Disclaimer: I do not, nor do I claim to, own RWBY or any other media that may be referenced. All rights go to their respective owners. The only thing I lay claim to are my OCs.
Back at Beacon after the holidays (and catching Pyrrha up on everything she missed), Blake hesitantly voices her unease at the whole situation between Roman Torchwick and the White Fang.
"The way I see it, we have two choices," Rosa explains to her squad as they sit in their dorm room. "One, we let it go. We let the trained hunters and policemen deal with it on their own and maybe try to get assigned a mission to deal with the White Fang after graduation. Considering how uptight Blake is about this after just a few months, that isn't going to work." She stops as a piece of soggy bread flicks into her face. She glares at Pyrrha - who had been picking the wheat product out of her own hair after the squad's internal food fight in the cafeteria just previously - and gets a meek 'sorry~' from the Argus native.
With a sigh, Rosa continues. "Our other option is to go after them ourselves. We aren't fully trained, despite how advanced most of us are, so it is much more dangerous. We have very little to go on, but considering our group, we have more ins than most hunters. We'd have to be careful not to get caught in the process, or we'll most likely get kept away from the situation for the rest of our schooling, maybe even expelled. So... who's in?"
"As the least combat ready of us all, I'm going to say that I'm in," Jaune says.
"Heck yeah! We'd be the youngest teams to ever take down a corrupt organisation!" Nora squeals.
"I was going to say yes anyways, but that just makes me want to do it more," Yang says with a grin.
"It would be a good thing to have on our record if we succeed," Ren states calmly.
"The morals are more important though, so I'm in," Pyrrha chimes.
"I'm in as well. I want to prove that I'm not my family, that I can make my own mark on this world, for the better," Weiss explains.
"Thank you, all of you," Blake says, a tear forming in the corner of her eye. "I'm in too, but I think that went without saying."
"Since it was my idea, and I'm your leader slash captain, I'm in as well," Rosa says with a grin stretching across her face. "That's a majority of eight votes. We have our first mission, albeit unofficial."
"So... what's the plan?" Nora asks, bouncing on her bed.
"We do nothing for now. We still have classes and have to keep up some semblance of... normality. We go to classes and outside of class, we start making notes on our mission. Anything that is relevant. If we have enough by Thursday, we can begin Friday after classes. If not, we wait another week," Rosa instructs.
"We may not have another week," Blake solemnly comments.
"Then we better get started with brainstorming and notetaking," Rosa tells her.
Thursday rolls around, and they have - just enough of - a plan to go ahead with.
Friday comes and they are all anxious for classes to end. So much so that Rosa ends her lecture on Grimm Anatomy early - citing that they should all get a head start on the work-load for the term - just to give them some extra time to get prepared for their 'mission'.
Dolled up in a variety of clothes, the squad goes over the plan.
"Alright, so, Weiss is going solo to call the SDC headquarters in Atlas to get her hands on the Dust shipment records over the past year. Yang has a contact on the shady side of Vale, an informant type who knows everything going on in the crime network, Ren will be going with her as an emotion diffuser and to sense negative emotions aimed at them. Pyrrha, Nora, and Jaune are on patrol duty, eyes on everything, if any of us need back up, you're on it. Lastly, Blake and I are going - in disguise - to a White Fang rally to get info on numbers and what their possible plans are," Rosa instructs as she puts the last bit of her disguise on.
You wouldn't be able to tell by looking at her that Rosa and 'Kiara' were the same person. Where Rosa had short dark hair, Kiara had long locks down to her waist. Instead of Rosa's wolf ears, Kiara had scales smattered across her skin. Instead of the luminous silver eyes that Rosa hid behind goggles, Kiara had dull green. A filled in bra gave her the appearance of a much larger bust, and more revealing clothes showed off more of her 'scales'. Instead of her swords crossed over her back, and a titanium box which hid her extra supplies (and the dual scythes her squad was still in the dark about), she had daggers hidden in each boot and a gun hanging in an obvious holster on her hip.
Blake had followed her lead, hiding her cat ears with her usual bow, putting in colour contacts to change her eye colour from gold to green, decorating her skin in scales, showing off a bit more skin than usual and changing her body's silhouette, but she kept her usual weapon slung over her shoulder. They could pass as sisters, which was their plan for if they were questioned at all.
"Are we finally getting back at that Torchwick creep?" a voice asks from the window.
"Sun?!" Blake spluttered as she recognised the faunus.
"How did you get up here?" Weiss demanded to know.
"Oh it was easy! I do it all the time!" he dismissed.
"WHAT?!" all of the girls screeched.
