Guys I swear I'm not lying this time when I tell you that it'll be months between now and the next update. Probably. Maybe. I dunno, I have about half of the entire fic plotted out by now, to the point of the rough contents of each chapter, but the sad fact of the matter is that even if I do have the time and energy to power through the next few chapters, well...as mentioned, I plan to wait for the canon explanation of the portal-void BEFORE I trim it to fit this fic, so I have to wait for V9 to air. Which, you know, is gonna happen in 2022. So, naturally, I'd have to stop before the chapter where Jinn answers their questions, because I won't be able to finish it until V9. You can expect no more than three additional chapters between now and then at the absolute max.
Anyways, as you might expect, I got this chapter out a LOT quicker than I thought I would...though I might have maybe neglected some of my homework to do so. Only a little! Its not like anything's LATE or whatever, just that I haven't perhaps prioritized it as highly as I should. And I'll tell you what, my obligatory forum response posts for various education classes don't give me damn near as much serotonin as this does. And really, that's what matters, isn't it? Me enjoying life?
Writing this out also made me aware of the interesting fact that we don't actually know who's partners with whom on Team SSSN. I think everyone just assumes its a Sun-Neptune and Sage-Scarlet situation because Sun and Neptune are shown as a pair the most? Not that the other two show up in RWBY enough for us to tell anyways.
Agent Pond is, naturally, a reference to James Bond.
"Okay, so we're here." Scarlet thumped his bags down with more irritation than force outside the dorm room Team SSSN had been assigned at Beacon –the dorm room they weren't supposed to show up at for another couple weeks. It was (not) fine if Sun wanted to go galivanting off on some stupid adventure a week before the semester actually ended, but receiving an all-caps text that "something totally rad is happening in Vale and you guys have to get here right now because this might be the coolest thing we've ever done" had been enough for the rest of the team to –reluctantly– move out to Vale ahead of everyone else, who were taking the time to leisurely prepare at Haven where there was less chance of spying competitors. "What's so damn important?"
"Uh, yeah-" Sun looked behind himself, holding the door so that he was pretty much the only thing they could see. "Hang on just a sec."
He closed the door, and Scarlet blinked at it for several seconds as he felt Neptune and Sage doing the same thing behind him. Neptune finally raised a hand, tentatively.
"Anyone wanna bet on what's going on?"
"Fifty lien says he's got some kind of exotic pet." Scarlet groaned, pinching his nose.
"Fifty on it being a new friend." Sage said. "Lots of famous people go to Beacon."
"Uh, fifty lien on it not being a girlfriend!" Neptune hastily chimed, before adding under his breath "No way he's gonna beat me to the punch there…"
"Okay, the room's gonna be dark, but you guys can come in now!" Sun called out from behind the door. As the unofficial leader whenever Sun was off doing his shenanigans, Scarlet sighed and took it upon himself to be the one to open the door, leading the other two in and leaving their luggage out in the hallway. If this was some kind of prank, at least their stuff would be unscathed.
The room was indeed dark, as Sun had promised, and Scarlet wondered what he was about to reveal-
Click.
"Surprise!" Sun shouted gleefully from his place by the light switch, now with the noticeable addition of a shiny gold party hat, as he pulled the string on a handheld confetti cannon, covering them all with fluttering specks of paper.
A banner hung across the center of the dorm room, reading 'WELCOME TO TEAM SSSNI, ILIA' in garishly bright letters, and multicolored streamers were slung all along the beds and taped in forlorn, inexpert draggles to the ceiling and walls. In the center of the room, a slender girl with her dark brown hair tied back in a curled ponytail blew mournfully on a curled noisemaker to accompany Sun's shout, wearing a matching hat and the telltale 'been battered by Sun Wukong's unending positivity for far too long' dead-eyed expression of the lost.
"What." Scarlet said, taking in the scene of festive carnage.
Neptune leaned around him. "Well…she's not a pet? Pay up!"
"I think a better question is what is going on here?" Sage said pointedly.
The girl, who Scarlet presumed to be Ilia, sighed and reached up, taking off the party hat and the noisemaker before she looked at them with a sense of apology.
"My name is Ilia Amitola." she said, proving his guess right. "And I'm sorry, but…I'll be bunking with you for the foreseeable future…?"
She almost cringed as she said it, grimacing and showing teeth. Scarlet could already feel a headache coming on.
"Why." he deadpanned, and Sun slid in, actually looking a little apologetic for once.
"'Cause she's probably being hunted by the White Fang!" he said proudly as he smacked a hand down on Ilia's shoulder and gave them all a radiant thumbs-up, making Scarlet's pupils constrict as Neptune choked in surprise. "See, a lot of stuff happened, and after we messed up their Dust raid on the docks, Ilia here decided to bail on the organization, but since they've already moved on to robbing shops and working with humans we figured there'd be a dark mastermind behind all this and it was totally not safe for her to just pick a hotel in Vale or something, even if Weiss did offer to pay for it-"
"Hold up, Weiss Schnee?" Neptune asked, stepping forward and spreading his arms as if to hold Sun and the rest of his teammates at bay.
"Huh?" Sun blinked at him, then waved dismissively. "Oh, yeah, that's her –anyways, she's on Team RWBY, and after they uncovered this whole conspiracy they asked us for backup, since it turns out it probably goes all the way up to Professor Lionheart? I mean, if its true, its probably best for us to be as far away from Haven as possible for a little bit, since the bad guys might use you against me if I'm here pryin' into their plans and whatnot and you guys are back at the school."
"Wow." Neptune said when Sun finally fell silent, stretching the word out so that it almost became two syllables, before he sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. "Man, when you said this was coolest thing we've ever done, I thought you meant that you manage to arrange a team spar with Pyrrha Nikos or something."
"Nah man, that's later." Sun flapped his hand dismissively again. "She and her team are part of the counter-conspiracy too."
Strained breathing made them glance towards Scarlet, who was being almost literally held back by Sage putting two hands on his shoulders.
"You were gone for literally only five days!" Scarlet shrieked, reaching out to claw the air in utter despair. "How the bleeding hell did you manage to get involved in all this?!"
Sun gave a shrug that was as carefree as his namesake.
"I dunno, man, stuff just happens in Vale." he said.
Everyone on Team SSSN minus its leader –and including the extraneous new I– gave despairing groans.
