-(=RWBY=)-
Chapter 24
-(=RWBY=)-
Jaune had an hour, no more, to get to the rendezvous point with the White Fang for the subsequent attack against the Ace-Ops. Waiting for the next public bullhead shuttle from Beacon to the city would take too much time, time which he did not have. So that left, as his only option –
He rushed back into Team RVLY's dorm, and as Weiss immediately turned away from the table to look him in the eyes, her own concern mirroring his apprehension, he came in close, to whisper in her ear,
"I have a mission from her, and I need your help to get back to my apartment as soon as humanly possible. I'm sorry to ask this of you, but –"
Weiss interrupted him, her own voice velvet soft.
"There's no need to be sorry. I'm glad to help, and glad you feel you can turn to me."
More loudly, for the benefit of their friends, who were now staring at them with amused smiles and suggestive grins, Weiss informed the room –
"Jaune has an urgent work engagement to rush off to, and I'll need to drop him off. Apologies for leaving at such short notice, but let us catch up again, perhaps at the end of the year."
Jaune added,
"Yeah, so sorry, but I've got to run. Catch you guys at our next meet-up. "
He was already halfway out of the room as he said that, giving only a hasty wave in parting. Weiss followed him, the urgency from both his words and actions moving her to keep pace, even as a chorus of their friends' voices bid them farewell.
Then, they ran. They exited the dorms and raced for the aerial docks, making it there in record time. Upon arrival, Weiss snapped out commands to her team to get ready to leave, even while leading Jaune to the cockpit. There, she informed the pilot of their urgent departure, before handing it over to Jaune to provide his apartment's address.
The SDC bullhead roared, as it took to the skies, and immediately Jaune turned his attention to another urgent matter.
Whipping out his scroll, he opened his onion routing browser, and went straight to the email account that he and Ozpin were using as a dead drop, to communicate with each other in the most secure way possible. After making sure that the content of his message itself was encrypted using a one-time pad, he saved it to the drafts folder. Then, he made a random post to Warble, Remnant's most popular social media platform, using an account that was being automatically monitored by Ozpin's computer systems. The content of his post didn't matter; the fact that he had posted, however, would signal to the headmaster the need to check the email dead drop.
The message he had sent was brief, and to the point –
[Ace-Ops found the warehouse and have set up an ambush for Adam Taurus's team. Watts's mission for me is to kill the Ace-Ops so that the White Fang can smuggle the dust out of the city – and he warns that refusing this task will mean the termination of my negotiations with Salem. The mission starts in an hour. Do I proceed?]
Jaune knew what the best course of action for the world was, of course; and hence, what the headmaster's answer would be – but he needed to make sure, this being a situation where lives were at stake, not least those of the elite huntsmen and huntresses whose skill and valour helped defend Atlas.
As Jaune waited, on edge, for the headmaster's reply, he spent some time thinking through the circumstances of this mission. In particular, he considered why Watts wanted the Ace-Ops dead so badly. Of course, as Watts had pointed out, the Ace-Ops were too strong to hold back upon, and going for the kill against them was critical if they were to be defeated and the stolen dust successfully transported.
But there was more than that, Jaune gauged. The Ace-Ops were some of Atlas's best huntsmen, and an important military asset; losing them, especially on a mission on foreign soil, would reflect extremely badly on General Ironwood, and cost him political support. And of course, weakening Ironwood would be something Watts would love – the man's resentment and hatred against the General was legendary.
Yet, even that wasn't the end of the story, or so Jaune suspected. By getting him to commit such unforgiveable crimes like murdering huntsmen, let alone ones so important, Jaune was setting himself up to be blackmailed. Were he to ever back out of making peace with Salem, Watts could force him back into line, by threatening to reveal this dirty little secret. In the potential face of Atlas's wrath, Jaune would be forced to join up – not unlike how Cinder Fall herself had been recruited, when on the run after the events of her childhood.
There was still no reply from the headmaster.
Jaune, grown increasingly antsy, also found himself bothered by something he had just realized – that the headmaster probably hadn't even authorized this mission by the Ace-Ops to ambush the White Fang. With the tracking devices Jaune had planted on the stolen dust months ago, the headmaster had always been in a position to know if the dust were being moved from the warehouse for use, and he could always authorize immediate huntsman action to prevent that. Political considerations, however, meant that he had to use Valean huntsmen to do so, not Atlesian ones. It was bad enough that Vale's huntsmen had failed to defend their own military base and prevent the theft of the dust in the first place; yet it would have been even more embarassing if it was Atlas who had to step in and save them. That the Ace-Ops were the ones carrying out the ambush, therefore...
... suggested that they were acting on their own, after having located the dust. They were eager to claim the credit for General Ironwood and Atlas, perhaps, and hence chose to leave Ozpin and Valean Huntsman Command in the dark. Politics – it all came down to politics.
It was unfortunate – and yet, inescapable also.
Jaune checked his scroll.
Finally.
A new message had appeared in drafts folder, and Jaune immediately opened it, copied the content, and decrypted it with his one-time pad. The resulting message, from the headmaster, was as simple as it was unsurprising.
[Proceed.]
Jaune turned off the screen of his scroll, and returned the device to his pocket with a sigh. Only then did his attention return to his surroundings inside the bullhead, and he realized that Weiss was looking at him with unconcealed concern. She had been silent all this while, but now she moved to ask,
"Is everything alright? Is there anything more I can help you with?"
Jaune smiled, even if his heart wasn't into it. Looking to reassure Weiss without misleading her, he offered,
"This mission will be costly in lives, and dangerous to me besides. But it's for the best, and I'll pull through, as always. But thank you, truly, for your concern. I wish I didn't have to make you worry."
His words elicited a small smile from Weiss.
"I will, all the same. And –"
She turned serious, her eyes smouldering with deadly intensity.
"Come back safely. Or I'll hunt you down in the next life and berate you for all eternity."
Come back safely.
That meant a lot, coming from her. Jaune nodded, grateful beyond words.
The bullhead had come to a stop over the metro station nearest to his place – signalling the end of their time together.
"Goodbye, and good luck, Jaune."
"See you soon, Weiss."
Jaune disembarked, stepping off the bullhead onto the rooftop of the metro station. The moment his feet touched concrete, he was already on the move, racing for the stairs and going down. Opon reaching the ground floor, he ran out of the station, and began sprinting home. Using aura to enhance his body, he pushed himself to preternatural speeds, his feet pounding the road beneath him. It being the industrial district at night, the roads were largely empty, though the sidewalks were – as ever – occupied by loitering groups of local ruffians.
