It was just another day working for the cause for the Faunus they called "Crab." Not out on the streets protesting the outrageously well hidden racism the humans used to maintain their dominance, nor out in the field with his brothers and sisters dealing justice to those responsible and taking back what was rightfully theirs. No, he was far too passive for that. It's not that he didn't want to recognize the plight of his kind, or that he didn't have the stomach for it – well, he doesn't, but it's really that he doesn't have the legs for it. Being confined to a wheelchair limits what options you have, after all. He just doesn't have the mobility to be of any use to the White Fang in the field. His mind, however, was a different story. They recognized his talents for analyzing data, so they welcomed to the fight and put him safely behind a screen, helping by assembling the best teams for the job.

Or, at least, that's how it was before Torchwick showed up.

Crab couldn't believe it at first – a human working with the White Fang? It had to be a trap – the police had finally wizened up and placed a mole in their ranks. He'd voiced his concerns to the lieutenant during one of their more recent meetings, and he'd acknowledged them, but he seemed to more than trust the man. Roman was someone who knew just how bad humans really were. He even openly recognized his place among them, the lieutenant said. But he was a friend they sorely needed in their fight, whether they liked it or not.

Despite the attempt to reassure him, Crab remained skeptical, keeping a close eye on how the con man ran things. As time went by, he heard and went over reports of missions he'd overseen personally. There were numerous recounts of his less-than-Faunus-friendly nature and rambunctious tone, but they'd always chalk that up to him not liking anyone other than himself. Those who worked with him also spoke of his brilliant attention to detail and his levelheaded efficiency displayed when under pressure. Some began to respect him, even call him a brother. Though Crab kept his skepticism in plain view, he too saw the proof in the data. Roman knew what he was doing – even since he'd arrived, their triumphs had been outnumbering their failures. Once Crab had entertained the idea of exchanging pointers with the man, but he'd been reassigned before that could happen.

Apparently, Roman had heard of Crab's concerns and brought him up with the lieutenant and his superiors, and they had decided to push Crab to the sidelines for a while to give the human some "breathing room." He was furious at first, claiming that he was taking his job just like the rest of the humans do to their kind, wondering if they'd throw him into a mine next. The lieutenant took him aside for a chat and told him that this was just a temporary thing to calm unrest in the organization. He still knew just how bat the humans were, he said, and claimed to fight their tyranny until the day he died, but it wouldn't help to fight amongst themselves at the same time. "This is not a time for dissention, but retribution," he said in his next big recruitment speech, which helped appease those with doubts. That still didn't stop him from putting Crab out of view.

Crab went along with it, though, agreeing to believe in his leaders for a little while longer, and took his new position in silence. Now he spends most his time in an apartment writing reports and managing personnel rosters, while Roman assigns and leads the teams himself. He still didn't trust the human, but he could set aside those feelings if it brought around real change for once.

Crab sighed and laid his head on his desk in boredom. It had been weeks since his new job had started and he hadn't seen a single other member in that time. All he ever saw were chat messages, pictures in roster updates, and reports from field agents. He alt-tabbed away from his work and to a fighting game he liked, but didn't start playing it. This was no way to live, he thought. Maybe he'd go outside later and try to make a friend at a café. Maybe he'd finally call his parents, who were probably worried sick about him, and ask for life advice. Hell, maybe he'd visit them. It'd been a few years since he'd been home.

Actually, that's a really good idea, he thought. Maybe I should exit out of this and take a breather. Figure my life out. Get a sandwich or something. In that order – no, wait, sandwich first. I'm hungry.

Before he could do any of that, a gigantic double-edged sword plunged through his des, shattering his mouse and keyboard, and surprising him enough to send him recoiling out of his wheelchair and topple him to the floor.

"Oops," a female voice said.

"What?" Crab asked no one in particular, dazed from the impact.

"Oh, I kinda destroyed your setup," the voice responded, "my bad. Lemme see if I can…"

Crab propped himself up with his elbows as the voice trailed off and saw a tall, blonde woman with green goggles and a prosthetic left arm standing on the desk behind the sword. She crouched down behind his computer and disconnected the mouse and keyboard, replacing it with a single wireless device that handled both functions. She flipped around the monitor to look at it. "Just gotta install some drivers, and… done!" She hopped off the desk, picked up his wheelchair, and helped him back into it.

