[X] There's a club nearby that was less than legal, but not provably illegal in activity. See if anyone there would have any relevant information.
The sun was down when Yang walked into the club. Late enough that there was a ton of people in the building, so the odds of someone here having information was a lot higher than it would have been in the middle of the day.
Looking over the place, Yang paused her gaze momentarily at the sight of the DJ's bear mask, but shrugged and moved on. She had more important things to do.
She'd heard of this place before. She wasn't the most well behaved teenager, and had occasionally gone to parties while telling her father she was studying with a classmate. There was meant to be one organised here last year, but then the club was being investigated be the authorities for...
Something or other.
Nothing had been proven enough to hold up in court, so the place was still running, but it was basically an open secret that this place had criminal connections. All that could really be proven was that the people in management had friends who had broken the law, but that wasn't illegal in and of itself.
Yang hadn't really wanted to mention how much she knew about her place to her father, because that would lead to questions regarding how she found out about this place and she didn't want to reveal she had friends who came here and invited her to a party here once. Her social life required her to be able to leave the house unsupervised, which didn't work well with her father knowing what kind of people she occasionally met with.
But that didn't matter right now. If Hei Xiong knew anything about Ruby, Yang needed that information. Fuck her social life, this was bigger than that.
As she walked down the steps and towards the bar, Yang kept her arms in plain view, so everyone could see Ember Celica on her wrists. That should discourage anyone looking for a fight, knowing she was armed and would be ready to fire before them. But she also had to maintain a casual demeanour, to make it look like she wasn't looking for a fight herself.
It'd probably be easier just to punch everyone until people started talking. She might be worried about how she compared to everyone here, but her father was an experienced Hunter and was only a minute away. Far enough away to not make anyone nervous, close enough to kick ass if needed.
Looking around, Yang kept an eye out for Hei Xiong. Known better as Junior, which he encouraged to remind people that he was the youngest in his family and there were worse threats who'd step in if you messed with him. His status was an interesting one, in that he deliberately downplayed himself to authorities so that people wouldn't come to him often. He did know a lot more than he let on, Yang had heard, and if there was the slightest chance he knew something, Yang wanted to have a good conversation with him.
Walking by a club bouncer, Yang paused, and gave him a smile.
"Hey, handsome." She began. "I don't suppose you'd know where Junior is?"
The bouncer looked at her. More specifically, at Ember Celica.
"Who wants to know?"
Yang shrugged. "Just a girl with a few questions."
The large man looked at her suspiciously, then seemed to reach a decision.
"By the bar over there." He said, pointing towards the man.. "Near the girls in white and red."
Yang looked over where the bodyguard was pointing, and smiled.
"Thanks, man." She waved at him as she left, heading towards the man between the two teenagers pointed out.
Walked towards them, Yang took a moment to think about how to open up her questioning. After a moment, she reached into her pocket, and pulled out a few notes of money.
It wasn't much, but it might be enough to get him talking. If he needed more, she had her card on her somewhere too.
"Junior, right?" Yang asked, as she walked up to the three people she had been pointed towards. The man in the middle finished his drink, then turned to her. He looked for a moment, then spoke.
"Aren't you a bit young to be in here?" He asked. "If you want some drinks, I don't know what you've heard, but I don't help minors get boo-"
"No, I'm not interested in that." Yang interrupted. "I hear you know things."
"What kind of things?" Junior asked, raising an eyebrow.
"I'm looking for someone." Yang replied. "Little girl, about this high. Black hair with red highlights, fond of weapons. Silver eyes. Sound familiar?"
"Never met anyone with silver eyes before." Junior replied. "Pretty sure I'd remember it."
"Then maybe you could help me confirm a few things that might help me find her?" Yang asked, as she walked to the bar bench Junior was resting on. Slapping her money on the counter next to him, she continued. "I might be able to make it worth your time."
Looking over her shoulder, the girl in white looked down at the money. "Is that all you can afford? That's five minutes of work for us, girl."
"Then surely it can buy me five minutes of his time." Yang replied.
