Chapter 19: Bad Track Record
Still rated M!
DOMINIC
The faunus were stronger. He knew it, with every fibre of his being. They deserved to take their place of ascendancy, to lay claim to what was rightfully theirs: the entire world. Humans had stymied them long enough. He would bring his people to glory, if only they would let him. Haven only stood because the strength of the faunus had been divided by the traitors. As he strode down the ramshackle streets of the faunus district, his broad, magnificent goals were given clarity again. These slums, the way filth literally fell from the humans down onto his people - he would find a way to stop it. If Blake and Ghira and Sienna insisted on useless dialogue with their sworn enemies, with tacit acceptance of the status quo, then he would continue his fight for justice without them.
Fighting alone didn't bother him. He'd been alone for so long. Alone at the top, at the forefront of his war against the humans. Alone at the bottom, in the darkness...
I'm not alone, anymore, he thought, rubbing his finger. For the first time, he felt like he had finally come to find reliable help in his quest. Himselves. Since using the Relic, his mind was able to finally focus on what was important, what was necessary. He didn't want to seem egotistical - even if he was a paragon of virtue, power, and drive - but who else but himself could he really rely on in this messed up world?
He had trusted his fellow SDC labourers: they had abandoned him in the mines, taking the easy option and fleeing to the light of the surface. They hadn't even tried to get him up. They'd left him in the dark, surrounded by grimm and lost in a maze.
He had trusted Blake: she had abandoned him in the middle of their work, refusing to continue along the path they had started down together and fleeing to the light of Beacon. She hadn't even tried to see things from his perspective. She'd left him in the dark, too, albeit less literally. She'd never given him any sign that she'd leave him. Sure, she'd voiced a complaint here and there about the growing body count, but he wasn't willing to abandon the cause like her parents just because of a bit of blood getting spilled. When you fight, people get hurt. Humans deserved to get hurt more than his people, right? Even now, he still couldn't figure out why Blake had left him. Not that it mattered. All that mattered was that she had, and that Dominic had moved on.
He'd trusted his followers in Mistral's White Fang branch: they'd abandoned the cause, refusing to do what was necessary and stand against Ghira and forcing him to withdraw after Sun pointed out that he was on his own. They rejected the bright future he had offered them, his promises of a new world order, preferring to let the faunus continue to scrounge about in the darkness while Ghira negotiated. That man and his useless idealism: what had it ever won them? Humans cannot understand reason, they had only responded to violence; they had only responded with fear.
He growled to himself. Humans. He was confident that Brazen knew what he was doing, getting so deeply associated with them, but still he had reservations about that association. Cinder was one thing: Cinder had delivered Vale to him on a platter; she was a key to the door of a vast repository of secrets. A key that could then be discarded once the door was open. Neo, on the other hand...
Certainly attractive, he was forced to concede. For a human. That was the problem, though. How could the High Leader, the saviour of the faunus, have a human beside him? It must be made clear that she is not beside me... she must be underneath. Subservient, as I promised my people all humans are wont to be. Otherwise, his reputation would suffer.
"Or, I could simply make my multiplicity more well-known," he muttered. Certainly there would come a day, after his fight was won, that he could stand side-by-side with his clones in the light, basking in the adoration of his people, unafraid to reveal the power of the Relic to them. Is that where I see myselves when all this is over? Brazen with my revelations into the unknown, Bedlam with my resolved past with Blake, and me with my revolution victorious? There would no longer be a need to hide in the shadows...
He looked down at himself. Disguised, hidden, forsaken. It gave him an idea for another option for Neo, beyond killing her or taming her. Her semblance would let her appear as a faunus... she could stand alongside us, if she looked right for the part. Brazen's remark lingered in his mind. As devoted to the cause as he was, he was still male. He continued walking to his destination, his ruminations on how he and Brazen could explore Moonbright with Neo ending only as he stepped onto the threshold of a dilapidated building, the first of several locations he sought to visit before the end of the day.
Knock. Knock. Knock, knock.
Time to see what was left of his support base in the city after two weeks of having been forced back into the shadows.
