Never trust me on my deadlines TvT. Anyway here's a more Adam-centric chapter! As well as a sneakpeak to this Jaune's backstory, which will be revealed as the story continues. However manages to guess what probably happened to Jaune gets a shoutout in the next chapter lol. Really liked this chapter, ended up rewriting it like 3 times.
Life sucked. And by the bastard gods Jaune could die happy if he never saw, or better yet, felt sand on his skin again in his life. Jaune scratched his beard as he sat in his tent, trying to glare the sand away from every crevice and corner and oh my gods it was also in his beard. Jaune hated sand.
The Arc let out a not-so-soft sigh, more a groan really, but stood up from his chair and tried to make himself look calm and collected. His ears told Jaune that he had an incoming visitor, so he picked up the documents he had read and reread a few hundred times to act as if he had been busy and totally not been sulking about his hatred of sand.
"General Arc! We have a message from the camp in Vale! As well as a package, it's marked as fragile and for your eyes only." Says the dark-skinned Vacuo-born teenager who handed over a letter, if Jaune was correct their name was Jet. The sadness that Jaune felt constantly got a bit worse at the realization that he no longer knew the names of everyone at his camp with certainty.
Regardless of his emotional state Jaune took the letter and answered, "I'm not a general, this isn't a war. But thank you for giving me the letter and have them bring the package to me,"
By Oscar's cane he sounded like Ironwood, even time couldn't erase the impression James Ironwood left on people. Jaune huffed under his breath, he missed the days when he could be more relaxed with the people, but Weiss had drilled into Jaune that when leading a large group of people you needed to meet certain expectations.
…and Jaune wouldn't desecrate her memory by forgetting her teachings.
The tall huntsmen flipped open the letter, fingers moving to take out the slip of paper and eyes skimming the first line.
"Dear Jaune, I know we haven't talked in a while so Hiiiiiiii! So my fellow leader, bad news if you're reading this-"
Jaune collapsed, his knees buckling. He didn't need to read the rest of the letter to know what it said.
"FUCK." Jaune roared, fist slamming into the ground and shaking the tent. He desperately wanted to tear up the piece of paper in his hands and burn it, as if that would change what had undoubtedly happened. Jaune couldn't do this again, not without breaking, he couldn't be the last one. Messy tears streamed down his face as he shakily got up, the hand not holding the letter holding the top of his chair for stability. Jaune turned to face away from the tent's entrance, there wasn't a doubt in his mind that everyone had heard him, but the least he could do was save a bit of dignity.
Two sets of footsteps stuttered slowly to a stop outside his tent, the shuffling of fabric indicating that one of them had lifted the tent's flap to get a better look inside.
"Where do you want us to put the package, sir?" Asked a voice.
Jaune steeled himself, swallowing the jump in his throat to at least try and make himself sound stable.
"Put it at the foot of my bed." Ordered Jaune, still facing the tent wall, and waited for the two individuals to leave his presence.
Slowly Jaune turned, drying his tears with one hand, but not before shaking it loose of any sand. Gods Jaune hated sand.
The crate that sat on the floor wasn't anything special, other than the familiar rose symbol stamped on the wooden lid. Jaune placed the crate on the floor, sitting next to it so it was on his left and grimacing as his bed creaked and groaned. His bed was as close to breaking as he was. Nevertheless, Jaune moved the crate once again to this time be on his lap, and opened the lid.
A sob almost ripped through Jaune's chest. There in the crate was a hooded cloak as red as roses, wrapped around something. Tentatively Jaune unwrapped the hood and placed it to his right, eyes closed, half to not let reality sink in, half to pray to the universe that whatever was in his hands was worth it. Jaune's eyes opened, and in his hands was a crown of gold and blue gems.
A relic. The relic. The only one that stayed around once the gods showed up again. All others had vanished. Yet the Relic of Choice remained.
And the second his eyes opened and Jaune gazed upon the relic's gem every choice he had ever made flooded through him. It was a somewhat familiar sensation, the time distortion that all relics seemed to have. The bombardment of information and memories was new, and far too much for a mortal mind to comprehend. Like all magic in Remnant, the Relic's power seemed to have increased exponentially.
