(Should be slotted into Chapter 30, after 'eyes on Chivalric Arms…')
"No," he said at last, and that seemed to take everyone in the room a moment to process as he rose up, and then walked to the window of their little 'hideout' staring in the direction Beacon was in, the direction of where his sister was.
"No?" asked Cinder, trying to keep her tone level, as she wasn't used to being questioned, and yet…she could see something in that no. Another idea.
"No, too many moving pieces, too complicated, too indirect. I've learned my lesson. I can't care anymore. No one cares about me, my family…not even you, don't deny it. I'm a useful tool, nothing more. To be used and discarded once this is over," it wasn't a question, it was a statement of fact, but Cinder nodded. He knew what he was, it might have been problematic in other tools, but this one seemed to have an idea of his own on how to get her what she wanted, and she was willing to listen at least.
"Good. Do you have a picture of this woman you want?" he asked, and Cinder took a moment to think, before snapping her finger. Emerald quickly pulled out her scroll and handed it to her, Cinder taking a moment to search through some very old files, before pulling it up.
"She is likely hurt, probably on some kind of life support. I would assume at any right," she said, and Jaune looked at the picture, before pulling out his own scroll and snapping a picture of it. He nodded at it, checking to see it was clean enough to still make her out, before turning back to Cinder.
"Do you want her rescued from that, or…?" he let that hang, and Cinder merely smiled.
"Oh no. You see, I stand to inherit something grand at her death. So all I need is her gone. If you think you have a way to make that happen, it doesn't matter how," she informed him, and Jaune…and Null nodded back, quickly pulling up his contact list, and then punching through some buttons. It took him minutes of messaging, but finally, his scroll rang.
"Jaune?" came a male voice, as a red headed man, presumably a faunus of some kind, came up on the screen, his mask on, showing him to be White Fang, at least devoted enough to make calls with it on.
"Adam, thank you for picking up. Listen, a while ago you said you could get my sisters that Ironwood was holding. How long do you need to make that happen?" he asked, and the red head looked at him blankly for a moment, before setting his scroll down and talking with someone off screen, the conversation sounding heated for a moment, before he came back.
"If you need it, Saphron and Terra could be on a transport tonight. Does this mean you found Amber?" he asked, and Jaune smiled at him.
"Oh yes…but best not to tell you where. Still, get them out, and safe to Menagerie. I'll get Amber myself and have the White Fang smuggle us out of the city tonight as well. The world willing…you know what, fuck the world's will. This is going to happen. After that…anything the Fang wants, I'm down for," that last was said with a very dark edge, but Adam, looking at him through the screen, only nodded in recognition, before breaking the connection.
"So, you have a plan then?" asked Cinder as he turned back to her, and he shrugged.
"Best you and Adam don't know the details. No one can get onto you for what I'm about to do. Just trust that tonight you'll get what's yours, and me? I'll take what's mine," he said, and then smiled, before breaking out in a laugh that was just this side of sane, as he walked over to Neo, whispered something in her ear that made her expression pale for a moment, before she turned to him, and with a smirk, the pair vanished from sight.
The others in the room, Roman, Cinder, Emerald and Mercury…they didn't know what else to do, and so the three simply left, with Roman taking a moment to clean up his safehouse, removing any signs of him having been here, before quickly deciding to leg it. He would be laying low for a while in one of his more upscale nests, as he knew he didn't want anything of whatever the kid was about to do on him.
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A bullhead was a normal sight approaching Beacon, even as the afternoon sun was just beginning to wane into evening. True, it was late, but that had happened before, and honestly, few eyes turned to the craft as it approached the small landing pad. Even fewer were watching as something climbed out of it, so they missed the sight of the mech suit slowly making its way from the landing area, to the courtyard just outside the school.
That suit, once on the news, looked…a lot less beaten up than one would expect, given it had been shown plowing through buildings, and taking fire designed to destroy armored vehicles, before it had vanished into the night. That wasn't due to repairs either, the suit, armed and armored as it was, was simply that tough, given it was designed to capture huntsman level opponents without needing to kill them.
