First of all: my apologies for a lack of updates. Been a bit busy lately
So what is plural for Faunus? I had always thought it was Fauna, but…could it be Faunus in general?
Anyway, having looked at the RWBY canon very carefully, I have determined that the trained humans *cough students cough* have more physical strength, endurance and stamina than the boring humans here on earth. So what would be hard to do for even trained people, I.E punching a dude across the room with a single punch, becomes easy to do in Remnant.
Rwbybomb21: at this point, the average is roughly 11K per chapter :3
Thanks for the compliment.
SuspiciousCook: damn, that's a lot of praise. I'm glad that you think it's so good!
A flying tomato: I realized this just now, but you read all chapters in one day? That's pretty impressive :O
And yes, Matt is (loosely) based off of the 11th doctor. Also, the armour was indeed based on the ODST suit from halo.
Tuutje07: Yeah, twists are a favorite of mine right now so keep your eyes open ;)
"Dear General Ironwood,
The ex-Operative Blackwood is nothing more than a haunting, seeking ways to improve its own presence in a world where the living hold the priority. I suggest that you do not worry about our defected soldiers and instead focus on stabilizing your own…projects.
General Randall Eventide.
Day 51 –White Fang recruitment center- 23:09- {flag location for later strikes}
It was usually large, dark buildings like these that seemed to sap her confidence the best. She would fear the unknown that lay waiting for her in the bowels of the night and it was that fear which always multiplied her lack of confidence. Which was ironic, because her Faunus heritage enabled her to see in the dark much better than humans could. In theory, she should not have to fear the dark or the unknown, as neither of them could hurt her. It was just that she was inherently afraid of that which might harm her.
Velvet slowly made her way across the road and kept her gaze strictly in the old warehouse, where she knew that a large amount of Fauna were gathering. She could smell them; she could smell the musky scents of dozens upon dozens of her kind, all different kinds of animal-scents. She couldn't tell for sure whether the one she was actively looking for was also among them, but she had to risk it. She knew that he had disappeared somewhere along the south part of the city, but she also knew that team JNPR had returned safely from one of those events down there. If they had returned safely…as humans…there was a large chance that no combat had taken place there. And if no combat had taken place there, there shouldn't be any reason for distress.
But that was the problem. That was precisely the problem. And as Velvet neared the entrance, catching the attention of two masked troopers armed with rifles, she tried to think of a way to explain how that problem away.
"Ears," one of the two troopers said and the other one opened a heavy, metal door. They didn't smell familiar to her, so she simply gave them a courteous nod and proceeded inside. The second she entered the large building, the various and collected scents of many dozens of Fauna hit her senses. She recoiled, but immediately recovered when she spotted a large boar-Faunus staring at her with angry little eyes. She did not want to be here…she had never thought she would be here. The White Fang were terrorists that only got what they wanted through sheer violence and fear. They were responsible for the bad names for Fauna all over Vytal…and she didn't want to have anything to do with them.
As such, she had never thought to ever visit one of their recruitment events. But here she was, scurrying around in the midst of their members like she belonged there. It couldn't be helped though; she was here for one reason and one reason only.
Velvet gathered her courage and continued walking, ignoring the glares that she was getting from various Fauna who obviously thought that she didn't belong there. And why wouldn't they? She did not belong there. Her teammates had pointed it out to her on many occasions; she was too timid. She had never fought a human or a fellow Faunus in combat and neither did she want to. She wanted to help the people who got hurt fighting the Grimm menace…and she wanted to do whatever she could to stop said menace, but there was no way that she was going to harm others in the process.
She nervously plucked at a strand of hair that was hanging in front of her face. A White Fang soldier was walking towards her, holding in his hand. Had they figured out that she shouldn't be here? Or were they simply curious? Why was he specifically walking towards her?
"Here," the man said as he handed her a mask, "take this. New recruits this way."
He beckoned for her to follow him, which she was quick to do. If she wanted to follow up on her plan, she would have to do so without catching any attention. So, she donned the mask and internally cringed when the cold material hit her skin. Never had she thought she would wear the White Fang mask…but this was for the greater good of a friend. She was going to get out of here pretty quickly and then she would never again do something like this.
Because, for all of the hurt and pain that humans had caused her, she still liked their kind. She wasn't like the Fang, which employed those who were ready to kill every human in sight. She had friends that were humans and…and things like racism or bullying should never ever be an excuse for murder. Nothing was an excuse for murder and anyone who thought otherwise was just as bad as those they hated. That was why Velvet would never take a life; she would only sink as low as those who had tried to make her life miserable. She was going to become a Huntress, not a terrorist.
She sniffed the air again and caught a faint scent that smelled familiar to her. But when she followed the scent and ended up in the main room, her courage nearly deserted her.
At the opposite end of a room easily ninety feet wide, across of nearly a hundred people who were all wearing the same white mask, stood a tall and muscled man with a downright terrifying mask. It looked like a Grimm-face, white with red streaks where the eyes were supposed to be. He was addressing the group of Fauna with a voice that sounded a bit distorted through his mask.
"Yesterday, we struck our first blow at the organization we know as Onyx!" The Faunus yelled, whipping his fist through the air as he rallied the crowd.
The amount of bloodlust took Velvet aback. Many a Faunus was screaming for more violence and those that weren't vocal with their desires were merely yelling victoriously.
"But that is not enough, is it?" He continued. "They need to pay for everything that they've done! The murders, the meddling, the assassinations!"
More screaming and Velvet was starting to feel a sickening sensation in her stomach. What had happened to her friend? Where was he? She smelled him, but where was he?
"Well, now we can! A trusted source has provided us with some very valuable information. Information that will not only help us strike a critical blow against Onyx, but also demoralize those who stand with them!"
Wasn't Onyx' entire purpose that they didn't need allies? That they did everything alone? So why did it need demoralizing?
"With everyone busy catching the guys who killed off the human government, we can focus on killing off two very important targets. The Operatives Greystone and Mantis!"
Velvet's gasp went unheard as virtually every single Faunus in the room exploded into cheering and screaming. And for the very first time since having come at this place, she could understand why. Onyx was an organization that dealt with large threats on a daily basis; they dealt with criminals and terrorists and monsters…and they counted the White Fang among the terrorists. But the face of the atrocities committed against Faunus-kind, whether the victims were White Fang members or not, was Will Greystone. And though Velvet hadn't heard of the name 'Mantis' before, she knew that it had to be another Operative.
"Onyx killed our brothers! Our sisters! They allied themselves with the likes of Beacon and even now they continue to kill and destroy! Well, not anymore. Who is with me?"
More screaming and this time, many people raised their hands and pumped their fist in the air as if to verify that they were in on the violence. But Velvet spotted one soldier who didn't; one soldier who seemed to be more interested in her than the riling of the crowd. She suppressed the urge to shudder and did her best to appear natural, but she couldn't shake off the feeling that he had seen that she didn't belong there.
