CHAPTER 5 – Espions
In a log cabin on the island of Patch were there two sisters in a bed, scheming beneath the younger's scarlet comforter.
In earnest truth they had been attempting to get to sleep properly as their father had wished of them.
Yet through the floor, a commotion had enraptured their attention.
Muffled voices familiar and unfamiliar filtered from below to rouse their inquisitive nature, insatiable as it is in all young minds.
Illuminated by the fluorescent white light of a dimmed electric lantern, hidden away in what was to them a comforting fortress, Yang could not help but tease her sister for her boldness.
"You asked me to sleep in your bed tonight because you were scared… and you want to this now?"
The accusation had Ruby rifling through her mind for a suitable response.
Alas, it escaped her, and she mumbled, "…shut up. Do you want to go or not?"
Truthfully, Yang was not feeling as brazen as she usually was.
A near death experience whose severity was slowly setting in was mixing with the leviathan guilt of nearly costing Ruby her life as well.
Laden atop that were the various emotions from the topic her father had… reluctantly discussed with the two girls that night.
Raven Branwen.
Taiyang's first and ex-wife.
Her mother… who abandoned the family.
Needless to say, the emotional complexity of the turmoil Yang Xiao Long was experiencing that night was intense, such that even an adult would stagger if burdened with it.
She was not ready to unravel nor even confront the storm inside herself, so she preoccupied with something that always made her happy: Making Ruby smile.
Stifling a giggle at her sister's full body pout, a posture so discernible she recognized it even laying down and obscured, Yang nodded to her sister's question, "I wanna. Oooh, are we gonna talk in Notre Voix like mom's stories? Comme un vrai espion?"
The eldest daughter felt guilty to be even capable of laughter after all that had transpired, but she received her distraction from her burdens.
Ruby's face lit up with delight before she wriggled about to slip off the side of the bed from beneath the covers.
Yang turned off the lantern, sat up, and pushed the bedding off herself, eyes adjusting to the warm light of the lamp upon Ruby's bedside table illuminate the girl picking up a box out of the bedside table's drawer.
Ruby beamed a smile at her and whispered back, "Comme des super espions!"
/\/\/\
The sisters crept from Ruby's room down a short hallway to an even shorter landing before the staircase that led below.
At the cusp of the wall, just where the stair's handrailing began, did they huddle next to one another.
Or rather atop one another, as Yang leaned over her sister to jockey for a better view as they both leaned about the corner.
Peering between those balusters rewarded them with a grander feast for their imaginations than they could have hoped for.
The first detail they noticed wasn't sight, but smell. Woodsmoke. There was a hearty fire burning in the fireplace. A commonality in their household.
The second was less common but still known to the both of them: The voices of their father and uncle.
They were arguing somewhere in the foyer out of sight from their perch, trying and failing to keep the discourse from becoming vociferous. That too was, unfortunately, something the girls were familiar with.
Whatever the contents of the argument were, they couldn't discern beyond contextless snippets, and as they tried to focus upon it a stirring of movement drew their attentions.
Shifting uncomfortably in her seat was a faunus woman they knew to be a Huntress from her stopping by with Peter Port earlier that night.
She was sat upon one of the chairs arrayed either side the living room couch.
The Huntress ran a towel over the set of rabbit ears atop her head before tossing it with a limp underhand into a wicker laundry basket next to the fireplace, filled with coats, jackets, and other outwear, the pile topped with similar towels.
An apparent courtesy from Taiyang, forgotten in the heat of his argument, now seeping a puddle of water onto the hardwood floor.
The faunus was staring at the dancing firelight reflected in that puddle, her mind far adrift in contemplation, absentmindedly rubbing her thumb along the pommels of the falchions leant against the side of her seat in their scabbards.
A timber in the fireplace creaked before popping loudly.
The sound was enough to rouse the woman from her trance with a shudder, sparing a hesitant glance towards the couch she was adjacent.
There, the sisters noticed something new, someone swaddled in what seemed to be every blanket on the first floor of their home laid still upon the couch.
No detail could be discerned of this figure beyond the sandy blonde hair upon the back of their head, as they were facing away from the sisters' view.
Contented that this was all there was to see, they settled back around the corner out of sight, and Ruby brandished a device.
Never let it be said that Ruby was less unruly than the eldest daughter… she was merely the more devious of the two.