At the mech's side, a young woman seemed to skip along side, smiling in a way that was most unpleasant, and she began to almost 'frolic', dancing around the 6 meter tall thing, glancing up at it from time to time, and then laughing without sound, as she and it finally came to the edge of the courtyard outside Beacon, a few eyes turning towards them, but far, far too many buried in their own lives to notice it, despite its height.
The pilot sighed, wondering if this really was the best the 'Guardians of Humanity' could do. It was true, the Paladin was silent on its feet, the thing's joints were pretty smooth, and it was designed to hunt its target down, and then engage in direct battle if necessary. Yet, to have something like this approach the school and cause not a single stir amongst the students or teachers, save a few fingers pointing his way was just pathetic.
Flicking through a few options on the surprisingly easy to understand user interface, he soon found a few small explosives. Loud noise makers that would get some eyes on him, and looking at the diagram to find how it would fire, he pointed the right arm of the unit into the sky, then let rip with a few solid, deep thunks, as they shots spiraled into the air, and then exploded like the flash bangs they were.
THAT got some attention, as his scanners saw a hundred or more people rush to see him now, his scanners quickly giving him readouts of everything on the ones it deemed the most important. Aura levels, expected combat ability based on visual records. It even gave NAMES in some cases, which was freaky, and made Jaune wonder just what the bastards at Chivalric Arms had planned for this type of unit, beyond hunting him.
He pushed that out of his mind as he fiddled with a few dials, and then started when the speakers on the outside of the mech burst into life with a crackle and whine that was almost deafening even within the thing. Luckily, he was able to adjust it, and hey, it brought even more people out to see him, a whole load of them looking towards him as he stood there all on his own.
"Students, Staff, and other types of Beacon Academy, I am Jaune Arc, I am Null," he began, and was gratified to see that so many of them were indeed aware of him, their faces screwing up, and more than one drawing weapons, aiming for him, though, as one might expect, no one wanted to make the first move, no one was that reckless, yet.
"I'm here today to get something of mine. I don't know what you've been told, what you've heard, or what you've thought about me, but I want you to know what you'll be fighting. Null is my Semblance, and it nullifies Aura," oh that got a reaction, he could see a few of them start to panic now, more than one group of students pulled back from him, trying to hide behind pillars or something, not that it helped with thermal sensors.
"Yeah, you're afraid. My Semblance does that to normal people. But the company, Chivalric Arms, the ones who've said all those horrid things about me, they aren't normal. They kidnapped me, killed my father, took my mother and sisters. They did…things to us. They poked me full of needles, they were planning on impregnating my sisters, in a natural way, and against their will," that got some more reactions, he could see a few faces scrunched up. Did they believe him? Probably not, but the accusation itself was enough for them to want answers.
"The White Fang found me, and they rescued me from that life. They've been helping me find my sisters. And my mother. My mother, who was on one of the planes shot down by a Beacon student, who died while one of you held me down and forced me to watch," if he'd been angry about that, it might have caused more of a reaction, but the chill in his voice, it was enough to give everyone pause.
"That…I will be taking my price for that. But that's later. For now, this school has my sister, Amber Arc. I know where, and I'm here to get her. This will happen. You can't kill me. Huntsmen and Huntresses many decades better trained have tried. Your deputy headmistress tried, and the only reason she's not dead is because I didn't want to kill anyone back then," that got another reaction, this one on her face, the suit's cameras helpfully zooming in to show it, a bit of anger. At being beaten? Or because he was bringing it up at all?
"So, you have a choice, and I'm spelling it out. Get out of my way, and let me take my family to where they'll be safe. Or die. Right now…I don't care which," he said, and then began to walk forward, his footfalls heavy against the ground, cracking some of the stone walkways as he put pressure on them they weren't really designed to take. It was less than ten steps later that some of the students got in his way.
They were…a small team, maybe two. He wasn't sure. Four man teams, right? Or was it three? He didn't care, they were a group of people, and they were in his way. He didn't kill them right away, not like he couldn't, but just to give them that second to explain themselves.