"Ugh. Well, I'm Scarlet David." Scarlet said as he finally gave into the new ridiculous situation that Sun had foisted on them all, and jabbed behind himself with a thumb. "This is Neptune Vasilias and Sage Ayana. Our dorm is your dorm, or whatever."
"No peeking when we're getting changed!" Neptune chimed with what was probably another of his charming grins, even going so far as to snap his fingers and point fingerguns at her.
"I'm a lesbian." Ilia deadpanned, and Scarlet choked on a snicker.
"Ey, fellow same-sex enjoyer." he said afterwards, though, stepping forward and offering a fist, and she perked up a little, stepping up to meet him in a gentle fistbump.
"Aw, Scarlet's bonding." Sun stage-whispered, sounding like a proud father, and the corner of Scarlet's eye twitched.
"And don't expect me to be happy with this half-arsed explanation." he said, rounding on his putative leader as the others, sensing another famed Scarlet lecture incoming, stopped paying attention and instead moved to start pulling their things into the dorm. "You don't get to greet your teammates with 'Hey guys, I joined a conspiracy!' after five days of radio silence."
"Counter-conspiracy." Sun said, grinning without shame. "And the whole gang's gonna be meeting up tonight after lights-out, so you can ask them more questions then."
"MOTHERF-"
Several hundred yards away, birds were startled up squawking from the trees in Beacon's courtyard as Scarlet's roar echoed across campus.
"Hello, everyone, and welcome to Beacon's first Counter-Conspiracy Conspiracy meeting!" Ruby chimed from the front of Team RWBY's dorm room, looking alert and at attention as she saluted the others with the dry erase marker in one hand. "First things first, I think everyone should introduce themselves. I'm Ruby Rose, leader of Team RWBY, and we're a Beacon-based team!"
"Weiss Schnee, Ruby's partner and unofficial financier of this…group." Weiss said with a slight sniff, positioned in one of the chairs for the dorm room's study desks. "I have familial contacts in Atlas, and our money comes out of my allowance funds."
"Blake Belladonna. I'm ex-White Fang, and though I severed ties with them completely, I'm still in contact with Menagerie, where my parents live." Blake said, sitting in front of the team's impromptu bunkbeds with her back against the wall. "I'm familiar with the White Fang at a high level and I'm mostly skilled at covert ops."
"Yang Xiao Long, Blake's partner and Ruby's sister." Yang said with a slight wave to everyone else, sitting at the other desk across from Weiss. "I'm mainly just a hand-to-hand fighter with a Semblance that's great for tanking hits."
"Uh, I'm Jaune Arc, leader of Team JNPR." Jaune said as Yang gave him an expectant look, shifting a little from where he sat on Weiss's bed. "We're another Beacon-based team. My Semblance lets me amplify the Aura of other people, which includes self-healing and Semblance usage."
"Pyrrha Nikos –I'm Jaune's partner, and a member of Team JNPR." Pyrrha said from where she sat beside him, offering a bright smile to the other co-conspirators. "I'm a four-time Mistral champion and an excellent fighter, though beyond that, I'm afraid I don't have much to offer besides my name and the fame that comes along with it."
"Lie Ren, a member of Team JNPR." Ren said, and looked to Nora sitting beside him.
"Nora Valkyrie!" she crowed. "Partner of Lie Ren and member of the baddest team to ever hit Beacon! My Semblance is High Voltage and my weapon is a grenade-launcher hammer and-"
When Ren tapped her knee, she fell silent, proving that these long months of training hadn't been for nothing, as she then looked expectantly at Team SSSN sitting across from them on Blake's bed.
"Sun Wukong, leader of Team SSSNI!" Sun said with a happy wave of his tail, crouching rather than sitting on the edge of the bedspread, presumably to give his extra limb the room. "Me and the guys are real happy that you're including us here."
"Neptune Vasilias. I'm Sun's partner and, uh, we're not doing anything illegal, are we?" Neptune asked with a slight wince.
"It's not illegal if no one notices that we're doing it until we hand the bad guys over to the authorities." Jaune said with a tight smile as everyone on Team RWBY studiously avoided looking at everyone else.
"Right…my name's Scarlet David, and I'm still not convinced that this isn't all bull." Scarlet said from Neptune's other side, his arms folded across his chest.
"Sage Ayana. I'm Scarlet's partner." the tallest member of Team SSSN(I) said from the end of the bed, placing his hands on his knees and inclining his head politely. "A pleasure to meet you."
Everyone looked down to Ilia, who was sitting on the floor and leaning against the part of Blake's bed that was actually a bedpost and not a precarious stack of books.
"I'm Ilia Amitola, and I'm ex-White Fang too." she said, looking a little uncomfortable at being such the center of attention. "I just left recently, though. I'm a chameleon Faunus –I can change the color of my skin– and I'm good at spying, assassination, and infiltrations."
"Penny Polendina!" their last member chirped, saluting brisky from where she was sitting on the low bookshelf between the two beds occupied by JNPR and SSSNI. "I hail from Atlas, and I am here for the Vytal Festival! I have connections to Atlas military and technology, but I do not have any abilities that a normal human does not!"
She hiccupped.
"Right, well…that's everyone introduced." Ruby said after a few seconds, turning to the whiteboard that she and her team had propped against the door. "Friends, teammates, and co-counter-conspirators, here's what we're working with! A few weeks ago, me and my team were out in Vale, and we took a few wrong turnings, and, heh…we basically ended up being flies on the wall for a super illegal discussion in the back room of a bar that just so happened to have the window cracked."
She began to scribble the vague faces of a woman with a fall of dark hair over one shoulder, another girl with a neat bob and two strands trailing down her back, and a boy with short, spiky hair slicked back away from his forehead. She then turned away from the board and tapped these rough sketches with the marker.
"There's at least three people involved, plus Roman Torchwick. The boss seemed to be a woman a bit older than us, with another girl and a guy our age. They obviously weren't spelling everything out, but they were talking about their plan to destabilize Beacon and how the headmaster at Haven had given them access to the festival. Apparently, doing something at the Vytal Festival was a pretty big part of their plans, but before we could really learn anything big, Torchwick started complaining about his job at the docks –which we, heh, foiled pretty good. The other thing, though, is that he doesn't seem super into this, so we figured he's the weakest link in their bad-guy chain."
