Here we go.


Cover Art: Mysterywhiteflame

Chapter 16


The academy made a big deal of the selection process for the Vytal Festival. Jaune had felt bad about that at first. Everyone wanted to go and compete in Vale, some seeing it as experience, a holiday, or for the older years their last chance to make a name for themselves before graduating. It felt wrong to be taking that away, practically rigging the system, when so many other teams had legitimate reasons to want to go.

Clover had laughed when he said that and assured him that the only rigged team was his. Everyone else would be getting the exact same opportunities as promised. "We always send two first year teams along. Kind of a competition for your year. You'll be snatching one of those spots but they'll have their chance again to go in two years. Besides, you have earned your place. What is fighting in some mini tournament compared to being selected for a secret mission in Vale?"

He made a good point. The "mini tournament" as he called it – Miss Schnee called it the Vytal Selection Tournament – was an opt-in schoolwide tournament that would determine which teams from each year got to go compete in Vale. It was pretty much expected that it'd be made up of mostly third and fourth-year teams since it would be embarrassing if they lost to those younger, but the possibility was there and plenty of first and second year teams did choose to enter.

They got their asses blasted open for it, but hey, learning experience. Jaune could almost taste the blood as a first year team got sent up against a fourth year and beaten so badly they had to be scraped off the arena by their apologetic opponents. To say competition was fierce was like saying Neon liked their pod beds. The competition was murderous. The best fights were fourth year team on fourth year team, which was both incredible to watch and a little terrifying. Why was any other year trying to enter this tournament when students close to graduation could fight like this?

He and his team had improved leaps and bounds under the specialist programme but these people had been here in the academy for almost four full years. They weren't just good; they were on the cusp of becoming actual huntsmen and huntresses.

To make it fair, however – if one could call it that – there was a proviso that two teams from each lower year would be selected by the adjudicators based on performance. It wasn't necessarily how far you got because some people could have easier enemies and some would run into a fourth-year team in the first round and be knocked out. Instead, they based it on what they assured everyone was an independent process around who would "embarrass Atlas less" when getting their shit pushed in by the other school's reps. Flynt's words, not Miss Schnee's.

The sad part of it all was that for the fiction of their team having been selected, they had to compete. That wouldn't have been so bad if they hadn't had the dubious fortune of drawing a fourth year team in the first round. They'd tried, they really had, but it was a foregone conclusion and it brought back the helpless feeling of the training mission in the quarry. They'd managed to bring their opponents' aura down maybe 20% across the board but they'd been knocked out the competition either way. Not that it mattered since they'd be going to Vale anyway.

"You know," said Neon. "Experiencing what the actual reps are like has me wondering why anyone wants to go in the first place. Any team that isn't literally incredible is going to get humiliated."

"It'll be even worse this year since Pyrrha Nikos is in Vale," said Flynt. "Imagine the honour of being knocked out by a first-year team. At least we can get away with that. These guys are going to be flipping emasculated."

"Pyrrha who?"

"Nikos," said Neon. "Famous Mistralian tournament fighter. Bit of a celeb over there."

"Oh. I mean, she'd still be a first year, wouldn't she? Is she really that good?"

"Looked it in the fights I saw her in. Televised," he added, shrugging. "Let's just say she handled those people her age like these guys handled us. Never looked close. Who knows, though. There's a big difference between being the best in a pre-academy tournament and the best at the Vytal Festival."

"I have also seen her fight," said Penny. "I saw no use of any Semblance during the fights, raising the question whether she has one or not, and whether she has never needed to use it. I do not think it wise to antagonise her."

"Well, it's a good job we're not going there to antagonise anyone," said Jaune. "Least of all some super athlete. Ciel's team did well, didn't they?"

"You mean Ciel did well," said Flynt.

Neon nodded. "Her team needs a reality check. They keep acting like they can do their own thing and ignore her when she's hands above the best on their team – and their leader."

"Ciel has complained to me of problems with her team," said Penny. Jaune wondered if Ciel had given her permission to say that, or whether Penny just assumed it'd be alright. Probably the latter. "She often complains that her teammates are not nearly as cooperative as we are. They do not like extra training outside of class, even after barely scraping through the second assessment."

