"Yang, behind you!"
The blonde in question looked over her shoulder just in time to see a massive, rocket-propelled hammer speeding through the air toward her person. Without hesitation, Yang whirled and threw up her gauntleted arms into an 'X' formation while bracing for impact. Impact certainly came, and the girl was sent sliding backward along the black and neon blue tile well past her companion, who had just landed a good ten feet beyond her original position.
"You alright!?" Sun called frantically as Yang fell to one knee and skidded to a stop.
Yang clawed at the digitally constructed floor with her metallic arm, her unkempt hair tossing about wildly. Without a word to Sun, she clenched her metallic fingers into a fist and pounded it into the floor before rising and cracking her natural knuckles.
"…how's a girl so big manage to get the jump on someone?" Yang asked as she looked over her opponent. "You hit hard."
Elm Ederne let out a hearty laugh as she slung her mechanical hammer up over her shoulder and flashed the other woman a smile.
"Keep in mind, little flame- we're professionals. We have our ways."
"Yeah, you do," Sun grumbled as he rose to a standing position and whirled his staff before breaking it apart into a pair of nunchaku. He whipped the handles down and beneath his armpits, standing at the ready. "I still can't figure out what your deal is."
Clover Ebi laughed as well, though his humor expressed itself in a far softer, condescending laugh as he whirled his twin broadswords in a mockery of Sun's movements.
"That's the idea. You two aren't bad… but you're not quite ready, either."
"Pff," Yang protested as she blew a lock of hair out of her eyes. "Ready for what?"
"Salem," Sun said matter-of-factly. "And we're not."
"At least one of you has an idea what's going on," Clover quipped as he attached his blades at the hilt, forming a double-sided weapon.
"Sun?" Yang asked while narrowing her eyes at Clover. "We're trading dance partners. Have fun."
"Wh-" Sun began, only to wince slightly as Yang let out a battle cry and flew forward, the sound of shotgun shells rattling to the floor behind her echoing throughout the room. He watched for a moment as Yang battered her fists against Clover's conjoined swords while the man merely reflected or dodged each blow, entirely unconcerned. With a sigh, he turned his attention toward Elm, who was bouncing the shaft of her hammer in her gloved palm with a wicked grin.
"Ready?"
"…probably not, but I'm gonna try," Sun asserted as he rushed forward, cracking his weapons up and over his shoulders before lashing out with his right arm.
The nunchaku flung outward as the hooked blade at the end of its barrel engaged, clawing through the air toward Elm's face. Elm dipped off to the side and out of the way before engaging the rocket boosters on the back of the head of her hammer, leading her into a frantic spin. Sun reeled his weapon back in and held both sticks within his palm as he readied himself to catch an impact, only for Elm to sweep his legs out from under him with one of her own in a rocket-boosted low spin. The teen went down hard upon his back, only for Elm to convert her momentum into an overhead slam of her hammer. Before the weapon could descend past Elm's shoulders, three aurous clones manifested in the space between her and Sun, holding back the massive weapon.
"Ha! I like your spirit!" Elm praised as she engaged the rocket thrusters once again, bearing down on the clones. "But can you hold me back for long?"
The copies from Sun's semblance adjusted their stances, each bracing against the straining weapon. Sun himself began to sweat as he kept his hands clasped upon his chest, channeling all of his focus into maintaining his protectors while the sound of thrusters and shotgun shells blasted around him.
"…aren't you afraid that thing might kill me if I can't!?"
"I have faith in you!" Elm shot back with a grin. "Besides, I c-"
As quickly as they had appeared, Sun's clones vanished, leading Elm to stumble forward as her hammer slammed into the floor and fragmented the glowing tiles. Sun deftly spun behind her and opened fire with both barrels of his shotguns, peppering the woman's back with lead and shattering her aura in a single flash of splintering green energy.
"…huh?" Sun asked as he tilted his head to the side. "Did I just…?"
"Not quite," Elm replied as she turned to face him. Without a word, she jerked her head to the side, and Sun followed the motion with his eyes.
