Mom and the others always told him that plans never survive contact with the enemy. But board games were a far cry from live combat. Gone was the luxury of time and cheap fun, and in its place was adrenaline, dull pain, and precious seconds he was quickly losing.

Backup plan. What kind of backup plan did he have? His eyes darted around for options.

Yang and Nora? On the cliff.

Blake and Ren? Fighting Sirius.

Pyrrha? Holding the line against Sheffield.

Ruby? Jaune picked her up and asked, "You okay?"

Ruby rubbed her head. "Yeah, I ran into walls harder than that." She paused, and then blushed in embarrassment. "Ah, forget what I said! I mean- uh, my sister hits me harder- no wait that's worse."

While Ruby flustered about her self-correction, Weiss jogged up to them, brushing the dirt off her skirt. "Will you dolts stop fooling around? We're in the middle of a fight."

That got Ruby to focus. "Right!" She pulled out Crescent Rose into scythe form. "Um, what about the landmines? I can't run over those. Where did they even get those, anyways?"

"Oh, we had the cargo space for a few tricks up our dresses," Newcastle said. "Now, are we going to stand around all day, or are we going to fight?" She tapped her umbrella into her hands.

"Now would be a good time for a backup plan, Arc," Weiss said crisply.

"I'm thinking!" Jaune's eyes darted between the girls around him and the path ahead. A few ideas sprung forth, and he grimaced. "We have two options. The first one, both of you replace Pyrrha while she gets rid of the mines."

The three of them, as one, looked to where Pyrrha fought. Sheffield really pulled out the stops against the gladiator, blocking and deflecting every strike of the sword and shield with her pistols and martial arts. And yet, with the ferocity that Pyrrha fought, Sheffield couldn't land a solid hit without resorting to tricks. It was like watching a spy movie and an ancient battle movie at the same time. If it weren't for the current situation, Jaune wasn't sure who he'd be rooting for.

"Pass. Option two?" Weiss was quick to shut down the idea, and Ruby wasn't eager to argue.

"You try to get rid of the mines with Ruby's help, she can take you where you need to go."

"But what about the maid?" Ruby asked.

Jaune drew his sword and shield. "Someone's gotta keep her occupied."

"Wasn't the point of this exercise to keep you out of their reach?" Weiss protested.

"Would you rather I go over there and stab the ground until I find a landmine?" Jaune didn't know why she was protesting so much. He was taking her place, so he should be the one protesting this dumb idea. If his body wasn't flooded with adrenaline, Jaune was sure he'd be shaking. "If it makes you feel better, Ruby can come back to help me once you're ready."

"You got it, Jaune!" Before Weiss could protest again, Ruby grabbed her wrist and pulled Weiss away in a burst of petals, blasting past Newcastle with ease.

Newcastle leveled a look at Jaune. "Sending out the girls while you face the enemy alone?" She shook her head. "I hope you won't make a habit of this, Jaune. Noble as it is, it's quite foolish. You would have fared better if they both fought me."

Jaune winced. It was definitely the smarter move, and yet… "How can I call myself a Huntsman if I don't pull my weight?" He brandished his sword and shield, setting his posture like how Sirius taught him (once a certain diligent dog Faunus kept her on task).

"Careful, Jaune. That weight you pull might be a buried anchor." Without warning, Newcastle lunged for him, umbrella outstretched.

Jaune caught the tip on his shield, only to find far more force than expected behind the thrust, pushing him a step back. He slashed back at her, but she was already out of reach. She didn't even let him have a chance to recover as she thrusted again into his sword-wielding shoulder. His aura took the blow, but he could still feel the blunt tip dig in past his armor.

Back and forth they went like this, Newcastle's swift strikes keeping Jaune perpetually on the backfoot. Jaune knew there was a skill gap between them, but with each blow he caught on his shield and each attack she parried, the gap grew from a hole to a chasm. It took everything he had to keep her at arm's reach, yet she still exploited holes in his guard.