That explained why Ciel spent her mornings jogging with him instead of her team. He felt bad for her. Ciel was a little odd and overly formal, but that was just the way she presented herself. There was definite wit and quite a bit of friendliness behind the cold exterior. You just had to know how to look for it. Maybe having seven sisters had helped him a little there.

The tournament wrapped up at the end of the day and the teams were assessed and shown on several digital boards around the academy. Getting to the front of those was a chore, and Jaune wasn't sure why they even bothered – plausible deniability, maybe? – but they made their way forward and quickly found themselves in the "selection" category off to the side of the main list. It looked like Ciel's team had made it through as well. Beyond that there was one team from the second year, and then a bunch more between the third and fourth, with more weighted toward them. He recognised the team that had beaten them, and the other that won the whole thing, but the rest might as well have been strangers.

"Oh, my goodness!" cried Neon. "We made it? I am, like, totally shaking!"

"Don't quit being a huntress," snorted Flynt. "Your acting sucks."

Neon shot him a sideways look and hissed, "At least I'm trying. You three are standing there like it was a foregone conclusion!"

It was a fair point.

"Wahey!" yelled Jaune. "We did it!"

"SENSATIONAL!"

"Hell yeah! Can't wait to tell my dad!"

The other teams who hadn't been selected shot them dirty looks.

/-/

It was that very night that they were escorted off the academy building and into a nearby complex stationed also on the floating island of Atlas. It was colloquially called the "Command Centre" since it was where all the admin of the island was, including where most of the leaders apparently met up. The inside was a lot more boring than the name suggested – it was mostly corridors, offices, and other rooms like that.

"Don't worry about being looked down on," said Clover, leading them alongside the slim form of Vine Zeki. "The support team has been briefed on why you've been selected. The whole point is for other people to look down on and not suspect you, so they're fully expecting you to be first years and non-descript. They're professional enough to follow orders anyway, and they know full well how important this mission is."

"No pressure on us, yeah," said Flynt.

Clover had dragged them out their rooms wanting them to meet the teams who would be acting as their logistical and strategic support while they were in Vale. It made a lot of sense, Jaune supposed. It was good for their morale to know they had people at their back, and the support teams would be able to get a feel for them as well. They were soon enough brought to a surprisingly boring looking room with numerous desks and terminals, and about eight people working at them.

Eight people for the four of us is two staff per team member, though. I guess that's quite a lot of support put into context.

"Look alive, people." said Clover. "I've brought children."

"Why does that sound like you lured them here with candy?" asked a woman at a desk. "Blink twice if you're here against your will, kids."

"We tried to get you the best support team we could," said Clover. "Alas, we couldn't find one with a decent sense of humour."

"Fuck and you," chortled a man on the other side of the terminal. "Ignore the big bad specialist, you four. They're not used to having to think for themselves. That's why they have us guys in intelligence do all the thinking for them. Brains over brawn."

"I'll admit they're good," said Clover, rolling his eyes. "For the sake of keeping everything on the hush-hush we'll be skipping names. Still, they can tell you four what support they'll be offering. Come on, people. Impress them now."

"Hacking, espionage and security," called a woman in glasses by a pc. "Unofficially, anyway. You need access to a terminal, database, or even Vale's security systems then you can call me. I can even get into banks to monitor transactions. It's all totally legal," she said, her wry smile saying it very much wasn't. "Honest."

"Us two are information specialists," said a man beside another, both warming their hands with coffee. "Think of us like detectives. You heap a bunch of clues our way and we'll try and piece some sense of order out of them. Right now, we're going over warehouse sales and abandoned warehouses in Vale in the last year to see if any seem a little out of place. Our stolen friend must be stored somewhere, and it sure as hell isn't under someone's sink. We'll typically be the ones pointing you at place we think you should investigate."

"Requisitions and supply here," said a burly man. "You need anything, you call me. Weapons, vehicles, gadgets, supplies, cash. I hold the purse strings. Don't get stingy either; the safety of the people in Vale is bigger than honour, so you need to grease someone's hand, you grease their hand until it can slide up their own ass."

"Faunus relations specialist and negotiator," said a female faunus with green hair, floppy dog ears, and a huge, charming smile. Everything about her screamed friendliness, but the gun at her side gave it a weird edge. "I'm your best shot if you want to deal with any suspected terrorists in a gentle manner. I've done a lot of White Fang codebreaking as well, so I'm good for encrypted messages or calls, and I can be patched in to talk for you if you need me to."