This truth was epitomized as she carefully tuned the Baby Monitor controller she'd salvaged from a box before her father took it to a donation drive somewhere in Patch's port town, Aiguille Point.
The Baby Monitor microphone was turned on and lying in wait, hidden in a magazine rack beneath a side table in the living room, put in place by Ruby when she 'got a glass of milk before bed.'
Carefully turning the volume dial on her 'spy gadget', the pair began to hear the goings on below echo through the speaker.
"-ike I said, Anne's tracking it- You think I don't already know that!?"
Qrow's voice, barking out with an agitated timbre.
"Don't you Gods damn ignore me. You brought him- it- 'the objective' into this house with my children!"
Their father's voice, icy with a suppressed wrath that his daughters had never heard of him.
"Well, sorry I didn't pack a tent, TAI. Kind of fuckin' hard to plan arou-"
A third voice cut in.
"Enough."
A masculine tone. Authoritatively firm but warm like an outstretched helping hand in a felt glove.
"Bickering does us nothing. I say that to the both of you. We're not enemies here. As undesirable as this situation is, the operation is still far from being compromised."
The man's voice bespoke a presence of raw command and due respect that transcended the distortion of a Scroll's speaker.
"Qrow, I apologize for being brusque during this call's opening. Finding creative ways to justify and obfuscate that this many of our number are on Patch… it is taxing. This is not an excuse, but an explanation you deserve for my belligerence."
"Taiyang… this was not planned. I did not orchestrate this. The operation should have concluded before the end of the night with the capture team on their way back to Vale by now. As it stands, one of the VIPs is unconscious and recovering from exposure while the other is at large."
The voice sighed, taking a more informal tone, "Tai, we have no other place to house the team without risking a potential breach in operational security. It would cost lives."
Static silence reigned for almost half a minute.
The voice began again, "I am already indebted to you. I'm painfully aware that short of things impossible at present, I cannot repay that debt. But I am in a position where I have no choice but to ask for your help."
"Finish the job then get out of my house."
All the bitterness and vitriol accumulated from the loss Taiyang had suffered in his life was carried on those words. This was a side of their father the girls had never seen.
One they were not sure they wanted to see.
The man on the scroll wisely accepted Taiyang's spite filled permission with silence, redirecting his attention, "…Qrow. Continue to update me on the situation as it progresses. Requisition whatever personnel and supplies you find necessary. If they are available, I will find a way to get them to you."
"You got it boss man… and before you say it, I know liquor doesn't count as essential. Lien to buy liquor however-"
"Qrow," the man on the Scroll call said sternly… with something almost indiscernible in the tone.
As uninvolved listeners of this conversation, the sisters were privy to a perspective unobserved by those within it, one that let even their young minds take notice.
There was a slight alleviation of the tensity, the tiniest slack in what was an atmosphere like a rope creaking near fraying point.
Just as the discussion began to taper the girls heard a series of small noises near the Baby Monitor.
The muffled creak of wood, the shuffle of cloth against cloth, and the dull pad of footsteps.
"You boys talkin' about booze? Good. We can have a drink while you explain the fuck I witness'd t'night."
The voice was feminine, deep in the throes of the speaker's Northeastern Vacuan accent, and with an even levelheaded pronunciation that dripped acid from each word.
"Meg-", Qrow was cutoff before he could begin.
"Don't even start you inbred booze receptacle consequence of a carrion scarfin' bird and desperate Mistrali bandit bitch in heat. Ain't talkin' to you."
Ruby looked to her sister in confusion to see Yang's ill gotten knowledge of curses spreading an unbidden blush across her face at Meg's… creativity.
"We both know sendin' Huntsmen into an op blind is tantamount to murder, and I watched a man crawl out've an Ursa's guts. Can'd say I knew to expect that. Answers, Ozpin. Cough em' up."
The voice on the Scroll, Ozpin, responded to her prompting, "Ms. Scarlatina… this operation was not meant to go this way, I'm sure your aware. To be frank, you are in something far larger than you know."
"Yeah. Yeah, I'm kind'a aware of that, Headmaster," Meg said his title with as much derision as she could muster without raising her voice.
Ruby held herself back from squealing as she silently kicked her legs back and forth in triumph.
She had felt the name Ozpin was familiar, but Scarlatina confirmed it, that was the Headmaster of Beacon Academy himself!
Whatever they were talking about simply must of been important by virtue of that alone and she had to know more.