None of them gave him any bother; they weren't foolish enough to want to make trouble for a huntsman, nor fast enough to try.
He arrived at the foot of his run-down apartment block in little more than a dozen seconds, though he was breathing heavily from the sprint by the end of it. Not pausing to catch his breath, he raced up the stairs to his apartment on the seventh floor, and pushed his way in.
After turning on the lights, Jaune immediately went for his weapons. Pulling back the carpet at the corner and prying out a loose floorboard, Jaune retrieved a bundled-up Crocea Mors. He had hidden it there, on the off-chance that some thief came for his utterly priceless Anra steel blade.
He needed that blade now – he would be fighting to kill, and there was nothing as good at doing that than Anra steel. As for the risk of discovery – there wouldn't be any survivors left to testify that they had been hurt through their aura, and it wasn't as if autopsies could determine aura levels before death. And while there was the risk of the White Fang noticing his use of Anra steel, he always had the excuse of having stolen the blade. Unlike with the airbase mission, this time round the benefit of using Anra steel outweighed the risks, and so tonight he would go into battle with it.
Wrapping Crocea Mors's distinctive hilt in black tape, and placing the sword in a plain, mud-brown sheath rather than its usual gold-and-white one, Jaune strapped the blade to his waist.
That done, he retrieved his spare scroll and put in a disposable SIM card. Then, he sent the rendezvous point's address from his personal scroll over to it, before leaving the latter behind. He needed a scroll's map app to find his way to the rendezvous – but he couldn't afford to use his personal scroll, which was registered to him and which would give his location away to the authorities were they ever to examine their huge backlog of geolocation data.
Once the spare scroll was pocketed, Jaune moved on to the final step, by pulling on the disguise he had used on the airbase raid a long time ago – plain black clothes, as well as a beanie over his head and scarf around his lower face, to leave everything but his eyes concealed.
Then, it was time to go. Jaune turned off the lights, then went over to the window and slid it open. After a quick check to ensure no one was around and watching, he swung out the window, onto a nearby pipe – which he then used to slide down to the ground.
Slipping into the same routine he had used for the airbase raid, Jaune ran for the nearby, run-down carpark where his beat-up motorcycle was parked. Upon arriving at the parking lot, Jaune located his vehicle at the corner and mounted it.
Turning on the engine, and flipping the motorcycle's kickstand up with the back of his heel, Jaune guided his motorcyle out of the carpark. Once on the main road, Jaune went for full throttle, and sent his motorcycle racing into the night.
He sped through the industrial district at a speed utterly perilous and certainly illegal, heading south-east. The roads, at least, were clear at night, with no one around to be killed by his reckless driving.
Jaune cleared the industrial district after some travel, crossing into the agricultural district instead. As warehosues gave way to farmland, Jaune continued travelling towards the far eastern end of the agricultural district, and hence the south-eastern corner of the City of Vale.
The farmlands blurred into indistinctness in the darkness around him, as he continued coaxing unsafe speeds from his motorcycle.
Eventually, a quick check of his scroll's map app told him that he was nearing the rendezvous, which he proceeded to navigate his way to, through the fields and farmhouses, following the detailed route generated by the app.
The rendezvous point loomed ahead, a non-descript farm in the middle of nowhere.
In the end, Jaune had made good time, with his calculations on travel duration having been borne out. He had earlier estimated that he would need fifty minutes to get to the rendezvous – twenty minutes to get from Beacon back to his apartment via bullhead; five minutes to ready himself at home; and another twenty-five minutes to get from his apartment to the rendezvous via motorcycle. And indeed, fifty minutes had come and gone since Watts' call – and now, the real challenge began.
He pulled up in the courtyard of the farm, where Adam Taurus's crew was already assembled. Armed to the teeth and monstrous in their masks, they were a sight that civilians and huntsmen alike had learnt to fear and hate.
As for their leader –
Adam Taurus, his hair looking the dark-red of dried blood in the gloom of night, strode forward, and acknowledged Jaune.
"Mordred."
The codename, from the legendary Angraeli knight of treachery, had been chosen by Watts, who as ever was being too clever by half. Tonight, that codename especially irked Jaune, but he let it slide, instead greeting Taurus in turn.
"Taurus."
The terrorist leader tossed him a mask, a tactical radio set, as well a packet of first aid dressing. The first two Jaune proceeded to put on, while the last he slipped into his belt pouch. Noticeably absent from the set of items provided were plastic cable ties, which they had used during the airbase raid months ago – for tonight, of course, no prisoners were going to be taken, nor any quarter given.
"I'll explain the plan one more time, for the benefit of Mordred. The rest of you, listen up again, because for this mission, any fuck ups mean we die."
Taurus gestured to Ilia.
"Map."
The brown-skinned girl quickly used her scroll to project a map onto the white wall of the large barn they were standing beside.
Jaune suddenly wondered what happened to the owners of this farmhouse –
– and after just a moment's thought, he realized that they were almost certainly dead.
The night's toll was already more than zero, and the actual huntsmen combat hadn't even started yet.
Meanwhile, Taurus, the murderer, was explaining the enemy's disposition of forces and their own strategy, with the aid of the map Ilia was projecting.
"Here's the warehouse, around a kilometer from here, and here's the road leading up to it."
With his sheathed katana, Taurus pointed at the warehouse and road respectively on the map.
"Information from Watts tells us that the Ace-Ops are camped around the area like this. The leader Ebi's here, with his two soldiers Ederne and Amin, hiding behind a hedge one field away."
Taurus pointed at the three bright dot more than a hundred meters away south of the warehouse's entrance. The dots seemed stationary, at first glance, but when another dot somewhere to the north started moving, Jaune realized something disturbing –
Watts had managed to hack into the Ace-Ops's scrolls, despite their military-grade encryptions, and was now tracking their position in real-time.
Jaune was suddenly very glad, and very relieved, that Ozpin was nothing less than paranoid when it came to cybersecurity and secrecy, and that their communications methods – dead drops accessed via onion routing, to leave messages encrypted via one-time pads – were theoretically untraceable and unbreakable.
In any case, Taurus was still holding forth on their enemy –
"Best guess is that the Ace-Ops wants to take us all out in a single strike when we're disembarking from vehicles in front of the warehouse. Ederne fires her rocket launcher, while Amin holds us in place with his semblance and Ebi's luck nonsense messes with our weapons – so we can't run, can't shoot down the missiles, and can't do anything but sit there and die. Then here –"
He pointed to a spot further to the west, beside the road leading towards the warehouse.