However, the message was clear.
Jaune now had a choice. What choice he had, he did not know, nor did he have the faintest idea. Humanity, Faunus included, had been on the back foot for two years now. The vision made that very clear.
Wiping the vomit from his lips and throwing a disgusted glance at the pool of bile on the floor Jaune realized that the crown now sat on his head. Fingers shot up to try and pry it off, but budge it did not. Before he could react further a presence made itself clear, smoke bellowing out from behind Jaune and an instinct so powerful primal wasn't a good enough word for it was screaming at him that no matter what Jaune did, he should notturn around.
A voice rang inside Jaune's head, it wasn't one of the gods, he knew well enough what their voices sounded like.
"My children have yet to learn their lesson. I apologize." It said, "Their silly little toy will let me rectify things well enough. So Jaune Arc of Remnant, Once my Rusted Knight. I give you a choice."
Jaune was incapable of speaking, whatever spacial and temporal distortion the relic was putting in place incapacitated him to a certain level as well as his surroundings. But the relic, and the entity behind it didn't need Jaune to talk, as his environment disappeared before his and enveloped him in pitch black, his eyes instead given a set of foggy images to look at. There was Mercury, Emerald, Neapolitan, Adam Taurus, and finally Cinder Fall.
"Redeem them, and your race will not suffer my children's machinations until they have properly matured. Or use the crown as a weapon to try fight off my children so you may have peace,"
The mental image of the cloak flashed through Jaune's mind, the pain and suffering that had been the result of fighting the gods. If you could even call it that.
That seemed to be answer enough for the crown. As the images vanished, Jaune was left levitating alone with the void. Soon enough the crown lifted from Jaune's head, and immediately afterwards Jaune was in the most pain he had ever felt in his life.
It was as if someone had decided to shoot a cannonball through his back, but not before lacing it with poison and acid. Through clenched eyes, Jaune was launched forward, or at least what Jaune thought forward was in the void. A myriad of colors replaced the pitch darkness, and as Jaune accidentally turned to see what his back had been facing, the only thing his brain could comprehend was the image of a tree the size of the world. Then Jaune's mind seized and his consciousness faded away.
/-/
Adam huffed, feeling the slight burn of his arms stretching over his head in what he considered to be a particularly silly pose. He definitely wasn't going to voice his complaints, seeing as Cinder was in the same pose as Adam and seemed to be as cool as always. The temptation to extend his left leg, the one that was held up in the air with the flat of the foot pressing against the side of his other leg, over to nudge Cinder and push her off balance was extremely strong. But he couldn't see that ending well no matter what, so Adam just took a deep breath and held the pose for longer.
"Now put your foot on the ground and let's reach to our toes," said Adam's father, as he led them through their afternoon weekend yoga, his broad back disappearing from view as he flexibly did as he instructed.
The red-headed faunus mimicked the motion, gently gripping the tips of his shoes with the tips of his fingers, Adam's hair falling around his ears due to gravity at the action. Adam's dad led them through a few more yoga poses, having them end with a wheel pose. It was probably Adam's favorite, as he got to see the world from upside down, which got him a pretty interesting view of Atlas as they did their yoga on the top of their apartment building.
"Okay, that's enough of a warmup!" The oldest Arc declared.
Adam let himself fall onto his yoga mat, which let him sit up in time to see his dad going from a wheel pose to a handstand, having kicked his feet up with enough force to flip himself in the other direction. It was dope.
"Remember, strength is important for hunters! But you have to be flexible enough to use your strength in ways that don't hurt you,"
Both Adam and Cinder nodded, they'd heard this before, Cinder more than Adam obviously but still.
"Can we spar now?" Asked Adam, more than excited to start fighting.
His dad smiled," Yep. You guys know the drill, the second one of you hits the ground or if I feel you go below sixty percent aura we'll stop."
