Said it on Tuesday's story but obviously not everyone reads every story so I'll mention it here – I will be taking a week off writing in April on the advice of my GP who believes my repeated headaches are due to overworking catching up with me after so many years. He wants me to arrange regular breaks so I'm probably going to do a week break every 4 months. Might increase that to every 3 months if it doesn't help enough when he next checks me over. Anyway, not decided the date yet but it'll probably be around easter time. I'll be sure to let everyone know in advance re dates closer to the time.
Cover Art: GWBrex
Chapter 37
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Man shot dead after murder attempt aimed at Arc sibling to "bring healer back" to Atlas.
Atlas Times
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Public divided after Jaune Arc declines to resurrect blogger.
Vale Daily Tribune
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People smuggling ring discovered that claimed they could get dying relatives onto Jaune Arc's healing list for lien. Mistral Chief of Police comments.
The Mistral Review
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Gillian Asturias' speaks out in support of allowed-death of Valean influencer: "To bring him back would have set a dangerous precedent."
Vacuo Today
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You had your say! OUR POLL shows Menagerie's people want White Fang to take further action against Jaune Arc and Vale.
Kuo Kuana Express
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It seemed like the whole world was divided over his decision and Jaune was fine with that. Divided was better than against him, and it was good to know some at least could see the common sense in it. There were arguments all over the place, many antagonistic, but some were even politely discussing the moralistic background of such a choice in the light of it preventing further tragedies. Jaune was just pleased everyone could distract themselves over that and leave him be. The division existed in Beacon as well, though most were polite enough not to bring it up around him. Weiss, obviously, wasn't happy.
"I see your logic but you could have had someone else make the decision. The fact that you opted to leave him for dead means you're the one responsible. Was your aura low? Did the doctors advise you not to use it?"
"No. My aura was fine."
"Then you could have spared a little for him-"
"And then what?" demanded Mercury. "Have a thousand more idiots follow his route? We'd be picking dead bodies off the trees."
The derisive response from Mercury drew an angry glower from Weiss. If his having left a man to die was one division then Mercury's inclusion in the friendship circle was another. Weiss had initially been fine with him, but when he opened his mouth that quickly changed. Her team were on the fence. Yang thought he was a riot for riling Weiss up so much, while Ruby found his cynicism a bit… well, cynical. Blake didn't seem to care either way. He couldn't argue with Ruby's feelings there.
Pyrrha was a bit of a surprise since she actually seemed to get along on some level with him. More than Jaune would have expected. They weren't friends by any means, and Mercury's attitude rubbed her the wrong way as well, but they at least agreed on ethical matters around his Semblance. Or at least on this. That was enough to have Pyrrha nodding and taking his side. Pyrrha's teammates, perhaps sensing the impending argument, had decided to exist in their own world and talk about pancakes.
Jaune envied them that.
"I understand that something had to be done to prevent more people making the journey but that could have been achieved by arresting and charging him."
"Wouldn't have stopped anyone," shrugged Mercury. "You think those people care about being arrested when they're already willing to risk their lives? A message needed to be sent. It got sent. Now they know they'll get nothing but a closed casket if they try."
"This will save lives in the long run," said Pyrrha, siding with Mercury. Or more likely just siding against Weiss. Mercury didn't care either way. "It's not just Vale, Weiss, but all the other kingdoms whose populations might have claimed they were coming for the festival and then snuck into the Emerald Forest to try and reach Beacon."
"Be even worse if all that death and misery became a staging point for the Grimm," said Yang, chipping in much to Weiss' irritation. "What?" she asked, shrugging at Weiss' glare. "It's true, isn't it? You think all that negativity is going to go ignored? Those idiots could spark a stampede toward Beacon. Or worse, toward Vale."
"I'm surprised all the angry idiots in Atlas didn't cause one already," said Mercury.
"Grimm aren't that sensitive, and they're not that negative." Weiss jumped into the lecture both as a way to get a leg up on Mercury, and to escape her losing argument. "It's not as though their anger at Jaune came out of nowhere. They were angry before at other things and just transferred it onto him when he became an easy target. Besides, Atlas is a defended city. Grimm are always challenging its walls, the same as Vale. They're culled in enough numbers daily that any increase would need to be truly sudden to overrun the city. They might have seen a 10% or 15% increase in Grimm, but that wouldn't make a difference nor be worth reporting."