"– Bree is camping by the road. If we flee from the initial ambush, she will intercept us with her speed – kill some of us, maybe, but mainly buy enough time for her allies to take us in the back and wipe us out. And finally –"
Taurus stabbed his sword at the final dot, the one which was moving earlier; it was located towards the north, behind the warehouse.
"Zeki is hiding at the back of the warehouse. If we attempt to hole up inside the place, he will likely enter by the back and attack us while we're focused on the front. His aura vines are difficult to deal with in enclosed areas, and he may kill a number of us before we can react – and even when we do respond, this gives the rest of the Ace-Ops the chance to breach the warehouse and swarm us."
Jaune was, admittedly, impressed – not just at the Ace-Ops's strategy, which was highly logical and effective, but also at the way Adam Taurus had saw right through it, using nothing but his knowledge of their abilities and where they were located on a map.
Blake had once told him that Adam Taurus was dangerous, not just for his blade, but also for his mind – and certainly, she was right.
Taurus, having set out the enemy's plan, now put forth his own.
"Mordred."
The terrorist captain looked over at Jaune.
"Your job is to deal with Ebi and his two."
The command was given without hesitation, in a way that brooked no disagreement. On Jaune's part, he merely nodded.
Taurus had taken the measure of Jaune's strength last time, and had seen his semblance besides – the man knew he was Champion-level, or thereabouts. Only someone of that level could stand up against multiple elite huntsman enemies working together – and so Taurus deployed Jaune accordingly. As for what Taurus himself would be doing –
"I'll handle Bree by the road. And Ilis and the rest of you –"
He looked around at his team.
"– jump Zeki and try to take him down immediately. If you can't, just do your best to hold out and survive until Mordred or myself can come over to help out."
Here was the weak point of the plan. Ilia was talented, but only at the level of a Beacon student. The other nine White Fang terrorists, meanwhile, could generously be described as competent primary combat school students. Collectively, they would pose little threat to Vine Zeki or any other elite huntsman.
But Taurus had no choice in the matter – his team's strength was what it was, and he could only make the best of it. The success of the night's mission, in the end, would come down to whether Jaune could defeat his enemies before Zeki could overwhelm Ilia's team – assuming, of course, Jaune would win at all.
I can. I will.
Jaune frowned at the three dots on the map, even as Taurus was finishing up on his mission brief.
"We'll coordinate our attacks on our targets to happen at the same time. Ilia, you guys loop around north to get into position. Stay quiet, and stay out of aura detection range – one hundred meters, at least. Use the map to make sure."
He traced the designated route onto the projected map.
"Same for you, Mordred. Loop around south, stay quiet, and stay out of range using the map."
He traced out a second route, and as before, Jaune gave a silent nod of assent. Taurus, remembering that Jaune hadn't been sent the map, as his own team would have been, forwarded Jaune the link to the website on which Watts was temporarily hosting said map.
The terrorist leader was coming to the end of his brief, as he said,
"I'll do the same for Bree by the road. Sound in when you're in position, and then I'll give the command to attack. Understood?"
"Yes, sir!"
There were nods all around, and a chorus of affirmative answers.
"Good. Let's do this right. This is our only chance to load the dust for transport to Mountain Glenn, and to make our train attack a reality. Success or failure here will be the difference, between freedom for the faunus, and remaining livestock to the humans. Remember that, and be ready to sacrifice your life for the our righteous cause. For the Fang!"
"For the Fang!"
With that rallying cry, Jaune and the White Fang scattered, and began making their way from the farmhouse to their ambush positions.
Though Jaune knew he ought to be concentrating on the mission, but he couldn't help but think on what Taurus had said.
Mountain Glenn.
Why was the Fang moving their gravity dust there, and what was this train attack they mentioned? Indeed, given their goal was to murder as many humans as possible, to demonstrate to the world the cost of ignoring the White Fang, and to blackmail the Kingdoms into caving to their demands, then surely they ought to have been using the dust to commit mass-casualty attacks in Vale or any other Kingdom capital?
Unless –
Jaune remembered the tunnels he had been training with Cinder Fall in, remembered how they had been sealed. And call it brilliance, or call it luck, but Jaune made the connection, his mind seeing the bright line between present reality, and the horrifying future the White Fang wanted to inflict on humanity
They want to unseal the tunnels.
Dread welled up, as Jaune understood what the White Fang had planned. The tunnels had been sealed at the Mountain Glenn end, a whole hundred meter stretch of tunnel filled up with concrete. However, if that seal could be removed, say, by lifting the whole stretch out via massive use of gravity dust, then the tunnels would be open, and Grimm would pour in, with matters made worse if, as eluded to by Taurus, the White Fang ran a train through the tracks, using dust-laden carriages to blow up yet more entrance holes in the tunnel between Vale and Mountain Glenn. With White Fang aboad the train, their hateful emotions attracting the Grimm, they could lead the monsters all the way to the city; the tunnel would become a dagger aimed right at the heart of Vale, an underground river capable of channelling the darkness right into hearth and home. And a final gravity bomb at the end of the line would be the icing of the cake, shattering the city centre and letting the Grimm pour out en masse – killing thousands immediately, and triggering such utter panic that other Grimm outside the city, from the mightiest Goliaths to the lowliest of Beowolves, would attack too, and threaten the Collapse of Vale.
It was a nightmare that could not – would not – be allowed to come to pass.
Jaune grimly reminded that he needed to pass this information on to Ozpin, if it was the last thing he did; thousands if not millions of lives depended on this. There was, of course, the risk that acting on this information would blow his cover, but Ozpin could always set up a believable way of stumbling across the White Fang's operations – say, by letting Beacon students take an abandoned-city training mission to Mountain Glenn. In view of that, swift action to stop this train attack – and what a cunning scheme it was; it had Watts's fingerprints all over it – made sense; the minimal risk to his cover was nothing compared to the importance of averting Collapse of the world's greatest city.
Even as Jaune was thinking about Mountain Glenn, he was taking the long way around in his journey to his ambush point, keeping himself far away from the main road and circling well behind Ebi's team, so as to avoid their field of vision. He was also taking care to keep himself hidden behind the hedges, even scurrying half-bent when the bushes proved shorter than his tall frame – all to avoid the risk of being spotted by Bree or Zeki from the other side of the road.