Junior considered it for a moment, before taking the money.
"This isn't buying you answers." He said, waving the money in front of Yang. "If it's something that needs to be bought, I'll need more."
"That's fine." Yang replied. "But I want to know. Have you heard the name Ruby Rose?"
"Just on the news." Junior replied. "Missing person report. Don't know anything else. She's the one you're looking for?"
"She disappeared in the middle of a shopping mall." Yang replied. "She was there one second, then there was a shattering and she was done. Do you know anything about that?"
"Nope." Junior replied. "News to me."
"The cameras on the scene cut out before she disappeared." Yang continued. "Before that, they caught her talking to a blonde woman and some brat of a kid. Any of that sound familiar?"
"Kid, you could be talking about dozens of people right now." Junior explained. "If you're looking for the people responsible, I need names or I need motives. You thinking this girl was kidnapped?"
"Yeah." Yang replied. "And I don't have names or a motive. That's why I'm here. I don't know enough and I need to know more."
Junior stroked his facial hair for a moment. "You're not giving me a lot to work with, girl."
"She went missing a while ago." Yang tried. "She'd need to be kept somewhere without being found out. Is there any location where a person could be held without risk of being heard calling for help?"
"Too many variables." Junior replied. "The easiest way to do that would be to get out of the city, and that's assuming there's no gags or sedatives in play."
Yang nearly groaned in frustration. Then, an idea came to her.
"Give me a moment." She said. "My uncle had access to the camera footage, I'll get him to send me a screenshot of the last people my sister talked to. Is there a problem with that?"
"Time's ticking, girl." Junior said, as the people at the bar slid him another drink.
Pulling out her scroll and moving to Qrow's contact information, Yang typed out a quick text to get him to send the screenshot. He responded after a moment with three different emoji, of a clock, a running man, and a smiling face.
Yang wanted to ask what the hell that meant, but didn't want to distract him from getting the camera footage.
"So, what's you name?" The girl in red asked.
"Yang." The girl with yellow hair said. "Yours?"
"Miltia." She said, before pointing at the girl in white. "That's Melani-"
"Don't drag me into this." Melanie snapped. "I don't want anything to do with her."
The girl in red shrugged. "It's better than just thinking of her as blondie. There's too many blondies. She's talking about a blondie. Less confusion this way."
Qrow finally sent the screenshot, and Yang held the scroll in front of Junior.
"Here they are." She said, pointing at the blonde woman with revealing clothing. "Does she look familiar to you?"
Junior looked at it, then paused. "Melanie, take a look at this. Was this the girl here on the ninth?"
Melanie sighed, and looked over Junior's shoulder.
"Looks like." She replied, before losing interest.
"So you know her?" Yang asked.
"Not well." Junior said. "She came here once, and a few of my workers have done jobs for her before."
"What can you tell me about her?"
Junior held up a hand. "Hold it. This is where information stops being free. I'm gonna need some payment for this. Or a favour."
Yang gritted her teeth, and breathed to calm herself down.
"I don't have much on me." Yang said. "But tell me about this favour."
Keep calm, she thought to herself. They were onto something here. They could work with this.
"A friend of mine runs a fight club." Junior said. "And a few of his fighters didn't turn up. He's short a match as a result, which sucks for him because one less round means less betting and less profits. I can afford to send one of my bodyguards here down later, but he's still one person short."
"You want me to go into a fight club?" Yang asked.
"Depends." Junior replied. "Can you fight?"
"Hell yeah." The girl with yellow hair responded. "But what's the difficulty we're looking at here?"
"Not too bad." Junior shrugged. "There's different groups for different ages, you'll be bumped up one if you turn out to be too tough, and you don't need to fight much. On short notice, you'd probably just be scheduled into a double-team match, two against two, but that's still an increase in betting opportunities."
"This sounds rather illegal." Yang noted dubiously.
Junior shrugged. "Nobodies reported it, and I have it on good authority there's a cop occasionally present."
"Corrupt?"
Junior shrugged. "Is there any way to prove whenever or not they're taking bribes?"