He waited at the door for a minute, hearing no movement from within. Passerby shot him the occasional look, making him feel more than slightly self-conscious. My disguise is fine, they're just looking at me like they would any other person they come upon, he reassured himself.
Knock. Knock. Knock, knock. He rapped his gloved knuckles again against the door. He looked around at the passerby, visually daring them to bother him or keep looking his way. They kept walking along.
He stepped back from the door and regarded the building. The windows were boarded up with planks of moss-covered wood. The shingles on the roof were well-weathered, many having fallen down onto the street and leaving small holes; it wasn't like they had rain in the undercity here, so why bother paying to fix the shack up? In any event, it appeared that nobody was home. Maybe they're out at work or something. It was fine, there were still other White Fang supporters and safehouses in the neighbourhood that he needed to check in on; he would just come back here at the end of the circuit.
Avoiding the busier streets, he slipped stealthily through alleys and over fences. The next place was an accountant, the White Fang's local numbers-man who had been responsible for organizing the flow of lien from the city to Sienna's cavernous sanctum and then back out to the brotherhood's agents, paying for things as mundane as clothes or as criminal as bribes and weapon shipments. Dominic knew the man's identity since he had led the Fang, and hoped that the high level of clearance needed to know that info had kept the humans unaware of his existence. Did anyone who was captured at Haven know about him? Dominic didn't know, hence the trip to find out.
The office-and-residence of the man was a quaint little affair. Innocuous, nothing that would make the humans suspect the importance it held for the faunus freedom fighters skulking about under their vainglorious city that rose up to intrude upon the peaktop clouds. He walked up to the business entrance and tried the door.
It was locked.
Dom regarded the hours of operation, and noted that the sign listed no times open during the week. Every day was listed as CLOSED. Peering in through the window, since the curtain rod was bare, he saw that the entire office was empty. The hardwood floor was clean, and he saw where some areas had once been covered by desks, chairs, bookcases. They were gone, now.
"He's packed up shop," a voice called from the street. He turned around and saw Lichen standing there, wearing her grease-covered work outfit. Evidently on her way home from a shift at the factory where she worked for sub-minimal, sub-human, wage. "I'm surprised to see that you haven't joined him in leaving town, after the message you left for me with Salt."
"Where?" Dom asked simply.
"Didn't you hear?" Lichen replied, drawing towards him to allow their conversation to be conducted in hushed whispers, "Ghira and the Prince chartered every transport ship in the harbour to take our people to Menagerie. He's offered free passage to any faunus who wants it; I hear the human government was happy to oblige. They're leaving port today, in fact, but most who're going have already boarded up and boarded ship."
So that's why I can't get a ship to Vacuo. That's why Salt insisted that I turn myselves in to Ghira and flee to Menagerie. Dominic realized. He'd let himself get distracted by the drama unfolding between Bedlam, Brazen, and Neo. He'd spent his time keeping his body in shape when he could have been delving deeper into what Ghira and his human allies were scheming. He'd been hiding. Maybe I'm just not used to lacking followers around to handfeed me information... I've become lax, reliant on others. Even now, I've been relying on Brazen and Bedlam to bring me interesting news, just like I would before on my throne, listening to the reports brought to me. At least I can trust what they tell me, though.
"I'd say it has left a lot of free real estate around here but," she gestured to the ramshackle houses, the listing buildings and overall disrepair of the area, "most of these places aren't worth the lien it would cost to make it to Menagerie."
Wheels continued to grind against one another in Dominic's mind as his thoughts churned out. He felt a twinge of remorse, a bit of anger, but overall the situation left him feeling rather hollow. He'd only cared about getting to Vale, essentially ignoring anything else that didn't directly affect him, like when Bedlam broke his aura. Maybe it is for the best. If the locals are going to Menagerie, I don't think I could have stopped that. I don't know if I should have stopped that. He'd been so focused on hanging out at the transit hub looking for a ship, he hadn't thought to look into why a coastal capital city had no ships heading to Vacuo. He had been so careful to be hidden that he hadn't seen Ghira's agents gathering up the locals. He hadn't even bothered to ask Salt why she was so insistent on Ghira; he'd thought it was just the speeches he had been making on the news. "So, you're on your way there now?"
