Kinda wrote myself into putting this out now with my little message the other day, but what the hell. It's St. Patty's Day, and I'm happy with it. Just remember what I told you guys: wash your hands, cover your mouths using your elbows, and you'll be fine.

Today, Jaune talks to his dad, Arkos goes shopping, and someone makes an appearance.

Wolves of Remnant

Chapter 10

"Now, son, I want you to calm down, and tell me what you need to tell me. Understand?"

Jaune took a deep breath and exhaled. He had waited until Pyrrha was in the shower to call his father about what he had done with Crocea Mors. Felt like it would be less awkward for both of them that way.

"Okay. Well, it has to do with Crocea Mors." He said a little hesitantly.

"What happened to her?" his father asked. Jaune could practically imagine the darkness spreading over his face.

"Well, you see… I might have… modified her? Just a little?"

There was a long pause on the other end of the line. Jaune was sure his old man was going through breathing exercises to try and keep his considerable temper under control.

"And?" his father answered.

"What?"

"And? What else?"

"Uh, nothing else. I had a friend of mine here help me modify her so I could fight better. End of story." Jaune's worry had evaporated and been replaced by confusion at this point.

His father sighed loudly on the other end of the line. "Dammit, son, you're going to give your old man a heart attack one of these days."

"I think I'm missing something here." How could his dad be this cool about this? Crocea Mors was the family heirloom. In his mind, to modify it in any way was an absolute sign of disrespect for his family and heritage.

"Son, how old do you think that sword is?"

"Well, it was used by an Arc in the Great War, so, maybe a hundred years old? At least?"

"Yeah, that's about what I guessed when I was your age." Joseph chuckled. "Jaune, Crocea Mors is over half a millennia old, and has always been used by an Arc, be it a man or a woman, soldier or militia or Huntsman. It is the tradition of this family for every warrior who wields her to modify her in some way. Before you, your grandpa Johnathan made the shield collapsible to make transportation less of an issue. Before him, your ancestor Leanne had the blade replaced with one made of adamant, the strongest metal on the planet."

"Seriously?"

"Deadly serious, son. You've done nothing wrong by modifying Crocea Mors. In fact, you've made me proud to have given her to you."

"Huh." Jaune grinned and felt the stress wash off his shoulders.

"So, tell me, what all did you do to her?"

"Well, context first. Turns out the sword and shield wasn't a good style for me, despite having an amazing fighter try to teach me. After an… incident on a field trip, I asked a couple friends of mine to help me tweak the shield a bit. Now, when you sheathe her, you can turn the sword into a broadsword with an added Ice Dust element."

"Interesting. So you're going with a two-handed style?"

"Well, yes and no. I can use Crocea Mors two-handed if I want, but I prefer to use a new chainaxe I built in my free hand."

"And by chainaxe, you mean…?"

"An axe with a chainsaw for a blade, yes."

"Well, if it works for you, I suppose."

There was a long pause, and Jaune felt it was time to wrap things up when he heard the shower turn off.

"Well, Pop, I gotta cut you off here. I'm going into Vale with one of my teammates, and she's almost ready."

"Wait, she?"

"Tellthegirlsilovethemkaythanksbye!" He hung up and turned off his scroll before slumping backward on his bed. "Oh, God, that was terrifying."

"What was that about?" Pyrrha called from the shower, "And could you hand me the clothes I picked out?"

Jaune dutifully grabbed the jeans and t-shirt Pyrrha had picked out for herself, placed them at the entrance of the bathroom, and knocked on the door as a signal. It was a routine that had been firmly established in the first week of school at Ren's insistence- and to Nora's dismay Jaune suspected.

"Well, for the sake of context, I just called my Dad to tell him about Crocea Mors." He told her, sitting on the edge of Ren's bed.

"How did he take it?"

"Surprisingly well. If anything, he was proud of me."

"That's good. So what was the horrifying part?" She asked, coming out of the bathroom wearing her blue jeans and a snug t-shirt with a picture of Pumpkin Pete on it.

"Well, as I was saying goodbye, I told him I was heading into Vale with one of my teammates, and I accidentally let slip that said teammate is a woman."

"Is that a problem?" She asked him with a cocked eyebrow.

"Normally, no. but when you grow up as the lone male among eight children, well… let's just say that mom can get pushy and everyone else is nosey."

"Truly, it is a miracle you made it this far." She smirked.