"Sorry!" he apologised. "I meant that I climb trees all the time, not looking in people's windows. Jeez, I need to think my words through more."
"Uh, yeah, you do," Yang agreed with him.
"Anyways, you're getting back at that creep, right? Well... I want in," Sun explained, jumping in through the window.
"That's not..." Rosa mutters.
"We don't want to get friends involved, Sun. This is dangerous, and yeah, we all agreed to do this, but none of us would feel right letting you put yourself in danger like that," Blake explains in exasperation.
"That's stupid, you should always get friends involved. That's why I brought my best mate Neptune," Sun scoffs. Rosa walks over to the window and looks out. Sure enough, there is another teen standing on the ledge of the building.
"How did you even get up here?" she asks him.
"I have my ways... Can I come in though?" he asks. "This is really high up."
"Fine. Get in here," she relents.
"So... are you letting us help you guys?" Sun asks after a few moments of awkward silence. The squad looks to Rosa and she just sighs.
"Fine. Sun, you can come with Blake and I on our intel gathering mission. Neptune can go with Yang and Ren on theirs," she allows.
"Intel gathering?" Sun questions.
"Yes," Blake says with a roll of her eyes. "Intel gathering. This is dangerous, we aren't going in guns blazing. We have to be smart about this, know our enemy, what they're planning. We can't afford to mess up. Today's mission is to get information and get back here... without altercations."
"Is that why you two are in disguise?" Neptune asks.
"How did you know they were in disguise?" Nora asks him.
"Well, Sun told me that the girl he met after his boat ride was a cat faunus and was on a team with a canine faunus of some kind. That doesn't match up with your appearance right now... so... disguises," he explains.
"Smart boy," Rosa chuckles. "Yes, we are in disguise so we can go undercover. Blake is likely to get recognised if she goes into a White Fang meeting as herself, and Torchwick has tangled with me twice now and my usual style isn't exactly discreet, he's going to recognise me."
Sun raises his hand. "Uh, do I have to disguise myself?"
Rosa looks him over for a few moments before turning to her box of supplies. After rifling through it for a minute or so, muttering under her breath the entire time, she ends up holding out a long piece of hardened cloth for him to take.
"Fake tail. Goes over your real one and should make it look like a scorpion tail. Add in some different clothes, a wig, and you should be fine. I'll help you," she tells him. His shoulders slump and Neptune pats him on the back.
"Tough luck," he consoles him.
Half an hour later (and multiple reiterations that this was an intel gathering mission, not a fight attempt), they are ready to head out. Yang, Ren, and Neptune manage to (just) fit on her motorbike and they head out into Vale. Nora, Pyrrha, and Jaune take a bullship to the shopping central of the Kingdom. The three faunus take another bullship into the industrial area of Vale. Weiss stays on campus to get the information that she needs.
"You think the others will be okay?" Nora asks, swinging her arms.
"I'm sure they'll be fine. Everyone is being careful," Pyrrha assures her teammate.
"I know, I just, usually Ren and I work together. I'm worried," she confesses.
"He has Yang and Neptune with him. Besides, Yang said that that place they're off to is shady, but the owner of the establishment wouldn't dare attack her. It's more other patrons they have to look out for," Jaune reminds her.
"True," she admits. "Oh! A closing down sale! Why don't we go check that out?"
"Sure."
Opening the door, they are not prepared for what they find.
Laying on the floor is a man in a pool of drying blood. His head was the source of the blood, due to the bullet hole in his forehead.
"What... happened here?" Nora asks, voice shaking.
"I don't know..." Jaune says softly. "Nora, go outside and call the police. Pyrrha, help me look for anything that could give us answers."
The two girls nod and get to it.
Jaune looks over the man and notes that he was a faunus, he had claws out when he died. "I think he died fighting," he voices to his partner. "But what could a bookshop owner have to fight?"
"The stuff in the back doesn't give too many answers. He was keen to leave though," Pyrrha calls from the back room. "Two packed bags on the table. A one-way ticket from Vale to Vacuo in his passport which is next to his scroll that was left charging. He was running. Probably from whoever ended up killing him."
"That then asks the question of who he was running from," Jaune muses again.
"The police are on their way. They said not to touch anything," Nora tells them.
Jaune nods. "Good thing I didn't touch anything."
"I only touched the passport to get a look at the ticket," Pyrrha tells him.
"Should we tell the others that we've gotten wrapped up in something?" Nora asks.
Jaune shakes his head. "No. They have other things to worry about."
"That was the worst ride, ever," Neptune comments as they come to a stop.