This spurred the two siblings to roll up their yoga mats, placing them on the edge of the parapet wall. Adam was basically vibrating, he'd yet to beat Cinder in a sparring match, but he was a fast learner and all his previous losses against her had taught Adam his sister's fighting style. So Adam felt pretty prepared for this particular fight, the main reason being that their dad had borrowed training weapons from the school to practice with. Obviously, Adam had chosen the thick plastic sword, one with a metal core and meant for aura users to train with.
His sister had grabbed the staff, made similarly to his sword, Adam scoffed internally as he remembered how Cinder had claimed that the spear was the queen of the battlefield. If that were the case all the heroes in stories would have spears, but they don't, they had swords. And it was up to Adam to prove his blade's superiority to his snooty sister!
Adam fell into a stance a few paces away from Cinder and met her gaze, amber eyes against azure ones, lightning basically crackling between them as they waited for their dad to signal the start.
A loud clap did just that, and Adam exploded forward. Cinder's whole fighting style, from what Adam could understand, revolved around controlling the space between any enemies and herself. It was effective, and Cinder dictated the terms and pace of a fight that way, always having it be in her favor. But if Adam could get close enough, fast enough, all he'd need is one strike to get her below the aura limit their dad set.
Adam had taken two explosive steps forward, almost leaping, body low to dodge under the tip of Cinder's staff. This turned out to be a mistake, as Cinder had retreated backwards at the same time Adam had advanced forward and swung up the other end of her staff in a sharp swipe to use Adam's low stance and momentum against him.
The faunus boy couldn't dodge it even if he wanted to, but Adam could shift his body so it slammed into his shoulder instead of his face. A deep throb of dull pain went through Adam, it almost felt like it was in his aura. He couldn't let it deter him however, as he knew full well that Cinder always had a follow-up attack to take advantage of any hesitation or flinching from her opponent.
Swearing internally Adam stepped to the side quickly, proven right by the fact that the other end of Cinder's staff had struck from above, this time missing by a few inches. Adam used this to continue his charge and swung his sword upwards and at an angle, stepping close to ensure Cinder wouldn't be able to dodge in time.
A growl escaped Adam as Cinder used the space of the staff between her hands to bounce his sword away from hitting her body. It had been a strong hit, and would have shaken the flesh and bones of any other person his age to the point where Adam would have just been able to capitalize on their reaction to attack once again and strike true this time
.
Not Cinder though, Cinder was Adam's equal when it came to analyzing how someone fought, and she undoubtedly had done the same to his own fighting style. So once his sword made impact with her staff, Cinder used said impact to throw herself into the air and away from Adam, landing somewhat awkwardly but still too far from Adam for him to strike at her without engaging again.
But Adam was stubborn, once again dashing forward with his sword close to his body, this time staying aware of both ends of Cinder's staff as he approached her. His sister jabbed at him as he got closer, but Adam pivoted on the ball of his foot and spun away from the stabbing motion. This not only let him avoid any damage, but it let Adam continue his crusade forward.
The tip of Adam's sword was aimed at Cinder's center, now that she had overextended it was unlikely for Cinder to block his attack like last time.
However this was Cinder they were talking about, and as much as Adam hated to admit it his sister was very good at fighting. So while he was surprised when Cinder shifted her body to not only avoid the stab, but also catch his blade between the side of her torso and her arm, he wasn't that surprised.
What did surprise him, however, was when she immediately headbutted him afterward.
Another loud clap signaled the end of their match as Adam was forcibly sat down on his behind by his sister's headbutt due to the combination of the force behind it, the speed Adam had been traveling, and his unstable stance as he had thrusted his sword.
"Why is your head so hard!" Cinder whined, out of breath and red, and while Adam knew he hadn't won the fight he was plenty satisfied that his sister actually had to try against him when they fought. Unlike her sparring matches in their combat school.
Adam snorted, seething internally at his loss but more than capable of realizing he was being ridiculous in his anger "I'm a bull faunus, why did you think it was a good idea to headbutt me?".
"Your brother has a point," Their father said, a small smile on his face, "You may have won, but I don't exactly know how good of a plan that was,".
