Chapter 25, The Trade
It was such a familiar feeling.
Hakke stood on the precipice of a tall, dilapidated building, looking down the street at a building that was positively crawling with people he very much doubted would want him there. At least this time he had a baseline understanding of what to expect.
Instead of gangsters wearing blue suits, it was terrorists wearing grey vests.
He hadn't had the privilege of running into the White Fang before. A situation he had been fairly content with, largely because he didn't even know where to begin approaching it. Well, to an extent. On one hand, he sympathized with their declared goal. It, in its broadest strokes, lined up with his own sensibilities and how he viewed the world. Everyone should have the same opportunities, regardless of race, species, status, or wealth. Frankly, those things shouldn't matter, the only thing that should matter is talent, effort, and achievement. Any organization fighting for a future where that was possible was one that Hakke could fully support.
Of course, there was a slight problem with how they were handling things. He and Callie had gone through the news reports and records of what the White Fang had begun to resort to in the fight for their goal. It started with peaceful protests, then it had begun to get more physical.
Then violent.
Goals were good. But actions spoke much louder. Told a far more complete tale.
The Warlock continued his vigil, binoculars scanning the warehouse ahead for the best route inside. The White Fang had abandoned their original goal it seemed, or at least splinter cells had. Their intent seemed more aligned with inflicting pain and hurt into their sibling species, rather than forcing a middle ground.
A mess of a situation he had no clue how to navigate.
Thankfully, he probably wouldn't need to. He peered around the binoculars to the small plastic lunchbox that had been left for him ahead of time. Inside had been a small digital storage stick of some kind, and a burner Scroll with a single number as its only recorded information. Unlike the Scroll that Hakke had stolen from Slick, it had been properly wiped clean. No traceable metadata, nothing.
It had had its operating system ripped apart and replaced with a barely functional one, leaving the device only capable of calling the single contact and nothing more. It was basically a compact CB Radio transmitter, the sort of thing Lightless scouts in the EDZ would use back home.
The stick was interesting, and only had a single encrypted video file on it; a black screen with a digitized woman's voice over it. Whatever it was or meant, he had no idea. Callie seemed to think it was a coded message of some sort.
"This is weird." Hakke said quietly.
"What, the fact that Cerulean's contact ended up being a middle man? Or the storage stick?" Callie responded in his earpiece.
When the Detective had given Hakke the number of her contact, their conversation had been weird. The man had directed him to this exact spot on the roof, to the red plastic lunchbox, and told him to call his employer for further instructions. He hadn't complied yet. Not until he had investigated all the bits and pieces of the lunchbox and its contents.
The original request had been to infiltrate this warehouse and find out if a White Fang higher up that went by 'Banesaw' was there or not. Apparently, that had changed since the last conversation.
"So. Are you going to call that number, or wait even longer?" Callie asked. Hakke set the binoculars down and slid back into cover, snapping open the hard light communicator. The roof that they had been directed to had been a perfect scouting perch: plenty of cover, clear sightlines of the target, elevation, and a solid distance away. Whoever had picked it knew their stuff.
"Let's get this over with." Hakke tapped on the call button and waited. He had to resist the urge to put the Scroll up to his ear, everyone seemed to want to use the face camera for conversations here on Remnant.
A gaunt, almost skeletal woman appeared on the screen, white-grey hair pulled back tightly over her scalp. A burn scar covered most of the left side of her jaw with a weblike mesh of melted skin. Her eyes were a piercing dull yellow, and they bored their way directly into his head. That said, the most striking feature was the Syndicate blue combat vest she had on.
"So you're Hakke." She stated.
The Warlock sighed. "Of course this was a setup." He peered around the roof. "Pretty sneaky, I'll give ya that. So. Where are they? Not the spot I would have chosen for an ambush."
"This is not an ambush. I offer a trade."
Hakke rolled his eyes. So far his every interaction with the Syndicate had been in the form of prolonged firefights and bloodshed. He didn't trust them as far as he could throw them. Although he could probably huck any given Syndicate grunt a fair distance if he had to. Probably not best to take idioms literally.
His hand dropped as his thumb moved to cut the connection.
"I know who's responsible for Boost."