"Are you ready?" He said, brushing off her sarcasm with a smile.

"Almost. I just need to put on a few things." She said, reaching for a hat, sunglasses and a black medical mask.

As the pair walked down the hall to the Bullhead docks, Glynda Goodwitch emerged from around the corner. Coolly, she walked up t Team JNPR's dorm and used her scroll to unlock the door using her administrative privileges.

Ozpin and her had been investigating Arc since he made it through initiation, but had so far turned up nothing of true significance. Glynda had known Joseph Arc as an underclassman when she went to Beacon, and she trusted his reputation. His three eldest were easy enough to track down, with the eldest, Saphron, being the only person of interest, being married to a woman who worked with Atlas hardware for a living. Arc's twin was also of interest with her rather rapid rise within the ranks of the local militia. The other three were still in grade school, with Lucy being the only one who concerned Glynda. She still did not understand how a 15 year old girl was capable of writing one of the most popular erotic internet stories she had ever laid eyes on; and that was saying something, considering she had already read the entire Ninjas of Love series and had a pre-order for the next addition in two months time.

Beyond that, the investigation had stalled out. All in all, the Arc family had led a rather boring life after Joseph hung up his sword and settled down with the then Suzie Q to start a family. And from what she had gathered from accounts of Attika's citizens, they had raised their children properly. With that, Ozpin had downgraded Arc to a curiosity and a potential ally. But Glynda was still unconvinced.

She had seen a copy of Arc's transcripts and they had seemed familiar to her. She had run a check across all current Beacon student transcripts, and when that failed, she expanded the search to students within the last 25 years, when Joseph had attended. It had taken a few days, but she came up with a single exact match. The name on them was Roman Torchwick.

Ozpin had been disturbed by the news, but was not willing to do anything about it. Glynda, however, absolutely was. The usual means had been exhausted, so it was time for the direct approach.

Half an hour later, she was stood in the middle of Team JNPR's dorm room, fuming at the absolute lack of anything incriminating. She had expected a few things, of course, this being the dorm room of four hormonal young men and women. Arc himself had a small stash of pornographic magazines featuring women both human and Faunus and with varying colors of skin, and Lie Ren had a similar stash of the Mistrali version- 'hentai' she believed it was called- that seemed to focus on women with short orange hair. Nora Valkyrie had a hidden stash of lacey underwear and other such garments that would leave absolutely nothing to any man's imagination, and even Pyrrha Nikos had something similar stashed in the back of her dresser. These were things she was prepared for and it was all she had to show for her time. She was about to storm out and call it quits when she noticed a journal on Arcs' desk.

Opening it, her anger vanished as she quickly realized that not a word of what was written in it was in the Common Tongue, nor was it like any language she had seen in nearly 30 years as a Huntress. The book contained what looked like normal journal written in what looked to her to be some sort of runic script.

"Finally." She muttered as she took out her Scroll and spent the next half hour photographing every page in the journal.

Ozpin aside, she knew there was only one man in Beacon who could possibly decipher this language. However, if she wanted him to get it done quickly and efficiently enough, she knew she was going to have to spend a lot of money on coffee. Lots and lots of coffee.

XX

"So, what did you have in mind?" the owner of the gun store, a grizzled old man with a thick brown beard and a tattered ballcap, asked Jaune.

"Well, I'm pretty much looking for a side arm of some kind." He told the clerk. "My primaries are a long sword and a custom-made battle axe, but I figured that a ranged option couldn't hurt."

"You ever handle a gun before, son?"

"Not once in my life."

"And you got into Beacon?"

"Do you need to see my student ID? My partner can back me up if you want." The owner nodded, and Jaune and Pyrrha got out their scrolls. Reluctantly, Pyrrha took off her disguise so that the man could properly identify her.

"Seriously? You're Pyrrha freaking Nikos?"

"I am. Hello." She said bashfully.

"Well, ain't that a kick? My boys are fans of yours."

"I'm glad to hear it."

"Name's Bob Singer." He said offering Jaune his hand.

"Jaune Arc."

"Heard about you too. The boys were ranting and raving for a week when they heard you got the leader slot over your partner, bless their idjit hearts. Come on back, I'll let you take a look at our selection."

Behind the store was a firing range with three stations, backed by a wall filled with guns of every kind. After a short safety briefing, he brought Jaune over to the wall.

"Now, any specifics you're looking for to narrow your choices?" he asked Jaune.

