The Name of the Game

by literalsin

A man from Earth wakes up to find himself stuck in the body of a fictional teenage boy with an ability that turns his life into a video game and foreknowledge of events to come. What could possibly go wrong? A take on the RWBY/Gamer crossover niche with an SI twist, a focus on world and character building, and fleshing out some of the details RT missed. Rated 'M' for a reason.

31. Good Help Is So Hard to Find

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The Name of the Game

a RWBY/The Gamer crossover, SI.

Arc 8: Trainspotting

Chapter 31: Good Help Is So Hard to Find

---

I groaned quietly as consciousness returned. The bed was empty, I noticed, save for one other person—and the cause of my interrupted sleep. Not that I was complaining too much, considering that waking up to a blow job was one of the best possible ways to start the day—the other being 'hello and good morning' sex. Taking a moment to simply enjoy the feeling, I wondered who it was who had decided to give me this particular wakeup call. Peeling back the blanket, I found a head of dark hair in my lap, topped by a pair of triangular ears that twitched as they were exposed to the cool air of the bedroom.

"Good morning, Blake," I greeted.

"Mmnn," the catgirl hummed in answer, causing my toes to curl as the sound traveled straight down my dick.

Reaching out, I stroked the top of her head, gently kneading the flesh around the base of her ears. Her eyes went half-lidded and a small smirk pulled at my lips. "Here, I've got a better idea. Turn around," I suggested. Her eyes went slightly wide and I nodded. Pulling back off my manhood, she quickly turned around, her knees moving to either side of my head. Taking a firm hold on her hips, I brought her pussy down to my mouth, breathing in her scent for a moment before running my tongue up her slit. The faunus girl atop me gasped quietly before laying across my body, her mouth going back to my shaft as I went to work licking, sucking, and occasionally biting her lower lips and clit. Her green apple taste filled my mouth as she grew wetter the longer I worked on her—apparently she had taken a few minutes to clean up at some point between when we all finally went to sleep and when she woke me up. Determined to get her off before me, I parted her lips and slid two fingers inside her, curving them so I could stroke her inner walls while I pumped them quickly in and out of her snatch.

I was nearing my own orgasm a few minutes later when I felt Blake start to quiver as she grew even wetter. I smirked as I felt her beginning to spasm around the fingers inside her. I refocused my efforts on her clit, latching onto it and sucking it into my mouth as I rolled my tongue over it. I felt a throaty moan from Blake around my cock and she redoubled her efforts, her cheeks going hollow at the force of her suction. That was enough to send me over the edge. Blake's lips wrapped tight around me and it felt like she was trying to suck out every last drop, even as her body shook and her cunt dripped grool onto my face as she came.

The faunus girl above me panted quietly through her nose for a moment as she caught her breath before sitting up and turning around to meet my eyes with a smoldering gaze. Her cheeks were puffed out slightly and I blinked as she opened her mouth enough for me to see the thick, white fluid she'd collected without spilling any of it. Closing her mouth, she swallowed audibly, and as she did I couldn't help but notice her eyes had gone slightly out of focus. She hummed a satisfied, "Mmm," as her tongue flicked out to lick her lips.

"Well, that was arousing," I muttered quietly, already feeling myself stirring again at the sight and thankful Gamer's Body meant my refractory period was pretty much nonexistent. Mildly curious given what I'd seen so far from every girl I'd slept with, I asked, "Taste good?"

"Like vanilla," Blake answered and I laughed softly.

"Well, at least it's not lemon," I shrugged. 'Or, you know, what sperm actually tastes like on Earth, according to every woman to ever complain about giving blow jobs. Thank you, Remnant—your insanity works in my favor in this instance. I suppose that narrows it down to either Aura or Dust, then—the two things Earth doesn't have—and since I'm not using Dust, that means Aura is most likely to blame.'

The dark haired girl shrugged. "Not the best flavor in the world, but I won't complain. Now if it were fish…"

I rolled my eyes. "Pretty sure you'd be alone in that." Reaching over, I pulled her closer. Blake shifted onto her side, her arms going around me as she buried her face in my chest. I felt her nose running across my pectorals a moment later as she inhaled my scent and chuckled quietly. "Are you ready to talk about last night?" I asked, before a grin crossed my lips and I added, "If not, I can always dig around in the girls' toy drawer for one of the tails I know they keep in there."

A quiet laugh escaped the girl's lips as she shook her head, golden eyes peeking up through her bangs as she tilted her head up to look at me. "Does this mean I check off the box for your catgirl fetish?" she snarked, and I decided to return the favor.

"That's what the tail is for," I deadpanned, earning a swat on the arm for my mouth. Reaching down, I swatted her ass in return, causing the girl in my arms to jump slightly and hiss at the sudden sting. Blake's nipples going hard and tight against my chest told me she hadn't disliked the little swat I'd given her.

"You're an ass, Jaune." Her eyes turned towards the door before she shifted against me as she considered. "Save the talk for later. Do you think we have time for another round before breakfast?"

I raised an eyebrow at that, trailing one hand down to lightly stroke her sex and earning a quiet sigh in response. "We can make time." Pale arms wrapped around my neck as I kissed her. Blake's eyes slid shut as I let my fingers work their magic on her, bringing my free hand up to gently rub at her ears and earning a quiet moan in appreciation.

---

I entered the kitchen fresh out of the shower with Blake, dropping down into a chair at the table and accepting a plate of pancakes from Miltia, who quickly moved back to her seat at my right. Blake sat down a few places away next to Yang, a towel around her shoulders as she allowed her hair to dry. Taking in the knowing looks from the others, minus an absent Penny, she narrowed her eyes in a glare—though I noticed there was no real heat in it—before digging into her own plate, covered in an assortment of fruit to go with her pancakes.

"You didn't have to hold breakfast on our account," I began, only for every girl present save Blake to turn amused looks my way.

"And yet, we did," Joan pointed out.

Rolling my eyes, I dug into my pancakes. "Thanks for that, then."

"So," Yang began, dragging the word out and drawing every eye at the table to her, "am I the only one here not screwing Jaune?"

"Yes," came multiple replies.

From my left, Neo grinned. "Yet."

Turning lilac eyes on mismatched chocolate and vanilla, Yang grinned shamelessly. "Are you implying something?"

Neo met Yang's grin with a leer of her own. "Only the obvious—that it's just a matter of time."

"Can we not talk about sex at the breakfast table?" Joan asked from the next seat down from Neo on my left.

Across from the elder blonde, Melanie leered. "I don't know, I think I like the idea of sex on the breakfast table. It's just the right height—"

"At. Not on," Joan countered, pointing a fork at the younger girl. A small smile twitched at the corners of her lips as she tried to maintain her stern visage, before losing it as her blue eyes cut to me. "Though, that is a nice mental image."

"Pfft. Who needs mental images?" Neo rolled her eyes, opening her hand and projecting an illusion in her palm—the breakfast table, with every girl there bent over it, their pants and panties down as I made the rounds.

"Okay, that's enough," I sighed, reaching over and breaking the illusion before jerking my head towards where Yang sat somewhat slack-jawed, even as the blonde's gaze shifted to me—then drifted down my body to my crotch and back up. "I don't think she can take much more before something breaks."

Neo was willing to let it drop, but apparently not without a parting shot. "One word, Jaune," the ice cream themed woman leered, conjuring up another illusion. "Clones."

I palmed my face as every girl there took on a thoughtful look at the imagery provided. Breaking the illusion again, I made a mental note to do some more research into getting a proper clone spell up and running, since now that I'd put the idea in their heads last night they were already starting to press for me to go for it. 'Can't be too hard, right? I mean, Blake and Sun both have clone Semblances. Except I want either actual clones or shadow clones ala Naruto, not shitty clones that are barely there or only last a few seconds. Maybe that's why the requirements were so high when I tried to make it—because Skill Creation knows the parameters I want for that spell. INT and WIS I can train, or dump points into, once I get into Beacon—but how the fuck do you train CON? Well, aside from sex. It's kind of hard to work sex into a normal workout and it doesn't help that I don't know how the system defines CON. It obviously includes 'stamina' and 'endurance' under its umbrella, otherwise marathon sex wouldn't level it. But it also affects things like my poison resistance, so maybe it also means the dictionary definition as well—that is, overall health. But Gamer's Body nullifies adverse physical conditions... It'd be great if my Semblance weren't actually pretty fucking vague on the skill point descriptions.'

I had to admit, a clone spell would solve a lot of problems. That was without taking into consideration the sheer versatility of the Naruto universe's 'kage bunshin' technique—from infiltration, to information gathering, scouting, assassination, as a combat force multiplier, and more. Even a bastardized, nerfed version would be better than nothing—because at least then I'd be able to level it up into something amazing later. Suppose it was nerfed to not have the memory transfer portion of the technique, for instance. I didn't need it when I had other techniques that could cover the gap or surpass it. Telepathy, for instance, would allow me to link up with myself so I had information in real time. The party system would allow for easy direction of multiple copies, if I even needed to considering that copies would think identically to myself in whatever situation they were in. Yes, I was practically salivating at the possibilities, but I simply wasn't there yet.

Putting the thought aside, I asked, "Where's Penny?"

"She went out to collect her new weapons for 'Jacqueline' and buy parts to build a weapon for her 'civilian' identity," Miltia answered. "She should be back in a while."

Nodding, I cut into my pancakes and savored butter and syrupy goodness. "What's the agenda for today?" I directed the question at Miltia, who had pretty much nominated herself as my unofficial secretary. 'Maybe she's the one acting as my secretary for Fox Hunt? I should figure that out. Maybe swing by the office and visit.'

"Hmm, let's see," Miltia hummed, drawing out her scroll with one hand while she ate with the other. "It looks like the schedule is booked up today. You're to engage in trust and intimacy building exercises for the rest of the day."

I blinked, raising an eyebrow at that and turned to Melanie. "Translation?"

"What my sister meant to say was 'sex,'" Melanie smirked.

"Of course," I chuckled.

Miltia shot her sister an amused look. "I was thinking more along the lines of a movie or something before my date tonight. Aside from that, there are a few things regarding the operation of Fox Hunt that we should go over," Miltia supplied.

Miltia, Melanie, and Neo all exchanged looks, and before I could ask, Joan beat me to it. "What, exactly?"

"Money," Miltia answered.

"Specifically, where it comes from," Melanie clarified.

"We have a lot of cash, and Fox Hunt needs equipment, building materials, construction done, and so on," Neo continued.

"How much cash?" Blake asked, and I wondered how to answer that.

"Well, I'm not sure about our official books," Neo began, looking at Miltia, who tapped her scroll and apparently sent a message off to Neo as the ice cream themed girl's scroll pinged. "Thank you. Unofficially, though? We're billionaires."

Down the table, Yang suddenly choked on the glass of juice she'd been drinking. Blake reached over and patted the blonde's back as she hacked and coughed, before finally croaking, "Billion? How?"

"Duped the contents of a certain train. It's where Penny and I have been the last few days. You know how the kingdoms are moving from paper to plastic money?" I asked, getting a nod from the blonde. "They've got to ship the money somehow. We tracked down one of those trains." Everything I said was true, if not truthful. Neither Blake nor Yang needed to know about my involvement with Cinder. Penny, despite not being here at the moment, thankfully knew better than to mention the woman's name around anyone outside myself, Neo, the twins, Jen, and Joan.

"And you intend to funnel all of that back into Fox Hunt?" Joan asked, drawing my attention.

"Yeah. That's the problem. I promised Angel more aircraft to play with, but we can't just have a large sum of money spring into being with no paper trail as to where it came from," I sighed, sitting back in my seat and rubbing at my forehead. It was a problem I had forgotten I'd have to deal with before I had left with Penny. "I think I'm back to trying to get a loan from the bank. Or off a loan shark. Well, no, can't have any trace of Fox Hunt doing business with those sort of people, at least not on paper. What about buying up property and businesses out of town anonymously…" I murmured, trailing off as my mind turned the problem over.

To either side of my, quiet snickering drew my attention to the twins and Neo. Raising an eyebrow, I asked, "What?"

The trio traded a look before Neo asked. "Should we let him off the hook?"

Melanie hummed, shooting me a considering look. "Maybe. If he's learned his lesson. Personally, I kind of want to watch him flounder a bit, until he begs."

Miltia turned an annoyed look on her sister. "That's pushing it too far," she chastised the white-clad twin before turning back to Neo. "I think we've watched him squirm over this one long enough. Besides, he did actually ask me to look into it."

"Out with it," I growled at the trio, though there was no real anger in my voice.

Neo stuck her tongue out before asking, "Jaune, what are we?" Before I could answer, she gestured between herself, Melanie, and Miltia. "The three of us, specifically."

"Danger wrapped in tiny, sexy packages. Bad girls," I grinned.

"That, too," Melanie agreed.

"We're criminals, dear," Miltia clarified, before casting a look at Neo. "To varying degrees."

Neo shrugged. "You two have managed to keep your hands mostly clean, which is pretty amazing in our line of work. Mine are… not so clean."

"Wait," Yang cut in, eyebrows raising. "You're what? What the fuck?"

"Criminals," Joan repeated, yawning. "The twins worked for my old teammate. He's sort of a minor mercenary crime boss at this point. Those two were enforcers and arm decoration."

"Hey!" Melanie and Miltia complained before Miltia continued. "We were not just arm decoration. Hei is a family friend. He offered us training and a job."

Joan shrugged. "That's about what I'd expect from him. I didn't say he was a bad guy, just that there's not much of a point denying what he is. He runs a gang and hires his men out for other jobs to whoever has the cash to pay for it."

"What about her?" Yang asked, pointing at Neo.

The ice cream themed girl smirked. "Extortion, blackmail, robbery, arson, murder. We were quite busy when I was still working with Roman."

"No jaywalking?" I asked, to which Neo stuck her tongue out.

"Never."

Yang's eyes had gone wide. "Murder?!"

Neo shrugged. "What? They were running a child slave ring. Roman found out when we went to do business with them and they offered us 'the goods' as payment. Killing them and turning the kids over to the cops actually made us the good guys, for a change. It was nice."

"'For a change?'" Blake echoed, arching an eyebrow. "How often were you the bad guys?"

"Not that you're one to talk," Neo shot back, earning a flinch, "but I wasn't going to mention the two dozen cops and three ice cream parlor employees in front of the goody good." At the round of blank looks she got, Neo asked, "What? They got my order wrong!"

Melanie sighed, palming her face. "I can't tell if she's joking about that. I don't think she'd kill someone for that, but on the other hand..."

"It's Neo," Miltia finished, mirroring her sister's facepalm.

Neo rolled her eyes. "It was only the one set of murders, actually. We always avoided conflicts with police and I wouldn't kill ice cream parlor employees for getting my order wrong. That's almost literally impossible."

Yang opened her mouth but Joan held up a hand, turning a look on the younger blonde. "She's right. Circumstances leading up to it notwithstanding, if I had come across something like that I would have done the same thing. Give it time, you will too. And before you ask, it's not even remotely in a legal gray area for us. Hunters have the authority, in extenuating circumstances, to kill on sight. Such circumstances include but are not limited to: self-defense, defense of someone else, and defense of a population center. They weren't hunters, so it wasn't exactly legal, but no one's going to bother to dig too deeply into it once they learn the circumstances. At best, she would get a fine and maybe be put under house arrest—what amounts to a slap on the wrist."

"But morally—" Yang tried and Joan shook her head.

"You find yourself in a volatile situation that requires an immediate judgment call. On the one hand, you have pieces of shit who have kidnapped, used, and sold children. On the other hand, you have the children themselves. If you don't take action, things go on as they have been and the entire operation becomes more of a danger to everyone as time goes on. Unless they're drugged out of their wits—" Joan shot a questioning look to Neo, who nodded. "Then they're both in danger and are a danger. Even then, drugs can only do so much. If things get bad enough, they become Grimm lures. If you just subdue the people responsible, then that gives them the opportunity to get free later—either by force or bribery—and they go right back to what they were doing, only smarter this time to keep from getting caught. If they don't escape, they're thrown in prison, where they'll live out a living death sentence with an unknown execution date while at the same time draining the resources of whatever nation they belong to for having to feed, clothe, house, and care for them while they themselves serve as Grimm bait. Jobs for prison detail aren't available while you're in Beacon specifically because you're guaranteed to see people killed. It's the point of housing that many evil people together away from the rest of us—to lure the Grimm into gathering together to spend a day or two trying to force their way in before Hunters come in and wipe them out. Option three is to just end them where you find them. It's quicker and, if you disagree with the use of murderers, rapists, and the like as live bait it's more humane."

I blinked at that, but didn't interrupt. 'That answers a few questions I had but brings up more.'

"But.. but that's— Dad never..." Yang trailed off.

"Grow up," Joan deadpanned. "You honestly think a father would tell his daughters about the darker side to the job when they're as young as you? You're young, idealistic, and naive." Yang opened her mouth and Joan held up a hand. "I don't hold it against you. I was just like you, before…" She shook her head. "Experience comes with time. What I'm saying is to keep an open mind. Things like killing people are never black and white in our line of work." Part of me wanted to chastise Joan for being too hard on the younger girl. A much larger part agreed with her on every point, however. I kept my mouth shut about it.

Deciding now was as good a time as any, I asked, "I'd heard some of that about the prison system before, but I'd like some more details. How does that work, exactly?"

Shifting her crystal blue gaze to me, Joan shrugged. "About like you'd think. We know Grimm have some sort of empathic sense and are attracted to negative emotions. The most negative sorts of people are the kinds that tend to go to prison—murderers, rapists, and so forth. That much evil gathered that close is a siren song Grimm never fail to ignore. Hunters routinely patrol the region to monitor Grimm presence and, when it reaches a peak and they eventually try to break into the prison to get at the prisoners, the staff are evacuated and Hunters come in and clear out the Grimm."

"And the prisoners..." I lead.

Joan's gaze turned cold. "If you actually manage to make it to one of those places, you're either in holding in the minimum security section, in which case you're usually evacuated with the staff, or you're in the maximum security section—in which case, you get to ride it out. No Hunter is in a hurry to keep those kinds of people alive, so there isn't a high survival rate. Once the Grimm breach the external walls, every door locks open, including the exterior doors. It saves on repair costs if Grimm don't have to break down doors."

Frowning, I asked, "They purge the inmates?"

"It's that, or like I said—let them continue to be a money sink," Joan nodded. "At least this way, they're made to be useful to pay off the debt they owe to the rest of society."

"That is... despicable," Blake glared. "So anyone who isn't useful to you gets killed?" she began, her voice rising as she spoke. "What next, leading the elderly out into the forests to die? The handicapped? The poor or unemployed, because they can't contribute?!"