"It's not like I'm going to do that again!" declared Cinder while she massaged her now red forehead, "Adam just got too close and the spin thing he did was ridiculous!"
"Hell yeah I did! Also, the spin move was awesome!" Adam claimed, breathing heavily and pumping an arm up in victory, ignoring the low "language" from his dad.
"That's true, you did a very good job in trying to close the gap and negotiating the distance between you and Cinder," said their father towards Adam, before turning to Cinder, "Your sister just did a better job at controlling the gap and using her weapon's distance in her favor,"
"It's not fair" Adam whined, "Her staff lets her hit me from farther away than my sword does,"
Their blonde-haired father nodded, "That's range for you. There's a reason why Cinder said the spear was the queen of the battlefield, if you don't have guns or aura, having a spear will always be better than a sword. The distance you can use it is just way better,"
Adam let out an exasperated sigh, "I was so close, I'm going to beat you one day Cinder,"
"In your dreams," Cinder rolled her eyes, "You're too predictable,"
"My spin move says otherwise, you totally panicked!" boasted Adam, getting up slowly and dusting himself off in the process.
Cinder sputtered, "No I didn't!"
"You totally did!" shot back Adam, smugly leaning forward and making a face at Cinder.
"I'll show you panicked! Let's have a rematch!" fumed Cinder.
"Not before the two of you sweep the roof, remember what I said the conditions for this sparring match were?" Interrupted the Arc patriarch.
Both Adam and Cinder parroted off what their father had told them, "We have to sweep the roof and shower afterward,"
"I don't know why you added the shower bit, the only one that doesn't like showering is Adam," commented Cinder.
"At least I don't take hours!" Adam responded.
Cinder made a clearly offended face, "You take longer than I do in the bathroom!"
"Nuh-uh,"
"That's not a valid argument,"
Before the two siblings could devolve into their bickering once more their father replaced the sparring weapons in their hands with two brooms.
"Sweep while you argue, I'm going to go see if they've gotten the grill out of storage yet and help if I can. I'll send Marrow up here to help you two,"
As he said that his father disappeared down the stairs into their apartment, leaving them to sweep the roof of dust, pebbles, and snow. Eventually, Marrow appeared through the door their dad had exited through, broom in one hand and a plastic cup with a rounded lid in the other.
"Marrow it's fuc-freaking Atlas, why do you have a slushy?" Adam questioned as he swept the floor.
A loud slurping echoed in the air, Marrow responding with, "It makes my tongue blue,"
"Help us finish so we can spar before Dad gets up here again," Cinder suggested. Adam nods vigorously at the suggestion, more than eager at the chance to regain his honor in battle.
Marrow takes a long and dramatic slurp of his slushie, before sighing even more dramatically, "Why are my best friends so into fighting. Why couldn't you too be into something that's cooler, like comic books or movies,"
Both Adam and his sister roll their eyes at Marrow as he sets down his frozen treat on the ledge of the roof.
"This is why we're at the top, and you're not," responds Cinder as she sweeps and signals for Marrow to do the same.
Now it's Marrow's turn to roll his eyes as he also starts sweeping, "You two are at the top of sparring class because Adam could get hit by a truck and come out fine, and also hits like one. And you just don't get hit, while kicking people in the face like a bajillion times a second,"
Adam puffs his chest, "You Atlas kids are just weak, I'm Mantle tough!"
"Yet you still haven't beat me," shoots Cinder with a smirk.
Marrow sticks his tongue out at Adam, "You're also an Atlas kid now, also you aren't even from Mantle, just a mining village on the ground,"
"First of all, you don't count Cinder because you're from Mistral and were just adopted into Atlas, and I can totally say I'm from Mantle, it's the spirit that counts!" Declares Adam, lifting up his broom as if it were a sword and he a victorious knight proclaiming his victory over the world in a dramatic pose.
The two other kids snickered and chose to ignore Adam's argument, much to his chagrin.
But before Adam could further debate his friend and sister on how he was right and they were wrong, the sound of the door opening signaled that someone had entered the roof.
