Author's Notes
I have revised the Author's Notes at the end of the last chapter and added a brief note. You absolutely need to read it to understand this chapter.
I'll give you a minute.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
You read it? Good. Please proceed.
Happy rats, and don't do crime!
Chapter 26 – Hey Sold Sister
In which I lied to you.
Death felt comfy.
Death also felt like a lack of blood loss, which was a welcome sensation.
Death also also looked a lot like Headmaster Ozpin, seated in a stool next to Jaune's hospital bed.
"Ah, you're finally awake."
Jaune looked around the hospital ward he was lying in, only to find there was no one else in the room. "How long was I out?"
"Almost a full week. Missions have ended, and the students have trickled back to school. Your team visited you, but they couldn't stay for the entire time without missing classes. Rest assured, they send their love and will be able to meet with you as soon as they are informed of your state."
"…were you just sitting in that stool for a full week, waiting for me to wake?"
"Glynda does most of the work at Beacon." Oz shook his head. "But that's not what's important. What's important is that I received an extremely odd scroll call just the other week. Tell me, Mr. Arc – what's the last memory you recall?"
Jaune rubbed at his forehead and decided it was too painful to sit up. "The last thing I can remember was passing out from blood loss while still on the–"
On the line with Amber.
Scroll call.
Ozpin.
Jaune's guard immediately came up.
"…on the airship."
"Hmmm. Most interesting." Ozpin rubbed at his chin as he rose and began to pace in front of the hospital bed. "You see, Mr. Arc, you continue to be a thorn in my side with these strange antics of yours. Last I recall we spoke, you had just recruited a decent chunk of the Valean White Fang's conscripts to our cause, and I was left to deal with the political fallout. Then, you apprehend Cinder Fall, a terrorist, and I discover that my good friend Leonardo, who recently resigned from his post quite abruptly, might have had a hand in sending her to Beacon. Now, a mission goes awry, with the city's beloved Citron Champion found seventh-eighths of the way to death's door in a nondescript Atlesian high speed aircraft hovering in the sky tens of thousands of miles away from where he was assigned to be. Vacuo has already cut off all diplomatic relations with Vale, thinking that your presence there was a declaration of war, maybe even the first wave."
Jaune rubbed his aching chest as he sat up. "But sir – fuck Vacuo."
"Indeed, but you must acknowledge that the circumstances are most odd. A news source got ahold of your team before I could and reported on you abruptly forcing them to desert your assigned mission in Iyun. Conspiracy theories are running rampant, and I've been accused of being involved in shady business, given our relationship, ranging from black ops hunter missions to assassination attempts of the Vacuoan premier gone awry. I'd like for you, in your own words, to tell me what happened."
Jaune sighed deeply. "I can't do that."
"I see. I take it this has something to do with the recently resurrected Amber?"
Jaune tightly shut his mouth and kept his eyes down. His breathing was the hardest thing to keep under control – Hazel's punches had really done a number on his lungs, and the stress causing him to hyperventilate only made it sting more. Still, any movement he did could give a clue away.
"You see, the strange scroll call I received was from our dearly departed huntress who we both know. There's no use pretending, Jaune."
"How did she even get your number?" Jaune asked. In the past, he'd frequently asked her to call Ozpin, and she'd never been able to, instead calling his teammates and having them fetch the headmaster. He wondered what had changed.
"Apparently, she called Beacon's staffing office, got Glynda's scroll number, and had her forward the call to me. That's not important. I have some questions for you about her."
"I…may or may not have some answers."
"Firstly, I want to say that I already know where she's hiding. I wanted to ask why you chose that location – it's literally the first place I looked."
Jaune forced himself to hold back a smile. Ozpin didn't know where she was. Perhaps Jaune might have been stupid enough to fall for it in any other circumstance, but Ozpin had failed to reference the critical fact that she was a scroll now, meaning that he was as of yet unaware. He was fishing, hoping to trap Jaune with cheap bait, but it wouldn't work.
"I'm not going to give her away that easy, sir. Why do you even want her, anyways? Cinder is the new maiden. Amber is neither your responsibility nor your problem anymore."
Ozpin pinched the bridge of his nose. "Brushing aside the fact that you even know that word, she still matters. A living maiden and her successor both exist. Amber spoke to me, Jaune, and I immediately rushed to check on her body. It's still there. The possibilities for researching the transfer of this power, the opportunity to determine a better method for the transfer…it could change everything."
"She's a person, not a lab rat."