"Yeah, the fact millions live in the cities is already a huge signal to the Grimm," said Yang. "Negativity drawing them is only a problem when you're trying to stay hidden. People are negative normally. I mean, if it were that sensitive then we couldn't even hold the festival, could we? Imagine if everyone bet on Pyrrha, she loses, then the resulting wave of depression over lost bets causes the apocalypse."
Jaune laughed at the thought, as did Pyrrha – though he had to wonder if that was more her liking the idea of sticking a middle finger up to all the people gambling on her. They made a good point, though. It was easy to look at the assholes in Atlas and assume they'd come out of nowhere, but they had always existed. He just hadn't noticed them before because they were on his side and directing their anger and rage toward other groups – like faunus, or migrants, or politicians. The only difference was that they were united in hating him now, so it was more concentrated.
"I'm not going to argue any further," said Weiss, in what was sure to be the prelude to a final sticking point that deserved an argument, but which she would make them feel childish for opening up. Jaune rolled his eyes. "But I still think it wouldn't have hurt to bring him back and then make him deal with the consequences. I know. I know. It might have led to more people trying the same. But you refusing to help him makes you seem cruel."
"Maybe he needs to be a little crueller," said Mercury.
Weiss sniffed loudly. "I said I didn't want to argue on the topic any further."
"Oh, so that's just the end of it then. You get the final word and that's that." Mercury sighed dramatically. "Yeah, sure. That sounds fair. You're worse than Emerald – and that's saying something because she's spent her whole life perfecting the art of being a cun-"
"ANYWAY!" shouted Yang, covering Ruby's ears from the nasty word. Even Blake looked annoyed at him. "Let's not argue about idiots anymore, yeah? This was meant to be a chill lunch. And Merc, weren't you going to bring your team?"
"Was I?"
"I mean, aren't they going to feel left out?"
"Meh. Emerald is a…" He noticed the glares. "Objectionable individual, and Cinder would probably drive Little Miss Prissy even further up the wall than she already has been. Mint? Well, she isn't interested. Like, at all. About the only interaction she has with me is trying to steal anything her eyes take a liking to."
"Does your team get on at all?" asked Weiss, exasperated.
"Sure we do. We've all got this peaceful arrangement where we don't bother one another. It's great."
"Aren't you friends?" asked Ruby.
"Nah. They're pains in my ass. Especially once a month."
"And suddenly," drawled Blake, "the reason why a team made up of three women and you might not have good cooperation becomes abundantly clear."
Mercury raised an eyebrow at her. "You on your period, too?"
Her book snapped shut. "I'm going to read elsewhere."
Everyone glared at Mercury.
"What!? It's a biological function!"
"That doesn't mean you have to come out and say it," groaned Jaune. "Or use it to try and brush away someone's actions as mentally or emotionally flawed because of it."
Still, and Mercury's stupidity aside, it was nice to have a guy-friend he could talk to. And maybe he needed a little work, but the guy had grown up with an abusive father who up and died, and no mother to speak of, so it wasn't like his harsh mannerisms were malicious. Jaune made his apologies to Team RWBY as Mercury shrugged and went to his meal. He wasn't going to apologise to Blake after what she'd done, but he left Yang to pass on the blanket apology if that would mean anything to the faunus.
/-/
Elm drew him aside after his afternoon stint with Dr. Tsune later that day with a serious look on her face. "It's about your family," she said, and Jaune's heart fell. "They're all safe and sound, I want that clear, but there was an attempt by an armed individual to break into their home. General Ironwood asked me to inform you before you saw the headlines. The man was caught by security before he even got into the building, and your family weren't even aware of it until morning."
Jaune nodded hurriedly, relief and bile mixing together in his stomach. He felt sick.
"Why?"
"The suspect is still being interrogated but Clover believes his goal was to kill one or more of your siblings so that you would board an emergency flight back to Atlas to save them."
