The sleep that greeted me held on as best it could with Nurses interrupting it every four hours. They said nothing much to me, other than encouragement to eat and get proper rest, but I soon found myself restless. The hours passed slowly waiting for Ozpin to return, and although I was no longer as anxious as I had been the night before, I was ready to get a move on. However excited I was, though, he did not appear. It was three days until he returned, and even then he did so without any announcement and without any sense of rush. With nothing to do besides eating, sleeping, and daydreaming, it was a welcome reprieve. I had just been eating my lunch when he decided to stroll in the open door, looking at me as if he were just stopping by on a whim.
"Took you long enough, for fuck's sake! I've been waiting here for three days!" I said, before throwing more of my tuna salad into my mouth. As shitty as the hospital's food was, I needed it. I was ravenous since being in Remnant, and my stomach was not letting up.
"I take it you're feeling better, then? I wanted to give you some space to adjust, and myself some time to do some research."
"Well… more or less I would say. Still getting used to the whole being a woman thing, and the whole being a Faunus thing, and the whole being in another universe thing, but other than that I can't complain too much. Oh, wait, no I can. I'm fucking bored."
"That is a lot of things."
I grunted softly, turning back to focus on my food. If he had something to say, he'd say it while I stuffed my face, I thought. He closed the door behind him and sat in the same chair as before next to me.
"By now, I take it you have made note of any… discrepancies in your form?"
"Yeah, I guess you could say that," I said, wiggling my ears playfully as I opened an apple sauce.
"I must admit, I did not think the transformation would be so, well, amicable. The scientists had told me that there was a risk of mutation in the rift, but I had not imagined something quite like this."
"Wish you had told me that, Ozpin. Wouldn't have changed my mind, but I do enjoy a bit of mental preparation every now and again."
"I apologize, I felt as though I had to keep things to a minimum when we first spoke, I did not want to overload you."
"I think you went past "overload" after the 2nd minute, Oz. Regardless, I would have appreciated a proper warning of what I was up against. Communication tends to help these things… not to mention, as much as I know you enjoy your secrets, I'd prefer to be privy to at least some of them. If I'm supposed to be saving the world for you, you have to give me something to work with."
Ozpin face dropped as I said that, his eyes seeming to avoid my gaze. I knew I had hit the mark; my knowledge of Ozpin ran that deep, but exactly what he was keeping from me was beyond my knowledge. After all, two volumes of canon content knowledge only got you so far when it came to stuff like this. I knew more than the average person about the situation, but anything else was likely in Ozpin's hands.
"You must understand, Miss Cortes, that I have had plenty of experience as a Professor, as a Headmaster, and most importantly, as a Huntsman. The things that I have seen, and done, have made me guarded when it comes to my knowledge. I have come into the habit of only telling people what they need to know, for better or worse. As much as this habit has lost me the confidence of some, it has kept me and this world relatively safe until now. I will do my best to keep you abreast of things as they arise, but know that if I have knowledge that I feel to be inappropriate for the time, I ask that you trust me to make that judgment."
"The ferryman asks a high price" I quipped, putting down my now empty container and looking at him with hard eyes. "I won't lie, Ozpin, I'm a nosy bastard, er… Bitch, I guess. I enjoy knowing things, even more so when knowing these things are relevant to me putting my life at risk. If you have something to tell me I ask that you do it now, and make it count. Do that, and I can trust you to do what's needed."
He looked at me, then suddenly began to giggle to himself, almost spilling his cocoa.
"What's so funny?" I asked.
"It's funny actually, I've heard words like that many times before, but never exactly in the same way. Yours reminded me of a dusty old- "
"Qrow." I finished, knowing exactly where the metaphor was going, before chugging the paltry cup of water I had been given on the tray before me.
"Yes, indeed. You and he are not so different."
"Then tell me what you told him."
He considered it for a moment, before sipping on his mug and leaning back. His face was stone cold, prepared for whatever it was he was going to say as he asked me his next question.
"Very well, but first let me ask you a question. What is your favorite fairy tale?"
Say whatever you would about Remnant, but its fairy tales hit differently. Magic woven into crystals, Gods of Creation and Destruction, Masters of Ancient Beasts, and more… all Earth had were Dragons and shitty love stories with some sad parables for texture. The maidens, the relics, and Salem were the important bits but the rest, well, let's just say that Ozpin was a good storyteller. He made it all seem important. Before I knew it, I was ass-deep in a plot to overthrow the world's leadership one country at a time. Salem, the controller of the Grimm, wanted us all dead or kneeling before her, and was willing to use any means she saw fit to get her way. The only thing standing between us and total annihilation was Ozpin, a reincarnated warrior, and his inner circle, a ragtag group of just about anyone and everyone he could get his hands on… and he wanted me right in the middle of all this.
Of course, there was much more pomp and circumstance to it all, but in a story as long as that one, you had to skim the details for key points if you were going to be able to understand anything.
"That's a lot to take in, Ozpin. You're actually talking about stopping the world from ruin as if it were just a step away from it."
"It may seem stable from the onset, but that is only because I have spent centuries cultivating that stability. If I were being truly blunt, Miss Cortes, we are losing. I am unsure for how long we can continue on like this, clueless on how much time we have until Salem acts against us in earnest. All that we know is that she is coming, ever closer by the day, and we must be ready."
"Hmph, so that's where I come in, I imagine?"
"Yes, but there are doubts in your current state. As informed as you may be to Remnant, you lack exposure to the heat of combat and the mistakes that it brings. Your aura is unlocked, but your semblance is still yet undetermined, and your training is next to nothing. In addition to all of this, we are still clueless as to what power you were meant to inherit from your father if any at all."
"So, I'm useless, is what you're saying?"
He knelt down next to the bed, smiling while he did. "Hardly. Just because you lack martial prowess does not mean you are not able to learn. Beyond that, there is the outstanding issue of the knowledge you possess regarding this world. I know not how or why, but you know of what is to come, and how to prevent the worst of it. Once your father told me of that, my interest in you only grew. However, we will wait for a time before we get to that. You still need rest, and there is much to do before you are thrown into the fire, so to speak."
With that he stood over me, ready to make an exit before he stopped and kneeled down to me.
"I want to ask you... now that you know what we fight against, do you still intend to stand with us? Now that you are here, as changed as you are, and with the stakes so high, I want to hear you say that you are still willing. I want you to know that you still choose this."
"Ozpin... to be honest, I have a lot going through my head right now, all things considered. You kind of just dumped the world's end onto me, I'm not sure what to think!... but I know this; you need help, and I know that I can at least try. So, I guess... yeah, I am."
To be honest, I had no fucking clue what to say. Ozpin wasn't exactly verbose, per se, but he certainly had a knack for cramming a lot of things into one conversation, without even mentioning that 'research' he had mentioned. He grunted in affirmation as he stood, watching him leave the room without another word or even a look. I sighed heavily, contemplating all that he had told me, and wondering what my fragile compliance meant for my future. It was all rather wild...The Grimm had a master, one who wanted our heads on spikes. They were more than mindless beasts; they were an army that had a purpose; to destroy us all. There were living keys to the vaults that housed what Salem needed, and only so much time left before they were hunted down.
People were moving against us, and it was only a matter of time before they played their hand. Luckily, they had me to be the counter… or at least they would once I learned how to do more than be a liability.
How much time I had; I knew not. All that mattered now was getting to work and getting Ozpin what he needed. Luckily, it didn't take me long to remember the one name that seemed to jump out at me when I considered people who likely wanted me dead.
"So, I guess it's time to smoke you out, Cinder."