He paused beneath one hedge, while still a field away from his ambush point, and sent one of his onion-routed and encrypted dead-drop messages to Ozpin, warning him of Mountain Glenn.
That done, Jaune tried to focus his mind. Protecting Vale was important, of course – but he reminded himself that more than just Vale was at stake tonight, with the fate of the world hanging in the balance, from the success or failure of this mission. He needed to concentrate.
Let's go.
Jaune continued making his way through moonlit farmland, before finally, managing to get into position, one field behind where Ebi's team was positioned.
"Mordred in position."
Soon enough, Ilia too called out,
"Ilia here. We're in position."
Adam Taurus, long ago in position, by virtue of his target Bree being encamped furthest west and nearest to their start point, acknowledged his team's reports with –
"Good. Three, two, one – go!"
As arrows loosed from a bow, Jaune and the White Fang were off, sprinting for their enemies with but one purpose in mind – murder, and the swifter the better.
Jaune was more than a hundred meters from Ebi's team, but with his speed, he was capable of closing it in the span of a second. Except, as he rushed forward, blade in hand –
The three Ace Operatives felt his killing intent, and reacted, faster than Jaune would have expected. He was barely halfway across, when all three had turned, well and ready with weapon and semblance.
Ederne was the first to attack. With Timber in its launcher form hefted upon her right shoulder and its twin barrels pointed right at Jaune, the giant of a woman fired.
A brief flash lit the night, as a pair of high-explosive rockets shot out of the launcher, careening straight towards Jaune.
It would have been trivial to dodge, ordinarily, but then Jaune suddenly found himself jerked to a stop, his headlong rush at the Ace-Ops thwarted by an unseen force coiled around his arms and legs.
Jaune hissed, realizing as he did that he had been caught by Amin's semblance of Freeze. Bands invisible as air but stronger than steel had wrapped around him, holding him in place, and leaving him a sitting duck, as the rockets hurtled towards his face.
For a fraction of a second, Jaune considered throwing Crocea Mors at a rocket – flicking his sword, as one would a knife – so as to detonate the rocket prematurely and destroy both it and its twin, before they could explode on top of him. However –
A powerful wind started up, right then, its howl breaking the silence of the night. Its sheer force caused the grass to ripple, and the nearby trees to nearly keel over – which of course meant any sword throw had suddenly turned from difficult to nigh-impossible.
Jaune's hiss turned into a growl, as he connected the dots immediately.
Fucking Ebi.
The man's semblance Good Fortune had rigged reality itself, making sure anything that could go well for himself did go well, and for anything that could go badly for the enemy did go badly.
Two rockets, coming for his head; an invisible force, holding him in place; and fate itself, turned against him. The Ace-Ops had him dead to rights, and indeed, a lesser huntsman could do naught but die –
– but Jaune Arc was no lesser huntsman. He was instead death itself with sword in hand; and he was an Arc, with fire in his blood.
The sun dawned in the dead of night, as a scorching shield of flames whirled into existence in front of him.
So wide it gorged out the earth below and blocked one's view of the shattered moon above, the shield intercepted the rockets, disintegrating them upon contact –
– and doing the same for the follow-up, a ceaseless barrage of rockets and rifle bullets that was the Ace-Ops's determined attempt to kill him.
But determined as it was, it was futile too. Safe behind his shield, Jaune stood there, patient even while bound, doing nothing but listen, and count. From his time working with the Ace-Ops in providing security for Blake's final campaign rally, he knew the details of their weapons and semblances. Ebi's Kingfisher offered no ranged options, while Ederne's launcher packed six rockets in all, and Amin's rifle could fire the usual thirty rounds before needing a reload. Having felt another four large rocket impacts upon his shield of flames during the barrage, and having counted the number of times Amin had fired –
– Jaune could tell that they were, right now, out of ammunition, and utterly unable to hurt him at range.
Jaune let his protective shield of flames fall, and prepared to go on the attack.
He didn't want to do this – didn't want to slay the Ace-Ops, and end more precious lives. And yet Watts had demanded this, in the name of his Queen, with refusal meaning failure for his mission and the possible destruction of Remnant. The greater good, and the lesser evil, dictated that he would have to commit murder –
– and so murder it was, with no time for regrets or second thoughts.
Now, who dies first?
Marrow Amin was the real problem. His semblance just left Jaune totally incapable of fighting in melee – which meant that he had to die, immediately.
Jaune took a deep breath, and then opened his mouth wide, and breathed.
For the second time that night, the darkness died to the light, as a searing, all-destroying blast of flame lanced out from Jaune's mouth.
The immolating fire punched right through Marrow Amin, vaporizing his torso in the most brutal way possible.
"Marrow!"
His teammates' horrified shouts rung out, even as the invisible bonds around Jaune's limbs had faded, the man generating them with his semblance having died.
While Ebi and Ederne were distracted, however momentarily, by their teammate's gruesome death, Jaune had closed the remaining distance.
He leapt at Clover Ebi, and though the man brought his fishing pole up to block, it was far too slow, and far too late, with Crocea Mors already arcing down, onto his head.
Anra steel met aura, and aura parted – yielding, like hope before the darkness.
He split Clover Ebi's head in twain, blood splattering onto Jaune's own face.
"Rargh!"
Jaune turned towards Ederne, her scream of despairing rage making him think she would just attack him outright –
– but no, she had presence of mind enough to hold off. He would have made short work of her had she engaged, it being simple enough to deflect that unwieldy hammer of hers before going in for the kill. However, she saw the risk, and so kept her distance.
The chance to attack without being attacked in turn – that was what Jaune sought, in this fight, as for all fights. However, it seemed that said chance would not present itself naturally, which meant he would have to create it himself.
Jaune was at around five percent of his total aura reserves, which was too low to allow further use of his semblance. All the same, he opened his mouth like before, as if to spit searing fire once more –
– and, as expected, Ederne blanched, immediately diving to the side for fear of her life –
– leaving her in mid-air, and indeed totally unprepared, for when Jaune darted forward, slashing down.
Crocea Mors carved right through her belly, spilling her guts onto the grassy field and coming close to splitting her whole body in two.
Jaune exhaled.
Three down, two to go.
Harriet Bree was probably the biggest threat remaining, and so Jaune went to aid Taurus against her, over helping Ilia's team against Zeki.
He raced for that clash in the darkness, crimson arcs of flames and crackling golden lightning marking where terrorist and Ace Operative were fighting.