"Move," he ordered, hoping they'd be smart about this. The girl in the beret seemed to look back to make sure the others were following her, including a rabbit-eared faunus, before she shook her head at him.
"I'm not going to. Whatever was done to you, a lot of people have died around you. You say that's not your fault, that you had your reasons, fine. Turn yourself in, and we'll make sure you have a fair hearing, but you won't be hurting anyone else," she declared, and he saw her and the other's flash their auras. Like…were they really this stupid? He didn't have time for stupid people, and so he took aim.
The arm shot out on a piston, just like he'd expected it to, the fingers opening up, and within seconds, they closed around a body. Strangely, he'd been aiming for the beret wearing leader. He got the rabbit faunus girl. The AI had autotargeted her. Racism, or just that they were standing close to each other? Either way, the fingers 'folded' out, becoming plates that drew back around her, actually creating a kind of vest that held her in place, as the hand drew back.
She was screaming, they all were, and he could see weapons being drawn, as he brought her in close to him, and she started to struggle, and even cry out. Her aura had winked out the moment she'd been close to him, and the 'vest' was tight around her, preventing her from moving, but hurting her too. Sick minds had designed this machine, designed it for one purpose, to capture him alive, and kill anyone around him.
He was just about to say something, to order them away, or he'd hurt the rabbit. He had nothing against her, and was certain Adam would appreciate it if he didn't kill any faunus on his little smash and grab mission. He didn't have the chance, however, the painful cries coming from her had activated some kind of fight or flight response in her team, and they chose to fight, the two guys charging him.
One had some kind of huge ass sword, the other some smaller blades mounted on his wrist. They got close to him, and struck with all the force they could muster at the arm holding the rabbit. Or rather, tried to. The larger guy was surging forward, momentum carrying him right against the bot, which had him brain himself on the arm, as his weapon, which looked big and imposing, was suddenly a lot heavier than he himself was, and the instant he lost aura, he had no control.
Jaune didn't spare him a thought, as the guy with the arm mounted blades came up, and found that, despite what he might have done against other targets, he couldn't even scratch the paint job of Jaune's ride. No aura meant there was nothing behind the strikes, and without wasting a moment, he backhanded him with his free arm, sending him sprawling into the dirt, looking like his neck was broken.
The beret girl, seeing her companion's downed…dead, panicked, and she drew up her purse, which folded out into a minigun of all things. Hardcore, but Jaune was protected, the mech was designed to take a hunter, and so even the dust rounds 'plinked' against the armor. They did not, however, plink off the faunus. No aura, just flesh, and Jaune even held her up defensively, letting her die, showing his resolve.
When the stupid bitch had finally realized she was doing no damage to her enemy, and simply hurting her friend, she finally stopped firing. It was too late, of course. The rabbit had lost limbs, he wasn't sure how many, and she was bleeding out quickly, her last words being…he figured the other girl's name. Coco…stupid name in his opinion, as she reached out a hand for her.
She slumped down, and he dropped her on the ground, and began to walk forward again, letting the beret girl rush past him to the corpse. He wanted to say he'd warned them, wanted to point out, he'd barely been trying that time, and three of her team were dead, two without him doing a thing, but he just tried to walk past her, tried to keep going, as he had no reason to end her life too. No reason to grant her a merciful death.
But then he heard it, that scream of primal rage, that cry for vengeance against the one who'd done this, despite him just standing there for most of it. He spun around, the Paladin almost turning in half, before he brought his other arm, the one with the gun up, and fired. It took two shots, but she was just standing there, her aura flaring outwards in her rage, making it weaker, so that the solid state slugs first shattered it, then shattered her.
He wasn't laughing, wasn't doing much of anything really, as he walked forward, and just started towards the place where his sensors showed a long shaft leading underground. That was where Amber would be, he knew it. He was actually getting close to the wall, about to literally just walk through it, when something changed in the air, and he paused, waiting for the tension to snap.
And then all hell broke loose. Fire rained on him from every direction. Bullet, dust and normal, and shouting huntsmen and huntresses in training. All of them crying out for his blood. Like he hadn't warned them. Well, they were in his way, and he had told them what happened when people got in his way.