"Thanks," he muttered, still a little confused.

"Technology's pretty rad, isn't it?" She smiled, leaping back onto the desk to peer at the monitor. "Used to be that you'd have to manually install drivers from a disk. Now that's all internal and automated." The fingers in her left hand assumed the position most people take when using a mouse, except this time without a mouse, calibrating its sensitivity with a couple imaginary clicks. Crab saw the glimmer of text light up on the inside of her goggles, as well as the waggle of her bushy tail.

"Who are you?" He glanced under his desk to see if the hidden alarm button was intact, but frowned to see that the sword had pierced it too.

"Amber – ooh, you play Grimm Eclipse too?" She patted her metal arm. "I've got a copy of that in here. Fun, isn't it?"

"Yeah…" Crab kept his hands on his wheels, intimidated by the friendly tone the woman was using. And her sword – yeah, that too.

"What's yours?"

"Pardon?"

"Your name." She glanced up from the monitor to look at him. "You asked mine, so it's only fair that you share yours."

He hesitated, not wanting to give out private information freely.

"Oh, and don't bother with lying," she said, turning back to the monitor. "I know you keep personnel files here, so I'd find out anyways. Better to just not waste any time."

"Crab," he told her honestly.

"Crab? Is that a nickname?"

"My real name is too monotonous for my liking," he half-joked. What was he doing? This woman just broke in to a secure outpost. He shouldn't be telling her such things so easily!

"Ah, I know what that's like," Amber nodded.

"Really?" Augh!

"Yeah, I have three middle names. Amber will do just fine, though."

A bit of time passed in silence as the woman continued doing whatever she was doing. Eventually she pulled out an external hard drive and plugged it into the computer. A minute later she took up a perch on the hilt of her sword and stared down at him.

"So," she began awkwardly, "how are you doing?"

"Well, I was about to start having a crisis of faith before you arrived, but right now I think I'm being robbed. That is what's happening, right?"

"I am copying a few things off your computer, so yeah, you're getting robbed."

"Great." He rolled his eyes, trying not to put his fear on display.

"Shouldn't take too long." She glanced down at her left palm and a holographic display popped up. "I'd give it another five, six minutes to finish."

"Why not just take the hard drive itself? Wouldn't that be easier?"

"I don't know what kind of counter-measures you've got on there. Safer to just take what I need."

"What if you accidentally pick up something extra, like a virus?"

"In that case, I'll just hit this button here-" she tapped something on her holographic display, "and call it a day."

"Oh." So much for that.

"Always use protection, kiddo."

"I'm not a kid," Crab objected, "I'm 17 – practically an adult."

"Yeah, but I'm older so I can be as petty as I want." She stuck out her tongue teasingly-playfully, almost getting a laugh out of him. This was all kinds of strange.

"I've gotta say," he said, choosing his words carefully, "you're not as… threatening as I thought you were going to be."

"I could always wave my sword in your face if it'd make you feel better." She patted the hilt of her blade lovingly.

"No, no, that's okay." Now she was being threatening. "How do you carry that around, anyway? It's almost as tall as you are."

"I have muscles." She flexed her good arm.

"Right, I suppose that was obvious."

"Also, the polarity thing helps."

"Your semblance is polarity?" Why was she telling him so much? He just couldn't figure her out.

"Yep."

"Wait – I knew you looked familiar. You're one of those people who've been causing trouble for us; asking questions and sending our men home with broken bones!"

"And women," she grinned. "Can't be discriminatory, now can we?"

"But… you're a Faunus, just like us! Why fight your own kind?"

"Just because we share a species doesn't mean we share ideals."

"We're fighting for our freedom!"

"You're kinda being jerks about it, though."

"What?" Crab felt himself getting angry. He wanted to rise out his chair and shout. "You think we should be nice? When has that gotten us anywhere?"

"It seemed to be working before," she mused, crossing her arms.

"Hardly," he scoffed. "Words and smiles hardly mean a thing when our people are starving inside their homes, slaving away in a mine because that's the only job they can get."

"I have a question for you," Amber said, suddenly dismounting her sword and taking a seat in front of it so she'd be closer to Crab. She took off her goggles and stared at him with fierce green eyes, gently resting her chin on the backs of her hands.