Joan's open palm slapped the table, causing more than one person present to jump and for just an instant, Killing Intent flooded the room—reminding me, and likely everyone else, that while she was generally fairly mild-mannered, the woman before us was a trained Huntress. She was a killer herself. "Do. Not," the Eldest Deadly Sister growled. "Do not delude yourself into thinking that those two things are even remotely similar. You can not conflate executing violent criminals with culling random groups of people just because they're a burden. It's not even an apples-to-oranges comparison, it's like comparing apples to dog shit. We're talking about people who have been tried and convicted, found guilty of their crimes by a jury of their peers. These aren't people who are capable of being rehabilitated and released back into society. These are hardened criminals who would like nothing better than to continue doing whatever it was they were arrested for in the first place."

"Then why not just execute them and be done with it?!" the faunus girl demanded. "It's inhumane and an injustice to just leave them locked up, waiting to be torn apart!"

"Because, it's not about some perception of justice at that point," Joan deadpanned.

"It's about sending a message," Neo quietly added, earning a nod from the older blonde. "'These are things we do not tolerate in a polite society and there are consequences for violating our laws.' It's a deterrent to other would-be criminals of that caliber."

Joan nodded. "Yes. And do you know why it's done?" she asked, looking around the table.

"Because it works," I answered, earning a nod.

"Because it works," she agreed. "You can argue until you're blue in the face about whether it's humane or not, but the fact is, it works on so many levels that it's not going away. In the years since that policy was implemented, violent crime rates have plummeted, along with the rate of Grimm attacks on larger settlements—mostly because many of those swarms are now being drawn to prisons instead of settlements. If you think things are bad now, then you need to brush up on your history. If, after you learn for yourself, you still feel it's wrong then you can either try to change the law, kill them yourself when you find them out of some misguided sense of mercy, or quit being a Hunter."

Frowning, Blake asked, "How can you just calmly kill like that, though?"

"There are four kinds of killers. The first kind are the ones who feel some deep sense of remorse after they've killed someone and usually wind up losing their composure and puking their guts out. They tend to not last long as Hunters. If they're lucky, they get to go Section 8. If not, they quit after their mandatory service is up. The second kind don't feel anything. They become numb to it. This is how most Hunters deal with the responsibility. The third kind are the ones who feel something good about it. There are those of us who feel justified knowing that they're put down a mad dog before it could hurt anyone else. Then there are those who just enjoy killing. That last group tend to be the ones who wind up in jail to begin with."

"I think that's enough on that subject," I interrupted gently, before either of those two could get wound up again.

Silence fell across the table at that, save for the sounds of utensils on plates, before Melanie quietly cleared her throat. "Anyway, Jaune, we've got knowledge. Resources. Experience. Use us."

Miltia reached over and placed one glove-covered hand atop my own. "You try to micromanage and do everything yourself and occasionally miss the bigger picture. Let us help."

Sighing softly, a rueful laugh escaped as I looked between the three girls. "I suppose I have a habit of that," I admitted. "So, what can we do about it?"

Miltia's lips twitched up into a mischievous smile. "You sent me a text asking about 'creative bookkeeping' before we killed Dumbo."

"We figured this would come up sooner or later, so the twins got in touch with some people while you, Penny, and I were out. We've got three people already working on it," Neo supplied.

"It's going to take time, though," Melanie warned. "They can only move so much at a time. You'll have to let Angel know to put getting aircraft on hold for a few weeks, unless she can convince Greene to accept some kind of payment plan."

Shaking my head, I turned my hand over and squeezed Miltia's hand in mine. "Thanks. I can't exactly promise I won't slip and do it again—bad habits, and all that—but do me a favor and let me know when I am?"

"Oh, we will," Neo smirked. "Speaking of bad habits..."

The twins and Neo exchanged looks before all three of them said, at the same time, "Our dates."

When Joan took on a hopeful look and Blake a curious one, I palmed my face. "I know. It's not like I've been putting it off intentionally. Things keep coming up. Stuff happens."

"'Things and stuff.' Sounds important," Yang smirked from across the table.

I shot the blonde a betrayed look. "Yang, don't shit stir."

"There are plenty of 'things and stuff' to do here," Joan deadpanned.

"We're willing to compromise on the timing," Melanie cut in. "We all know how schedules tend to fall apart around you."

Casting my eyes around the table and seeing the girls all seemed to be in agreement, I laughed quietly and nodded. "Okay, we'll make time. We can put everything that isn't important on hold and turn over everything to do with Fox Hunt to Angel and Jim until Beacon starts. Sound good?" The girls nodded at that. "Great. Why don't you get together and work out a schedule? In the meantime, I should probably take care of things in preparation. So that means no movie, sorry to say."

Neo caught my attention, "Swing by your office before you hit up Angel and Jim. There's some stuff you need to approve and sign for."

I rolled my eyes. "Why haven't we switched to entirely paperless?" I asked, though I suspected I knew the answer—for the same reason the 'paperless office' never worked on Earth.

"The need for hard copies," Miltia answered, confirming my suspicions.

With a grunt, I pushed myself up out of my chair. "Alright then. Better to get this done sooner rather than later. I'll text you when I'm finished."

"Be back in time for lunch," Joan called after me.

---

Staring down at the pile of paperwork in my IN tray that had accumulated during my short absence, I frowned. "Note to self, make sure Yin knows she can approve shit in my name," I muttered.

"Will do, sir," a voice I didn't recognize piped up from nearby, and I jumped slightly as I realized someone had managed to sneak up on me.

'How in the world?' I wondered, glancing between the woman in question and my minimap. A plain blue dot showed up right beside my own Fox-masked icon. I could have sworn that hadn't been there a moment ago. The speaker was a little on the tall side for a woman—standing at 5'8", with red hair, blue eyes, and a heart shaped face. She looked somewhat familiar and was sexy in that 'girl next door' sort of way—small but perky breasts emphasized by her tight button-down blouse, creamy pale legs and thighs coming out of a mid-thigh length skirt, shapely hips and waist. Her nameplate listed her as 'Amelia River,' level 15, and attached to my guild. "Thanks," I drawled out the word.

Dropping into the chair at my desk, I pulled everything out of my IN tray and began going over it. Cloth rustling drew my eyes to where the secretary had taken a seat at a second desk and begun typing away at her terminal. Ignoring her, I focused on getting through the backlog before my eyes jerked back up as they caught the motion of her crossing her legs and I realized two things: her desk lacked a back that would have hidden the view of her legs and she was wearing a small, lacy white thong under that skirt. 'Nope. Do not eye up the secretary.' I pulled my eyes away from the sight of her crossed legs under the desk. 'Requisition approval, funds dispersal approval, final after action report for our first official deployment,' I skimmed through the documents, signing what needed signing as I went.

The better part of three hours went by that way, in silence save for fingers tapping at a keyboard, the rustle of paper, and the occasional scratching of my pen as I signed White Fox, Admiral, Fox Hunt to each document needing a signature. I had to admit, the woman's Word Per Minute count was a damn sight higher than mine, going by the sounds of her fingers. She seemed quick and efficient at least, so I could see why Neo hired her. Occasionally, Amelia would shift in her seat or move one of those pale legs up and down, the motion inevitably drawing my eyes for just a moment. If she was going for 'eye candy,' then Neo had succeeded—not that I could blame her. When I finally finished and dropped the stack into my 'Out' box, Amelia stood and moved over to my desk to collect them as I got ready to leave. "I'll have these filed by the end of the day, sir."

"Thank you." Shifting to move around her, I was stopped by a small hand coming to rest in the center of my chest.

"With everything going on, we haven't really been introduced. Why don't you stay a while and we can get properly acquainted?" she asked, her hand curling to dig her nails into my chest slightly—or they would have, if not for the light armor I wore with this outfit.

"Erm," I eloquently said, blinking as I took in the look she was giving me. 'Those are definitely bedroom eyes. Nope. Nuh-uh. Ain't happening. I'm not that kind of boss and I know a honeypot when I see one. Going to have to talk to Neo and/or the twins about this. I can't have someone here trying to seduce me in the office and making things awkward. Or worse, a fucking lawsuit.' Reaching down, I carefully lifted her hand. "Some other time, perhaps. I'm on a tight schedule at the moment."

"Certainly, sir. I'll put it on your calendar," she smirked, and I resisted the urge to facepalm.

Leaving the office—I did not flee—I headed for the elevator. Making the short trip across to the Officers' Quarters, I hurried through security back into our quarters. I changed gear as soon as I was on the other side of the salle port and the smell of food hit me full in the face now that I wasn't wearing my masks. 'That smells delicious,' I mused as my mouth watered. I found Miltia sitting in the living room, speaking with Yang when I walked in. The pair looked up at my entrance and I raised an eyebrow.

Miltia's lips twitched up into a smile. "Everything taken care of?"

"Yeah, we should be good for the handover," I nodded. Dropping onto the couch beside her with a groan, I asked, "Who hired the secretary?"

"I did, why?" Neo's voice answered from the direction of the entry hall and I turned to find her dropping into place on my other side.

"Neo dear, do me a favor?"

The small woman considered it before smirking and answering, "Depends on the favor. Is this favor sexual in nature?"

"Yes. Please don't hire people you'd like to sleep with," I deadpanned.

Neo snorted in quiet laughter. "I have no idea what you're talking about," she denied, though from the tone of her voice I could tell she wasn't being entirely truthful.

Miltia shifted enough to shoot an amused look at Neo before asking me, "Is she a problem?"

"She's a sexual harassment suit waiting to happen."

Neo shrugged, "I don't think you'll have to worry about it. But if it bothers you—"

I rolled my eyes. "It does."

"Then she's fired," Neo continued. "I'll have her replaced before the week is out. I'll make sure the next one is better."

Somehow, I wasn't entirely certain our definitions of the word 'better' lined up in this instance—if the amusement in her tone was anything to go by. I had the feeling I was being set up for a joke at my expense, but knowing Neo it would be harmless fun. Probably. Turning a look on Miltia, I asked, "Why is she in charge of hiring my secretary?"

A mischievous look crossed the short-haired twin's face and she grinned. "Because you made her your second in command. I'm just Head of Intelligence—I don't have anything to do with hiring and firing aside from being part of the screening process."

"Shouldn't that go through Human Resources or something?" I asked, narrowing my eyes at the red-clad girl.

Miltia nodded. "Normally. But since Neo's your 2IC..."

"I can overrule HR, or just skip them entirely," Neo grinned.

Sighing, I asked, "Did you at least vet her?"

"I pulled her from the employee pool, so she'd already been vetted," Neo confirmed. "It's where I'll get the next one too, considering the sensitivity of the documents they'll be handling."

I supposed that was good enough, since the twins and I had checked all of those at various times. 'Well, in that case, it really is harmless. She's having fun with it, so there's really no point raising a stink about it.'

Checking my minimap and finding Joan, Blake, and Penny in the kitchen, I asked, "What are the others up to?"

"Blake is helping Joan with lunch. So is Penny, actually. Penny wanted to learn, but I suspect Blake may have had ulterior motives, since Joan is apparently making fish," Miltia answered.

Neo laughed quietly. "Well, we know what to bribe her with."

A small, lithe form dropped into my lap and Melanie wrapped her arms around my neck. "What'd I miss?"

"Jaune was just telling us how his secretary was too sexy for him to handle," Yang smirked and I turned an annoyed look on her.

"I said she was a lawsuit waiting to happen," I denied. A scroll ringing drew my attention towards my HUD before I realized it wasn't mine going off. I suppressed a smirk as Yang fished her scroll out from her bra. "Do I even want to know why you keep your scroll in your bra?"

"Harder to accidentally break it that way," the blonde admitted with a shrug.

"I'm surprised those things don't crush it," Melanie muttered.

"Shh! I'm trying to eavesdrop," Miltia shushed as Yang flicked a finger across the scroll and Ruby's face appeared a moment later.

In the background, I could make out a patch of bright, blue sky and what looked like a striped rock formation of some sort, vaguely reminding me of images of the painted desert in Arizona. Yang beamed a smile down at the camera. "Hi sis! What's up?"

"Hi Yang," Ruby greeted happily, though I noted a tired quality to her voice. "I'm taking a break for lunch. What're you doing? And where are you?"

A smirk spread across Yang's lips as she answered. "Oh, not much. I'm at Jaune's."

Ruby's eyes went wide. A moment later, her hand holding her scroll moved and her eyes shifted, locking onto mine through the 'back' of the two-sided display. "Hi guys!"

"Having fun?" I asked, and she shrugged.

"The traveling is fun. The training, not so much."

Smiling at the younger girl, Neo asked, "Where's your uncle got you training?"

"I'm not supposed to say," Ruby began as she stood up.

The camera view switched, showing an outwards view with her fingers just to one edge of the screen, and I blinked. 'So, the entire surface is a camera, on both sides? That's kind of cool. I suppose that explains why the video quality is so good.'

As I'd been thinking that, the camera panned around, showing a view of Ruby's surroundings: scrub land, red dirt that looked to have a near-sand consistency where it was disturbed, a slightly more green patch of land around what looked to be a slow moving stream, and finally back around to the painted rock formation Ruby was taking shade under. The scroll's camera switched again and Ruby smiled. From my lap, Melanie hummed before saying, "Looks like Vacuo."

"It's definitely Vacuo," Neo confirmed.

Ruby shrugged. "I can neither confirm nor deny that it's Vacuo. But it's really pretty out here. I always thought deserts were supposed to be all sand dunes and stuff." Her smile dropped as she wrinkled her nose. "Hot, though. Ugh. I need like three showers after this."

"If that stream is deep enough you could always go swimming," I pointed out, and she nodded as a faint blush covered her cheeks. Yang rolled her eyes and I caught a leer from Neo, while I heard giggles from Miltia and Melanie.

"I plan to later. It's why I picked this spot. I killed all the local Grimm yesterday, so there's not much in the area. I'll head into town and meet Uncle Qrow some time after dark, then we'll probably move on in the morning." Her eyes tracked to Yang again. "How's dad?"

"Oh, you know. 'My baby girl is growing up,' blah blah blah. He worries but he'll get over it," Yang shrugged.

"Should I call—" Ruby began to ask, before Yang interrupted.

"No!" she hissed, and I raised an eyebrow at that. "Unless you want him expecting us to call every time we're out on a mission. And do you really want to expose your teammates to our dad?"

Ruby winced. "Yeah, no. That… let's not do that. Dad can be a bit… much."

"Older sister knows best," Yang taunted.

The little redhead leveled a glare at her sister. "And what did you mean 'my' teammates? My dearest sister Yang, are you implying that you don't want to be on the same team as me?"

"Hmm," Yang hummed. "Team with Jaune or team with the cookie monster…"

"Hey!" Ruby grumbled

I rolled my eyes at the byplay. "Your dad's not that bad."

Lilac and silver eyes met mine at the same time, staring in silence for a long moment before the pair burst out laughing. "He—he has no idea!" Ruby chortled.

"I know, right? I mean, there's the meddling," began Yang.

"And the hovering," Ruby added.

"And the dad jokes," the pair synced, in a simultaneous groan.

Yang sighed. "I mean, I know my taste in humor is—"

"Crap," Ruby deadpanned. "Absolute trash. You wouldn't know funny if it walked up to you and smashed you in the face with a pie."

The blonde snorted. "Shut it, you. My sense of humor is great! As I was saying, it's an acquired taste. But dad's like a hundred times worse."

"He really is," Ruby nodded, meeting my eyes again. "You've met dad, but you haven't really had time to get to know him. It gets worse."

Shaking my head at the pair's antics, I grinned. "I don't know. I kind of like your dad. He seems like a decent guy." My grin shifted to a smirk as I added, "Besides, it's a parent's prerogative to embarrass their kids in front of their kids' friends."

"He's working with the enemy, Yang!" Ruby accused, silver eyes going wide.

Yang withdrew as if struck. "I.. I just don't know if I can trust you any more, Jaune. It's like I don't even know you!"

"Ha ha. Laugh it up," I rolled my eyes, earning giggles from the girls.

"They have a point," Melanie agreed from my lap.

Turning my eyes on the white-clad twin, I said, "Remind me to ask your mother to tell me all your embarrassing secrets."

"You know, I never thought there'd be an upside to being an orphan, but I see it now," Neo admitted, turning a smirk on us. "Their dad is an embarrassment," she gestured at Yang and Ruby.

"He really is," the pair agreed in tandem.

Neo's gaze shifted to the twins. "Your mom enjoys embarrassing you."

"That's because our mom is a conniving bitch," Melanie countered.

"She really is," Miltia agreed. "She enjoys head games."

Neo's mismatched eyes locked with my blue. "And your sisters are obsessed with you."

"Hey, now. It's just the one." Neo's eyes bored into my own. "Jun doesn't count. She'll grow out of that phase." Neo's eyes continued boring. "Jen doesn't count either, she needs a constant in her life right now." Still staring. "Jean doesn't count either, she's just annoyed about Jane having slept with someone without her. She's obsessed with the idea of sex with me, not with me in particular." Yet more staring. "Okay now you're grasping, Jane's obsessed with staying away from me of late, that's not being obsessed with me."

"If you say so, dear," Melanie smirked.

An alarm quietly chimed from the other side of the scroll in Yang's hands and Ruby sighed. "Well, I guess break time is over. I should get back to work."

Echoing her sister's sigh, Yang nodded. "Yeah, and I should head back home soon. If I skip training again, dad's going to get annoyed."

Trading goodbyes with Ruby, the scroll shut off and Yang stowed it. Standing up, she popped her back. "You staying for lunch?" I asked, shifting Melanie off my lap as I stood. "Speaking of, let's go check on that."

"Yeah," Yang agreed. "I really do need to leave when we're done, though. I need to up my game if I'm going to keep up with Ruby. Last time she trained under Uncle Qrow she handed me my ass in our next spar. I don't want a repeat of that. I'll swing by again when I get a chance." A smirk crossed her lips as she added, "I figure I'll give you a day or two to start missing having me around before I do, though."

"Oh, you can take a couple of months, then," I teased, and she reached over and smacked me on the arm.

"Ass."

I returned the smack with one of my own. "Blonde."

"Well, if that's not a case of the pot calling the kettle black," Yang snorted.

"It's okay when I do it," I countered, earning an eye roll from the blonde in question.

"Just kiss already," Neo groaned, sidling up to press herself into my side as we headed into the kitchen.

Yang slipped up to my left side and turned a glare on Neo. "Maybe I will."

"Do. It," Neo egged the blonde on.

"Neo," I sighed, turning an annoyed look on the shorter girl. "What have I said before? You break it—"

Strong hands grabbed my jaw, yanking me around to my left as Yang closed the distance. Then her lips were pressed to mine, my mouth opening to meet hers as I responded on reflex and our tongues danced. 'Neo was right. Honeysuckle.'

When the blonde pulled back and broke away, I found myself looking down into a pair of burning red eyes for a moment before she shifted her gaze to Neo and smirked. There was a distinct sway to her hips as she turned on the spot and walked into the kitchen, leaving Neo, the twins, and I standing there. "Did that just happen?" Miltia asked.

"She snapped," Melanie answered.