It turned out to be several someones, as the adults seemed to have finally gotten all the stuff out of storage for the apartment's roof party.
"Let's get ready to party!" yelled out a faunus man with a pair of two pitch-black wolf ears, his earthy brown eyes reflecting with mischief as he proudly swung the door open.
"The party isn't until later," grunted one of the hunters who was currently helping a few other hunters wrestle a huge grill through the small doorframe. Adam noted they seemed exerted not because the grill was heavy, but rather because they were trying to fit it through.
Marrow's eyes lit up, "Dad!" he said as he went to tackle his father. The two embraced, Marrow being thrown up into the sky before being set down.
"Aesop if you don't help us with the grill we're feeding you veggie burgers instead of meat," growled one of the hunters who were struggling with the grill.
Marrow's father snorted, "We all know who's cooking, you say that like it's a threat," but helped finally wrestle the grill through the narrow door.
Once the hunters had finished that, a veritable stream of other people came through the door and began setting up streamers, lights, tables, and chairs.
The three kids hurried up to finish sweeping, giggling amongst themselves as they listened to the adults' gossip.
"So you're finally bringing over your spec-op boyfriend?" asked Aesop to a short black-haired huntress.
"He just got promoted, don't say that around him or it'll go to his head," she responded humorously.
Another hunter chimed in, "C'mon we all know they're chosen at the Academy, it's just a bunch of ceremonial bull shi-"
"Language, there are children present," rang out the golden-haired Arc, coming through the door with two coolers under his arms. The hunter grumbled a small sorry towards him.
"Thank you," Jaune Arc said, before turning to the huntress, "And this boyfriend of yours must be one lucky guy,"
"Oh he's lucky alright, it's his semblance and everything," she responded smugly.
This got the kids to perk up, "That can be a semblance?" asked Cinder.
Adam scoffed, "It seems like cheating to just be lucky no matter what,"
Marrow simply cocked his head, "How did he figure out his power was just being lucky?"
The adults just shrugged, stating that "semblances are just like that,"
Adam and Cinder's father approached them with a warm smile, "Good job cleaning, you two go wash up and grab a snack. I'll be helping with the food up here if you need me."
/-/
The smell of cooked meat lofted through the Atlas air, the dust-powered grill doing its job nicely even against the slight chill. People filed up to fill their plates before going back to congregate with their friends and family on the roof, chattering amongst themselves, the younger hunters and their teams retelling their missions to any who would listen, while the older hunters fell back on more domestic topics like gossip. A bit away from the grill was a small foldable table with even smaller children currently stuffing their faces with greasy sausage, grilled chicken, and towering burgers.
"Who wants my tomatoes?" asked Marrow with a slight grimace, opening his cheeseburger to pick out the slices of tomato.
Adam's fork streaked across the table to spear the slices and stuffing them into his own burger, "You're so picky,"
"Nuh-uh," shot back Marrow, throwing some fries in his mouth before answering, "I just don't like tomatoes, they're too mushy,"
"They're good for you," mused Cinder, wiping her mouth with a napkin as if she hadn't just finished demolishing an entire plate loaded with food.
Adam nodded sagely, "Food is food, wasting it is bad,"
The trio ate their food while looking at the party, a few distinct uniforms catching Cinder's eyes.
"Look, there are Atlas students here,"
Marrow cocked his head in curiosity, "Don't they live in the academy?"
"It's the weekend," said Cinder, "Dad says that as long as you finish your homework in the academy you have all the free time you want,"
"Or they snuck out," piped in Adam, taking a glance at the Atlas students. For some reason, the uniforms rubbed him the wrong way, and he was getting a bad feeling from the students. But before Adam could explore that intuition of his he noticed a tantalizing smell coming from his left.
"I don't know why but someone brought a lasagna," chuckled his father, carrying three plates with slices of the aforementioned dish, "Do any of you want some?"
The patriarch of the Arcs chuckled once more at the resounding yes from the trio of kids, their appetite yet to be sated. He set down the plates in front of each child, before retrieving napkins from within the pockets of the apron he wore which said "Kiss the Cook" in bright pink letters, and setting them down next to the plates.