She half expected him to tap at the shoulder of the soldier standing next to him, but that didn't happen. Instead, he glanced one more time at the raving man standing at the podium and then moved towards Velvet, who immediately felt a rising sense of panic. She had just caught the whim of a familiar sense and if she had to evade a soldier who had recognized her, she would never find the source of that scent.
But other people were standing too close to her; she couldn't walk away from the approaching White Fang member without looking very obvious. And she didn't want to look very obvious right now.
The trooper casually made his way past the other attending people, who were still engrossed in the masked man's speech. What had Velvet done to get this guy's attention?
When the soldier was within a few feet distance of her, he stopped. "Why are you here?" He casually asked, but his voice sounded rather familiar to Velvet. And that scent…
"Cal?" She whispered, not sure if she had the right guy. "Is that you?"
He brought a finger to the place on his mask where his lips were supposed to be. "Affirmative. What are you doing here?"
"Looking for you," she countered. "You stayed behind. Why?"
"To eliminate the threat once and for all."
"What?"
He gestured with his head at the man at the podium. "See that guy? He's pretty high up. Important in the Fang."
"No," Velvet immediately said, realization dawning upon her. "You're not going to do that."
"It's really the sort of thing that's necessary, you know? I'm the only Faunus on my team, so-"
"Violence doesn't solve anything. It will only make you as bad as they think you are."
"I don't care for that."
"But I do! Please just…just come with me? We'll go back to Beacon and-"
As soon as she said the name of her school aloud, people turned on them. It was obvious that some of them had been listening in on their conversation, as there was no way that they could have responded so soon.
"They're with beacon!" One of them shouted.
"Traitors! They infiltrated us!" Another one yelled. The sudden noise was playing havoc with Velvet's ability to orient herself due to the sensitivity of her ears and when she felt a large hand grabbing a hold of her wrist, the sudden pain gave rise to new feelings of panic
"Got ya!"
But as soon as the guy had locked her wrist in an iron grasp, Cal shot forward and punched his mask off. Then he spun around and followed up with a roundhouse kick to his neck, knocking the guy out.
"Velvet!" He snapped. "We are leaving!"
And then he grabbed her wrist in turn, snapping he rout of her rigid posture. She swallowed her panic and looked around the room for an exit. Fauna all over the place were realizing that they had been infiltrated and more and more soldiers turned to face them.
Cal opened fire on the nearest door and blasted its hinges off, but one of the soldiers had the same idea and took aim at the trooper.
Velvet acted without thinking and jumped in front of the shot, activating her Aura and deflecting it. "Move!" She then exclaimed and grabbed the soldier's arm in turn, pulling him with her. The reason why he hadn't evaded that shot was because he had been lining up a shot of his own, aimed at the high-ranked White Fang member who was now telling the other soldiers to go after them.
Cal tore off his mask and gave her an odd look, but she ignored that and pulled him inside of the hallway where she had first entered the building from. An angry mob was following them and many were now taking potshots at them, but her Aura deflected most of them and as soon as they reached the nearest door, she dodged the last round and jumped inside.
One of the doormen immediately pounced at Cal, driving him to the wall with overwhelming strength while going for a giant knife with a crooked edge.
"The door!" The Onyx soldier snapped at her while he tried to fend the Faunus off. "Close the door!"
Velvet hesitated for a second, but she knew that they would most certainly die if she didn't stop the White Fang from following them. Cal would have to fend for himself for the moment; he was skilled in martial arts, right?
She jumped at the door and slammed it close. But there was no way that she was able to hold it closed on her own; she needed something strong to keep it in place, to lock the mechanism. Something metal…
The giant knife slid over the floor to her and she stared at it for a moment, before deciding that it would do.
Velvet then grabbed the knife and inserted it in the slot on the door, locking it in place. Then she rounded on the White Fang member who was grappling with Cal, ready to fight should the need arise. But it turned out that the Onyx soldier had the situation under control; just as Velvet had managed to lock the door in place, Cal stepped away from the giant White Fang soldier who was attempting to throttle him. He grabbed the trooper's arm, placed his hand at the elbow and then snapped his arm with a sickening crunch. The other Faunus screamed in pain, but Cal delivered three quick punches to his face and crotch and then flipped him to the ground.
"Cal," Velvet started, but the Onyx soldier wasn't done yet. He unfolded his weapon –a large, nasty-looking tomahawk- and slashed at the fallen trooper, embedding the weapon deep inside of his throat. "Cal, no!"
"Come on," the Fox-Faunus then snapped. "We're getting out of here!"
But Velvet couldn't run. Her legs refused to move and her feet felt like they were pinned to the ground. What was she doing? Why was she running from the White Fang with a soldier who had just brutally murdered a fellow Faunus? What use did the White Fang even had if people just murdered each other for them?
Once more Cal grabbed her arm and he pulled her away from her transfixed position, forcing her to tear her gaze away from the dead body –courtesy of a completely senseless murder.
"Why did you do that?" She demanded, her voice nearly breaking. The crimson opening at the neck of the murdered trooper had had her hypnotized and even as Cal put his hatchet away, her stomach lurched at the sight of the blood that still clung to its metal head.
"Self-defense," said the fox-boy with a shrug. Then he looked at the dead body and frowned. "Oh, I see…"
"You didn't have to kill him!" Velvet then exclaimed, hot anger rising up in her throat. "You already defeated him."
"Velvet, these people are killers," the soldier responded and pried the other door open. The relentless pounding at the door which Velvet had closed with the blade would soon overwhelm it; they couldn't afford to waste time here. "He would have stabbed us in the back the minute he got up."
"Then you should have knocked him out or…or…" she stopped when she realized who she was talking to. His first appearance had been mass-murder and despite the fact that he was extremely willing to help both her as team RWBY in their struggles to deal with certain things, he was still a teenager about her age who had no problem with killing lots of people whatsoever. What had happened to him that he was to completely unfazed by the things he has done?
"I…damnit Velvet, I'm a soldier! Killing the bad guys is my job…if I show mercy, people could die."
"People also die when you kill them," Velvet retorted. "Sometimes, showing mercy is good. You showed mercy to me, remember?"
"That wasn't…I didn't… that's not the same."
Velvet grabbed the hand which he had used to murder the doorman with both of her hands and looked him in his eyes. "We are the good guys, Cal. Please stop acting like the enemy…you are better than that."
The fox-eared soldier stared back at her eyes for a little while, before a particularly powerful blow on the door caught his attention. "We should go now, before they catch up."
She nodded and left the White Fang mask –which she had removed during the chase- on the ground. Velvet knew her principles. Never would she take a life, as the capacity of mercy was what divided the good people from the bad people.
The people working for Onyx, teens as they might be, walked that line every day. A single push could steer them in either direction…and she was going to be there for Cal to make sure that he found his way in the right one.
Day 59 –unidentified country, north of Kingdom of Vale- 7:22
It wasn't every day that you woke up inside of a small tent, next to two sleeping guys and one snoring girl. Though Pyrrha wasn't too sure about spending the night so close to Ren, she was in no way dissatisfied with sleeping so close to Jaune. She liked the boy a lot and despite his shortcomings at the warrior-part of being a Hunter, he was an excellent leader. And more importantly than that, Jaune was kind. Yes, he was naïve and lacking in knowledge, but he was kind and he cared about other people. That was important to for Hunters.