"Totally makes sense." Sun said, nodding wisely. "If these guys got their credit from Professor Lionheart, then they're probably not from Vale, and they needed a local dude to show them the ropes. Lotsa people did stuff like that back in Vacuo."
"Right." Ruby nodded enthusiastically and turned back towards the board to create something of the beginnings of a string-diagram, with names and locations plastered all around the three rough faces in loopy black handwriting. "So we figured that if we ambushed him at the docks, we'd be able to beat some truth out of either Torchwick or his hench-wench, Neopolitan. Since we didn't want to get them to bring any reinforcements, me and my team went in alone with Ilia, Sun, and Penny, with Team JNPR waiting on the outside to call in our reinforcements or come help themselves if we needed it. Me and Weiss and Penny tracked down Neopolitan, but everyone else got tied up in dealing with Torchwick and the White Fang, who he'd apparently been working with."
She circled White Fang several times with the marker.
"We're still not sure what that's about, but if the baddies wanted manpower, they might have manipulated the White Fang somehow into joining their master plan."
"I might have cut all my ties with the White Fang, but I actually only left them just before the semester began." Blake said, drawing everyone's attention. "The night before I left, my…associate, Adam, the leader of our group, met with a trio of humans in the main tent. According to gossip before we left in the morning, they were planning a "revolution of their own" and Adam had told them no, but…"
"We think he might've accepted after all." Ilia finished. "Adam's a great leader, but he can be ruled by his emotions sometimes, especially when it's something he has a lot of feeling about. He and Blake were…" Her eyes slid over to Blake who tucked her chin into her knees a little, looking away. "…close, and he was pretty emotionally compromised after she left. Even if it meant fighting for a human cause, he might've said yes if they promised to help him bring her back, or gave him a show of force that he knew he couldn't win against."
"Hold up, didn't Blake say she left the White Fang?" Neptune asked, raising a hand as though objecting in class. "Why does he want her back?"
"Adam doesn't like other people telling him what to do." Blake said, mostly expressionless, although her ears laid back a little. "And he doesn't take no for an answer."
"I'm filing that under a solid yikes." Sun said, leaning around Neptune to look at her, his bright blue eyes concerned. "Vote for adding Blake to the anti-White Fang protection roster?"
"You're not adding another person to our team." Scarlet growled, but he raised his hand along with Neptune and Sage anyways, on what seemed to be sheer team reflex. Ilia half-raised her hand as well, though she looked uncertain about doing even that. Blake rolled her eyes a little, but the slight curl at the corner of her mouth was almost fond.
"Anyways, our point is that the White Fang are probably in cahoots with these three conspirators, and they're working with Professor Lionheart in turn." Jaune said with a cough, dragging them all back on track. "Ruby said she managed to get some information out of Neopolitan, right?"
"R-right!" Ruby said, straightening up as the group turned their attention to her again. She tapped the board with her now-capped marker. "While I'm not 100% on whether or not I managed to…counter-corrupt?…her, I did get her to spill some stuff about Haven. Apparently, there's something called a Relic –or a lamp, she kinda used it interchangeably– in a vault underneath the school. The entrance is hidden under the female statue in the grand hall, and you need to put something from Lionheart in the chains around the statue's waist, some kind of circular trinket. The statue platform will turn into an elevator that'll take you down to the vault itself."
"The Relic is further hidden behind a door that can only be opened by someone with a very special Semblance." Weiss continued. "And according to what Ruby learned, the Relic itself is a special tool that can be used to gain information. Therefore, if we manage to get to Haven, open the vault, and retrieve it before these conspirators can, we will be able to learn of their plans and how to stop them."
"We originally planned to go to Mistral if this whole information thing didn't pan out." Jaune said, picking up the thread of the story, mostly addressing SSSNI and Penny. "Pyrrha's got family there, and Ren and Nora grew up in Anima, so we figured it'd be pretty easy to excuse ourselves while we snuck around, and Team RWBY could come with us on the 'camping trip' since we're all such great friends."
"I also know someone with the specifications for the Semblance that opens the vault." Yang said, making Team SSSNI look at her with interest as Penny cocked her head. "My biological mom. Only problem is…she's kind of a bandit out in the wilderness of Mistral."
"Yeah, that would kinda make relic retrieval difficult." Neptune mumbled, pressing the tip of his folded hands underneath his chin before gesturing outwards. "But whatever! We can totally figure out what to do about that, right?"
"We probably can. And Neopolitan just…told you all this." Scarlet said dubiously, looking at Ruby, who flinched and stepped back, spreading her hands.
"I-I just brought up some points on why she shouldn't want to destabilize the Hunter academies if she's a career criminal!" she said hastily. "And I also…look, it'll be even better if we have an in with the bad guys, so I told her that my team was going to take the train to Mistral over break. If she wants to work with us, she should show up at the station."
"But what if she doesn't want to work with you, and uses that as a chance to ambush you guys with the rest of the baddies?" Sun pointed out.
"That's where we come in!" Nora said, leaping to her feet and striking a pose as she flexed her arms. "Like anyone could take us on. We'll super-covert-ops our way onto the train, and bam! Bad guys thwarted!"
"Uh, yeah." Jaune laughed sheepishly. "Our plan was kinda to have Team JNPR head there early, so that even if something happens to Team RWBY, at least some of us will get through."
"Splitting your forces under these circumstances is a very effective tactic." Penny said, nodding wisely to herself as she folded her arms, before her green eyes shadowed a little. "But Team RWBY is taking on quite a big risk. I would recommend anonymously altering the authorities that something may be amiss at that station at that time, such as a suspected terrorist attack. It won't stop this Neopolitan from making contact with you if she needs to, but it will stop any larger forces coming to dispose of you covertly."
"Which brings us to our next problem." Ruby sighed, before quickly drawing an expanded Scroll with two cartoonish googly eyes –eyes that were squinted in a suspicious manner– on the board. "The boss lady mentioned that a guy named Watts was helping them out with the electronic hacking part of their plan, which means that until we figure out who's involved with what, we shouldn't use anything that can be hacked to record anything that might give us away."
"If this is the same Arthur Watts who supposedly died in the Paladin Incident, then that information is most concerning." Penny said, everyone's eyes going to her again. She straightened a little under the unanimous attention of three different teams, looking pleased. "He is responsible for the CCT network in Mantle, as well as Mantle's environmental Dust control, and he was a brilliant doctor and scientist in Atlas, until my father- erm, until he somewhat fell from grace after his project was passed over in favor of my father's. He also created the Atlesian Paladin-290, a new form of mecha-battle-suit that will revolutionize military exploits and has not yet been unveiled to the public."