"How many hunters die every day at the hands of the Grimm? They could all be spared if we had safer maidens, or methods to control the flow of their energy should they fall. Amber would not be harmed, or even experimented upon. We merely wish to research her."
"Like you merely wished to 'protect her' by locking her up?"
Ozpin shook his head. "I suspect that you've seen only fragments and now believe you have the full picture. Do you truly believe you understands the forces at play here, Jaune?"
He still didn't even know who Salem was, so he answered honestly. "No, I don't."
With nowhere to go, silence fell between the teacher and student.
Jaune cleared his throat. "Sir, please, why don't you make this easier for both of us and tell me what you already know? I mean, what you actually know. My lips are sealed until I know that I'm not giving up any information about Amber, her whereabouts, or how I saved her life, but that doesn't mean I can't tell you anything about Iyun or Vacuo. I'm happy to tell you a sanitized version of what happened, as long as I know that you don't know the critical details that could be used to piece together Amber's involvement in what happened."
"Very well. I received a phone call from Amber, who by all accounts should have been dead. She begged for me to use Beacon's proprietary technology, shared with us by Atlas, to triangulate the location of a scroll that your own scroll was in an ongoing call with. An action, I might add, that I did without negotiating a price or demanding anything of her, if that perhaps helps persuade you of my goodwill and peaceful intentions towards Amber."
Jaune bit his tongue to prevent himself from screaming. Ozpin had held Amber in his own two hands.
That's too close, girl. He may not have figured it out, but he just as easily could have.
Ozpin went on, unaware of Jaune's internal turmoil. "The scroll took us to the deserts of Vacuo, where we found you floating nearly two miles in the air in a partially engaged bullhead of Atlesian origin. We managed to save your life and treat your wounds in a local hospital before they became life-threatening. The damage was most severe – only the most extreme of injuries tend to persist after aura regenerates, like yours must have after the surgery was complete."
"Well, tanking a fist to and through the stomach from Hazel Rainart probably classifies as 'the most extreme of injuries.'"
Ozpin's eyes widened, and he removed his spectacles. "Hazel…I-I'm so sorry. His feud with me is a personal one, and it has on occasion overlaps into the lives of my students. For this, you have my apology."
"You saved my life, so we'll call it even." Jaune smiled. "And hey, you don't need to worry about it ever happening again."
Ozpin nodded. "No, I don't. From now on, all first missions shall be far more carefully supervised. Never again shall I let something slip through the cracks like I did here."
"Not what I mean."
Ozpin took a few seconds to figure it out. "Hazel is…?"
Jaune couldn't resist beaming at the headmaster's astounded expression. "Yup."
"This whole time, I thought Miss Scarlatina's articles were overenthusiastic rubbish, but if you really did–"
Jaune immediately backtracked, stuttering. "Actually, it was more of an accident – he tripped into it. He seemed under the weather when we fought. Raven wore him down. P-Please don't tell Velvet."
"Raven? Raven was there too?"
Jaune thought it over. He needed to be careful with his next words, as her identity as a maiden couldn't be revealed. Only Jaune could know that Ruby was the next Spring maiden, lest Ozpin lock her up like he had Amber.
"She was. She had taken the place of our assigned hunter because she wanted to recruit me on her own private vengeance quest to fight Hazel and Tyrian after they attacked her tribe. I sent back my team because I didn't want them caught up in it. We didn't desert anyone, sir. She was behaving like a rogue huntress, and I refused to have Team Juniper do her bidding."
"Fair enough, I suppose. What has become of Raven? Did you manage to find the location of her tribe? If, that is, you feel that I am to be trusted with such information."
"I don't care one bit for Raven or her tribe. That said, I have no clue where the rest of her bandits are, but I can give you Raven's exact location."
"Where?" Ozpin asked eagerly, leaning forward.
"Four hundred and twenty hops away from the bullhead you found me in, buried two inches beneath the sand."
Ozpin sat back, eyes wide. That clearly hadn't been the answer he was expecting. "By the Brothers. Hazel and Raven, in one day. I'd best call Qrow and ask him to double-check his own heartbeat, given how fast hunters are dropping. I suppose that explains why you were in Vacuo less than two days after your team reported leaving you in Iyun."
Jaune nodded. Honestly, he just wished this stuff stopped happening to him. He knew that there were bad people out there in the world, but couldn't the universe at least shift the load a bit, let someone else pick up the slack once in a while? Why was it his job to work his way up an increasingly terrifying ladder of evildoers?
"Anything else?" Ozpin asked.