"Fucking finally," Neo chuckled. "Now, if Jaune will just get her into bed…"

I reached down and swatted the ice-cream themed girl's ass. "Trouble maker," I accused.

"You know it," she agreed.

Shaking my head, I managed to put one foot in front of the other and finished the short trek to the kitchen. I caught sight of Penny sitting next to Blake in the kitchen while Joan leaned against the counter next to the stove, where the timer for the oven was counting down from just under ten minutes. The gynoid's green eyes went wide and her face lit up in a blush. Yang, I noticed, still looked incredibly smug where she sat to Blake's right, opposite Penny. Blinking, I asked, "Penny, are you okay?"

Her mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water, Penny shook her head slowly as she reached up to hide her face. "No?"

"What's the matter?" I asked, my eyes darting in to take in the others and noticing various looks of amusement to some degree. "What didn't you tell me?"

"I-I… when you told me to go to bed last night I didn't," Penny began, and I nodded.

"Okay," I drew the word out. "And?"

Penny's blush grew brighter, if that was possible. "I peeked through the walls."

Yang's face screwed up in confusion. "'Peeked through the walls?' Do you have x-ray vision or something?"

I blinked twice as the implications registered. Bringing my hand up and palming my face, I groaned loudly. "Oh god, I am not ready for this conversation." Muffled giggles erupted from the others and I glared at them from between my fingers, though there wasn't much heat in it. "This isn't funny," I sighed, exasperation tinting my voice. Turning to the gynoid, I asked, "How much did you watch?"

"All of it," she answered quietly. "I'm sorry!"

"It's fine, Penny." Taking in her mortified state, I resisted the urge to smirk. "Well, you won't peek through the walls next time, will you?"

"No!" she whined piteously.

"So, next time I urge you to go to bed," I lead, and she nodded swiftly, sending copper colored hair flying with the force of her head shaking.

"I will!" she promised.

Sighing in relief at that, I added softly, "Well, at least you learned something from it."

"Yes," Penny agreed, and I raised an eyebrow. "Biologicals are weird."

"Oh, this should be good," Neo muttered, eyes alight with mirth as she watched Penny.

"'Biologicals?'" Yang repeated.

Ignoring the blonde, Miltia asked, "How do you mean, Penny?"

With a completely innocent look, Penny answered, "You have physical ports for biological data exchange."

"Last time I checked, so did you," Melanie countered, and Penny flushed at that, but kept going.

"But it's so inefficient!"

Grinning, Joan argued, "But it's fun."

Penny shot the woman across from her a skeptical look. "I don't know… You have to reseat the ports so many times during a single coupling just to exchange data!"

"Again, fun," Joan repeated.

"Mmm," Neo hummed. "Talk techie to me more."

Shooting the ice cream themed girl an amused look, I did just that. "Open your ports so I can dump my data."

"That's…" Miltia began.

Melanie finished in a flat, "Terrible." At the same time, Yang finally lost it and broke down into peals of laughter.

"Oh, so you aren't interested. More for me, then!" Neo chirped. "Now, come here, Jaune. I want a torrent of your data all over my display."

Penny tilted her head to the side, sending Neo a confused look. "You keep using these words. I don't think they mean what you think they mean."

"So wait," Joan began, turning an amused look on my ancula. "You've got an always-on internet connection, right?" Penny nodded as Yang mouthed a silent 'what?' "And this is the first time you've ever seen people engaging in sexual acts?"

"Well, no," Penny admitted. "But having the data in my libraries or seeing something on the internet is not the same as seeing… that." Poking her fingers together, she quietly added, "It's different when it's people you know."

"No shit," I groaned quietly. Nearby ,Yang collapsed into a chair at the counter with a stunned expression on her face as she stared at Penny. Neo and the twins broke into laughter.

"It's not that funny," I deadpanned.

Neo met my eyes, wiping tears of mirth from her own. "Oh, but it is, my love. Her face is priceless," she pointed at Yang.

The twins nodded along with Neo. "It really is," Melanie agreed. "I think she finally caught on."

"The penny dropped," Miltia added, earning a snort from Neo.

Yang pointed at the little redhead. "You're a—"

"Girl?" I supplied.

Yang shook her head. "No, a—"

"Person," I cut her off.

"Ro—" Yang tried again.

Penny smiled a shy smile at the blonde. "Robot?"

"Yes?" Yang drew the word out.

"Ancula Myrmidons, Penny Polendina," Penny supplied. "A combat gynoid."

"Where…?" the blonde asked, looking around the room.

I rolled my eyes. "Atlas. Where else?"

Frowning, the blonde's lilac eyes narrowed as she considered things. "You all knew!"

"You were the only one who didn't know," Melanie countered.

"Even Ruby knows," Miltia added.

Biting her lip, Penny asked, "Does… does this change anything?"

Yang was not oblivious to the tone. Shaking her head, she pulled Penny into a hug. "Nope. It explains a lot, though."

"Changing the subject," I began. "I know what the others will enjoy. What were you thinking for your date night?"

Joan hummed. "Two days and nights." There were sounds of protest from the twins and Neo, before Joan cut them off with a glare and two words. "Three. Weeks."

"Fine," the protesting trio acquiesced.

I raised an eyebrow at Joan's request. "So, what? You want a vacation?"

Joan shot me a flat look. "'Vacation?' What's that? Does it taste good?"

Snorting softly, I nodded. "Okay, so you've never had a vacation before. It's this magical thing where you take a few days and leave town. Go somewhere. See sights. Spend a few nights in a little village somewhere in the middle of nowhere."

"So, my job, essentially," Joan rolled her eyes.

That brought me up short for a moment, before I came up with an idea. "Okay. I may have something else in mind, then. I know a lake in the middle of nowhere…"

"Done," Joan agreed quickly, before frowning as she dug out her scroll. "Tomorrow?"

I shook my head. "I need to go see someone tomorrow night or the day after," I denied, turning a look on Neo, who smirked at that. "Day after that, maybe?"

Joan bit her lip, then shook her head. "Not if you want to see our parents. Personally though, I'm all for blowing them off and fucking off to the middle of nowhere for two days, if you want to."

"Tempting, but no," I denied. "It'll have to be after."

"Fine," the elder blonde sighed. "We can leave that evening."

"Jaune," Penny spoke up, drawing my gaze. "Do you want us to come with you to meet your parents?"

Neo snorted softly at that. "Like he could stop us."

Beside her, the twins nodded. "We're coming," Melanie agreed.

"We'll need transport large enough for all of us, that isn't visibly tied to Fox Hunt," Miltia supplied.

Looking between the three of them, I asked, "You're sure? I've got no idea what we'll be walking into."

The trio exchanged looks before nodding. "We're sure," they synced.

"It's kind of creepy when they do that," Blake murmured from the other couch.

Turning a look on the faunus girl, I asked, "What about you? You want to come too?"

Blake hummed, then shook her head. "Tempting as it is, I've already made plans. There's a new book being released that day by an author I like. It's about a man with two souls." Biting her lip, she offered, "I could put if off, if you wanted—"

"It's fine, Blake," I denied. "I'm sure you'll hear about it afterwards." Thinking about it a moment, I added, "Or I could do the tacnet thing and send you the feed."

Blake shook her head, "No. As curious as I am, it would distract from my book. Can I get the details after?"

"Okay then," I nodded. Turning my gaze on Joan, I asked, "So, what's for lunch?"

"Blake wanted tuna," Joan began and I made a face. "Yeah, I remembered you hated it before."

I blinked at that. It wasn't the first time my tastes and those of the original Jaune had lined up. Then again, there were lots of coincidences like that between me and the Arc siblings. 'Luckily, I've yet to find something I enjoyed that this body's taste buds hate.'

I pulled myself out of my thoughts in time to hear Joan saying, "Penny had fish in her inventory, so I baked those, some fries, and hushpuppies." She checked the timer and popped open the oven to check. "Looks done to me," she shrugged, turning off the oven then reaching in to pull the dishes out. With her back turned, Joan didn't see my hand twitch to stop her from doing so, but everyone else did. While Yang and Blake looked confused, Melanie, Miltia, and Neo shot me knowing looks. Penny, on the other hand, bounced up to help Joan.

"Sounds good," I finally said, grabbing a stack of plates down out of the cabinet and gesturing for the elder blonde to go first.

Lunch was quick and, soon enough, I was washing up plates as everyone was getting ready to go see about doing their own things. Finishing up the last plate, I stretched and popped my back before looking to Miltia and asking, "So, we've got a couple of hours to kill before our date. How ever shall we pass the time?"

"Actually," Miltia began, digging out her scroll. "There are some other things you should probably take care of while you've got some time. Things like picking up transport to get us to your parents' home without using a company car."

"But what about—" Melanie began, only for her sister to throw her an unamused look.

"You are not draining him dry on my date night before it's even started," Miltia denied hotly.

Neo laughed at that. "Oh, I see how it is. Someone's feeling possessive tonight."

"We agreed—" Miltia began and Neo waved her off.

"And I agree. Really," Neo nodded, before a smirk crept across her lips. "I'd be kind of pissed off too, if it was my night and he couldn't cover my face and hair in hot, steaming c—"

Hitting Neo with Silence, I turned an amused look on her. "That's enough of that." Giving the three of them a peck on the lips, I headed for the door. "Right, then. Errands it is. Again. Yay."

I dropped the Silence on Neo and opened the door. Not a second before I closed it, the ice cream themed girl continued where she'd left off. I rolled my eyes as I began the process of passing through security to get out of the base as the Fox. 'Miltia mentioned transport. She's right, we can't just use the sedans for this. I'm sure anyone with brains watching the base has figured out we use those. Maybe an SUV?'

I would have to swing by a car lot on the way back to pick up Miltia. Before that, though, I needed to check in on the state of the gangs. I knew we had been collecting the tithes they had been leaving us from their operations, but I wanted to make sure the mental commands I'd left using Dominate were still in place and perhaps add some new ones. Specifically, I'd be using them to be on the lookout for White Fang operations within the city. A thought occurred on my way out the elevator and into the light. Casting Wings, I took off across the city, throwing on Invisibility and the rest of my Stealth suite of spells as I went. 'I wonder if I could get away with sending the gangs after the trains the White Fang stole. Cinder doesn't know I've consolidated them by puppeting their leaders.'

Checking my map, I made sure the tracking spell I'd placed on the train was still working as I considered it. 'Run it by the individual gang leaders. Pose it as a hypothetical. 'What would you do if you found out the White Fang was sitting on a load of Lien?' If they think they have the forces to try to capture it, then it could be worth it. And it's not like I'm really risking anything there, since I poached all the decent people from their ranks to bolster Fox Hunt.'

I was still thinking it over when I dropped into an alley and switched over to my Shiro gear. 'Okay, first stop, Akamaru. Let's see what he has to say before I decide. After that,' I glanced up at the bar labeled 'SP' on my HUD. Gamer Semblance updates seemed kind of important and having one fail was… unsettling. There was also the worry that, if I hit zero SP, one of two things could happen: either my Semblance would stop working, or I'd die. Oh sure, there was always the third option that maybe nothing would happen, but I didn't want to chance it. 'So, gangs first, then create and clear an ID or three in town to refill Spirit. After that, swing by a car lot to dupe one then back to base to get cleaned up for our date.'

My HUD pinged, alerting me to a new email. Raising an eyebrow, I checked both the address it had been sent to and from. 'Came in from Fox Hunt's secure mail server. Don't recognize the address though.'

Shrugging, I opened the mail and found a video waiting. I watched the first few seconds play out and realized what it was I was looking at. A quick text to Miltia asking who had been working on our video editing project confirmed who the email address belonged to. 'Jen must have been working on this since we got it in. Didn't know she had any experience with video editing,' I mused. I would have to thank her in person next time I saw her. Spending a few seconds to compose a short email, I fired off a copy of the video to April as I had promised. Considering that this wasn't exactly breaking news but rather a public interest piece on Fox Hunt, her producers would need time for their editors to go over everything. I didn't expect to see it in the news for a few days at least.

---

While I thoroughly enjoyed the feeling of Miltia's ass grinding against my crotch through our clothes, the decor and music left much to be desired. As the 'song' ended and the next one began, the petite girl took my hand and lead me off the dance floor. Weaving through the crowd and tossing a negligent wave towards where Hei sat at a table off to the side of the dance floor, we hit the exit and I resisted the urge to sigh in relief as the blaring thump of bass and chirping of techno was muted by the walls of the club. Miltia laughed quietly as she caught her breath. "Thank you, Jaune. That was fun, and I know how much you hate club dancing."

"I don't really mind, if it's for you," I shrugged.

"I appreciate it," Miltia nodded, slipping up against my side and putting my arm around her as we walked towards the car. "That worked up an appetite."

Slipping into the car and leaving Junior's club behind us, I considered our options. Beside me, I felt Miltia briefly struggle against the Dominate spell holding her—token resistance at best, but more likely a demand for attention. It was even more token given the fact that, with the masks she and her sister had absorbed, either of them could break my mental spells pretty much at will if they wanted to. I had yet to actually get through their defenses when they were trying to keep me out. Thankfully, at least for Miltia, some experimentation had shown that the resistance could be dialed down—or shut off entirely in this instance, as she trusted me enough to let me control her. Well, that, and the act of having me control her really turned her on. Case in point, our date tonight.

Smirking, I directed one of her hands to clutch the seatbelt resting between her small breasts, while the other settled on her right thigh, not quite close enough to touch herself. As I left her hands there, I felt her desire and excitement ratchet up another notch across our link. Considering that I had been in control of her since we'd left Fox Hunt, she was already worked up to begin with—but the agonizingly slow, teasing approach was starting to drive her mad. "I'm thinking we should find somewhere nice and… public to eat," I mused aloud.

Miltia flexed against the spell again, but it was my words that spilled from her lips this time as she answered, "That sounds wonderful. We should get a table." Her eyes widened slightly as she realized what it was I had in store for her and I turned a knowing grin on her for a moment as we drove on. For the most part, I was allowing her to speak and react as she would normally, just giving her a mental push to do so—that is, until I found somewhere it'd be more amusing to override her, such as forcing her to offer up the suggestion for our seating arrangements. With a booth, we would have at least some semblance of privacy. A table would put us in plain view of anyone who happened to be looking our way and paying attention. The risk of being caught had sent her heart rate climbing the moment the words slipped past her lips.

The short ride to our destination was spent in companionable silence, save for the radio pouring out some instrumental piece. The place I had in mind for the night was a small, upscale restaurant with the sort of classic look and feel I preferred. Dim interior, candles on the table, intimate atmosphere, with just enough background noise to allow for a sense of private conversation. More importantly—no screaming kids, no obnoxiously loud idiots, and the wait staff knew their trade well. They even had a band playing something along the lines of jazz in the corner.

Once we were seated and our orders taken, I turned my attention fully on the red-clad twin across the table from me. Miltia had traded her usual outfit for a shorter, lighter red dress that clung in all the right places, and the only makeup she wore was a bit of green eyeliner and a shade of pink lipstick that drew the eye. Those pink lips tilted upwards in a small, smug smile as she watched my eyes take in her form—the hunger in her green eyes probably mirrored my own, and had nothing to do with the food we were waiting on.

"So," I began, "got any plans for once I'm in Beacon?"

She flexed against the spell holding her again as she answered. "Yep."

I blinked at that as her mouth shut and she smiled. Giving her a mental prod, I asked, "Really? Such as…?"

"Nothing much," she evaded, and I frowned in thought as I realized she'd figured out a way to lie while under Dominate. Well, not necessarily lie so much as tell half-truths and withhold information

"You're being evasive," I pointed out, deciding to turn it into a game.

The girl across from me smirked in reply. Under my direction, she scooted her chair further in and leaned forward to rest her elbow on the table and her chin in her right palm. Her left hand moved down to her lap, playing with the hem of her skirt which had ridden up her deliciously creamy thighs when she'd sat. Her heart rate and breathing picked up slightly in excitement, before settling back down as she realized that I wasn't going to make her take it further for the moment. With a little more mental encouragement to speak, she began. "Well, there's the bag project, for instance. You still need to fix the whole 'exploding failure' issue if we're going to sell them."

I winced. "Yeah. Can't say that losing a limb is an appealing consequence of the seals failing," I admitted. The problem on my end had been lack of time to play with it. I couldn't just Semblance up a working pattern for what I wanted and Sanguine's notes had been less than helpful on this particular issue. This one was going to fall to me to fix on my own. 'The look in her eyes says she's still dancing around whatever it is she doesn't want me to know, but I get the feeling it's more of a game for her, too—showing that she can resist in different ways.' Leaning on the spell, I tried the brute force approach. "Anything else?"

"We talked it over and we're going to have Jen train us while she's staying with us," she answered as a smile spread across her lips that looked more akin to Neo's preferred shit eating grin than something I'd normally see on Miltia. And of course I already knew that, as she was aware.

Nodding, I asked, "To what end?"

"To get stronger, obviously," she retorted, mirth dancing in her eyes.

"Smartass," I accused, and she stuck her tongue out at me. In response, I focused on Dominate and shifted her left hand two inches up her thigh, leaving her index finger just brushing her mound through her panties and drawing a quiet gasp from Miltia's lips. "Why?"

"Do I need a reason to want to get stronger?" Miltia asked, her eyes going half-lidded as she glared at me for teasing before I smoothed her face back out into a smile, which immediately shifted back into 'shit eating grin' territory the moment I wasn't focused on it.

In a normal conversation, that would usually be a sign to the person asking questions that they were being an asshole and should drop the subject. In this case however, it was one more example of how she could evade without directly going against the spell forcing her to speak. I didn't particularly care what the girls had planned—I'd like to know, but not knowing wouldn't bother me since I trusted them. The fact that she didn't want me to know was interesting, but more interesting was her showing me the gaps in my Dominate spell. Her reply had cornered me, though. If anyone was actually paying attention, then pressing further would be out of place and she knew it. Verbal check, as it were.

"Clever girl," I murmured, earning a giggle from the girl in question.

The waiter arrived with plates bearing our food before disappearing as swiftly as he'd come. "This looks good," Miltia said, taking in the pasta dish on her plate—some chicken thing with white cheese sauce that I didn't bother to remember the name of.

Digging my fork into my lasagna, I hummed appreciatively as the first bite hit my tongue. As Miltia's fork reached her lips, I pushed my will on the Dominate spell on her, directing the hand still in her lap to shift and begin slowly stroking her sex through her silk panties. The girl squirmed, nearly dropping her food, but I forced her to recover and go still. Green eyes locked with my blue again as I fed her while slowly teasing her. As I made her swallow, I smiled and pointed at her lips, where a small dab of that thin cheese sauce had smeared rather suggestively. "That's a good look for you," I smirked.

I let her tongue dart out and lick the sauce off under her own direction, keeping her hands occupied as she spoke. "You're a cruel man, Jaune."