"So he's a guy that can write code and engineer, along with whatever hacking is." Neptune said, looking glum.
"That'd be more coding, brainiac." Sun scoffed, jabbing a finger into his temple as he looked at his friend askance.
"Oh like you have any idea of what hacking involves." Neptune sniffed incredulously, folding his arms and leaning away.
"I do, man! Ilia's been teaching me!"
"I've been teaching you what channels the White Fang typically operate on and what sites they can use as a foothold." Ilia muttered from the foot of the bed, massaging her temples with the fingers of both hands. "That is not the full definition of hacking, and even if it was, it's only been two days, so there's no way that you'd become a master at it this fast!"
"Details, details." Sun said blithely, waving her off.
"Ahem." Jaune coughed, drawing their attention again. "Stay on task, guys?"
There was a bevy of awkward, apologetic muttering from Team SSSNI before everyone quieted down.
"So, let's focus on the most practical things first." Pyrrha said to start things off again, folding her hands neatly in her lap. "RWBY and JNPR, at least, are planning to go to Haven over the semester break. Our team will board the first train as covertly as may be tomorrow morning, then wait at the second stop outside of Vale for Team RWBY. They will take the train at noon, and barring any incidents, disembark and meet us at that same stop. Assuming everyone makes it there successfully, we'll board another train to Haven and take an inn there together."
"Pyrrha's going to need to wear a cloak or something when we get to Mistral." Jaune said, making his partner give him a grateful nod. "She's a lot more famous there than she is here, and we don't want any extra attention if we can help it."
"Maybe not a cloak." Sun suggested, his tail waving slowly behind him as he pinched his fingers with a slight grimace. "That kinda makes it obvious that you're trying to hide something."
"What do you guys want to do, though?" Ruby asked pointedly, tapping her marker against the board, where she had written RWBY-JNPR Team Jaunt. "Do you want to come with us, or…?"
"The main White Fang presence is in Mistral." Ilia said without hesitation. "Atlas has too much of a military presence, not to mention the fact that its not really hospitable outside the main settlements. Vacuo is just as bad environment-wise, but there's less discrimination, so we don't need as much of a presence there. Between Vale and Mistral, Mistral is easier to move around within settlements, and there's more room outside them."
"Why not Menagerie?" Penny asked, tilting her head to the side like a bird.
"The chieftain won't allow it." Blake, rather than Ilia, answered promptly. Everyone looked to her, but her eyes were locked on the wall. "Menagerie is on precarious-enough ground as it is, internationally speaking, and they're not willing to risk it any further by harboring the White Fang. Oh, sure, the White Fang has a pretty steady presence there anyways, but they're not willing to make it their main base. Even Sienna knows better than to paint a target on our backs like that."
"Exactly." Ilia nodded. "I don't want to attract trouble by letting people catch a glimpse of me there."
"Plus it'd be a bit sketchy if we went right back to Haven after rushing here in such a hurry." Scarlet said, planting his chin in one hand and his elbow on his knee as he looked aside with a sigh. "I mean, from the outside."
"So you're with us?" Nora asked excitedly, bouncing a little in place. Scarlet huffed a little, curling his lips in a pout.
"Let's just say I'm not not with you." he grumbled. "I won't say that this is all circumstantial evidence –because it's not– but all we have to prove that any of this is true is your team's word."
He jabbed his finger at Ruby, who did not help herself by swallowing nervously.
"Th-that's why we're going to Haven." she said, rallying quickly. "With the information thingy, we'll get enough to prove what's going on, as well as figure out how to stop it."
"And then we hand it over to the headmasters?" Sage asked.
"Yup." Jaune gave him a little nod. "We're not going to Professor Ozpin with this yet because we barely have anything to go on, and this is huge. I mean, one of the headmasters working to bring down another school? That's like something out of the Great War, so if we don't bring absolute and irrefutable proof with us, we could cause a massive diplomatic incident, and that's just if we're wrong. If we're right, we might ruin our chances of catching the people responsible, leave the Vytal Festival open to disaster, and get ourselves bumped off by the secret shadow masterminds in the process."
"In such a situation as this, it is best to tread very carefully and consider all possible outcomes and options before taking a course of action." Penny said, swinging her legs a little. "I believe it is correct to wait until we have more concrete evidence than Ruby's word, even if we trust and believe her as friends."
"In that case, I think me and my team should stay here." Sun said. "We'll keep an eye out for anyone sneaking around your dorm rooms while you're at Haven, and if something big happens, you'll just be a Scroll call away."
"Sun's been able to sneak me into Beacon by claiming me as a relative." Ilia sighed, massaging her forehead a little. "It should work for a little bit longer, especially with all the strangers coming to participate in the Vytal Festival. I can hang around with Team SSSN-"
"Team SSSNI. With an I."
"-with Team SSSNI," Ilia groaned, her eye twitching slightly. "-and no one should be too suspicious of it. What about you though, Penny?"
Everyone looked to the other girl sitting on the bookcase, and she frowned, putting a finger to her chin in thought.
"I do not believe I have the mobility to go to Haven." she said, wilting a little. "I am…my father is most protective. I was not even supposed to be present at the docks, and if he knew, I would receive a thorough scolding. There is also…there are certain military connections that my family has that would make it unwise for me to accompany you."
"Okay, so it looks like it will just be a RWBY-JNPR mission." Ruby said, scribbling out everyone's names and placements on the board. "Since Penny might be monitored because of her Atlas connections n' stuff, and Ilia doesn't have a Scroll right now since she dumped her White Fang one, we'll contact Team SSSN in case of emergencies. Uh, everyone get their Scrolls out so that we can exchange numbers?"
There was a flurry of confusion as everyone pulled out their devices and started passing them around, adding their numbers to contact lists and occasionally scrolling to make sure that they hadn't been double-added. Eventually, though, everyone seemed to have gotten everyone else's number as they all settled down again.
"Do we get code names?" Sun asked excitedly as he tucked his Scroll away in his jeans. "That'd be awesome!"