His thumb stopped, hovering over the end call button. Slowly, he retracted it and lifted the Scroll back up to his face. The mystery woman's face remained unchanged, no evidence as to whether this was a lie or not.
"What." Hakke said.
"Boost. It's why you're fighting the Syndicate, is it not?" She leaned in slightly, her face taking up more of the translucent screen. "I have the who, and more importantly, the where."
Hakke opened his mouth to give a retort, before snapping it shut. He eyed her warily. "And I'm guessing this info is mine if I agree to this trade. What do you want?"
The woman leaned back to her original position. "Somewhere in that warehouse is a lieutenant with the White Fang, a man who goes by the name of Banesaw. I need you to find him and deliver that flashdrive to him."
"So the thing that the first guy told us to do initially."
"I need you to make contact with him. I need him to get this drive."
"And what's on the drive?"
"That is none of your concern."
"No, I'm pretty sure it is. You see, you people have been trying to kill me since I got to Vale. If I'm going to do this, I need, no, require that info." Hakke felt he had learned a bit about negotiating, no reason not to put it to work now. "Besides, I can always figure this out myself, we've made plenty of progress so far."
"Really?" She said, raising an eyebrow. "You'll have this all dealt with in a week? Because that's all the time we have left. After that, they plan to flood the streets of Vale through the hands of every drug dealer they can give it to. It will be chaos."
"Why are you telling me this?"
"Because the Syndicate is splintering. Because those behind this drug have violated every tenet we have, every rule, every code. Because they plan to kickstart an avalanche of violence this city may not survive. Because they're bad for business. There's a thousand reasons I want them gone."
Hakke was once again quiet. On one hand, he absolutely didn't trust this woman. It felt too convenient that someone who just so happened to have the information he needed would just so happen to appear at the penultimate hour. On the other hand, if what she said was true, he couldn't afford to ignore it. The Hive were here, in influence if not physically. Their plot was already underway, their machinations festering like gangrene in a wound.
"Fine." He finally got out. "One condition. The video on that drive, what does that code say?"
She sighed. It was not a happy sound. "It's a personal, family matter, and something that only affects my family. What matters is that Banesaw will know what it means. Tell him Ringtail sent you. That should do the trick."
"Okay, so how would you recommend I get this to him?"
"You have proven yourself both creative and hard to kill. You'll figure something out. Call me when it's done." The Scroll went dead.
"Well." Callie said, materializing over his shoulder. "That was unexpected."
Hakke collapsed the Scroll and put it in his bag. "What do you think?"
She flitted over to face him. "It could go either way. But, I don't know if we can afford to ignore this. At the very least no one here seems to know how to properly kill us, so the only real risk is if we were to leak the garage's location, or something similar."
He nodded. "I'm thinking about the same. So we go in and out, and hopefully we don't aggravate these White Fang folks enough for them to also want us dead. Rather only have one of those at a time."
"I'll keep a tight monitor on Scroll positions. Let's do this."
Hakke packed his things and began his approach, hopping from rooftop to rooftop, making sure to stay out of the main sightlines to the warehouse. The neighborhood was situated in the industrial district, an underused portion to be precise. The area was rife with what most would call the scum of society, whether they were there by bad luck or otherwise. Plenty of homeless squatters in abandoned buildings, or small time gangs prowling the dingy alleys. If the White Fang were looking for downtrodden to recruit into their ranks, they probably couldn't have picked much of a better spot.
Eventually, the Warlock made his way to one of the warehouse buildings adjacent to the one he wanted. It was large, and with a convex metal roof, just rounded enough and slick enough to help shed the light Valean snows of winter. It also made it so it was exceptionally hard to walk without making a crazy amount of noise. Hakke was many things, but stealthy really wasn't one of them.
There was plenty of activity here as well, uniformed White Fang members hauling boxes off of two trucks and bringing them inside. It looked like a combination of clothes, food items, and other miscellaneous equipment. Not many weapons at least. It seemed this was going to be a hub when they were done, not a barracks.