Yang sighed. "Are those my options? Money or fight club? Is there anything else?"
"If you want the information today, sure." Junior said. "If you're willing to wait a few days, there's gonna be a race. The more people in it, the bigger the prize money, the bigger the gambling wins are. I stand to gain a few things there, and if you participated, I might be able to give you a discount. Even better, if you can stop a certain asshole from placing enough to get a prize, I could give away this information for free."
"A few days from now?" Yang asked. "I don't exactly have time for that-"
"Then go with the fight club." Junior shrugged. "Or just pay me now. Either way, your five minutes are up. Go for a walk, make up your mind, and come back if you decide to go with something."
"But-"
"You heard the man." Melanie aid, putting an arm on Yang's shoulder and squeezing enough to cause a small amount of pain. "Leave. He'll hear your answer later, let the man drink for now."
Reluctantly, Yang stepped away, and Melanie let go of her shoulder.
"I'm glad you understand." Melanie said, as Yang walked away.
The yellow-haired Huntress in training walked off, trying not to let the girl in white get to her.
A potential lead. That was good. If they could track down the blonde woman, they could figure out what she had to do with Ruby's disappearance. They were one step closer to finding Ruby.
Exiting the club and walking down the street, Yang turned when she saw the flower shop, and stopped when she stood in front of the window. A moment later, her father stepped out of the building.
"Yang." Taiyang said. "Any luck?"
"Junior might have a lead." Yang noted. "But it's not free. I could buy it, but he's saying he's willing to give the information away for a favour too."
Taiyang frowned. "What kind of favour?"
"Gambling thing." Yang replied.
Her father relaxed. "Oh. Go on, what was he asking for?"
"He had two suggestions." Yang noted. "Filling in at a fight club tonight, or participating in a race in a few days."
The blond man considered it for a moment.
"Let me guess." He said. "You want to go for the fight club, but don't want to make me worry?"
"I mean, the race sounds appealing too, it's just in a few days-"
"Don't worry about what I think." Taiyang replied. "While money would be the easiest, either of the other options could provide more opportunities too. Running into someone who might know something, for instance."
"So you're going to let me try it?" Yang asked.
"Oh, don't get me wrong, I'm against it." Taiyang replied. "If you want to fight, I'm a bigger fan of the 'Go in and beat people up' strategy. But information gotten that way is a bit more unwilling, so staying on Junior's good side is probably important, and if this is a gambling thing, he'd probably get a bigger profit from the fight or race then just a straight-up transaction. I'll let you make the call, though."
"I don't suppose you'd be willing to tag into the ring?" Yang asked, out of curiosity.
"I somewhat doubt the legality of the options that don't have us beat everyone up. I'll probably sit to the side if we don't try that. Don't want the big bad Hunter scaring all the poor little borderline criminals off, after all. Just let me know what you decide soon, I'm keeping a list of all the bad decisions you're making and once we find Ruby you'll be properly made fun of for them, in addition to however long you're grounded for knowing about this place."
Yang groaned. "Dad, please. There's nothing Xiong with knowing about Hei Xiong's club."
Taiyang chuckled. "Ha ha, Yang. Good one. Very funny. I'm dyyang here."
He paused. "Die-Ying. Die-Yang. Tai-Yang. Damn it, I could have taken the joke further."
"If you're too slow to come up with that at the time, I guess we know for sure Ruby gets it from her mother."
"I will not stand here and be mocked by my own daughter." He declared. Then he sat down on the ground. "Go on."
Yang laughed.
After they finish goofing off, the two of them have to reach a decision. What does Yang decide?
[X] Just give Junior some money. It's simple, it's easy, no big risks beyond him maybe asking for more later.
[X] Go to the Fight Club. It's easy, she just needs to turn up for Junior to give the information, and a chance to punch something would be great stress relief.
[X] Enter the race in two days. Yang's father had been hinting at her next birthday present for a while, get that motorbike early and use it to win the race.
[X] Taiyang's got the right idea. Go back to Junior's club and beat up everyone until he spills the information for free.