglasses immediately raised his hands in surrender. "Ijustwantedtohelppleasedon'tkillme," the stranger babbled rapidly, taking a half-step back.
"Are you with the White Fang?" Jaune demanded, though some of the gravitas was lost as his dry (and probably partially crushed) throat caused his voice to crack partway through.
"No, no!" the man denied vehemently, "We got word of an attack and our boss sent us out to try and catch the animals that were responsible! I'm with the Red Axe Gang!"
"I feel like that's not something that you should be admitting to an Atlas Specialist," Jaune observed with a small, wry grin. His would-be savior paled further, and Jaune barked a short laugh that turned into a harsh cough. "Relax; I'm not the ungrateful sort. Tell me what's happening."
"We need to get out of the plaza," the gangster responded, sweat beading visibly on the man's brow as he stooped down to pull the remaining rocks from Jaune's legs. "Our guys have spotted where the animals fired from, but we don't know if all of them have started running yet - we need to get into cover before one of them sees us and decides to finish the job!"
"Take a fucking breath, man," Jaune rumbled, slowly pushing his torso upright and brushing off his shirt and pants with his one good hand. "Panic is going to draw attention and get you shot sooner. Where's the nearest solid cover?"
"There's an alley about twenty meters behind you," the gangster stated as he helped pull Jaune into a crouch. "Can you walk?"
"I'm a soldier; I could pull myself out of a firefight with my two front teeth if that's what it takes."
A moment of confused silence fell, and the Specialist sighed.
"People in Vale have no sense of humor," Jaune grumbled. "Lead on, I'll get there."
The gangster nodded and tried to throw Jaune's arm over his shoulders, only to physically leap away at Jaune's roar of pain.
"Not. That. Arm," the Specialist hissed venomously.
The Red Axe thug nodded, and gingerly moved over to Jaune's other side to try the other arm; once they had settled, the pair started hobbling towards the alleyway rapidly.
The crack of a marksman's rifle drowned out the din of the plaza for an instant, and Jaune swore loudly again as he felt the impact squarely between his shoulder blades; the force of the bullet nearly tore him from his feet, but his Aura barely held.
He spotted two more gangsters at the alleyway entrance ahead waving them forward, machine pistols in hand.
"STOP WAVING AND SHOOT BACK, ASSHOLES!" Jaune roared; the two men started and fumbled, but quickly took up their weapons and started spraying small-caliber rounds over his head at the buildings on the opposite side of the plaza.
Jaune and his escort skirted around the pair and stumbled into the alley; the Specialist was quick to step aside and hug the wall, and the pavers just past his previous position shattered under another sniper's bullet. Adrenaline started to give way to exhaustion, and his breaths slowed down to deep, greedy heaves of fresh air.
"There were shooters on this side of the plaza as well," Jaune growled at the gangster in between bouts of panting, "Have they been dealt with?"
Instead of replying, the man pressed himself against the same wall as Jaune and fumbled for his Scroll. Shaky hands and soft curses led to a call, which connected after three rings. "It's Marko, I'm on the north side of the Transit Plaza - have those rats in the Mountainview Apartments been dealt with yet?"
The response was unintelligible to Jaune over the gunfire, but he could guess from the gangster's scowl that it was bad news. "Well call for more fucking backup! Get the damned Twins or something, we need to wrap this up and make tracks fast!"
The Scroll closed and was shoved back into a pocket in Marko's suit coat; the man's other gloved hand came up to wipe the sweat from his forehead.
"You realize that these are the same terrorist fighters that've been fighting the militaries of Atlas and Mantle to a standstill for the last thirty years," Jaune rasped dryly. "They're extensively trained and practiced in urban warfare, and they're a lot less merciful than the police or government troops."
"Yeah, well, our guys know this area like the backs of their hands," Marko retorted half-heartedly - his nerves still showed through at the prospect of fighting militants. "Are you gonna be alright on your own?"
Jaune responded by awkwardly unfastening his belt from his waist single-handedly, earning a startled look from the gangster; the look went away when he threw the belt around his neck and then fumbled to cinch it around his arm as an improvised sling. Once that was taken care of, the Specialist threw Marko an amused smirk.
"I should be asking you that; because I'm gonna take this pistol, walk into that building, and take at least one of these assholes alive for interrogation."
Marko could only stare for several seconds.
"You Atlesians are fucking lunatics," the gangster finally concluded. Jaune scowled faintly.
"I'm Mantlese, but I take your point. Now are you coming or not?"
Pax huddled closer to the wall as more bullets ripped upwards and crashed into the underside of the concrete stair landing above. "We're boxed in," he said wryly, though his nerves still slipped through as he gritted his teeth.
"We're out of frags," one of the rocketeers added, "And an Inferno would take out everybody in this whole damn stairway, present company included."
Sergeant Tajra responded by turning around, kicking in the emergency door on the landing that they occupied, and hosing down the hallway beyond with automatic carbine fire. "We're either crossing to the other stairwell, or we're finding a window that we can jump out of," the Zealot ordered.
Pax laughed uncertainly, and then stopped when no one joined him. "Fuck," he swore softly in resignation.
The fireteam broke from the stairs into the building's second floor, with the last man out firing a burst down the stairs to discourage would-be pursuers. They entered an identically-laid-out area to their previous roost; only this floor was stuffed to the gills with cowering office workers, who immediately cried out in terror when Poof and Tajra burst into the room.