"You enjoy it," I countered, forcing her head to bob in a nod. "And it could be worse. I could have you doing all sorts of humiliating things."

Miltia chuckled softly. "That's Melanie," she denied, before a small, mischievous smirk crossed her lips. "Oops. You didn't hear that from me."

"Oh really?" I asked, raising an eyebrow. "I'll have to remember that. And just throwing your sister under the bus like that—how terrible."

"I have no idea what you mean," she demurred, a happy smile on her face as I fed her another bite.

"Uh huh," I shot her a knowing look at that. "Trouble maker."

"Mother always said we had a talent for causing trouble," Miltia chuckled.

"When's the last time you visited her, by the way?" I asked, popping another forkful of lasagna into my mouth and contemplating wandering into the kitchen to throw around a few Charm spells to get the recipe.

Miltia hummed as a thoughtful look crossed her face. "It's been a while. We should visit her soon, and bring you along when we do. She likes you."

I turned a skeptical look on her. "You sure about that, given the head games?"

"Yes. That's just mom being mom. And then there's Dating Mode to consider," she mused aloud and I rolled my eyes. Miltia waited as I began sipping my drink, then added, "We wouldn't mind you giving us a little sister." I choked, coughing as I set down the drink as she smirked. "I'm sure mother would appreciate the company of a younger man."

"You. Bitch," I managed to choke out as I cleared my throat. "You planned that." It was yet another flaw in the Dominate spell—namely, unless given specific instructions otherwise or unless I was fully in control of them, then the person under it could still plan against the person casting it. Sure, surprising me and causing a coughing fit wasn't exactly intent to harm, but it was still subversive to the intent of the spell. Then again, Miltia was the one person who had the most experience being under that particular spell at all levels of effect and I hadn't completely crushed her will as I had with the criminals I'd used it against, so she could still plot against me—actively wanted to, in this instance. That, and she had both a naturally high Will save and her mask to fall back on, so perhaps she was the exception.

"I would never do anything to upset my master," she murmured quietly, amusement and anticipation radiating off her from our link.

I stilled her left hand, directing her to push aside her panties. A moment later, she gasped quietly as I forced her to roughly shove two fingers deep into her sopping snatch. Her breath hitched in her throat as they withdrew, before slipping up to circle her clit. Then they stopped entirely, pulling away as I set her back to eating. Frustration and excitement in equal parts spilled across our link and I smirked at her. "I think you would, just to get a rise out of me."

"Absolutely," she admitted as I forced her to answer honestly. "What's the fun in having an owner if you don't occasionally step out of line, just so he can correct you?" Her eyes widened slightly at being forced to say that and she blushed faintly.

"Why am I not surprised?" I shook my head, grinning at her answer. 'Then again, she didn't actually try to be evasive about the answer, so she wants me to know this as opposed to whatever she was hiding earlier,' I realized. "Finish your meal, pet, and if you're good I might just take you on a walk."

"Promise?" she asked, and I rolled my eyes, focusing instead on my meal as I idly directed the hand in her lap to stroke her inner thigh.

By the time we left, after I had managed to Charm the chef into giving me copies of his recipes, Miltia had to lean against my arm to steady herself as her legs didn't quite want to cooperate and her breath came in quiet pants. "Where are we going?" Miltia asked as I helped her into the car before moving around to my side.

Turning a grin on her as I started the car and pulled out, I shrugged. "I found a nice spot on one of my flights across the city," I answered vaguely, reaching over to turn on the radio, familiar synthesized notes pouring from the speakers as A-Ha's Take On Me began playing. I laughed quietly as I forced Miltia to dance along to the music in her seat, much to her amusement.

"Something from Earth?" she asked as her body bounced around out of her control.

"Some anime dance that was ridiculously popular a few years back," I answered as she brought her hands up to her head like ears and shifted about in her seat. "I should have you, Melanie, and Neo all do it and record it for future blackmail material."

"It only works as blackmail if it bothers us," Miltia pointed out. "I think it's cute, Melanie wouldn't mind, and Neo would go along just for laughs."

"Curses, foiled again," I heaved an obviously exaggerated sigh, stilling Miltia's dancing and turning my eyes back to the road for the few minutes it took to get to our destination.

As we pulled to a stop, the short-haired twin raised an eyebrow at our surroundings—an empty parking lot on the Residential District side of the river, not too terribly far from my old apartment. Directing her out of the car and to follow, we walked towards a ten foot rise in the land that stretched out to our left and right ahead of us—clearly a man-made feature as opposed to a natural part of the terrain. "What is this?"

"River embankment," I answered as we crested the top, to a view of the commercial district across the water with the city's lights dancing off the river stretched before us. Pulling a folded blanket from my Inventory, I found a flat section of ground and spread it out before dropping down to sit. Miltia kicked off her heels as she stepped onto the blanket before dropping gently into my lap under my direction. Leaning back against the embankment, I pulled the lithe girl in my arms closer as she pressed her lips into mine—our kiss slow, languid, and unhurried. My hands trailed down her back and flanks to her thighs, before slipping back up and under the hem of her one piece dress. Her skin felt hot, flushed under my fingers as I enjoyed the feel of her. Miltia fought briefly against the spell holding her, trying to move her hands, but I kept them draped around my shoulders.

Silk panties met my fingers and I met her eyes as I smirked against her mouth before grabbing them and giving them a firm yank, ripping them off of her and tossing them to the side. Her teeth snapped down, catching my bottom lip between them as she bit down—not hard enough to break my Aura or draw blood, but definitely enough to feel uncomfortable. "I liked that pair, Jaune."

I cast a glance down at the stringy little red number lying in a pitiful, wadded up ball on the blanket, soaked through with her excitement. "They look better there."

"You're horrible," she murmured against my mouth as I kissed her again, effectively shutting her up even if I could have just forced her silence with the spell holding her.

My scroll ringing brought the fun to a temporary halt as my HUD displayed an icon for an incoming video call. Miltia's irritation at the interruption showed as I felt my control over the spell holding her snap. "Who is it?"

"Ruby," I frowned. "I could just—"

Miltia sighed, shaking her head. "Go ahead. Let's see what she wants."

I fished my scroll out of my pocket and answered the call. "Ruby, what's up?"

The scroll in my hand lit up, showing a field of stars for a moment. A quiet splash sounded and a pale hand took the scroll on her end and tilted it down until it came to rest on a head of dark hair—black in the low light cast by the scroll—and a pair of silver eyes above a wavering, watery surface. Ruby pushed upwards slightly, exposing her lips, neck, and stopping at bare shoulders as she sent me a hesitant smile. "Hey, Jaune."

I raised an eyebrow at that, catching Miltia's eyes as her expression mirrored my own. "What're you doing?"

The girl on the other side of the scroll stuck out her tongue. "Swimming," she answered, as though it should be obvious. "It was hot all day and I wanted to wash off the funk."

"I see that," I murmured.

'This is unexpected,' Miltia's mental voice pointed out, and I silently agreed.

The camera bobbed as Ruby shifted on the other side. "What about you?" she asked as she moved, before the camera settled back down.

"We're just enjoying a night out," I answered vaguely.

"We?!" the little reaper asked, panic suddenly in her voice. She ducked down lower in the water, silver eyes going wide as she asked, "'We' who?!"

Miltia shifted off my lap and molded herself to my side, bringing herself into frame on the other end as Ruby's eyes tracked the other girl. "Me," the twin answered with a small smile.

"Buh-I-uh… But I—" Ruby spluttered quietly. Miltia sent the girl on the other end a knowing look, before turning and locking lips with me—a quiet, throaty moan clearly audible. While her lips were sealed to mine, the red-clad twin's green eyes were locked firmly on Ruby. I glanced at the scroll to see silver eyes had went wide and even in the low light provided by the glow of her scroll, I could make out the blush creeping up her features. "I'llcallbacklater!" the redhead whimpered, disconnecting the call.

"That was evil," I scolded gently, pulling back from the girl in my arms.

Miltia snorted softly. "No, evil would have been mounting and then riding you while you two talked. Now that I think about it, I should have done that." Laughing softly, she rolled back into my lap. "Now, where were we?"

I reasserted my hold over the girl straddling my waist, forcing her to stand. One hand slipped down to grab her dress and lift it, exposing her bare sex to my gaze. The other hand moved down to lightly stroke herself, her long fingers working back and forth gently over her bare lips—never quite dipping between them or coming close enough to brush her clit. "I believe I was going to force you to torture yourself while I watched." Meeting her green eyes with my blue, I smirked as I asked, "How long do you think I can keep you right on the edge before you start begging?"

"I'm on the verge of begging now," Miltia pointed out breathlessly. She whimpered as I forced her to spread her lower lips wide, taking in the sight of her for a moment before resuming her teasing.

"Too bad you're not quite there yet, then," I smiled and the girl before me bit her lip. I forced Miltia to stand like that, the soft, wet sounds of her stroking her cunt filling the air for several minutes as I felt her struggling against the spell grow more and more desperate, aching to let me allow her to do more while fighting against her own self-control not to simply snap the spell holding her.

Finally, when I felt she really could stand no more, Miltia's head lowered. Her green eyes stared up at me through dark lashes. "Please? Won't you please let me come, master?"

I stilled her hand. "Come here," I ordered, allowing her enough control to move on her own as I beckoned her closer.

Miltia stumbled as her knees threatened to buckle, but I caught her by the hips and held her steady, directing her how to move and ending up with her thighs to either side of my neck as she straddled my face. I put my mouth to work kissing her lower lips. The taste of cherry filled my mouth as I lapped up and down the small girl's slit, giving her the attention she'd been desperately craving all night. Long, thin fingers threaded into my hair seeking a handhold as her thighs began to shake. 'She really was that close,' I mused as she shuddered in my arms.

Forcing the girl to stand on shaky legs, I followed her up and helped her disrobe. Holding out a hand, I Conjured up a collar and leash. "Ready for that walk now?"

Melanie's green eyes went wide as she bit her lip and excitement radiated over our link. "Oh my."

---

The day after my date with Miltia was a total loss in terms of getting anything productive done. On the other hand, I believed that time enjoyed was never time wasted—and the day was very enjoyable. The girls agreed, if their insistence on not leaving the bed for anything except food and the occasional break was anything to go by. I was beginning to worry for the state of our bed though, if the creaking it had developed was anything to go by—that, and the structural integrity of the wall the headboard rested against.

Joan had been talked into helping set up and power new wards both over Fox Hunt itself and the Officers' Quarters where we made our home. I was still looking for a pattern or theories on a pattern in Sanguine's notes that would give me a way to curtail Raven's spying, but I didn't have much hope of finding anything any time soon. Well, Raven's spying, and the ever present possibility that she could decide the money had gotten too good and she wanted to turn 'Shiro' over to Atlas. Or do something like opening a portal into an active volcano just to play a real life game of 'the floor is lava' if she decided to screw with me—assuming that was within the scope of her Semblance's power.

Even with my current skill level, I simply lacked the necessary experience to interpret much of the information in the faunus-turned-spirit's journal and I had no completed patterns that would fit the bill. That was fine though, since it gave me something to work towards, along with the bags.

Today, as soon as I had managed to get out of bed and prod Neo and Miltia into getting up and joining me in the shower, we had changed into our Fox Hunt outfits and headed down to the briefing room, while leaving the other girls to sleep. Miltia was dressed for the role of Head of Intelligence today while Neo was in her Yin disguise and mask as my Second. Angel had apparently been busy and wanted to go over her findings before we video called Greene to negotiate terms on the new hardware we were trying to purchase. We entered to find the smell of coffee filling the briefing room and Miltia and Neo broke off to join Angel at the coffee maker.

"Angel, you truly live up to your name," Neo murmured, beginning to fix her own cup.

"We order it in bulk. I'm pretty sure every military in existence would simultaneously mutiny if Grimm managed to destroy the coffee plantations," Angel grinned before turning to shoot me a curious look as I sat down. "Boss?"

"No thanks," I shook my head.

Miltia's mask shifted, becoming inert and allowing her to push it up to rest atop her head—Angel being one of the few that had seen all of our faces, we trusted her not to blab. Smirking as she filled her own cup, the short-haired twin said, "He doesn't do coffee."

Neo's smirk mirrored Miltia's as she moved over to sit on my right. "Give me a kiss," she demanded, puckering up and leaning in.

Reaching out, I pushed her gently away with a finger to her forehead. "After you brush your teeth."

"Blasphemy," Angel shook her head, taking her own seat as Miltia dropped into the seat on my left. "Don't let the men hear you say that, boss."

"Just a little one?" Neo persisted, and I rolled my eyes at her teasing.

"Nope," I denied, shaking my head as she slipped away from my finger on her forehead and closed the distance.

"Come on, you won't even taste it," she tried.

"I will throw out your ice cream if you keep that up," I threatened.

Neo's eyes went wide. "You wouldn't dare!"

"You don't know me very well, then," I countered. "I absolutely would. For an entire week."

The shorter girl shot me a glare before dropping into her seat with a pout. "You win this round."

Shaking her head and draining the last of her coffee, Angel said, "Right. On to business."

"And away from those two trying to one-up each other," Miltia added, sticking her tongue out at us as she did.

Angel ignored the byplay as Neo made a lewd gesture with her own tongue in answer and I rolled my eyes at the pair's antics. The hologram projector in the center of the table lit up, displaying a picture of what looked like a bullhead. "We can go over these one by one if you like—"

"Send the detailed report to my scroll and just give us the summary, please," Miltia instructed, and Angel nodded. I would be going over those in private with her later anyway, since this was something I needed to learn as part of my role as the owner of the company. Also, in case Miltia was injured or otherwise indisposed and could not handle it. That of course brought to mind the fact that there was no real redundancy for the upper positions. Critical roles were left without people capable of filling in, should something happen. I made a mental note to ask about that, since I was pretty sure I couldn't have been the first person to think of it as training up replacements was standard operating procedure in military organizations.

"Yes, ma'am. Sixty bullheads on offer. Of those, sixteen are either in dire need of repair or are fit only for parts. Nine are in moderate condition and could be refit inside a few months. Six are in need of miscellaneous replacement parts but would be airworthy within a few weeks of purchase if we ordered the parts—faster if we cannibalized parts off that first sixteen. The rest are in good, working condition but require maintenance. We could have a fleet up within a week or two," Angel began as a detailed list of each unit and the parts required for each replaced the bullhead in the holographic display.

"How much are we looking at for the lot, plus cost of repairs?" Neo asked, eyeing the list warily.

Angel tapped at her scroll and ours chimed a moment later. Looking at the figure in question, I winced. "Yeah, we can't swing that at the moment, can we?"

"No," Miltia denied. "Not if we want to stay above board."

"Can't we just use the hack tool to change the records?" Neo asked, and I shook my head.

"Too much risk. We'd have to alter the digital records, then I'd have to hunt down everyone involved outside of Fox Hunt and alter their memories," I denied. Shifting my gaze to Angel, I ordered, "Forget you heard that last part."

"Sorry boss, I couldn't hear you all the way over there. Did you say something?" the older woman asked.

"Good girl," I grinned under my mask.

On my left, Miltia drummed her fingers on the desk, adding, "There are also the physical records to consider. Melanie and I have been looking into where they're kept. We need to do something about the bill of sale for the stuff we've already purchased, preferably before we get audited—which is probably going to be either the end of the year or the end of the fiscal year."

I winced at that. I really didn't want the Remnant IRS equivalent digging around my organization. "Right, get me that quick as you can please."

"Yes, dear," Miltia smiled and I chuckled.

"So, we have an idea what to do about getting these from Greene without paying cash up front?" I asked, and Miltia hummed.

"Perhaps," she nodded. "We have enough in official liquid assets for a ten percent down payment. With that, they would possibly be willing to allow us to pay off the rest."

I blinked at that before rolling my eyes. "Right. Should have considered that," I admitted, scrubbing a hand through my hair. I'd taken out more than one vehicle loan before, so I knew how that process worked—I just hadn't expected the same thing to apply to our situation. That, and I hated the very concept of interest. Usury was a sin for a reason, after all—on the personal level, it was voluntary indentured servitude and on an international level it was economic warfare. I had gotten to the point where I'd much rather just save money and buy things outright—even if it meant I'd do without for a while. 'On the other hand, this is a 'spend money to make money' situation,' I mused, before finally nodding. "Okay. We'll lead with that—unless there are any objections or anyone has a better idea?"

There were no objections, so I reached out to the interface on the table to dial up Greene and open negotiations as Miltia and Neo replaced their masks.

---

'My faith in the universe is restored. Even on Remnant, lawyers and salesmen are universally despicable,' I groused later that night as I made my way towards Cinder's current base. 'I fucking swear, if I didn't need him I'd put a missile through Greene's bedroom window.'

I shouldn't have been surprised, considering Green was essentially a lawyer playing the part of used car salesman for the government—compounded evil, as it were. He had scented blood in the water and bilked us for as much as he could. If we missed payments—which I didn't expect us to—they would repossess the equipment. If the check bounced, they would repo everything. We were doing the maintenance ourselves to lower the costs, but we would essentially be buying fuel from them at a set price written into the agreement. Nor could we scrap the sixteen busted ones for parts, as they weren't ours to scrap yet—so we were stuck with them in the lot, either letting them sit as hulks taking up space or we were going to have to repair them, making them even larger money sinks. And so on. We couldn't even technically claim them as an asset on our taxes, thus until we paid them off they were a money sink. The only good news was that we would be taking possession of them within the week and could probably get them in the air on the timetable Angel had laid out—unless it took longer to get replacement parts than we thought it would. That would give us some breathing room, but I wouldn't stop worrying about it until we got the contract for the reclamation project. We had to rely on trash bounties that Hunters didn't want—scraps, essentially—until the money from the train job started filtering back in. That is, unless we got lucky and ran across a bounty worth some actual Lien before the Hunters did, but I wasn't going to rely on luck. It was like starting a plan with, "step one: win the lottery."

I was still irritated by the time I set down on a roof a few blocks from the shoe shop. Finding the front door locked, I forced the lock open with Telekinesis by turning the deadbolt on the other side—since I didn't have the precision to force the tumblers—and entered, setting off the little bell above the door. Quick footsteps moved almost silently down the stairs as I closed and locked the door behind me. My senses warned me of the incoming attack and I dropped into Haste, turning back towards my attacker in time to snatch her right hand at the wrist with my left as her hand descended on my head with one of her weapons drawn. Shifting, I pivoted and slammed the smaller woman against the wall, pinning her there with the weight of my body. Her free hand came up in an attempt to put a bullet through my head, but I pinned that one above her head as well with my right. I faded into sight as I allowed Invisibility to drop.

"Emerald," I greeted the girl as her red eyes glared into mine.

"Asshole," she ground out, her body shifting under me as she tried to force me off. When I refused to budge, the greenette demanded, "Get off me."

Letting her go, I backed away and asked, "So, why'd you try to kill me this time, since you knew damn well it was me the moment you spotted me from the stairs? Are you mensing?"