That was important to her.
Pyrrha rolled out of her sleeping bag and got to her feet. Her gear was waiting for her in the jeep and she didn't want to wait too long to get ready, as the teams still needed to cover a lot of ground before they would arrive at the nearest city. Their journey was a long one and everyone needed to be at their best to be able to make it succeed. And she knew that everyone was at their best at the moment. During normal days, Pyrrha always was the one who wake up early to wake up the rest. After that, Ren would prepare everyone's clothes, clean up the beds and take care of the schedules, all while being helped by Jaune and 'assisted' by Nora, who did not seem to notice that she wasn't actually helping that much. But they all smiled and allowed her to help. Ren had long since admitted that he liked seeing Nora happy and Jaune…Jaune was just that kind.
And while she didn't know how things went with team LACG, Pyrrha did know that Ruby and Weiss had grown very close together. The two always sat beside each other when the situation warranted it and, which it did most of the times. Blake had obviously not been accepted by the humans she had met thus far, which made her friendship with both team JNPR as team LACG that much happier to think about. And Yang, though she appeared to have a few moments where she just seemed to be lost in thoughts, was one of the few students who actually got along with Will. Headmaster Ozpin could not have chosen three better teams for this job –and she knew that Ruby, Jaune and Lisa would see them all through it.
No, it wasn't the trio of teams that Pyrrha was worried about. And as she donned her combat outfit and placed her hairpiece on her head, she noticed the person whom she was worrying about. Last night, when they had stopped near an open field close to a forest, Will had disappeared without talking to anyone. At the time, she had been too tired to think anything off it and she had quickly fallen asleep. But now that she thought about it, it was rather weird for the young soldier to have left in the dead of night without any friends with him. And it was even weirder of him to be lying against a tree, obviously asleep while inside of his uncomfortable-looking armour.
Pyrrha shook her head and carefully approached the sleeping soldier, looking around for potential traps or ambushes. The Grimm had played a foul game three days ago and she didn't want to end up at the receiving end of another Death-Stalker like that. The fact that Will was still in one piece in these Grimm-invested lands was a surprise, be it a very pleasant one.
"Hey," she muttered while kneeling next to him, gently touching his shoulder to try and wake him up. "Are you well?"
After she shook his shoulder a few times, the soldier shot awake. Literally. His head snapped up and he backed up against the tree as if she were frightening him half to death, his left arm going for a knife on his chest and the right one scraping over the ground. Pyrrha had frightened him.
"Do not worry," Pyrrha kindly said as she placed her hand on the holster of his knife, preventing him from accidentally hurting himself. "Nobody is going to harm you!"
Will stared at her from underneath his helmet for a few seconds, his chest moving rapidly. Only after a silence that lasted five seconds did he seem to calm down somewhat. "Pyrrha?" He then asked with audible confusion in his voice.
"Yes," she replied. "I did not mean to scare you, I was simply worried."
"Worried?" The boy repeated as he crept to his feet. "Why?"
Pyrrha looked around. "Well, you are lying at the edge of our camp against a tree," she said with a laugh, trying to shake off the feeling that something was amiss. "May I ask why you were not sleeping in one of the tents? There was enough room."
The boy leant against a tree and bended forwards, sighing as he did. Then he took his helmet off and let it fall to the ground, instead of keeping it underneath his arm like normal. "I was keeping guard," he replied with a voice that was so soft that it might as well have been a whisper. He had some serious bags underneath his eyes. "There was movement all over the area."
Really? She hadn't noticed anything. "Why did you not ask for someone to relieve you? I would have been happy to help you."
"I didn't want to wake anyone up," Will then said as he rubbed his eyes. "What time is it?"
Pyrrha checked her scroll. "Half past seven."
The soldier sighed again. "I fell asleep," he said with disgust.
"Yes," she replied. "Alone. Outside of safety in a dangerous land. Have you no concept of personal safety?" The blank stare that answered her pretty much covered that question, so Pyrrha rephrased it. "I don't think you understand that this was a dangerous thing to do-"
But he did not allow her to finish. "Don't really care about that. Wake the others…we're leaving."
And then he placed his helmet back on his head and walked past her, seemingly uncaring that he was being very rude.
"But we do…" she softly said and then decided that something was really out of place. The Operative's attitude had been decreasing as of lately…he was being rude, distracted and neglecting.
As Pyrrha walked back to the tent to wake her team up, a nasty idea popped up in the back of her mind. Will had been somewhere between fifteen and sixteen when he had found himself on the bloody and brutal battlefields between Luna and Arcadia, where he had undoubtedly taken many lives. Soldiers under the eighteen years old were considered child-soldiers…a vile and unholy concept that was extremely illegal. It was entirely possible that he was developing a serious case of Posttraumatic Stress-Disorder. That would most likely kill him if it wasn't treated soon…
She continued to ponder the various signs of trouble that she had been seeing for a few days now, even as the rest of the teams got up and got dressed. Ren and Jaune worked together with Yang to make them breakfast, but the blonde girl nearly killed them all when she accidentally lit the propane tank that they were supposed to be cooking on, on fire.
"Uhh…is this supposed to happen?" Yang asked as she held the burning tank in her hands.
"Shit!" Lisa exclaimed and dove for cover, pulling her Cho with her.
"Yang! Why?" Ruby yelled and did pretty much the same with Weiss.
"Ooh, shiny!" Nora then said, prompting Ren to pull her away from the burning object before she could snatch it away.
"Throw it away throw it away!" Jaune exclaimed and unfortunately, Yang chose that moment to listen to his regretful lapse of leadership.
"Alright," Yang said and then flung the burning canister a good twenty feet away, right into the forest.
"Uhm…won't that cause a forest fire?" Blake pointed out.
"Ah…right," Yang replied. "Should've thought that one through. "
"Grace!" Weiss ordered, "Do something!"
"Yes, safe the forest!" Ruby shouted.
The demolitions expert groaned in frustration. "And I was this close to hacking that computer with Alessa. Hang on…"
Eleven people held their breath as the brunette quickly ran up to the propane tank, whereupon she picked it up, twisted a small handle and cut the gas-supply off. "We're clear!"
"Wooh," Jaune muttered as he wiped his forehead. "We nearly died there. Be more careful next time, Yang!"
"Sorry," the blonde said without really looking the like. "Stuff happens."
"Crisis averted,' Ruby whispered, but despite the danger being gone she did not appear to be willing to let her partner go, whom she was clinging to as if her young life depended on it.
"You people do realize that a simple Bunsen burner exploding would have only scorched the tree a bit, and nothing else?" Ren pointed out.
"It's the danger on the inside that counts," Nora said and poked at the defused gas canister. "Can I keep this?"
"No," Grace snapped as she snatched the thing from Nora's fingers. "I wear the sapper-vest; the exploding gas-tank is mine."
Nora pouted. "D'awww…can I at least say goodbye?"