The team did not slow from their dead sprint; on the run, however, the second rocketeer fired a short burst of gunfire into the ceiling.
"SHUT UP AND STAY WHERE YOU ARE AND NOBODY GETS HURT!"
And even as he finished speaking, the team had crossed the entire office and entered the next hallway.
"Immaculate diplomacy, Private," Tajra deadpanned; Pax couldn't tell whether she was being sarcastic.
"Thank you, Sergeant." Nobody else could tell either, apparently.
Twenty seconds later, the fireteam hit the double doors to the main stairs. The rocketeers took point, and the rest of the team stacked up on either side as they kicked the doors open.
The doors nearly crashed into three surprised Red Axe thugs, who were only off-guard for a second before they raised a handgun, a machine pistol, and a sawn-off shotgun.
The Zealots were faster, dropped two of the gangsters with carbine fire before throwing themselves aside. Tajra herself followed through by swinging around the corner with her rifle reversed in her grip; the butt of the weapon caught the man in a fierce uppercut, knocking him back into the banister of the ornate spiral staircase beyond.
Without missing a beat, the Sergeant pressed her attack. Her rifle fell to her side by its sling, and she delivered a vicious haymaker to the gangster's chin, stunning him; she then stooped low, seized his legs, and lifted him bodily over the banister, where after he could only utter a short cry as he tumbled out of view. All that followed was the sound of a sickening crunch down below.
Tajra cracked her knuckles and glanced back over her shoulder. "Somebody grab that shotgun."
Pax gulped and kicked the weapon over to Poof, who picked it up with a nod of acknowledgement.
The team pressed on.
"We've got them boxed into an apartment on this floor," one of the dozen Red Axe gangsters waiting outside of the stairwell reported and Jaune and Marko entered, shutting the fire door behind them.
"How many are there?" Jaune demanded immediately, earning a puzzled scowl from the original speaker.
"He's with us," Marko said simply when the others looked to him. "Spit it out."
"There's at least four in this building," the first man finally grunted. "They've killed six of our guys so far. Boss ain't gonna be happy unless we bring all four of 'em back before the bodies have cooled."
"You're leaving at least one of them alive," Jaune growled, moving to well within arm's reach of the mobster and pressing a finger from his good hand into the man's chest. "These fuckers did all of this just to kill me, so it's my responsibility to see that something good comes of this clusterfuck."
"And who the fuck are you, exactly?" the Red Axe man shot back, undaunted.
"I'm an Atlas Military Specialist," Jaune deadpanned.
The gangster predictably flinched, but otherwise reacted less than Marko had. "Well that'd explain that," the man commented wryly. "Are you really in any shape to be taking on a squad of terrorists with a broken arm, though?"
"It's only a fireteam," the Specialist gestured dismissively with his good arm. "They're good, but so am I; and you guys should be just enough to tip the scales."
The other man rolled his eyes but nodded shortly. "Let's just get this over with; we need to clear our people out before the cops finally show up."
Jaws gritted his eponymous teeth as he shoved his last magazine into the well of his carbine as he surveyed the scene. He was currently seated on a throw rug facing the south window of a third-floor apartment, his back pressed against the back of a sofa.
He craned his neck to peer around his concealment and noted two of his team crouched in an offshoot hallway leading to a bathroom; one was applying sloppy battlefield first aid to the other's twin gut wounds from heavy pistol rounds.
The wounded man probably wouldn't survive the night if they didn't all get out of this damned apartment within the next two minutes.
The last member of the team was pressed into the corner adjacent to the front door of the apartment; the burly man was down to his sidearm in one hand, and a wicked-looking machete in the other.
"Actual, Chalk Three," Jaws growled softly into his earpiece, "We're pinned into a south-facing apartment on the third floor by ten-plus hostiles. We have one wounded, and we're almost out of ammo; please advise."
The connection crackled for far too long. Finally, Tajra delivered their sentence.
"Be advised, Three, we are no longer in position to render assistance. Fight your way out; if this is not feasible, none of you are to be captured alive."
The wounded man across the room with the only other earpiece in the chalk uttered a quiet cry of dismay and then began to sob softly. Whether it was from pain or resignation was not for them to judge.
Instead, Jaws plucked the earpiece from his ear, and crushed it in his grip with a primal snarl.
"Situation Zeta," he called to the others. "Fight like hell until you can't fight anymore."
"Abandoned and going out against a bunch of fucking gangsters in the middle of a foreign Kingdom," the man by the door rumbled discontentedly. "This is just fucking humiliating."
"Hey, who knows," the man tending to the wounded offered distractedly, "Maybe the Legionnaire survived and we'll get to deal with him instead."
At that moment, the door to the apartment flew off its hinges in a ballistic arc clear across the room, crashing against the other side of Jaws's sofa. The impact jostled him into action, and he leapt up and began dumping his magazine into the open doorway; only to stop after a second when he noted that no one was there.
Instead, the man by the doorway was thrown bodily across the room in the same fashion as the door when the wall beside him detonated spectacularly. Unlike the door, however, the sofa wasn't in the right place to stop his flight; and instead, the unfortunate Zealot crashed through a picture window and went screaming to the plaza three stories below.