He stroked his chin. Going in via the roof was probably not the best way in. The only real way to get in there was either cutting through the roof or breaking a lock on a skylight, both of which would make a racket and probably cause a fight. He could try introducing himself and walking in as a messenger of 'Ringtail', but he figured a Faunus-oriented terrorist group would have some issues with a Human waltzing up to their front door.
Even a disguise might not work well. Faunus were recorded as having improved senses compared to humans, at least in some cases. But it would only take one Faunus terrorist with a good sense of smell to tell him as a Human. Probably. Did Humans have a different smell compared to Faunus? Were the Humans here on Remnant even Human?
This was an alien planet after all, one that was Traveler-knew how far away from the Sol System. The only real reason he had assumed that they had been seeded from Earth was that the chances of convergent evolution to this degree was basically zero. But the chance was technically there. It couldn't be a Vex simulation as there was too much actual Light here, even with it trapped behind the Barrier.
He pushed the thoughts aside. There would be time for that later.
"Any ideas?" He asked softly.
"I picked up some blueprints of this building off the CCTS, it looks like there is a maintenance entrance into the sewer system. It should lead directly into the building, and into one of the more out of the way rooms as well. I think that should be our best bet."
He hummed in agreement. Sewers were never pleasant, but he had traveled worse. Besides, the worst sewers of any planet imaginable were basically virulent gardens compared to the death-sweet halls of Oryx's Dreadnaught.
He followed his Ghost's directions as she led him first down to a side alley some distance from the warehouse, down a manhole, and then through several winding brick passages to a metal door. Through the door, past stretches of service pipes and electrical access points, and finally to a ladder that led directly up into the building.
Callie pinged him to wait, and eventually an all clear. Must have been some Scrolls up above in the room. He grimaced as he began to climb. Scrolls meant the room was being used for something, which meant that at any point someone could waltz right in. He raised the hatch with one hand, peering through the gap to see in anyone else was in. With the coast clear, he pushed it aside.
To find it was padlocked closed.
Grumbling to himself and gritting his teeth, he focused Solar Light into his finger and began softening the metal. A minute later it was soft enough for him to break with a quick, jerking push. Wooden crates dotted the room, placed in haphazard arrangements. Over the smell of burnt metal from the lock was the stench of tobacco. He looked over to a corner to find an empty chair, a bottle of scotch, a high fashion magazine, and an ashtray with a cigar stump mushed into it.
Cigars, cigarettes, tobacco in general was something that Hakke personally found repulsive. He had to suck in more than his fair share of chemical laden smoke during his missions for the Vanguard, he saw no reason to do even more over his down time. The bottle however, was a different matter. An unopened bottle of 25 year old Atlesian scotch, if the label was anything to go off of.
He picked it up, looked it over, shrugged, and had Callie transmat it. Good scotch was hard to come by in the Last City, and he wouldn't look a gift horse like this in the mouth.
Now he just had to find Banesaw and find a way to deliver the drive without getting the entire warehouse after him. He figured if he found an envelope or similar, he could just huck it onto the floor and trust one of the grunts there to give it to the boss. Then, he could just leave without having been seen at all. It might just work.
Callie once again gave the all clear, directing him out of the room he was in and out into the halls. It took some time, and plenty of hiding to get where she was directing him. The warehouse had an office section built in on the second floor, with a balcony built into the main work zone to allow the bosses to observe their workers. It was a very similar design to the dockyard he had been ambushed in earlier, almost like this was a common design for Vale.
What that said about the worker-employer relationship, was something probably, he really didn't care.
He slowly maneuvered his way up to the second floor, taking routes that Callie called out to him; routes that had practically no one present. Why would they, when they were positioned deep in the facility? Finally, he found an office space with some old equipment left over. There were cubicles, separated with cheap wood and frosted glass. The Warlock began sifting through the desks one by one, until he found a spare envelope and pen. He scratched out a quick note on the front, slid the drive in, and sealed it.
"Hakke, hide." Callie suddenly interjected into his ear. "Someone's coming."
He slid the envelope into his coat and ducked behind one of the cubicle walls. A voice carried over from the main hall and into the office space, one filled with snark and bravado. Hakke shook his head slightly, and caught something out of the corner of his eye. A desk, probably the old manager's desk going off its higher quality, had been dragged out and placed in a place of prominence, alongside a small messy pile of documents and maps of the city.