Pyrrha turned to Jason Cho, leaving the mourning Nora and stern Grace behind her. "They said that they were busy hacking a computer?"
"Yeah," Cho replied.
"And…which computer were they talking about?"
"The one in the car."
She turned around and looked at the trio of cars parked near the edge of their camp. "Which car would that be then?"
"The one with the most secrets," Cho replied, looking at her with a rather blank expression.
"The Onyx one?"
"That's right."
"Ehm," Pyrrha started, feeling a bit awkward. She wasn't very good with computers, but she did not consider herself to be bad with them. "How do you hack a computer in a car?"
"I thought the same thing, but Alessa's really good with tech. Surprisingly."
She raised an eyebrow at that. "Surprisingly?"
"The only one who she really talks to is Grace. Not as much as much to us."
"You should probably rectify that."
"I know, but…the system works. She doesn't like attention very much."
"That is hard, considering her…choice of outfit."
"The blindfold? Yeah, was hard to get used to at first. But I learned not to ask too much questions."
That surprised her. "Why? Do they refuse to answer?"
"I wish," Cho replied without as much as blinking. Talking to him was a hard thing to do as well, as he simply did not seem to ever blink. "Their explanations don't make any sense. Last time I asked Lisa why she didn't want to drive in her brother's car, despite her wanting to drive badly?"
"And?"
"She said it was because he had installed over ninety self-destruct buttons on it."
"What!"
Cho shrugged. "I know. The Professor seemed to have removed a lot of them, but the rest of my team still had to deactivate all kinds of pop-ups during the journey."
Pyrrha simply nodded. Sometimes, it was better to just leave things be than to pursue them. Three days had gone by since they had left Beacon and in those three days, the initial Grimm ambush had been the most interesting thing to happen. Sure they had encountered other roaming Grimm, wandering groups of bandits and the occasional trading-outpost, but those had all been well within their capacity to handle.
Because of the isolation that the cars brought, talking generally had to wait for bathroom-breaks and the like. And that was a shame really, as Pyrrha had hoped that they would get to know each other better during their expedition. But it could not be helped; team dynamics were important enough for all them to want to push social interaction away for a few hours.
After the teams had finished their breakfast (nobody had dared risk the MRE's yet when they still had a few fresh supplies to take care off) they resumed their journey. There wasn't that much to talk about onboard the large jeep and Pyrrha soon dozed off, only to wake up a few hours later when Ren nearly drove their car against a tree.
"Ren, why?" Jaune exclaimed.
"I'm sorry, I didn't see it in time," their driver replied. "The other teams were in my way."
"Aww, you woke Pyrrha up!" Nora said with a sad tone.
"That's alright," Pyrrha hastened to say. "I slept well tonight, so I did not actually require the sleep."
"You slept for a long time though," said Jaune. "Long enough for us to come up on the next city, anyway."
That got her attention alright. "The next city?" Pyrrha asked, sitting upright. "So soon?"
"It's been more than two days. We should have already arrived at our goal," replied Ren. "But these roads are dangerous and weird. Does anyone actually know where to go?"
"We've all got maps…and these cars have compasses," Jaune replied hesitantly. "We should be able to get to the north pretty easily with that, right?"
"Who is laying the course for us?" asked Pyrrha.
"RWBY's car."
"That explains everything." Ren said with a smile.
It started to rain not soon after that. Dark clouds were forming in the sky and large droplets of water were falling from the air, inhibiting their ability to see. Ren wasn't every happy with that, as his control over the car was sloppy enough as it was. Thankfully, their convoy entered the city. It was around 2 in the afternoon, so it should have been crowding with civilians running about with umbrellas, or at least cars driving around. But those weren't around; the city looked empty. No pedestrians, no bicycles or cars, nothing. It looked a bit like a ghost town. As soon as Pyrrha thought about that, a shiver ran down her spine. There was no such thing like ghosts, right?
RWBY's jeep took a left at the next intersection, quickly followed by LACG and JNPR. Once again they approached a street that should have been teeming with life and once again, not a single soul was to be found. It wasn't raining that bad, was it? The lights were all out too. Perhaps there was a power-outage
But when Pyrrha suggested this, Ren said: "I don´t think so. The streetlights are still working."
"They wouldn't do that if there was a power-outage, right?" Asked Jaune.
"So what is going then?"
"No clue."
RWBY´s car slowed down considerably and Yang crawled onto the turret, turning it around on its swivel and keeping a close eye on the roofs of the buildings. Nora suddenly jumped up and down in her chair and then quickly followed the blonde´s example –without having visibly taken her seatbelts off. She had simply left her chair without ever releasing them.
The domed turret on Professor Adamant's car had to be manned too, as that thing was spinning around just as the other two turrets.
"It appears that our comrades do not trust this situation either," said Pyrrha. "We must be vigilant."
But when the lead vehicle stopped after ten minutes of continued driving through the seemingly abandoned city, Pyrrha felt a faint sensation of apprehension. Why were they stopping? What was their goal here?
"Ah, good," said Jaune without even sounding worried, "I need to go to the bathroom. Be right back."
When their jeep stopped too, the first thing Jaune did was exiting it and disappearing behind some building.
"Wait!" Yelled Pyrrha, but Ren chuckled and told her that a guy should probably be alone at that moment.
"But it's this place," she replied, her initial sense of unease increasing with every passing second. "It feels wrong, we should not linger here."
Ren opened the door and left the jeep as well, while Nora jumped off the turret and walked up to an old book that had been abandoned on the streets. "People are most likely hungry and I could sure use a break."
Pyrrha didn't want to unnecessarily stress anyone, but this seemed like a really unwise position to remain. "Let us at least be careful then."
"Fine by me," Ren replied and opened his backpack. They had run out of fresh supplies at dawn and the boy took a small, sealed bag out that seemed to resemble an MRE. Pyrrha was not eager to try those out, but she was hungry enough to understand that there was no other choice. And preparing that would probably take her mind off of her unease.
"Dinnertime!" Nora yelled as team RWBY and LACG approached a central square in the city, which might have once been a busy parking place but now only contained a few cars and nothing else. But at least it was under a roof, so they were all dry. And it did fit all three of their cars, so there was also a positive point. Yet Pyrrha could not help but feel wary of the place.
She watched as Yang pulled out a the same small canister of gas that she had used to nearly cause a forest-fire (Ren had called it a…something burner) which Ruby then immediately yanked out of her hands.
"Relax sis'!" The blonde exclaimed and took the device back. "It was a small mistake. You know that I can cook, right?"
"I do. But I think that having you near something that explodes can be a dangerous thing."
"Ruby, just humor me." When the redhead appeared reluctant to hand the burner back, Yang smiled and added: "I promise I won't blow anyone up," which was apparently enough for her sister to comply.
Grace meanwhile had already set LACG's burner up and Lisa was staring at the contents of one MRE which she had emptied in a pan. "What's this supposed to be?" She sneered, poking at the contents with a knife. "Are we supposed to sniff this up or what?"
Pyrrha suppressed a laugh. Had the girl expected something else then?