He would, too. Obviously. They could make the flight in under four hours if they used a military aircraft, and Jaune be on one the second one of his family died. "Did he have family he wanted me to heal? Is this the next step up from people trying to reach Beacon? What's next? Will they start torturing and killing children in the streets unless I come back?"
"He doesn't have any dying family."
"Then what? He thinks I belong to Atlas and should be back there healing?"
"Actually, it's the opposite. Preliminary analysis of his online activity show he's posted in several forums taking an antagonistic and aggressive leaning with regard to you. They're the kind who feel you've come to Atlas, stolen the money of hard-working people, and then run away with it and left them to foot the bill."
"T-That's nonsense. They told me I brought more into Atlas economically than they paid out!"
"That's true, but idiots will never see or accept that. They just see the millions spent and think anything else the council says is politicians trying to justify things. You can't argue with them, Jaune. They'll believe what they want and decry anything else as fake, lies, or people being soft." Elm made finger quotes in the air as she said it. "It's the anti-establishment kind of people. Anything the government says is a lie automatically, and anything their so-called freedom fighters claim online is gospel. They're a minority, thankfully, but they've always been the loudest and they're finding refuge among those angry at you."
"Then it was an ambush for me?"
"We're not yet sure but that does seem possible. They might have had someone in air traffic control who would alert them to the aircraft you came in on, then they could storm it and take it over. I'm not sure what they would plan next – some sham online trial, I'm sure, and maybe declaring you a criminal. It doesn't matter anyway. They'd have never made it onto the aircraft alive with me there, and you'd be an idiot to think your landing would be rushed or unsafe. The whole Arc-Ops would be there, along with General Ironwood and a retinue of handpicked soldiers. They wouldn't have had a chance. The point is, they're stupid enough to think they would, and they've targeted your family."
Jaune swallowed. Nodded. "What happens next?"
"Your family have been moved to an undisclosed location. Undisclosed to the public – you're free to call them straight after we're done here. They're under constant protection. General Ironwood wants to do a sweep for other dangerous individuals before making a decision, and your family's wishes will be taken into account as well. If they want to leave Atlas and come to Vale then they'll be allowed to, but I'm not sure that's a wise decision."
Jaune wasn't sure it was either. Vale was less militant but little better, and if people were already willing to go out and die in the Emerald Forest to reach him, then they'd be just as willing to go and harass his family. Most of it would be people begging them to speak to him on behalf of their families, and thus non-violent, but it only took one. Vale didn't have a standing military prepared to protect his family either. They were safer in Atlas. Which was probably why General Ironwood asked Elm to talk to him first. He must have wanted Jaune to convince his family to stay where it'd be safe.
"I'll tell them they should stay," said Jaune. Elm looked relieved. "But it'll be their choice."
"Of course. We'd never suggest otherwise." Elm gripped his shoulder. "You just needed to know since you'd have seen this on the news otherwise, and that wouldn't be fair."
"Yeah. Thanks. Why is this all happening now when it didn't before?"
"It's because you're less accessible now. There always have been people trying to force their way to see you, but there was an official way to manage it in Atlas so all of the attempts were aimed at that. We had cyber-attacks, hackers, blackmail, bribery – everything. Those working in the department had to be rotated out several times. We just never told you because you didn't need to know, and because we were able to handle it. The pressure was spread out over a well-funded department so it wasn't so bad."
"And now I don't have that. No one is handling the list for me now so they've decided they can come to me directly."
"Exactly. Atlas faced this before after the colour revolution. There were a lot of refugees trying to reach the city. At first the city decided to make the process close-to-impossible to try and deter them, but that only made it worse. Refugees would pay criminals to smuggle them in, and risk their lives to do so, and the situation got far worse than before. When we brought back the old system of a fair interview process, a lot of the illegal stuff died down. Those refugees no longer needed to risk their lives or go through criminal routes because we had a fair system again, and given the choice they'll rather do things by the law."