"Bumblebee isn't meant to have more than two passengers, it isn't surprising that it was bumpier than normal. We're here now though," Yang says with an eye roll.
"On that note, where exactly is... here?"
"Shady side of Vale. Particularly, we're going to the Lumbergents Bar. The owner typically knows everything going on in Vale. First time I went in, I saw him doing business with Torchwick. He'll give us all the information he knows on the guy. Shouldn't be too hard," she tells them.
"So... why so many of us then?"
"Junior isn't the one we need to worry about. His henchmen won't shoot unless he orders them to or we hit first, and he's not going to cross me. Other clients... they aren't necessarily going to exercise the same caution. Ren's semblance is emotion masking, should defuse tensions enough to hopefully stop any fights breaking out. You're here because you're of the most use as backup here in case a fight breaks out anyway."
"Oh."
With that, she cuts in front of the line waiting to get into the club - much to the line's protest - and the two boys follow along quickly. Once inside, they get faced with over a dozen guns, but they get lowered when a man in a suit walks up to them.
"Blondie... what are you doing?" he queries. Yang smirks.
"You, my shady dealing friend, owe me a drink, and I want some information," she tells him, grabbing his collar and dragging him to the bar, Ren and Neptune dutifully following along behind her.
"How can I help?" he asks cautiously as he mixes up a strawberry sunrise - no ice- for her at her request.
"Everything you have on Roman Torchwick and all the Dust robberies that's been going on," she says with a raised eyebrow as he gives her the drink.
He sighs. "Look, I don't have a great deal. Torchwick came to rent some of my men, they all got nabbed by police so I've got nothing there. I did some background checks, there's a lot of falsified information for anyone to wade through. One thing's for sure though, any time he turns up somewhere, his... I hesitate to say sidekick, but basically his main answer to hunters, well, she turns up not long after. She's mute, uses an umbrella and concealed sword, very acrobatic fighting style, more so than my twins. She'd probably run circles around you even. As for the Dust robberies, Torchwick is the main culprit. White Fang has been doing a fair deal too. It's not their usual venture, but the Vale branch has been... going off the rails for a while," the information brooker divulges.
Yang sips her drink. "Thanks for the information. In fact, I'm going to give you some of what I know. Torchwick is 'going in on a joint operation' with the White Fang. They attempted to steal the Schnee Dust Freighter delivery about a month and a bit ago. Some close confidants were the ones to put a stop to that theft."
"Then why come to me?" he asks with a snort.
Yang smirks in reply. "Confirmation of information. It's good to corroborate the intel we've been gathering," she tells him, gesturing to Ren and Neptune who are standing on either side of her as she sits at the bar. "Plus, that extra info on Torchwick is good to have."
She stands up abruptly and drains her drink. "Don't go telling anyone I was asking about Torchwick, you hear? I'll have to come and knock some respect back into you if you do," she says with a sultry wink.
"Noted."
"Come on boys, let's go."
The three walk out and Junior sighed in relief. He could deal with pretty much all of his clients with ease, but that blonde always managed to get him tripping himself up. That in and of itself was dangerous when dealing with her, because she could definitely go through with her threats.
If there was someone he could ever admit to ever being afraid of, it was her.
Sitting in the library going over notes was probably the easiest of the tasks assigned that day. She'd gotten the information from Schnee Headquarters without much trouble, now she just had to wait for the others to get back.
Sighing for what seemed like the hundredth time, she pulls another book on criminology and law over to read. The topic had gotten dry an hour ago, but she wanted to have all the knowledge she could get on the matter would help her in the long run.
"Self assigned mission?" a voice asks.
Weiss jumps and turns to face a girl dressed in the latest fashions sitting down next to her.
"I don't know what you're talking about," she denies.
The girl scoffs. "Of course you don't. I'm not going to report you. I'm no snitch. Just, take it slowly and stay safe, okay? Your squad shows promise, but that doesn't mean shit if you're dead."
"I don't even know who you are," Weiss tells her, shutting her book and moving to get up. The other girl grabs her arm.
"The name's Coco Adel. I'm the leader of Team CFVY, we're second years."
"Riiight..." Weiss trails off, not understanding where she was going.
Coco takes off her sunglasses with a sigh.
"Look, I'm not saying to give up on whatever you've decided on doing, I'm just saying be careful. There's a reason students aren't allowed to self assign missions," the older girls says.
"We're fine. We're fully capable of this," Weiss informs her.