"By any chance, were you able to collect my effects? I'd like to check my scroll, and I think I dropped some of my weapons in Vacuo. History has shown that I need them on my person at all times, lest Tyrian Callows burst through the windows and decide to finish the job."
Ozpin let loose an annoyed grunt. "You shouldn't joke about such things."
"Because they might come true?"
"Because that information must be kept secure. People like Tyrian and Hazel, the knowledge of the maidens, Salem's role as the queen of the Grimm – there is a reason I have not gone public. One of the many reasons I still seek Amber is to ensure she continues her vows of secrecy."
"Q-Queen of the Grimm?"
Ozpin stared at Jaune for a second, confused. Then, he groaned and rested his face into an open palm. "I forgot that Amber wasn't aware of the full picture. I take it you only know as much as she knows?"
"More or less. Raven…told me some stuff."
"For your sake, I hope it wasn't much 'stuff.' This information places a target on your back. You're already no doubt beneath me at the top of the black queen's list of foes, given how many agents of hers you've stopped. Hazel, Torchwick, Hogwash, Cinder, Watts, Leonardo…"
"Those last two weren't me."
Ozpin raised an eyebrow in suspicious disbelief. "You're telling me you had nothing to do with the death of Doctor Arthur Watts via starvation? I find that hard to believe, given your long list of other successes. And Leonardo sent me a letter mentioning you specifically – the youngest male heir of the Arc family – as the reason he resigned."
H-Huh. I guess the universe really did spread out the load. Well, it's good to know that someone else is out there, taking care of the bad apples that I can't. My apologies, universe, for complaining beforehand.
"A handheld taser and an empty bandolier were the only items recovered from your person in Vacuo. As for your scroll and wallet, your teammates had those items and left them on the stand next to your hospital bed."
Jaune looked to the side and saw Amber, right there. Hidden in plain sight, eh? You and I are going to have a nice long chat, friend.
Ozpin, unaware of the fact that Jaune's 'full aura' hadn't actually done anything to heal him, cleared the young man to leave Beacon's hospital wing and move about the school grounds. It probably wasn't healthy to walk around with all those stitches in his body, but he needed to get started on fixing the mess he'd gotten himself into right away. Plus, aura merely accelerated natural healing, so Jaune just needed to give his wounds some time, and the end result would be the same. He hoped.
The first order of business was to debrief with Amber, but he had no idea what eyes Ozpin had on him. The old man was no doubt watching his every move, and he didn't want to risk calling her without being sure they were alone.
Also, he could see the bird.
Never let it be said that Jaune didn't have a good head on his shoulders. Raven turned into a raven, and she'd mentioned this Qrow fellow, so putting two and two together, Jaune arrived at the obvious conclusion: the bird that had been following him was a spy. He was tempted to shoo it away, but he thought better of revealing his knowledge of it too early. If he could somehow use it to leak false intel on Amber's location to Ozpin, that might take some of the heat off.
For now, he needed to meet with the other Junipers, explain what he could, and decide whether or not they deserved to be dumped with the immense burden that was the truth. Then, he needed to talk to Ruby about her new powers.
His own team came first. Nora, Ren, and Perry arrived back from their midday history class to find Jaune lying back in his bunk in the dorm room, patiently waiting for them.
"JAU–"
"No hugs!" Jaune quickly uttered, before Nora could break his few surviving organs in a mighty embrace. "I'm still recovering."
She stepped back almost instantly. "Okay. I'm glad to see you're better. We wanted to wait for you, but–"
"Don't sweat it. It was really, really, really weird to wake up to Ozpin ominously looming over me, and three more faces, no matter how familiar, would have only compounded that. Are you guys all doing okay?"
Perry's eyes widened. "Are we –? Jaune, you nearly kicked the bucket! What happened out there? We trusted you and fled like you'd told us, and your scroll told –"
Jaune sat up and clamped a hand over Perry's mouth, then winced at the pain the sudden movement brought him. Looking around, he raised a finger to his lips, then checked the door and windows were locked.
"Let's hit the rec center, why don't we?"
"Now isn't the time to exercise, Jaune."
Jaune winked at Ren.
"Your eye seems to be twitching, leader. You should have a doctor examine it – it may indicate an as-of-yet undetected injury."
"J-Just follow me."
"Jaune," said Perry, his voice strained. "Why in the Brother Gods' names are we swimming in the pool instead of talking about what happened?"
"Because I'm not sure if Ozpin bugged our room, or even one of us. The pool will ruin any listening devices. I think."