"Why do you think they call us terrorists?"

"I- what?"

"It's because they're jerks too, yeah, but also because they think they're right. I can't exactly blame them when the group once responsible for uniting our two races is executing humans in broad daylight, turning peaceful protests into violent displays of power. Before, they were afraid of us because they could not grasp the idea that we had the potential to be just as good as or even better than them. They abused us for that – tried to rile us up. Now they're afraid of us because they succeeded and now they know we are just as bad as them, if not worse.

"The problem is the White Fang isn't wrong either. We absolutely should have stood up to their abuses. Heck, I do that every day too. We should be equals, not animals."

"Then why fight us if you believe in us?"

"Two reasons. One: I don't believe your method is the one we should be using. Blood in the streets only puts more blood in the streets. There's too much anger in our fight, something I have firsthand experience with. My brother is probably one of the angriest people alive, but he doesn't let that dictate his actions… all of the time. We need to find a better way to cope with that anger and a better way to prove that we don't have to prove we're equals."

"You think you have that way?"

"If I did, I'd be taking over your gang, not fighting it. And that brings me to my second reason: I'm working from a smaller picture, where as the White Fang is working from 'the big picture.' During one of your 'displays of power,' you took the lives of my parents. I'm just looking for the Faunus who gave the order. That's who I'm fighting, not your ideal."

"I…" This was outrageous. Why was Crab listening to this garbage? And why was it making an odd sort of sense? What did she mean the white Fang killed her parents? Did they kill their own kind before too? "I… don't know if I can accept that."

"I didn't say you had to," Amber shrugged. "I don't even know if that's right. I'm just following my heart, like my brother. Just wanted to be clear that's where I'm at right now."

Crab sighed, feeling dejected. It was bad enough that he was having a crisis of faith before, but now this? That breather was sounding better every minute.

Amber's external hard drive beeped as it finished copying the files she wanted and she turned around to retrieve it along with the other device she'd plugged into the computer. She pocketed them and hopped off the desk, removing her sword from it and swinging it over her shoulder. Crab gulped – she was still really tall.

"You said you were having a crisis of faith earlier, right?"

"Yeah," he mumbled.

"What about?"

"I-" he sighed again. "I don't know if we're doing the right thing either. Frankly, I was hoping that argument would rekindle my belief."

"Well," Amber smiled, slipping on her goggles and placing a hand on his shoulder, "maybe you should take a break."

"I was just thinking about that, actually."

"You could always track me down later to argue some more."

"Maybe I will." She laughed. He couldn't help laughing with her. "So wait, does this mean you're not going to kill me?"

"Yep."

"So I can just go about my day?"

"Well, I have to knock you out first. Give you a reason to take a break. It'll hurt for a while, but don't worry, you'll be fine."

"Oh, okay. Wait, what?"

Before he could flinch, Amber electrocuted him to sleep and went on her merry way.

"Really, just like that?" Duster asked, bewildered by his sister's tale.

"Well, I left out the bits where I took care of the guards outside and dealt with the internal security, but yeah, just like that."

"You sure your copy has everything we need?"

"Can't be sure 'till I sift through it all, but I think it'll give us something to work with."

"Alright then, good work, sis."

"Thanks," she nodded, hopping off her stool, which she'd taken from their godfather's spares for bar fights. "I think I can avoid the stuff this Torchwick guy has touched – he seems too recent an addition to matter to us."

"Still sounds important to me," Duster said, folding his arms. "Might be we'll have to handle him anyways."

"Might be someone is taking care of that for us already."

"What do you mean?"

Amber tiptoed over to the tale her brother sat near to pick up the romance novel she'd walked in with, trying not to wake Sapphire, still asleep on the couch across from him past mid-day.

"That girl I ran into earlier, the one who gave me this?" She tapped the cover of the book, which was delightfully titled "Ninjas of Love." When Duster skimmed through the opening pages, he knew it was just as hilarious as it sounded. He was tempted to bring up the idea of acting out dramatic readings of it with Nigel at that poetry slam club he loved so much.

"What of her?"

"I glanced through some of the data while I was at the base. She has a file in there."

"Really; she one of them?"