"Stopping power, and some kind of magazine are the first things that come to mind."

"Well, that eliminates revolvers, a personal favorite of mine, I'll have you know."

"Oops?"

"Now, if you're looking for stopping power, I think this would be the best option." He handed Jaune a massive handgun with a rail on the barrel. "Desert Eagle XIX. Semi-automatic and capable of chambering the largest centerfire cartridge of any self-loading pistol. Idjit kids like to call her the Deagle."

"What kind of ammo does it take?" Pyrrha asked for Jaune.

"She can fire .357 Magnum, .44 Magnum and .50 Action Express. There's a few others, but those three are the ones I keep in stock. You okay there, son?" he asked seeing the look on Jaune's face.

"Huh? Wha?"

"He asked if you're okay, Jaune." Pyrrha repeated.

"Yeah, yeah, sorry. Um, can I try this thing out a bit?"

"Thought you said you don't know how to use a gun." Bobby said with a frown.

"I do!" Pyrrha said eagerly, "I can teach him the proper stance."

"Hmph. Alright, we'll start you on the .44 and see how you handle it."

With that, Bobby left them alone and Pyrrha led Jaune over to one of the ranges, setting him up in a proper sweeper stance and showing him proper gun range behavior. The owner came back with a trio of earmuffs and a pair of fully loaded magazines.

"The amount of ammo you have per clip differs depending on the caliber of round you use. In this case, you'll have eight shots per clip with a .44 caliber round. Now, show us what you got kid." He set the clips down next to Jaune and backed away with Pyrrha and put on their head gear. Strangely enough, Jaune loaded the clip, chambered the round and lined up his shot with the expertise of a man with twenty years of experience under his belt. He unloaded the clip into the target before ejecting it, clearing the chamber and turning the safety back on.

"Don't like it when folks lie to me, boy." Bobby said as he pushed a button and Jaune's target came towards them.

"I swear to the Brothers and Maidens I've never handled a gun before in my life." Jaune professed.

"Sure about that?" Jaune's target reached them and he saw two tight groupings on the silhouette target. "Cuz I've never seen a beginner get three headshots and five center of mass on his first try."

"Does this mean no sale?" Pyrrha asked, clearly worried.

Singer stared at Jaune for a while before letting out a sigh. "Normally it would, but there's something in my gut telling me this is for the best. Come back to the front of the shop and I'll walk you through the paperwork. It'll take the better part of a month to get processed, but once it does, I'll give you a call and you can pick it up here. Ammo's a different story. Don't know how Beacon works, but according to Vale law, you'll have to keep the ammo stored separately from the weapon, with locks on both."

"Beacon follows the same rules." Pyrrha informed him.

"Good. I can sell you a couple lockers if you want."

"We're assigned them when we start at Beacon."

"Alright. We'll talk more once the paperwork is approved."

"Deal." Jaune said, shaking Bobby's hand.

XX

"Welp, that's that taken care of." Jaune said as he and Pyrrha walked out of the shop, Pyrrha now re-masked.

"I'm still trying to figure out what happened in there." She said, her voice understandably muffled.

"You're not alone."

"What was it like from your perspective?"

"It's hard to explain. Just holding that gun… it's like instinct just took over."

"What about you know who?"

"Now that you mention it, it almost felt like he was happy. Like he liked it when I squeezed the trigger."

"Oh, that's, um…"

"It's fucked up is what it is. Am I right?"

"That's about what I was going for, yes."

"Jaune? Is that you?" a pair of new voices said behind the pair. Jaune froze in place. There was no fucking way. He turned around and saw two girls with black hair and green eyes standing behind them. They looked nearly identical, except that one wore white clothes and had long, straight hair, and the other wore red and had much shorter hair.

"Mel? Mil? Is that you?"

"Yeah, it's us." The white girl said.

"It's been, what? Five, seven years since we last saw you?" the red one said.

"Thereabouts." He answered, a smile forming on his face.

"Well, don't just stand there gawking like some kind of creeper."

"Yeah, get over here and give us a hug."

Jaune laughed as he walked up to the twins and hugged them fiercely. A pit began to form in Pyrrha's stomach, fearing the worst.

"Well, what the fuck are you doing here, cuz?" the short haired one said.

'Wait, cuz? As in cousin?' The pit began to shrink.

"I got into Beacon." Jaune said, pointing back towards the school.