"Jaune, are you even trying to pull your weight? Or are you holding back out of concern for me?" Newcastle asked.

And that was the other reason he was failing to land a hit. "I don't want to hurt you, Cassie." The sword was sharp enough to cut through metal. He didn't want to think of what would happen if he caught her arm or worse.

"That's sweet of you, but I'm not as frail as you think. If you won't attack me, I'm afraid I'll have to finish this little duel. So show me your resolve once more, Jaune, or was it all just bluster before?" She attacked once more, but this time, her strike had a bit more weight behind it.

Jaune parried it away. Barely, but the effort wasn't as half-hearted as before. He parried the next strike, and the next one, and the next one.

Parry. Parry. Block.

Was this the extent of his resolve? Was he going to stop here out of fear of hurting someone he cared about?

Parry. Parry. Block.

No, he knew they were tougher than they looked, and he knew what they wanted out of him. They wanted the best out of him. Funny enough, so did he, but where they wanted someone who commanded, he wanted to fight and be a hero. So where did his resolve go?

Parry. Parry. Block. Thrust.

His resolve went forward, like a tidal wave. Unshakeable and unstoppable.

Newcastle smiled as she dodged. "That's more like it."

When this was over, Weiss was going to have a long talk with Jaune about crazy decision making. Ruby would also be there as well. After all, what could possibly make him think that she was qualified to handle land mines? But never let it be said that a Schnee would back down from a challenge. Between Weiss' eye for detail and Ruby's keen eye, it didn't take long to find the spots that would house potential danger.

The problem was that in ruined structures, they were everywhere.

"How are we supposed to take care of this?" Weiss asked. "We don't have time to deal with all these traps."

"We don't need to deal with all of them," Ruby said. "Just enough to run past."

"That's still a lot, Ruby, and the path is too narrow to work with. We'd get knocked off the moment we step out there."

"Then what if we don't step on them?"

Weiss gave Ruby a dry look. "Don't step on the landmines? What a brilliant strategy. What next? Do we find another Nevermore to fly with?"

Ruby shook her head, brushing aside the sarcasm. "If we flood the path with ice, we can freeze the triggers over and the ice expansion can possibly even break a few of them so we can walk safely!"

Weiss blinked. That was a surprisingly well thought out plan. Perhaps she misjudged Ruby's planning capabilities. She said as much to her partner.

Ruby blushed. "Oh it's nothing. I got the idea from when I tried to make an ice cream gun for a project back at Signal, but the ice dust backfired and broke the chamber and firing pin. I was banned from using Ice Dust for a while."

Weiss facepalmed. "Dolt." But regardless, Weiss spun the chamber on her sword until it locked into ice, and then she stabbed at the ground. A sheet of ice poured out like a river, running into every crack and crevice. As the wave moved forward, they could hear a few frozen mechanical snaps of metal and plastic. Sometimes a payload or two would burst out, but only the ice dust ones, creating large pillars jutting out of the ground at odd angles. Within minutes, the path to the cliffs was frosted over.

"Woohoo! That's my partner!" Ruby cheered.

"It was your idea," Weiss said, but she still preened at the praise.

"Well, aren't you the clever lasses," a voice said behind them.

Ruby and Weiss turned in time to see Pyrrha lunge for the maid that appeared behind them, with her back to the path. Sheffield brought up her pistols in a cross to catch Pyrhha's sword and shove it aside.

"But do you really think we hadn't anticipated something like this?" Sheffield asked, not taking her focus off the gladiatrix. "Newcastle! London Bridge!"

They watched as Newcastle kicked Jaune back and made some distance before pulling out a small device and pressing the button.

Boom! Kracka-Boom! Boom! Boom!

The sound of thunder rolled out of the chasm as the paths to the cliffs detonated and collapsed. Ruby and Weiss watched in shock as their planned path fell to pieces. Ruby was the first to recover as she whipped around to face Sheffield.

"That's cheating!"