The first group, four probably first years led by a guy with a hammer, were easy. They ran AT him, like they hadn't seen what happened to the other two who'd tried that. He didn't even have to move much, just sweep his arm forward, the moment they were within five meters of him. Their aura died, and then they did too, leaving a few nice red streaks on the paint job, which soon vanished under the fire being thrown his way.
To their credit, the next few teams weren't nearly that stupid. They stayed back, covered each other, even retreated into the halls of Beacon, trying to find some defensible position. Some were even using sniper fire to hit him from a distance. Smart, good tactics, the sort of thing that worked against grimm and other monsters. He was Null, however, and that meant he was not like other monsters.
The mech smashed through a wall, collapsing it onto those who'd been using it for cover, his proximity meaning they didn't have to suffer long, as a ton of stone and…whatever the walls of Beacon were made of poured out onto them. He didn't know who they were, and didn't care, as he just moved inward. He wasn't going fast, he wasn't rushing this, nor was he going slowly and savoring it. He was just doing what needed to be done to secure his future.
Over the next hour, he tore through Beacon like a scalpel, cutting down anyone who had dared to fire at him, who had stood in his way. Some found ways of doing damage, to be fair. That girl with the hammer had actually been smart, using her weapon's grenade launcher to bring down the heavy ceiling onto him, trying to bury him in it, while her boyfriend kept shooting at his joints.
This thing wasn't so badly made as to allow that to work, and they were soon nothing but stains on the ground, as someone else with some kind of shadow power looked at him, screamed, and ran. A coward, who'd been willing to stand up, before it became obvious they couldn't win. He just fired once, the single shot enough to shatter the fool's aura, and leave him a set of legs taking a few steps before collapsing.
He was impressed with the staff…but only so much. The big guy with the old school gun, and the scrawny one with a thermos were both good, and even coordinated their attacks, constantly moving back, trying to lure him right over a large hole they'd somehow dug out of the floor. It was a good plan, actually, the hole just the right size and shape so the mech wouldn't be able to move in it.
They were probably just as proud of the hole's two brothers on either side, and sisters to the other edges too, which were not marked with a great big red X on the floor of the…Jaune assumed it was some kind of gym area. The place only had so much space however, and Jaune was soon able to get right on top of the two, and he made it quick for both of them, the gun toting guy taking a gulp from a flask before the end.
It went like that, as thermal sensors told him where everyone was, even those who tried to flee into the surrounding woods, and one trying to rush to the cliffside edge. He even found one set of actually inventive students trying to hotwire his Bullhead, the only functional ship on the flight pad thanks to Neo, but they didn't get anywhere with it, as he reached in, and tore them apart.
The most difficult fights were with the woman in the nurses outfit. She was one of those rare faunus with two traits, a tail and ears, both fox-like. She fought like a demon, even managing to jam several hypodermic needles into some exposed parts of the mech's body, literally dancing around him, to keep herself just out of reach, and almost managing to pry open some panel he didn't even know about.
She didn't make it, of course, not once he started to take her seriously, and when he finally pinned her down, she looked…content with the good work she'd done, even pulling out a grenade of all things from her shirt, and pulling the pin, forcing even the mech back by a few steps, before he could recover, finding that she'd done more damage to the unit all on her own than everyone else combined.
Then there was that one group, the largest gathering in what seemed to be an auditorium. They were huddled up, probably terrified, but some red headed girl…young woman was standing outside of them, holding a sword and shield, the same way he would have done, had he been a hunter. She was strong, and fierce, and it looked actually kind of cool, such that had she not been protecting those who'd taken pot shots at him, Jaune might have let her live.
He couldn't allow it, of course, and she fought him. Her power, magnetism it seemed, was unable to affect the mech, thanks to Null, but she was able to do all sorts of other things. From tearing pipes out of the walls to blast him with water, to even using soda cans she burst open to try and cover his view up so she could fire at him, or move inside his guard real quick, a dancing huntress.