The office door slammed open, the voice got significantly louder. And began making its way closer. With a sinking realization, Hakke realized that the man was approaching this desk. He looked around hurriedly for a better place to hide.
"Look, I'm already there and I'll have a crew of these animals trained up to my very high standards. I'll be back to dragging it in by the ton before you know it." The man was saying, his long footsteps being punctuated by the clacking of a cane.
Hakke scuttled in a crouch as quietly as he could around the far end of the cubicle as the man continued.
"Cinder, please! Have I ever let you down before? I've done everything by the playbook - yes, even that." A pause. "Oh please, life is full of the unexpected. That's why you partnered with me instead of going with the standard two-bit scumbag this wonderful city has to offer."
Hakke sent a ping, and Midnight Coup transmatted into his hand. He slid it under his coat and magnetized it to the small of his back. Coup was not a weapon that one would normally call a holdout piece, but desperate times and all that.
"Yes, yes I know. A few more days, tops. Then it'll be back to normal…" The last words dragged out. "I'm going to have to call you back. It looks like this place has a rat problem."
The sound of a Scroll closing. Hakke paused, peering back to the bend, then looking up. Reflected in a small, round mirror was an upside down reflection of a man in a black bowler hat and white suit, peering disdainfully at him.
Hakke cursed under his breath and rose to his feet. "That," he said, pointing at the mirror, "is garbage."
"Oh, I'd have to disagree. It helps me find what's scuttling about."
The cubicle cut off the majority of the man's body, only leaving his head above the beam of frosted glass separating them. He had a long shock of orange hair dangling over one eye. A blind spot, or at least it would obscure his vision, unless he had some sort of Semblance that would mitigate that disadvantage. The man looked familiar, however. It took a moment for the name to dredge its way up out of his memory. It was from a news bulletin Cerulean had shown him when he had asked about the Dust store robbery he had seen his first night in Vale. She had shown him the man's mugshot.
Roman Torchwick. Torchwock? Sconcewick. Probably the first one, but definitely something along those lines.
"Well, okay. Good job then, you found the scuttler. I'm going to leave now."
Torchwick sucked in a breath. "Oooh, sorry. Afraid I can't let you leave. Even as decrepit as this place is, a hideout is a hideout, and a hideout isn't very good if someone knows where it is."
Hakke took a step back, hand drifting along a desk top until he felt something he could throw. Torchwick took a step towards the bend separating them, his cane twirling lazily in his off hand.
"Unfortunately for you, this is it. Although I do need to know, who exactly are you? I like keeping tabs on the scoundrels that are unlucky enough to break in to places that belong to me."
"Today, I'm a messenger."
"Really? What's the message then?"
"It's not for you."
"Then why are you here?"
"I needed an envelope."
His cane cracked back onto the floor. "You know what? I think I'm going to enjoy killing you."
"Oh no. Ah! " Hakke exclaimed, emotionless.
Torchwick's face fell into an exasperated expression. "You don't seem particularly alarmed about this."" Behind the frosted glass, Hakke saw the shadow of the man's hand rise to his chest. "You do know who I am, right?"
"Yeah, you're the guy running around and robbing convenience stores. No offense, but you're like the eighth guy this week who's threatened to kill me. Death threats sort of lose their edge after a while."
"Eugh, well you're no fun to banter with. It would probably be easier to call the Fang up here to chop you up, they do hate their Humans after all, but I find some annoyances are better dealt with... personally" Torchwick's cane flipped up to rest over his shoulder, a smirk plastered across his face.
"First thing you've said that makes any sense." Hakke muttered loudly, and then threw the object he had found as hard as he could at Torchwick's face.
The frosted glass shattered as a ruby red stapler smashed into Torchwick's face, the man staggering back in surprise with an angry curse. Hakke grabbed a paperweight off the desk and vaulted over the wall. Once back in the main office walkway, he turned to face his opponent and drew his baton. He'd need to add some discouragement to prevent pursuit.
Torchwick snapped his Scroll open in his off hand and raised his cane like a sword, planning to call reinforcements. Hakke flipped his baton and got into a fighting stance, before throwing the paperweight with his off hand. It sailed through the air and slapped the Scroll from the thief's hand.