Taurus was choosing not to engage Bree in melee. Though he probably had the advantage of skill, and definitely the advantage in reach, with his katana against her exosuited fists, her semblance gave her the edge in speed – so that attempts to duke it out steel against steel would be a coin toss at best.
So instead, Taurus was resorting to dust, with every slash of his katana Wilt sending arcs of fire screaming at Bree – keeping her at bay even when they missed, and wearing her aura down when they did hit.
All the same, it was a costly strategy, with Taurus burning his own aura reserves to accomplish this, all against a lightning-covered Bree who kept dodging and weaving without any signs of tiring.
Into this standoff, Jaune thrust himself. Dashing forward, Jaune was putting himself in a position to take Bree in the rear –
– except she reacted to his advance, quickly and optimally. As Jaune came rushing in, she abandoned her deadly dance of flame and lightning with Taurus, instead pivoting to attack Jaune immediately.
It was the right choice, and the only rational thing to do – she could not hope to win against two enemies, and so was forced to try and take one out as soon as possible.
Jaune knew this, of course – knew her desperation, knew what she had to do given her dire situation. He let her come, let her blaze in trailing lightning, her exosuited fist coming in with a devastating punch aimed at his face.
He let all this happen, because he knew this too –
– that despite her semblance, he could match her speed for speed, and more importantly, a sword outranged a fist.
Fast Knuckles didn't even come close to touching him, Crocea Mors having cleaved through its owner's head long before her attack could make contact.
In death, Bree wore a look of surprise, one she kept even as her lifeless body had slumped to the ground.
Four dead, and the last soon to join them.
Taurus had noticed how Jaune had killed Bree through her still considerable levels of aura. The man tilted his head, his confusion clear – though that cleared up soon enough, as wary realization hit.
"Your sword is Anra steel."
Expecting this, and ready with his excuse, Jaune replied,
"Yes. And I use it much better than the man I stole it from."
"Hmm."
Taurus nodded, satisfied with the explanation, and then without further ado both of them started sprinting towards the back of the warehouse. There, Zeki's Aura Vines were visible, as twin streaks of light dancing in the dark – whirling and spinning, reaching and wrestling.
The whirling of the vines slowed, and then stopped, as Jaune and Taurus approached – and they could see why.
The White Fang had been thoroughly trashed, and all ten of them now lay groaning in pain on the ground around Zeki. They were still alive, at least, which was more than Jaune could say for the man's own team.
And Zeki could tell – of course he could, given that Jaune and Taurus stood here, alive and well, even as Ebi and the rest were nowhere to be found.
Zeki's usual tranquillity and composure shattered, as grief and despair washed over his face.
And yet, soldier and a huntsman that he was, he did not let his emotions crush him; instead, with grim determination, he got into a stance, and prepared to fight them to the death.
Taurus, meanwhile, was looking at his team on the ground. He seemed more concerned over them than their enemy – and strangely, Jaune found himself grudgingly respecting the terrorist for that. The man was a monster, by all accounts – not least Blake's own – but he seemed to care for his own men, at least.
Jaune signalled to Taurus to take care of his fallen comrades, and the terrorist captain immediately started dragging his defeated allies away from the combat zone, all the while trusting that Jaune could handle Zeki on his own.
Vine Zeki, on his part, was not content to wait as Taurus retrieved his allies, and understandably so, since permitting that only risked getting himself double teamed in due time –
– and hence he attacked, the aura vines whipping forth ferociously in an attempt to tear Jaune to bits.
The vines came in like a pair of scissors, the one above cutting in from his left while the bottom one struck from the right, in an attack that was hard to block and even harder to dodge.
Jaune dodged anyway, twisting his body while kicking off with both feet. The momentum of the former, combined with the force of the latter, spun him around in a butterfly kick that lifted him into the air while keeping his torso and legs horizontal to the ground –
– such that he slipped between the vines, his head not clipping the appendage above nor his feet getting swept up by the extremity below.
Jaune landed, the perfectly executed butterfly kick learnt from Ren long ago leaving him spinning down into a crouch –
– which he immediately pushed off from, in a lunge forward that ended with his sword through Zeki's chest.
Jaune withdrew Crocea Mors from Zeki's torso, and gently lowered the man's body to the ground.
Five out of five, and another successful murder for tonight.
As Jaune knelt beside Zeki, he found something nagging at him – an unease, that he could not quite shake.
This had been too easy – far too easy.
And how could this even be? How could some of humanity's most elite huntsmen fall so easily in the face of evil? How, when the end result could well have been the succeess of the White Fang's Mountain Glenn subway attack, and the potential fall of Vale itself?
And the answer came, merciless in its logic, and so obvious questioning it seemed stupid.
Because good intentions alone save no one. Because evil cannot be defeated, and the world protected, unless we huntsmen and heroes have sufficient strength to do so.
Jaune recalled what Cinder Fall had told him, just yesterday night.
Power – it is your sword, and your shield; the only way to protect yourself, or anyone else.
Whatever else Cinder Fall was, she was right about this. Jaune had always wanted to be a hero, but he had always thought of it in terms of saving others, without ever giving much though on what that required.
Now, of course, he knew, and all too well.
Heroism requires power, and a hero must be strong – else the people you seek to protect will be dead and gone, with no one left to mourn.
Understanding this, Jaune could only hope that his strength, and that of Ozpin's cabal, would be sufficient to thwart Salem's plans for the world, and to avert the apocalypse she was spending all eternity trying to kindle.
"Enough rest, all of you."
Adam Taurus's commanding voice shook Jaune out of his deep, dark musings.
The terrorist captain, having finished checking up on his team's health, was satisfied that no one had any significant injuries despite their broken auras. Needing to move the mission forward, he instructed,
"Start moving the dust out of the warehouse. The bullheads will be here very soon. Mordred –"
Separately, the man told Jaune,
" – you keep watch. Pay attention to the north-east – that's where Beacon is, and where any reinforcements will probably come from."
Happy to do something other than stew in his own thoughts, Jaune nodded in agreement.
As the White Fang started moving the dust, Jaune took up a post behind the warehouse, watching the north-west in particular as Taurus suggested.
Things proceeded smoothly, however, and soon enough the White Fang's bullheads arrived. There were ten of them, which was a considerable number given how poorly resourced the Fang was in general. That they were here showed just how important the Mountain Glenn attack was to the Fang, and how much they were willing to commit to see it done.