"Is it? How naive of you to think so," Sheffield cooly replied as she parried Pyrrha away. "We made no agreements to not destroy the path, thus it's hardly cheating."

"Yeah, but- it's-! You-!" Ruby flustered about until she settled on, "That's not fair! How are we supposed to get across now?"

Sheffield only gave the barest of shrugs before dodging away, leading Pyrrha back to a more open area.

Weiss looked down at her Dust containers. Still far too low on Gravity Dust for another catapult, even at this closer distance. Ice wasn't far behind, which made using another ice bridge unfeasible. An earth bridge? No, it'd collapse under its own weight, not to mention the possible instability made by the explosions.

Weiss grimaced. "I can't believe I'm asking this, but do you have a plan, Ruby?" As loathe as she was to admit it, these maids were crazy, and it seemed equally crazy tactics were effective against them. Ruby was good at that.

Ruby chewed on her lip as she frantically looked around. "I.. I don't…" Her eyes darted around, looking for nonexistent traps, and clouded with a heavy fog of self-doubt.

"Focus, Ruby!" Weiss flicked her finger against Ruby's forehead, bringing the girl back to reality.

"But what if-"

"No." Weiss jabbed a finger at Ruby. "Let me worry about the traps. You make the plan that gets us out of here."

Ruby took a deep breath. "Okay, uh, we need…" Ruby trailed off as she looked around the path, focused mostly on the pillars off to the side. "Blake!"

"Blake is busy holding off the first maid."

"No, I'm not."

Weiss and Ruby jumped as Blake and Ren appeared from behind them, slightly out of breath, face crossed with frustration. "What are you two doing here?" Weiss asked. "What about the maid?"

Blake pointed back at the start and they could see Sirius trying to break out of a chokehold from a livid Nora. "It's being handled. What did you need, Ruby?"

"I have a plan to get us across the gap! I just need your ribbon from your weapon. Oh, and Jaune."

Jaune was surprised he held out as long as he did, but in the end, he supposed it was inevitable that this would happen. Newcastle humored his fighting attempts, but she eventually had enough of playing around. A wide parry and then a hard strike at his wrist sent his sword flying off to the side with a clatter. He started to move for it, but the tip of Newcastle's umbrella held itself inches from his throat.

"Sorry, Master Jaune, but I will be needing your surrender now," she asked politely.

Jaune glanced around for a way out, but she had him dead to rights near the edge of the platform. Where were Ruby and Weiss? He heard something explode earlier, but couldn't afford to look away. Did they get knocked out? Was this really the end?

No, Ruby was still kicking and she was waving her arms at him to… oh! He could do that much.

"Before I do that, can I ask you something? How does an umbrella hold up to sniper fire and a sword sharp enough to cut through metal?"

Newcastle tilted her head, but obliged his request. "Simple. It's armor plated fabric, made to withstand quite a range of small arms fire. Though if you had any technique, you could have done a bit of damage to it, but you may as well have been using a butter knife on a frozen roast."

Jaune stared at her. "You know, out of all the maids, I thought you were the most normal one. What the hell is Mom's hiring criteria for maids?"

"We were co-workers of a sort. Now will you surrender?"

Ruby made a signal, but not for him. 'Is that Ren? What's he doing-?' Jaune's thought cut off as he was snatched away and sent flying upwards. He only just got a glimpse of Newcastle staring up at him before Ren delivered a flying kick that sent her sprawling off the side of the platform. Jaune's heart stopped for a moment, but resumed when Newcastle opened her umbrella and floated down the abyss. He then looked up to see his rescuer was none other than Blake, and - oh no - they were dropping back down again. His stomach flipped as they swung over to the destroyed bridge where Weiss and Ruby waited.

Jaune yelped as he was unceremoniously dropped at their feet. He clutched his stomach as it gurgled its displeasure. "Little warning next time?" he grunted out.

"If you throw up on me, I will kick you off this bridge myself," Weiss threatened. "Get up!"