He would have been in trouble, if he'd been fighting her on his own. Most of the others would have been easy to kill, but she was better. Luckily, he had the mech suit, and it had a flame thrower he hadn't shown off before he got to her. Mind, it didn't have a lot of fuel, since it used normal liquid, rather than dust, but when she thought she was safe, and came at him from the front, he used it, and got to watch her red hair turn orange for a moment.
Despite that, she tried to fight, despite what must have been agony just to move, she kept her dance up, until finally, her body seized, and she just couldn't move anymore. He didn't let her see what he did to the others, some of them upperclassmen who'd been hiding behind her, others…well probably Beacon support staff. They didn't last long regardless, and he finally checked his sensors, and then moved onto his goal.
Two heat patterns were there, one identified as Ozpin, the other as Glynda, and they were arguing, standing in an elevator, trying to get it to move. He, despite everything, barked a laugh over the speakers as he finally came around the corner, and Neo revealed what she'd been busy doing while he'd been…cleaning up, her illusion falling away to reveal Ozpin had been working on a keypad and elevator control he'd…borrowed from a hotel, and had Neo bring inside with her.
"Do you know the code?" he asked, and Neo nodded, miming punching it in, in the air before her, as the pair, looking at the console that had literally been jammed into the floor to keep it stable, just stood there, and they turned around to find they hadn't been in the elevator at all. Neo might not have been able to make physical illusions, but with the right setup, you didn't need much to convince someone they were wherever you needed them to be with her gift.
"I…those stains…is there anyone left?" said Glynda as she stared at him, boggle eyed. He wondered if she at any point had thought to come help the students. Probably, but she hadn't, and the robot before her stood passively, as it pointed a hand forward, the one with the 'grabber' arm…which was still covered in gore from where he'd squeezed a few people a bit too hard with it.
"Leave, out of my way, now, and I'll let you live," he said, simple, direct, and when Ozpin said something…or was about to say something, Jaune fired right at him. The teacher lifted the cane he was holding up, and moved to block it, only for the shot to change shape as it neared him, the illusion that had surrounded it shattering, causing it to go from a single solid slug, to a glowing dust crystal, the size of his fist, and so when it struck his guard, it exploded.
The effect was…devastating to them. The round was designed to disable an airship. Not a bullhead or a transport plane either, but one of the large air battleships of Atlas, and the impact of it was like a bolt of lightning striking them directly. They didn't even have time to cry out, as their bodies were filled with that energy, and they fell to the ground, dead, just like he'd promised.
Jaune climbed out of the mech, and turned to Neo. He showed her some instructions, settings and the like, to start on, with her looking concerned at first, before understanding dawned, and she grinned. It was the sort of smile horror movie franchises were built around, and Jaune just shrugged it off, as he, stone faced, climbed into the elevator, and punched in the code she'd mimed.
The ride down took a while, and when he was down in the depths of Beacon, it opened into a room that looked…he was honestly in shock for a moment, as it reminded him of some scifi films he'd seen. What the hell was going on at this school?! He saw big overhead lights, walls of black, shiny metal, and what looked like some kind of abduction pods along one wall, one with a woman in it, the other open for someone else to climb into.
He then saw Amber, his Amber, laying on a medical bed, the sort you saw in hospitals, and he rushed to her, looking at all the wires and stuff hooked up to her. He didn't know what any of it did, but he didn't care either. He tore it all off, as quickly as he could, and then lifted her up in his arms, feeling her stir slightly, as he walked towards the elevator, stopping only to look into the glass tube with the woman in it, and shoot two bullets into her chest.
By the time he was up top, Amber was awake. She was awake, and crying, saying…all sorts of horrible things. About Chivalric Arms, about Ozpin, about…everything. She'd heard everything that had been said around her over the last few days, all of Ozpin's plans, his…madness. She wasn't sure, her thoughts were scattered, but she was so, so glad to be with him, she wasn't ever going to let him go again.