"Eat shit," she growled.

I jerked my head towards the stairs. "Your boss in?"

The thief considered the question for a moment, clearly weighing her options, before apparently deciding the backlash from Cinder if she lied about me showing up wouldn't be worth the satisfaction of sending me away. "Yes," she answered shortly, holstering her weapons and turning towards the stairs. "Knock next time, fucker. That door was locked for a reason."

I shrugged. "Force of habit." Still, I was pissed and Emerald was an easy, if not willing, target for my frustration. A smirk spread under my mask and I added, "And I'll keep doing it, if only because I know it pisses you off."

"I will kill you," she threatened. "'Sorry boss, my hand slipped. Guess you'll have to find another bed warmer.'"

As we topped the stairs, I retorted, "Maybe, but it wouldn't be you." The smaller girl flipped me off over her shoulder as she lead us towards what passed as Cinder's meeting room. "If you're good though, I might just put in a good word with Cinder for you. Getting laid would really help with your attitude, so she may give you a pity fuck just for that."

"Fuck off and die in a fire," Emerald growled, turning another glare on me over her shoulders.

As we entered the room, I caught sight of Mercury sitting on a couch tinkering with his prosthetics while Cinder sat in her chair with her nose buried in a book. Cinder looked up from her reading as we entered, molten gold eyes locking with my red contacts and for a moment her lips twitched as though she couldn't decide whether to smile or frown, before her eyes moved to take in Emerald and that smile shifted into a smirk. "If you two can't get along, I will lock you in a room together until you work out your differences," Cinder threatened, her tone somewhere between amused and exasperated.

Emerald's hands twitched towards her weapons as she grinned. "That sounds like a plan—"

"Without your weapons," Cinder deadpanned.

The greenette considered it and Mercury rolled his eyes. "Don't bother. He could take you in hand to hand."

"Fucker," Emerald grunted.

As the greenette grumbled to herself, Mercury sighed and gave the screwdriver in his hand one last twist before dropping it on the table in front of him. Pushing himself to his feet, he grabbed Emerald and lead her back towards the stairs. "Come on, let's go get a drink."

"She's not going to put out just because you get her drunk," I warned, earning a middle finger from Mercury as he passed, which I returned in a negligent wave. As the pair cleared out, I dropped into a chair and pulled my mask down, turning a grin on the woman across from me. "She really does not like me."

Cinder marked her place in her book and set it aside. The bell over the door chimed below, signaling Mercury and Emerald's departure. "She can dislike you all she wants so long as she can work with you."

"True," I nodded. "The fact that getting under her skin is amusing helps."

"You shouldn't abuse my subordinates," Cinder shook her head. "Otherwise, I may abuse yours."

I rolled my eyes. "Neo would enjoy it. Mercury still bitching about his leg?"

"Yes. He's looking into non-conductive materials to prevent them from being damaged in the same way in the future."

Frowning, I asked, "Does he think that'll work? That blade the Fox uses doesn't behave like an electrical Dust blade—or like actual electricity, really." It wouldn't be much of a problem for my alter-ego if Mercury figured out a way to ignore one of my favorite attacks. The Plasma Blade was loud, highly visible, and pants-shittingly scary to be on the opposite end of for most people. However, if he did find a way to ignore it and could get into close combat range where his fancy prosthetics would be useful, that still wouldn't leave me pitting my martial arts against his, plus his fancy toys. As the Fox, I had shown them enough elemental manipulation that getting into close range should be considered a bad idea for a melee fighter. He would need something more if he wanted to deal with everything they actually knew about. There was no way he would spend the time figuring out some way to defend against or neutralize everything he was aware of. If he was smart, he would work on ways to kill me in one shot—but I certainly wasn't going to put the idea in his head.

"It won't hurt to try. Any insight you could give," she began, and I shook my head.

"You know more about him than I do by now, I figure. I fought the guy once and it was just a short running battle." Of course, I'd claimed to have been spying on myself, so I had to give her something. "I don't have anything that'll help, just a whole bunch of shit we can't do and should avoid doing."

"Oh?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

I nodded. "He rotates patrol schedules, routes, and so on daily so we can't rely on that. His computer network is air-gapped, so there's no chance of hacking in and getting those routes. Every camera in the place can see me, even with my Semblance, so that's out. Getting friendly with some of the grunts got us some details on their internal ranking structure. Seems military, but that shouldn't be surprising considering what it is."

"Do you think he's ex-military?" the woman asked, and I shrugged.

"Could be. Or that could be because he's been recruiting a bunch of ex-military for his upper echelons—if not his command structure—from what we've been able to gather. The one with the spooky possible mental Semblance that you can't ever really focus on is apparently his Head of Intelligence. Someone you can't identify after seeing them being in the Intel business—go figure. Aside from that, all I've really got is what passes for a rotation on his bodyguards—the visible ones, at least. When he bothers coming out. When he doesn't simply fucking fly everywhere," I grumbled. "I reiterate: too much trouble to pick a fight with for me."

Cinder hummed, then nodded. "Fair enough." A small smirk twitched her lips upwards as she asked, "How did you convince Neopolitan to release you from her clutches?"

"How else? Bribery and distraction," I chuckled.

"What with?"

I turned an amused look on her. "I promised her ice cream, then sicced the twins on her. Don't think that's going to work if you want to attempt bribing her in the future. Then again, if you offered to let her in your pants, that probably would work. You have my permission to bribe my underling with your body while I'm gone, but I want video and I'll expect a repeat performance next time I'm in town."

A small smirk tugged her lips upwards as she asked, "You don't think I'll seduce her away from you?"

"Ha ha. No. If anything, you should be worried about her seducing you. She's downright predatory when she wants to be." Golden eyes rolled as the woman scoffed softly. "And on an unrelated note, you're being awfully civil, considering—"

"Considering you're late?" she interrupted, and I nodded. "I am trying to determine how upset I should be. You said one day."

"Got held up. Traffic was—" Golden eyes narrowed in anger and I cut myself off. "Neo did warn you."

Red lips turning down into a frown, the woman across from me nodded. "That she did, which is one reason why I am tempering my response."

"I'll talk to her about it. What's the other reason?"

Her eyes bored into mine for a long moment before she said, "If I take something, I expect it to be mine. This," she gestured between the two of us, "was… not planned as thoroughly as I would have liked and you were already attached beforehand." Frowning, she added, "It is difficult to admit, but I am unsure how this arrangement is supposed to work. Ideally, I'd simply remove Neopolitan from the picture. On the other hand, I am not unwilling to consider the potential advantages such a situation presents."

"I don't think Neo is going to go along with that whole 'removal' thing. Or the twins," I denied. Grinning, I added, "In fact, they've pretty much tasked me with getting you 'on board,' so to speak."

Cinder hummed, looking amused as she asked, "Have they, now?"

I nodded, ticking off points on my fingers. "You're strong, you're smart, and you're dead sexy. I'm not going to try to convince you one way or another, however, and they're in no hurry as far as that goes. In other words, we're fine with keeping the status quo."

"I do enjoy our current status quo," Cinder admitted. Her lips quirked up as she added, "Perhaps I may consider Neopolitan's offer."

"You seem to be disregarding the twins' opinion on the matter," I pointed out.

"Not at all. I've seen them at Junior's little club. They are young and easily manipulated. Case in point," she gestured at me.

"Hey! I'm not manipulating them," I denied. Her lips turned up in amusement and I quietly added, "Much."

"They would follow your lead. Neopolitan, despite her previous attempts at the silent routine, is clearly the most influential of the three. The most likely to lead. She would require… handling," the woman across from me assessed.

I turned a deadpan look on her. "Do not abuse my minion in ways she doesn't enjoy." I managed to hold the serious face for all of three seconds before laughing softly and adding, "Though, with Neo, there aren't many ways she doesn't, and she really wants in your pants."

"Your minion is damaged," Cinder rolled her eyes.

"Maybe," I shrugged. "But she's loyal. Probably more so than Emerald is to you, seeing as she's getting laid regularly. If you're not careful, one of these days Emerald is going to wait until you're drunk then push you down and tear your clothes off with her teeth."

The woman across from me palmed her face and groaned quietly. "Do not remind me."

"It'd help if Mercury could actually draw her attention, but that's not happening and he's more than a little interested in you himself. Can't really blame him for that, though," I shrugged.

Cinder glared at me through a gap in the fingers over her face and I felt her power flare in warning for a moment. "That is quite enough about my minions' personal failings," she hissed.

"Sure, sure," I nodded. "We could always talk about mine. Oh wait, we're back to clothes and removing them with teeth." The woman across from me growled softly and I grinned. "Or not."

"Not," the brunette grumbled.

I shrugged at that. "On a more serious note, I'll be heading out soon. End of the week at the latest."

The red-clad woman dropped her hand from her face and raised an eyebrow. "Already?" I nodded and she frowned. "The date crept up on me, it seems."

"That tends to happen when you're enjoying something," I pointed out, earning a nod in agreement. "I'll be leaving Neo behind to coordinate things for me, but don't expect her to be available full time."

Frowning, Cinder asked, "Why not?"

Humming as I thought about how best to answer, I finally said, "Let's just say that I have more than one iron in the fire and leave it at that."

"Mm." Shifting in her seat, Cinder crossed her arms under her breasts and narrowed her eyes at me. "I take it you plan to return at some point—you wouldn't leave Neopolitan or the Malachite twins behind, otherwise."

I nodded. "That, and I think you'd get bored without someone around you can actually talk to instead of at."

"I do not—"

"You do," I countered, cutting her off. "Though, to be fair, Mercury doesn't seem like much of a conversationalist and Emerald's just going to agree with whatever you say. You need someone around who isn't afraid to call you on your bullshit and who won't blindly kiss your ass."

Cinder chuckled, turning an amused look on me. "And that's you? I don't recall you 'calling me on my bullshit' at any point in the time I've known you."

I made a show of looking around at the empty seats in her sitting room before turning back to her with a raised eyebrow. "You know someone else who fits the description? As for the second part, I'm sure we'll get around to it eventually."

Her eyes narrowed and her gaze turned pointed. "Then you should make sure to complete this job quickly, lest I grow bored of waiting."

"It'll take as long as it takes," I denied, shaking my head. "It's long term and… well, let's just say I'm getting more out of them than they're getting out of me for this one, even if they don't know it. I can probably swing back through Vale every now and then, but it won't be often." Cinder growled softly at that before pushing up out of her chair. Taking my hands, she dragged me to my feet before pulling me across the room towards the hall. "What are you doing?"

"Making the most of the time I have left before you depart, since I also have to share that time with Neopolitan and the Malachite sisters," she answered simply, pushing her bedroom door open and hauling me inside, before closing it with a kick. "And if, in doing so, I send you back to them thinking of me," she turned to face me, a malicious little smile crossing her lips as she did, "so much the better."

I really should have learned to keep my mouth shut by now, but I'd always had a problem with my brain-to-mouth filter. "Possessive mu—" I was cut off as she grabbed the back of my head, yanked, and crushed her lips against mine.

---

My eyes snapped open and I wondered where I was for a moment as I sat up and looked around in the dark, the room around me still shaking faintly as something glass fell somewhere nearby and shattered. I found a system update waiting on me but dismissed it—I could read it later, after I figured out what had happened. Beside me, a warm body sat up and molded itself against me. The room lit up with a soft orange glow and I turned to find Cinder at my side, holding a small ball of flame aloft. "Did you feel that?" I asked, getting a nod from the woman.

"Yes. It felt like—" she was cut off as a siren sounded from outside, and from the sound of it I could tell it was some sort of city-wide emergency broadcast system. Two short barks of sound blasted across the city, followed by a two second burst, then the pattern repeated. "That's the Hunter scramble pattern. Something kicked the wasp's nest."

"Felt like an earthquake," I theorized. I wasn't aware that Vale was on or near any sort of fault line.

Cinder nodded. "That, or an explosion." Yawning, she extinguished her light and wrapped her arms around my midsection before pulling gently. "Either way, it's not our problem. Come back to bed."

"Who knew you'd be so clingy a sleeper," I teased, earning a nip on the shoulder as she bit me, before following it up with a kiss.

"And no one will, if you know what is good for you," she threatened, throwing one leg over my hips and mounting me, before laying out across my chest. "This is nice." Shifting, she buried her face against my neck before sleepily murmuring, "It may be worth negotiating terms with Neopolitan, if I could have this every night, when you return."

I chuckled quietly, fully intending to tease her some more when our scrolls both rang. Rather, Cinder's rang while mine chimed as a text came in. At the same time, a second text came in from one of my other scrolls—the one assigned to the Fox, once I'd made sure it was secure. Frowning, I looked at my HUD, seeing the first was from my automated camera system while the second text was from Miltia. As Cinder's scroll continued to ring, I groaned quietly. "You should probably get that."

Molten gold eyes narrowed, one of them flaring brightly and trailing flame for a fraction of a second before she huffed out a frustrated breath. Shifting atop me, she reached out for her night stand and snagged the two scrolls there. Handing mine to me, she put hers to her ear and answered. "This had better be good."

While Cinder was occupied, I unlocked my scroll and checked the message I'd gotten on its screen to keep up appearances. Every camera but one at the farm had lost connection. 'That would explain why I'm getting texts from that, since I set it to alert me only if something malfunctioned.' I opened up the message from Miltia on my HUD, giving that a read over as well.

'Dust explosion reported in the southeast sector of the city, Residential District. Orders?'

"Slow down and repeat what you just said," Cinder demanded.

Frowning, I considered the location in question. I knew the farmhouse where I'd been storing Cinder's Dust stockpile was in that area and that the White Fang were supposed to move it, but surely those idiots hadn't… 'Damage control first, information gathering second,' I decided, shooting off a return text telling Miltia to scramble a few units and offer whatever assistance we could. Once that was done, I connected the scroll to the one active security feed at the farmhouse. The camera still working had been set up high on a tree in the woods overlooking the house and barn, out of sight so that even if someone found the rest of the cameras they might miss this one. Now, instead of the house and barn, it showed only the sky lit by a crazy multi-hued flickering glow—as seen through a spiderweb of cracks all along the camera's surface.

Manipulating the screen, I quickly backed the footage up by half an hour and flipped through cameras as I advanced it. After a minute of watching footage from various feeds on fast forward, headlights showed up on the camera that had been facing the small dirt road leading up to the farm. Three box trucks—all of them marked FISH on the side—pulled up outside the barn and White Fang began to spill out from the cabs and cargo areas. Another camera caught sight of a Bullhead touching down in the field behind the barn before Adam disembarked and moved into the barn to inspect things. They all moved around inside for a few minutes, taking stock of what was available, before Adam gestured and the White Fang mooks there began picking up crates and moving them towards the trucks. He carried on a conversation for a few minutes with someone off to one side, but out of deference to Cinder's conversation, I kept the audio muted. Eventually, Adam made his way outside and the Bullhead took off again.

"What do you mean, 'trap?'" came a quiet hiss from above me, and Killing Intent suddenly filled the air. Looking up, I found a pair of eyes glaring down at me with the first stirrings of what looked like hurt and betrayal behind them. Raising an eyebrow at her, I gestured with my scroll and turned back to it. The Killing Intent in the air sputtered for a moment before dying out as the legs to either side of my hips tightened and one of Cinder's hands came down, her fingernails digging into my chest almost painfully.

On my scroll, I watched as a White Fang member inside the building looked around for a moment before kneeling next to one of the boxes of higher grade Dust I'd left there. These crates were nearer to the back of the barn, while the terrorists had started moving the things closest to the door first. 'Wait… isn't that one of the mooks I puppeted back when we delivered the train to Adam?' I wondered, my eyes narrowing as I watched the man on the screen dig out a few Dust crystals and pocket them—it was hard to be sure with the masks, but he looked about the same height and build. A moment later, a second White Fang operative came around the corner, yelled something, and drew a gun. The SMG in his hands spewed glowing red rounds as the other mook dove away from the crates. Several of the rounds found their way into what I now recognized as a crate of red Dust, which began to glow ominously even as the mook with the gun shifted his aim to track the 'thief.' Bullets hit the wall and the camera feed went white, then black as it died after that.

I had to back up the video and advance it frame by frame, but when I did I winced at what I found there. Several of the rounds had impacted the Bounded Field pattern I'd drawn on the wall, destroying it. Switching camera feeds, I watched in slow motion from an exterior camera as the barn violently imploded—the force of it enough to create a vacuum, drawing in the White Fang nearest to it and even rocking the vehicles parked nearby on their suspensions. Immediately following total folded space field collapse as the Bounded Field pattern broke, the area was suddenly bathed in light of every color imaginable as the Dust inside went up all at once and every other camera in the area was temporarily flash blinded and outright destroyed, save for the camera I'd left in the tree.

A thought occurred and I backed up the video again. The camera in the tree had a view on the barn, the house, and enough of the field behind it… 'Oh fuck me, tell me they didn't…' I silently pleaded, watching the events unfold again. On screen, Adam left the barn and disappeared around the back of it. The Bullhead lifted off from the field and turned towards Vale as it ascended. The Bullhead was still in the camera's field of vision when the barn violently imploded, then exploded, leaving the camera temporarily blinded. My stomach dropped out from under me as the realization set in. 'That explosion was large enough to be felt all across Vale—it'd need a yield in the multi-kiloton range for that. Adam was still inside the blast radius when it went off. There… there is no way he survived having what amounts to a low-yield nuke go off in his face. Those stupid fucks! God damnit, Adam was a genocidal maniac, but he was a known element! I could predict him, plot around him with what I could get out of Blake. Now? Everything I know or had the resources to learn about their actions and Cinder's just went straight down the shitter. No Roman, no Adam. Though that first one is entirely my fault. Having an 'in' as his replacement was worth more than having Roman around as a known element, but that was before Adam went and got himself blown up. We've gone completely off the rails and the only thing keeping things even remotely predictable now is inertia—and even that is iffy, because in this fucking metaphor the terrain ahead doesn't exactly match what I was expecting. Every encounter with the White Fang and Cinder's bunch is now in question. Mother fuck!'

"Shiro," Cinder spoke above me, her voice quiet and entirely too calm as she brought my slowly spiraling panic to a halt. "Tell me you had nothing to do with this."

I considered the question for a moment before shaking my head. "I can't."

Her nails dug into my chest harder and I winced. "Explain."

Backing up the video and switching the feed to the interior cameras, I handed it to her. "See for yourself."

Cinder took the scroll and I watched her face through the screen as she followed along, her jaw clenching and eyes narrowing in barely contained rage at what she saw. "Those… stupid, thieving animals," she ground out, hands clenching my scroll hard enough that I worried she'd break it. Finally, she seemed to relax slightly and her face softened somewhat as she regarded me. "I fail to see how this is your fault."