Jaune finally returned and Will seemed to display a strange curiosity in a nearby phone-boot, because he stared at one for over ten seconds before finally deciding to visit it.
"Had a safe journey?" Ren asked his teamleader.
"I uhh…I totally did not get lost," replied Jaune, rather unconvincingly.
"You're still in time for dinner."
"Thanks!"
Pyrrha and Jaune joined team RWBY, while Nora and Ren joined team LACG. Someone had packed JNPR's burner at the near-bottom of their large backpack and nobody had felt any real desire to pack out all their supplies and materials just to get it.
"Does anyone else feel a bit strange?" Asked Pyrrha.
"What do you mean?" Replied Blake.
"This city should be teeming with life, yet there isn't a single soul to be found."
Yang smirked. "So it gives you the creeps?"
"It does not. It makes me feel like something is off."
Two gunshots suddenly rang out and, amplified by the cavernous parking lot, served to startle all twelve of them. Lisa uttered a profane exclamation and nearly threw the cooking pan to the ground, while Jaune dove to the ground and sought cover. Ruby squealed and unfolded her weapon, which every member of the teams then also did.
The shots came from the phone booth, where Will had found it necessary to shoot the phone.
"What the hell!" Shouted Lisa.
Yang looked equally pissed. "What was that for?"
"It was ringing."
"My ears are what are ringing here!" Weiss grumpily said.
"Guys, easy," Ruby tried to calm the situation down. "Nobody got hurt. Will? What did you see?"
"Nothing," replied the seemingly jumpy Operative, "there was…interference."
"You shot a phone because of interference?" Jaune tried to sound skeptic, but a glare from Will very quickly shut him up. Pyrrha had never seen the soldier look so angry at such a small offense –actually, she had never really seen him glare at someone before. Sure, her interaction with him was limited at best, but he had never done anything that made him look upset in any way. "I –I mean sure! I-interference is bad, right? Ehm…little help here?"
Ruby demonstrated once again that her ability to suspect and prevent rising trouble. "I think we should simply eat our MRE's and then hit the road again. I don't know about you guys, but this place gives me the creeps."
Pyrrha shot a thankful expression at the little redhead before she joined the queue for dinner.
"Alright," Ren explained, "we have beef ravioli over here…"
"Looks like chicken with salsa right here," Yang added.
"Chili and macaroni!" Lisa exclaimed with a smile. "Jackpot!"
Will approached LACG's apparent-delicious chili and sighed. "You weren't supposed to cook it like this."
"Say what?" Asked Grace.
The soldier sat down and took the cooking pan off the fire. "You cook water, dump a bit in the bag until it reaches this line and then stir it."
"As opposed to…"
"As opposed to drowning it."
Lisa was silent for a few seconds, but then…"Nah, look! It's all chili-ish. I know how to cook macaroni, so mind your own cooking."
Will shook his head and took out something that looked like a small burner, only without the obvious head. He then poured half a cup of water in it and flicked a button, after which he settled for watching the rest of the group eat. He looked very pale…had he contracted some sort of virus?
"As team JNPR's leader, I reserve the right for first taste," Jaune declared with a smile and poured some of the beef ravioli in a small, metal pan. He poked the substance –which looked uncannily like red vomit- with his spoon, before taking a small bite…
…only to nearly choke to death in half a second and then spit it out again.
"Jaune?" Pyrrha asked, not completely certain of what had just transpired. Jaune appeared to be trying to completely empty his lungs and if he continued like that, he would reenact the infamous scene from his first day at Beacon.
"Going alright over there, vomit-boy?" Yang teased him.
"I-I-It tastes h-horrible!" The boy yelled. "Bad! Bad military food!"
Lisa, having just observed Jaune nearly dying because of the MRE, decided that it was an excellent idea to load a spoon with the goo and stuff it in her mouth. Cho tried to warn her, but she was a bit too fast.
And the results were rather predicable. She slipped into a coughing-fit and quickly dove behind the jeep, where she started to gag.
"That's it," Grace decided, "I will have to burn all the MRE's in a large fire."
"Come on guys," Blake sighed. "It's no Beacon, but it's all we have."
\"Have you tasted this stuff then?" Yang asked her. "Here, try a bite. Or are you too scared of a kitty to try the big, nasty food?" Her tone assumed a condescending quality and Blake scowled.
"I don't see you eating it either," she said. "Weren't you supposed to be a badass when it came to bad cooking?"
"I don't see what the deal is," Ren declared and took a small bite of the ravioli. Then he visibly shuddered and forced himself to swallow, after which he immediately took a few large gulps from a water flacon. "Now I do," he croaked. "I'm done eating."
Will dumped one of the smaller MRE's inside of his small device, which had to be some portable heater. Then he opened the sack and placed it onto the heater.
Ruby was the next person to try the food and it wasn't a big surprise when she pulled a face and made a disgusted sound. "Bleargh…it tastes like feet!"
…how would Ruby know what feet tasted like?
Jason Cho then poured himself a cup of the chili and took a bite. To the oblivious outsider, his facial expression did not change. But to someone who had been observing him and hoping for a sign of danger, there was definitely something there. The corners of his mouth dropped, his nose wrinkled somewhat and his eyes shone with unparalleled despair and agony. Also, he held the cup upside down and dumped its contents, which spoke volumes about his opinion.
"It's worse than Alessa's self-made cookies," he declared. Grace then jabbed at his ribs with her elbow, after which Cho's neck-muscles clenched. "Secret cookies."
"I don't do warm stuff," Alessa said, sounding insulted.
The Operative, unsurprisingly, finished up with his own portion and then disassembled the heater.
"What the heck Will! That stuff is pure evil! How can you eat that?" Ruby yelled.
"It does appear to be quite inedible," Blake muttered and imitated Jaune's instinct of poking the food with a stick. Where did everyone get those sticks?
"It's not that bad. It's warm, made with clean water instead of river-water and devoid of sand."
"Yeah, because a lack of those things is what makes food great and delicious!" Lisa cried, having recovered from her near poisoning at the hands of MRE.
"You know what would be good with this?" Nora asked, spooning down Ren's portion and dumping his empty cup next to her own empty cup. "Some steak-sauce or red peppers."
"Nora, seriously? You can eat that stuff?" Jaune asked.
"Sure! What's not to like? Beef? Good. Ravioli? Good!"
Yang shook her head. "You really are an odd little girl."
"I like it!"
As on cue, several people handed their portions to Nora, who merely smiled. At least one person could leave this garage with an empty stomach…
"Is there anything else to eat in this dump?" Yang shouted in frustration. "I mean come on, are we supposed to eat nothing but this cra –eh, junk?"
Way to save yourself there, Yang, Pyrrha thought.
The Operative shrugged. "Every person has a stash of kecks. Why not eat those?"
Lisa gestured to Cho, who immediately grabbed his bag and started rummaging around in it.
"What are kecks?" Jaune asked.
"Bread-replacers."
"That sounds ominous," Ruby said with a small shiver.
Cho hefted a small, silver package, roughly four inches long and two inches across.