"'Not all wisdom brings joy, be ye warned, knowledge can also destroy,'" Ozpin said evenly.
Meg hummed, "You certainly know how to tailor to your audience, don't you? Choosin' a sayin' as old as the clans that settled the Vacuo's border coasts."
It was half a comment, half an accusation, making it clear in no uncertain terms the Huntress would brook no deflections.
This was not a lightless forest forcing Meg's vision into grayscale, pattering with the ceaseless white noise of rainfall, worrying she couldn't keep the promise she made to her daughter: 'I'll see you back at home.'
Compared to that, there was nothing that gave Scarlatina pause in this room, not even Ozpin's authority. Especially not his authority considering he put her in this position in the first place.
The heavyset trod of boots was caught by the microphone, coming from the kitchen based on its direction, "Might I cut in for a moment?"
"Peter, good to see you," Ozpin said with genuine joviality, "How goes the note taking? Any discoveries?"
"Don't you dare ignore me," Meg growled with the barely restrained fury of a pot of scalding water near boiling over.
"You'll know in good time, you old codger," Peter said with the amused tone of a friend narrowly saving his fellow from a rather poor decision, "Unfortunate as it is there's no avoiding this. Scarlatina's a bloodhound of a woman, no meek rabbit. She isn't going to let this go."
"And she knows not what she's latched onto," Ozpin rebutted with a tired almost saddened sigh, "But yes, I'm aware she must know. We would be tossing her to the wolves if we let her wander about looking for answers to what she has seen."
Port yawned in sympathy, a melancholic weariness in his tone as well, "You've more important things than guiding a new inductee into our little circle. I'll answer her questions. You wrap up with Branwen and Xiao Long. As for you Ms. Scarlatina, ours is to be a lengthy chat. Do you prefer tea or coffee?"
"…coffee," Meg said guardedly, her boiling blood yet to simmer.
"More tea for me then- ah! I nearly forgot to thank you for that Xiao Long. My gratitude for the refreshments and food upon our return, we were in sore need of it."
"It's nothing. Been too long since someone who has taste in what they drink slummed it here anyway," Taiyang said, his demeanor still edged with an ice that gave what would've been a playful rib a cutting edge.
Qrow took the passive aggressive insult in stride, "Hey… that's not fair to the girls. They know nothing beyond sugary fruit juice with or without fizz. Don't be so judgy Tai."'
This he said with a tone of such utter seriousness that for a fleeting moment everyone, the sisters included, genuinely believed he hadn't known the barb was directed at him. Save for one.
Taiyang stifled a laugh with an audible *SNRK*, barely containing it as he said, "Sugary fruit juice, huh? And what is alcohol then Qrow?"
The girls' heard the telltale sound of Qrow's flask flipping open, "Sugary fruit juice with or without burn. Duh."
There was a brief silence as Qrow took a sip with a short satisfied 'aah', "See? Still burns. Tastes good too."
"Qrow…" Taiyang tried to say angrily as the frost melted from his voice.
"Awe, c'mon, I'm just worried Beacon's party king forgot the sweet, sweet kiss of whiskey… hey remember when we had to make a pitstop at-"
Taiyang broke at the very mention of whatever event Branwen was referencing, letting out long laughs that quaked his lungs, "Gods, you ranted for like five minutes about kilts that night!"
"Don't you spin this to me, you put the car on the roof of the motel! Oz, back me up!"
With a chuckle and a snicker Ozpin concurred, "I swore to never let you forget that incident Taiyang. So, since the opportunity has presented itself, you managed to get a sedan atop a motel."
Ruby and Yang couldn't make sense of the story the three men cackled over as they recounted it, the laughter overriding the words through the Baby Monitor.
"Scarlatina. If you'd accompany me to the kitchen while the gentlemen wrap up their… very serious discussion on the operation," Port said with a chortle.
"Y-yeah," Meg replied quietly, her voice almost lost in the noise. Her tone was noticeably lest hostile, now awkwardly lilted from tonal whiplash and the peculiar sensation of an outsider who just realized they're among a group of old friends.
As the laughter of Ozpin, Taiyang, and Qrow died down, Ruby could hear the thud of Port's boots and tamp of Meg's footfalls walking out of range of the microphone.
Her grip on the Baby Monitor controller tightened in frustration.
"Ah… just, keep me updated Qrow. Try and have as good of an evening as you two can," Ozpin said, still chuckling, before the sound effect of a Scroll call being ended abruptly sounded.