"Oh, skies no. I'm staying in Mistral – it's not like it is a mandatory eviction of our people like what started off the revolution. I've got a steady job that'll make up for this one-" she gestured at the vacant accountancy office with her thumb, "-not paying me a stipend."
"You do own your house, Lichen." Unlike many, she didn't have to deal with mortgage payments, thanks to the White Fang. He looked at the office, "so that's it? They're all willing to just throw their memories away, pack up shop and leave to go to the charity continent?" He sneered the last two words, leaving no doubt as to his thoughts on accepting handouts from humans over taking what was wanted.
"Yeah, that house and four-hundred lien would get me halfway to Menagerie. Not many happy memories here, for most. I imagine most of them would have gone to Menagerie earlier, but either couldn't afford the passage or were afraid of the dangers inherent to such long-distance travel. There are such terrible stories about bandits and grimm out in the wilds, or even at sea. Which is the real reason I'm staying, I suppose."
"You don't think the trip will be safe for Ghira?" Ghira always did have bad luck while travelling, but he's always gotten where he wanted to go before, Dominic thought idly; Ghira was, regrettably, a hard man to stop once he had set his mind to something. Stubborn as an ox, he chuckled internally. Just like his daughter's bovine-esque herd mentality, Ghira inverted the human's perception of the faunus as having character traits akin to their physical traits. Meanwhile I'm prowling solo like a panther, sleek and silent and dark, through the city streets. Take that, stereotypes!
"No, I'm sure a group that size will be safe enough." Lichen stated. "I'm staying because Salt wants to go to school here, to become a huntress and make it safe for people to travel. She had had hope that you would see reason and convince your brother to go to Menagerie. Us faunus could create our own Huntsman Academy... Adam could be a professor, do some real good for our people. You too, I imagine."
"Real good?" Dominic growled, "so what... so what my brother," - he nearly slipped up and said I - "did for you all those years ago wasn't real good? You think that if he'd been in Menagerie sitting behind a desk that you would have gotten out of that crate?"
Lichen's eyes narrowed, "that's not what I! I didn't mean... I can't believe he told you..."
"I won't hold this against the ones who choose to flee rather than fight." Dominic said, taking one last look at the office before taking a few steps away from it back to the street. "At least they won't get in the way of those of us still willing to do what is necessary to ensure the future of the faunus."
"The future of the faunus will be ensured by peace, Taurus. We have to make a choice about what sort of world we want to leave to Salt."
"You're wrong, Lichen. I can forgive you, but you are ignorant and wrong." Dominic sighed, "this world has pulled the cloth over your eyes, the government hides the truth from the people. Maybe Ghira knows, maybe he doesn't. There are forces, great and terrible, aligned against us. Not just humans. More than grimm."
Lichen began to step after him, trying to keep pace with his increasingly long strides into the empty street.
"Beacon was just the start. Haven won't be the end. I refuse to let our people share humanity's fate. Not going to fall alongside my oppressors while trying to believe they're my friends." Dominic said, then turned around and faced Lichen. He took out his scroll and turned it on. "I refuse to let our people remain in the darkness."
"What are you saying? I don't understand."
"You don't have to understand, just know that I'm doing what is best for the faunus. I always will." He spun the scroll around for her to see. "These names. Do you know if they are on Ghira's ships?"
Lichen scanned the list, nodding slowly as she read each name. "Yes. Yes, I think all of them are leaving. So many faunus are taking the offer, the news announced estimated numbers a few hours ago. Filled with hope and optimism fed by Ghira's positivity. They kept it out of the news until now to keep the general human population from getting involved. A lot of businesses, factories, and companies are about to lose their cheapest source of labour. I'm actually sort of surprised the government supported this."