"And how are we supposed to eat those?" Weiss snapped, reaching for one of hers. "Boil it? Cook it? Maybe drown it in water? Or do we need another mysterious Operative-method?"
Cho tore the package open and took something out that resembled a biscuit, square and surprisingly edible-looking.
"I think you open your mouth, stuff the cookie in and close it again," Grace said with a snicker.
"Dibs!" Ruby yelled and with one smooth movement, she opened Weiss' pack of kecks and stole roughly half of the contents.
The Schnee Heiress stared at the opened pack of kecks. "Seriously, exactly half of them?" She asked with a skeptical look.
"I think that means you get to eat too," Yang laughed. "Gimme one too, I want to try it."
A few students reached for their own supply of kecks, but nobody dared to actually eat any of them without knowing Ruby's reaction.
The redhead swallowed, looked at the remaining kecks in her hand and pouted. "It's dry," she complained.
"Bread-replacer."
"It's hard to chew on."
"Kecks."
"It's dry-"
"Drink some water."
If these kecks were only dry and hard to chew, Pyrrha would risk it. She was hungry and they had plenty of water to go around anyway.
In truth, these kecks were actually pretty edible. Sure, they were a bit hard to get used to, but for something that was called bread-replacer they were better than expected. And the water helped wonders, too. When everyone had downed a few kecks, cleaned their bowls and stashed their supplies, the teams were ready to go.
"Alright," Ruby said as she unfolded a map. "We are…"
Blake pointed somewhere on the map.
"Here! And we need to go…here. So…ehm…yes…this is totally clear to me."
"Let's just find the northern-most point and work our way from there, right?" Lisa suggested.
"We need to get back to the road for that. And out of this ghost-town-"
"It's not a ghost-town, Jaune."
"Yes it is. There are no people around, so ghost-town."
"I think," Weiss interrupted, "that we should probably get out of this town first. When we get back to a major road we can orient ourselves to the North."
"Yeah, good idea," Ruby replied. "Any objections? No? Not overruled. Let's go."
They boarded their cars again and, after a bit of awkward turning on Ren's part, they were on the move again. But this time it didn't take very long for them to stop again; they had barely exited the city, or things turned for the worse.
The ground shuddered with the rumbling of thunder and the rain worsened. Bright lights were clearly visible in the distance and, as opposed to the constant strikes of lightning, these didn't fade away. Someone had working lights out there –and they were aimed at the general direction of their convoy. Unfortunately, they were both extremely far away and on the opposite end of a large ravine, which was at least a hundred feet deep.
"Seriously?" Jaune exclaimed when he stepped near the edge to look down. "A cliff? How are we supposed to go around here?"
Pyrrha looked to the left, then to the right. "The chasm continues for a large distance on both directions."
"I have a feeling that we won't encounter any good bridges," Ren said.
"Let's try that one, shall we?" Jaune said. Then he grabbed his scroll and called RWBY's leader. "Hey, Ruby? You mind if we look for a way across?"
"Good idea, left or right?"
"Left. Right has a better sight."
But as it turned out, most bridges were either constructed of pieces of old wood and rope, or natural formations of stone roughly two feet across. No car would be crossing to the other side. The only bridge that would be possible to traverse even on foot was a simple suspension bridge, which looked very old.
"Is this some sort of joke?" Jaune exclaimed. "How do we go on now?"
Ruby called him again. "Jaune? Will says we can place trackers on the vehicles for either Beacon or Onyx to come pick them up later. We'll continue on foot."
Jaune pulled a face and looked outside. It wasn't raining as heavily as before anymore, but it was still very wet. "Yeah…great…let's totally do that.
Working together with the other teams, they left the most non-important supplies behind in the cars and put on their rucksacks. Pyrrha quickly discovered that the material was not uncomfortable to wear and, despite the various forms of clothes, Dust and ammo they were carrying, the bag didn't exceed her physical strength.
Jaune was less impressed though. He groaned and nearly lost his balance, requiring Nora to keep upright. "How much does this weigh!"
"Ease up Jaune, it's not that bad," Ruby assured him as she walked by, with a bag that was equally as large as his. How did she wear that over her cloak?
Pyrrha walked over to her friend. "You need to fasten the belts and lean forwards. Here, allow me to aid you."
Lisa's team took the lead this time, followed closely by Rub "Listen up people," the blonde said, "the bridge is damaged and easy to fall through. Take it slow, take it one at a time and don't rush."
"What happens if we rush?" Yang asked.
Nora whistled softly and then made a sploosh sound. That message was obvious enough.
The bridge itself was a rather difficult thing to traverse; the wind was howling, the ropes were wet and the wood was slippery enough for quite a few students to slip and nearly fall.
"Watch out!" Yang shouted and grabbed Cho by his arm when he broke through one of the rotten planks, preventing him from sinking through the bottom.
"Thanks," he muttered as he pulled his leg back through the ragged hole.
"How come you didn't see that?"
"I don't function at great heights."
"Is that Cho-ish for having a fear of heights?"
"No."
"Alright…"
Lisa and Alessa reached the other side and were about to jump on top of the rocky outcropping when a terrifying shearing sound from the other side of the cliff got their attention.
"Uh-oh…" Ruby muttered.
"Damn!" Jaune cursed in a panicky voice.
"Well, we're screwed," Lisa declared.
"Move!" Ruby then shouted, being the first to regain her composure. "Run for it!"
The anchoring point at the side they had just left was slowly sheaving itself in half against the rocks, with one wooden plank having just torn itself free. The entire bridge was about to come loose and if they were still on it…Aura wouldn't safe them from such a steep fall.
Lisa and Alessa helped Cho and Grace from the bridge, who then turned around to guide team Weiss and Blake off. Ruby stuck behind to help Jaune guide his team over the suspension bridge, but the wind picked up and the entire thing nearly flipped sideways. The ropes were about to give away and-
"Will!" Yang shouted, stopping at the end of the bridge. "Get your ass over here!"
Pyrrha, who had been observing the anchor-point at their end, looked up and saw that the Operative was displaying some very odd behaviour. He was two-third of the way across the bridge, but for some reason he had turned around to stare at the other side of the bridge –the side which was just about to completely collapse. He slowly extended one arm, as if to caress the damaged rope that he was using to hang on. What was he doing? The entire thing was seconds away from collapsing.
"Oh no you don't!" Ruby growled and then activated her semblance, as the rocks underneath her feet shattered and her body disappeared. She crossed the remaining twenty feet in less than a second and then wrapped her arms around the soldier's waist, turned back towards the cliff and pushed off again-
-only for the rotten wood underneath her feet to give away and cause her to trip, accidentally breaking the one rope that was still holding the bridge up.
"Ruby!" Yang screamed and she attempted to go after her sister, but both Jaune as Lisa immediately jumped at her to keep her in place.
It all happened so fast. Pyrrha knew that there was chance that those two could keep Yang in place for longer than a second, but there was also no way that Yang could manage to safe Ruby or Will from the bridge.
The Operative seemed to have shaken himself out of his stupor though, as the falling form of red and black that was Ruby and him did not lose contact with the falling bridge, instead using their remaining speed and momentum to gain an additional ten feet of
"Don't!" Jaune yelled at Yang, who had yet to realize that something had changed.