He staggered himself up and tried to get the world to stop spinning. "Okay, so what's the plan?"

"Just be quiet and keep your breakfast down!"

"What?"

But Jaune received no answer as the world blurred red for a moment and he was grabbed by Ruby.

"Hang on, Jaune!"

Jaune's senses righted themselves, only to find himself (and his stomach) in terrible danger. "H-Hold on, can we talk about this?"

"Nope!" Ruby chirped. "Weiss! Pull!"

"This wasn't part of the plaaaaaaaaaaaan!" Jaune cried out as he and Ruby were launched via catapult. He yelled as they went hurtling up- no, towards the cliff face. Jaune shut his eyes and brought up his aura, praying it would keep him from turning into a nasty stain. As he did, he held tight onto Ruby, fearing what might happen if he dared loosen his grip.

Suddenly, the world spun around once more, and Jaune felt gravity pull on him in two directions. "Huh?" He cracked his eyes open to see himself and Ruby standing on the cliffside, their bodies parallel to the ground below. At their feet was one of Weiss' gravity glyphs, with a trail of them leading upwards.

"Come on!" Ruby said as she pulled him upwards in a sprint. Crescent Rose was deployed behind her, and as she ran, Ruby fired shell after shell after shell as she yelled, keeping her momentum up as she fought the natural laws of the world.

She was two-thirds of the way up when the glyphs began to flicker. Ruby nearly lost her step, but Jaune was able to kick off of an outcrop to push her back on.

"Keep going, Ruby!"

They were nearly there. The clifftop was just out of reach.

The last glyph vanished before they could reach it.

Click. Click.

Crescent Rose was empty.

With hardly a second thought, Jaune threw out his hand to grab the cliff. His fingers latched onto a rock, but it broke under the sudden weight. But before he could even move an inch further down, his arm was grabbed by a strong hand.

"Whoa there!" Yang said. "Need a hand?"

"Yang! This is no time for jokes!" Ruby called up as she dangled from Jaune's waist.

"Of course it is, I'm not doing much except Yang-ing around up here."

Ruby groaned. "Why do you have to be like this? Just pull us up already."

"I would never leave my sweet little sister hanging like that." With seemingly little effort, Yang hoisted the two of them up and over the edge of the cliff.

Jaune collapsed on the ground, unwilling to move from the safe steadiness that was the earth. "Can we never do that again?"

"Ready to blow chunks, Vomit Boy?" Yang joked, but then added in seriousness, "Just do it over the cliff and not on my shoes."

"Where…" Jaune gulped down the rising bile as he tried to sit up. "Where's Minnie?"

"Over here." Jaune turned his head to see Minnie sitting cross legged as she sharpened a hunting knife. "Take a minute and catch your breath. You earned it."

Jaune let out a sigh of relief and flopped back down, but he did not relax. He couldn't when Minnie was acting like she already caught him. 'I don't see any traps. The area is too wide. She's outnumbered. Why does she think she's won?' But he wasn't about to turn down the moment of respite.

Once his stomach was settled, Jaune stood up. "Alright, Minnie, I'm ready. What's your game?"

Without looking up, or even getting up, Minnie inspected the edge of her knife. "I'm going to catch you without moving a muscle."

Yang scoffed. "You couldn't have stayed still when I was trying to catch you?"

"I needed the exercise." Minnie sheathed the knife and stowed it away. "So, this is the part where you lose, Jaune."

"What are you talking about? It's three against one." Jaune reached for his sword…. Oh crap, he forgot to pick it up. "You're still outnumbered!" he added when Minnie gave him a smug grin.

"Am I? Because it looks to me like you're outnumbered."

Jaune looked around, but he saw no reinforcements. Ruby and Yang had similar looks of confusion.

"You know, Jaune," Minnie said, her voice cutting through the air like a knife, "there's a hard lesson every budding leader should know. It's the same lesson that's learned from wolf packs to ship captains: How do you deal with mutiny?"