Hakke pressed his advantage, swinging an overhead strike that was blocked by the thief's cane as he recovered his cool. Torchwick's cane spun in a blur, before he would swap his stance and lash out with it like a rapier. Hakke matched him blow for blow, as he fell back towards the door. The thief was skilled in swordplay, more so than Hakke was, but he had expected that.
Guardians weren't known for their fancy bladework, outside of a few hunters that was. They didn't need it. Guardian swords were powered, had edges of exotc energy that allowed them to slice through the toughest armor and bypass the hardiest shields. And when they didn't have a weapon proper, their fists and knives were backed up by the Light. When a single punch could disintegrate your enemy, all that mattered was landing it. When Light strengthened your arm, you could smash through whatever defense your opponent had.
Hakke had spent his entire life mastering a particular style of combat, one that focused on raw power and close quarters gun fighting. The people of Remnant had turned their melee combat into a lethal dance of sorts. It would take him years to properly adapt his skills to be able to match the Huntsmen of Remnant in their chosen form of combat.
Murex and Magenta had taught him that when they had beaten him black and blue. They were lessons he had been taking extensive notes on throughout. Much like how the tactics used to kill Cabal weren't the same as the ones best suited for Vex, the Huntsmen of Remnant had their strengths and weaknesses.
They were adept at fighting Grimm and other Huntsmen.
And nothing else.
Hakke staved off the worst of Torchwick's attacks with a gauntleted arm as he plunged his baton into the drawer of a nearby desk. He tore it out and swung his baton in an underhanded strike. Torchwick blocked, the drawer continuing on it's path to slam into his chin. Hakke blocked a strike at his head and threw a punch. Torchwick caught it in an open palm.
"Hah!" He cried.
Hakke forced his hand open and launched a weak palm strike at the thief's legs. The lanky man's eyes widened as he tried to identify what the Warlock was doing, and Hakke used the distraction to finish ramming his armored fist into Torchwick's face.
He snarled, stabbing out with his cane and pushing Hakke back. He swung the hook end of the cane around, catching Hakke behind the neck and driving his head into Torchwick's incoming knee.
The thief was good, but not Murex good.
Hakke surged up and pulled the man's bowler hat down over his eyes, and immediately followed it by a proper palm strike that threw the criminal through the cubicle walls. The man hopped to his feet and hooked an office chair with his cane, before throwing it at Hakke.
"You, irritating, cheap-shotting rat!" Torchwick snarled as he approached once more. "Look what you did to my office!"
"It needed redecorating!" Hakke snarled back, tucking his arms in a boxer stance and ducked under the thief's guard, landing a right, left, and an uppercut in rapid succession. Torchwick responded by cracking the length of his cane upside Hakke's head, then hooking his collar and bodily throwing the Warlock down towards the exit.
Hakke immediately began to backpedal towards the exit, swatting furniture over to make his enemy's time harder. Difficult terrain that Torchwick didn't even make an attempt at going over, instead slamming his cane into the floor.
"I really don't like you, Rat."
"Yeah, well, the feeling is mutual." Hakke retorted.
"Glad we're on the same page." The thief sarcastically chimed, and raised his cane like it was a gun. Then a reticle popped off the end.
Hakke remembered what planet he was on.
A Dust projectile sang out with a whistle and hit Hakke dead on, the explosion rocketing him backwards out the exit by means of the door. Lying on the remains of said door, Hakke peered through the wreckage and over his own prone form to see Torchwick, smirk back on his face, maneuvering over the rubble. He stopped, smiled, and raised the cane again.
Hakke rolled to the side as another projectile detonated where he had just been. He could hear muted shouting from somewhere else in the warehouse. He groaned internally, that meant stealth was completely abandoned. As such, he pulled Midnight Coup out. He made an educated guess, and began firing shots in a staggered horizontal line where he expected Torchwick to roughly be. He was rewarded with a cry of surprise, then pain as at least one of his Dust bullets hit home.
Then the wall exploded. Hazard of fighting someone with a grenade launcher, he supposed.