From the gap, the Legionnaire and a gaggle of mobsters poured into the apartment, with the former dumping a full magazine from a pistol into Jaws's upper body. The Zealot's Aura held for the first half of the volley, and he squeezed off a burst in return; but this protection gave out just as Amsel's kicked in, and a trio of ten-millimeter Full Metal Jacket rounds ripped through the front of Jaws's body armor, only to be stopped by the back plate and left to bounce around and wreak havoc inside of his torso.
As Jaws slumped lifelessly over the front of the sofa, the remaining two Zealots were forcibly relieved of their weapons by Red Axe gangsters.
"Get them up," Jaune ordered tersely, "We can't hang around here; they're missing their missile launchers, which means that those are somewhere else in this building rigged with Burn Dust explosives that could go at any second."
That bit of news instilled some urgency into the mobsters, and the group was out in the hall and hustling the captured terrorists to the stairwell in mere moments.
Not a moment too soon it would seem, as two things happened behind them: An Inferno Dust missile impacted in the apartment that they had just vacated; and that blast triggered the Burn Dust charges on the floor of the apartment directly above.
These two factors culminated in a frankly distressing amount of fire, which Jaune keenly felt licking at the back of his neck as he seized the wounded Zealot and took over hauling the man bodily down the stairs.
"No joy," Poof reported as she lowered her rifle's detached scope. "We've got one laid out on the plaza, probably dead from the fall; Jaws died from the breaching action; and the last two were seized and moved out before the missile hit. Amsel's alive, and now he has two of ours."
"Taurus is going to fucking filet us," Tajra half-moaned, half-hissed. "We're out one full chalk with nothing but property damage and dead civilians to show for it."
"Well shouldn't we go back and at least keep trying to stop him then?!" Pax demanded incredulously, even as he sweated nervously out of fear of both his present company, and of the impending lashing that they'd all apparently be receiving from the Commander.
"Rover's got the right idea," one of the rocketeers noted gravely, "I think I like the idea of dying in combat a lot better than getting shish-kabobbed by Adam Taurus, or messily dismembered by the Banesaw."
"Use your fucking brains, you suicidal morons," Tajra shot back, "The Commander only brought a platoon of us from Mantle, and the High Leader made it unequivocally clear that we're not going to be getting reinforcements. I want to kill this asshole as much as the rest of you, but at this point we need to quit while we're behind so that we keep working to get the Vale troops up to snuff for the rest of the campaign. We'll have other opportunities to kill Amsel now that we've got a face to his name."
The rest of the chalk fell silent, and Poof finished packing up her rifle. With that, Tajra turned to Pax.
"If we run into any resistance along the primary exfil, we'll need to assume that our entire route is burned," the Sergeant bit out. "If that happens, you need to be ready to take point and lead us out of whatever shitstorm we might find ourselves in. Understood?"
"Understood, Sergeant," Pax nodded hastily, shouldering his carbine.
Tajra grunted in satisfaction and shouldered her own weapon. "Move out."
Jaune was pleasantly surprised to find himself not being shot at as he exited the burning apartment complex with his prisoner in-hand. The scattered shots and streams of exchanged gunfire had faded, and now the Red Axe Gang and their once-ubiquitous uniforms were disappearing from the square rapidly.
"We'll leave the man in the square for the cops," the gangster that led the assault on the third floor grunted to him, "But we're taking the other body and the intact conscious one; the wounded man is yours."
"If he dies before I can get him medical, I'm coming after you guys to get your prisoner," Jaune responded over his shoulder, accompanied by a dark look of warning.
"And we'll give him to you no later than two days after we hear that yours has died," the man raised his hands in submission, though his continued disgruntled expression made the gesture somewhat disingenuous. "But our boss needs to find out who we need to go after or shake down to get reparations for these damages."
Jaune sharply bit down on an aggressive protest. His position with the police was tenuous at best, so alienating a prominent local third party was not in his interest if the VPD turned out to be a dead end at some point in the future.
"Can you at least tell me where I can find you guys if I need to get in touch?" he asked in a reluctant growl.
"Come to the nightclub in the Eastern Industrial District, on the south side of the Route Four underpass," the gangster rattled off. "Ask for Marko over there and mention the attack at the Commercial Transit Port, and you'll be seen by whoever's on hand. Make sure you come during business hours and be discreet."
"Alright," Jaune nodded, adjusted his hold on the wounded man, and turned to head towards the arriving first responders.
"Thanks," the gangster called reluctantly from behind him, "Would've been a lot more trouble without you."
Jaune chose not to respond, and the Red Axe Gang finally disappeared completely from the scene as the police finished setting up their cordon and the fire crews continued battling the dwindling Dust-fueled flames that danced on the cobbles and within the neighboring buildings.
"Wouldn't have been any trouble without me," he muttered to himself; he then fell silent as a pair of SWAT officers and paramedics approached him.
After setting the autopilot to touch down in the grass beside the airship terminal, Winter leapt from her personal Skyhawk transport while it was still roughly twenty meters in the air and turning over the plaza to descend.
Smoothing her descent with a Gravity Glyph, she touched down amidst the crowd of startled firefighters and police officers and transitioned seamlessly into swift strides towards her target: An armored VPD ambulance that contained both her partner and his prisoner.