"If she was, then she isn't anymore. The White Fang seem to be hunting her."

"Hm… maybe we should talk to her?"

"Maybe," she shrugged, "but given that I couldn't tell she was a Faunus when I met her, maybe she doesn't want to be involved anymore."

"Fair point, I'll leave that one up to you."

"In any case, I should head back to my shop. I'm not the only one who needs new limbs."

"Alright, see you later, sis." He waved goodbye to her as she left through the door and made her way downstairs.

When he turned back around, he saw that Sapphire had woken up, sitting groggily with her hair in an adorable mess atop her head.

"Afternoon," the wolf Faunus said in greeting.

"Wasn't I sitting over there?" She asked after a few seconds of confusion, pointing at the wall near the door.

"Y' were, but we decided t 'move ya to th' couch after you fell over."

"That explains the headache," she murmered, rubbing the side of her head. "You got any OJ?"

"Yeah." Duster got a glass for both of them. When he returned, her hair was all normal again. When he asked her how she did that, she told him it was magic.

"So I'm guessing Amber found something?" Sapphire queried between silent sips. It had been a while since she'd last had orange juice. She didn't remember it being so tangy.

"Y' heard that, did ya?" She barely caught a temporary frown cross his face.

"Bits and pieces; wasn't awake enough to catch everything, but you two weren't exactly quiet."

"Sorry 'bout that," he smiled sheepishly. Weird for someone who is part wolf to be able to do that.

"It's okay, I needed to get up anyways."

"Y' looked like y' needed a good rest."

"Mm, part of me thought the last couple days were a bad dream. Guess not."

"I know what that's like."

"I'd imagine so."

There was a pause as the two of them took a simultaneous drink of OJ - a bit bitter that time. Sapphire looked out the window closest to her as some light flared through it, its sill empty and dusty. Cleaned up, it might've been a good resting place for a cat.

"I'm a little surprised you managed to find one of their bases so quickly. I expected us to lay low for a while and then go hunting."

"What can I say," he beamed with comedic pride, "we work fast. Although, if y' prefer t' keep napping…"

"Hey, I just like sleep, okay?" she growled a little too seriously.

"Never said there was anythin' wrong with sleepin'. I do it all th' time."

"Surprise, surprise."

Yeah, a cat would love that sill. And later in the day when there was no light, it could hop down to the floor below it – maybe on a new velvet rug – and lie on its back and be all cute and cuddly.

"Where's Nigel?" Sapphire wondered aloud, noticing the giant man wasn't in the room.

"He went to go visit his mother's shop in the market. Actually, d' ya want t' meet her? I've got t' stop near there anyways, so why not tag along before I take y' home?"

"Sure," she said as they both stood up. "Doesn't look like I've got anything better to do anyways."

"Cool. Oh, and take this:" he traded her empty glass for a familiar scabbard. It was the one she'd left behind at the docks. "The morning shift found this laying there all by its lonesome. They held onto it in case anyone came back for it."

"Thanks," she said, genuinely happy to have the sheathe back. She immediately slid her blade into it and hooked it to her waist. "Wasn't looking forward to replacing it."

"Amber did say I'd find it, right?"

"She did. I'm just not used to being around useful people anymore."

"My sister's not one t' lie," he shrugged, donning his hat over his ears. "Stick around; maybe you'll meet more of us."

"Right."

The market is one of those places that you just expect to be packed on the weekends as thousands of humans and Faunus alike bustle their way through tight spaces to acquire the goods they need to survive. Most shops are small, family owned outfits that specialize in certain services. You've got your tattoo parlors, like Cid's Tats, your book stores, like Red Apple Books near the front, and Anteater's at lining up the rear. Then there are the music shops, like Nucleus Records, where musicians small and large perform on a daily basis, the groceries, and the occasional mixed-heritage restaurant. Some people, usually from out of town, set up stalls in the street to display their wares from. There used to be laws against them, but a few decades back they managed to strike a revenue share deal with the locals. Busking musicians looking for an enthusiastic crowd often spend their time jamming down there. More than a few famous bands got their start on that long yellow road.

And then there's Jade's Emporium, Nigel's mother's shop.