"Maybe later, but not right now." Blake said, one ear flicking as though to chase away a fly. "For this mission, RWBY and JNPR's cover is that we're just on a camping trip. If someone is suspicious of us and if they hack our Scroll records to listen to past conversations, the fact that we're talking in code will just confirm it."
"Really, if everything goes according to plan, all we'll need to call you guys for is to let you know that we landed safe in Haven, we got the thing in the vault, and that we're coming home." Yang said, tapping off points from where she had her arm laid over the desk. "If we're calling you outside that, everything'll have gone wrong already so there'd be no point in using code."
"Ugh. Fair." Jaune sighed, running a hand through his hair to push back his bangs. "Let's hope things don't get that bad."
"They won't. They shouldn't." Pyrrha hastily amended. "We'll be fine."
"So we've got our personnel down for the mission." Penny said, perking up. "What is to be the mission contents?"
"Uh, well, once we get to Haven, or a little bit before depending on the train schedule, Yang and at least one other person will go to track down the bandit camp." Ruby said, and reached over to Weiss, who rummaged around on the desk and handed up a map at the same time. Ruby jammed its uppermost edge under the top of the whiteboard and stepped away, pointing to an irregular circle drawn on the continent of Anima. "Jaune and the rest of his team have been combing the Mistral news reports, looking for reports of bandit attacks, so we've got a rough idea of where their camp might be. Once Yang and the others find it, they'll try to negotiate to get Raven to help us."
"Why negotiate?" Sage asked, frowning a little. "Isn't she Yang's mother?"
"In blood only." Yang scoffed. "Raven's a stone-cold bitch that only cares about her tribe, and since she left me with dad right after I was born, its pretty clear I'm not included in that."
"We conjecture that Raven will be exceedingly reluctant to help us at all, given that it would mean breaking into a Hunter academy." Weiss said from the desk, turning from the whiteboard to look at the other teams arranged on and between the two beds. "Therefore, if attempting to appeal to her sense of family fails –which I believe it will– we can force her hand by threatening to reveal the location of her bandit camp to the authorities."
"That's why we'd probably split off." Ruby said, tapping that part of the plan as it was outlined on the board. "Some of us will go to the camp with Yang, but the rest of us will be at Haven. The bandit camp team will call them when we actually find the camp, and if we don't call them again within a certain timeframe, they'll call you guys and go to the authorities in Mistral."
"Mm. Good call, calling both." Neptune said, putting a little too much effort into nodding wisely. "Mistral's law system is kinda corrupt, and this is a bad time to find out that the wrong person's been taking bribes."
"Damn straight." Yang clicked her tongue and pointed a finger gun at Neptune, making him perk up.
"Ren, Nora, and I will be staying at Haven." Jaune said, speaking up. "Ren grew up in Anima, so he'd know the place a bit better than me. Pyrrha's definitely going with Yang, though, because apparently the Branwen Tribe respects strength and we don't want to show a weak face to them."
"Neither do we want to seem overly tempting, so I will be staying behind with the rest of Team JNPR." Weiss said with a reluctant sigh. "As it stands now, Ruby, Blake, Yang, and Pyrrha will be the ones to make contact with the bandit camp, though if we manage to convince that criminal Neopolitan of anything, that may have to be readjusted…"
"We can only worry about it when it happens." Ren said philosophically. "Right now we're planning with what we know we have."
"Too true." Jaune nodded to him. "Team RWBY's been practicing pickpocketing, so if we can sneak Weiss up to the academy, she'll probably be able to snatch that thing off of Lionheart –whatever it is– that can open up the statue. It'll probably tame a few days to track down the bandit camp, so ideally, we'll hit Lionheart's office just before, so he won't have much time to miss it."
"Once we've got the thingy and Raven's agreed to help us, everyone will assemble in the Haven great hall after hours, and we'll use it to activate the statue and get down to the vault." Ruby said. "Raven's a bandit queen, so she might want to steal it for herself, so everyone'll need to be on guard."
"And once we get our mitts on this lamp, we'll wring it for all the answers it has!" Nora said, grinning and punching one fist into her open palm.
Morning dawned.
Team JNPR was already awake with it, and Ren wondered if any of the others had been too high-strung to sleep. Jaune, at least, seemed used to operating on low rations when it came to that, but Ren knew that Nora would make the world suffer for it if she didn't get enough rest.
An unexpected aura of businesslike calm had settled over him as they shouldered their luggage and made their way to the Bullhead that would take them into the city. Ren could feel the comforting weight of StormFlower on his hips, and he felt prepared, more prepared than he had ever felt for anything before. He was setting out on a mission with his team, like any Huntsman would dream of, and they were solidly ready for anything the world had to throw at them. It was an invigorating feeling, especially when he looked to the side and saw Nora vibrating, clearly ready and eager to head off on the call to adventure.
Pyrrha was all balanced calm, standing in the swaying Bullhead with unconscious and consummate grace. With Pyrrha at his side, Ren could feel confident staring down armies, and it wasn't even her fame as a champion that reassured him –it was her poise, how that even now, heading out at the crack of dawn and on legally uncertain intel, she looked ahead with clear green eyes towards the future, calm and steady and ready to face whatever came with perfect equanimity, be that a horde of Grimm beyond number or a mix-up of their train tickets.
And Jaune…
The ineffectual friendliness of their team leader had peeled away again, just a little, showing the steel beneath his gawky smile and clumsy social graces. Jaune looked towards the future too, but his eyes weren't full of a steady calm: they looked towards a future filled with casualties, his mind whirring, whirring, trying to think of ways to chip them down, to erase them before they became true. In a way, it was just as comforting, and it was especially comforting in a leader. Never once would Jaune act to throw them away in a desperate gambit, never once would he falter on his path to ensure that he saved as much lives as possible. To Jaune, victory was not victory unless he managed to get each and every one of his allies home safe, and he would eke out every bit of talent and strength within himself to make it so. Like Pyrrha, that was a bulwark Ren could feel safe putting his back against, a friend and a teammate he was glad to fight alongside.
The city was quiet as they flew in. Though the sun was above the horizon, it was still quite early, and Ren felt a tiny hint of paranoia tickle at the back of his neck. What if they were flying into a trap? What if the enemy had anticipated their moves and was even now taking steps to pick them off? Had they not accounted for something?
He took a deep breath and let the worries flow off of him, like water. They had planned this together. He trusted Jaune, he trusted his teammates, and he trusted his friends. He would believe in the plan that they had all made together.
