Plastered Paradox
Chapter 5
"I see Vale is still as much of a shithole as it's always been," Raven observed as they walked down the street.
"Hey," Jaune chastised. "Sure, Vale may be a shitty city… but it's our shitty city."
"What's the appeal of living here?" Cinder asked, swerving to avoid a drunk, smelly homeless man who was walking down the street. She gave the man a disgusted glance, then turned back to Jaune. "For real, I feel like I'm about to get stabbed over drugs I don't even have."
"You just don't understand," Jaune explained. "See, it's important to have pride in your city, no matter how much it sucks. Sure, I may walk out of my front door one morning and immediately step in a homeless man's shit, then find out that someone's broken into my car for the seventeenth time this month, and that they left a knife behind this time, and then some guy robs me and shoots me over crack that I don't even have. But when some Atlas-living bitch boy tries to act all high-and-mighty about how his city is better simply because he only has to worry about the cold and the crippling racism, I immediately get offended, because sure, Vale is a piece of shit city, but damn it, it's my piece of shit city, and I'll have pride in it over just how shitty it is. Does that make sense?"
"Not at all," Raven grunted.
"Alright, yeah, I kinda lost the point of what I was saying partway through it," Jaune admitted.
"Why are we here, anyway?" Cinder asked, looking around at the crowds marching through the city streets. "I had enough of the big city living in Atlas, and I barely even left the hotel when I lived there. Can we go back to Patch? Patch was nice."
"We are not going back to Patch," Raven rebuked.
"Unfortunately, Raven's right about that, Cinder," Jaune informed her. "We're not going back to Patch. Like I've been saying, I've got business with Headmaster Ozpin."
"What kind of business?" Cinder questioned.
"You wouldn't believe me if I told you, trust me," Jaune explained. "Let's just say that it's not only important, but that it's also something you'll both have to leave the room for."
"Gross," Raven said with a shudder.
"Not like that," Jaune insisted. "Seriously, it's nothing dirty. You'll both just think I'm fucking crazy if you hear me try to explain it."
"Why are you implying that we both already don't think you're fucking crazy?" Cinder asked. "Because I'm pretty sure we both do. I know I do."
"For once, the teenager is right," Raven said gruffly. "I also think you're insane, Jaune. In fact, I've been meaning to ask exactly which asylum you broke out of before showing up in Mistral."
"The asylum in your ass, that's what," Jaune retorted. "Seriously, let's just head for Beacon and get this shit over with."
The other two reluctantly nodded, and they continued on through the city, doing their best to avoid crazy homeless people and drunk drivers the entire time.
After a little while of walking through the often times quite literally shitty streets of Vale, the trio arrived at Beacon's front gates, whereupon they ran into the first big obstacle of this little excursion.
"How do we get inside?" Cinder asked.
"What are you talking about?" Raven questioned. "We'll just walk in. Who's gonna stop us?"
"See, you say that, but there is, in fact, one particular person who I'm pretty sure can actually stop us," Jaune said. "She is, in fact, one of maybe two people in the entire world that I am actually wary of. So wary, in fact, that you can expect me to be on my absolute best behavior while I'm here, purely so I don't attract her ire."
"And who would that be?" Raven demanded. "Are you saying she's scarier than I am?"
"I'm saying that, compared to her, you are little more than an obnoxious yapping puppy," Jaune said, his voice low. "You think you've seen scary people before? I'm telling you, you haven't seen anything like her. She is a demon in human form – I find it difficult to even put into words just how oppressive her sheer presence is, yet I will try. Women fear her. Grimm fear her. Men turn their eyes away from her as she walks. No beast dares make a sound in her presence. She is alone on this barren earth."
"Who the fuck are you even talking about?" Raven asked, incredulous.
"You'll see," Jaune told her. He looked around Beacon's front gate, his eyes landing on the security camera hanging above them. His eyes narrowed, and he cleared his throat.
"Hey, old man!" he called. "Open up! I've got some important stuff to talk about with you! You don't know me, but I know you – the real you, the one you're hiding from everyone! You know, the whole shady wizard thing that you don't let anyone know about? Well, I know about it! Open up, I have to discuss your ex-wife and the world's worst divorce of all time!"
"The hell are you doing?" Raven said. "Do you have brain damage?"
"Probably, but that's not why I'm doing this," Jaune said.
He looked back to the camera and was about to start speaking again when the gates began to open. Cinder and Raven blinked incredulously, and Jaune just flashed them a grin.
"What did I tell you?" he asked. "Didn't I say-"
That was as far as he got before a purple aura enveloped him, then sent him flying into a nearby wall. Immediately, Raven drew her sword and Cinder drew her replacement banana.
"Wait!" Jaune called. "You two, hold on. I expected this would happen."
"Oh, did you?" a new voice said. "Please, do go on."