"Thank you!" said the children in sync.
"No problem," responded Jaune Arc, patting his daughter and son's head before being summoned back to his station behind the grill.
Marrow swallowed his mouthful, "Eight out of ten, good, but not on the level of your dad,"
A small nod came from Adam to show his agreement, while Cinder chewed before responding, "Seven point five. Good, but the sauce is too much and they could have chosen a cheese that melted better. Dad's recipe is better,"
"At least we know that if you can't be a huntress you can always be one of those restaurant reviewers," laughed Marrow.
"Like that one movie, Ratatoot-toot," Adam said.
Marrow yawns slightly, "I've never seen that movie, isn't it old?"
"Yeah, it was one of the only things they had to watch back in my old town," responds Adam.
Cinder sniffs haughtily, "Lucky, back in my old home I never got to watch anything,"
"Oh yeah? Well I had to share a room with like twenty other kids!" claimed Adam.
"At least you had a room," Cinder shot back with a sly smile, ignoring Marrow's exasperated look as the two siblings once again made something a competition between themselves.
"My orphanage didn't heat, so I win,"
"I had to wear a shock collar,"
"I had-"
Marrow finally cut them off by stating, "Hey look I think the Atlas students are getting into a fight with someone,"
Sure enough, across the rooftop, the same teens Adam had felt were bad news were currently standing with their hands at their sides and their hands balled into fists. They seemed to be having an argument with a short faunus woman with black cat ears and her towering husband, who seemed to be carrying up a ball of cloth in his arms.
The music did little to hide the following accusation, the words holding onto the air as if to ensure everyone heard them.
"Why don't you take your posters and go back to Menangerie with the rest of the animals!" spat a student, causing everyone's heads to turn. The silence was deafening, as tension took the place of spoken words.
It was broken by an almost comical sight, as a familiar blonde man wearing a pink apron and oven mitts went to stand next to the faunus pair, defiant in front of the blonde male student.
"I think you four should apologize to them," stated Jaune Arc, his words seeming more like an order than a mere suggestion, "They're our guests as much as you are, and you're scaring their baby,"
The Atlas student frowned, "Oh piss off, go should also go back to Vacuo or Mistral or wherever you came from."
Adam's father frowned in return, "Please leave, you're making people uncomfortable and your attitude is disgusting."
Another student went to grab his teammate's shoulder, attempting to diffuse the situation but failing miserably as the racist student cocked back his fist and sent it flying to strike at the Arc's face. Everyone shot into action at that, but no one was close enough to stop the hit, and aura smashed against aura. Yet Adam's father stood unmoving, completely unimpressed by the display of aggression, unscathed, and merely stepped back as the blonde student was tackled to the ground.
The following commotion made it so that Adam couldn't see what happened as the hunters crowded around the Atlas students, with bated breath and a crushed fork in his hand he was relieved to see his father stepping out of the crowd with the faunus pair in tow.
Both Adam and Cinder rushed forward to check if their dad was okay, Marrow following behind looking equally as worried.
"I am extremely sorry you two had to see that," Adam heard his father say in a whisper, but was interrupted before he could continue
"Dad!" yelled his children, stumbling over themselves to clutch at his apron to see if he was okay. A tight smile assured them that physically their dad was okay, both of them being scooped up in a rather awkward hug before being set down softly.
"It's okay, we're no stranger to those kinds of people," rumbled the tall faunus man, his golden eyes reflecting grimly in the light.
His wife sighed, "We were invited here by friends, but those students saw napkins in our hands and immediately assumed we were here to get people to come to a rally. Our daughter is simply a messy eater and spilled milk all over herself,"
"Still, it's unacceptable that this happened. Let me make it up to you somehow," Adam's dad said firmly, one hand on Adam's shoulder while the other landed on Cinder's.
The baby-holding man, though Adam had yet to see the baby due to how swaddled up she was, cleared his throat and made an embarrassed face, "We- uh. Never really got food due to the incident, and we've heard you're a good cook,"
Marrow piped up, "He's the best cook!"