"That's what Team SRLT ("Starlight") thought," Coco tells her. "They were the best of our year. They self assigned a mission, and now, none of them are able to continue learning to become hunters. Turquoise is the best off. She's paralysed from the waist down. Rouge has severe mental trauma and can't get through a single day without getting triggered. Silver and Leimomi died. There is a reason why students aren't allowed to self-assign. It's to keep us from diving into situations too big for us to handle, situations that get us killed." she pauses for a few moments while Weiss soaks in the information. "They weren't the first team that happened to. So, be careful. I won't outright report you, but I will be keeping an eye on you and your squad. If I think you're getting in over your heads, I'm reporting. I can't watch another group of people with their whole lives ahead of them just throw it all away."
Weiss is silent for a few moments before she gives the older girl a nod. "Okay. I promise that we're being careful and not just rushing into things. We're doing intel gathering today, I've already done my part and am just waiting for the others to get back. We are being careful."
Coco nods in reply. "Good. Keep it that way. Anyway, that wasn't why I wanted to talk to you originally."
"What is that supposed to mean?" Weiss asks hotly.
"I was already looking for you and your team, but then I realised you weren't doing regular study, hence my warnings. Anyways, my team was meant to organise for the Beacon Dance coming up in a few weeks. Unfortunately, Ozpin's asked us - as the current top team of our year - to go on an earlier training mission, so we won't be able to finish it off. I figured you and your partner would be the best bets for planning a dance," the fashionista explains.
"You... would trust us with that?" Weiss inquires.
"Yeah, plus, it might just draw your attention away from your self-imposed mission long enough for you to weigh up the costs a bit more. Though that's just a coincidental bonus. Think you can handle the dance planning?"
"I think the squad as a whole will be able to handle it together. There may be some conflicting ideas to begin with, but we'll get there in the end. You can count on us."
Coco nods. "Okay then. I'll send you through all the stuff my team's already organised that you'll have to work with. Expect it within the next hour or so."
"Okay," Weiss replies as the older girl stands up and walks off.
"You sure this is the place?" Sun asks.
"I'm sure," Blake tells him as she puts on her plain grimm mask, Rosa copying her.
Sun shrugs as he puts his on. "If you believe what you are doing is right, why hide who you are?"
"Humans wanted us to be monsters, so we chose to don the faces of monsters," Blake explains darkly.
"That's a bit... grim," he mutters.
"So's the guy who started it."
They walked up to the entrance and went inside. It didn't take long for a rabbit faunus to come up to them.
"Hi! Where are you guys from?" she asks.
Just from her civilian clothing, Rosa can tell that she isn't already a member.
"We're from Vacuo, not much Fang presence out there, so when we got here, figured we'd see what the fuss is about," Blake comments, her accent copying the Vacuo accent.
"Ooh~ You three would do well out there. A scorpion and two lizards. Pretty good match for that desert," she giggles. Rosa shrugs.
"Bella and I consider ourselves to be snakes more than lizards. But yeah, pretty good match. Just wish there weren't so many languages. Makes it hard to communicate," Rosa chimes, flashing a toothy grin.
"And Mr Scorpion here?"
Sun chuckles. "I've been with these two lovely ladies for a while now. They wanted to come to Vale, so I followed them. The monkey faunus that nearly got caught gave me perfect cover to sneak off that ship myself."
"You stowed away on a ship?" she asks incredulously.
"Yes, yes he did," Blake mutters darkly.
"He's kind of like the guy who was fine with us leaving, then a day later, he decided he wasn't, so... he stowed away on the nearest ship to Vale. When he turned up here, Bella gave him a real shiner," Rosa laughs.
Sun pouts. "Yeah, that hurt. But, I am glad she didn't go for the crotch."
"If you had gone for Kiara, she would likely have castrated you," Blake points out.
"Seriously?" Bunny asks, shock written all over her mask covered face. Rosa just shrugs.
"Vacuo is a dog eat dog kingdom. I'm not the one to let anyone get away with attacking me or my sister," she says.
"Fair enough," Bunny admits. "Oh, the rally's starting. I'd better shut up."
"Thank you all for coming today," the masked man on the stage greets them.
He talks for a while, before introducing the White Fang's partner in crime. Roman Torchwick.
Torchwick is... interesting. Flamboyant, manipulating his audience as best he could, coaxing them into trusting him. A true conman. His revelation of the stolen Atlas-tech is not something Rosa could have predicted though.
Sun spots a girl in white, brown and pink walking around the back, an umbrella twirling in her hands, and makes a note of how the girl looked at Torchwick like he had hung the stars and the moon in the night sky.
Blake on the other hand looked around the warehouse they were in, making estimates of how many people were there, and noted the numerous shipping containers with the Schnee symbol on them.