"Ha! Pay up, bitch!" the white-clad girl cheered. Her twin grumbled as she pulled out her pocketbook. "We heard from Joan that you had applied, and put our bets on your success."

"You just lost me a hundred lien, bastard." Red said.

"Jaune, how do you know these two?" Pyrrha asked.

"Fuck, right, sorry." He moved back over to Pyrrha. He wanted to introduce them, but remembered why Pyrrha had dressed the way she did. "Over here." He took Pyrrha by the hand and led the trio of women to a nearby alley. "Mel, Mil, this is Pyrrha, my partner at Beacon. Pyrrha, this is Melanie and Miltia Malachite. They're my cousins."

"Wait, you're the Champion from Mistral, aren't you?" Melanie asked, making Pyrrha wince.

"Well, well, the Invincible Girl is dating her partner? Talk about scandalous." Miltia teased.

Pyrrha's face turned the same shade of red as her hair while Jaune charged Miltia and clamped a hand over her mouth. He closed his eyes and engaged his Semblance, taking a deep breath through his nose and listening intently. Thankfully, it seemed no one else was around to overhear anything.

"Fucking hell, Mil." He growled, "Think about what you're saying before you tease people like that. Man, she really hasn't changed a bit, has she, Mel?"

"She really hasn't." Melanie said.

"Oh, come on." Miltia complained. "Even if she's famous, I doubt it was really that bad."

"Well…" Pyrrha said uncomfortably.

"Wait, seriously?" Pyrrha nodded. "How bad we talking?" Miltia asked hesitantly.

"It's not as bad as you think. I'm used to it at this point."

"Pyr, remember how you told us your parents took out restraining orders against five different people within your last two years of competition?" Jaune said, not buying her bull. Pyrrha's face fell, but Jaune gave her a side hug. "But don't worry. That was back in Mistral, and you're at Beacon now. And so long as you're a member of JNPR, me, Ren and especially Nora will do whatever it takes to keep your past from getting to you."

"Thanks, Jaune." She smiled and returned the hug.

"Ugh, I think I'm gonna get diabetes from how sweet this all is." Miltia groaned.

Melanie giggled at her sister's antics. "So, Pyrrha, how would you like to hear some embarrassing stories about your partner as a kid?"

"Hey, hold up a minute." Jaune said, suddenly worried.

"That would depend on how embarrassing the stories are."

"Pyr!"

"Let's answer that with a question." Melanie said, wrapping her arm around Pyrrha's shoulder.

"How old do you think Jaune was when he stopped wearing onesies?" MIltia asked, mirroring her sister.

"He stopped?" Pyrrha asked.

This caused both twins to turn and look at Jaune with wide eyed, shit-eating grins.

"DAMN YOU, TANYA!" he roared to the heavens.

XX

That night, four individuals had a unique experience as they slept: a shared dream. In this dream, each individual was nude but for a white light that covered their private areas. As they bickered with each other, they were silenced by a great boom as a golden humanoid figure came into existence before them and spoke.

"Coco Adel, Velvet Scarlatina, Cardin Winchester, and Sun Wukong. You are needed."

Normally, any one of them would have spoken up in defiance of the golden being, but they found themselves too enraptured by his words.

"I come to you now with a warning. Your home and those you know and care for are in peril."

An image of Beacon flashed before their eyes, followed by images of their families and friends.

"The Fall will come soon, at a time of celebration. The disaster cannot be avoided, but the damage can be minimized. Forces are already in motion that can save your Kingdoms and your homeworld, but there is one person crucial to your success. One whom all four of you know or will come to know soon enough."

An image of Jaune appeared before them.

"This man will lead your world to salvation. Protect him, and heed his words. Beware the Maiden, and those who serve her."

An image appeared of two individuals, one male with silver hair, one female with mint green hair, both about their age and standing before another female with raven hair and a single amber-colored eye.

"Who are you?" Velvet asked.

The golden figure's head turned to her, almost in curiosity. The light that enveloped him faded, revealing a man in shining gold plate armor and with long, perfect black hair.

"Know me, for I am the Emperor of Mankind, it all its myriad forms."

XX

And so, the new Inquisition is formed.

This is another thing I picked up from vixvix, but I wanted to make it a bit more me. People in my other fic sometimes complain that I cast Cardin in all these irredeemable roles, so I figured I would try something different for a change.

Also, the Malachites. What can I say? After reading Service With a Smile by Coeur Al'Aran, I realize the gift RT gave us with those two. Might as well use them.