Pyrrha wasn't sure what happened after that, but suddenly Will and Ruby were dangling a few feet below the cliff-end. The soldier was hanging on to the rope with one hand, as he had his other hand intertwined with Ruby's hands.
"Let go of me!" Yang snarled and with one lurch, tore free of the two team-leaders who were attempting to stop her from jumping into the ravine.
Pyrrha rushed to the rope that the soldier was holding on to and saw that he was slowly but steadily slipping. Not only that, but the rope was shaving against the rock-wand and with each little sling, it tore a strand away. "Yang!" She shouted, diving for the rope to prevent it from snapping. The blonde was already on it.
Will looked down at Ruby, who nodded at him. Then, in an impressive feat of power on his own, he heaved her up and threw her in the air-
-right into the waiting arms of Yang, who immediately and without any visible strain pulled her up and over the edge. Cho shot to Pyrrha´s aid and together, the two of them tried to pull the rope up before it could snap and throw the Operative into the abyss. The rocks under their feet were unstable and some of them were already crumbling, but it was a risk that they had to take.
Just as they were starting to make progress and reach for the undamaged part of the rope, the wet piece of cord snapped and nearly took the both of them with it as the ground underneath them fully gave away. They jumped back just as Yang jumped forwards, grabbing Will´s arm before he could fall.
Once she was certain that everyone was safe, Pyrrha turned to Ruby to ask her what had happened. Lisa was sitting with the little redhead, looking worried.
"Are you alright?" The young Adamant asked, but Ruby could only respond with a burst of laughter and Pyrrha could easily see why. It appeared that Lisa had not noticed that the wood on the bridge had been very rotten; she had stomped right through one plank, failing to notice that she had actually torn it free of the bridge and taken it with her. It had lodged itself around her leg, with her ankle still stuck in the place where her foot had torn through it. "Why is everyone laughing? People almost died! Everytime I laugh when people nearly die, I get a whole morality-speech!"
"You're wearing the bridge!" Ruby giggled. "Like a sock!"
"What the –oh for the love of –damnit!"
The Adamant stepped back, making place for Yang as she pulled Ruby into one of her rib-crushing hugs.
"I was so worried! You weren't paying attention to where you placed your legs again, were you? Don't do that again!"
"Yang…air…must have…" Ruby gasped, prompting he blonde to let her go.
While the little redhead took a few deep breaths, Yang turned Jaune and Lisa, who quickly stepped backwards. "What the hell was wrong with you? I could have saved them sooner if you idiots hadn't jumped at me!"
"But you…you would have…it wasn't safe to-" Jaune muttered, but Lisa had more success in vocalizing her thoughts.
"You were going to jump off the cliff and die," she said. "Had Jaune not noticed that, we would have three people at the bottom of the cliff."
Pyrrha's feelings of proud and happiness towards her teamleader were not shared by Yang. "There was no way of knowing that! You could have just as easily prevented me from saving their asses! And you!" She then yelled at Will, who was still staring at the other side of the cliff, turning around only to see who was yelling at him. "Did you lose your mind? What the hell is wrong with you, stopping like that! You could have died! Ruby could have died!"
It occurred to Pyrrha that Yang was taking the protection of her little sister extremely serious. Even after everything had turned out ok, she was still fuming.
"I-" the soldier started, but Yang didn't allow him to finish.
"I nothing! I should throw you over the end of the damn cliff myself! What were you thinking?"
And this wasn't only born out of pure concern for Ruby, it seemed.
"I saw someone standing there."
"And that was important enough to dead-freaking stop?"
Pyrrha turned to Blake to ask her a rather important question, but Weiss had beaten her to it.
"Did you see or even hear anyone follow us?"
"No."
"Did you smell anyone on the other side?"
"I didn't."
"Is there any chance that he might have seen something that you have missed?"
Blake was silent.
"Well?"
"No."
It occurred to Pyrrha that Alessa had been perfectly capable of spotting the Grimm ambush before. Had there been someone, she would have probably seen it, would she not?
Weiss crossed her arms. "I don't know what's wrong with him. His actions nearly caused Ruby her life!"
"Ruby chose to go after him on her own, Weiss."
"I don't care for that! You know how she is!"
"Perhaps he really did see something?"
"Or perhaps he is merely getting jumpy."
"Actually, he always was jumpy."
"Whatever!"
Pyrrha looked back at the ruined bridge and wondered if it had fallen apart by itself, or that someone or something helped it along.
The destruction of the suspension bridge had left most of them in a bit of a depression. It was probably a mixture of the loss of their comfy cars and the realization that there was danger that they couldn't fight with just weapons and skills. Whatever it was, it left an obvious gap in their conversation that Yang could not seem to fill. After a few minutes of silence though, she and Lisa found something simple to talk about.
"I'm just saying that I 'm a big fan of the M5 series," LACG's leader declared as she tapped the point of her weapons blade, to verify if it was still there. "They've really got the punch, you know?"
"Oh I know alright," Yang replied. Her weapons were easily folded right over her wrist, but Lisa wasn't that lucky. Her weapon could not fold itself like hers; it remained large, bulky and cumbersome. But it looked awesome and it didn't weigh too much, so it got bonus points for that. "But the armour is just as important. The upgraded M6 is nearly indestructible; no Buster's going to get through that one."
"But if it's too heavy and gets bogged down-"
"That baby's got a beefed up engine; nothing is going to outmaneuver it."
"Seriously? Does the M6 have such a powerful engine?"
Yang nodded. "It's one of the major upgrades from the M5. It used to be a real glass cannon, but then they changed the composite plates and installed the new engine. It's a real beast now."
"You really like your mechanics, don't you?" Lisa sked.
"Yeah, it's fun. Ruby went ahead and educated herself in weapons crafting back when she was younger, at Signal Academy. I wanted to be able to talk with her about weapon-designs and…well, one thing led to another."
"So you specialized in vehicles?"
"I didn't specialize in anything. It's just a hobby; I like to do my research about military vehicles and that's'…basically the gist of it."
"Then a ride in a jeep with a really big gun must have been a dream come true, right?"
"Totally. Although I never got to fire that big gun…"
The teams approached a road, which led to the large structure with the enormous headlights. A few abandoned cars and weapons lay scattered on the ground, which was odd.
Grace ran up to meet Yang and Lisa. "Ehm, Lisa? There are people ahead…they are armed."
"Alessa spotted them?"
"Yes."
"Alright team," Lisa then yelled, "prepare for bad guys."
"And I thought we wouldn't get to kick a little ass today," Yang said with a grin.
"We might want to take it easy," Weiss said from behind Yang. "Remember the abandoned city? That was hardly a good sign."
Whoever was watching them didn't make a move and even as the three teams approached the large building –which appeared to be a cross between a Colosseum and a bunker, standing thirty feet high and easily a hundred feet wide.
Ruby joined Yang and together they looked for an opening in the building, as the people who were supposed to be keeping an eye on them had to be here.