Half way down the brick road the market runs along, there is this large open space designed like a roundabout, but for people. This is one of the busiest places in the whole section of the city. On one side of the circle are six shops, each something different, each never lasting for more than two months – not because Jade's drives them out of business by taking up the whole other side, but because they rotate out with other lesser known businesses as a sort of showcase. You never quite know what you're going to get each time the switch comes around.

In the center is a large fountain, fancy and solemn, though it rarely looks the part, dedicated to the fallen huntsmen to whom every living being owes their thanks and praise. It was declared an untouchable monument – something to be seen, but not touched or experienced. When Jade moved in, she didn't have any of that. Now bands perform concerts in front of it, chefs cook around it, and on hot days, children splash inside it, coloring the statues with chalk and paint. Of course, she'd clean it up at night with the other store owners, but as she'd put it "there's respect, and then there's dedication." Her own son said she was full of it and she laughed.

It's certainly a lively place, though as rumor has it, Junior's club may match it. You'll find more Faunus here than anywhere else in Vale enjoying their time relaxing, chatting and dancing. The police rarely have to touch the place because of the store owners, lead by Jade. They make sure the market is a safe haven for all.

When Jamal's grocery had its time in the spotlight several rotations earlier, he dragged this one trouble maker (racist) from the roundabout to the front of the market, bringing loud attention to his hate crime while Jade and Cid gathered a parade of supporters behind them, human and Faunus alike. When they reached the entrance of the yellow-brick road, a three-way intersection, and tossed him out, a sea of friendly faces kept him from coming back. A few weeks later he came back anyways and personally apologized to Jamal on his knees, offering to help around the store as penance. Now he's known as one of the more prominent voices of Faunus rights in the market. We're all proud of him.

"Sounds like a fun place to be around," Sapphire said, breathless as they walked down its streets.

"Well, Amber and I have spent th' last six years living around here," Duster smiled as he waved to Jamal and the man, who was making faces to his 18 month old daughter toddling in her wee blue booties. "It's kinda grown on me."

"I'll bet."

"We're almost there; shouldn't be more than a couple minutes if there isn't a show at the fountain."

"You haven't told me what kind of shop Jade's is yet."

"You'll see when we get there," he chuckled. "Can't spoil too much now."

The sign was a little more than telling what she'd expect to find inside: anything and everything. Each oversized letter was composed of jade outlined with worn marble. Heroes, beasts, and Grimm of legends had been carved into them in great detail, invisible from afar, but implicitly apparent up close. The first thing she noticed upon stepping through its glass doors was the gigantic jade dragon suspended by invisible wires above. Its wingspan, measured in godfathers, was three long. They'd have dwarfed the lights if the wings weren't anything but bone. On colder, more eccentric nights, ground burn dust burned blue in the dragon's skull, lighting its teeth and eyes – a fearsome sight to behold.

The shelves and displays below gave haven to trinkets and other beauties from around the world, some modern, and others from a forgotten age where light was a myth in the dark. Books and tomes ran the walls of the second floor, works of fiction and not, some of which you can find at Tukson's, some of which you cannot. He and Jade often traded so he could maintain his image of having "every book under the sun." In the far back were stands of old huntsman armors, usually replicated by permission, with a pair of exceptions, along with their signature tools of protection and destruction. Adults would gawk and shuffle around them, trying to control their children, who stare up at them, eyes wide, pawing at their greaves, going for their swords and spears. The huntsmen who came by to pay their respects, however; those who knew the stories only kneeled, even when Jade said it was within their right to inspect their history, so long as they didn't break it. She owed her kin that much.

Some of the things were for sale, like the books with duplicates, where as others were not, like the armor. It was more like an interactive museum and an emporium. Then again, a place of inspiration is often better than a place of profit.

"Interesting place," Sapphire commented as she oohed and ahhed her way between pieces, trodding down the aisles like the child we all wish we still were.

An out of place thud from the balcony above, prompting the pair to move upstairs.

"Dar!" A middle aged woman shouted from out of sight. "Could you come help me for a moment?"

When they made it upstairs, they saw a woman with long, jagged green hair in a tank top arranging books on one of the two-story tall bookshelves. A man and his kid – a boy no more than three, who was sitting on his shoulders with a toy plane in his hand, handed her a book that had fallen from a stack she was holding one handed. What struck Sapphire as odd was that she was putting these books back without a ladder. In fact, her only support was from the tips of her bare toes, clinging to the edge of one of the higher shelves effortlessly.

