My dumbass said the Branwen Tribe was in Vale in the previous chapter, and I never noticed. Ignore that, for my sake.

Also, important message. Fuck Ted Nivison, and fuck the rest of the Lunch Club. They're nothing but a den of snakes doing everything they can to ruin Carson's life, and I hope they all pay for it in blood. Filthy bastards, the lot of them, but Ted has a special hatred from me, ungrateful prick.

Onyx pulled up to the apartment building and stepped out, carrying two cases of beer, one for him and Mason, the other for the night shift receptionist, Ivan. He was a beast of a man and a heavy drinker, so he wouldn't be surprised if he finished the whole six pack by the end of the night. When he walked in, he saw the guy at his desk, slumped over and sleeping like a baby.

"How the hell'd he land the front desk job?" He asked to himself. He left the case next to him as a wakeup gift before heading upstairs. He could smell the pizza as he entered the apartment.

"Dude, that shit smells great." He said as he set the beer down on the table. Mason looked back at him from his spot on the couch, slice of pizza halfway down his gullet, and quickly beckoned to the smaller table behind the couch. Onyx nodded and set it down on that table instead, next to the pizza. Mason had finally swallowed his food and spoke up.

"Grab a slice and a beer, then tell me what your plan is." Onyx did so before hopping over the couch, nearly kicking Mason in the head, and sitting down.

"Ok, here's what I got." Onyx said while he set his stuff down. "You remember what I said about me knowing Raven personally?" Mason nodded. "Well, since the little unlucky target is so eager to find her mom, I could use the fact that I know her to lure her out, alone, and capture her." Mason thought for a moment while taking a swig of beer.

"That could work, but we'd need to figure out some of the details before doing that. Like how exactly we lure her out, where we lure her to, and where we keep her locked up."

"I was figuring this out on the way home. I could text her using my Scroll, since you've already modified both of ours to be untraceable, lure her to an abandoned building, shoot her with a knockout dart soaked in my blood, then keep her in a warehouse until Junior picks her up." Mason raised an eyebrow at this, looking mildly surprised.

"Well well well, when did you become the criminal mastermind? This is probably the second most forethought you've put into something, just behind getting out of the Branwen Tribe." They both chuckled briefly. "But seriously, that sounds like a solid plan, we just need to get our hands on a knockout dart with a gun that can use it. You can do that while I get the other stuff lined up."

"Alright, sounds good. Only problem is, how do we get a knockout gun? Can't exactly get one legally, and it's a bit of a strange item to find on the black market." He looked at his friend, only to see him giving him a look. "What?" He asked, confused.

"You could always go to Nox." He suggested, and Onyx groaned.

"Fuck no, there's no way I'm going back to that crazy bastard." He declined.

"Oh c'mon, you're just being unreasonable. Yeah he acts a little weird, but he's good at what he does." Mason defended him.

"A little weird?! He always wears that weird mask and insists he ends every business deal with a handshake, to the point he threatened someone when they refused!" Onyx complained.

"Look, do you seriously think you're gonna be able to get one from anyone else?" Onyx made to retort, but stopped mid-breath. He thought before sighing in defeat.

"Alright, I'll go see him in the morning." He conceded, and Mason smirked.

"Good. You do that while I deal with the other stuff." Onyx grumbled before they turned on the TV and watched whatever was on while eating and drinking to their heart's content, and it was well into the night before Mason went to bed, and even longer before Onyx passed out on the couch, beer bottle still in hand.

X

Onyx drove through the slums, suit and tie on and a handgun holstered on his hip. He passed by the type of things you'd expect from the lower area of Vale, women on street corners, homeless Faunus cuddling around burning barrels, the works. And as he got closer to his destination, he started seeing more interesting people. Gangsters armed with serious firepower, all looking like armed anarchists. They wore stolen police vests, police weaponry, and even gas masks, all painted crazy colours, motley green. But what really stood out was the large building in the southern part of the slums known only as the House. It was a massive mansion that'd once been inhabited by a rich family determined to bring order to the slums. And when they abandoned it for whatever reason, it was promptly taken over by Nox and his gang, the Hyenas, the ones he'd seen patrolling their territory.

He pulled up to the House, which had a massive neon smiley face hanging above the door alongside a hyena visage, put on his signature skull mask, got out and approached the door before knocking. After a moment, he heard some shuffling on the other side before the door opened a crack, the chain of a deadbolt lock visible.