The crowd finally parted enough for her to catch a glimpse of Jaune perched in the rear doorway of the ambulance, his body turned at an angle to where the medics could treat the burns on his face, and so that he could keep one eye on the unconscious Zealot strapped to the internal bed at the same time.
"I can't take you anywhere, and apparently I can't let you go anymore on your own, either," Winter greeted.
Jaune turned to fix her with a wry sideways glance, which had the fortunate benefit of not showing her the light burns spattered across the side of his face. "I know, I know, I'm just a menace. Please, apologize to society on my behalf."
In response, Winter waved one of the medics aside and stepped forward; she took a hold of Jaune's chin and turned his face towards her, and she took in the new burns and old scars on his visage. His expression fell into nervous impassivity.
She offered a short hum. "You know, I think you've taken that archaic "women love a man with scars" assertion a bit too seriously."
"Well, I suppose that's another bit of bad advice to thank Dad for," he replied with a faint quirk of his lips. It fell away swiftly as Winter offered a decidedly sour look at the reminder of his father's existence. "I got you a present?" he tried instead.
"I noticed," she stated flatly. "The question is, is it a pet bird, or a dead bird?"
"We'll find out within the next few hours," one of the police medics inside the ambulance chimed in from the unconscious Zealot's bedside, "At the Headmaster's insistence, he'll be transferred to Beacon as soon as we can stabilize him, where he'll be treated by whatever vetted medical professionals that you folks can get your hands on."
"I'm surprised that Chief Reagan would pass up that kind of windfall," Winter observed with a quirk of her brow.
"The Chief's apparently stuck in a tedious and thoroughly unpleasant meeting with his VDF liaison, and they've been trying since the attack started to hash out whether paramilitary terrorists from Mantle would qualify as international criminals, international terrorists, or prisoners of war," the medic counted off the three on his fingers. "Professor Ozpin was kind enough to offer to hold the prisoner under Huntsman and military guard at Beacon while all of the concerns of jurisdiction are being sorted out."
"Clever," Jaune noted mildly, "Very clever."
"You'll probably only have him for two or three days tops before the Defense Force or the Council demands that he be remanded to custody somewhere in Vale proper," a SWAT officer added, rounding the side of the ambulance and leaning against the open door. "Better make good use of the time that old Oz has bought you."
"We'll do just that," Winter promised, before turning fully to the officer with a look of consternation. "So how is it that a troop of gangsters beat Vale's Finest to the scene of a terror attack?"
The man, whose eyes and nose were hidden by a tinted visor, made his feelings clear with a deep grimace. "There was a bombing across town in Industrial ten minutes prior," he grumbled. "Our first response teams were already en route to that scene when the call came in from the Transit Authority. We had to mobilize reserve officers to respond here because we weren't clear immediately on whether this was another bombing or a first-strike-style attack, so we couldn't justify redirecting deployed teams immediately."
"Do Atlas and the VDF not have units ready to respond to the Transit Authority, considering that they have troops stationed here?" Jaune asked with genuine curiosity.
The SWAT man shook his head. "The troops on-duty here from the VDF are Reservists who rotate through the airship stations in one-week-shifts as a part of their annual service commitments," he said, folding his arms over his plate carrier. "As for Atlas, well. The soldiers they have stationed here are some of the only regular military troops in Vale, apart from a handful of officers attached to the security garrison at the CCT; so, I think these guys are just shit out of luck by design."
Jaune and Winter let out of matching noises of disdain.
"We'll need to address this to the General when he calls," Winter muttered, her mouth set in a tight line at the prospect.
Her Scroll chimed at that moment. "In any case," she sighed, drawing the device and glancing over the message, "We've just been ordered to escort the prisoner back to Beacon as soon as possible so that we can turn over security to Ozpin."
The officer offered a short sympathetic grunt and pushed himself off the door to stand fully upright. "You'll be hearing from Detective Rojas or one of her other detectives within the next few days," he said with a pointed look at Jaune.
"You know where I'll be," Jaune replied resignedly. He climbed down from his perch in the ambulance and gingerly rotated the arm that the paramedic had popped back into place a few minutes ago. "I'll bring the Skyhawk around. Can you guys pull this thing up to the terminal so that we're not unloading in the open?"
"I've just about got the bleeding stemmed, so that shouldn't be a problem," the medic in the back answered. "Your friend, the Doctor, just came to in the other ambulance as well, so he should be a big help in keeping the poor bastard alive as well."
"Great. Let's get a move on before the rest of those Zealots realize that they'd rather have another shot at me than report their failure to Taurus."
- To Serve With Honor -
After nearly two harrowing hours of ducking, dodging, and doubling back to shake off their gangster and police pursuers, Chalk One finally stumbled into a basement on the west end of the Residential District. Chalks Two and Four were already present, with Tock bent over an old commercial radio set holding the receiver to his ear as he communicated with their handlers for the operation.
Tajra glanced around the space, taking stock of their numbers, and frowned. "Is this everyone?"
Zipper nodded solemnly. "Chalk Three's been wiped to the last man; everyone else made it out."
Pax felt his heart drop below his stomach as Tajra let out a heavy sigh. The loss of Chalk Three, the second-largest chalk in the strike force at four men, meant that they were down to just about two-thirds of their original fighting strength; Chalk One was the largest at five, while Two and Four were only two strong each as the comms and security teams, respectively.