"It's the same here," she said. "When you were slaving away at the hospitals there was a proper route for them to get their loved ones on the list. It didn't always work for them, but it was there, so they tried to follow the rules. Now that there isn't one, they're coming after you directly. It's the same people as before, but they no longer have an easy route to you so they – or the more desperate ones, anyway – are taking the hard route."
"Then what am I supposed to do?"
"There's no good answer here," said Elm. "Not when you can't use your Semblance for your own safety. After? If you still want to? I guess the answer will be to have a system in place that people can throw themselves at so they're not throwing themselves at you or your family. Do it as a charity raffle or something. So-many people a day, they have to pay to enter, and the money is given to a good cause. You'd be surprised how often guilt can keep people in line."
That wasn't a bad plan for the future but he knew why Elm was really telling him all this. She was making sure he understood that this was going to continue. That now the world knew he couldn't use his Semblance because of his aura problems, there was no longer a legitimate way for people to get onto the list. Maybe 99% of those with dying relatives would accept and respect that, but the 1% - the desperate prepared to do anything and everything to get what they wanted – wouldn't. They would now try and find other ways to get what they wanted, and the life-threatening jaunts to Beacon were just the first idea they'd come up with. Attacking his family was second, and hopefully Atlas was going to make that so impossible that they'd give up on it.
"Do you think they'll target me here in Vale?" asked Jaune.
Elm nodded. "I do. Beacon is protected by a forest and Grimm but the city is not, and you need to go for medical testing almost every other day, then there's your two hospital visits on the weekend. I think there's a good chance some deranged individuals will try and target you there. We've already had reports of one person trying to break into the medical research facility. They don't have dying family either. Their goal was to expose an alleged conspiracy theory that the claims of your aura malfunction are fake."
"What? Why would it be?"
"So that the rich and elite – the world order – can keep your Semblance to themselves and leave the common people to die."
Jaune groaned. "You have got to be kidding me."
"I wish I was. You have to remember, Jaune, that for every ten average people in the world there are going to be two or three idiots. Now multiply that by the population of Remnant. There's no shortage of people who took the incident of you healing the Board of Directors at the SDC and ran with it."
"I wish I'd never unlocked this. I wish I'd died in that forest."
Elm gripped his arm tight. "Don't say that."
"It's true!"
"Jaune!" She shook him. "Your family loves you. Your friends love you. I understand that you're feeling trapped. I get that. But you mustn't let these people win. Things will get better."
"When?"
Elm didn't have an answer. Jaune pulled his arm from hers.
"I need to call my family."
And after that, he needed to talk to rant.
/-/
Mercury was all too easy to talk to.
"That's fucking nuts," he said. "They should kill the guy. No, wait, then they'd come demand you go bring him back, wouldn't they? Lock him in a pit and throw away the key instead." Mercury snarled angrily. "What did your family decide?"
"They're going to stay in Atlas. They know it's safer there then it would be here or anywhere else."
"Good call. Vale is going to get even worse with the Vytal Festival here. Too many people coming and not enough police to keep control of them all. It'd only be more dangerous here."
Mercury wasn't the only one to have expressed sympathy and concern over this. Weiss had called him immediately on finding out to ask if his family were okay and what they were doing, and Pyrrha had texted as well. They'd been worried and he was grateful for that, but what they both offered was someone to talk to and hug it out. He really did appreciate that, especially Weiss putting her temper aside for him, but he didn't want to be held.
He wanted to scream and thrash and howl. And Mercury was all too bad an influence.
"You know what we should do?" he said. "You should round up all the people who are willing to break the law to get to you and make them compete in some sick game. Make them fight against one another and then the winner gets their family resurrected."
Jaune snorted. "I think that'd be illegal."
"What? Like what they're doing isn't? Besides, I bet they'd sign up if they got the offer. They're already prepared to die for this so give them a way to do it – like your bodyguard said. At least this way you'd only have to do the one set of work and you'd be rid of them a hundred people at a time. You could do different seasonal challenges. Have a battle royale one month, then make them race around a track of murderous obstacles the next. Or do parkour across some stupid obstacle course where falling off means instant death."