Under Taurus's leadership, and with no huntsmen alive to interfere, the White Fang quickly loaded the hundred tons of dust onto the ten bullheads, with each one carrying about ten tons – quite the load, but still within the capabilities of the bullheads and their powerful engines.
The loading took no more than half an hour in all, vastly aided as it was by the use of numerous forklifts, and the White Fang's skill at operating them – they had clearly trained for this.
Once loading was done, the bullheads took off without delay, heading east, going over the walls of the city and making for the mountains. And Vale's Air Force, which would ordinarily have detected and intercepted any such unauthorized flights in and out of the city, would tonight not be doing anything all, Watts having hacked into and sabotaged the city's air defence radar system.
As the roar of the bullheads' engines faded into the distance, it was time for Jaune and the White Fang to disperse.
Except, of course, that was when it all went wrong.
"Halt, criminals! I am combat ready, and will not hesitate to use force if you resist arrest!"
A voice terrifying familiar reached Jaune's ears. And his heart leapt, shock and dismay coursing through him.
No. That's impossible.
Praying desperately that he had heard wrong, he turned around –
– except sight confirmed what hearing had warned –
– that one of his friends was here, and in true mortal danger.
Penny Polendina was standing on the roof of the warehouse, right at the edge, and looking down them. Her aura burnt bright in the night, and true to her words, she seemed ready to fight.
A dozen furious questions raged within Jaune, each one more unanswerable than the last.
How did she get here? Why take a fight, against one of the most dangerous terrorists alive? What can I do to get her out of this unharmed?
Taurus, meanwhile, had reacted quickly in the face of a new enemy. Gravel crunched as he leapt to the side, putting himself right between Penny and his team. Ilia and the others were still suffering from broken auras after their one-sided bout with Vine Zeki, and liable to suffer death or serious injury, if caught up in huntsmen combat now. And even as he repositioned himself to cover his team, Taurus commanded,
"Mordred, with me. The rest of you, flee."
Not needing to be told twice, and trusting their captain to hold against the enemy, the White Fang began fleeing west, away from the warehouse and the fight.
As for Jaune himself – it was a terrible position he found himself in. On the one hand, he needed to protect Penny; and on the other, he needed to avoid openly opposing the Fang and thus alienating their mutual ally Watts. And all this, he had to do while at around five percent aura, a level where his semblance was unavailable and where any hit suffered would be fatal.
Both Penny and Taurus, though, gave him no time to come up with a plan; the moment the White Fang began fleeing, friend and foe alike sprang into action.
Penny leapt down from the roof of the warehouse, even as twin blades appeared in her hands, summoned from sheaths unseen.
She hadn't even landed when Taurus was already sprinting forward, his sword arcing towards her head, in an attempt to deal a devastating blow before she could even respond.
Jaune could have intervened, but doubt as to the right thing to do made him hesitate. And that hesitation left him a helpless spectator with sword in hand as –
Penny barely managed to bring her left sword up in time to block Taurus's powerful strike, but she then swiftly transitioned into a retaliatory strike, with her right sword stabbing forward towards Taurus's face –
– but the man was too quick, pulling back the instant his first attack had failed. With grace born of skill and long experience, he segued into a follow-up attack, by bringing his blade crashing down on Penny's overextended right arm.
Jaune winced, expecting the bright flash of aura loss, if not an outright shatter, and was ready to jump in to prevent Penny from getting hurt any further –
– except Taurus's sword was simply stopped cold by Penny's forearm, without any aura lost at all. This caught Jaune by surprise – and for the second time in just a few seconds, he found himself riveted by uncharacteristic hesitation.
Taurus, too, was taken aback, what with his opponent being so tough her skin might as well have been metal. His surprise made him pause, fractionally, and this was enough to cost him, as Penny brought her left sword across in a powerful blow that forced him to block. His footing not the best, Taurus actually staggered slightly under Penny's strength – which had always been considerable, as Jaune could remember, from her incredibly firm handshake that first time they met.
Taurus drew back, and Penny pursued, her swords slicing out in front of her in an attempt to land a strike on the terrorist. But for all of Penny's speed – well above the normal Beacon student's – Taurus was even faster, and he eventually backed off far enough beyond Penny's reach.
Thankfully, Penny didn't chase any further; though she had acquited herself well against Taurus in that initial exchange, it was only due to the element of surprise from being far stronger than a huntress-in-training had any right to be. Once Taurus had adjusted, he would destroy her in melee combat all the same, Jaune was certain.
On the positive side, all this had given Jaune enough time to formulate a plan – which was to simply step in and save Penny whenever her aura went dangerously low, and when Taurus objected, offer up certain justifications that even a terrorist would find persuasive.
Penny, having decided that melee combat wasn't working out all that well, switched to what seemed to be her semblance. Backing off, she summoned eight other blades from her back – perhaps from some hidden folds built into the back of her dress, since she didn't seem to be carrying any sheaths.
The array of ten blades floated around her, reminding Jaune of his late partner's Polarity.
Does she have some sort of magnetism-based semblance? That could also be how she blocked Taurus's sword so effortlessly with only bare skin.
Taurus, seeing that the battle had shifted to ranged combat, now drew Blush. Pointing his scabbard-rifle at Penny, he began firing.
Penny's floating blades came together, interlocking into a makeshift shield and interposing themselves between Taurus's rifle and herself, to block each and every bullet sent her way.
No fool, Taurus didn't just shoot blindly into the shield of swords, instead trying to put bullets into Penny's lower body, which was uncovered by the shield – but Penny was alert and aware, tracking the angle of Taurus's rifle barrel and moving her swords to always be between her and it.
Eventually, Taurus ran out of ammunition, and needed to reload – which, of course, Penny didn't let him do. Going on the offence, she sent her floating blades spearing forward, one by deadly one.
Taurus leaped backwards, trying to give himself more time to react to the incoming blades, each one of which tore forward at devastating speed. Jumping and weaving in retreat, Taurus evaded the blades, the sharpened steel always missing him and slicing into the ground instead.
Once all ten blades had been dodged, Taurus started reloading Blush. Simultaneously, Penny called back her floating blades, and started rotating them in a circle.
That she was about to try something different beyond spearing them forward, however, didn't hit Jaune until an intense sphere of emerald light formed from the rotation of the blades.
Is that hard-light dust? If she using dust sorcery?
Taurus, seeing the imminent and incredible danger, abandoned his attempt to shoot at Penny, and instead went for Wilt instead.