Jaune winced, then looked towards the voice. "Hey, Glynda."
The woman in question glared at him, her arms crossed over her chest. "Is that all you have to say for yourself?"
"I'm gonna go out on a limb and say that I probably did something crazy last night when I was incredibly drunk," he ventured. "Alright, lay it on me – what did I do? Did I make one too many advances towards you? Perhaps I called up Ironwood and bad-mouthed him? Or maybe I mailed the Council one too many bags of flaming dog shit."
"Actually, you killed Ozpin," she said.
Jaune instantly paused. "Uh, come again?"
"You killed Ozpin," Glynda repeated. "Judging by your tone, I'm guessing you genuinely don't remember doing that?"
"Not at all," Jaune said. "Care to fill me in?"
Glynda sighed tiredly. "If I must. I'll give you the short version – you appeared in Ozpin's tower out of nowhere and coerced him into a night of drinking and debauchery, which he accepted, because you apparently made quite the convincing argument when you promised you'd get him laid or die trying. I'm not sure if you actually managed to get him laid or not, but you did end up getting him killed, so I suppose your asinine statement was more accurate than you imagined it'd be."
"Wow, uh, that's quite something," Jaune said awkwardly. "How did he die, if you don't mind me asking?"
"Well, it all began with one shot of bourbon too many," Glynda recalled. "Then one of you insulted the other's honor, and as we all know, the only way to rectify a proverbial slap across the face like that is with a duel. And duel you did – Ozpin with his cane, and you with your sword. Unfortunately for Ozpin, you are apparently some kind of drunken master, so it wasn't much of a fight… though I don't believe you intended to actually kill him; that kind of just happened when, in your moment of victory, you went to spike your sword into the ground like a football player who just scored a touchdown, only for the blade to bounce off the hard asphalt, fly through the air, and hit Ozpin square between the eyes, killing him instantly."
"Oh, wow," Cinder spoke up. "Hey, quick question – if Jaune accidentally murdered somebody, why wasn't he arrested immediately?"
"Because, little did we know, dueling is actually still legal in Vale," Glynda admitted. "Apparently, nobody thought to amend that law since the Great War, but I suppose I can't blame them for that, because who would be stupid enough to actually do it now that a not-insignificant portion of the world has superpowers? Aside from these two idiots, that is."
"You know, you sound surprisingly not that angry with this development," Jaune noted. "I would've thought that losing your boss would have really pissed you off."
"Are you kidding? I just took a day off for the first time in years," Glynda reported. "Ozpin going the way of the dodo is the best thing that's happened to me in years. Unfortunately, all good things must come to an end, and now I have to go find him."
"What do you mean, you have to go find him?" Cinder asked. "The guy died. Generally, that means there isn't much to find."
"In a just world, you'd be right," Raven grunted. "But the old man's got more than a few tricks up his sleeves. Don't even try to ask about them, by the way – you'll get no explanation out of us. And believe me, you're better off for that."
Cinder furrowed her brow. "How long are you two going to keep secrets from me?" she demanded. "I'm stuck with you now, in case you've forgotten. That means I'm going to find out all your dirty laundry eventually. You can't hide it from me forever."
"No, but we can certainly try," Jaune interrupted. "For real, be glad you still don't know what we know – the sheer, soul-crushing dread of what I've learned over the years is one of the leading factors of my drinking problem. You think you've had nightmares before? Girl, you should see my nightmares – they'd make you curl up in a ball and cry for your mother." He paused. "Oh, sorry – that's probably in very bad taste. Uh, my bad."
Cinder rolled her eyes. "Whatever. Anyway, I thought this blonde lady was one of your nightmares?"
"She is," Jaune insisted. "But we all have to face our fears eventually, I suppose."
"Oh, is that what this is?" Glynda wondered. "Perhaps I should make things really scary for you. Would that be preferable?"
"This is fine," Jaune hurriedly said. "Anyway, would you mind letting me down? I'd like to go find Ozpin now, plus get my sword back, if possible. That is possible, right?"
"That depends entirely on how ready you are to raid a police station and break into the evidence locker," Glynda explained."
Immediately, Raven's eyes lit up. "Wait, are you serious?" she asked. "Is this something that's actually within the realm of possibility?"
"I suppose so," Jaune conceded. "Though I should probably reconsider that, given how excited you are over this."
"What?! Come on!" Raven protested. "We've done what you want all day, is it too much to ask for you to give me this one thing?"
"Be honest, Raven – you don't actually care about helping me get my weapon back, you just want to steal evidence from the police lockup and maybe ventilate a few cops," Jaune pointed out. "Which… I mean, yeah, I guess that's kinda based given how corrupt and shitty Vale's police are and given the caliber of drugs and guns they've no doubt got locked up in there, but still. We can't just go around, knocking over police stations on a whim."
"We certainly can, you just refuse to because you're a pussy."