"I'm sure they got something from Ghira in return..." Dominic snarled. "That's how negotiations work." What did you sell them, Ghira? Was this what Sienna's base bought us, or was it something else that paid for your ships? It was infuriating to think for long about the way Ghira treated with their foes. Why negotiate, why play their game of this-for-that, when we can take what we want? When it should be a game of take that-and-that? "Though the humans are probably simply happy to be so easily rid of you all."
"You should go to the docks, Dominic. Talk with Ghira, he'll tell you about the parts of Adam that your beloved brother won't mention."
Lady, I've seen my own naked bodies and fought beside myself against grimm and human alike. Until a couple weeks ago my thoughts were all packed into the same picturesque physique; there's nothing hidden between my brothers and I... except maybe the fact that Bedlam wasn't fond of my clothing purchase to replace the stuff Neopolitan wrecked.
Lichen didn't know that, though. With a somewhat guilty expression now on his face, Dominic turned off his scroll. "I trust my brother. A single simple secret or two doesn't change that." He pocketed the scroll. "I have other business to conduct around the city, but I might at least see the ship off."
Lichen began walking away towards her home. "Keep yourselves safe."
"I shall. Despite our... differences... it is still nice to see you. Stay safe as well."
Dominic watched her leave, then looked back at the empty accountancy office. With his list of faunus scrapped by Lichen, his schedule had cleared up significantly. I guess I'll go get that camera that Bedlam stashed in Blake's house, head to the docks to see Ghira take off, then pick up some more food. After that, maybe he could introduce himself to Neopolitan.
BEDLAM
The last vestiges of moonlight reflected off the frosted landscape that whirled by in a blur of black, white, and green beyond the pane of glass. All indistinguishable from the scenery of the past few days but for the growing amount of snow accumulated on the ground as they moved further north, the light of the dawn presuming itself over its celestial neighbour. It had been a quiet trip towards Argus so far, making regular stops at small walled settlements along the coastline. They were moving faster, now, no more stops left until their destination, but it would still be a couple days of travel yet. He looked over at the snoring lump that was his elderly cabin-mate. Even if she wasn't snoring loud enough to make up for the silent passage of the gravity-dust powered train's, his common sense would ensure that he remained awake. Not like I sleep much anymore. Constantly wearing the blindfold probably made it hard to tell if he was sleeping or awake, too; another benefit of his decision to train his aura-sight.
Maria had - outside of her sleeping - been quiet for the entire trip, spending her time reading newspapers and other literature kept aboard by the train company. She left the cabin rarely: to get food or use the bathroom, during which times Bedlam was left on edge on the strong chance she come back with one of the huntsmen (who were ostensibly hired to protect the train from the dangers of the picturesque landscape floating by outside, but seemed to be trying to make some extra lien on the side) to deal with him, but she didn't. Bedlam had had the pleasure of watching Calavera deal with the pair of them once. They had come by to inform the occupants of the cabin that, 'thanks to our diligence, the train remains safe from grimm or other threats'; it would have been more intimidating if they hadn't been boasting that to a cabin hosting a stowaway international terrorist. For Bedlam, though, the knowledge that the local security detail was a pair of meat-headed thugs actually did help him relax a bit.
Just not enough to let me sleep.
He looked at his hand, removing his glove. The finger was still a mess. Aura had stopped the bleeding, fought off infection, but the cuticle was lost. He wasn't sure if it would ever come back. He wondered if it would come back if he merged into one of his clones, or if the resultant being would still lack the fingernail. Did Dai say what merging would do to the physical body? He didn't remember it being mentioned. He looked over at the source of the snoring again. Certainly Calavera 'seemed' to be sleeping, but it could just as easily be a human ruse. He didn't know her, he didn't know who she was or who she worked for. All he knew for certain was that she looked old, acted calm, had as much luggage as he did, and that she ate cashews passionately.
He wanted to draw Wilt.
He wanted to use his scroll. He'd done as Dominic had requested and made a journal entry during his one foray out of the cabin where he was hid away. Now he had something he'd rather not forget to ask them about the next time he saw them - about what would happen to his fingernail if he merged with them - but he couldn't write it into the journal for fear of his signature weapon giving him away to his current company.