The laser fired, a torrent of emerald light lancing forth. Taurus, square in its way, seemed doomed to die, doomed to vanish in the searing light –
– but against all odds, he brought Wilt up, to absorb the attack with his sword.
Moonslice.
Jaune had read the public files, had listened to Blake warn him time and time again. Here it was, the attack that made Adam Taurus feared and famed above virtually all others.
Taurus slammed the sword back into its sheath, all the while his eyes and his hair and the crimson on his clothes glowed the red of a blood moon.
If that attack lands, Penny's dead.
Jaune moved.
Taurus performed iai, the traditional Mistralian sword technique of drawing one's sword and cutting at the enemy in one, single, smooth motion.
Wilt left Blush, at speeds so blazing it would have left even lightning in the dust.
But Jaune was ready –
– and quicker even then that, Jaune was there, Crocea Mors arcing at an angle towards Wilt –
Silver steel, mirror bright, struck the blade of crimson light, sweeping it aside –
– and sending the monstrous torrent of energy unleashed by Moonslice careening off to the right.
In a night turned red, the redirected attack hit the warehouse and absolutely annihilated it, a whole slice of steel just disappearing in an instant, even as the remaining halves disintegrated around it like crimson petals scattering in the wind.
"Mordred!"
Taurus snarled at Jaune, his anger at the interference – assuming it wasn't just interpreted as outright betrayal – being predictable.
Before things could blow up, Jaune hastened to explain,
"Soldiers are one thing, but killing a student will ruin the Fang's reputation. Besides, there may be more huntsmen in the area, while your team is without aura and vulnerable; you should go to them immediately, rather than waste your time with her."
Jaune jerked his head at Penny, who was now keeping her distance warily – which was wise, after how close she had come to dying.
"Let me deal with the kid. Go to your team."
Taurus's eyes narrowed behind the mask, as did his mouth thin with angry words left unsaid. With an enemy still on then battlefield, he knew better than to argue – but this was a loss in trust all the same, even if it wasn't serious enough as to hurt Jaune's own relationship with Watts.
With the glare never leaving his face, Taurus turned and dashed away, chasing after this team. And only once the man was safely away, and his blade nowhere near Jaune's back, did Jaune turn back to Penny.
Despite his success in protecting her while not giving the Fang the impression of him having turned traitor, Jaune was still worried. He hadn't thought this far, or how to deal with Penny once he had gotten her alone.
Forced to settle quickly on a course of action, Jaune decided that he would just have to beat Penny in combat and cause sufficient aura loss such that she retreated. It wasn't ideal, of course, and Jaune didn't want to hurt his friend; but better some brief pain and light bruises, than for him to let her go after Adam Taurus, who would have no qualms killing her.
Jaune now wished he had brought his training sword of ordinary steel. Fighting not to kill or severely injure was very difficult with Anra steel, though he would do his utmost to show the necessary restraint.
That was the plan; and Jaune set a sword stance, ready to turn intention into action – except at that precise moment, Penny chose to speak.
"I do not know why you chose to save me, Mr White Fang Terrorist, but thank you. In return for your help, let me offer you some advice. Even if you escape tonight, we will easily track you down. I am not an ordinary girl, Mr Terrorist, but a sentient android built by Atlas."
A sentient android?
That outlandish claim beggared belief, and Jaune almost laughed it off as some strange attempt at intimidation –
Except –
Except certain facts started trickling into Jaune's mind, each one innocuous in itself, but revealing when put together, like pieces forming a jigsaw puzzle.
There was Penny being utterly unharmed by Taurus's blade...
Taurus, too, was taken aback, what with his opponent being so tough her skin might as well have been metal.
... and then there was her father, the smartest man in the world, achieving stupendous progress in android technology...
"As some of you might have heard, we are very close to making a breakthrough on being able to transfer minds into android bodies..."
... and finally there was Penny's shock, at that very lecture, when Jaune had casually mused that sentient androids could well already exist.
Smiling slightly, Jaune said,
"Just thinking about sentient androids and how they might already be here."
Penny looked shocked; her eyes widened, and her head jerked back, even as the girl herself seemed to fall into a daze. Jaune found it all quite strange, but then again strangeness summed up Penny in a word.
It was an idea utterly ludicrous on its face, but upon applying reason and calling to mind the empirical evidence, Jaune couldn't help but conclude that this was probably true – that his friend Penny Polendina was in reality not a girl of flesh and blood, but an android made of steel and fibreglass.
Jaune's shock left him speechless – and all this while, Penny didn't let up.
"As a sentient android, Mr Terrorist, I have advanced sensory and computing capabilities. Even as we speak, my systems are analyzing your aura in all its complexity. Once that is done, and your aura's unique quality committed to my system memory, I will be able to identify you in your civilian identity, no matter how you try to hide."
Alarm, icy sharp, knifed right through his chest.
No – no, no, no.
Everyone's aura had a unique feel, as produced by the massive complexity that was a person and their soul, and it just wasn't possible for someone who hadn't known you for very long or hadn't spent much time with you, to recognize the feel of your aura and identify you just off that. For Jaune, Weiss could do it, and Blake too, and probably RVLY as well – but no one else, and certainly not this girl he had newly befriended. Except, of course, she was no girl, and it appeared computers could achieve what was impossible for mere humans.
And the upshot –
If my identity gets out and I get arrested, I will no longer be able to continue running missions for Watts – leaving my infiltration of Salem's inner circle a failure, and leaving the Queen on course to steal the Relics and end life as we know it.
Fear and desperation surging through him, Jaune decided that there was no choice – he had to damage Penny's android body sufficiently, so that she could no longer continue that damnable aura analysis.
He coiled his legs, and then leapt forward, the world blurring around him as he brought to bear all his prodigious speed –
– speed which fell ignobly short, as Penny took to the skies. As Jaune came to an abrupt halt beneath her, with his feet digging furrows into the gravel, Penny floated well above him, and well out of reach.
Calling down to him, she said,
"Surrender, Mr Terrorist! You cannot reach me while I fly by levitating my Floating Array when it is stored inside me. And running will do you no good either, with my aura analysis almost complete – Atlas will simply hunt you down, with my help. So please, consider the benefits of surrender – you could seek a plea deal, and General Ironwood should extend one, especially since you saved me."
Jaune shook his head in wordless frustration. If he couldn't stop his aura from being identified, all was lost.
Think, you fool.
If he couldn't damage her computer systems, then he would just have to get out of range of the analysis being conducted – which meant running, whatever Penny's warnings.