"Look, I've already fucked things up bad enough by accidentally killing Ozpin," Jaune argued. "I don't need to fuck things up even worse. Speaking of which, I say again, where is Ozpin?"
"I'm not even going to ask where you learned about that, because I know the answer is just to going to infuriate me," Glynda grumbled. "Instead, I'm just going to believe that Raven told you everything. Similarly, I'm also not going to bother asking why Raven is here or why you suddenly have a teenager trailing after you, because again, something tells me that the answer is just going to infuriate me. Instead, I'll just assume this is due to the alcohol you no doubt consume en masse."
"Correct on all counts," Jaune replied.
Glynda brought a hand up to pinch the bridge of her nose. "Of course… anyway, to answer your question, I don't know where Ozpin is yet. I assume he's somewhere in Vale, because this is his base of operations and it would benefit him to get here quickly. Besides that, I've got no idea – he's made no attempts to try and contact me yet, so I can only assume that he's either in serious trouble or he's enjoying his brief time not having to watch over a bunch of out-of-control, horny teenagers."
"I resent that remark," Jaune chastised. "Cinder may be out of control, but she's not horny."
"What?!" Cinder argued. "How am I out of control?!"
"You burned a hotel down."
"You encouraged me to!"
"You also shoved a banana up your former mentor's ass."
"Again, you encouraged me to!"
"I just told you to use the banana. I didn't tell you how to use it, your mind just went immediately to anal penetration. On second thought, maybe Glynda was right, and you actually are horny, just like the rest of them."
"What do you morons want?" Glynda asked, sounding exhausted. "Seriously, at this point I'm willing to give you whatever it is just to get you all to shut up and go away. Hell, if it involves five minutes alone in a room with some brass knuckles and Peter Port, I'll give you ten minutes alone with him instead. Please tell me that's actually what you want."
"Tempting, but no," Jaune said. "Truthfully, I think the three of us all want slightly different things, but at this point my desires are the only ones that actually matter since they aren't completely stupid, so I'll just come right out and say that all we want is to find Ozpin and hope he can shed some light on the somewhat unprecedented situation I've found myself in."
"Big words," Raven noted. "I'm surprised you understand half of what you just said, Jaune. Then again, I'm also generally very surprised when you aren't just talking like a pirate all the time."
"Give me a few bottles of rum and we'll get there," Jaune promised. "Anyway, Glynda, do you really have no idea where Ozpin is?"
"None at all," Glynda said. "Honestly, your luck would be better served asking random people around Vale if they've seen him, because I'm completely lost at the moment. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go back to enjoying my time off before he comes back and starts working me like a Faunus in an SDC mine again."
"You get time off?" Jaune said, amazed. "Honestly, I thought you just worked all night, then retired to your coffin when the sun finally came up and you finished drinking the blood of the students you hate."
"Keep making quips like that and you'll find out," Glynda threatened.
The purple aura around Jaune's body finally faded, and he came crashing to the ground. Glynda turned and walked away, closing Beacon's gate behind her. Jaune rose to his feet, dusting himself off, then turned back to his two so-called companions.
"Well, that could have gone a lot worse," he observed.
"It could have gone a lot better, too," Raven replied. "What's your plan now, genius? We're right back at square one when it comes to finding Ozpin. Bet you thought you could just waltz in here and have a chat with the old man, huh? Unfortunately for you, it seems like the universe hates your fucking guts."
"Believe me, I already know that," Jaune said. "I wouldn't be here right now if the universe didn't hate my fucking guts. But it's not all bad – I think I might have a pretty good idea of how to find him."
"Have you seen Ozpin? He's about this tall, he wears puke-green suits and sweaters, he's of indeterminable yet obviously somewhat old age, and he talks like that mysterious mentor character you always hate in Mistralian cartoons?"
"What the fuck are you talking about?" the random passerby said. "Get lost, bro."
The man roughly shoved Jaune away and kept walking. Jaune was unperturbed, though.
"Yeah, well, at least my breath doesn't smell like penis," Jaune fired back as the man walked away. "Fuck off, dude. You suck twelve-year-old kid cock, you tremendous boy-molesting pederast. I hope the guy at the next door in your new neighborhood beats the shit out of you when you go to tell him exactly what kind of lists you're on."
"That's the most vulgar I've ever heard you get," Cinder observed. "Honestly, it's quite impressive. What brought that on?"
"That's just how people talk in the big city," Jaune replied. "Precisely none of that was actually true. That's not going to stop me from saying any of it."
"Did you actually just want to provoke a fight with that guy so you could beat him up?" Cinder asked.
"Alright, yeah, that's primarily why I did it," Jaune admitted. "Can you blame me? We've been interrogating random people about Ozpin for like an hour, and all it's gotten me is harsh language."
"I got cookies out of it," Cinder said, taking a bite out of one of the mint chocolate cookies Jaune had bought for her.