Tock chose that moment to turn and fix the Sergeant with a grave expression. "Commander Taurus for you, Sergeant," he said flatly.
As she moved over to the radio, Pax ambled over to where most of Chalks Two and Four had planted themselves, and slumped bonelessly down the wall to rest his head on his knees.
"This is so fucked," the sole Valean in the squad whispered hoarsely.
"Aye," one of the others agreed, the man lying flat on the concrete floor with his hands resting on either side of his mask. "We spent too much time on the 'X'; we should've pulled out after the second volley instead of sticking around to shoot up the terminal. We'd have been out of the buildings and on the move before those gangsters had even shown up."
"We shouldn't have been out there in the first place," one of the others argued in a defeated tone, "We should've scoped the fucker out and hit him from ground level in a more secluded location away from the terminal; the bastard only had a fucking pistol, we could've taken him in a godsdamned alleyway, maybe even taken him alive."
"He had that plus-one that we never identified," someone else interjected, "Who's to say that he wasn't a Huntsman?"
The chatter died abruptly as Tajra approached the cluster, kicking the one man lying on the floor lightly in the shoulder. "The plus-one was Beacon Academy's resident physician," she reported flatly, "He's also a ten-year veteran of the Vale Defense Force, as well as an outspoken proponent of universal merit-based workers' rights. His brother heads one of the largest international mercy missions in Remnant, one that's been fighting Atlas for decades for relief access to Mantle."
There was a collective wince across the group. "Commander's not happy, is he?" someone asked rhetorically.
"We're to report back to HQ within three hours for debrief and an after-action review," the Sergeant stated without answering. "Take five minutes to hydrate and muster your gear; we're moving the rest of the way through the sewers."
There was a collective groan of dismay. "Commander's not happy," the previous smartass affirmed to Pax in a whisper.
As predicted, the trek back through the sewer was a punishment in and of itself, particularly for those among the squad with keen senses of smell. The route had them traversing nearly five kilometers of these tunnels, and by the time they crawled out of the sewer access in their headquarters building, many of the squad were on the verge of passing out. As it is, three of the men climbed out of the hole and immediately made for corners or trash cans to empty their guts into.
Pax was the last to transition from the sewer to the warehouse area. He glanced around the space and noted the curious looks of several of his Valean comrades who were standing guard or moving cargo in the vicinity.
A familiar authoritative roar ended this curiosity swiftly. "SQUAD!" the Lieutenant boomed from across the space, "ON ME!"
The Zealots executed a dignified scramble to form two ranks in front of the officer. As soon as they did so, the group froze up collectively when Commander Taurus appeared from a nearby doorway, his posture vaguely slouched, and his hands clasped behind his back.
The Commander ambled slowly and deliberately to the head of the formation, with the Lieutenant taking a few steps to the side to offer his position to his superior.
Adam looked up and down the ranks, a weary expression hidden by his omnipresent mask, but still apparent from the thin line of his mouth. His gaze also swept over the many curious faces in the background, where several of the Valean members were doing their best to unobtrusively linger and catch whatever they could of the impending debrief.
"Briefing Room Two," the Commander finally intoned, "Three minutes - get there. Dismissed."
Grateful to be spared a public tongue-lashing, the Zealot team plus Pax fell out and double-timed into the back hallways towards the designated room.
Behind them, as the Lieutenant fell in at his shoulder and shot a sharp reprimand at the loiterers in the warehouse, Adam sighed heavily and allowed his face to fall into one hand as the other rested on his hip.
"Sir," Boris offered a soft warning as he moved to block Adam from the rest of the room's view.
"Let me have one fucking moment," Adam snarled back quietly, though he did straighten up and make for the door to the hallway.
Once they had reached the safety of the halls, the Commander sighed again, this time with a faint rumble of frustration. "I should've gone myself," he stated flatly.
"You're not just a team leader anymore," Boris replied in an equally flat tone as he played the voice of reason, "You're the Chapter Commander now. We can't lose you for a week at a time while you're holed up with a QRF in some secluded safehouse."
"The whole plan was half-baked in the first place," Adam started ranting, "Thirteen troopers and four fucking rocket launchers - what the fuck was I thinking?! He's not some regular drone hiding behind a suit of armor anymore, he might as well be a godsdamned Huntsman! I already knew how much Aura he had from the fact that he was able to eat one of my strongest attacks and walk away!"
The Commander stopped and pivoted on a dime and put his whole arm through the nearest wall with a choked shout of rage. After a moment of consideration, he withdrew his arm, dusted the plaster and splinters from his sleeve, and carried on as if nothing happened, albeit with a deeper scowl than before.
"I got careless and set my men up for failure from square one. I played right into that bastard's hands."
"I doubt it," Boris was finally able to interject. "I doubt that Amsel was even anticipating a direct assassination attempt like this, considering how unprepared we caught him. The circumstances and our own tactics were our downfall, not the objective in itself."
"We'll never catch him alone and outgunned like this again," Adam growled, "He knows that I see him as a threat, and now he'll do everything in his power to make himself into the single greatest pain in my ass of this entire campaign. And Vale and Atlas will think that we're scared of him, and they'll give him a blank fucking check to do so."