They had done it in a Spruce Willis movie once, and he hoped the principle was sound.
"Ozpin…is listening?" asked Nora.
Jaune nodded. He was standing in the shallows after dunking himself in the pristine water of Beacon's pool, while his three teammates treaded a few feet away in the deeper end. He'd wanted to join them, but his bandages had started leaking blood into the water when they were submerged, so he was stuck to the kiddie end of the pool to keep them above the surface.
"Let me start from the beginning. Actually, no. That's not early enough. This all began when I…actually, I don't think I can tell you that. No, you deserve the truth. Buuuut it's not my secret to tell. Okay…ring if I should tell them."
Amber, who was deposited in a locker on the wall of the pool room, rang once.
Guess this is it.
"Perry, you remember how Amber knew we were talking about you choosing a last name at prom, and we told you she could read minds with her semblance."
"Yeah, I didn't really buy that," said Perry. "What is it actually?"
"Okay. Keep an open mind, you guys. Amber is my scroll."
Three pairs of eyes blinked at him.
"She was actually a magical girl who was nearly killed by Cinder Fall –"
"The naked woman you tased and blew up?" asked Nora.
"The very same."
Amber buzzed angrily at the mention of her killer.
"She was dying, and there was a machine – an Atlesian device that transferred aura. I dropped my scroll into it by mistake, and she just sort of switched into it. She's been alive ever since. She can hear everything we say, she can see everything with her camera, she controls my scroll and everything running on it – that's why always called you for help so quickly when I frequently find myself in danger. Remember how I took her out when I was fighting Hogwash the Boarbatusk? I needed to protect her from damage. A-And how I called in an airstrike almost instantly on the Paladin? That was because she's sentient and alive and did that for me."
"This is untrue. A scroll cannot be alive, nor can it be inhabited by a person's aura," said Ren. "I do not believe it."
"I…I want to believe you," Nora said anxiously. "But that doesn't explain why you think Ozpin is spying on you, or why you made us leave you in Iyun, or why you were nearly dead in Vacuo."
"But it does explain a lot of other things," said Perry. "Jaune, I trust you. It's crazy, but crazy's how things work at this weirdo school. I remember wondering how you got that rocket locker airstrike on a paladin so quickly when you'd only just taken out your scroll, and you always did call on it without dialing. You handed it to us in Iyun and told us to run, and then Amber was on the line as soon as we were in the forests, telling us where to go without any explanation. It makes sense. Scratch that – it makes no sense, but I think it is more believable than it is unbelievable."
Jaune nodded. "Amber and I can probably pull all sorts of tricks to show you, but for now, just roll with it. There's a lot more I need to tell you. Let's start with what's easiest: Ozpin. He was the…uh, what was it…the 'abusive boyfriend' I rescued Amber from. He's still trying to find her and capture her for her powers, hence why I don't trust our room to be private."
"The abusive…oh yeah, I kinda remember that," said Perry.
"He doesn't seem like that bad a guy," said Nora. "I don't want to downplay…but, like, he's always so nice!"
Amber rang, and Jaune stepped out of the pool. Toweling himself off to make sure he didn't drip on her and fry her circuit boards or something, he collected her, answered, and put her on speaker.
"He's not evil," said Amber. "He just is controlling to me and people like me. It wouldn't be the end of the world if he found me, just…a loss of certain liberties I currently have with Jaune."
"It wasn't worth it," chided Jaune.
"Your life was on the line."
"And you nearly sold yours to save it."
"That's my choice, Jaune."
"Holy…" breathed Nora. "She just…she just jumped into the conversation like she was…listening."
"And where does all this tie into you nearly dying?" asked Ren. "While I struggle to believe this farce about live scrolls, you truly were found in Vacuo, having traversed half the planet in hours. That is definitively a real occurrence that was documented by several Vacuoan EMTs and hunters, so I think I'll be far more accepting of your explanation of said events."
"So you remember how I said Amber is a magical girl? And Ozpin wants her for her powers?"
Perry nearly tore out a clump of hair. "Dust, Jaune! He punched through you?"
"His fingertips went into me, yeah. It was quite unpleasant."
"Right through your aura?"
"…yeah."
Jaune decided not to open that can of worms. Ren was already frowning more than usual, Perry was looking confused enough to need a diagram of all the interwoven pieces and how they came together, and Nora was…
Nora was…
He desperately wanted to believe that her displeased look was due to concern for his safety or anger at Hazel or Raven, not disbelief or disapproval of Jaune's own actions in the story, but experience had taught him that the cynical outlook tended to be the safer one to take in most scenarios.