Besides, other than start a fight –or flee– there wasn't much they could do if the enemy had set a trap. As strong as they had become, as hard as Jaune had trained them, none of them were Hunter level yet, and there was also the simple factor of age. None of them had the experience in espionage and double-dealing that an older student or an older Hunter would have. Very likely, they wouldn't recognize a trap until they walked straight into it.
Ren found his eyes drawn to Nora again, and another part of him relaxed as he saw her hands dangling loose and easy, knowing that she was nonetheless ready to grab her hammer at any moment. There wasn't much that could take Nora down if she was ready for it. Her Aura was strong, and she was splendidly well-trained. At the worst, at the very worst, they'd all be able to run, including her.
His eyes were nonetheless sharp as they disembarked from the Bullhead, darting to every shadow and every person they passed, and Ren considered that he wouldn't be relaxed, fully relaxed, until the train had chugged out of Vale and into the wilderness. Then again, Jaune was looking just as fiercely –he was just hiding it a bit better, sweeping his eyes in casual flicks that nonetheless missed nothing. Pyrrha, bless her, was maintaining their cover as casual students going out on a camping trip by chattering with Nora, but Ren noticed that she still carried her duffel bag in such a way that it wouldn't hamper her quickly slinging her shield onto her arm and drawing her weapon.
They made it to the train station without incident, which wasn't so impressive, considering how close the Bullhead docks were to the other transportation hubs. Still, any moment when their plan progressed without incident was a good moment, as far as Ren was concerned. Tickets were procured, no one attacked them in the station, and Team JNPR made it on the train without anything untoward happening, not even another rude passenger bumping into them. When they got to their little private compartment in the larger car, Ren rather thought that everyone heaved a sigh of relief.
It was spacious, reminding him a lot of the dorm rooms at Beacon, actually, with three slitlike windows in the wall showing the station outside, and two bunkbeds at either side of the small room. There was a stack of shelves made out of matching wood against the wall at the foot of each bed, and they moved to store their things by habit, Jaune and Pyrrha taking one and Ren and Nora taking the other as they stowed their gear.
No one took off their weapons, though, and even though Jaune rotated his shoulder a little inside the shoulder pad of his armor. He'd updated it from the first set Ren had seen when Jaune had initially took over leading their team: the chest plate was bigger, and there were gauntlets as well as shoulder pads.
"Welp." Jaune said as they all moved to sit down in preparation for the train to move –or, in Nora's case, gleefully skitter up to the top bunk like a monkey. "We made it."
"Made it so far." Nora pointed out, executing an experimental trial run of the mattress as she rolled from side to side. "Don't count your chickens before they hatch. Ooh, do you have any chickens? I mean, you lived outside Vale. Does it feel like cannibalism when you eat eggs 'cause you had chickens that were like a part of the family? Ooh, ooh, do you think chickens feel like its cannibalism when they eat eggs-"
"Chickens do what?" Pyrrha asked, looking a little stricken.
"Chickens are omnivores." Ren said, drawing StormFlower out to lay it on his knee. Polishing the sickle-blades was an excellent way to pass the time, as well as have his weapon available should anything occur from here on outwards. Plus, this meant that it would be in top condition by the time they arrived at their last stop.
"Yeah!" Nora crowed happily from above as the sound of her rolling came to a stop. Without even looking above himself, Ren knew just from the creak of wood that she had sat up to grip the edge of the bunkbed excitedly. "Chickens will eat anything. Plants, bugs, mice, dropped hamburgers, dropped chicken wings, their eggs, other chickens that got fucked-up in pecking order fights –I tell ya, even Grimm hath no ferocity like a chicken flock that's scented blood. It's like a swarm of piranhas."
"Wait, seriously?" Jaune blinked. Ren gave him a grave nod.
"We've seen it before on farms." he said. "As we were passing through."
"Pigs, too." Nora said happily. "Pigs'll eat you if you lay down in their pen."
Jaune and Pyrrha exchanged nervous looks.
"Somehow, farming seems so much more of a dangerous profession now." Pyrrha said with a gulp. Jaune gave an almost bitter half-laugh.
"Yeah." he said. "Especially if you're Oscar…"
"Who's Oscar?" Nora asked, and as much as he liked to pretend that he was entirely absorbed in polishing his weapon, Ren had to admit that he was listening hard. Jaune didn't really talk about his fallen comrades, which was perfectly understandable, but didn't help at all with his team's curiosity.
"Oh, uh, Oscar's an old friend of mine." Jaune said, sounding like he was smiling a little, reminiscent. "He was a farmkid, too, until he got swept up in…some stuff."
Jaune exhaled slowly.
"He was –is– a great kid." he continued, less reminiscently. "I just…man, it hits sometimes that I won't –that I haven't seen him for a while."
"Is he…okay?" Pyrrha asked, and Jaune huff-laughed again, and when Ren looked up, he was wiping his eyes on his sleeve.
"Yeah. Yeah, he's fine. Probably shoveling manure or whatever as we speak." Jaune said as he straightened up a little, offering them a smile that seemed only a little bit forced. "I just…miss him. Y'know how it is."
"We don't know how it is, because you, mister, are stuffed full of more secrets than a Lancer is stuffed with murder." Nora said from her position on the top bunk, and Ren sighed.
"Nora, we've been over this. He's not a serial killer."
"Serial killer, schmearal killer!" Nora said, leaning almost halfway off the bed as she stabbed a finger at a nonplussed Jaune. "I've got your beat, mister! You're a super-secret agent planted on Team JNPR by, like, Atlas or somebody to counter a conspiracy plot that will decide the fate of Remnant!"
Jaune blinked a little, and then he relaxed and laughed.
"I think you've been playing too many video games." he said, rubbing the back of his neck, his knee bouncing a little in place. "And aren't we all countering a conspiracy!"
"Yeah, but you're like, an outside plant or something! You know things, buddy, and I won't rest until I'm sure you won't stab us in the back in a last-minute double-cross grab for glory!"
"That's it. I think we should stop watching Agent Pond movies with Team RWBY on game night." Jaune groaned.
"Exactly! Agent Pond sounds suspiciously close to Agent Jaune, wouldn't you say?"
"Nora, you can't use my name as evidence that I'm a spy."