"Back it up and watch it frame by frame. The dipshit with the SMG hit a box of red Dust, so they were fucked anyway, yeah," I pointed out, before admitting, "But numbnuts also caught my Bounded Field with a burst. That went up first, so technically…"

Cinder snorted softly. "No. Firstly, I warned those idiots not to damage the seals. Secondly, as you said, he shot a box of red Dust. They were all dead in a few more seconds, regardless—especially given that it was sitting in the middle of a pile of other miscellaneous Dust. Thirdly, no one with sense starts shooting a gun near a Dust stockpile. It was suicide by stupidity. They were too stupid to live and the Faunus race is better off without them polluting their gene pool." She turned a small smirk down on me as she set aside the scroll. "I knew it was too soon for you to betray me."

"'Too soon,' huh?" I raised an eyebrow. "Do you expect everyone to betray you?"

"Absolutely. You don't?" she returned my raised eyebrow.

"Not really," I admitted. "Trust is useful, if dangerous. And while I don't expect it at every turn, that doesn't mean I'm not prepared for it to happen. Though my reaction for dealing with it is the same almost regardless of who it is: get as far away as possible as quickly as possible and lie low for a while."

"Fair enough." Sighing softly, she pushed herself up off of me and began searching for her clothes. "Come. We must go meet with the White Fang and show them this, if I am to salvage this situation. With some luck, I may actually be able to turn it to my advantage."

"Adam's dead," I pointed out and Cinder blinked, wincing at the news. "Watch camera 8 again—there's no way his Bullhead cleared the blast radius before it went up. And yeah, that was pretty much my reaction. Adam was a genocidal maniac and he planned to betray us and kill us both eventually… but at least he was predictable like that."

Cinder nodded. "You are correct. The Fang will never allow a human to lead them. They will either promote one of his lieutenants to leadership or make contact with the main body of the White Fang and ask for orders." She frowned before adding, "Assuming they don't all believe that Adam initiated a coup and was their supreme leader. It's entirely possible that Adam's cell was officially disavowed, so that he could act outside the normal White Fang while still using their resources."

"And you think they're black ops?" I asked, and Cinder nodded.

"Essentially, yes. The most likely explanations they would have used when Adam formed his cell would be to either go with the story of an assassination attempt by humans to rally the members of the cell together or a successful coup by Adam—depending on how extreme they wanted to go and whether or not they ever intended to make contact with the main body of the White Fang again. So, it isn't entirely implausible that an agent broke off from his cell and simply has bad information regarding the internal structure of the White Fang," she surmised.

"I'm just telling you what she told me," I reiterated, pulling my pants on as Cinder finally found her bra—hanging off an arm of the ceiling fan above us.

Jumping up and snagging the garment, and in the process setting her breasts to bouncing in a way that I found very distracting, Cinder hummed. "You're going to have to introduce me."

"She's skittish," I denied. "Says she wants nothing more to do with the White Fang and wants to turn over a new leaf."

"If she wanted that, why did she immediately shack up with a criminal?" Cinder asked, one fine eyebrow climbing towards her hairline.

"You're assuming she's 'shacked up' with me," I pointed out, earning a patiently amused look in answer. "I'm not going to dignify that with a response. As I was saying, if she wants out I can't exactly deny her the opportunity. Not everyone is cut out for this life."

Sighing as she adjusted the bra and began pulling her dress on, Cinder nodded. "She may know valuable information."

"Probably, but I don't know if she'd be willing to give it up," I shrugged. I felt comfortable enough with Blake now—and thought she was comfortable enough with me—that I could start asking her for information about the White Fang. It would help to get that information before Beacon started, so Fox Hunt could act on it. There was always the risk she would say no or get upset, but the potential information Blake had was worth too much not to ask just because it might upset her. Either way, I wouldn't be sharing what I got with Cinder. Changing the subject as I pulled on my shirt, I asked, "How are we going to do this?"

Cinder considered it for a moment before sighing quietly. "I will call Emerald and Mercury and meet them before going to see the White Fang. I doubt they would be willing to listen if you were there, so it would probably be for the best if you went back to Neopolitan and your twins for the night. Would you send me a copy of the video?"

"Sure," I agreed, finishing up buckling my armor on and picking up my scroll to do so. "This kind of sucks, you know. We finally get comfortable enough for me to spend the night and then this shit happens."

"Don't remind me," Cinder groused.

We finished getting dressed and left the shop, taking to the rooftops as we sped across Vale. We stopped on a roof halfway through the commercial district, sharing a quick kiss before Cinder parted to meet up with Mercury and Emerald while I took off in a circuitous route to lose any followers before heading back to Fox Hunt. I'd noticed that Cinder and I had picked up a tail at some point after leaving the shop and I didn't want to lead them back to anything important, but I also didn't want them breaking off to follow Cinder if I suddenly dropped off the map. 'Then again, I could stand to blow off some steam,' I mused, deciding a change of plans was in order.

Checking my map over I picked a park nearby, altering course as I traveled while leaving Invisibility and the rest of my stealth suite off to offer my pursuer some tasty bait. The lure proved irresistible and as I came gliding in for a landing, my senses screamed a warning. Faint light lit the area ahead of me, painting my silhouette on the ground. Drawing Ascalon as I hit the grass, I brought the Dust blade around behind my back even as I began shifting out of the probable path of the attack. A black-clad blur rushed through where I'd been standing as metal clanged and screeched against Dust. The shorter form quickly turned around, leveling a silver sword at me as I returned the favor with my own glowing blade.

For a moment, neither of us moved. Her light blue eyes swept over my form, narrowed into a glare. "You stopped the attack blind."

'Yeah, out of sheer, dumb luck, you crazy little bitch! I was trying to smack you like a tennis ball, not block,' I wanted to yell, but resisted the urge. Better that an enemy overestimate my threat level. It worked for the Fox, so far. "Miss Schnee, good morning," I greeted instead, moving to circle her to put us into a better position. I'd picked this park specifically so I could turn the environment to my advantage if the need arose, after all. "Isn't it a bit past your bedtime?"

Weiss's jaws flexed and I swore I heard her teeth grinding from where I stood. "Funny. You're a real comedian."

"I try," I shrugged. "Any particular reason you tried to sneak attack me? Not that I'm judging—sneak attacks are the best attacks, after all. Don't ever believe what anyone else tells you about them being cowardly, underhanded, or dishonorable."

"I went to investigate the ruckus out in the Residential District and, what do you know, it was blatantly obvious that it was a Dust explosion. I thought to myself, 'who do I know who has been stealing large quantities of Dust and who likely doesn't know safe handling and storage procedures for it?' Then who do I find, out and about town, but the very man I had been thinking of?" The Schnee heiress seemed so very sure of herself about this, and so very serious… It made me want to fuck with her head, and she had left me such a nice opening it would be a waste not to use it.

I sighed loudly, palming my face with my free hand. "Miss Schnee, really? I mean, I get it—really, I do. I'm a bad man and that is very appealing to some women, but I really don't think it would work out between us. Oh, it'd be fun no doubt, but I'm pretty sure it wouldn't last."

"W-wha—?" she stammered, taking a moment to parse that before her eyes went wide and a blush crept up her face.

Not quite done pressing her buttons, I added, "What would your father think of his daughter dating a suspected criminal? And a Dust thief, no less. Why, I imagine he would be furious." I paused a beat, just long enough for that to sink in, before I continued my verbal assault. "Of course, just like the 'bad boy' thing, there's a certain appeal for a girl in disobeying her father. Is that what this unhealthy obsession of yours is about, Ms. Schnee? Finding a man strong enough that when your father objects, he'll be powerless to do anything about it?"

"Y-Y-Y-YOU SHUT YOUR MOUTH!" Weiss finally erupted, waving her sword at me. "I am not—! We are not talking about—! No!"

"If you say so," I agreed, nodding along. "So, if you weren't planning to ask me to help piss your father off—"

"I WAS NOT!" the snow-white blonde across from me screamed.

I continued as if she had not interrupted. "Then why did you seek me out, princess?"

Taking several quick, deep breaths to steady herself, Weiss attempted to steer the conversation back around to where she had intended for it to go—but it was obvious I had thrown her off her game. "You've moved from theft to terrorism."

I raised an eyebrow at that. "Not confirming the theft bit," I began, getting a glare in response, "but what makes you think I'm any kind of a terrorist?"

"A Dust explosion in the middle of Vale, for one thing," Weiss deadpanned. "Or it could be the dead White Fang—and pieces thereof—littering the area. I knew you were scum, I just didn't realize just how low you could sink."

"Well, I'm sorry to hear a bunch of terrorists died when the Dust they were mishandling went up," I snarked. I could have faked surprise but I knew how much the Weiss of canon loathed the White Fang—it would be more effective to play to that than feign surprise or shock, simply because it was highly likely I would be mirroring her own feelings on the matter. Some of my own feelings may have slipped through, too—namely, that the only member or former member of the White Fang I gave a single, solitary fuck about was Blake and the rest could all die tomorrow and I wouldn't shed a tear. "Did you consider that possibility? Why blame me when the simplest explanation is one of those idiots dropping, sneezing on, or spilling coffee on something?"

"Well," she frowned, eyes shifting away as she muttered, "It's possible."

Pulling out my scroll for Weiss' benefit, I checked the time. "It's been maybe half an hour since that explosion. You mean to tell me you got up, put your disguise on—you forgot to change your hair by the way." Weiss' eyes went a bit wide as she glanced to the side, eyes settling on a bang before her face scrunched up in annoyance at the slip. I continued on. "Then you ran over to the site of the explosion, found someone willing to talk to you despite obviously being a Schnee trying poorly not to look like a Schnee… How'd you manage that if there were White Fang in the area? Then you hauled ass back into town and just happened to run across me?"

Weiss frowned. "Well, no. I had finished my last patrol of the night—looking for you—and was in the process of getting ready for bed when the explosion happened. I rushed back out and was fast enough that I was one of the first on the scene. I didn't talk to anyone, because there were White Fang there picking up bits and pieces of other White Fang. They didn't find me because I was hiding in the top of a tree. I came back into Vale intending to go back to my hotel for the night. I did not expect to run across you, but that I did means you were almost as close to the crime scene as I was. And why am I answering your questions?! You answer mine!"

"You haven't actually asked anything," I pointed out, earning more teeth gnashing in the process. "But I'll have you know I was in bed and happily sound asleep when that explosion went off," I denied, before irritation at the situation slipped through and my mouth ran along ahead of me, adding, "And now I'm not, because the woman I was with had to go deal with it." I turned an annoyed look on the heiress. "Needless to say, I am not amused by this bullshit and I am not in the mood to deal with you beyond a little banter, princess. We are quickly approaching the point where I'll get bored with you and leave."

The girl across from me frowned at that. "A convenient excuse—"

"You spotted me a few minutes before we parted and you've been following ever since, so you know damn well I was with a woman before you attacked me. Black hair, fancy glowy red Dust-enhanced dress? Impossible to miss her," I countered. Smirking, I added, "In fact, you probably saw us say our goodbyes for the night, too."

Weiss shook her head. "Then you're either both involved somehow and she's an accomplice, or you're using her as a cover."

I stopped circling the blonde and lowered my sword, incredulity written all over what was visible of my face. "Do you even hear yourself? What are you smoking that that's even a possibility for you?" I wondered, shaking my head. Sure, she was right, but she'd have to be crazy, lucky, or just plain doggedly stubborn to believe that a woman she hadn't even met was guilty by association with me. That, or she'd done a lot more digging than I'd given her credit for and had actually stumbled onto Cinder somehow.

Weiss had no answer to that—or if she did, couldn't put words to it. Intuition and instinct were such an ingrained part of the human psyche that we often made wild leaps of logic we couldn't explain later because our subconscious minds put something together that our conscious minds had missed. So, in the age old tradition of people everywhere faced with a problem they couldn't solve or a question they couldn't answer, Weiss ignored it and bulled right on ahead. "I heard a certain train went missing a few days ago. You like trains, don't you Shiro?"

"Not really. I never had a model train set as a kid," I shrugged. "What train is this? I haven't heard anything about it on the news." Of course there hadn't been any news on it—it was a secret shipment. Drawing attention to it would mean letting the world know there were other such trains out there.

"It wasn't on the news," she ground out. "As you well know."

"So, you've got nothing," I deadpanned. "Bored now. I don't know about you, but I want to go crawl into a warm bed and pass out for a few more hours before the day starts. So, unless you're looking to join me—"

"Take a long walk in the dark," the girl growled quietly, with more teeth gnashing.

"Then I'll be going," I finished, sheathing Ascalon to further impress my point upon her—I was done for the night. Still, I couldn't resist a parting shot. My lips twitched into a smirk under my mask as I added, "And just between you and me princess, you should too. Some beauty sleep would do you some good. Might help those bags under your eyes."

I half turned and made to snag a building I'd lined up with my line launcher, but the Schnee heiress disappeared in a burst of speed and put herself back in my path. "You can sleep in a jail cell."

I sighed. "We've been over this. You have no jurisdiction, no authority to make arrests, and no evidence. At best, if I came along willingly, the police would hold me a day or two for questioning and release me after that. I don't really feel like dealing with the inconvenience, however—and I don't want to give you the satisfaction—so I won't be coming along peaceably. I highly doubt you've improved enough in the week or so since we last met to take me on—especially given your sloppy sneak attack earlier."

At this point, even riling Weiss up wasn't doing it for me. The night had been thoroughly spoiled and I just wanted to go home, crawl into the middle of my big bed with the girls, and tell the world to fuck off for a few more hours until I had to go deal with the Arc family stuff. So, I gave the peaceful route one last try. "It's a nice morning. Don't suppose I could interest you in a quiet stroll through the park instead of the fight you seem dead set on starting?"

"No," Weiss denied, reaching up to spin the chamber on Myrtenaster.

"I'm not packing low grade Dust like the last time we fought," I warned tiredly.

The girl across from me smirked. "Neither am I."

"What have you got? Grade 5? 6, maybe? That thing holds half a dozen colors at most, and half of them are visible from here. You've lost the element of surprise, you're broadcasting your options for Dust, and you're outgunned. You should have just stayed in bed," I growled, my hands dropping back down to my sword and preparing to draw.

Weiss snorted softly, nodding towards the weapon at my side. "Variable-blade Dust sword/polearm combo. You could probably fit well over a hundred blades in that sheath if you weren't using it for the other half of that weapon—as it stands, you probably have a maximum of fifty with Gen 6 storage tech, maybe more if you're crazy enough to try to combine that with space expansion Bounded Fields in a Dust weapon sheath… in which case, please tell me so I can stand far back when it explodes. At least one of those blades is Colorless, which tells me you've got anywhere from one to eight Dust crystals in the hilt to power it—and unlike powder form Dust, crystal Dust is limited on ranged attack options. If you're not a complete idiot, you've probably got at least a few backup Colorless blades while the rest will be individual colors for when the crystals in the hilt run out. You tend to favor fire and lightning though, so they're probably weighted heavily towards that and equally flashy elements." A small smirk crossed her lips as she added, "Most damning though is the fact that you keep trying to push my buttons and do everything you can to avoid a fight without running away, even though we both know you could—so either you really do want a fight—"

I opened up the throttle on Haste, subvocalizing Invisibility as I dropped into Flash Step. Hitting the assisted draw, I swung at her from her 8 o'clock, dropping Invisibility as I did to keep up that particular ruse. Ascalon caught nothing but air as the heiress vanished. I Stepped away and disappeared again just as she reappeared at where my 4 o'clock had been, Myrtenaster halfway into a thrust that would have slid under my ribs if it had hit and managed to get through my Aura. 'Okay, she's faster now. Why?'

Taking in her form, I caught a faint light shining under her feet and realized what it was I was seeing a moment later. 'She's casting to increase her own speed without using the usual oversized glyphs.' A quick Observe told me the Dust type was Momentum Black—one of those 'exactly what it says on the tin' colors and one of the basic ones on the list of those my Semblance could identify thanks to Use Dust and eating manuals. 'So, the glyphs probably give her control over how much momentum she applies, along with direction.'

Her stance shifted, Myrtenaster held at the ready as she watched her surroundings. The placement of her feet, the way her weight balanced, all told me she was ready to spring away again at a moment's notice. As she brought the sword up to eye level, I watched her blue eyes briefly glance at what passed as the hilt and narrowed my eyes as I realized she was using its partially reflective surface as a crude mirror, clearly expecting me to try attacking from one of her blind spots again.

"Clever," I commented, immediately Stepping several yards away as her eyes tracked to my last position but she refused to take the bait. "Or obsessive." Another Step moved me further away, back towards my previous position at her 9 o'clock. "You must have spent a lot of time thinking that fight over."

"Don't flatter yourself," Weiss rolled her eyes. "I—"

I moved to her 12 o'clock and attacked, my foot passing through the space her face had occupied a moment before as she disappeared again—there one moment, gone in a blur or black light the next. 'It's like Flash Step,' I realized, frowning as I moved and went Invisible again. Weiss had settled into a defensive stance again, a grin on her lips as her eyes tracked over the area. 'She's… having fun. Huh. I guess she really didn't buy my warning last time.'

Deciding a change in venue was called for, I checked my map and oriented myself on my next destination before taking off. Partway there, I turned back to face her and dropped Invisibility. I didn't have to wait long for her to notice me and attack. Pulling my disappearing act again, I proceeded to lead her towards my goal. As soon as Weiss moved into position again, I attacked, swinging a high overhead strike. I missed, Ascalon eating air as it passed through where Weiss had been a moment ago, before slamming into and through the raised concrete wall surrounding one of the large fountains in the park. Water rushed out around my feet and I took a few steps to the side before going Invisible again and freezing in place. True to her previous pattern, Weiss took up a defensive stance and waited for me to make the first move.

The red glow of the lighted Dust blade in my hand faded out as I thumbed the switch on the hilt of the sword. A moment later, it lit up yellow and hummed quietly—nothing at all like the intimidating roar of my Plasma Blades, but then that wouldn't help me here anyway. Quietly hopping up on top of the ruined fountain, I dropped the tip of my blade into the water. A crack! sounded as the lights in the fountain exploded, but my focus was on Weiss. The girl's Aura flared briefly before she disappeared again and I waited.

As soon as she reappeared, I was on her, slamming my blade into her side and sending her stumbling a couple of steps as her Aura flashed briefly around the area of impact. Instead of trying to fall back on the defensive again, she blurred into an attack. Bringing my sword up to parry her thrust at my chest, I was surprised as her arm and blade were lit with the same black light and blurred, before a rain of sharp impacts slammed against my Aura. At the same moment, my vision was swarmed with various popups.

Physical Resistance has increased by 1!

STR has increased by 1!

DEX has increased by 1!

CON has increased by 1!

INT has increased by 1!

WIS has increased by 1!

CHA has increased by 1!

LUK has increased by 1!

Popups enough that,

STR has increased by 1!

Aura has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

DEX has increased by 1!

Aura Strike has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

CON has increased by 1!

Reinforcement has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

INT has increased by 1!