""Fuck you!"" Taiyang and Qrow both said playfully in unison.
Yang's eyes nearly bulged out of her head her sister turned the volume dial to near maximum.
"Qu'est-ce que tu fais?!"
Ruby ignored her sister's whispered scream.
This was merely a calculated risk, she justified to herself. The spies and agents in her mother's stories had to do the same thing to get the crucial information.
The conversation was dying down. Nothing loud enough to carry down the stairs was going to sound out. Peter and Meg would start talking, then Ruby would know what was really going on.
Yes, a risk well worth the chance.
All she needed was a bit of luck.
/\/\/\
Qrow watched Port walk away with Meg, the situation properly defused.
'Heh. Still got it.'
He took another swig from his flask, leaning with a hand braced atop a nearby side table.
Qrow couldn't have known Ruby had stood atop this piece of furniture one too many a time whilst playing, loosening the screws attaching the body to the legs.
Ruby couldn't have known the furniture her 'spy gadget' was hidden beneath, which was to her one of the sturdiest objects she interacted with on a regular basis, was so unstable.
Everyone in the room understood why what happened next occurred.
Qrow was an unlucky man. Supernaturally so. His reputation for a wake of mayhem preceded his hyper competence and accomplishments several times over.
After all, no one can prepare for everything, and with luck blacker than Grimm anything can happen.
Like the legs falling away from the side table one is leaning on.
A spray of whiskey misted from his mouth as the support beneath his arm gave way and he staggered to avoid falling.
The side table's body fell atop the magazine rack beneath it with a reverberating wooden thud, before dramatically teetering forward, the drawers sliding open to spill their contents on the floor before slamming shut again in a thunderous crash that tilted over the magazine rack.
All the contents of the magazine rack slid out directly in front of Qrow's feet, who paid no notice as he was warily watching the unconscious man on the couch for signs of him awaking to the racket.
A hundredth of a second later a static ridden echo of the side table's crash echoed from the top of the stairs.
He, much like Taiyang at the same time, made for the stairs to check on Ruby and Yang.
Qrow's foot shifted forward and sent an object skating across the living room floor, an eerily similar muffled echo of that event resounding from upstairs.
Now that he was alert, Branwen could hear rapid footsteps down the hallway above, which had the protective instinct in his mind worried until he picked up the object he had accidentally kicked.
Then he started laughing.
Taiyang, halfway up the stairs, leaned down to see his friend now in full hysterics holding up the rather spectacularly discovered device.
Qrow doubled over, the last of his lung's contents squeaking out as his friend's left eye uncontrollably twitched at the sight of the Baby Monitor.
The man of the house began ascending the stairs, bellowing a righteously authoritative, "GIRLS!"
/\/\/\
Port and Scarlatina watched the theatrics in the living room playout from the kitchen with no small amount of bewilderment.
After the spectacle was over, Peter turned back to what he was doing, and started preparing their drinks.
"Should… we be worried about any of that?" Meg asked over her shoulder, unsure if she should look away… or could look away as Qrow cackled on the floor.
Port shook his head, filling a tall glass with steaming tea from a kettle, "Xiao Long spent 4 years in academy with the man and 4 more sharing a house with Qrow. He is well versed in not getting too attached to furniture."
Meg, still watching the man she blamed for all of this laugh until he couldn't breathe, said, "I'm talking about the kids. They overheard some sensitive topics, Peter. Children don't keep their mouths shut well. Ask me how I know."
"A son, two daughters, and seven grandchildren, Scarlatina," Peter jestingly chastised as he pulled another mug from a cupboard, "I'm well versed too. Thankfully they only overheard the implication of secrets, not the secrets themselves. Milk and sugar?"
"No, I'll take it black. I could use the kick 'bout now," Meg finally looked away from Qrow as his laughter petered out, "Is there something we can, I don't know, do?
Port poured the last of the lukewarm coffee Taiyang made upon the capture team's return into the mug and walked over to the kitchen table.
He placed the coffee at a seat adjacent to his own before easing back into his chair, in front of which was a large leatherbound journal lying open with a sprawl of notes around it taking up a full fourth of the table face.
"We're both parents, so I know your answer to this question regardless, but I ask anyway," Peter said, flipping his journal to a specific page and plucking certain notes from the table face, "Would you appreciate unsolicited assistance in disciplining your child?"
