vacuo, 12:46 pm, Silent Gallows Penitentiary*
The crowd of people shouted and taunted behind him. Qrow smiled a bit.
This bozo was about to get his just- Wham!
Without any warning, the man had swung a rock-hard punch to his face. Qrow stepped back into a wooden worktable. The man raised his hand and starting jabbering in Vacuian to the crowd, cheering for him.
The man, named Louis, laughed.
Qrow shook his head, and said under his breath, "You're going to have to do better than that, pal."
Qrow got back up, holding his fists up. Louis looked at him and threatened him in Vacuian.
"Let's go." Qrow said, gritting his teeth.
He swung and hit Louis in the face. Louis recovered, and slammed him in the face once, twice, right into the crowd. The crowd shoved Qrow back into the fray. Qrow held his fists, assessing. Waiting.
Louis swung, and Qrow dodged, before punching him twice. Louis fell into the crowd, who gently helped him back up. Louis once again threatened Qrow in Vacuian before lunging and grabbing Qrow's arm, forcing him to bend over. Qrow used his free hand, and punched Louis right below the belt buckle. Shockingly, Louis took minimal recovery time, before making a vicious punch to Qrow's nose. Qrow yelled in pain, and Louis tried grabbing the back of his neck. Qrow pulled away, and elbowed Louis hard in the side of his head. Louis yelled, and pushed Qrow into the crowd. One of the people in the crowd began strangling him. Qrow tried to loosen the grip, but no give. He b"gan elbowing the man in the ribs with all his might. The man let go, and Qrow was shoved back into Louis, who punched Qrow in the stomach. Doubled over, Qrow quickly recovered.
"Alright," said Qrow "You asked for it!"
He rushed Louis, yelling like a wild animal. He punched Louis square in the nose, and then elbowed him in the chin. He heard Louis' neck bones crack, before Louis got back up. Louis kicked Qrow in the chest, sending him to the ground. There was a tall post in the center of the fighting area. Louis shoved Qrow up to it, pushing his throat into it with his forearm. Qrow used his free arm and, grabbing Louis's head, he smacked it against the post. Louis reeled back, blood on his forehead.
Louis, now thoroughly enraged, grabbed Qrow, and forced him to the ground. He then straddled Qrow and began punching him mercilessly. Qrow punched him back. Louis pinned Qrow's arms down with his one hand, and with the other, he covered Qrow's mouth, shoving it into the ground. Unable to breathe, Qrow tried desperately to free his other hand. He jerked it free, and punched Louis in the face. Louis reeled back, and Qrow got up.
"Alright, my turn!" Qrow shouted.
He straddled Louis and began hammering him in the face. He was about to strike his third blow when a man held his wrist back, and another man forced him to get up.
"What the..." Qrow said, caught off guard.
Louis was being restrained by another two men.
Qrow huffed, "Hey, we weren't fighting, right little guy?" he said, grinning at Louis.
Louis swore at him in Vacuian.
"Hey Louis give me a call when you're tall enough to ride the rides!" The people told Qrow to shut up, before taking him away.
Qrow was led down into a dark prison.
"Oh come on!" Qrow said as the men shoved him into a cell, "How long am I supposed to be in here? Huh? Where's the toilet?"
The jail keeper, Ironwood, replied, "You're looking at it. Have fun."
"I will! We both will..." Qrow said.
The cell door slammed shut with a clang, and Qrow was left in almost complete darkness. The only light to be found was leaking in from the small eye-slit in the cell door. Qrow then slumped down on the ground and sighed deeply. This certainly hadn't been the first time he had been in a jail cell. He let his arms droop.
He remembered the nights at the orphanage he had spent like this many years ago. How often he felt as if he was somewhere like this back then. The orphanage had always been his prison. After a bit, he laid down. As he drifted off to sleep, he could hear the soft drips of water down the walls. The next morning, the cell door opened. Straining to see in the sudden flood of light, Qrow shielded his eyes, and saw a figure walking towards him. It was Ironwood.
"Get up," Ironwood said with harshness.
Qrow sighed, "Oh man, I was having a great dream too..."
Ironwood grabbed Qrow's arm and forced him up.
"Hey, hey!" Qrow said, "Alright! Easy..."
Ironwood was handcuffing him from behind. After snapping the lock to the cuff shut, Ironwood pushed him out of the cell.
"Alright!" Qrow said. "James I swear to you, I was getting you and glynda more on baron and his group, but my files are missing; I'll get more than enough to replace what was stolen" he was whispering as low as he could manage but as they were in private. With that, Ironwood led him away.
Envelope he continued, "But not nearly enough time to look into what you found right."
Qrow looked at Ironwood and frowned, "Hey, you were told not to open that, headmistress eyes only kind of 'don't look' files are in there."
"Yes," said Ironwood, "I was also told not to take bribes, not to bring anyone here, and not to beat on my inmates." He held up the envelope, "But here we are."
Qrow sighed in frustration. Ironwood, putting on a show as he flipped through papers and pictures, and stopping to read a few documents for moments at a time, but not any longer.