He turned, and was just about to escape –
"Jaune?"
Penny's strangled voice reached him, and he knew that he had failed.
Jaune closed his eyes, as despair blossomed within him, dark and crushing and all-consuming, intense as nothing he had ever felt since Rothenburg itself.
And even as he despaired, so too did Penny break down into horror and disbelief. Her words said all –
"No. No, it can't be! Jaune, how can you... what made... Why? Why do... Why do this, why be a terrorist? You killed them! Specialist Ebi, and the rest of the Ace-Ops! I can see their bodies from up here. All those wounds from a Valean longsword – from your sword! And poor Specialist Amin... he was always nice to me, and now there's nothing left of him but his head and some limbs – did your semblance do this?"
Accompanying Penny's frenzied questions was mounting horror, which was, of course, understandable.
But her distress was the least of Jaune's worries, for at that moment, all he could think of then was how he had failed so utterly. The mission was a failure, and that promised annihilation as the fate of the world.
No. Wait. That's not true – not yet.
Penny knew the truth, of his identity – but so long as it didn't get out any further, he wouldn't get into trouble with the law, wouldn't risk arrest, wouldn't compromise the infiltration mission.
Yet, to prevent the truth spreading from Penny to others...
... he would have to persuade her with the truth of his mission, or else kill her to ensure her silence.
And of those two options, Jaune knew which one was the monumental risk.
From the way Penny had been roped in to this warehouse ambush – with the Ace-Ops no doubt summoning her as backup before their deaths – it was clear that she was ultimately under the command of General Ironwood, if not in theory then in truth. Telling her his secret – that he was sent to infiltrate Salem – risked letting it leak to Ironwood, and if he was the traitor then everything would be for naught.
Jaune couldn't risk it – couldn't put the life of one girl, above the good of the world.
How could he, when doing so would make meaningless the sacrifices of Domremy?
He wanted to scream – about how necessary evil should not be necessary, and about how, at the very least, he not always be the one to do it.
Salvation – or perhaps damnation – came from a voice of iron stealing away his choice and need to kill his friend for the lives of strangers.
"Ms Polendina."
A deep, powerful voice, effortlessly commanding, echoed through the night.
A still-distraught Penny dug her scroll out from her pocket, and Jaune surmised that the voice had come from the device, with the scroll's speakerphone function remotely activated to get Penny's attention.
"It is time to retreat. Jaune Arc is too dangerous to fight, and you have already done more than enough – with his aura identified, we will capture him in time."
Penny was silent for a while, not responding to the man who was suddenly issuing her orders over her scroll. But eventually, after long seconds, she replied, subdued and without the infectious energy that so defined her –
"Yes, General Ironwood."
Jaune felt emotions conflicting in the extreme, when he heard that name. On the one hand, there was no point in killing Penny any longer – and wasn't that a relief. On the other hand, his hopes of keeping his identity hidden were utterly dashed, and with the death of that secret came the potential failure of his infiltration mission, and all that portended for Remannt – meaning his despair returned in full, crushing force.
Is it over? Truly?
Jaune tried to look for the bright side –
– and found it, in a hope however dim.
He could perhaps still make it work, by becoming a fugitive, and evade the law while still continuing to carry out tasks for Watts, in hopes of infiltrating Salem's inner circle.
The circumstances had changed; the mission did not. And however much harder and however more dangerous things had become, Jaune would see it through – because the alternative was the Relics being stolen, and death on a scale hitherto unknown to Remnant.
His resolve renewed, Jaune pushed the despair back into the pits of his heart from whence they had come.
"Jaune!"
Penny had pocketed her scroll, and had seemed ready to fly away as ordered. At the last minute, however, she hesitated. Turning and hovering closer to him – despite everything – she asked, one last time, in hopes of some answer that would make sense of his betrayal.
"Please tell me why, at least. Why are you helping the White Fang kill huntsmen and hurt people? Did they perhaps threaten you, force you to help? It's something like that, isn't it, friend Jaune?"
Her eyes pled with him. She needed this – needed to know that he was a good person, underneath all the murder and all the terroristic behaviour.
Of course, Jaune could only disappoint. However good his reasons, they could never be given; and however exculpatory the truth, it would have to remain buried, so deep no one could find it.
In lieu of the truth, therefore Jaune offered his friend a lie. And since said lie would inevitably make it back to Watts, he had to play up all his rage and resentment, and all his frenzied thoughts and rationalization – to give the impression, of a man all too ready to betray humanity to their eternal enemy.
Jaune gave a smile that cut like a knife.
"Why? Why? Because Ozpin threw me under the bus. He blamed me for Rothenburg when it was me who saved the village and its ten thousand citizens! And saved a hundred thousands lives more, because without me that Necrovalock would have made an army out of Rothenburg and rampaged over the eastern regions. I almost died fighting on the frontlines for the sake of humanity, and the thanks I got was a stab in the back, and the hatred of the very people I trained my whole life to protect."
There was a coldness to Jaune now, summoned from the depth of his soul.
"I always wanted to be a hero, Penny, like my ancestors before me. And I tried, I really did. I tried to do the right thing, tried to save people, even when it meant risking my life, and even when it cost me my family, my friends, and everyone who I've ever loved.
"But it turns out that my sacrifices are unappreciated; unwanted; unneeded. Well, then – so be it. You cannot save those who do not wish to be. And if they don't want me to be their hero, I'll gladly be their enemy.
"And it's for their own good, really. As the Farmboy Conquerer, Ozymandius himself, once said, peace comes from unity, and unity is born from a common enemy."
"Look around, Penny, open your eyes, and see – faunus discrimination; Mistral letting Raven Branwen carve out her own bandit kingdom, and Atlas building up its military for no discernible reason, save to fight another Great War to avenge their loss eighty years before. This world is insane, and unjust, and corrupt to its core – and absolutely not worth protecting at all. And while others might be happy doing nothing about it, I'm not. If no one will fix this, I will – by burning this world to the ground, and building a new one from the ashes. A better world, a world at peace, one where tyranny is a memory and everyone can be happy."
Penny's horror was greater than ever, her eyes wide even as she looked about to cry.
Jaune turned to leave, but as he did, he left one parting shot.
"I saved you this time, Penny, but from today onwards, expect no mercy. The next time we meet, it'll be as enemies."
-(=RWBY=)-
A/N: I've been keeping to a fortnightly schedule so far, but the next update might come a bit slower, as I have a week-long international business trip coming up.