Clear on the other side of the room, Yang's hair was aflame as she peppered Clover's defenses with blow after blow. Shotgun blasts rang out with each punch, the blonde hurling both shells and fists around herself as she made a desperate attempt to break down Clover's aura. While the man managed to deflect the vast majority of strikes in the girl's vicious assault, some punches landed, and landed hard.
Sun watched in confusion as a hit connected and caused the man's body to pulse a familiar green, while the next punch resulted in a baby blue ripple of protective energy instead. The pattern continued until Yang's breathing quickened and her strikes slowed, while Clover watched for an opening all the while. Then, just as it looked like Yang had finally run out of steam, the older man made a single, calculated spinning blow to Yang's stomach with the hilt of a sword and sent her flying. Yang tumbled and rolled along the ground as her aura burst in a flash of yellow, and Clover snapped his fingers. Immediately after the noise, a green bolt of energy flew from his hand and back to Elm, where her borrowed aura enwreathed her once again.
"You… steal aura…?" Sun asked as he jogged toward his fallen companion and looked over to Clover.
"…or give out my own, depending on the situation," Clover acknowledged as he reached Sun's side. "My team trusts me with complete aura management for everyone, as situations evolve. You broke Elm's, yes, but only after I had siphoned it down to about 20% to better deal with Yang."
"…so, you're saying you couldn't handle me with my semblance engaged?" Yang asked with a grin from her place panting upon the floor.
"I'm saying that I wanted to be sure," Clover answered as he offered the blonde a hand. She took it and pulled herself up with a smile.
"Yeah, yeah. I could totally take you, solo."
"Yang," Sun griped as he rubbed at the back of his neck. "Don't be so sure. Besides, w-"
Sun lurched forward as a massive paw of a hand clapped upon his shoulder, and he looked behind himself to see Elm standing close by with a grin upon her face.
"Give yourself a little credit, kid!" the woman encouraged. "You two can hold your own against us… at least, for a little while. You're not bad, and you'll get better in time!"
"I almost had you, last round," Yang boasted as she cocked her gauntlets once again. "Gimme a minute to re-up my aura, and I'll show you 'better'."
"Almost isn't going to save you down in the mines," Clover reminded. "Let alone out on jobs. You can't rely on 'almost' if you're assigned guard duty or breaking up gang activity down in Mantle. You need to be calm, authoritative, and have the skills to back up your attitude."
"Alright, I'll be the one to ask," Sun offered. "Do you… honestly think we're ready for hunter's work? Apparently General Ironwood wants us keeping busy and taking on actual assignments between dust runs…"
For once, Elm said nothing, and instead exchanged an unreadable look with Clover. The man turned to look Sun over once again, and flicked his thumb across his chin.
"…I'll let the general answer that, soon enough. You'll know when."
Yang let out a noise of frustration and folded her arms with a snort.
"Why can't we get any straight answers out of anyone in Atlas? Is the entire city like this, or is it just you people?"
"It's mostly an Academy thing," Elm offered with a shrug. "Though not without reason. Are you ready to go again?"
Yang watched with a smirk as Elm lowered her hammer and began to bounce it against her palm once again.
"…you're on."
Weiss held her scroll up, checking her features within the projected onscreen mirror. She took a moment to study her face within the faux glass, before closing her eyes and quickly snapping the device shut. For a moment, she considered opening it for the fourth time and trying to find a way to make an adjustment to her appearance, but she decided against it. With a weary sigh, she lifted a gloved finger and pressed the intercom next to the steel door before her.
"It's me!"
A good minute passed before the door bisected itself and the halves slid open, revealing a taller male with a toothbrush lodged in his mouth. Marrow's eyes lit up as he saw Weiss standing before the doorway, and he mumbled around the plastic as he gave her a casual salute.
"Hey Weish!"
Weiss rolled her eyes, somewhat amused by the absurdity of the man's toothbrush and his sopping wet hair in contrast to his professional Ace Ops uniform.
"…did you just wake up? Marrow, it's almost one in the afternoon…"
Marrow turned to hide his guilty smirk and waved the woman to follow, still speaking around his toothbrush.