"Sure I can! Now, who's your outside contact!? Who are you working for?! Talk, punk!"
"Nora, if he's a spy, shouldn't he be immune to you just yelling at him as an interrogation?"
"Shit, Pyrrha's right. All right –Ren, hold him down! We'll have to bring out the medieval torture devices!"
"Why did you go straight to medievaaaaAAAAAAA-!"
Ren didn't move a muscle from his place on the bed as Nora leapt down to all but tackle a startled Jaune, wrestling somewhat playfully with him on the bed as she tried to jab her hands past his guard for a fearsome tickle. Ren knew exactly what she was doing –most of the tension had drained out of the room as Pyrrha laughed breathlessly behind her hand and Jaune and Nora thrashed, her cheerfully proclaiming that she was going to wring out all his secrets as Jaune shrieked for his partner to help. By proposing an absolutely outlandish theory and carrying it as far as she could, Nora had made everyone laugh, made them focus on each other and their bonds rather than the looming task at hand. She diffused the tension in the room as easily and neatly as snipping the wire on a bomb, and she did it without anyone even noticing what she was doing.
This, among many other things, was what Ren loved most about her.
Still, there was no reason not to be entirely distracted from the mission. Ren kept one eye on alert and the other on StormFlower as he polished, working carefully around the razor-sharp edge of the twin sickles. If an enemy thought to take them by surprise, they had another thing coming.
"Okay, this is fine, this is fine, this is fine…" Ruby muttered, almost whining around her teeth as she tugged her red hood a little further over her face. Team JNPR had made it to their stop, they'd called it in and everything, which meant that all that remained was for her team to board the train and go.
She was wracked with an entirely uncharacteristic nervousness. Ruby couldn't believe she had dropped the ball this hard. Sure, okay, maybe Yang was right in that she was fixating entirely too hard on saving people who didn't want to be saved, but Ruby had made the decision, when Neopolitan had demonstrated that she was still willing to attack Ruby and hadn't accepted her arguments against working for Salem. She'd started swinging Crescent to kill, but then before she'd struck the final blow Weiss had retracted her glyphs and Neopolitan had gotten away.
Ruby should have planned for an illusion. They were Neopolitan's trademark. Rather than trying to hit the fleeing figure with her scythe, Ruby should've shot her with a bullet, it would've slowed Neopolitan if she was real and shattered the illusion if she wasn't, and she should've called out to the others. Maybe she didn't have to let Penny know that she knew she was a robot, but saying that Neopolitan had vanished would've prompted Penny to search with her heat vision anyways and Ruby could follow her directions from there. She could've done it, had Neopolitan's head tumbling on the rooftop and her threat neutralized, but she'd underestimated her enemy and now maybe all of Remnant would pay for it.
Just normal weekday things.
Ruby hated weekdays.
This was fine though. This was still fine. Neopolitan hadn't been with Cinder at Haven, so she would only have known about it through retrospect. Sure, she could tail them, or call ahead to warn Lionheart, but she couldn't directly thwart them yet, and they hadn't taken any actions that would tip her off that Team JNPR also knew about the future –or, well, Jaune, but whatever. If things went according to plan, the rest of Team JNPR would soon know what they were dealing with as well.
The point was, unless Neopolitan wanted to defy Cinder and have Torchwick somewhere else while the Breach was being prepared, Team RWBY had a much better idea of where she would be than she would of where they would be in the future. If worst came to worst, Ruby was prepared to go door to door in Vale, hunting her down with scythe in hand. This was for Remnant, and she didn't give a damn if Neopolitan and Torchwick's roles were reversed and it was his turn to seek fiery vengeance for his partner's death at her hands. Having fought the both of them, Ruby knew that Neopolitan was the bigger threat even without her foreknowledge.
Torchwick was good, but by Yang's report of the dock fight, Ruby reckoned that he'd never had to fight for his life against skilled Hunter-level opponents –because it definitely showed. He could hold his own against skilled students, he could give the average graduate some trouble, but when it came to an enemy he couldn't outmatch or outrun, he was toast…and really, any finely-trained graduate could outmatch him. If he had a Semblance, he'd never showed it, and the second a fight started getting tough, his impulse was to flee, usually aided and abetted by Neopolitan. If someone like that was out for her life, Ruby would barely sweat. She'd had far scarier people coming after her for far scarier reasons for far longer.
–gnashing teeth guttural voice black slick Grimm flesh oh gods it's like me–
Ruby shook her head rapidly a few times. Yeah, she wasn't worried about Torchwick if she somehow managed to kill his hench-wench. He wasn't the threat Neopolitan was, even if she somehow had a reason to tell him all she knew. As far as Ruby could tell, he was a career criminal to the core, which meant he'd run from troubles he thought he couldn't face and try to duck out of major conflicts however he could. Upon looking at everything that they knew, Salem and Ozpin and all the rest of it, he'd almost certainly book it to Vacuo.
Yang tapped her shoulder and jerked her chin towards the train. Everything seemed in order, but since they were the ones that Neopolitan would be looking for here, on this date, everyone was tense. Without any consultation, the rest of her teammates had bunched up around Ruby, Weiss on one side and Yang on the other, with Blake covering the rear. Every person walking near them was scrutinized, every shimmer of air judged. Maybe it would make them look a bit weird, but Ruby would definitely take this over suddenly lurching forward as Neopolitan's blade stabbed out through the front of her chest, or tottering and falling to the ground as her throat was sliced through.
Practicality over social dignity. Again.
Ruby whimpered a little at the weird reputation she knew her team was getting, because even their performance in class wasn't enough to offset their many irregular behaviors…actions they couldn't exactly stop, either, because each one was grounded in some form of practicality. At least Weiss could get away with shrieking at the students that they'd seen on the casualty lists to study harder, work more, improve themselves, without coming off as creepily invested in the lives of other teams. For once, Ruby thanked the overly-critical attitude that her partner had originally brought with herself to Beacon. Nobody was suspicious when the infamous Ice Queen snapped at them for not being as utterly perfectionistic as herself.
As they moved in a little clot through the crowd, Ruby tried to hold a sniper-formed Crescent Rose close by her thigh, mostly hidden beneath the equally-bright-red billow of her cloak. Given how fast Neopolitan moved, even having her weapon stowed on her back might cause too much of a delay between spotting the threat and moving. Uncle Qrow had taught her that, when she was little and he was explaining about how people fought with knives. They were close-range weapons, and thus knife-fighters who had experience with killing knew how to get close to you and strike before you even noticed they had a weapon, never mind got your Aura up. Knives were small, easy to hide, and if you had any amount of agility, you could get close to your target and strike with speed, and they'd never know what hit them even as they died.