"I think you might be overestimating the military abilities of politicians," Boris muttered. "It's more likely - especially considering their response to his actions during the ambush - that Vale's leaders will see Amsel as a magnet for conflict and bloodshed and do everything in their power to keep him sequestered out of the public eye and out of our reach. If we do not pursue him any further beyond now, we might be able to fuel that misconception and remove one variable from this equation for the future."
"That's just plain idiotic," Adam snorted derisively, before pausing and then sighing in disappointment, "And yet you're probably right."
"Never underestimate the capacity for civilian bureaucrats to hamper military expediency through politics," the Lieutenant stated sagely.
"That still leaves us with four men dead or missing, a load of collateral damages, and a witness from the Vale branch," the Commander pointed out with a grimace. "Can we keep Pax from talking until we can run spin control?"
"Sure," Boris drawled back, "We can also alienate the entire Vale chapter in one fell swoop and turn our trickle of disillusioned deserters into a landslide of conscientious objectors." Adam swore venomously at that.
"You said he has family from Mantle?"
"He has an uncle - no blood relation - who fled from Mantle twenty years ago to escape the conflict after his wife and children were killed by a series of Legion raids and White Fang reprisals. He also has his mother whom he supports financially, and several young ones in his neighborhood whom he looks after. I don't think Pax even realizes his own influence in the community," Boris summarized with a short frown. "I appreciate the stabilizing presence he brings to his unit, but he'll be problematic if he chooses to speak out against our tactics."
"He gets on well with my troops," Adam noted, "Tajra said that he meshed with the strike team from the get-go; his opposition could be damaging to their morale, on top of the disaster that this operation has already turned out to be."
The Lieutenant released a heavy sigh and scratched at the back of his neck while his other hand rested on his hip. "... I'm not in the business of 'disposing of' my troops, Adam," the man finally muttered.
"Despite my apparent reputation, I was not going to propose that," Adam snapped back instantly with a deep scowl, "I don't murder my own brothers and sisters for disagreeing with my methods."
"... So then that business with Sokolov?" Boris asked quietly.
"Sokolov. Was. A. Traitor," Adam bit out each syllable with a rumble, audibly repressing a growl, "He was stealing intelligence documents and preparing to sell us out to Atlas for protection - how in the hell was I supposed to know that he had an accomplice? Furthermore, how was I supposed to expect that said accomplice would be in place to document his unscheduled execution and release it without context for Atlas to use as propaganda?!"
Boris wordlessly raised his hands in a placating gesture, and Adam bit down on his remaining frustration, opting to stalk in silence for the remaining distance to the briefing room. But when the doorway came into view, the Lieutenant added his final two cents.
"You brought a reputation with you from Solitas - or at least, you brought most of your notoriety. You need to decide if you want to embrace and leverage that fear, or if you want to try to build a different image for yourself."
Adam made a small noise of dismissal; but his eyes were cloudy and distant, up until he pushed open the door to the briefing room and re-centered himself.
Someone inside had called the room to attention, and eight of the nine remaining members of the strike team stiffly held this position and faced the front of the room; while Tajra, as the ranking fighter in the room, stood at attention facing Adam and the Lieutenant.
"Seats," Adam rumbled, and the squad swiftly plopped back into their metal folding chairs.
Boris took the outer perimeter of the room and ambled to the front, while Adam paced deliberately up the center aisle. Wilt and Blush were tucked into his belt and clacked softly against his leg with each step. Despite the Zealots and sole Valean awaiting his first words with bated breath and beading sweat, the Commander held his silence as he reached the board at the front and stopped and pivoted on his heel beside the Lieutenant.
Even as his veiled blank stare swept across the room, the wheels in Adam's head were spinning furiously, accompanied by prolific internal swearing.
After a solid minute of waiting, in which the looks from the squad were becoming increasingly less concerned and more puzzled, the young Commander finally sighed and collapsed back into a waiting chair, his face falling into one hand.
"Alright, look," he said flatly with a knife-hand gesture at his audience, "Nothing about today has gone right. For anyone. So first off, I would like to put your immediate worries to bed by saying that none of you will be punished in any fashion for the events which transpired this morning. Considering that four of our brothers already won't be returning home, I'd say that even if punishment was warranted, you've already been punished enough."
A collective sigh and a few quiet, hysterical laughs of relief rose from the strike force, and Adam felt himself twitch involuntarily at the idea that his troops feared for their lives in his presence for failure that they could barely be held responsible for under the circumstances.
"There were flaws with how this operation was arranged, as well as a few in how it was executed," he continued, causing the assembly to straighten back up. "For the sake of posterity, we're going to break the operation down piece-by-piece so that we can all take something constructive away from this."
Adam stopped, and glanced around the crowd to some uncertain faces. "But before we get stuck in on that… If anyone has any questions or anything that they want to get out onto the floor immediately, then speak now or hold your peace."
Another weighty silence fell, and a few faces in the group twisted up uncertainly.
He allowed a few beats to pass before nodding. "So," he clapped his hands once, "Let's run it back. First mistake of the operation: Go."
"We were improperly equipped for dealing with a single foot-mobile target with Aura," Poof said immediately.
"Valid," Adam nodded, "Your equipment would have been at least sufficient for a normal Legionnaire; however, the loadout failed to account for the target's strong Aura. Next."