"Ruby is fine by the way, so thankful for your concern" he huffed as he heard Ironwood groan just as he pulled his scroll out.
"Your daughter is fine, qrow, and I was the one who updated you on her and her life at beacon." Ironwood cared for everything in humanity, but by the gods it was draining his heart, mind, and body. "She aced a test on strategies and techniques on better leadership tools...unorthodox aside, she's gotten better"
"Thank you, James" he smirked as he grabbed his nose and snapped it in place, screaming out and groaned in pain as he set it correctly. "Fuck, that hurts more every time"
"Oh by the way" qrow decided to probe deeper in the files they all had been tracking down, "Are there any more dossiers in this old penitentiary or whatever else pertaining to her?"
Ironwood thought for a moment, "Uh... There could be. There's a bunch of old files and stuff on personnel way back when."
Qrow nodded, "OK, great! Great. Go through those and see what you can dig up. Meanwhile, I'll talk to geralt. He's our history and grimmlands expert. Maybe he can make sense of this whole mess."
"Right," said Ironwood, "I'll look into the files. Turn around."
Qrow did, and Ironwood cuffed his hands again.
After a bit, they returned to the prison yard. Just before entering the yard, Ironwood said, "Alright, when you're done talking to him, you come and find me."
"You got it," replied qrow grabbing the scroll and slipped it into a hidden pocketing his pant leg.
Now that they were back, ironwood once again resumed his act. Shoving qrow into the yard, he shouted, "If I catch you fighting one more time, it's your ass in the hole for you!"
Qrow nodded, and then said under his breath, "Nice acting, Ironcuck...almost as good as mine." He smirked as he made his way to a corner of the prison with an overview of the yard, but blocked him from view. While stealth wasn't his forte, he made it a point to be crafty at the least.
Luckily for him, this certain prison was pretty relaxed on prisoner's lives beyond killing each other and feeding the bastards...beyond that the guards, CEO, and hell even the kingdom didn't care.
The rhythmic knocking allowed qrow to enter the secret entrance to Ironwood's private room and instructively, qrow talked. "Looking into these files and preventing an apocalypse aren't enough, you needed this shot too?" Qrow looked to a blonde sitting at the general's desk typing away...and the whole 'ignoring him' treatment entirely after walking in was agitating him.
"Ruby is still my daughter"
"Leave family out of this meet up of yours and your nose won't BREAK against my boot heel again you stupid avian" he said venomously sweet as he looked at qrow with a spine quivering smile he had when raven left him and yang.
"FINE, I'm sorry I don't have anything new beyond the group baron castus and reaper belong to is called the 'saviors', the woman I worked with was a traitor, and I'm so sorry your ex-wife is to blame for village after village...I warned you back when STRQ was disbanded not to pursue that thread, but here we- WHAM"
The blonde leapt over the desk and rocketed into Qrow with a HARD left haymaker to his jaw loosing two teeth followed by two hooks to his eye and cheek, a grip of hair brought him doubled over with a knee to his sternum and ended this via choke slam cracking the wood floor.
Tai cracked his knuckles and neck before spitting on the floored drunk and dusted himself off like wiping his deeds from his Conscience.
"You're too familiar with getting your ass handed to you, and I'm done with you branwen, both of you twins brought my life and those around you hell, so just do your job and get out"
Huffing qrow stood up and said, "first hit was free, the others stopped by my aura Xiao long, do your job, and I'll let this glide under James' radar"
Qrow grabbed Ironwood's scroll, plugged it in and started talking shop for half an hour before Ironwood stopped by.
"Everything we know of this group is dismal, but there's good news" James said over the phone and hung up groaning. Tai poured some whiskey in two glasses and pushed on with double the liquor to Ironwood before drinking his.
"I see you two had a discussion before discussing" he quipped looking down before looking to qrow smirking.
"I let him, but the impossible thing is about barons 'saviors' not Tai tantruming in my expense; I found out that baron castus is reaper's mentor so to speak and from my diggings on reaper I think that he's not who we need to look into anymore"
Ironwood simmered on qrows words of baron and the group, he runs and found a question finally. "What do you mean we don't need to bother with baron?"
"We need to look into your old biochemistry professional: doctor Merlot and reaper's subsequent birth from no parent figure" he groaned at his missing teeth and downed some of his own whiskey, picked up his teeth and just SHOVED them back in his jaw. Of course it was pure agony, but his smile was his best gift from remnant, and he needed it.
"I already did, and I found nothing but a crater wider than your liquor tab at every bar in remnant and baron didn't exist before almost twenty years ago, so we don't have a thing to go on for whom he really is." Ironwood said, downing all his whiskey.
Qrow and James gave tai all the information they both had and sent it to glynda for their share of work, and took out some food from the small fridge and ate a wedge of watermelon with chicken and mac 'n cheese.
Qrow was sent back to his cell and ate with the other prisoners, lamenting and gathering what little he could in case he needed a quick escape without being found.
While ironwood made plans to take the two other men with him and fly back to vale his thoughts on Cole and his darkness manifested as it had, he hoped he could help guide the young man to the path of a family and hoped that it wasn't too late.