"…point taken."
"Then come and sit down. We have much to discuss," Peter's disposition became far more serious as he continued to pour over his writings.
Meg tentatively sat down, rarely ever seeing the veteran Huntsman so dour.
"This is not a happy thing, the talk we're about to have. I'm telling you because I knew from the moment we saw our guest crawl out of that Ursa that you would have to be told," Peter said melancholically, "So, I'm going to give you the option to remain ignorant."
He held up a hand before she could protest, "I find myself morally obligated to give you as much of an idea as to what you are getting into without revealing too much. I will give you answers if you pursue this path, I swear upon the sanctity of my soul."
There was a pregnant pause permeated only by the veteran Huntsman's drumming fingers,
"Keeping these secrets transcends government security. These are truths many have died for the world over. The safety of you, your family, and your associates hinges upon your guarding of this information once you know it," Peter paused again contemplatively, "What's more, this is information that may burden you to the point of outweighing any relief to your curiosity. You will not know that you did not wish to know until it is too late. Do you understand?"
Meg paused with eyebrows raised, but nodded nonetheless, albeit apprehensively.
She looked down into the mug she was now clutching tightly.
There was a safety in not knowing and the very idea it could put Velvet and William in danger… perhaps even more than them.
At the same time, not knowing would follow her every step she took for the rest of her career. A single hitch in a split-second decision due to fear from an unanswered question would cost her life.
Not a possibility. An inevitability.
Two sides warred within Meg, opportunistic curiosity versus nihilistic pragmatism, but she eventually came to a conclusion.
She could take the risk now to perhaps die some far-off day for what she learned tonight or she could pretend this hadn't affected her and wait for the eventual fatal stress induced mistake.
Now it was possibility versus inevitability.
The faded heat of the coffee danced at the tips of her fingertips through the porcelain.
Its bleeding warmth dissipating like the opportunity before her.
Meg took a deep dreg from her coffee and locked eyes with Port, growling with conviction, "Tell me everything."
French to English Translations
(These are in the order that they appear.)
- Comme un vrai espion? (Like a real spy?)
- Comme des super espions! (Like super spies!)
- Qu'est-ce que tu fais?! (What are you doing?!)
12/6/22 Post Chapter Blurb
"Espion" is the French word for "Spy", apparently.
This is a bit of a lighthearted(ish) chapter to transition from chapter 4 and setup chapter 6 while easing a bit of the built-up intensity out. Sorry for the cliff hanger, but things are going to get heavy again next chapter, which was just jarring with this chapter's tone.
Personally, I found my writing was a little fast here, but the situation is one of immediacy, so it felt somewhat justified.
Please let me know about your feelings on my depiction of canon characters. I'm doing a lot of reading between the lines and interpretation from the characters' conceptual premises to enhance what I liked about their canon depictions.
Criticism is expected and anticipated as always.
12/16/22 Post Chapter Blurb
UPDATE – This is the second draft of Chapter 5. I pushed the slightly edited first draft out far too early because I was having a rough week and needed a win that day. Getting a chapter published felt like progress, but it wasn't of the standard I hold for my work.
I rushed the first draft out and going back over it, the pacing was rushed just as I noted earlier and the writing as a whole suffered for it. Here were my problems with it:
- Taiyang was justifiably furious about a piece of Ozpin's war being brought into his house. There needed to be more buildup to his anger cooling off.
- Meg… holy shit I did her a disservice. I made her look like a panicky wimp rather than a Huntress in over her head. She freaked out earlier because she witnessed something abominable, not because she's a pansy.
- Qrow is a mediator that defuses tension through camaraderie to keep a team running smoothly. That was in the first draft, but the execution was so obtuse and clunky it felt like he just magically made everyone chill out rather than being suave.
- I want Ozpin to feel like an actual person in this story, not just Secretive Leader Man. A lot of fanfics depict him as an aloof morally gray pragmatist, missing out on the goldmine of drama and tragedy from him genuinely caring his allies. He is friends with Taiyang and Qrow, but he's now distant with the former due to their paths in life obligating them to go different directions on top of Summer's "death" (assassination) driving a wedge between them. I wanted that depicted this chapter and it wasn't in the first draft.
- Port was too mopey.
Expect new chapters to not have this problem. I'm going to go over them in the morning rather than hitting the publish button at midnight.
Criticism is expected and anticipated as always.