"You might as well call me excuse-maker," said a tired-looking guy. "My job, aside from helping out, is to make excuses to whomever needs them as to why you're doing what you're doing. Caught sneaking out of Beacon? I'm your sick relative – hospital records included. Caught by the police snooping where you shouldn't be? I can rustle up some forged documents and maybe even a warrant. If shit gets really bad, I'm the one who's going to be calling Vale's Council and making up some wonderful excuse for how you're totally not investigating the White Fang. You just slipped, tripped, and happened to knock a bunch of them out." He snorted. "Happens to the best of us."

"I'm a software engineer," said a woman smoking a cigarette and leaning back in her chair. "It's not the same as Little Miss Got-caught-hacking-military-computers-and-pressganged-into-service over there." She jerked a thumb at the first girl, who showed the middle finger back. "I'm more on the creative side of things. I can make software you might need – either to monitor a place, keep you hidden, or to program a system if you need me to. She's the one who can help break into a scroll off a White Fang grunt or completely annihilate an enemy database. I'm the one who could make you a trace that you could slip back onto a scroll so that if they ever uses it again, we can not only get their exact location but trace wherever that call or message went."

"And finally," said the last man, "I'm the one in charge of keeping this operation running – and keeping it secret. Misinformation, structure, command. That kind of thing. Get used to my voice because you'll be hearing me most often and I'll be passing on what these knuckleheads say. It's easier that way. I'll transfer you through if you need any of them in particular. For the sake of communications, I'm going by the codename of Warden. That's also to the name of our division for this operation."

Jaune was kind of glad they hadn't done names because he had a feeling he wouldn't have been able to remember them all. Still, it was a lot of different resources being left at their fingertips. Jaune swallowed and said, "We'll do our best not to let you all down."

"Don't worry about it," said Warden. "We all know what you can and can't do, and this will hopefully be a clandestine operation." He smirked. "Until it's time to strike, and then it'll be others who will be doing the striking. Your job is just to be the spotter here. Do as we say, let us help you, find the White Fang and call for the cavalry."

"Atlas wouldn't put an impossible task in front of a first year team," said Clover. "Not only would it be pointless to harm you like that when we're investing so much into you, but it'd harm us as well. The fact you're being sent to do this at all is because we expect you will be enough to make this work."

"Sounds good to me," said Neon. "So, when are we going?"

"Two days from now," said Warden. "All the representative teams will be shipped off then via airship. It's a good eight hours to Vale." He waved them forward, and the four of them left Clover to look at a map of the city. A large red circle had been drawn off it to the side with Beacon written on it in red pen. "You'll all be given dorms in Beacon and access to the CCT there. Your scrolls have been scrambled, so don't worry about intercepted calls. You should lay low for the first day or two. Settle in, learn your way around Beacon, get comfortable and act natural."

"It'd be a good time to learn the lay of the school in case you need to slip out or in," added the hacker girl. "Excuse-maker can get you in or out if he has to, but the more you use him the less believable it becomes."

"Technically, there are no rules demanding you stay in Beacon overnight," said Excuse-maker, tiredly. "But lessons are mandatory and the White Fang tend to have jobs, too, and thy need to stay hidden just as you do. Most of their activity is going to take place on Friday or Saturday night. You might as well relax until the weekend."

This was a whole less desperate than Jaune imagined it would be. "Okay. So, our first weekend?"

One of the two detectives stepped up with a clear plastic sheet he laid over the map, with notes in black pen. It was absolutely covered in notes. More than Jaune could read, and often in handwriting he could barely read.

"These are our deductions so far."

"That's a lot of deductions!" cried Neon. "What the hell."

"Vale is a big place unfortunately. There's a lot of places to hide. This is the industrial quarter, though." He circled one part of the city with his finger. "It's where most of the factories and warehouses are. Makes it cheaper to transport goods and avoids too much polluted air or noise from reaching the residential districts. It's our belief the weapon will be in here, but we don't think you searching there will necessarily be your best shot."

"Too many warehouses to break into and too many security cameras," said the other. "You'd be there months. We think your best shot is going to be to find some White Fang activity, preferably recruitment, and work your way in that way."