"Who's that?" Sapphire asked as she tried to understand the woman's form to see if she could replicate the feat.

"That's Jade," Duster said nonchalantly, having seen this hundreds of times before.

As they closed the distance between them, the little boy pointed their way.

"Hat!" he declared, and threw his toy plane. It floated to Duster gently, who caught it between two fingers with expert precision. He then traded it for his hat like a Frisbee. The boy caught it in his tiny hands with equal precision before drooping it over his head, so big it covered his eyes. He propped it up with one hand, his fingers shaped like a gun. "Draw, pardner," he said with enthusiasm.

"Sorry, Little J," Duster smiled at the boy, shrugging with exaggeration, "but I don't got mine with me." He lied, but that was okay.

"Well, too bad!" the boy laughed maniacally and shot him with a pew. Duster feigned injury, clutching his shoulder and falling flat to his back, groaning "y' got me!"

The boy commanded his father forward to inspect his kill. As he looked the defeated Faunus over, pushing the hat back up repeatedly, he was shocked to find that he had actually brought his weapons with him.

"B-but, you s-said-" the boy stammered.

"I'm sorry, kid," duster grunted weakly, still feigning injury, "I was jus' too embarrassed."

"Why?" he asked with genuine curiosity.

"I… didn't bring any ammo." That time he was really telling the truth. Duster closed his eyes and pretended to pass out before the boy could gasp.

"How could you," the kid pouted, the words coming out with some difficulty. "You're s-supposed t' re-mem-member! Shame on you!" He folded his arms and scrunched up his face in disappointment. Sapphire though it was cute.

"Y' gonna let 'em talk this way t' me all day, Dar?" Duster asked, raising a brow.

"Absolutely," the boy's father laughed and reached down to help his friend up. The boy put his hat back on his head and patted it into place. Duster adjusted the brim a bit, but let it take its shape back on its own, handing the plane back to him.

"Hey, Duster," the woman said, still putting away books, her balance perfectly precarious.

"Jade; Dar, Little J," Duster said back. He didn't have to reach far to tussle the kid's brown hair. "How're ya'll doin'?"

"Well enough," Dar sighed, "though my husband is still quite insistent on trying new recipes every week."

"Don't tell me; he made another stew."

"You know my stance on those. As for Jayce?" He looked up to his kid, who was fiddling with the toy plane. Sapphire noticed Amber's logo on emblazoned on its underbelly.

"I like planes!" The boy smiled. Sapphire almost giggled. Jade did.

"Yeah."

"And Cor?"

"I'm not his keeper."

"He's your brother-in-law. And best friend."

"He's-" Dar sighed, adjusting Jayce's position on his shoulders. "He's coping."

"Well, considering Rebecca, that's th' best we can expect out of him."

"Yeah." There was an awkward pause between obligatory questions. "How about you? I hope your life has been less depressing since the last time we met."

"Uh," Duster hesitated, scratching the back of his head.

"Really?"

"Well, more exciting, really. We can talk about it later."

"Sure."

"How 'bout you, Jade," Duster asked, turning to the green haired lady above.

"Good," she said as she finished placing the books on the shelf. She hopped off and fell backwards, flipping once before landing lightly on her haunches. "Great, actually." She flipped her hair out of her eyes, which were a fierce green. "Store's been busy and the Market's been relatively peaceful. Cid's got a few new designs, but not much else has changed since you last came by." Her gaze shifted to Sapphire and tossed a split-second gesture her way. "Who's this," she asked, striding toward her.

"I'm Sapphire," she said, extending a hand to greet her.

"Mmhmm," Jade said, brushing past her, granting her a close up view of the incredible detail in the dragon tattoo that coiled around her chest and spine. Sapphire wished for a moment she had another frost crystal to keep her face from melting before noticing her blade was in Jade's hands.

"What do we have here," she murmured, turning the weapon in her hands as Sapphire reached for her sheathe, wondering how she managed to take it without her noticing.