The hungry, wolffish grin that Minnie bore sent chills down Jaune's spine. "I don't understand."

"I told you already. It's three against one, but you're the one."

"We didn't go through all that just to hand him over!" Yang said.

"Yeah!" Ruby added.

Minnie's grin became sharklike. "Even if I offer to tell you anything and everything you want to know about your parents right now?"

Ruby and Yang went still, and Jaune's heart nearly stopped. 'What? They aren't seriously considering… whatever this is? What does Minnie know that they want?' Jaune couldn't comprehend what might be going on in their heads

"All you have to do is just hand him over," Minnie said sweetly. "You can do that much, can't you?"

"Wait, wait, hold on, don't listen to her!" Three sets of eyes locked onto Jaune, two with unreadable expressions, and one that smelled the blood in the water. "I-I mean, we're right at the end! Yang, you said it yourself, are you going to just give in now?"

"Jaune, no offense or anything, but this is kind of a personal issue. A big personal issue."

Ruby said nothing, but looked down at the weapon in her hands almost forlornly.

"I can see that." How was he going to navigate his way out of this one? "Look, I'm not going to even pretend to understand, but…" Too selfish. "You should…" Too cruel. "I…" And that would make him a right douchebag.

Outran, then outgunned, and now outsmarted. Every card and advantage he played, they still turned things around on him. Jaune had resolved himself to fight his way into Beacon, but he couldn't bring himself to fight this. Not what might be his first friends. Was this where he drew the line?

"No."

All eyes turned to the source of the word, Ruby, who now had a determined resolve about her.

"Thanks, Minnie, but no thanks. You told me to make my mom proud earlier. I don't think she'd be proud if I turned in my first friend at Beacon just to learn more about her." Ruby spun her scythe about her body into a combat ready stance. "I'm going to be the greatest huntress ever and make you tell me those stories!"

Yang let out a sigh and pushed her hand through her hair. "Damn it. I can't let my little sister show me up like this. Ah, I already got what I wanted earlier anyways." She put up her fists and smirked at Jaune. "Looks like this is your lucky day, Vomit Boy."

Minnie leaned back with a pleasantly surprised look on her face. "Hmm. Almost had you there, kids, but you know what? I'm not even mad. In fact, I think I like this better." With feline flexibility, she curled up and sprang up to her feet. She then picked up her rifle and brandished it.

Jaune, Ruby, and Yang tensed up, ready for a fight. Except, it never came. Minnie unloaded the ammo from her gun and then started to field strip it. She even did it without breaking eye contact, as if she was trying to assert dominance through disarming.

Jaune raised an eyebrow at the display, but he didn't dare relax for a second. "Minnie, what are you doing?"

Minnie pulled a leather case from somewhere behind her and laid it out on the grass. "What's it look like I'm doing? I'm packing it in." She tucked each piece of her rifle away in their straps with practiced care.

Jaune gave her a bewildered stare. "You're giving up?"

Minnie paused and narrowed her eyes dangerously at him. "You want to rephrase that, fool within ass-kicking distance?"

He could hear Yang snicker off to his side as he tried to backpedal his words. "I-I mean, you're going to let me go? Just like that?" Never let it be said that Minnie didn't take pride in the hunt.

Minnie let out a pleased hum. "Just like that. No more tricks." Minnie folded the case up and tucked it under her arm. She gave a two-fingered salute. "Scout's honor."

Jaune could hardly believe it. He knew she wasn't lying, but after all the trouble they gave him, she was going to let him go? What about mom's orders? What about this role they wanted for him? What about-? Jaune's thoughts were shoved aside as Yang physically shoved him forward.

"Don't just stand there, move!" she said with a grin. "You better not chicken out on us now."

Jaune nodded numbly and his body moved on autopilot into a jog. Minnie grinned wolfishly as he passed her and headed for Beacon.

He was really doing this. He was going to be a Huntsman.