"Infiltrate one?" asked Neon. "You mean me, don't you."

"Not with your hair," snorted the software lady. "Face it, girl, you'll be too recognisable from your Vytal profile. No, you should rely on our faunus specialist for that." The faunus waved happily. "We'll be doing our best to intercept and track calls across Vale at unusual hours while you all sleep. We'll also be roaming through CCTV looking for any suspicious activity."

"The Vytal Festival is a big deal," said Warden, "So we expect the White Fang will want to bring in more people. It's harder to keep things on the down low if you have a lot of people to control. Someone is bound to slip. That's where you step in. You're looking for one of two things – either a panicky captive you can kidnap, bribe, or convince to turn coat. Or a White Fang member you can knock out and steal a scroll from. We can do the rest from there and give you a time and place for their next meeting, then you can scope it out or even head there in advance and have some surveillance set up. You can requisition that if you need it."

The more he heard, the less worrisome it all sounded. He'd thought they would be hiding in the shadows, hearts racing, hoping they wouldn't be seen as dangerous terrorists talked below them. Instead, it sounded like they'd be arriving twelve hours early, throwing up some covert cameras and then watching from a safe distance sipping milkshake.

I guess there's no point Atlas being the most advanced kingdom if we're not going to be using that…

"That sounds doable," said Jaune. "More than doable."

Warden smiled. "That's the point. We don't see the use risking you four against terrorists when we can monitor them from a distance and unwind their whole operation. Your job is just to be our hands in Vale since we're not allowed in. Go around, set up cameras, check out places for us, the like. Ideally, we don't want you to have to fight, though it's bound to happen in a small way. We just need you to step in and take out the odd member. Steal a scroll. That kind of thing. You ever get in trouble, you run. The White Fang would be idiots to follow you since you're the ones legally allowed in Vale. You run into public and they're the ones in trouble."

"Hell," said the hacker. "If they do chase you into public then we win anyway. It's the proof we need that they're active, and we can push Vale to let us send teams in to deal with them. It's hard to argue we're not needed if I can steal some CCTV of a bunch of terrorists chasing some kids through the city. I'll just pixelate your faces, scrub out some details, and no one will know."

Flynt laughed. "Is that actually an option?"

"Sure," said Warden. "This ends in our favour in a lot more ways than it can in theirs. How this goes bad is if the White Fang is provoked to use their weapon, you four get hurt or captured, or the Council somehow finds irrefutable proof of what we're doing. Almost anything else is a win for us, even if it's just the White Fang being forced to smuggle the weapon out of Vale. You can capture them, help us find them, expose them, lure them into Valean huntsmen. Whatever. We either want to take them out ourselves or force Vale into a position where they have to let us. A White Fang attack – preferably without casualties – will do wonders for that. Just be careful," he stressed, "Provoking them could go very wrong, very fast, especially in a population centre. Them chasing you is fine. Them chasing actual civilians is a disaster, especially if it's revealed later that we had a hand in it."

"How do we get in touch with you?"

"There will be an app on your scroll disguised as an online video game. Press it, open the game, then swipe from down to up and you'll be put through to us. We will remain silent until you say Warden at which point we'll respond. This unit will be active 24-7 so there will always be someone immediately available. Any other questions?"

Man, it sounded like they were in a spy movie. They were in a way. This was espionage on a political scale, except that they were less the spies and more the mules helping the spies have some access to Vale. It was still a huge deal.

"I'm good. Penny, Neon, Flynt?"

They shook their heads as well. He could tell Flynt and Neon were excited. They'd been worried before but, like him, all this explanation and effort had helped alleviate that a little, and now there was just a burning curiosity for what Vale would be like. He felt it, too. It'd been Beacon he applied to get into after all, and now he'd be going back.

Definitely not in the way I imagined I would be, but this is fine. Atlas turned out to be way cooler than I thought it'd be.

/-/

The airship from Atlas to Vale was obnoxiously smooth. It was obnoxious because it meant the technology for such smooth flights had always existed, and Atlas had just chosen not to share it – so every flight he'd hurled on was, in a sense, their fault. The pills he'd taken beforehand might have helped as well, but the oddest thing was that he never once felt the queasiness at all on the long flight over. It could have been the distraction of Penny and Ciel talking, or watching Flynt and Neon argue over in-flight entertainment, but he actually thought it might have had something to do with nerves.