The adults laughed at the earnestness behind the statement, and while Adam's dad looked bashful at the claim, but simply stated, "It'd be my honor,"
And so while the adults stood around the grill as Cinder and Adam's dad cooked, the trio of kids had sat back down in their original seats at the kid's table, now accompanied by a sleepy baby placed in a stroller.
"She's so cute!" praised Marrow, making silly faces to entertain the baby's quickly fading attention and wiggling his finger so he could watch in amazement as the baby tried to catch his finger with her tiny hands.
Both Cinder and Adam squirmed in their seats, desperate to join Marrow and fawn over the baby as well, but too proud and wary of anyone catching them in the act to do so. But they did, internally, agree that the baby was incredibly cute, swaddled up in a thick denim jacket that definitely restricted the baby's movement, but it was probably intentional seeing as babies don't really move a whole lot. .
"Did we ever get her name?" asked Cinder inquisitively.
Marrow nodded, "Brownie or something,"
"I don't think someone would name their baby Brownie," stated Adam, inching closer so he could look at the baby and was delighted when the baby cooed at seeing his face.
"If I were to name her after a food I'd name her after one of those sandwich cookies, the ones with the super dark cookie part and the creamy middle. It matches her skin and hair," said Marrow, his statement making more sense than either Cinder or Adam would like to admit.
Cinder finally joined the two boys and crowded around the baby, her hands tightly in her lap as she monitored and observed the tiny faunus babe.
"I think it's the first time I've seen a baby," said Cinder, "She's so tiny,"
"I don't think I was ever that tiny, maybe you two, but I'm built different" Adam boasted, ignoring the stares from his two friends.
Marrow huffed a laugh, "You definitely were, everyone was at one point, even our parents,"
"I don't know, my husband is pretty big and I can't imagine him being as tiny as our little Blake," said a voice from behind the trio.
A collective eep escaped the three kids as they spun to look up at the mother of the baby.
"Hi," she beamed at them, "I'm Kali Belladonna, and that's Blake Belladonna, nice to meet you,"
Marrow was the first to forget how easily Kali had snuck up behind them, "Hi! I'm Marrow, your baby is like super cute, how old is she?"
"Hello Marrow, and to answer your question she had her first birthday a month ago. Don't tell my husband, but she definitely said "Mama" on that day," Kali said with mischief in her eye, before going to scoop up her child and giggling in unison with her baby.
"Are you guys going to live here?" asked Adam, excited at the chance to surround himself with other faunus but hesitant to just outright state it.
"We're just visiting some old friends, Blake's too young to be away from home for so long," answered Kali.
A gruff voice came from behind her, "Not to mention how little we'd sleep once Blake figures out we left her favorite storybook back home,"
"Ghira don't say that out loud she's going to hear you!" stage whispered Kali, playfully picking up Blake's small hands and placing them on her ears as if to hide her from her father's comment.
Her husband let out a loving sigh, shaking his head slightly at his wife's silliness, "I'm sure Blake takes after me and would be completely reasonable once we explain to her it was an accident,"
An overly exaggerated gasp escaped Kali's mouth, dramatically holding her baby to her chest, "Are you insinuating I'm not reasonable?!"
"No," deadpanned Ghira, the corners of his mouth slightly turned upwards "I would never do such a thing. I'm telling you you're not reasonable,"
The clump of cloth with a baby inside giggled at her father's sarcasm, resulting in Kali looking at her in mock horror, "Betrayed! By my own child! Here, since you want to take your father's side."
Ghira rolled his eyes as his wife placed their child in his arms. Rocking her gently and bringing Blake up closer to his face so her reaching hands could pat his face, almost consoling him for having such a dramatic partner.
A new voice interrupted the scene, coming from a lean and tall man with tan skin and a uniform Adam had never seen before.
"Hello my name is Clover could I ask some quest-"
"Here you two go," butted in Adam's dad, giving two plates full of food to Kali before turning to the man named Clover, "I can answer any questions, we wouldn't want to bother our guests any more than we already have,"
With that, the Arc patriarch pulled the uniformed hunter to the side, which Adam thought was quite funny due to his dad's apron and how confused the other hunter looked.