She shivered, pulling Crescent Rose a little closer against her leg. Ruby had her Aura up, but given how fast and how hard Neopolitan had hit Yang before, she might cut right through it if she built up enough momentum.
Which was, you know, a comfortable thought to have as you walked about.
This is fine, this is fine, this is fine… Ruby thought over and over again in her head, her outwards smile tight and strained. Neopolitan had at least proved that she was smart, so striking Ruby right when she was expecting it and had reinforcements was a stupid idea, right? Which meant they'd be fine, right? Right?
Ruby just didn't have it in her to understand how criminals thought. Who'd want to hurt people for profit when they could be nice, also for profit? Sure, people turned to crime and stuff because terrible things happened to them and they wanted to survive, but those people weren't evil, just misguided and doing their best. Torchwick and Neopolitan were at least a little bit evil, even if they didn't go the whole way.
She shook off her woolgathering as she and the others ascended into the train, not-so-subtly clutching their weapons close. Yang at least could be moderately sneaky about it, since hers were just gauntlets, but the way Weiss had one hand on Myrtenaster and Blake was keeping her fingers wrapped around Gambol Shroud was not at all covert. Oh, well. They'd learned from last time and taken a compartment in the rear car of the train, so if they had to dislodge themselves to avoid endangering the passengers again, at least they wouldn't have to run around too much to do it.
"The sucky thing is, we can't plan for Professor Lionheart." Ruby sighed as they made it to their compartment unmolested, flopping down on the bottom bunk with Crescent Rose draped across her stomach. "I mean, we know where the round thingy probably is when he's carrying it, but what if he's not carrying it? What if we can't find it?"
"There's no point in what-ifing a good plan to death." Blake said, taking a moment to stretch a spare Gravity-laced ribbon across the bottom of the doorframe to trip anyone coming in suddenly. "We've done the best with what we have."
"Plus we can always beat it out of him if we absolutely have to." Yang said, looking out the window suspiciously. "I mean, we all know he's working for Salem at this point, so if we threaten to tell old man Oz, he'll probably fold like a deck of cards."
Ruby sighed mournfully through her nose, staring up at the bottom of the bunkbed above her. Lionheart's betrayal hurt and she hadn't even known him, just been familiar with the idea of him as Haven's headmaster…but that in itself was enough. It was more than enough. People had believed that he would defend them from the Grimm; his Huntsmen, Huntresses, and Hunters had all put their trust in him, and he had betrayed them to their deaths. He had left the civilians of the kingdom open to whatever Salem would send at them.
How could he?
How could he?
What kind of fear could possibly excuse such a monumental betrayal?
Ruby was a Huntress through and through, blood and bone and bred. Her parents were Hunters. Her sister was a Huntress. Her friends were Hunters. Practically everyone she knew and cared about were Huntsmen and Huntresses. To her, the Huntress lifestyle was everything, and the headmasters of Remnant were the pinnacle of that lifestyle. The were the strongest guardians of humanity and Faunus, and to have that betrayed, have it selfishly thrown away…gods, it hurt.
Even Ironwood had at least believed he was protecting people.
Lionheart was just…a coward. Someone who had seen the threat Salem posed, and had it break him.
Ruby made a habit of forgiving people, but there were some things that crossed a line even for her. There were some betrayals that you just did not commit, and this was one of them. In that position, Ruby would have rather died than sold out the people who depended on her. It didn't matter how terrifying the threat, how horrible the alternative: she would do her duty, and protect people. If she could save everyone by becoming one of those –those Hounds, Ruby would do it without a second of hesitation. She wouldn't let any fear, any terror, break her.
And if it did, then by the gods, Ruby would rather take her life than become a threat to anyone else.
That was why she couldn't forgive Lionheart. Whatever, however Salem had terrified him, the worst he would face was death, and as a Huntsman, he faced that every time he went out in the field. The fact that he couldn't see that selling out all the Hunters of Mistral, that lying to his comrades, that betraying everything he had sworn to protect, the fact that he couldn't see that any of that was a fate worse than death…that, Ruby could never forgive.
She didn't plan on killing him when they got to Haven, or anything. Aside from the fact that they planned to slip in and out with no one but Raven the wiser, killing a headmaster, even one that had already taken steps of treason, was far too big of a move for Ruby and the others to handle. The political repercussions alone would be immense, not to mention what would happen in the shadow world where Ozpin and Salem dueled. No, after they'd talked to Jinn and figured out how real this world was or wasn't, then they'd go to Ozpin, and tell him everything. He could take care of it.
Ruby still felt a bit bad about the fact that they hadn't told him anything yet, but then again, if this was all a strange hallucination…well, they wouldn't need to tell him, would they? Ozpin would be just as fake as everyone and everything else.
But if this was real, if this was time turned backwards or an alternate dimension…well, he needed to know. And since Ruby didn't plan on going to him with anything less than a full report, off to Jinn they went. Whatever Jinn had to say, it would give them a framework on how to move forward, rather than just announcing "we come from the future!" to Ozpin and nothing else. Together, they could all figure this out.
Footsteps in the passageway between compartments made them all look up, and Ruby sat up completely as Ilia peered into their compartment and smiled in relief at getting it right. She had a bag in one hand, and was wearing her combat gear from last night.
"Wh- Ilia? Is everything okay?" Blake asked worriedly, unsheathing Gambol Shroud with a rasp of metal. If Ilia was here alone, then Sun and the others…
Ilia shook her head without any sign of fear, tossing her bag into the room with a soft thump before stepping over the stretched ribbon with a wryly raised eyebrow. Apparently, it amused her.
"Hey, uh, you wanna say something to let us know its actually you?" Yang asked, pulling her arms back to cock her gauntlets, and Ilia tilted her head and smiled.
Her eyes flashed pink and brown as there was a collective intake of breath from Team RWBY, before another quick blink had them changing back to steel blue.
Before anyone could say anything, do anything, "Ilia" held up a Scroll with two words typed on it, bright white against the glowing blue of the Hard Light Dust.
I'm in.
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