The elevator opened to Neo, with her hand hovering over the last lever. The mech…it had a self destruct feature. Like a real one, and while it took some effort to turn it on, the yield was measured in tons of force. A nice, simple clean blast, that would erase everything here, and hopefully create enough confusion for them to get away, as they left the building with the useful tool behind for its final mission.
They were already on one of the other bullheads, not the one they'd come in on, but one Neo had just removed a few parts from and kept, when it finally blew. Even from half a kilometer away, they were nearly taken out of the sky by the shockwave. He had to fight to keep them in the air, which, strangely, allowed them to blend in with all the other air traffic in Vale, his flight just low enough to watch the shocked faces below looking up, and towards the rising column of smoke that had been Beacon Academy.
He allowed himself a smile at that, at the shock and awe in those expressions, before he punched the engine, and was soon well away from the city, one of several 'civilian' flights to do so, even as the city tried to order them all to go to ground. It was sometimes nice to have a panicky, flighty populace to blend in too, and an hour later, he and his family were far outside the city, and on their way to the rest of their lives.
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The people of Vale were in for a great shock when one of the Atlas ships that had been patrolling their skies finally made its way over to where the former site of Beacon Academy was. That wasn't to say the whole place was a crater or anything, the explosion had not been THAT big, but it was still large enough that most of the main building was simply gone, with bits of rubble marking where it had been, while structures beyond either slanted away, or collapsed in another direction.
The soldiers of Atlas, ever faithful and diligent, went in hot, and had cameras on, the idea being to assure the populace they were on it, that they were here to protect them. And for a time, that was a good thing, as they soon began to find that no one else was, the population of the Academy being nothing but stains on the wall, and a few, mangled beyond recognition, bodies.
Instantly there was outcry, there were demands to know who and what had done all of this, from the people, and most importantly, from Huntsmen and Huntresses the world over, as this was an affront to their whole way of life. They would get an answer, if not the right one, when one of the teams, on a live feed, headed into the center of the crater, and found a hellscape with some still smoldering fires.
The thing that instantly drew the eye was a war machine, a formally tall, powerful thing by the looks of it, though now it was torn into several pieces, and slagged so hard that it took a moment to separate its remains from those of the building it had been part of. Only a few pieces of armor were intact, but the moment the symbol on them was seen, the feed was cut, and the transmissions went black, as the world exploded.
Atlas…their symbol, was on the warmachine that had done this. Immediately the calls for blood went up, and in minutes, a man with a disheveled appearance appeared on the main battleship, to get his niece off it, only to find a group of guards and techs loading her onto a ship to take down to the city in the confusion. They did not survive the attempt, and neither did most of the airship's flight deck, as the man took the last working bullhead, and flew off with four girls loaded onto it.
In the coming days and weeks, the cries for blood were tempered by promises of justice to be found. Blame was cast at Null, that this was his doing, as they'd said it would be, but with no evidence of his presence save their claims and a report by a dead woman no longer able to back them, those cries of innocence were found hollow, especially as people like Jacques Schnee tried to force the Festival to go on, to boost morale, regardless of the tragedy.
It took a month for Atlas, faced with demands for information about Null, information they simply refused to give, to finally be voted to be sanctioned, the Kingdom being forced to protect itself, as Vale found support from Vauco and Mistral instead. Three Kingdoms…soon possibly to be joined by another, when Menagerie, without prompting, offered aid and their best Huntsmen to protect the city, as it got back on its feet.
Jaune would laugh at this, his sisters too, as he watched the peoples of the world scramble about. Atlas, for once, was telling the truth, and too late their lies had caught up to them. It would be some time before they'd have allies beyond their own shore again, and for the family Arc, that was the best sort of Revenge, knowing those who'd hurt them were now without their power base, and likely to falter and fail, if they pushed too hard right now.
Meanwhile, in her Citadel, far from the Lands of Men, a woman with a face of bone and eyes of red would find at her feet one of her great servants, presenting her with a prize that put the world one step closer to what she desired it to be. All in all, it was a lesson on being direct, rather than plotting and planning. Perhaps, she might make use of that directness herself, she muttered, before laughing at some punchline no one else would understand, but the sound of it seemed to make the heavens quake in fear.