"I wush up until two doing paperwork," he mumbled. "Got shent to deal with a riot in Mantle."
Instead of the roll of her eyes that she had mentally prepared for, Weiss suddenly stopped following Marrow through the suite and found that she could only frown.
"…a riot in Mantle…?"
Marrow disappeared into an adjacent room for a moment and let out a spitting sound, before running water echoed throughout the suite. Weiss' frown only deepened as she waited and eyed up the messy furniture and stacked shelves of the living room. She didn't have to wait long before Marrow reappeared, pulling his wet hair back into its usual loose bun as he approached her.
"Yeah. It's not really that unusual, especially these days."
"Because of my father?" Weiss inquired, already knowing the answer.
Marrow only nodded slowly, looking incredibly uncomfortable.
"…we don't have t-"
"We do," Weiss corrected. "I do. It's all even worse than you let on, Marrow. I went down to Mantle with Sun, and it was just… I saw so much pain, and had so much anger directed at me from the faunus in the area…"
"Yet you didn't run away from it," Marrow pointed out as he gestured toward the couch, which was the one thing in the room that had been cleaned off already. "You did what you set out to do, and faced that along the way."
"And what I set out to do set us back with Ironwood quite a bit," Weiss reminded as she sat down upon the couch and folded her arms. "I take it you already know everything?"
"…pretty much," Marrow admitted as he lowered himself onto the cushion next to Weiss'. "Yeah, maybe meeting with Robyn Hill without telling us wasn't a great move, but you were trying to help, all-in-all. That counts for something."
Weiss gave Marrow an unimpressed look, though the man's earnest tone never faltered.
"It counts for something with me, Weiss. I know you're trying, and I know you're hurting. Speaking of… how's the shoulder?"
Weiss lifted the arm in question and rolled her shoulder. A dull, barely noticeable pain coursed through her arm, though she found the sensation entirely tolerable.
"Better. Much better, with this brace. Still, I don't want to just sweep all of this aside. I feel awful, and I know it's going to get harder. I also know that I have no right to bitch, either, considering what some of my teammates are going through."
Marrow raised a brow, giving Weiss an incredibly familiar look of awe.
"…I never expected you to curse…"
"You're the second person I've heard that from this week," Weiss said with a roll of her eyes. "I guess I'm just living on the edge, now. Maybe next time I see you, I'll have a nose piercing."
"Nose piercings are cute," Marrow offered, only for Weiss to give him an uncertain look. "I-I mean in general! You know what I mean!"
"Actually, I don't know what you mean," Weiss replied as she shook her head. "I've never even seen a nose piercing in person."
Marrow shifted in his seat, feeling as though he had dodged a particularly awkward bullet.
"Well… anyway, is there anything I could do to make you feel better? We don't have to clean this place out today, if you're not feeling up to it."
"…Marrow, as much as I feel like wallowing in filth right now, we absolutely have to clean this place today," Weiss protested as she looked around the living room. "You're going to lose something, trip on something, or accidentally entomb yourself in pizza boxes," Weiss muttered.
"…I made them into a pyramid!" Marrow tried as he gestured to the arrangement that had appeared upon the kitchen counter.
"That is not an art installation, no matter how much you'd like it to be," Weiss informed. She smirked despite her awful mood as an idea crossed her mind. "Besides, the more organized we get you, the more room you have for your… action figure displays."
"Statues!" Marrow protested as his tail thumped angrily against the couch cushion for emphasis. "You did that on purpose!"
Weiss chuckled softly to herself before letting out a sigh.
"I did, yes… but you really don't need to do anything for me. Everything I'm going through right now, I either deserve, or brought upon myself. Sometimes, it's both…"
"Hey," Marrow warned as he slipped off the couch. "You're doing it again. You really need to stop closing yourself off and just accepting that you're going to be miserable. I won't let you just be miserable."
"…what are you doing?" Weiss asked as she turned to watch Marrow walk into the kitchenette.