Mercury was enjoying this far too much – and Jaune had to admit he was as well. He couldn't help but laugh along with the idea, gruesome as it was. Besides, it wasn't like they were serious. Or not entirely serious, anyway. It really would get rid of a lot of the problems.
"Do you think people would tune in to watch?"
"Oh, for sure. They'd bitch about it and call it barbaric but they'd be glued to the screen. Man, I'd pay to be in charge of that. No resurrections necessary. We could call it…" He paused dramatically. "The Fucking Idiot Games."
Jaune burst out laughing.
"Yeah, no," said Mercury. "Not catchy. Okay, name pending, but concept is sound."
"Y-Yeah, sure, if you could find anyone to agree to it." Jaune wiped a tear from his eye. "I needed this. I was just so angry I was going to break my hand on a wall. Thanks for making me laugh."
"Yeah, no problem. I definitely said all this to make you laugh and not because I'd totally be down for watching it happen." The worst part was that he wasn't even sure if Mercury was joking. Or maybe the worst part was that Jaune didn't mind if he wasn't. "But seriously, man, you need to give my first idea some thought."
"Which one? You've suggested no less than a hundred ways I should cruelly punish people."
"The one where you say `screw you all` and leave. Fake your death, get away from all this, just up and go." Mercury sat cross-legged, even if those legs of his weren't real. He'd shown Jaune the mechanical prosthetics-turned-weapons.
Only Mercury would genuinely laugh about having reduced an air-traffic control agent to a breakdown when he'd faked tears and cried loudly about the bad man "taking his legs away" when he was told to surrender any and all weapons to luggage.
"It's not as easy as that." Jaune looked away. "There are a lot of people relying on me."
"Fuck them!"
"Not those people," stressed Jaune. "Good people like Ironwood, Elm, the Arc-Ops." There was Dr. Seng as well, who would no doubt blame himself if Jaune faked a suicide. Elm would be heartbroken and blamed for having failed him. And it'd mean leaving Weiss as well, because there was no way he could fake his death and still marry into the most well-known family on Remnant. "It's a good fantasy, Mercury, but I can't up and abandon them like that. It wouldn't be fair."
Mercury leaned forward. "Since when is any of the shit you're put through fair, man?"
"It's not-"
"There are two types of people in this world, Jaune. Those that control their lives and those that don't! I'm not going to say victims because sometimes bad stuff happens to anyone, but if bad stuff is happening because you refuse to do anything about it then that's a problem you've created."
Jaune was stunned. "It's not that simple."
"You're right. It's not. But complicated doesn't mean impossible. It just means a whole lot more work to make something happen. Saying "It's not that simple" and then using that as an excuse to not do anything about it is part of the reason you feel so trapped, man. I've been there." stressed Mercury. "I've been trapped in a room, without legs, as someone else controls every single thing about your life. And I tell you now that no one was going to get me out of there if I didn't. I was the one who had to act. Without legs, without a Semblance, without a damn chance!" He jabbed a finger into Jaune's chest. "I acted. I changed things. You think your shit isn't simple? Try being in that situation. Try finding yourself a way out a burning building in the middle of nowhere with no legs. Now that was complicated."
What was he supposed to say to that? What could he say?
"Your situation is fucked up, Jaune. I agree. But it isn't insurmountable. Look, I'm not good at this motivational speech shit – I think we can both agree on that – but what I'm trying to say is that you have options. Don't go letting other people choose them for you."
"I…" Jaune swallowed. "Yeah, I… I guess you're right."
Mercury nodded, satisfied, and an awkward silence descended. Mercury was never one to let that exist however, and quickly popped out a question. "Hey. Wanna meet my team? I've done the whole roster with your argumentative girlfriend's. Only fair, right?"
Fair? He supposed it was, and if they were anything like Mercury then maybe it wouldn't be so bad.
"Sure. What can it hurt?"
Okay, wow, I didn't even plan Mercury's little rant at the end there. It just sort of came to me as I was writing him. Still, he's got a point, eh? Say what you will about his character but he damn well was in a bad spot and he dragged himself out of it on his own. Cinder and Emerald just sort of showed up at the end.
Next Chapter: 23rd March
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