That's not true, he silently chuckled, maybe they'd think me the bandit Raven Branwen. He looked over at one of the complimentary Mistralian newspapers that had been provided to the cabin which his cabin-mate had perused, with the large title Government Reinforces Kuchinashi hanging over the image of his self, or rather, Dominic, slicing through the Nevermore Alpha with Moonslice. It was a grainy image, distorted, and when he saw the image had had a moment of panic as he thought that Calavera would certainly realize who he was. She hadn't. Bedlam was left with the satisfaction of knowing that the moment had gained some measure of immortality without any consequences for him getting caught on camera.
It had been an awesome thing to see himself do.
However, the fact that Dominic, covered in small grimm, had been mistaken for a middle-aged human bandit woman? Well, as previously mentioned, Bedlam wanted to use his scroll. There were things that he wanted to make a note of to bring up the next time he was able to chat with his duplicates. He would get a good laugh about this one day. After that slim outfit that Brazen had worn after they had looted the abandoned farmhouse outside Ilhari - an image that didn't make him question his sexuality at all - and Dominic's own apparent femininity, Bedlam was the last version of Adam to not have found himself confused for a girl.
Not an achievement I'd ever have thought I'd be in possession of... or so strangely satisfied by.
He looked at his outfit. Rather, Brazen's original outfit that he had removed from the office that it had been thrown into, to replace both his own tattered original and the substandard replacement Dom had procured for him. He couldn't blame Dom, of course, since Adam had never really understood size measurements. Why was an Atlas large a Mistral medium shirt? Hopefully Brazen won't mind, but I sort of was in a rush to get on the train and didn't have time to go on another shopping run. He tried to justify the necessity of the swap. He felt a bit guilty about it: he certainly could have gone out clothes shopping again after planting the spy camera at Blake's house. Instead, he'd been all-too-happy to keep sparring with Dominic, relishing in the slight combat advantage he somehow had. Maybe it was the extra practice fighting the grimm through the cave, maybe it was the added heft in his hilt from the addition of his scroll, or perhaps it was his improved aura senses. Maybe it was the focus granted to him by the lingering itch on his mangled finger, an extra kick to motivate him to be stronger. To be better than he was, to not get caught by humans again.
The memories of being held by Neo lingered in his mind. He hated the human, had wanted so badly to simply shove Wilt into her abdomen and give it a twirl. Like making cotton-candy on a stick, but with her entrails. It would have been so cathartic. For some reason, perhaps for the sake of reason itself, he'd managed to stay his wrath. He'd realized that she might serve him better alive, via serving Brazen. The strange swirl of thoughts that had run through his head as he finally managed to extricate himself from that dreadful bondage had faded into memory, just leaving the lasting impression of conflict. He hadn't been sure what to do. He hoped that Brazen made good use of his difficult decision to spare the human. If anything, he and Brazen were square: the cost of keeping the human alive was letting Bedlam borrow his shirt. A fair trade.
Yes, everything was even between them, as it should be.
The snoring stopped. Lump rose up from under her bed sheets and, though her eyes were mechanical, she still swiped at them as if to clear them. "Mister Bedlam. Did you sleep well?"
"As well as ever, I suppose."
She snorted derisively, "you stayed awake all night again, didn't you?" She shook her head and rose out of her bed or, in her case, fell down to the floor. He'd thought Neopolitan was short of stature, but this woman made Neopolitan appear tall. He wondered if this was some running joke in his life: every woman he met henceforth would be smaller and smaller.
"What's so funny?" She asked.
Oh, I think I just laughed aloud. Maybe he did need to get some sleep. Maybe there will be time for sleep later.
"Well I am going to go see what they have on sale for breakfast. Do you want anything? You're welcome to come along, too..." she plied him with her big blue eyes and grating whine like she had the past couple days. "I could use some help getting the plates in the cupboard from a nice tall man such as yourself."
"Best if I stay in here. I'd eat a pastry, though." It was easy to slip tranquilizers into liquids, but if they tried to poison or drug a pastry his faunus senses had a good chance of detecting it.