He'd always been anxious before, especially when flying, and he'd been twice as bad when going somewhere he was afraid – like his arrival at Vale when he'd been sure his forged transcripts would be caught, or the subsequent flight to Atlas when he'd half-expected to be arrested. Here, he felt calm. Yes, there was a secret mission in Vale and that was reason to be cautious, but that wouldn't begin until at least the weekend so there was precisely no reason to feel worried. Jaune still felt the old him would have worried, but time in Atlas had calmed him down a little. Or taught him to save his panic for the assessment tests.

There was something to be said for those being so terrifying it drove all other fear out of you.

There were perhaps eighty students from Atlas coming to Vale. It was a tiny portion of the population of Atlas Academy, but it felt like a lot when they were all crammed together in rows in uniform. The school wanted them to make a good impression when they landed, so they'd been told to collect fresh uniforms and polish their shoes, and even drilled on marching in formation with a sergeant to look over their salutes and correct them. It felt silly, but the better they looked the more students Atlas could draw so there was some common sense behind it. He suspected there might also be a psychological element of intimidation toward the locals, mostly to make the local teams from Vale a little less confident in competing against them.

Jaune didn't so much mind the uniform if he was being honest. He'd disliked how boring it was at first – all white and pale grey – but he'd come to appreciate the sleek lines and how cavalier it made him look. Flynt wore it better. His darker skin and hair contrasted with the white for a debonair look, whereas Neon looked like someone had started a psychedelic painting from the top down and run out of colours at her shoulders. Penny wore it well and with a bright smile.

"We are arriving in Beacon, Vale," announced the speakers. "Please return to your seats."

That was enough to have Flynt and Neon break off from their little argument. "Here we go," said Flynt, grinning madly. "Excited?"

"A little," admitted Jaune. "Yeah."

"There's a school prom coming up before the fights start. You looking to find a girlfriend while you're here?"

Jaune wasn't sure why he was suddenly the centre of attention at that one, not when Flynt was as single as he was. Neon wore a shit-eating grin, whereas Ciel and Penny just looked quietly curious. Neither was any better than the former. "I don't really have any plans either way. Maybe? I'm more focused on exploring Vale. Know what I mean?"

Their little code for their expected jaunts in the city. The four of them were avid sightseers and wanted to explore the city. Neon chuckled. "Oh yeah, I'm looking forward to that. So many things to see, so many people to meet."

"So many parties to crash," quipped Flynt.

"Let's be serious, guys." The airship rattled as its landing gears touched down. "Looks like it's time to go."

When the ramps came down, Winter Schnee stood at the top of them and slowly marched down. The students came in two files behind her, touching down to the grass and spreading out left and right as Winter stood in the middle. They formed horizontal ranks off to the side of her, four deep and ten wide on either side. In front and all around them, curious students from Beacon, and probably some from Mistral and Vacuo as well, watched. Most of them weren't even wearing a school uniform, and while they certainly looked unique and flamboyant they didn't cut as powerful an image as they did. Jaune smiled, oddly proud of standing with his peers with a rigid body and arms at his side.

Winter Schnee snapped her feet together and her fist to her chest as Ozpin approached with a tall blonde woman beside him. At that same moment every student echoed, the clack of their shoes hitting together and the thump of fists on their chests echoing in almost perfect unison. He spied a team of girls off by the corner of the building, watching in what seemed like a cross between confusion and awkwardness. It seemed like a lot of the locals were less impressed and more weirded out by their behaviour. As if they had no idea what basic discipline meant.

Most of them only have one weapon on them, thought Jaune. Mecha-shift by the looks of it, but if they lose that weapon or it malfunctions then they're left with hand-to-hand as the only option. Meanwhile, Crocea Mors hung at his left hip but he had an SMG in a case slung over his back, with the strap across his chest. There was also a much smaller collapsible stun rod on his right hip for emergencies and, failing even that, a small knife hidden in a slide-in pouch on his belt. That was less a weapon and more a generalised tool, however. Meant to cut rope, meat, branches, clothing or for any other of a thousand purposes they might need it.