Jade put some space between her and the group as she swung the blade around for a bit. She naturally extended the weapon from scimitar to glaive form as she fought some imaginary enemy, her eyes closed. As they watched her go, Sapphire noticed that her form was eerily similar to her own. Jade even knew to slap a dust crystal in the blade's gap. Duster and Dar heard her mutter the words "it's missing the ribbon" under her breath.

"Sapphire, you said?" Jade finally spoke between twirls.

"Yes."

"Are you Victory's daughter?"

Sapphire paused for a moment, surprised to hear her mother's nickname spoken by a stranger.

"How do you know that name?"

"Fine weapon you've got here," she said, handing it back to her. "Did you know it once belonged to the Jade Dragon?"

"The legendary huntress from Vaccuo? My mother told me the tales, yes. How did you-"

"Legend? She knows I'm only 48, right?"

"What?"

"Sorry, let me start over." Jade extended a hand to shake the one she'd ignored earlier and Sapphire accepted it. "I'm Jade, also known as the legendary huntress from the west."

"What." Sapphire was having trouble parsing this. She heard Duster snicker. Little J covered his mouth when she turned to him. "Did you know about this?"

"Th' weapon? Naw, but th' legend? Now you know why I wanted you to meet her."

"Huh. How did you acquire the weapon?"

"I taught her how to use it. C'mon, Vicky must've mentioned that too."

"You did?" She added a bit quieter "what did you just call her?"

"Yeah, a few years before I retired. Passed on the weapon itself when I did."

"Huh." Jayce started making airplane noises while playing with his toy. Duster joined him, pretending his hat was a UFO. "Mom always said you were dead. Was that to protect you?"

"Oh, no, I imagine I am quite dead to her."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, I broke up with her, after all."

"You – what? You dated my mom?"

"Yeah, felt like I needed a fresh start on life. Bought this place with what I had. Met Nigel's father soon after." She peeked past her to call to Duster. "He's in the arena reading, if you're looking for him, by the way." He returned a casual thumbs up as Little J's plane blew up his UFO with its secret super lasers.

"I'm sorry; I'm still having trouble accepting this. You dated my mom?"

"It's not that hard a concept to fathom, kid," she frowned, crossing her arms. "Or are you saying-"

"No, no," Sapphire said, holding up her hands to stop that train of thought, "nothing like that. I'm just feeling suddenly validated about certain… revelations right about now."

"Oh." She unfolded her arms.

"Yeah."

"High-five." They did.

Some hard rock trickled in from outside, drawing the attention of Jade's customers.

"Well, I should probably get back to work. Seems like some of my patrons are getting distracted by-"

She twitched unexpectedly, her ears perking up as she recognized the tune being played.

"Is that Rich? Excuse me."

Jade leapt from the balcony without further warning and made her way to the door, waiting for the song to be over. Duster, Sapphire, Dar, and consequently the evil-mastermind known as Little J followed, taking the stairs to see what the commotion was about. Apparently a band had just started a concert. A substantial crowd had gathered to see them play. There were two guitarists, a keyboard player, and drums, but no bass. They all stood ankle deep in the fountain, except for the drummer, rocking their hearts out. Sapphire would've asked their name, but everyone seemed lost to the harmonies.

Except for Jade, who at the end of the song leapt over the crowd and into the fountain with a splash. The crowd cheered.

"Rich," she said, picking up a mic.

"Jade," the lead singer smiled.

"Didn't hear you were playing tonight."

"Felt like surprising you for once."

"So you did. Where's bassman?"

"Sick."

"Ouch. Got his bass?"

"Yep." The drummer handed it to her as if this was all scripted, or had happened before.

"And an amp?"

"Plugged in with an extra long cable, too."

"Sick." She slung the bass over her shoulder and plugged the cable into it before leaping to the top of the fountain and straddling it like she did the shelf. Then she ripped into a roaring bass solo, cuing the next song, and for the real set to begin. The crowd bounced, Dar and Jayce included.

"Well, that was interesting," Sapphire shouted in an aside to Duster.

"Small world, ain't it," he shouted back.

"So what now?"

"I've still gotta stop by Jamal's on th' way out, but if you'd like t' leave, we can."

"Actually, I think I'd like to stay for a bit," she said as her foot started tapping and her head started bobbing.

"Sounds good t' me."

So they did.