"Starting the process of cheering you up," Marrow answered as he went about filling a kettle with water. "I know things have sucked since you got here, and I know the other Aces have kept you guys at a distance… but not me. I refuse to let you just 'figure things out on your own' and 'grow up' like they want me to. You're not little kids. I mean, you guys are adults, even if the rest of the Aces don't treat you like it. Even adults have feelings that need tending to. Valid feelings."
"…I still don't understand how you're so different in the face of Clover, Harriet, and Elm," Weiss said as she stood from the couch and watched Marrow begin to rifle through some kitchen cabinets. "Are they really just as callous with you as they are with us?"
"Sometimes, they're worse," Marrow answered as he continued to gather supplies. "But I know it's just because they think they have to be completely serious on the job. They can't handle switching professionalism on and off, so they just play it safe. I've seen Harriet smile once or twice, and Elm is… kinda friendly, to a point. Clover's got a… um… he has a girlfriend, so there's that."
"…Clover has a girlfriend?" Weiss asked as she continued her approach into the kitchen. "And… what exactly are you making…?"
"Yeah, but I… it's not really my place to talk about her," Marrow said nervously as he pulled down a bag of marshmallows. "I'm making hot chocolate. All three of them are human… they just don't want to show you that side of themselves. I'll show you mine, even if I'm a faunus."
Marrow jumped slightly as he turned only to find Weiss directly behind him.
"Marrow… without worrying about semantics, you're one of the most human people I've ever met, if you catch my meaning," Weiss admitted. "You remind me a lot of Sun, with how straightforward and caring you act. It's something I don't see in many people anywhere, let alone the Aces."
The man stopped and stared into Weiss' eyes for a moment as he held the bag of puffy treats. After a moment, he broke eye contact and went about rummaging through the fridge.
"Yeah, well… I think the world would be a better place if more people did act this way, especially toward people who are hurting."
"You know… maybe there is one thing you could do for me," Weiss said hesitantly. "Though I feel… odd about asking."
"What's that?" Marrow asked as he rose from the fridge with a gallon of milk and set it upon the counter.
"…I don't suppose I could have another hug?" Weiss requested with a sheepish look. "It helped last time…"
Without a second thought, Marrow finally set down the bag of marshmallows upon the counter and scooped Weiss into a gentle embrace. Though she was quite sure that her arm placement wasn't ideal, Weiss did her best to wrap her arms around the taller faunus and lean into his chest as she closed her eyes, simply reveling in his warmth. She breathed slowly as she nestled against his frame, though unwelcome thoughts began to creep through her mind, sprouting like weeds in an otherwise beautiful garden.
"…is this… wrong?"
Almost immediately, the warmth faded slightly as Marrow pulled back enough to look down at Weiss' worried face.
"Is what wrong?" he asked, his tone cautious.
"Just… this," Weiss emphasized as her mouth became a tight line.
"…what is this?" Marrow asked, his tail twitching anxiously. "I mean… to you. In your mind, what are we doing right now?"
Weiss paused to think and found her mind to be less of a garden, and more of an indecipherable tangle of unfamiliar structures.
"…I have absolutely no idea."
"Well, is it helping, at least?" Marrow questioned. "Is it something you want, right now?"
"It is," Weiss affirmed. "I just… I don't want to accidentally cross any boundaries that we shouldn't. I don't know what I'm doing, Marrow. I haven't exactly had many hugs, in my life."
Marrow's heart sank at the girl's words, and he moved back in to squeeze her more tightly.
"…get used to it, then. You can have as many as you want from me," Marrow reassured. "No matter what this 'is' or 'isn't'. It can be whatever you want it to be, as long as it's bringing you comfort. I'm not worried about putting labels on right now. I'm worried about you."
Weiss pressed farther into Marrow's chest and inhaled deeply, taking in the scent of his leather jacket. After only a moment more, she initiated the pull back, and gave Marrow a grateful look.
"…I'm feeling better already. Let's drink, and get to cleaning…"
Author's Note:
For the foreseeable future, I'm going to be sticking to one update of this story per week, because of some life stuff and a few other reasons. Depending on the date that Volume 8 begins, that may or may not change. I'll go into more detail once we find out the date and I get some other things sorted.
-RD