None of those were mecha-shift. They probably could have all been combined together, but then it'd only take one mechanical fault to rob him of all his weapons in a fight, not to mention the maintenance and care of it would take three times as much effort and cost. He'd seen how much of a pain it was cleaning the internals of a mecha-shift weapon. Running an oiled rag over Crocea Mors was effortless by comparison.

It occurred to him that he was already looking at their weaknesses and listing them out. Clover's training really was coming in almost automatically nowadays, which was a pleasant surprise. It didn't make him feel any more confident about winning the festival when his team had been torn to shreds by their own fourth years, but it was a welcome reminder that they'd come far.

"Welcome to Beacon," said the Headmaster of Beacon, Ozpin. He was slimmer than Ironwood, and shorter, leaning on a singular cane with shaggy white hair and a relaxed smile. Something about him seemed off, though. Not suspicious or anything, but like he was much more dangerous than he looked – which Jaune could well believe. You didn't get to a position like his without being one hell of a huntsman. Injury or not, he could probably take on a whole bunch of teams at once. "I hope you will enjoy your time here and have an opportunity to mingle with our students and explore our fair city. Dorms have been allocated to you and the details of such will be forwarded to your scrolls. Beacon can be somewhat of a maze to those new here, so I've asked for volunteers to show individual teams around the main buildings. The cafeteria, training halls, the borders, and the dorms. If you do have any questions please feel free to refer to your scrolls or ask anyone in a Beacon uniform." He smiled faintly. "I am sure they will be happy to help you."

"Thank you," said Winter. "General Ironwood sends his apologies that he could not be here in person, but he will be arriving a few days from now. There are several important meetings he has to attend in Atlas before he can arrive."

"The perils of working on both the council and as headmaster," chuckled Ozpin. "I understand completely." He coughed and nodded to the woman beside him, who stepped forward and raised her voice. She reminded Jaune of their harshest drill sergeants, which wasn't entirely a bad thing. Maybe Beacon wasn't as lax as their students gave off.

"I am Glynda Goodwitch, head of combat and deputy of Beacon. Separate into your individual teams and await a guide. Your luggage will be offloaded and taken to your rooms directly so leave it on the aircraft. Weapons are to be stored in our lockers when not in use. No exceptions."

It was absolutely no different to Atlas so he didn't expect there would be any. Maybe Mistral and Vacuo weren't the same. Flynt got a pass on that normally since his weapon… well… it didn't exactly pass as one, and a trumpet wasn't something you could misfire and hurt anyone with. Nothing worse than their eardrums anyway. Ciel sighed and left them to re-join her team, and the four members of JCKP waited patiently as other teams were collected and led away by various people. Their guide was one of the last, perhaps even the last, and Flynt was scowling by the time she arrived.

Short, quick, black and red. The girl had incredibly pale skin and odd gunmetal grey eyes, maybe even silver. "I-I'm sorry!" squeaked the huntress. She was short. Very short. "I-I was late and… um… welcome to Beacon! I'm Ruby!"

She hadn't been late; she was one of the four he'd spotted earlier, which begged the question on the delay. Judging from how red she was, and how much she was fidgeting, he decided to let it go. Maybe it was just nerves.

"Jaune Arc." He smiled as best he could. "Leader of Team Jackpot. This is my partner Penny, and these are Flynt and Neon. We'll be in your care, Ruby."

"What!?" cried the girl, leaning back. "But I was told I just had to show you around – not care for-" Her eyes widened further and she flushed. Flynt almost choked on his laughter and Neon elbowed him in the side. "You meant-? Okay, right." The girl paused and took a deep breath. It didn't seem to calm her that much. "So, tour? Um. Cafeteria! Yeah, let's start there. It's where the food is served!"

"That is how a cafeteria normally operates," said Penny, all smiles.

The worst part was that she meant it in a friendly manner and just wanted to be a part of the conversation, but poor Ruby looked like she wanted the floor to open up and swallow her whole. It got so bad that Jaune started to feel sorry for her.

"The cafeteria sounds like a great place to start. Why don't you show us where that is?"

"Y-Yeah. Follow me…"


Poor Ruby abandoned by her team and left to be a guide for the scary Atlas soldier-students.


Next Chapter: 28th January

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