"The unit's positions were too spread out for our strength and firepower," Tajra acknowledged grudgingly, "We were unable to render proper fire support for one another, particularly once we initiated the withdrawal."
"Correct," the Lieutenant responded this time, "A maximum of two positions consisting each of half of the force would've allowed the whole unit to not only support one another, but also to conduct proper security in your respective positions to expedite your withdrawal."
"Next," Adam pressed. There was a moment of silence, and he took that chance to chime in for himself. "Time on target. The unit overcommitted and remained in its initial positions for too long after the first volley; the withdrawal should have been initiated immediately upon the first shots being fired, so that by the second and final volley, at least part of the unit would already have been on the move and securing a ground-level evacuation point."
"Acknowledged," Tajra grumbled.
"Anyone else?" the Lieutenant prompted.
"Collateral damage," Pax whispered more to himself than anything, earning looks from the two officers at the front of the room. "Collateral damage," he repeated for them to hear, "The soldiers providing security for the terminal could be considered valid targets; but the other disembarking passengers, as well as the civilians caught in the plaza by the Inferno rockets, were purely collateral and are very difficult to justify."
A tense silence hung in the air as the other members of the strike force looked between their Valean attaché and their commanders.
Finally, Adam offered a slow nod. "... Valid," he admitted with an uncharacteristic hesitancy; but he offered no further elaboration, prompting the Lieutenant to pick up the slack.
"The collateral in terms of both loss of life and property damage is likely what prompted the intervention of the Red Axe Gang," he rumbled grudgingly. "Had the unit focused its fire on the target alone, they very well could've been more concerned upon arrival with search and rescue, rather than pressing an engagement against our forces."
Pax offered a faint nod of satisfaction and took his seat; but as he looked around, he noted a bevy of uncertain and begrudging looks being thrown his way by the rest of the strike force. Tajra was sending him a masked stare that radiated her disapproval.
Sensing an end to the teardown phase of the debrief, Adam took to his feet and paced over to stand front-and-center of the whiteboard. "Taking all of this to mind, and considering the losses sustained to our already-limited manpower, we will be making no further targeted strikes against Amsel using our own forces," he announced, causing some shuffling and whispered discontent from the crowd. "The decision is final," he pressed more forcefully, cutting off the whispers and setting the group unconsciously to 'seats attention.'
"This order comes with the word of the High Leader," the Lieutenant boomed. "The Mistral Headquarters intends to send an emissary to try and open up talks with the civilian government of Vale; meaning that as of their arrival, further egregious casualties amongst the civilian population would only hurt our political position going forward."
"On top of that, it's very likely - based on recent decisions from the Vale Police - that Amsel's movements within the Kingdom will be heavily restricted and guarded where necessary, meaning that another targeted strike of any sort would come with costs in equipment and manpower that we're not prepared to pay for one target," Adam concluded, though the scowl on his face was proof enough of his discontent with the decision.
"Instead, we'll be focusing our resources on existing objectives - public outreach and strikes against other legitimate targets within the Kingdom-proper. On top of that, we'll need to divert part of our information apparatus to locating our captured trooper."
That caught the room's attention, and Tajra let out an involuntary noise of confusion. When it drew attention to her, she hastily stated, "Sir, I was under the impression that our only captured trooper would be in the military's hands."
"Van was taken alive but wounded; and yes, he was transferred to Beacon Academy to be put under Huntsmen and military guard," Adam nodded. "However, we've confirmed from the scene that the only other member of Chalk Three that wasn't confirmed dead - Snipe - was not taken into custody of any agency of Vale. Based on this, we can only assume at this time that he's either gone to ground and is waiting to return once he's shaken any pursuit; or that he's been taken by a third party within Vale itself. And considering that it was this "Red Axe Gang'' that led the assault on his position…"
"... Then he's being held to be interrogated or ransomed off by the mob," Pax finished with a sigh of dismay and exhaustion.
A final silence fell over the room.
"So, when's the raid?" Tock asked casually.
"Much as it irks me, we're not raiding the largest criminal organization in Vale's underworld to recover one man who may or may not actually be in distress," Adam grumbled.
"We're going to try and open up a dialogue with the leader of the Red Axe Gang, Hei Xiong," the Lieutenant explained, "At the same time, we're outsourcing to a freelancer to track down - and if necessary, rescue - Snipe from wherever he's hiding or being held."
"Which freelancer? I thought all of the good ones in Vale were under somebody's thumb that doesn't like us," Poof asked.
"Wait, I think I know this one," Zipper interjected. "It's the Mistrali kid, right? The one that we hired to whack the Commandant of the labor camp in Prometheus?"
"That's the one," the Lieutenant nodded.
"Aw man, I hated that little bastard," Skipper groaned.
"That one wasn't my first call either," Adam muttered in agreement. "But our hands are tied. We have our objectives for the foreseeable future, and we have to do our best to keep to a strict R-O-E from here on out while the emissary is working their magic."
"Who is the High Leader sending as the emissary?" Tajra asked.
"It'd better not be those creepy Albain bastards…" Tock muttered, earning nods and murmurs of agreement.
"Corsac and Fennec are on permanent station keeping Menagerie's counterintelligence infrastructure up and running," Adam replied to Tock. "I've been instructed to keep the emissary's identity under wraps until their public arrival. Rest assured, however, that they have the full authority and confidence of Mantle, Mistral, and Menagerie."