Physical Endurance has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

WIS has increased by 1!

Meditation has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

CHA has increased by 1!

Sneak Attack has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.
LUK has increased by 1!

Iaido has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

for a moment,

STR has increased by 1! Confuse has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

Fireball has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N. STR has increased by 1!

DEX has increased by 1! Dominate has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

Flash Freeze has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N. DEX has increased by 1!

CON has increased by 1! Forget has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

Spinning Mana Sword has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N. CON has increased by 1!

INT has increased by 1! Read Thoughts has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

Elemental Manipulation has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N. INT has increased by 1!

WIS has increased by 1! Telepathy has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

Rasengan has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N. WIS has increased by 1!

CHA has increased by 1! Telekinesis has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

Invisibility has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N. CHA has increased by 1!
LUK has increased by 1! AP Round has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N.

Charm has reached level 25. Would you like to choose a Skill Evolution? Y/N. LUK has increased by 1!

most of my field of vision was blocked. 'What the fu—'

There was a sound like ice shattering and cold washed over me, radiating out from my chest. My lungs seized up as I felt searing pain from the point of impact. From the corner of my eye I could make out my HP bar drop as I was sent flying—yet more popups clogging my field of view even as some of the notifications disappeared on their own. Rolling to my feet, I dropped into Invisibility—another popup—and Flash Stepped—yet another popup—to move away from my last position. Growling softly, I began closing out windows as I wondered what the fuck had happened while checking myself over. My Aura flickered around my body for a moment before stabilizing as I felt the wound Weiss had given me close up as though it had never been as Gamer's Body kicked in. The only sign she had managed to gig me was a thin puncture through my armor on the left side of my chest, at the point where the armor was split between two plates for flexibility. She had managed to punch the thin blade through my Aura after repeated strikes to weaken it, angled it up and caught my lung, then blasted me with ice for good measure.

While I cleaned up my UI and Weiss retook a defensive stance, I took a moment to consider my options. 'She's too fast for the pole to be effective. Likewise for the Dustcasters built into Ascalon. I could retreat, but I can't have her thinking she can win against me—it'll only encourage her to go after stronger opponents by herself. I have a more limited spell selection as Shiro and Weiss is a pretty decent foil to my power set. And with Momentum Dust givingher instant speed... wait a minute,' my train of thought came to a halt as I glanced down at her feet. The smaller glyphs were there again.

'I need to lock her down. Limit her mobility. It'll mean no more hit-and-run tactics, but at this point that has failed anyway. I can deal with the loss of mobility, she can't.' With that, a plan began to form and I took off towards the trees. My plan was actually pretty simple—the trees would serve as obstacles, concealment, and cover. With any luck, Weiss would be forced to slow down or risk pinballing herself. Then again, I wasn't intending to rely on luck.

Once I was a few yards inside the tree line, I dropped Invisibility. A sharp whistle caused Weiss to start and I grinned as I yelled, "Over here, princess."

This time, there was enough distance between us that I could track her when she launched herself at me. Waiting until the last moment, I swung my sword and dumped power into the blade for an Aura Strike. The blade buzzed quietly as it passed through the air, missing Weiss's face by inches as the heiress came to a sudden dead stop. The blade hit the tree to her right and I jumped away an instant before physics took over and the tree trunk exploded outwards—electricity flash-boiling the water inside and causing a sudden, violent outgassing of steam and wood shrapnel. Weiss flinched away, one hand going to her left eye as she was temporarily flash blinded and possibly deafened. To her credit, the heiress anticipated my follow-up attack from her blind side and reacted accordingly even as her Aura flared brightly for a moment and her left eye refocused on me.

Ascalon went flying in as I launched a series of probing strikes, testing her defenses and pressing her deeper into the wooded area of the park. Realizing what I was doing, she tried to make distance by going around me to head back into the open, but I intercepted her before she could. 'I was right. She doesn't have the control to use it in this clutter yet. Too much brush to trip over and too many limbs to run into at that speed.'

Recognizing a losing situation when she was in one, Weiss changed Dust types. A flick of her free hand had a glyph spinning up under her and, an instant later, trees around us exploded outwards—suddenly sprouting limbs and spikes of ice meant to limit my own maneuverability. She changed Dust again and one of the more familiar glyphs I'd seen her use before for jumping around appeared in the upper branches of one of the trees around us, above her icy additions to the forest. Weiss leapt upwards, quickly bouncing out of her own trap, before turning to regard me as she changed Dust types again.

"You realize I'm not going to just let you sit up there and attack with impunity," I deadpanned, flicking the switch to change over my own Dust crystal. Ascalon's yellow glow and faint buzzing faded out, replaced by soft green and a quiet hiss of moving air. More ice erupted around me from the trees and the ground and I swung twice, charging up back to back Aura Strikes—the first turning Weiss's ice into sleet while flinging the second not at Weiss, but the tree she was perched in. The heiress leapt away and made to send more ice my way before a cracking sound drew her attention back to the tree she'd been in, where the top had fallen out of it and crumpled against the tree next to it. Shooting her a grin under my mask, I taunted, "Can you dance?"

Ice blue eyes widened as I began flinging out Aura Strikes, forcing her to give up on the offensive Dust and simply dodge. For my part, I worked on clearing enough of the ice Weiss had nearly managed to trap me in before taking to the air—jumping into the nearest tree and using Surface Walking to maneuver around the heiress, cutting off her attempt to get back to a clear spot at ground level. I faintly heard Weiss growl in frustration as I forced her back down towards the mess she'd left on the ground, effectively forcing her back into her own trap.

Touching down a moment after she landed, I was forced to dodge a rising wave of ice she had launched into my projected path. Flipping the selector switch on Ascalon's handle again, the blade turned an orange color. Earth Orange was one that, when asked for her input, Jen had suggested using to balance out my limited selection. It was one of my two more defensive Dust types loaded into the sword's handle—the other being a light blue that I would bet was what Weiss was using: Ice Blue.

As the girl across from me brought her weapon down in a vertical slash, sending out an expanding crescent of Aura and ice, I returned the favor—swinging Ascalon into a rising arc that dragged the tip of the blade against the ground. Earth and rock erupted at my feet, slamming into Weiss's own attack and crushing it under its greater mass and weight, before continuing on to slam into the heiress a moment later. Not taking any chances, I followed up with two more—the first missing as she managed to roll behind a tree, the second partially uprooting the tree and forcing her out of cover. I was there waiting for her, having thrown on Invisibility and run the distance after the attack. I dropped out of Invisibility and slammed the flat of the sword into her head—a Sleep Strike spell already imbued in the blade. Weiss hit the ground. I had to give her credit as she actually tried to roll out and get to her feet, wobbling drunkenly as she did so. Another application sent her into la la land as her Aura finally broke and the sword smacked into her skull.

"Good night, princess," I muttered, sheathing the sword and dropping to rest against one of the still standing trees in the area, exhaling a long sigh as I did so. Looking down at the battered form of my unwitting sparring partner, I considered my options. 'Fuck it,' I decided after a moment of thought, before casting on the girl. Weiss's naturally higher Will Save didn't help her here as it had against the first Sleep Strike, considering she was unconscious. Forget to erase the last thirty seconds or so, which should include any potentially worrisome memories of feeling funky after I hit her the first time and she rolled high on her Will Save. Dominate, Read Thoughts, and a second casting of Sleep just to be sure she wouldn't wake up washed over the girl one after the other until I was satisfied. Then, I ordered her to remember where she was staying.

Pushing up from my seat, I brushed myself off and bent down to lift the girl into a bridal carry. 'She doesn't really weigh anything. Hell, I think she may be lighter than the twins.'

Throwing on Invisibility once more, I took off into the city, making my way to the heiress's hotel. Slipping inside, I made my way up to her room—surprisingly not the penthouse suite and, more surprising, not the most expensive hotel in town. It seemed Weiss was fairly serious about not drawing too much attention. Fishing her room key out of her pocket, I let myself in and looked around. Her luggage stood out and I made a mental note to dupe its contents before I left—or at least the Dust therein, at any rate. 'Then again, I'm pretty sure she's close enough to the same size as the twins that they could use what she has or alter it to fit. They're not going to turn down gifts—especially since whatever Weiss has is bound to be high quality stuff.'

Moving to her bedroom, I looked down on her dirt and sawdust covered form and shook my head. "Sorry, princess. You can take care of that in the morning." Looking around the room, I found a set of stationary and a pen on a table beside the bed. A faint smirk tugged at my lips as I set about making a note.

Brought you back safe and sound after our late night rendezvous and put you to bed. Don't worry princess, your chastity is still intact—after all, if you're going to use me to piss your father off, I want you to be conscious to enjoy it. Sleep well. - Shiro.

P.S.: Don't bother changing hotels. I know it's disappointing, but we won't be meeting again for some time. I have some business to take care of for the next few months and I'll be out of town.

P.P.S.: I am not running away so that does not count as a win for you. Nor does it have anything to do with the Dust explosion—not that I expect you to believe me on that front.

Chuckling quietly, I left the note on the table beside the bed and made my way over to her luggage. Opening the first compartment, I whistled softly at the Dust I found there. "I'll dupe it all and sort it out when I get home."

One trip through an ID to collect a copy of Weiss's luggage later and I left the hotel room, locking the door behind me as I made my way outside and went looking for somewhere to change over to the Fox so I could head home for the night. As I neared the edge of my range, I allowed the spells I'd left on Weiss to dispel. The only thing that would stick would be the Forget ensuring she didn't realize I'd tried to use Sleep on her. I was tired, my foul mood was back now, and my temper was growing dangerously short at this point. Fighting Weiss had helped—I had probably enjoyed that more than I should, to be honest. On the other hand, I may have beaten her, but I couldn't really call it a win since I'd had to resort to tagging her with Sleep. She had forced me to use something outside Shiro's 'official' skill set. Worse, she had managed to tag me through my Aura. That only illustrated that the gap between us wasn't nearly as wide as I would have liked. Weiss learned from her mistakes and adapted quickly. It meant I needed to find time to work on more training for tactics and techniques to use as Shiro—time which would be in short supply, come Monday.

I was sorely tempted to just say 'fuck it' and ignore the whole Arc situation, but curiosity wouldn't let me. "What's the worst that could happen?"

---

"It's not the end of the world, you know."

I turned an unamused look over at Neo, seated on my left. Behind us, the twins giggled softly. "Quiet, you two," I warned preemptively.

"So you have problems with not being in control, Jaune?" Joan asked from the back seat, and I could hear the smirk in her voice.

"Yes. That's absolutely it," I deadpanned. I winced and grabbed the 'oh shit' handle as Neo swerved around a slower moving vehicle. "It has absolutely nothing to do with the madwoman driving."

"You agreed that it would look suspicious if we showed up and you were the one driving my car, my love," Neo reminded with a smirk.

"I remember," I growled quietly. "I should have just had us change seats outside of town."

"Too late for that!" Neo cheered, reaching out and hitting the radio button.

"MOVE BITCH, GET OUT THE WAY—"

"Fuck no," I hissed, reaching over and jamming a finger on the seek button.

"Last night a little dancer came dancin' to my door—"

Neo's finger hovered over the seek button for a moment before moving back to the steering wheel, tapping along to Billy Idol's Rebel Yell. Behind us, Joan asked, "Is that a Semblance thing?"

"Eh?" I asked. "What do you mean?"

"We think so," Melanie answered from Joan's right. "Unless it's Penny..."

"Nope!" the gynoid chirped from where she sat in Joan's lap, under the effect of a Lighten spell—because while Joan could ignore Penny's weight, the seats had complained.

"Speaking of Penny," I interrupted, turning enough to eye the gynoid. "I got an update last night and only got around to checking it this morning. Apparently certain notifications were reset and permissions were removed for 'pets and summons' to close those messages. So, Penny, have you been closing my Semblance notifications?"

"I was, until your Semblance updated and now I can't. They were constantly popping up and a hundredth of a second is plenty of time for anyone to read them!" Penny answered guilelessly.

Turning away, I facepalmed and resisted the urge to groan. "I know they're annoying, but I kind of need those. I got stabbed last night because my Semblance reset a couple of weeks worth of notifications and then dropped them all at once."

"Wait, you got stabbed? By who?" Melanie asked, beating the others to the punch.

"Three guesses and the first two don't count," I offered.

Neo shook her head. "No, sorry Jaune, that's not nearly enough. Even when you cut the list down by lumping people like the White Fang all as one group, it's still pretty long."

"It's not that bad," I rolled my eyes. "It was Weiss. She picked us up when we left Cinder's place. The usual song and dance ensued. Oh, and on a completely unrelated note, I got you presents. Came across a small stockpile of Dust and expensive clothes and duped the lot."

"'Unrelated,' right," Joan snorted softly.

"We don't care if it's related. In fact, if they're copies of Weiss Schnee's things, they're bound to be the sort of high-quality stuff that costs an arm and a leg. And let's face it, rich girl or not, she's got good taste," Miltia pointed out, to which her sister and Neo both nodded.

"We're probably about her size, too," Melanie hummed.

Neo frowned, however. "I don't think I'm going to be able to squeeze into anything she had without some adjustments in the chest area."

"Like you won't enjoy playing with it while you alter it," Miltia countered, earning a nod from Neo. "As I was saying, before Jaune interrupted," she turned a smile my way and I stuck my tongue out in reply. "We're pretty sure everyone has individual playlists."

"My Semblance has done that since day one. At this point, I just assume it's doing it to screw with me." It was also a good way to tell just how bad off I was in any given situation. If my Semblance felt like putting on the mood music, odds were good I was about to get fucked.

"Weird," muttered the blonde, before quietly adding, "But I think I've seen it before."

Blinking at that, I turned and asked, "When?"

Joan's blue eyes met my own for a moment before she answered, "The day you died. I was there in the hospital with you. Doctors called Time of Death and you were clinically dead for a few minutes. Then everything went nuts and you started healing up."

"What, the heart monitor started tapping out the rhythm to Take On Me or something?" I asked, resisting the urge to laugh at the mental image.

"No. More like every speaker on that floor of the hospital, including the P.A. system, started playing random songs."

Her expression had closed down, going flat as she'd talked and her tone matched it. 'She's dwelled on it so much it looks like she's numb to it,' I realized. I turned back towards the road as we finally cleared the city streets, heading deeper into the Residential District. "I want you to show me that memory later. If you don't mind."

"I..." she hesitated, frowning as she considered it.

After a moment, I nodded. "It's okay. You don't have to."

Sighing, the elder blonde closed her eyes. "I will later."

"So, any idea what caused that explosion last night?" Melanie asked, blatantly changing the subject, for which I was grateful. "Reports from our teams on site had lots of details on the effects, but nothing on the cause."

Joan shrugged. "No idea."

I winced. "I might have been responsible."

Three voices from the back simultaneously asked, "What?"

Neo's head turned and her eyes locked onto mine as she raised an eyebrow. "Eyes on the road," I ground out, reaching for the 'oh shit' handle again.

"Explain," she demanded before turning her attention back to the road.

"Indirectly," I clarified quickly, watching the scenery whip by worryingly quickly. I made a mental note not to let Neo drive us back when we left. Considering it for a moment, I added, "This doesn't leave this car, understand? Do not mention this after we're done talking, do not talk about it amongst yourselves, if you must do so use telepathy and only between those of us present. Understand?"

"Why not, Jaune?" Penny asked.

Running a hand over my face, I answered, "Because if Blake finds out, you know who she'll blame. And she won't necessarily be wrong. Are we agreed?" I asked, and waited until I had affirmatives from the others before continuing. "Remember the train? I puppeted some White Fang there and left orders to destroy the Dust cache at the farmhouse to prevent them from getting their hands on it. Apparently, they decided the best way to do this was by shooting the Dust—except they also shot out the seals for the space expansion Bounded Field inside the barn. Full field collapse on top of all that Dust going up. I didn't give them any sort of orders as to how to accomplish this, so they decided on it themselves."

"You can do that?" Joan asked, her tone clearly worried. "Give people orders that will result in them killing themselves?" I nodded and she sighed. "I, that is... Dust, Jaune, you can't let anyone else know!"

"We've been careful," Neo answered before I could. "And it's not like he's just throwing that spell around all over the place. Mostly on assholes who deserve it."

"Or me, for fun," Miltia smirked.

"Fun? Being mind controlled is fun for you?" Joan asked, incredulity plainly obvious in her tone.

Miltia shrugged. "Only when it's Jaune doing it." Her smirk became a leer as she quietly added, "You should try it some time."

"I'll pass," Joan retorted. "As I was saying, though. Mental Semblances are rare—"

"Fuck," I breathed, running a hand over my face. "'Rare,' but they do happen. So Emerald isn't a fluke."

"You know someone else with one?" Joan asked, eyes going wide for a moment before she frowned. "That is a rarity. And yes, they are a thing."

Turning a look on the twins, I grumbled, "So I wasn't being paranoid to worry about it."

"No. People with mind-affecting Semblances do occasionally turn up. But anyone with anything remotely like mind control or mind reading gets disappeared. Either by one of the governments or by private organizations. Don't let anyone figure out you can do that," Joan warned.

"I'll keep it in mind," I agreed. I had always been careful with that particular spell before, treating it as a 'need to know' subject. Angel was the only one outside the group who knew now, and I could reason that her knowing was more useful than not and worth the risk. "Anyway. White Fang mooks shot up my space expansion Bounded Field on the barn. Field collapsed and detonated the Dust inside. How bad was it?"

"Very," Miltia and Melanie answered in tandem. A moment later, my scroll chimed and a text from Miltia popped up with a picture of the site. Opening it, I whistled softly as I took in the scene. The barn was gone and in its place was a crater that had to be thirty yards across and at least ten yards deep—or so I guessed, using one of the people standing in frame holding a piece of equipment as a reference for scale. The entire area was lit with a multi-hued glow—most of which came from the center of the crater, but some was simply moon-and-starlight, somehow amplified to nearly a daylight level of brightness.

The thing that first caught my eye, though, had to be the crystal formation. It spanned from the bottom of the crater at least twenty yards upwards and twisted in odd curves, bands, and arches away from a central spire. Some of it even floated free from the main body of the crystal, suspended in mid-air. From its coloration and the fact that it looked to be shedding mist, it was a safe bet to say it was made of ice—at least on the exterior. Where physics packed it in and called it a day however, was what appeared to be stuck inside the ice. Lightning and fire were two of the more easily identifiable things frozen in place—lightning arcing through several individual arms branching off the formation and running through the pillar at the center; tongues of flame hanging suspended in bands and branches.

The earth around the crater was littered with jutting stone spears—most pointed outwards, but a few near the edges curved inwards. A closer look showed odd rises in the landscape, stretching away from the crater—like ripples in a pond. The farmhouse had been blown away as well, but at least part of the foundation had remained, if only as part of the garden of stone surrounding the blast site. Trees around the area had been blown to flinders from the shockwave while others were merely knocked down—reminding me of pictures of the Tunguska blast on Earth.