The Belledonas let out a collective sigh at the sight, more than happy to go sit down and finally eat.
"What do you think is going to happen?" whispered Cinder to Adam, "Those students better get in trouble."
Adam nodded, clenching his fists at the memory of what happened, "They better, no one gets to hit our dad without getting away with it,"
"For once I agree with you," said Cinder.
/-/
James Ironwood massaged his temple with his human hand, trying desperately to hide the sheer loathing by steeling his face, even tempted to activate his semblance.
"Do you hear me Ironwood?!" spat Gustone Red, an old, old, military man who was supposed to be his deputy headmaster, but ended up more as a nuisance than anything else. A remnant of the oldest of guards, the only reason James hadn't fired him by now was due to the political value having Gustone as a teacher gave him, and the backlash Atlas Academy would face from certain officers in the military wasn't worth it. But by Ozpin's cane if he had the chance, James would surely take it.
"Yes." James responded with a frown, "And I'm telling you we can't press charges when our student is the one that assaulted someone, I don't care if who they attacked was from Vacuo and that the White Fang was involved. The other schools and councils would have our head,"
"Bah," Gustone spat once more, shaking in rage, "We're Atlas!".
The temptation to strike the other man was immense, but James was steel itself, and remained cool.
"We can bring the hunter from Vacuo in for questioning, just in case we really are missing something," James said, allowing the unsaid "To get you and people who think like you to shut up" part to remain unsaid.
This got Gustone to back off, leaving the room in a huff, mumbling and grumbling a variety of undignified things as he left. The only thing Ironwood picked out at the very end was Gustone growling, "Dirty sand-dwelling race traitor,"
With a sigh, Ironwood left a message for his specialists "Prepare a holding cell, one of our nice ones please,".
A sparring match between Cinder and Adam! A party! The Belladonas! And Atlas Politics Drama! Like I said I really liked this chapter lol, it was fun to write and really just like helps establish the stuff that's too come in the future. I also want to use this lil tid-bit here to talk bout some things.
The first thing is the power level that Jaune's kids are going to be on, in case if anyone is wondering, it will be established that Cinder and Adam alongside their future siblings will all be prodigies and talented compared to the average hunter in training. Which I think is a pretty solid interpretation to make, considering Cinder managed to fight off Ozpin at her age with barely mastered Maiden powers, and canonically held of Glynda from the bullhead in like episode one without using her maiden powers at all. Adam speaks for himself, his future semblance and level of skill he displayed shows that even learning under the White Fang and not going to a hunter school he was capable of beating any other hunter in one on one combat. Also establishing the age-gap between the main cast of this story and the main cast of the original one, its going to be around a 7 year age gap, so Ruby hasn't even been born yeat and WBY alongside JNPR are around one year old.
Second, now that I've scared away all the homophobes I can talk about the "planned" Qrow x Jaune ship. Yes I say "planned" because currently, it's what I consider to be the most plausible ship that I'd like to explore both romantically and narratively. I won't spoil anything important, but this fic will be based in Atlas for the most part, so sadly characters that are set in other locations won't be as good of a match with Jaune, even though this Jaune x Goodwitch is really appealing to me. I can't remember if I've already said I was considering Ironwood for the ship as well, but even I couldn't think of a way for Jaune to thaw Ironwood out, so that ship went under. As for the Jaune x Willow ship, she's too much of an un-character for the most part of the original show that I'd have to spend too much time in this story developing her character and explaining how she and Jaune get together, which I don't find the most appealing. In contrast Qrow already has an established character, has no set location for the most part other than "wherever Ruby and Yang live", and has been shown to already be a simp for Atlesian character. Yes I shipped Qrow x Clover, Volume 7 Episode 12 didn't happen I don't care what anyone says TvT. I should also clarify that the Jaune ship may change depending on how the story develops as I write this, depends on how I feel the character dynamics end up feeling like.
Anyway, This has been a pleasure, and I hope y'all enjoyed reading