Skipper let out a low whistle at that, and Pax leaned closer to Tock. "What's that supposed to mean?" the Valean whispered to the young comms specialist, earning a puzzled shrug in return.
"In the meantime," Adam spoke up again, drawing attention back to the front, "This unit is on light duty around the base until further notice. Clean up your weapons and gear, return anything you drew from the Quartermaster, and stand by for orders."
The Commander's eye turned to Pax as he asked, "Any final questions or concerns?"
'Why did two of our comrades and dozens of my countrymen have to die for you to achieve NOTHING?!' the young Valean's mind raged. But he bit his tongue hard enough to draw blood and held his silence.
"Dismissed."
- To Serve With Honor -
"... And between sources within the Secured Zone, as well as aerial surveillance and field reports from units on the ground, our analysts have concluded that the Prometheus Restricted Zone has finally begun to experience a net population decline, while the Secured Zone's population has stabilized at just over one hundred seventy thousand. Based on this information, the local Commandant is formally requesting permission to proceed with the next phase of civil redevelopment-"
A small red light blinking on the desk's display caught General James Ironwood's eye, and his head rose from the palm of his gloved prosthetic hand, along with a single finger raised towards the bureaucrat in front of him. The STF man dutifully paused his report mid-sentence as the General keyed his intercom.
"What is it, Anastasia?"
"Sir, there's been an incident in Vale. The White Fang has made a public attempt on Specialist Amsel's life; the Specialist survived, but two of our soldiers are dead, along with over forty others."
Ironwood's eyes narrowed, and his instructions were fired off swiftly and sharply. "Send a message to Headmaster Ozpin that I would like to speak with both of my Specialists in two hours' time over his secured connection," he ordered, "And get the Vale CCT's commander on the line in ten minutes with a situation update."
"Understood, sir. Will that be all?"
"Yes, thank you Anastasia." His finger lifted from the call button, and he looked to the staff officer standing staunchly at parade rest. "We'll pick up the rest of your report at this time tomorrow, Captain," the General stated coolly. "In the meantime, contact the Commandant in Prometheus and inform him that he has my approval to proceed with the next phase of renewal. However, I expect to have his complete and up-to-date Operational Plan in front of me before his operations commence; I also expect him here in that spot that you are standing in, delivering a summary to me by the end of the week. Is that understood?"
"Jawohl-" the Captain cut himself off and cleared his throat at the General's look of consternation, "-Yes, General; I understand." The man delivered a crisp salute - which Ironwood smoothly returned - before turning on his heel and marching out of the office.
When the door on the other end of the sizable space slid shut, James Ironwood sighed and turned his chair to look out of the curving bulletproof window that made up the entire exterior wall of his thirty-second-story office in the Atlas Military Command complex.
Below the space, the sprawling plaza in the center of the complex bustled with the hundreds of souls that kept the military machine churning. Just beyond it, the skyscrapers, spires, and raised tramways of Upper Atlas gleamed in the early morning light; and out of in the distance, over the edge of the floating city, the perpetual snow caps on the northernmost of the mountain ranges that separated and shielded the heartland of Atlas from the rest of Solitas glowed with a similar, more pure and natural brilliance.
'Soon, those mountains will no longer be a hard border, keeping Atlas safe from the Mantlese and the Grimm,' he pondered wistfully. 'Soon, everything beyond those mountains will finally be truly and purely Atlesian.'
He stayed like this and dreamed of his nation's bright future for a while longer; then he turned back to the desk, activated the hard light display of his personal terminal, and selected an icon on his quickbar that pulled up the most recent version of a certain Specialist's personnel file.
A youthful male face with bright blue eyes framed by shaggy blond hair smiled brightly from the middle of a large, blond, mostly female family; while beside this idyllic portrait, the haunted, sunken, and scarred face of a dark-haired young man stared back at him with a gaze like twin frozen cobalt gems.
"In the meantime," he said aloud, "We need to figure out just what kind of game you think you're trying to play in my domain, Jaune Arc."
End Chapter 11
Author's Note: I had this guy just about all set to post yesterday when my modem crapped out; fortunately I'm friends with one of the telecom company's regular techs, and he was able to rush a new modem out to me first thing this morning.
So, if I was organized enough to claim that my story is organized into "arcs," I'd say that there's one more chapter after this one to wrap up the first full arc of the story. Chapter 12 will introduce a few new characters who will be central to the next arc; and then Chapter 13 will mark the start of the Beacon semester, where we'll be introduced to the revised first- and second-year cast. Fair warning, significant changes to that roster are in store.
The little bit with Ironwood here at the end also signals the introduction of the situation in Mantle/Atlas/Solitas into the plot-proper. Unfamiliar names and historical references will be bandied about, and every so often we'll cut to Solitas to explore the situation on the ground as it develops. I'm hoping that you'll enjoy the geo- and socio-political interplay and the side plots, and that some of you might speculate in the reviews about how these plots will progress and/or tie into the story in Vale; certain developments in Vale will likewise affect the situation abroad.
A belated thanks to everyone for the congratulations; the post-grad job search is slow, but I've dredged up a promising lead that could pay off as soon as the end of this month, so keep your fingers crossed.
Thanks for tuning in, and I'll see everyone in Chapter 12.
-Knightmare Frame Razgriz