"Why do you think they have such headlights?" Yang asked.
"I don't know. Must use a lot of power though," Ruby replied.
"They probably have a lot of generators," Weiss remarked, joining them too.
"Nah," Yang told her. "They just have a lot of headlight fluid."
"Pardon me? Headlight fluid?"
"You don't know about headlight fluid?" Ruby asked, sounding surprised.
"Well…of course I know about headlight fluid. I just thought it was limited to…you know…cars."
"Oh no, they got headlight fluid here alright," Yang said.
Weiss was about to make another remark, but then the two heavy doors at the front of the building opened and a group of five armed men came running out. They appeared like soldiers in a time of need; wearing simple helmets, tactical vests and crude assault rifles. One of them was only armed with a pistol.
"Halt!" One of them yelled.
"Identify yourselves!" Another joined in.
Yang heard a clicking sound behind her and realized with a start that their nigh-suicidal comrade was still with them. And Will did not take kindly to people pointing guns at him or people around. She could recall a conversation with vivid clarity where she had asked him how he usually dealt with people as an Operative. His response had been…crude. "If they are superiors, I obey them. If they are threats, I neutralize them."
That had been bolstered a week or two later by "if they are allies I assist them", but that still did not warrant any security for these people. They were clearly not with Onyx, which only left them in the 'kill' category. And Yang really wanted to avoid that.
"Yeah, easy!" She told them. "We're not enemies…no need to shoot."
She wasn't as much talking to them as she was talking to Will. She could practically feel him being ready to murder the hell out of these guys.
"Who are you then?" The soldier with the pistol demanded.
"We're students from Beacon Academy, from the Kingdom of Vale," Ruby gently told the man. "We are on an expedition to the North."
"You're all armed and packed for trouble. We are to believe that?"
"Wait, I heard of Beacon once. It really is established in Vale. These guys don't look like the typical Council grunts.
"Look," Jaune said and stepped forward, receiving a lousy gun-cock in the process. Still he ignored the obvious threat and kept his cool. Sort of. "I can understand you not trusting us. If you want to, you could sent a few people to keep an eye on us while "
"Yeah and risk leaving the HQ undefended? Great plan kid," one of the soldiers snapped. "In case you hadn't noticed it, there's a war going on here!"
"Then why aren't you on your post, soldier?" Will snarled with surprising ferocity.
"Because we had to deal with a bunch of raggedy-ass teens, tough guy."
"Look, I would love to stay and chat, but we really need to keep going," Weiss explained in a rather condescending tone. "We're heading north and-"
"Well that's too bad princess, but the area's off limits. The civvies all around were all cleared out."
"Hey!" Ruby snapped. "For your information, jerk, we're on a highly classified mission!"
Yang was impressed. While Ruby had called Weiss a princess at least two times during their time in team RWBY, she had never see her lash out at anyone for insulting her partner like that. It was cute to see.
"Well that's too bad," one soldier said in a very condescending tone, "as we're not going to let a bunch of kids run around in a battlefield."
"I'm going to run around on your head if you keep this up," Yang growled at him. She was getting fired up and that was a very dangerous thing.
Another man joined the five soldiers, coming running at them from the door-opening. This one wore a heavy coat with various stars and medallions on them.
"Stand down, all of you!" He barked at his men, who only grudgingly replied. "Now, who the devil are you? What are you doing here, the area is evacuated! All civilians are to stay in the designated shelters until the fighting has stopped."
So that explained the abandoned city.
"Sir, we're Hunters-to-be from Beacon Academy," Lisa explained. "We have an important assignment and it is important that we get to the Northern-most point of Vytal ASAP."
"Well, that's only two days away from here now. But there is no way I am letting you in there; this outpost indicates a military line that nobody gets past. Its hell out there and I don't need civvies running around. It's bad enough with this unidentified train that arrived east of here."
Train? What train? The tracks had been abandoned; the trains called off.
"We can handle it," Ren told him.
"We're trained in extensive Dust and Aura usage," Blake added.
"I like to think that we are as ready for conflicts as normal soldiers are," Grace then finished.
"I don't. Now get out of here; we've got enough to worry about. Boy, lower your gun before anyone gets hurt. You're lucky my men did not shoot you on sight."
Yang looked at the Operative –who wasn't wearing his helmet at the moment- and was unpleasantly surprised by how he looked. His eyes, normally calm and devoid of anything, were more angry than she had ever seen them before and he seriously looked like he was about to unload his entire clip into the officer's face. Did he know this man? Had they encountered each other before?
She briefly considered yanking the gun out of his hand, but then an explosion sounded in the distance and the ground shook violently. The officer cursed in a foreign language and turned back to the building.
"You want to go North? Very well. You will have to cross through two miles of dangerous battlefields. You want to go badly, you go now. You want to live through that area, you come with me to plan your journey."
The teamleaders didn't need long to decided; before the man had even fully disappeared inside of the bunker Ruby, Jaune and Lisa had already deduced that they would need all the help they could get.
"Everyone who is against crossing the deadly battlefield says 'I'?" Jaune tried at one point, but nobody said 'I'. And neither did he. However, when nearly everyone had entered the building to find the officer, Yang stuck around the entrance and waited for the Operative to follow them. He was lagging behind and aiming his pistol at the roof of the bunker, the road behind them and the forest to their right. He was looking seriously paranoid now.
Yang reached out and grabbed him by his shoulder, pulling him close and shoving him against the wall.
"Alright, what's your problem?" She angrily demanded. "You're grumpy, mute, distracted and hostile against the wrong damn things! What's eating you!"
"What do you think?" He replied heatedly. "Something is constantly stalking us, staying barely out of our sights. It's constantly there, I can't track it down and you students are acting like you're on a damn road trip!"
She released him within an instant after having heard that. There wasn't even an urge to punch him in the face, just shock. 'You students'? Hadn't they been traveling together for half a week now? Hadn't Ruby spent hours trying to get him to be accepted? Weren't they even worthy of the notion 'companions' or even 'allies'?
"Us students," she replied softly, trying desperately to ignore a sudden and quickly-rising feeling of burning anger, "are still capable of enjoying life. We don't need to think of everything as death and war to function."
Her anger influenced her mind and almost immediately after having said those words, she regretted them. That had been way too much and way too soon.
And she didn´t know what made her feel guiltier: him looking down and away while he replied, or the actual reply itself. "If you want life to stay as it is, you had better change that."
His voice was soft and nearly had a defeated tone to it. It wasn't a threat, but Yang sure as hell wished it were. And as Will simply walked away to join the rest, leaving her alone outside of the bunker, she felt nothing but the desire to punch something.
Which she did. It was just that there wasn't anyone around to notice it.
"Get to position, move move move!"
"Cover my six!"
"You two, over there. You, open that door."
"Sir!"
"Give him some space."
"Sir, it's empty."
"Empty? Good, now we can-"
"Wait one, there's something in the shadows. Shit! Open fire!"
"Damn, it's fast! Open fire, open fire!"
"There's another one! Shoot-
Unidentified Fireteam, near derelict train – 16:22