"I can't believe the sheriff was a rogue huntress," said Nora.
"Uhhhh…can't believe as in, 'I doubt your story is true' or 'Wow, so crazy, I can't believe it'?" Jaune asked nervously.
"But it would explain the townsfolks' odd demeanor," Nora said without answering him. "They kept away from us like we had the Green Fever. You say it's all because you spilled paint on her daughter, and she wanted revenge?"
"N-No. She was a maiden, and she needed my help fighting Hazel and Tyrian."
"Who was Tyrian again?" asked Perry.
"He's Ozpin's secret bird spy, right?" asked Ren.
"I thought he was the dead body in the desert that Raven used to fast travel," said Nora.
"He actually didn't show up," said Jaune, correcting both of them.
"Then why did you even mention him?" exploded Perry. Jaune cringed, and the Faunus recoiled. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to blow my stack, it's just…this is a lot to take in."
"It's all true, I swear."
"Oh, I don't doubt that. Well, mostly. I'm just having trouble parsing which character is which, and who had what powers."
"Ren, do you believe it?" Jaune asked.
"Your story has no inconsistencies or plot holes, lending it credence. However, it defies conventional logic and violates the principles of Occam's Razor frequently. I will withhold judgment on its veracity until I see Ruby use these maiden powers and Amber demonstrate her…biotechnological nature."
"And N-Nora? What about you?"
"Why didn't you tell us?" she asked.
"About the maidens and Amber?"
"Yeah," said Nora. "We've been a team for over a month now, and it…it kind of hurts to know that you were carrying all this stuff around and didn't feel like you could trust us with–"
"It's not like that," Jaune assured her. "It wasn't that I didn't trust you, it was that I didn't want to sound absolutely crazy."
"You do sound absolutely crazy," said Ren. "I have not yet ruled out the idea that your scroll's audio and video feeds have been hacked, or you are just 'pranking' us." There were finger quotes for the word pranking, as though Ren doubted there was such a thing in reality.
Jaune ignored him. "Nora, I swear, I wasn't trying to keep anything from you."
Nodding weakly, Nora seemed to accept this.
Except…
"Well, there is one thing."
Her eyebrows raised. "Go on?"
"Ummmmm…it's…it's…it's a personal secret, and I…it's kind of embarrassing, and…"
"Is it something that threatens our lives?" asked Perry. "Like the maidens, or Amber being with our team?"
"Not your lives…"
"Jaune," growled Nora.
"Look, this one isn't anything bad, it's just…private."
He wanted to tell them. It would even be to his benefit – they were three hunters who, if in the know, could unlock his aura. The only problem was that he wasn't sure that they would be willing to. His authority as their leader and his trust as their friend had been spread thin today by all the other wild tales, and learning that he'd been lying to them about another key factor in their lives could be the tipping point, especially when this one he'd willfully kept from them.
He'd lied about the aura, thinking he could quickly fix it. When the opportunity to do so slipped away after Lisa Lavender interviewed Velvet, it was too late to tell them without the question of why he withheld the truth for so long coming up. The more he'd waited, the worse it got. He knew that lying wouldn't be fixed by more lying, but he couldn't tell them right now. Maybe when things had calmed down, but right now, he was on the verge of losing them. That much was obvious to both him and Amber, hence her lack of prodding for him to come clean.
"It won't put you in any danger, I promise. It's…It's something I want to keep to myself, but because I'm trying to work out how I feel about it and how to handle it by myself before I share it with others…"
"You doin' drugs?" said Perry. Jaune shook his head, and Perry went on. "Secretly gay? Eating disorder? Weird fetish?"
"Tiny penis?" offered Ren, nodding.
"It's not any of those," Jaune quickly answered. "But it's…like that. Same magnitude of how much it impacts me and the people around me."
"You should tell us," Nora insisted. "How can we trust you if you don't?"
"Yeah," said Perry. "It's not right for a team leader to keep secrets."
Ren nodded in agreement. "You've lost the credibility required to do so. We're going to have to insist that you tell us."
"Oh, really?" came Amber's voice, who had remained mostly silent up to that point. Her voice didn't sound normal. "You're going to insist, now, are you?"
Jaune looked over to Amber. "Am, it's not –"
"You fucking ungrateful sacks of shit!"
"Amber!" Jaune shouted, but she spoke over him.