"Only because I know better than to pick a fight with the Vale Scouts," Jaune told her. "Seriously, they look innocent, but those girls are wicked. They're almost as scary as Glynda Goodwitch, and that's saying a lot." He looked around. "Anyway, where's Raven?"
"Right here," Raven said from next to him, causing him to jump.
"Ah! Fuck, woman, do you have to sneak up on me like that?" Jaune asked. "No wonder he left you."
Raven rolled her eyes. "Are we about done here? It's clear that this is a fool's errand."
"I think we're making good progress," Jaune said. "I mean, think about it – every idiot we ask gets us one idiot closer to finding the idiot who actually knows something."
"That's a good point," Raven said with a nod. She reached out and took a random passerby by the shoulder, then dragged him close so their faces were almost touching.
"Are you gonna tell me where the old man is, or is it gonna be your surviving family members?" she threatened.
Predictably, the random passerby instantly let out a decidedly un-manly scream and then ran off. Raven watched him go with satisfaction, then turned back to Jaune, who sighed tiredly.
"Okay, point taken," Jaune said. "Fuck it, let's go get wasted. I know just the place."
"When was the last time a day went by where you didn't drink?" Cinder asked.
"What?!" Jaune shouted. "You're gonna have to speak up – I can barely hear you over the pounding bass!"
"Jaune, you're talking to a vending machine."
Jaune blinked, then rubbed his eyes. To his surprise, he was, in fact, talking to a vending machine. Unperturbed, he turned back to Cinder.
"Sorry," he said. "Anyway, you're gonna have to speak up. The music's too loud."
"I asked when the last time time a day went by where you didn't drink," Cinder repeated.
"Oh. I think it was… mm… maybe six years ago? It was just before we defeated Sal-"
Cinder leaned in expectantly, and Jaune realized he had very nearly said too much. He cleared his throat. "-ami. It was just before we defeated Salami."
"That's the worst lie you've ever told me," Cinder deadpanned.
"It's not a lie," Jaune insisted. "A Geist possessed an entire warehouse full of salami. We had to eat our way out. I ate so much salami that day that I couldn't go near the stuff for years, and it drove me to drink."
"That's the only eating out you've ever done," Raven said before taking a sip from her gin.
Jaune glared at her. "Come on, Raven. That's really the kind of comment I'd expect from Cinder."
"It's really the kind of comment I wanted to say," Cinder interjected. "By the way, Raven, when's the last time you-"
"Say another word and I'll cut your head off and use it as a baseball," Raven threatened.
Cinder quieted down… for about five seconds.
"...You know, there's an obvious solution here," Cinder said. "You and Jaune should just-"
"No," Jaune said, putting a hand on Raven's shoulder and pushing her back down into her seat as she tried to stand up. "No murderizing the fifteen-year-old, even if she occasionally gets on my nerves. I'd like to think we're all more civilized than that."
"I'll show you civilized," Raven growled.
Jaune ignored her, instead turning to the bartender. "Yo, Barkeep!"
The large, bearded man came striding over, polishing a glass in his hands as he did so. "What can I get for you?"
"You got any information?" Raven asked.
"That depends. You got anything with which to pay for my information?"
"Do you accept payment in children?"
"Not anymore," the man said. "I've already got three of them running around here."
"Wait a minute, are you Junior?" Jaune asked, surprised.
The bartender sighed tiredly. "Yes, people tend to call me that. Am I supposed to assume that someone of importance passed my name along?"
"You could say that I know someone like that," Jaune said. "You know the type – tall, blonde, crazy, somewhat fiery, likes to burn down nightclubs… ah, but you'll learn about that in a decade or so."
"What?"
"Anyway, we're looking for someone," Jaune continued. "You know what happened to Ozpin?"
"Some drunk guy killed him in a duel," Junior reported. "That'll be fifty lien."
"Lighten up, Junior," said a voice from off to the side. "I think these might be my kind of people."
Jaune turned, and was stunned to see none other than Roman Torchwick there. It was unmistakably him – he had every trademark associated with Torchwick; the cane, the white suit, the bowler hat… the only thing missing was being vored by a Grimm.
"Who the hell are you?" Raven asked. "And more importantly, why should we care?"
"Well, that's not the kind of thing that sounds good said out loud," Torchwick admitted. "Let's just say that we might have a mutual acquaintance in common, thanks to your friend."
His eyes changed colors for a second, and Jaune couldn't help but heave a sigh of resignation.
"Oh, you've gotta be fucking kidding me."
Rushed to get this one out as fast as I can, because I'm antsy after a week of not writing and felt the need to update fast. I don't really have much in the way of an A/N and I kinda need to get back to work since I'm uploading this when I should be working, so I'll keep this relatively brief, I suppose.
Thank you for reading, and I hope to see you all next time. Have a good one!