Jaune glared down at the holographic screen. "You motherfucker!" Jaune cursed fighting the urge to toss his scroll across the room.
"Mr. Arc there is no need for such vulgar language," he said maintaining his cool demeanor.
"What the fuck do you want?" Jaune asked him, vulgarities seemed like the only way he could strike at the assassin through the screen. He really wished he knew someone that could trace this call and send an entire strike team team to his location. Maybe just a guided missile to send him to a million pieces.
"Like I said I want to finish this," Vasily told him, "I was so crushed when we were interrupted last time and now that your little sex doll is out of the picture I think it time we settle this like gentleman."
Jaune walked out of the room to find Pietro, he might know how to track a signal. "How about you meet at Atlas Academy," Jaune mocked, finding this idea ridiculous and hoping to keep him talking, "I'll bring my friends."
"I'm afraid I already have a venue for the occasion chosen," he said.
Probably filled with traps and drones. Jaune thought to himself. So much for fighting like gentlemen. "Where?" Jaune said, hoping to arrive with an army at his back.
"Not so fast," Vasily said with a sinister grin crossing his features. "I've already had to suffer enough interruptions Mr. Arc and I don't intend to suffer anymore."
The screen pulled away and Jaune found himself staring at a small apartment complex. Confusion took him for only an instant before he recognized the home and felt dread nauseate him.
"Cynthia is it?" Vasily asked him. "I have been doing my research Mr. Arc and when I saw your shuffling a bunch of brats to school I couldn't help but be shocked that a Huntsman with your capabilities would waste your time, I suppose they mean something to you else you wouldn't waste your time."
Jaune glared at him. "What did you do?" Jaune asked him dangerously. Pietro spotted him and looked over curiously at him glaring daggers at his scroll. Jaune looked up and mouthed "Vasily" at him so he knew.
"Nothing yet," Vasily said, "Just a few bombs attached to their gas lines, one for each of those snot nose kids, a little insurance to prevent any interruptions."
Jaune seethed with fury. He would target children? For him?
"I cannot be worth all of this!" Jaune protested, "Even if I come and face you, you cannot escape, I'll get the General to surround the place."
"Oh you'll come!" Vasily told him with unwavering confidence, "I know you want to settle this as much as I do, to settle who is superior. As for the General he is going to be indisposed shortly."
Jaune didn't know what he meant by that but he doubted Vasily was bluffing about that.
"If I see a single huntsman or Atlas uniform anywhere near those homes or interrupting us I will detonate those bombs," he told him.
"I cannot be worth all of this," Jaune told him.
Vasily laughed, "Oh but you are Mr. Arc, I have killed Huntsman and Huntresses around the world and you are the first one to best me in combat, I underestimated you the first time, I didn't know you were from the great Arc Family, I didn't know you wielded the weapon of a long line of great warriors."
Great warrior? Did Jaune not remember that fight the same way as he did? "I got lucky!" Jaune pleaded.
Vasily giggled as if he had actually said something funny, "You undersell yourself Mr. Arc, you are a born warrior."
Jaune scowled, "Fine, where do we meet?" he said unable to think of anything to dissuade him from this path..
"The Mantle Botanical garden," Vasily told him, "be there within the hour and we'll settle this."
The video feed cut out and Jaune was left staring at his scroll.
"You're not planning on going right?" Pietro asked him not allowing the silence to settle.
"I don't really have a choice," Jaune told him.
"Yes you do," Pietro said.
"Not any choice I could live with," Jaune told him, "I don't sit back a let other people die, especially when there's something I can do, especially when it's because of me."
"You cannot hold yourself accountable for what that man is doing!" Pietro scolded him firmly.
"I know that!" Jaune spat back a little harsher than he intended, "but that doesn't change the fact that sitting back and being a no show will get innocent people killed, and even then it's not like Vasily is going to stop, he'll keep pursuing me and putting other people in danger. Putting Penny in danger! I only lose by not going."
"He's going to kill you!" Pietro explained to him, "How and I supposed to explain to her that I let you go to your death."
"She's a protector," Jaune answered him, "she'll be sad, but you know that she'll understand why I had to do this." He chuckled a bit at the situation, "at least I was able to leave her with a piece of me, and I intend to try and take a piece of Vasily while I'm there."
Pietro hung his head and sighed, "You'd have a fighting chance if your aura was currently up to snuff, but you're right, I just… it's not right that Penny should lose you, not right now and not like this, she can't even say goodbye."
"A goodbye would only make it more painful," Jaune told him, "and full aura or not I don't intend to go down without a fight or to play by his rules I just need a chance to think about how I cheat."
Pietro's chair moved across the room, "I don't know about ways for you to cheat that assassin, I have no doubt that he'll play fast and loose with his own rules, but I don't think he could object too much if you arrived fully equipped for your little duel."
Jaune smiled feeling a bit of relief washing over him, "alright, better weapons, what do you got?"
Pietro grinned, "the best prototypes in Atlas," he said, "how does that sound?"
Jaune took a breath, "it sounds like a start," Jaune said, "if I can't have a solid plan I'll certainly settle for the best guns I can get my hands on."
Pietro nodded, "alright then, let's get you locked and loaded."
Vasily pocketed his scroll and looked out over the atrium of the old botanical garden. The tall trees and underbrush would serve well enough as a stage tonight. The lights suddenly died turning off and plunging the area into darkness save for the silvery light of Remnant's shattered moon shining down through the glass roof.
The attacks on the power grid had been successful; it seemed providing another blackout sure to cause worry and attract grimm. The substations helping provide power to the automated defenses would already be facing numerous cyber attacks, for once Vasily had appreciation for basement dwelling tech heads, numerous hackers doing what even Bonnie couldn't achieve on her own, massed mediocrity at its finest.