Hakke dashed to the side, his contrail of fire hidden by the drywall dust hanging in the air and waited. Two more whistling flares slammed into the floor and wall through the gap, followed momentarily by a very smug looking criminal. He twirled his cane and pointed it for another volley.
Hakke dashed once more, this time towards Torchwick, and extended his baton in a thrust. With a thump of displaced air, it traveled straight down the barrel of the criminal's cane-gun, and bumped into whatever internal mechanism was there, just as it fired. There was a grinding boom, the sound of shearing metal, and a shockwave followed by thick, billowing smoke. Hakke's staff rocketed out of his grip, flying far back over the balcony and embedding in a concrete pillar out in the warehouse. Both combatants reeled, ears ringing.
Torchwick recovered first, swiping his cane across Hakke's head with a snarl. He pulled it back to smack the Warlock again, and stopped.
"What? Melodic Cudgel. broke it!" He roared.
Hakke looked at the cane. Right after the handle the metal was a orange with heat and sported a large, angry blast hole where he suspected the breach was. In line with that, it seemed that when he had last been struck, it had also bent the cane somewhat.
"Whoops." Hakke said, and slammed a palm strike into his distracted opponent, sending him sprawling down the hallway. Hakke turned and began running towards the warehouse. He needed to retrieve his weapon, then get the hell out of here. He reached the balcony as two Faunus sleeveless grey vests and bone white, Grimm skull masks rounded the corner, Grendel made weapons held at the ready.
He came to a halt. Fighting them would just ensure that he would then need to worry about terrorists alongside the mafia. If he could avoid it, he would. The grunts had frozen, their eyes darting between the Warlock and the wreckage behind him. Between him and the massive hand cannon he held.
Slowly, he placed Midnight Coup in the small of his back, and pulled out the envelope.
"Got a message for Banesaw. You two wouldn't happen to know where he is, would you?" He asked.
They exchanged glances, before they were interrupted by a very irate Torchwick from down the hall. "Are you kidding me? Do I have to do everything myself?"
The man crashed into Hakke's back, shoving him past the panicked guards and over the balcony railing. He landed softly from a glide, spinning around to face Torchwick once again.
The criminal tore a gun out of the hands of one of the White Fang grunts. "Here's another quick lesson for you idiots. When a Human who isn't me breaks into your base, you kill him. Like this!"
Hakke ran for cover as Dust rounds began raining down around him. He sent a silent thanks to the manufacturers of Grendel weapons that their weapons were so inaccurate, as most of the rounds splashed harmlessly off the pavement around him. By this time the rest of the White Fang in the area had wisened up to his presence and were descending on him.
"I transmatted your extendo-stick Hakke, focus on getting out of here." Callie told him. He looked over to the pillar it had stabbed into, only seeing a small hole as the only evidence it had been there.
"Thanks Callie, when did you mark it for transmat?"
"I just transmatted manually, the old fashion way. I need the jumpship to automatically transmat lost equipment over any real distance."
"So this whole time I didn't need to worry about retrieving it."
"Not really, but I appreciate all the effort. It just means I don't have to come out during these exciting times as often."
With the knowledge that his weapon was secure, he began zigzagging his way towards the lower floor offices, towards the sewer entrance he had fist broken in from. The Fang here didn't have many guns, thankfully, and the few that did were easily dissuaded from their assaults by one or two Midnight Coup shots to their legs.
Nonlethal only. Really didn't want to add terrorists to the enemy list, at least not until the Syndicate problem was dealt with.
Others closed the distance with blades and clubs that he knocked aside with his armored gauntlets, the weapons sparking off the Arcology steel with no effect. He had to admit, it was much nicer blocking attacks when solid armor, and not just reinforced cloth was there to take the hit.
He may need to invest in more armor overall. Shin guards, maybe.
He punched, kicked, and tossed his way through the small number of White Fang grunts in his way, tearing a submachine gun from one as he went. One lone grunt stood between him and the interior of the offices, a grunt he tackled. He slammed the man into the floor, and shoved the envelope into his hands.