Calavera shrugged, then shuffled out of the room. Bedlam was left with his thoughts. Blake is in car five, he thought. Close to car four, where they sold food to passengers. He had made one trip out of his current cabin the first evening to scout the train out, and had discovered the whereabouts of Blake and her team. She had her three teammates in there with her, and the rooms on either side housed the other students and the alcoholic huntsman they were led by. He had spent a full day running through ideas on how to take Blake despite that. The idea of charging in, grabbing Blake, and blasting a hole in the side of the train, while an elegant and easy plan, left something to be desired. What would he do once the pair of them were on the crisp ground outside, other than tumble down the hillside together? Drag Blake back to Mistral? He felt like the disturbance he would cause her companions would enable them to quickly give chase. He could charge in and just eradicate his target. If one of his brothers would charge Moonslice, or if he could figure out a way to do it here, he could make it work. Maybe if I revealed myself to Dee or Dudley, those hired-huntsmen for the train, I could kill the pair of them and store up some charge for my semblance without alerting Blake, then charge into her room and unleash it on her before she could prepare her defences or shadow-clone away to safety. There were a lot of 'ifs' in that situation. He also didn't like the lack of satisfaction the quick kill would bring him. Blake had to suffer. She had to be made to experience a fraction of the agony she had dealt him with her treachery, her scheming against him. Killing her while she slept with a single well-placed blow would be almost a kindness. A kindness she didn't deserve from him. He looked at the image of her on his scroll.
Maybe one day Sun and Ilia would thank him for ridding them of their association with Blake. 'Thank you so much, Adam, for getting us out of those toxic relationships we had with her that made us do foolish, stupid things that set back the cause of faunus liberty a century', they would say. 'How could we have known that she was such a terrible person?'
It wasn't Sun's fault Blake had kissed him. That had been her choice.
Ugh. Choice. His choice on how and when to deal with Blake. His choice to become Bedlam. His choice to pursue Blake alone, leaving his clones behind. What was the right choice?
A knock came at the door. Bedlam didn't bother to answer it. The knock came again. He heard voices from the hall: Dee and Dudley, making their rounds. Then the voice of Calavera. The door slid open.
"This next stretch of track is mostly uninhabited, notorious for having a lot of grimm nests. It sure would help to have a pair of strong, well-fed huntsmen on duty while we go through it." Dee said while eyeing the plates of food Maria held in her hands with a hungry gleam. "Surely you don't think you could eat all of those jelly tarts..."
"I'm still a growing boy here," Dudley added, a little bit of drool dripping out of his mouth as he flanked her.
"Oh, go bother someone else today!" the elderly woman admonished, trying to weave through the burly men into her cabin.
"I just want to point out how unfair it is that the company makes us pay for food just like passengers," Dudley said, "it's almost like they want us to go hungry."
Maria elbowed him in the gut, which softly flared with his aura, "maybe you could stand to go hungry every now and then. I've seen less pudge on a Mistralian opera cast."
"Fond of the opera, are you?" Dee inquired.
"Pretty expensive hobby, that is," Dudley added as the eager grin on his face grew twofold in size. "Spend a lot of time in Mistral Above?"
Bedlam rose to his feet, having grown tired of watching the routine exchange days prior. He wordlessly grabbed the plates from Calavera, put them down on her bed, then slammed the door in the face of the huntsmen once she squirmed through the mass of flesh they attempted to put between her and her room.
The knock, much louder, sounded on the door, followed by the muffled 'screw it, man, let's go see if the other cars have bought breakfast yet..."
Which was followed by the muffled response, "yeah, maybe someone has bacon or something up the train."
"Scum," Bedlam said.
"I find myself agreeing with that, sadly." Calavera said, to her bed and taking a plate. "Huntsmen used to be honourable defenders of the people, a counterforce to both the power of Mistral nobility's military and the criminal gangs. They used to be... better."
"If you say so. I've only known them to be like that or worse. Being faunus has never been easy."
"Well, I'm sure it was never because of your glowing personality. Here," she handed him the plate of jelly tarts, "eat up."
His wariness - Blake called it paranoia - fought against his hunger. I'll need my strength for the fight to come, he decided, and took the plate. They didn't smell or look poisoned.