The lights returned as the dust generators turned on providing power to the more necessary systems for the building. He strolled down the hallways towards the security room opening the door to find Bonnie sitting at the terminal with a rolling chair.
"Is there anything to report?" he asked her, wanting assurance that nothing would go wrong.
She turned away from the holo screens showing not only the exterior of the building but the various homes of those kids Arc escorted to school, she would be ensuring that they stayed put so his insurance policy remained intact and Arc didn't try bringing unwelcome guests.
"Everything is ready," she reported for him, "the attacks are proceeding as scheduled and all systems are functioning as intended."
"Good, he'll be here soon." He said reaching into his jacket and retrieving a tube and loosing a fresh cigar that he proceeded to clip the end and light it.
"Vasily…" Bonnie started tentatively, "I know you want to see this through-"
Vasily growled through his smoking cigar, his teeth biting into the thick rolls of tobacco as he grabbed her throat. "I am losing my patience with this!" Vasily snarled spitting out the ruined cigar to burn on the floor. "All you ever do is try telling me to abandon this and leave Arc the victor and right now with less than an hour and a city in terror you pester me!"
"No," Bonnie choked, "I just… I want you to know why."
"So why!?" he demanded pulling the snub nose revolver he had taken from Kalt and pulling back on the hammer as a threat before pressing the muzzle beneath her chin.
She gently touched his wrist of his hand on her throat and gently pulled his hand away and led it down to her belly. "Vasily, I have been worried because you're going to be a father."
He hadn't been expecting that. For years she had been following him from continent to continent helping him in his assassinations and she had never shown any apprehension for his work until now. And now he knew why she was being so nervous, and why she had been touching her own belly so much, and why she was pestering him about leaving.
"You're pregnant?" He said, pulling his hand away from her belly. "When?"
"I learned about it the night before you fought Arc," she explained to him, "ever since I saw you with that blade in you I've been trying to figure out when to tell you, but Arc took your attention and I have been wondering how this is going to end since."
Vasily stepped away and looked to her belly with a sneer. This was why she had been pestering him? Worry over some brat?
"I'm going to kill Arc and take his sword," Vasily explained to her, "and then you're going to nip this in the bud and be finished with it," he told her.
"But-," she said.
"You'll cut it out Bonnie or I'll cut you out," he told her keeping the revolver trained on her, "you're enough trouble with that bastard in your belly. What did you expect? That I'd take our little bastard around the world with me for assassinations? There's no room for that and the last thing I'm going to suffer is months of you waddling behind me, we'll take care of it once we're in Vacuo, understood?"
Bonnie nodded silently and Vasily turned away. He at least felt better now knowing why she had been apprehensive these last few weeks, and giving her a clear end to this trouble. The deserts of Vacuo would be a refreshing change of scenery after all this, a half dozen jobs for some cartels or feuding tribes would be enough to set things back to normal.
He reached into his jacket for another cigar and lit it taking a long draw of the think smoke. All that was left to do was to wait for Arc, the minutes seemed to stretch with his anticipation.
Bonnie hugged herself in her chair giving the monitors a customary glance. Nothing yet, no sign of the Arc boy as of yet. The signal traffic she monitored between law enforcement and the military was reporting multiple casualties from the various bombs and grimm incursions told her that their plan to keep Ironwood and everyone else occupied was functioning perfectly.
The spot where he had pressed the gunbarrel felt like it burned. She touched it of course finding no physical injury but her mind continued to make her uncomfortably aware of the fact that minutes ago he had been pressing the barrel of a revolver against that spot ready to paint the ceiling with her brains.
What I had been expecting? She thought.
That he would want to stop his line of work? The constant travel and hiding? The violence? That you wouldn't have to do so many horrible things anymore? That a kid would change everything?
Anger and embarrassment and hurt stormed inside of her and every time the radiofeed reported a casualty from the fires or explosions or the grim she couldn't help but feel a blade of guilt stab her.
She had adjusted to the killing at first. Someone was going to do this kind of work and collect the paychecks, why not them? It hadn't bothered her when Vasily took jobs to kill criminals for rival gangs. She had even found some pleasure in helping him kill politicians for the White Fang, she was a faunus after all, she was helping her people. At least that is what she told herself to make it more palpable. It was a cruel world, she had learned that when the SDC had sent Vasily to kill her and her friends. Why was she bad for returning that cruelty?
But this?
She had never done anything quite like this before. Every reported casualty was her fault, all for the sake of giving Vasily a distraction for his little showdown. This wasn't some dead mobster and his gooned marked for death by another mobster, this wasn't some politician fighting against the rights of faunus, this was completely different. This was needless overkill.
She took a look at the monitor seeing the dark windows of an apartment where one of the children Arc escorted to school was. She could not see inside of the building but she wondered, if the mother was trying to calm their child in the dark, if she had any instinct to the danger she was in at the moment.
Children. When did she become comfortable endangering children? When had she come to value Vasly's vanity over the lives of others?
Her mind spun as she thought about everything she had done to come to this point and what the future held. She couldn't imagine a future where Vasily hung up his rifle, any illusion of peace she had he had just shattered when he stuck that muzzle beneath her chin.
That spot still burned.
An electric beep pulled her away from her thoughts and she looked to a holoscreen showing her the street outside the garden. Arc had arrived and was approaching, it was showtime.
I hope you all enjoyed this weeks chapter. Sorry it was short but I had a lot going on this week and had to work on my days off so this is what I was able to get out. Hope you are all ready for the final fight, and I promise you this is the final fight. As usual please review and leave me with your thoughts and comments. And thank you MidKnightMoonglow99, MajorBrony95, DrknssRules1 and Firefly25 for all their help and continued support.