"This is for Banesaw. From Ringtail. Get it to him or I'll be back." He threatened, leaving the man holding the envelope on the floor. He raced through the halls until he made his way back to the first storage room, leaping down the maintenance tunnel and down into the sewers. As he ran, he heard echoing shouting behind him as the White Fang gave pursuit, with Torchwick's angry ranting overshadowing the rest.
He stopped at the end of a long tunnel, turned around, and waited. Once it sounded like the White Fang were nearly at the beginning of this particular stretch, he began firing short bursts from his submachine gun and hand cannon down the tunnel. He fired fast enough, and irregularly enough to actively suppress and dissuade any of the terrorists from peeking around the corner.
Once the submachine gun ran empty, he dropped it and ran, taking random tunnels and gliding over larger gaps, weaving a confusing and random path through the sewers. Eventually, the sounds of pursuit faded, and finally stopped.
Hakke kept going for a while, Callie directing him to a manhole exit by the river, some miles away. He flipped open his Scroll and dialed up his Detective partner.
First, he would update her on what the hell just happened. Then he would call his mysterious Syndicate contact back. And then maybe, Traveler willing, he would get some concrete answers.
Find a way to put an end to this, once and for all.
Welp, glad I put in that heads up last chapter.
First things first, Happy (belated) Fourth to those in the US. Got to see the coolest firework display for the Fourth of July I've seen yet. Fireworks themselves were aight, but there was an active thunder storm behind them the entire time. 10 outta 10, would recommend.
Things have been hectic this last stretch of time, new job's keeping me busy, and I'm going to have to organize a better personal timeline to juggle everything and allow me time to write. I'll figure something out, but it may be a bit rough for a while. Regardless, I fully expect to be able to see this tale to its conclusion, I've got too much cool crap planned not to.
Talking about conclusions, we are in the last arc or two before the final hurrah on the main Syndicate plot. They won't vanish overnight or anything, and will still provide some threat, but their time is approaching its end.
Lucky Roll Casino Arc, here we come.
Behold! Review Responses!
Guest - Oh goodness, yes. I wasn't kidding when I said there would be some serious ramifications. Now I just need to put down a few interactions between the various villain factions, and put more thought into how Cinder is going to alter her plans based on what's going to happen.
AidsNinja - Glynda: initially horrified at the sheer quantity of death happening, but would probably adjust once she realizes everyone is immortal. Viewership of Crucible matches in the Last City drops for that month due to odd changes to match structure. Shaxx: FAR more intense training. FAR more enthusiastic yelling. HEAVY emphasis on fixing the lack of grenades being tossed around.
Al the Obsessive - Mostly canon, with a few details added by me. Glimmer is canonically seeded in veins by some sort of Golden Age machine, though no one knows for sure. It appears basically wherever Golden Age crap is. I added the fragile bit as a way to cap it's spread, otherwise some locations would end up as giant balls of glimmer given enough time.
Athrix (Guest) - The vast majority of Destiny stuff is by-and-large nightmare fuel compared to Remnant, which could easily be categorized as a death world on its own. To that end, the existence of an army of walking corpses that slaughter hordes of aliens by breaking reality on a whim and dancing while doing it is going to make anyone reach for the hard stuff. As for Hakke and Ozpin staying away from one another, they'll eventually cross paths, but the how and why should be relatively unique at least.
The Baz - John Napier (Historical 'Warlock') I'm in the 'He up to something' Camp myself. If there is a single character that wouldn't bring Hive artifacts to the City, it'd be him. That, and all the times he's rejected getting aid from qualified people for the Endless Night, or redirected legitimate concerns, something funky be going down. Who knows, mebbe the leaks were right.
DarkMegatronXX47 - It's tradition at this point for Hakke to piss everyone off. I've been really looking forward to finally adding Torchwick into this, he's by far my favorite RWBY villain for the simple fact he was fun to watch. Hakke and Torchwick are going to cross paths more than once, and each interaction is only going to make them hate each other more and more. It's going to be great.
Guest - Yes. One armor piece (technically it's underway right now) and eventually one weapon will be properly exotic by destiny standards. Maybe more, but those two are guaranteed right now. Although he will be building a Huntsman styled weapon for himself sooner than that. His Baton/Staff needs upgrades and a name after all.