"Jaune learned about the maidens from me the morning after the night he'd just nearly been killed by one. He was still coming down from the adrenaline and wrapping his mind around the fact that they ever existed in the first place when another one started threatening him and kidnapped a whole town just to force Team JNPR to come there. And once he knew just how dangerous she was, his top priority was evacuating you three miserable babies before she sent you to your deaths like lambs to the slaughter! Here he is, dragging himself out of a hospital bed to tell you as soon as he can, and look at how you respond: upset that he didn't waste critical time explaining why he was trying to save your stupid asses while he had been busy saving them!
"As for my cellular condition – yeah, he didn't tell you about me, but it wasn't his secret to tell. I didn't know if I could trust you three at the time, with how many people Ozpin has loyal to him. I'm only choosing to tell you now because Oz has his sights set on the Junipers because of me, and based on how you so-called teammates have been behaving, I'm starting to regret that choice. You idiots are squabbling like spoiled brats and harassing your leader as though his body isn't still pulling itself back together after having nearly died a few days ago! You think he's lost the right to keep one single personal secret? If you ask me, you three haven't earned the right to hear it. You don't fucking deserve Jaune.
"You had it easy. You just got to go party in some buttfuck nowhere village and go home and sit on your asses. You didn't have to make the impossible call between deserting a fucking trained elemental goddess or letting her throw you into the meatgrinder. You weren't the ones to stay behind so Raven wouldn't come chasing. None of you did the impossible and fought Hazel solo and had his fist shoved right through your guts and still offed him and kept on going. You didn't trek through the desert on a fool's errand looking for an airship you weren't even sure was there when it would have been easier to just curl up and die. You didn't have to listen to your best friend on the other line, not sure if any damn word he said was going to be the last time you'd ever hear his voice. You didn't have to sell yourselves to the devil to keep him safe, because you'd rather give up your own life and liberty than ever let him come to harm.
"So cut this bullshit right now. Don't ever let me hear you say that you can't trust Jaune, because if I do, I'll grow robot legs, crawl up your dickholes, set myself to vibrate, and tweet 'Bumbleby Sucks, Tauradonna for Life,'you bilge rat cocksuckers!"
Nora blinked. "I don't have a –"
"I'll fucking crawl up your vagina and explode, then! Fuck you! Jaune, pick me up, dramatically walk out, and slam the door in the faces of these ungrateful fucks!"
Jaune awkwardly did so, making sure to grab a towel before he left the pool center.
"FUCK!" screamed Amber, when they were outside. She was vibrating like there was no tomorrow. "FUUUUUUUUUUCK!"
"Geeze, even your original body didn't get burned that bad. You had a lot to let out, didn't you?"
"I fucking listened to you pray your final prayers, and they don't even wait until you're fully healed to press you like that for every little detail. You're entitled to privacy, Jaune. Everyone has some secrets."
Jaune smiled. He was feeling rather vindicated after having Amber come to his defense like that, and the giddiness was impossible to contain. "Even you?"
"Especially me. Though it's mostly classified shiz, not deep dark personal stuff."
"Oh, so we're back to not swearing now, then?"
"Yeah. Sorry if I exploded at your partner and girlfriend and whatever Ren is to you. It was just too much. You nearly sacrificed everything for them, and they had the audacity to…all I could see was red, and it wasn't just a snap filter this time. Woo – I really am pumped, though. I feel like I could run a marathon."
"Just as long as you don't actually sprout legs and crawl –"
"Please, don't." Amber didn't have a face to emote with, but he could hear the cringe in her voice. "I was preparing that little speech from the moment they started getting testy, but by the end, I was just running on pure emotion."
Jaune wasn't ready to have a talk with Team RWBY about the death of Raven yet, and he had a feeling some space would be needed between him and his own team, so he decided to hit up the cafeteria.
When he came out of the lunch line with a simple sandwich and some pretzels (no drink, as the holes in his stomach might not have fully sealed up yet), Jaune caught sight of Velvet waving him down to her team's table, and he was too spent to argue. It would be nice, at least, to have lunch with someone who was drama free and entirely on his side, even if Velvet didn't fully know what that side actually was. Besides, as annoying as she could be, she was technically his sister-in-law through Ren, so he should at least try to get along.
"So…I hear you've been up to some exotic business, Mr. Champ," the rabbit Faunus said, eyebrows raised. "It's quite the puzzler. Even I can't figure out the full story."
"Why don't you tell me what you've got so far?" Jaune mused. "I'll fill in the gaps."