"What'r you here for, Death?" The criminal asked. He was wearing the typical Hyena getup, and had an equally green mohawk. He could hear the heavy metal blaring through the speakers in a nearby room as shouts and loud crashes were heard.

"I'm here to see Nox." He said plainly. The man grunted before shutting the door, unlocking it, and opening it fully.

"I don't need to tell you what'll happen if you try anything." Onyx nodded and entered. The entire interior was covered in various graffiti, and the floors were covered with all sorts of stuff, some old trash, some dropped bullets. There also seemed to be a perpetual slight green mist in the air, but he didn't care about that. He walked through the entrance hall and continued past the stairs. He looked through an open door as he passed, and saw multiple Hyenas watching as one of their own put her hand over her gas mask's visor and threw a large knife at a random man strapped to a large target on the other side of the room. The knife hit him square in the chest, burying up to the hilt, making him cry out in pain while the anarchists cheered and high fived the thrower.

He reached the door to Nox's office and entered before he could convince himself not to. Inside the room was fairly clean, other than the occasional stray piece of paper or other trash. There was a desk in the center of the room with windows lining the back wall, giving him a clear view into the courtyard. Just as expected, it looked like one big party, but much more chaotic and lethal to the unlucky captives. The walls were lined with various pictures, enlarged and put in fancy painting frames. He recognized a few, one was Junior, one was him, but others he didn't know. Some had big purple Xs spray painted over them, so he could only imagine what they were for. And then there was the man himself, Nox, currently bent over fully at the waist, hands clasped behind his back, while staring into a small aquarium where a group of fish was swimming around, totally oblivious to the utter chaos going on around them. The aquarium was in far better condition than the rest of the House, so at least he took care of his animals.

"Ahem." He cleared his throat, which caused Nox's head to practically snap to him. He wore a slightly scuffed up suit and tie along with a full face LED mask that had been programmed to read Nox's emotions and portray them. For a moment they displayed question marks over the eyes before suddenly turning to shock and happiness as he shot up.

"Death my boy, what a pleasure to see you again!" He greeted, his voice heavily distorted by the mask to give it a deep and heavily digitized effect. He dashed into his desk chair, causing it to spin in a circle and finish facing him. "Why, I haven't seen you since you needed info on that little target of yours last month, and oh what fun it was seeing the news of him." He rested his chin on his hand and smiled. Well, his mask did.

"I don't wanna be here longer than I need to be, so let's cut to the chase. All I need is a sedative strong enough to quickly knock out a person, a couple darts I can put it in, and a decent rifle that can fire them. Think you can handle it?" Nox sat in an exaggerated thinking pose for a few seconds with a thinking face on before busting out laughing, hands on his knees.

"Of course I can, who do you take me for?" He practically threw his chair to the side and started rummaging around under his desk while muttering to himself, tossing out increasingly odd items until he found what he was looking for. "Ah, here it is!" He emerged holding a black dart rifle alongside a small box of darts.

"How did you-?" Onyx started, confused, but Nox cut him off.

"A single hit from one of these darts and the poor bastard on the other end is going down without so much as a whimper." Onyx looked at Nox skeptically and went to take the rifle, but the mad gang leader pulled back.

"Ah ah ah, you know the rules. I want something in return for my generosity, and I think you know what it is." He said, and even through the mask Onyx could practically feel the cheshire smile.

"Fine, what do you want? Lien? A favor?" Nox waved him off.

"Nonsense, I just want you to spend some time with my boys is all!" He said, and that combined with the pat on the shoulder he gave him, sent shivers down his spine. Of course he'd pull some shit like this.

"Are you serious?" He asked, and Nox gave him this blank look.

"You're not in a hurry, are you?" He asked, and Onyx sighed. He wasn't, but this was the last thing he wanted to do. Unfortunately, it seemed like Nox could read his mind.

"Lovely! I'm sure they'll love to meet someone semi-new, and they know how to fuck shit up in all the right ways, most of the time." Onyx grumbled as he left the office to go see what was up with the other Hyenas. "Oh, and don't drink the glowing beer, unless you want to end up spouting nothing but verbal diarrhea." He said, and Onyx closed the door.

"Alright, let's see what these psychos have in store for me." He grumbled as he walked down the stairs, hearing another set of cheers from the other room.

Thanks for reading, and since I have nothing of note to say, I'll just skip to the comments.

: Onyx will be (mostly) successful in what will come, so don't worry.

Bloodhunter101: It's here lad, enjoy.

As always, I hope you enjoyed reading. Mundu eftir dauðanum, Mundu eftir lífinu.

-Bile