The man I'd been using for scale earlier shook his head, turned away from the blast, and shouted something before waving his arms away and moving quickly back from the blast area. I blinked, realizing I'd been looking at a video—not a picture. With the man there moving through the frame, I realized just how unnaturally still it was. 'That shouldn't be possible. There has to be some other type of Dust at play here, because surely either the lightning or the fire would've burned through the ice. And that's not counting all the countless other striations running through the crystals—metal, water, and more that I can't place that could be just as destructive as fire or lightning or could be completely inert.'

"That is... pretty." I found myself at a temporary loss for words. Nothing I could say would do it justice. I'd honestly never seen anything quite so beautiful—and made all the more so for the sheer destruction it contained, frozen in a moment.

"Cameras don't catch half of the effects going on," Melanie added. "If you've seen the guy moving, that's what he was shouting about. Sound didn't carry inside the range of that crater—a result of Silent Silver in the crates, they think—but he was trying to warn people to stop looking at it with the naked eye. He said it was a cognition hazard."

I blinked. "Does that mean what I think it means?"

"Persistent mental effect capable of enrapturing or trapping a person," Joan confirmed my suspicion. "I don't know what kind of Dust would do that."

"Indigo," I quietly supplied. "It's what they used on Jen."

Miltia winced. "The more of that crap destroyed, the better. It'll be a costly loss for someone. Not the most costly, though." Her green eyes met mine and she added, "You missed something important when you went through everything."

"Keeping in mind that it was labeled with numbers and not words, and I can only identify the basic colors at the moment," I pointed out, and she nodded.

"It's still a loss. There was at least one crystal of Time Brown—"

"Of what?" I interrupted. "I could have sworn you said 'time.'" Miltia nodded. "Fuck me, that is bullshit. So not only can Dust fuck with matter and space, it can make time do screwy things too. That's so much bullshit. Also, who picked the name? It's terrible."

"According to my database, Atlas named it," Penny supplied.

Joan nodded. "There are a few naming schemes for Dust, depending on who discovers it. Mistral tries for things that sound catchy. Atlas goes for no frills, description-in-the-name."

Closing the video, I asked, "How dangerous is this? Will it all explode when the time Dust wears off?"

"Very. And yes, once it wears off the effects that are being held in check by the Time Brown will go off. The area has been temporarily quarantined, but it should be safe for a while. It might be worth going to have a look in person," Miltia suggested. "Fox Hunt is helping Vale PD keep the area locked down while they clean up what they can and warn people away from the area, so it wouldn't be out of the question for us to show up. It's kind of a limited window of opportunity, though. We won't be there pro-bono forever—only until they've got a handle on the situation, so we aren't losing too much money on this."

I shook my head. "No, I'll just have to take your word for it. Worst thing a criminal can do is return to the scene of the crime."

"And on that note," Joan spoke up, shifting her gaze to Neo—or as much of the ice-cream themed girl as she could, given their respective positions in the vehicle. "I went to bat for you with Yang."

"Thanks for that. Blondie's a bit too goody-goody for us some days," Neo smiled back at the rearview mirror.

"Uh huh. Now, before I do the same with our family, I'm going to need to know more about you. I called Hei, so I'm well aware of everything he knows about these two," she gestured towards the twins, "but I'm going to want to hear it from their lips. As for you, Jaune wouldn't keep you around if it was bad, and I assume he knows..." she trailed off, shooting me a questioning look.

I nodded. "I do. Not my story to tell, though. I kind of thought you'd trust my judgment."

"I do, but as they say—trust but verify," Joan countered.

Turning an amused look on me, Neo shrugged. "I don't mind. Since you asked so nicely," she shot a look at Joan through the rearview. "I grew up rich. Part of Vale's so-called 'high society.' Dad was on the Council, mom was a Hunter. Between their jobs, they didn't have much in the way of time to spend with me, so I spent most of it with our maid, who taught me how to sew in her free time. Hunter's kid, so I figured out my Aura and Semblance pretty early. Mom was kind of amused at the superficial similarities. Her Semblance allowed her to induce auditory hallucinations, produce UHF and ULF—shatter your skull or induce an embolism, fun things like that. With so much time to myself and the fact that I was home-schooled, well, I got bored. I didn't exactly need money, but jewels and Dust are both shiny and you know I'm like a magpie at times—and crime sounded fun. The thrill of going out and pulling it off without getting caught was addictive. Roman and I crossed paths a few times—well, more like I stole things out from under his nose after he'd already stolen them. Eventually, we partnered up. Then Jaune came along and everything changed."

Joan turned an annoyed look on me. "How much of that is truth?"

I shrugged. "Your guess is as good as mine was the first time I heard it."

"You don't believe me?" Neo asked, chuckling quietly. "Fine. I grew up in a series of temporary compounds in the woods, as part of a secret group of assassins that have been around since the time of the Wizard and have been blending in at every level of society—from the high rollers to the gutter trash—in order to keep the peace in Remnant. It's where I learned acrobatics and where to put the pointy end of a blade. The thievery and everything was just a cover for infiltrating the criminal element of Vale. Now, I'm holding in place and waiting for orders since Jaune seems to have thrown a monkey wrench into things."

Palming her face, Joan groaned quietly. "My bullshit detector must be on the fritz. If I didn't know that was literally the background for one of the characters of 'Rogues in the Dark' I might actually buy it."

"Those novels are trash," Melanie shook her head.

Miltia nodded agreement. "Worse than 'Ninjas of Love' as far as plot-to-porn ratio. It can't even pretend to be erotica at this point. It's just wordy porn."

"There is nothing wrong with wordy porn," Neo countered.

"Neither of those stories is true?" Penny asked and Neo laughed from beside me.

I sighed. "No, Penny."

"Okay, so the truth?" Neo asked and Joan turned an unamused look on her. "To be honest, there isn't much to tell. Short story short: I'm an orphan. Never knew my parents. Grew up bouncing from one foster home to another to another because I was too much of a problem, but I was too damn cute not to adopt. In between places, I picked up skills here and there. I was never abused or molested or anything like that—never even really bullied, beyond the usual pecking order type shit that goes on in places like that when I actually managed to get kicked back to an orphanage. Got old enough to join an academy but I didn't like the idea of risking my neck for the same people who looked down on me for where I came from, so I took off on my own. By then my Semblance had kicked in and I started stealing to survive. And for fun. And because I like shiny shit. Roman and I crossed paths on the same job. Well, that is to say, he stole the goods and I sat back and waited, then lifted them off him when he was done. Had a good laugh over that. We played cat and mouse for a couple of months before he finally offered me a job. After that, things took off and I found myself playing second fiddle at the heart of a small time gang. Roman was great at first—funny, charismatic, charming really…" Noticing the look Joan was shooting her, she shot a glare back in the mirror. "Hey, don't look at me like that! I was young and stupid, okay? Anyway. I figured out that I was pretty much eye candy and a handy tool to keep around since he hadn't awakened his Semblance. The sex was mediocre, to be honest. The only reason I stuck around was because I didn't really have anywhere else to go. No marketable skills, as it were—at least, not legally—and taking off on my own would mean being in competition with Roman again."

Leaning back, Joan sighed quietly. "So, how much of that was bullshit?"

"Only a little," I clarified. "The truth is a combination of the first and last story. The second is because she wrote the book in question."

Joan blinked. "Wait. What?"

"Yup!" Neo nodded. "I get a royalty check every six months. It didn't sell well thanks to those jackasses releasing 'Ninjas of Love' almost immediately after. But as Jaune said: I grew up in high society, until my parents died. Mom didn't come back from a mission and dad… couldn't take it. He blamed himself, me, everyone else—for the longest time I thought it really was my fault that they died. 'Video killed the radio star.' I got over it. I realized mom died from bad luck and dad was sick in a way I couldn't help."

A look of realization crossed Joan's face at that. "I remember that. I'm—"

"Don't bother," Neo cut her off. "As I was saying though, considering where I came from and the fact that I was adorable, there were plenty of people willing to take me in. I 'acted out' a lot as a kid. Eventually, they took the hint and I got shoved into an orphanage. Pretty much ran the place after six months until I left. I wrote 'Rogues in the Dark' after crossing paths with Roman, actually—before I started in on the crime thing. I made enough off the initial sales to buy an apartment and royalties would have kept me fairly comfortable for a few years until I put out another—which my publisher keeps urging me to do—but it wasn't enough for me. I was bored. So I went looking for trouble. I called it 'research' at first, but really, I loved the thrill. Yes, I had a crush on Roman. Yes, I tracked him down and fucked with his head until he got the picture. I didn't realize what I was getting until after I had it though. He finally pissed me off enough to leave and Jaune picked me up in a bar. He manipulated me into joining him and I've been happier in the last month than I have been in the last six years." Neo leered as her eyes found the twins in the mirror. "The twins helped."

"And that's it?" Joan asked, drawing a nod from both myself and Neo.

"Yep. No dark secrets. No tragic past. I'm pretty much average in that regard. Unless you want to get into the whole bullshit psychological breakdown of my Semblance, how it makes me an everygirl who can blend and survive anywhere, and what it says about living in orphanages and foster care."

Joan rolled her eyes. "Losing your parents is generally considered tragic. And I'll avoid the trip down the rabbit hole into psychobabble if you'll agree to do the same."

"Agreed. So, show of hands. Who here lost a parent?" Neo asked before throwing up her hand. Miltia and Melanie added theirs. "Now, who here had at least one parent who was a piece of shit?" Neo's hand went down, Penny's hand slowly went up while Joan groaned quietly and raised her own hand. "Ruby lost her mother and Yang's… is complicated."

"That's an understatement," I grunted, turning an eye on the point where I felt Raven watching from. "Taiyang, Yang and Ruby's dad, is a lunatic. Pretty sure he acts that way as a coping mechanism, because no one can be that off-kilter and still be functional."

"I've met him," Joan nodded. "Great guy—definitely someone I'd want at my back in a fight—but yeah, he's a bit off."

"And their uncle is a drunkard and probably a womanizer. Blake said she grew up on the streets," I supplied.

"So, yeah. Average," Neo grinned. "Anything else you'd like to know?"

"No, I think I'm good," the elder blonde murmured. We fell silent after that for a few minutes until she sat forward in her seat and pointed at a road coming up. "Turn off ahead," Joan instructed Neo from the back seat, and the maniac behind the wheel slowed the red SUV enough to take the corner on two wheels as opposed to rolling, heading up the long driveway towards the Arc home.

The brakes pumped then locked, throwing us into a slide and my hand went back to the 'oh shit' handle as the vehicle spun around one hundred and eighty degrees before coming to a stop. Opening my tightly clenched eyes and seeing we weren't all dead, I yanked off my seatbelt and bailed out before Neo decided to try that stunt again for laughs. Once I was on solid ground, I turned to see Neo had parked with the rear bumper all of a foot from the closed garage door. "Nutcase," I grumbled as the others left the vehicle.

"But Jaune, you drive like that sometimes," Penny supplied and I shot the gynoid an annoyed look.

"Not like that," I denied.

Moving up to my side and bumping her hip into me, Neo leaned up and whispered, "Forget you have Aura?"

I blinked. "No," I answered, refusing to meet her eyes as she laughed quietly. Sweeping my eyes over the five girls, I gestured towards the house. "Joan, it's your show from here. Lead on."

The blonde nodded, starting off towards the house and asking, "What grade Dust are you packing?"

"Six mostly, for offensive stuff—one nine in each of the Sabers, though. Sevens loaded on defensive enchantments for the armor—I figured there's no point wasting a nine on it unless I need it, in which case I can just swap it out in the field through menus."

Joan shot me a look and shook her head. "Don't tell our parents you have that, or where you got it and go ahead and swap it out for Grade 3 or 4, before we get started. And don't have it equipped when you get to Beacon. If they catch you with it, you'll catch hell."

I nodded. "That's fine. I can change out to something lower before Monday. Why not tell our parents? I don't think they're going to report me."

"No," Joan agreed, "but you're not supposed to use it except for emergencies. They'll recognize it on sight if you use it, so as I said, change it out. What about the rest of you?"

The twins and Neo traded looks and shrugs between themselves. "We don't really use much Dust," Miltia admitted. "No Dust weapons anyway."

"We've got defensive enchantments like Jaune's, also using Grade 7," Melanie finished.

"Grade 7 for defenses and I might have upgraded my parasol with something new and shiny, running Grade 6," Neo answered, turning a grin on me.

I raised an eyebrow at that, eyeing the weapon in question where Neo was leaning it against her shoulder, currently folded up. A closer look showed what looked like something faintly glowing from the inside of one of the folds. "You turned it into a Dustcaster using an offensive enchantment sewn into it."

"Maybe," Neo hummed, smirking as she dragged out the word.

"Right, all of that has to go," Joan sighed.

From her other side, Penny chirped, "I am powered by three full sized Grade 9 crystals," the girl answered. "Currently, they are at seventy-five percent capacity."

Joan's eyes went wide as she looked at the little gynoid. "Well, that explains some things, like the strength and the laser power output," she muttered, shaking her head. "I'm kind of surprised you haven't blown yourself up with those."

"My power regulation circuits are top of the line," Penny explained.

"You can use the family stockpile to swap what you've got out with lower grade stuff, if you don't have any," Joan offered.

I turned an amused look on the woman. "A stockpile of Dust I haven't duped yet? Please, show me." The elder blonde opened the doors and the girls trailed in after her as I brought up the rear. I'd barely gotten the door closed behind me when the group came to a halt. Looking over the heads of the four shortest girls, I saw Jen had met us at the door, and she and Joan were now eyeing each other warily, unsure how to proceed. "Did you two have a fight while I wasn't looking or something?"

"No," Joan answered, at the same time Neo and the twins answered, "Yes."

"It was an old argument," Jen shrugged.

Frowning, I asked, "Is that why you left?"

Jen nodded and I turned a look on Joan. "You broke it, you fix it."

"But—" the elder of the pair began. At the same time, Jen tried, "It's—"

Not in the mood for bullshit, I pulled up Charisma and Intent before growling quietly, "Fix. It."

Joan tensed and turned a pleading look on me as she half-whined, half-whimpered for doing that to her, before the elder blonde nodded slowly. Jen's emotionless mask thawed somewhat and she sent a small smile my way. The pair traded a look and Joan asked, "Talk after this?"

"Mm," Jen nodded in agreement.

With that handled for the moment, I asked, "Where are our parents?"

"They're talking to Jana and Jillian. We have a few minutes before things start," Jen answered.

"The others outside?" Joan asked, and Jen nodded, tossing her head towards the back door and turning to lead us through the house.

"Family photos?" Melanie asked, crossing her arms as she and Miltia took in the photos in question, arranged on one wall and a table. One in particular stood out, centered amongst the others as it was. Jun stood front and center, beaming a smile missing her two upper front teeth and looking about five if I had to guess. Immediately behind the tiny redhead were a pair of blondes, each with a hand on Jun's shoulders. The one on the left was shorter—around five feet at the time of the photo—with long hair pulled back in twin-tails. The girl on the right was a few inches taller than her sister at what I guessed to be five foot three, with short hair in a pixie cut. I didn't recognize either of them, so I assumed they were the two siblings I had yet to meet.

Behind who I supposed were Jana and Jillian were, from left to right, Joan, Jean, Jane, and Jen. 'Poor Jen,' I mused, a small smile crossing my face. She hadn't grown much since that photo—either in height or bust. She was the runt of Iris's litter, apparently. Other than some differences from growth spurts, the four elder sisters looked much as they did today.

Standing behind their progeny were the Arc parents. Jacques Arc in the center, tall and broad-shouldered, short cropped blond hair, and a neatly trimmed full beard that failed to conceal a roguish grin. To his right stood Iris—blonde hair pulled into long braid that draped over her right shoulder, curvy, and very tall for a woman. I could see where Joan got it from. To Jacques' left stood Lily—shorter, slimmer of build than Iris, and with somewhat less in the chest department. Where Iris had the Nordic valkyrie look down pat, Lily had the sportier build of an Olympian.

'Well, this should tell you something,' Melanie sent to the group, along with the picture in question. It was plainly obvious that it was missing someone. Namely, me. Well, minus Jaune, rather. Original Jaune. Whatever.

'There could be a good explanation for that. I could have been sick—' I began. My eyes shifted across the other photos. Many of them—mostly the ones taken more recently—seemed to also prominently miss the only Arc son.

Joan turned her head enough to meet my eyes as we walked. 'You weren't.'

I rolled my eyes, linking in Jen as well and posing the same question to her. She thought over it a moment, pushing open the back door and stepping outside before answering, 'You were in school that day.'

'So were the rest of us, and they pulled us out of school,' Joan added hotly. Ignoring or missing the mental jab, Jen nodded in agreement.

Looking around the back yard as we stepped outside, I spotted the twins sitting with Jun. The little redhead looked up, spotted me, and beamed a grin that seemed to split her face in half. "Onii—!" she paused mid-yell and winced, before correcting herself with, "Jaune!" and launching herself at me like a human missile.

Catching the smaller girl about the middle as she wrapped around me like an octopus, I laughed. "Hey, squirt."

Jane and Jean stood as we got closer, the pair of redheaded twins going wide eyed and trading incredulous looks. "Oh Dust, I think he got her to start acting…" Jane trailed off, seemingly looking for a word that wouldn't offend their little sister.

"Normal," Jean supplied, apparently not caring if she pulled the punch or not.

Jen shot a glance at her youngest sister before quietly adding, "Not like a child."

Jun flushed red and dropped off of me. "I can act normal! I'm grown up, I drink milk!"

"If the shoe fits," I teased, earning a look of betrayal from the youngest Arc.

"I hate you all," she grumbled, moving to sit down at one of the two wooden picnic tables set under a couple of umbrellas for shade, but only after snagging Penny by the hand and dragging her over to talk.

Neo hummed as she looked between the four eldest siblings. "How's this thing going to go?"

The Arc sisters exchanged looks before Jane sighed and answered, "I've got no idea. Usually we'd do a round-robin style tournament. This year, Jaune's actually going to compete... and he brought girlfriends."

"Dad and moms are going to want to evaluate you, probably," Jean supplied. "They'll probably have you fight some of the younger siblings."

Nodding agreement, Jen added, "Jaune will probably either fight one of us or—"

"Me," a quiet voice answered from behind us, and I turned to see two blonde Arc girls I recognized from pictures—Jana and Jillian—in addition to Lily, Iris, and Jacques Arc. Lily waved from where she had spoken, a bright smile on her face as she looked at me.

"Jaune," Jacques grinned, looking over the group gathered behind me before his eyes locked with mine.

Jacques Arc

Arc Clan Head

Divine Light

Level: ?

Intense, storm gray eyes met my blue and I felt the small smile I'd had since greeting the others slip as I hit him with Observe and the skill came up blank.

"It's been a while."