"I think I've cracked most of it. I asked around, and I went to some of the teachers, and I bet my story's pretty much complete." Velvet looked off into the middle distance and started gesturing to nothing with her hands. "The scene: a desolate swamp village just west of Vale! On his first formal mission, Jaune Arc discovers an invasion of body swapping Grimm that had taken over the town of Iyun. Realizing that the only way to destroy these fiendish creatures is to reverse the flow of time so that they never evolved into existence in the first place, he commandeers an experimental Atlesian prototype and uses its Quantum Hyperdrive to warp himself to the sands of Vacuo where the Sacred Hourglass of Last Year can be found. He –"
Jaune was about to raise a finger to cut her off and correct her, but Coco winked at him and offered him a pleading look. Chuckling internally, he decided to just let it roll. Besides, when he got down to it, the honest truth of the situation – maidens and magic and portals – was nearly just as farfetched.
"–entire kingdom had already been taken over by Azazel Rainart, a Grimm-human dark angel bred to feel no emotions or pain. The Commandos launched into a grueling four century war in the Eternal Time Chamber with the corrupted forces of Vacuo while Jaune himself fought their leader on the Spirit Plane."
"It was actually the Shadow Dimension," corrected Jaune. "You know, where we fought."
Velvet rapidly pulled out a notepad, crossed out a line, and quickly scribbled something down. When she was finished, her story resumed.
"Unbeknownst to the Citron Champion, though, his mortal body was attacked while his astral projection slew Rainart. Critically wounded, he used his A.I. companion, the Artificial Modified Brain Emulating Replication, A.M.B.E.R., to call in his future airship for an evac."
"And then what happened?" Jaune asked eagerly. This retelling was actually kind of fun, Jaune decided, as he heard more and more of it. "What came next?"
Velvet sat back down and shrugged. "I don't know."
"What?"
"I don't know. No one does."
He looked around the table to find all four members of Team CVFY staring at him.
Coco looked at him with morbid curiosity. "Velvet's headcanons aside, this one is…weird, kid, to say the least."
"We've read the police reports and heard Beacon's updates," said Yatsuhashi. "Your story is truly unknowable. None have the full picture, though many wish to."
"You were discovered…just, floating." Coco set down her utensils and frowned. "Not flying anywhere. Just there, in the sky above a bunch of unidentifiable dead bodies and a warzone of scattered weapons. Complete carnage down below."
"Metal, bro," said Fox. "But equally mysterious. How did you get to Vacuo? Who were those people that were dead? Where were you going? And, like, if you were all bled out and whatnot, how did you call in help?"
"All your other tales are logical," said Yatsuhashi. "The defeat of Grimm, the capture of rogues – comprehensible to the rational mind. This one follows no archetypical pattern, and there are no clues to decipher that which fills the gap. You simply vanished, then reappeared in the most curious of circumstances."
"What are you guys saying?" asked Jaune, growing uncomfortable as the eyes bore into him. "Where is this going?"
"People are starting to postulate, blondie." Coco folded her arms and looked at Jaune with sincere concern. "From a vet to a noob, let me warn you – wandering minds are a dangerous thing."
"Guys, you're starting to creep me out. J-Just spit it out."
"You were discovered in a foreign kingdom after having deserted your mission," said Velvet slowly. "With dead bodies rather than captured criminals or destroyed Grimm. And some sources are saying that the sheriff you were shadowing was one of the dead. We're on your side here, but…uh…"
"…but there are sides," finished Coco.
"Sides?" asked Jaune. "What, like…pro-me and anti-me?"
"Some took it upon themselves to look into your academic records," said Yatsuhashi. "They found nothing."
Jaune froze.
"People are beginning to think you're a spy."
"Or a traitor."
"Or a sleeper agent."
Well, better that than a fraud, I guess, Jaune thought.
"And these people," Velvet went on. "Their numbers are growing."
Jaune sighed. "And just when I got used to hero worship."
"Jaune, this isn't a joke." Fox looked downwards uncomfortably. "It's not that you're unpopular or something. You're feared. Vacuo has temporarily cut off diplomatic relations with Vale, and that's not making people any less worried."
"Worse yet, many still adore you," added Yatsu. "The wheels are turning. Vacuo and Vale are at odds, and Vale itself is growing divided."
"Over me?!" Jaune pointed to himself, unable to believe what he was hearing. "But I'm just one guy! I'm not even a real hunter, I'm just a student!"
"You may be, but the Citron Champion is a hero," said Velvet. "Or, to some, a threat."
Great. In addition to not having any armor to protect me and losing all my weapons in Vacuo, I'm now a target to both the good guys and the bad guys. Guess I'll die.