Minneapolis watched Jaune haul ass towards Beacon. Those physical training drills the other girls ran him through definitely paid off. A proper Commander needed to be quick on their feet after all, physically and mentally. The eye candy was a bonus, not that Jaune needed to know that.

But there was a lot he did need to know and the sooner the better. North Carolina knew it too, but she just got caught up being a perfect mother for him instead of the perfect officer of Azur Lane. Few could blame her, given their current crappy situation. But at the end of the day, they still had a mission. They needed Jaune to help carry it out, and he couldn't do it like the domesticated pup he was now.

Besides, it was clear that Jaune had really spread his wings after throwing himself out of the nest. He was still gliding down, but now he has not one, but seven new friends (actual human and faunus friends) to help him along. Watching them rally behind him to face off against a much more powerful enemy will be worth whatever punishment North Carolina could give them. Though she didn't say it, even the stick-up-her-ass Sheffield had to agree it would be very hypocritical of them to smother this growth.

Minneapolis turned back to her new potential protege. "You're a fast learner, Rookie. Or maybe I'm a good teacher? Maybe I should start tutoring Combat School kids?" There's an idea. She would need to ask Ranger about assessing her teaching skills later. Then again, grading papers meant less field time. Scratch that.

Ruby blushed and waved her hand dismissively. "Oh stop. I only got in two years early, I'm not that good."

"Oh, so does that mean you didn't cotton on that I would have handed both your butts to you and not told you a thing if you gave Jaune to me?" Ruby's face told her 'not at all'. She really did take a lot after Summer's spirit. It reminded Minneapolis of Lena and Clevelad. Humans are weird like that.

"It was just a lie?" Yang asked, her eyes flashing red like her mother's.

"Would you have taken it if it wasn't?" An uncomfortable expression flitted across Yang's face, but ultimately she shook her head. "You probably thought you'd give anything to know, but didn't think that would include friends?"

Yang not-quite-sheepishly rubbed the back of her head. "I did trash a bar and beat up the owner for not telling me anything." She scowled. "Not that they knew anything anyways. But no, I guess not."

Minneapolis stowed her hunting rifle away in her Cargo Space. "Now you know that next time someone offers you something that's too good to be true, it probably is."

"Yeah, cool, lesson learned." Yang waved her hand dismissively. "But can you please tell me how the hell you just did that?"

"Did what?" Minneapolis blinked and tilted her head like a doe.

"Minnie, you shoved a rifle up your, uh, shirt-cover." Ruby pointed between her corset and Minnie's attire. "Do you know how much candy I could sneak into the movies if I could do that?"

"Sorry, trade secret," Minneapolis said as she reached back up into her curtain and pulled out a flare gun. She raised it up and fired, launching a red streak into the air: Target Escaped. "You girls mind doing me a favor?"

"Sure!" Ruby chirped.

"Keep being a good friend to Jaune. He could stand to have a few like you when his mom comes calling."

"You can count on me!"

BOOM!

Ruby and Yang spun around at the sound of the massive explosion to see a large pink and green phrase written across the air: WE PASSED!

"Huh, thought she'd save that for later," Yang commented.

A/N: And that's a wrap for the first arc of the story!

I know some of you were hoping to see more of the Arc household, but don't worry, there'll be plenty of that coming soon enough. Beacon is not the end of seeing our favorite shipgirls, and Jaune still has a lot to learn about his legacy. Not to mention a lot of the other fun surprises I have in store for Jaune.

That said, I will be needing to take a brief pause to do a few things. Namely flesh out a few more details for the upcoming arcs, prep some foundations, maybe brainstorm a bit, and perhaps settle on some ships that i've been holding off on. I may do a poll on that last one some time in the future. Being open to a lot of ships does not make it easy to pick.

But most importantly, I want to be able to put out another chapter for my Salem fic. I'll still keep writing for this one, but any chapters I complete will have to wait until I can get something out for that fic first. And right now, said chapter is being incredibly frustrating to piece together (when I get the time to work on it, that is).

Please leave a comment! I love to hear from you guys.