As the rally came to an end, the trio bid farewell to the rabbit faunus they had met.
"As much as we aren't afraid of a fight, we aren't actively looking to fight. We'd rather remain on the down-low," Blake explains.
Bunny nods understandingly. "That's fine. I'm joining, but I've been thinking about it for over a year. I've just gotten to a point where I'm sick and tired of all the discrimination. I'm not as good a fighter as my cousin, Vel, she's training to be a huntress, but I know that I want to help break this cycle of oppression. You can always join up later."
"This has given us a lot to think about. Maybe we'll see you again sometime?" Sun offers.
"Maybe. It was nice meeting you though!" she says before walking off to join the others signing up to the organisation.
The three leave the warehouse, take off their masks, and Sun gives a sigh. "I've stowed away on ships before, but that was... that was a different level of intense."
"Let's just get back to the others. We have a lot to talk about," Blake tells him.
It was quite late by the time everyone is back in the RRAYNNBW dorm.
They take turns sharing the information they learn, and confirm things for each other.
"She's already arrived. She had the umbrella, and she was definitely Torchwick's right-hand-lady," Sun tells them when Yang reveals what Junior had told her.
"Tukson? He was a White Fang member. He was friends with my dad, I think they were distantly related too. He must've been trying to get out and the Fang wasn't happy about that," Blake shares when Jaune informs them about his group's discovery.
"How'd you get out then?" Pyrrha asks.
"I jumped onto a different train car, cut the caboose, and just hitched a ride to Vale. My partner still completed his mission to steal all that Dust, and he couldn't go after me because there wasn't anyone else to get the Dust back to the camp," she tells them.
"If Torchwick said they're moving base out to the south-east, that probably means they're moving to a new stage of warfare. The reports from Schnee Headquarters outlines that central Vale is the target for Dust robberies. We'll probably need to get our training mission in that area if we want to investigate," Weiss muses.
"She's not wrong. We'll have to be careful. Tonight could have ended much worse," Blake points out. "They have a mech suit, probably a few more, more than a few tons of Dust, whoever killed Tukson, and that umbrella girl. Not to mention roughly two hundred members in that rally alone. There's probably a lot more already at their new base, and they'll likely want to net as many new recruits as they can in the coming weeks if they're planning something big. That's a big task force. I don't know if we can combat that."
"We have to try," Jaune says solemnly, shaken by what he had seen. "People are already dying because of how extreme the White Fang has gotten. Authorities aren't doing anything but sitting on their asses and talking trash. We have to do something."
"We can't just blindly go in though. Coco warned me about this. Students have died doing self assigned missions. Yes, we have to do something, but it isn't worth anything if we get ourselves killed in the process," Wiess scolds.
All in all, it was a fruitful night, but it left all of them worried.
Could they really pull this off? Or are they doomed to fail already?
A/N: Welcome back to the Grimm Reaper! I know this wasn't the most exciting chapter in the world, mainly because everything goes right for once. Part of that is because I felt having a 10v1 fight was overkill (along with dreading having to co-ordinate 10 people attacking one opponent, even eight people (if i followed canon and had Sun an Neptune get thrown from the fight early on) was something I balked at), part is because I felt that the main part that causes issue with their plan was Blake and Sun being spotted in canon, which is alleviated by going in disguises, and the last part was I wanted things to go right for them for once.
Onto another matter, to the people who commented that Rosa's name (Rosa Ruby Calavera) is a bit ridiculous, yeah, I know. However there is reasoning for it. For one thing, I'm not exactly sure how easy it would be to legally change your name as a minor would be, so that factored in. Secondly, she's fifteen, has been raised as Rosa her whole life and everyone around her knows her as such; switching from one name to the other isn't easy, even for the people around you (my mum still occasionally mucks up my cousin's name even though she changed it five or six years ago). Lastly, she was having an identity crisis. Even though Oscar managed to calm her down and she was presenting herself relatively calmly, she was still clinging to the identity of herself that she knew. Can you blame her for choosing a name that doesn't flow that well? I will also say this now, the matter of her name isn't over. How? You'll have to wait and see.
Lastly, because I know this was a relatively unexciting chapter, keep your eyes out for a second update in a few hours. I need to do some editing and re-writing because part of what I have written actually doesn't make sense and it really should, but once I've fixed that, it'll be going up. As always, feel free to leave reviews, it helps me know what you think of my story and what I can improve; and if you need someone to talk to, feel free to PM me, I will try to respond as quickly as I can, but I am limited by when I can get on my parents computers because mine is still being fixed. Otherwise, I'll see you in a few hours with the next chapter.
-RebeccaMagic9