Oh, and speaking of not having a weapon, there's that darn tournament coming up. I'm gonna really be a drag if I don't have any way to fight. I might have to drop out entirely.
Velvet pursed her lips. "We're not expecting a civil war or something, but you really oughta watch your back, Jaune."
A hand touched Jaune's back.
"GEEEEH!"
"WHOA!"
Jaune's hastily thrown fist was easily swallowed up by the larger hand.
"Cool it, Jauney-boy! I'm not looking for a fight, I swear."
"YAAAA!" Jaune screamed.
Jaune disentangled himself and pulled away from…
"C-Cardin?" He placed a hand over his heart and nearly felt it beat out of his chest. Of all the people he'd been expecting it certainly wasn't the brutish boy who'd given him grief all those moons ago.
Memories came back to him of their last moment together, of Jaune challenging Cardin to make his move and see where it got him. And now, here he was…
And he picked the perfect time. I only won last time because I sicced Nora on him. Without her and my team to back me up, he's –
Wait a sec…
This was the first time he'd seen Cardin since then. But not just in person – he didn't recall seeing him in class or at the cafeteria or even in the hallways. It was as though Cardin had simply disappeared until now.
"Cardin, were you…were you in that rocket locker this whole time?"
Cardin snorted. "Nahhh, no way. I ditched that ride and traded it in for a…look, that's a whole 'nother thing. Jaune, I just came to apologize. Dove 'n' the others were right, I was…into you, and I expressed it in the worst way possible. Boy, I was being a real grade-A douche back then."
"You're…sorry?"
"Yeah." Cardin's head sagged. "Being a ripped tomboy bully might feel good if you're the tomboy, but I learned that it's no fun when you're the guy whose meds are being stolen by robbers."
"W-What?"
"I also learned that I'm into women and men. And rams. Again, story for another day. There's one more thing I have to give you."
Cardin's hand fell downwards to his waist. For a second, Jaune thought he was going to take off his belt, but then he gripped the shaft of his sheathed weapon, that big mace. Jaune went into high alert, and he heard the sounds of Team CVFY rising from their seats to his aid.
"Cool it, guys – I said I'm not here for a fight," he said.
Cardin drew the weapon by its hilt, but it wasn't a mace.
"I believe this belongs to you, Arc."
tl;dr You got bamboozled (okay, you probably didn't, sorry)
Next Chapter: Little Girl Red And The Yang On The Moon
In which Jaune Arc gets a sword and gets annoyed.
Author's Notes
So, I lied. A lot. More than Jaune. When I was halfway through this chapter, I noticed that all my fics end in even multiples of 25, and that Jaune 'dying' in the previous chapter would have been a really good ending…if I wanted it to be depressing as balls (which tend to be very depressing). I stopped writing and decided to review whether or not there were any remaining loose ends, and lo and behold, there were not.
And that's why I tricked you. For the evulz.
For confused future generation (people reading this when the fic is finished, not while it's still being posted), I originally listed the number of chapters as 25 on AO3, and I pretended the previous chapter was the downer ending of the story. People yesterday were probably bawling their eyes out over the death of the Citron Champion (jk no one cares about my OC Jaune) before I revealed that the 26th chapter wasn't an obituary from Velvet but actually a continuation of the story.
This is a comedy. There is no downer ending (it's going to be the happiest ending of all three of my finished fics so far), it was always supposed to continue into Volume 3. I also lied about the size. This fic is actually about 210,000 words long and contains 37 chapters.
It's also Part 1 of a series called The Hogwash Chronicles. Get goosed, boys! Boom!
Everything I wrote in the author's notes in Ch. 25 is HOGWASH with a capital HOG. Complete and utter lies – except for the part about how I adapt the outline of my stories to fit my organically grown characters' personalities. That part actually is true, and it prevented Blake, Adam, and Ilia from having to kill Ruby to get the maiden powers at the end of K. (Don't ask where I was originally going with that one. It was dark originally.)
I scripted from the start that Jaune would take serious damage from Hazel, and that he would realize he wasn't going to win without taking a risk. The risk would pay off but also nearly cost him his life, and it would be a fight on a whole 'nother level from what he'd faced before, and he would be overconfident and count on his luck like in all his other duels, and he would have to pay a price to walk away alive (knowledge of Amber's survival going to Ozpin), but at no point did I intend for him to die. I have a whole Vytal planned with tons of comedic bits.
Happy rats, and don't do crime!