Maria sat down on her bed and began eating her own breakfast: a juice-box, a few slices of cheese, and a bowl of green berries that Bedlam couldn't identify doused with syrup.
"So, have you figured out how you're going to get into Atlas?" Bedlam asked. Maria had mentioned the day before that she was on her way to Mantle to get routine maintenance done on her eye-tech, but she lacked any typical means of getting to her goal: she wasn't an Atlesian citizen, and the Kingdom had closed its borders to everyone else.
"Oh, the borders can't remain closed forever. I'm sure they'll open up any day now." Maria popped a spoonful of berries into her mouth and chewed them for a minute. "They're going into winter, they'll need to trade with Mistral for food besides seafood and snow eventually."
Bedlam snorted, "that's pretty optimistic. They're stubborn and set in their ways up north. If they don't have to open their borders, I doubt they will. Despite common perceptions, they do grow a lot of their own food, and are reasonably good at storing it." The food doesn't spoil in the cold, unlike the humans.
"What about you? Why are you heading to Argus? You've been noticeably recalcitrant to share anything about that."
"Recalcitrant sums me up well."
"Are you running away from Mistral now that the White Fang is changing?" Maria asked pointedly, "I know that they had a large presence in the Kingdom, and now that their organization is changing a lot of faunus don't know what the future holds for them."
He nibbled on his jelly tart rather than answer.
"The White Fang wasn't all bad. They did some good. They did some bad. No more than could be said for most anyone, these days..." she looked at the doorway, sadly, evoking the memory of the resident guardians trying to shake passengers down to sate their own appetites. "At least they're trying to do something, I guess."
"The White Fang doesn't define me anymore." Bedlam admitted. "They might have, once, but now... I'm not sure what defines me. I just want things to be how I thought they would be by now. I just want the people I cared for to still..."
Maria nodded. "Time has a way of doing that. I've certainly had my share of it."
"Share of what?" Bedlam asked, "you're not a faunus, are you?"
"What? Oh, no my boy, I'm human for a few generations back at least as far as I know. No, I meant time. I'm an old woman." She put her bowl of berries down, pinched her arm with her fingers and pulled the wrinkled skin out. "I'm old! Hahahaha!"
Bedlam took another bite of his jelly tart. His face might be concealed by his hood and blindfold, but he kept his eyes on her. He might be slightly obsessive, but he kept thinking that Maria might be quantifiably insane.
Behold, the ravages of age!
"But in all seriousness, you probably should-"
The train shook. An inhuman screech pierced through the train's metal walls and echoed through the cabin. It seemed like the train was finally going to see some attention from the local grimm population. Maria nervously stroked her walking stick.
"Don't worry, I'm sure that our resident protectors will safeguard us from the grimm. They didn't look that hungry." Bedlam teased nonchalantly.
"At least the ride will be more peaceful if they're out doing their job rather than bothering me," she replied. She picked up her juice-box and seemed to calm down a bit.
"Even if they're not up to the task, I know there are a few more capable folks on the train with us that could lend them a hand. Some of the huntsmen-in-training from Beacon, the ones who were at Haven a couple weeks back, are aboard."
Maria's eyes squinted at him, silently asking him why he would know that. She probably didn't need to ask; she could probably put the pieces together. He was faunus. He had been White Fang. The people who had stirred up the White Fang were on the train.
The train shook again, with what appeared to be grimm-fire splashing down the window as the roof above them took a hit from whatever monsters were chasing them. He hadn't seen grimm that strong since the wyvern at Beacon; grimm with elemental attacks were thankfully rare, but not unknown. He didn't even know if humans and faunus had discovered all the different kinds of grimm that existed in Remnant. Brazen's conversation with Salem through a novel grimm variety hinted at that.
Blake's team would leap at the chance to fight some grimm. They'd be rushing out of their rooms, probably already on top of the train. A grimm attack might be the perfect distraction to take Blake, or a terrible time. All the adrenaline of the fight would have her team on high alert. Better to wait it out for now.
"AAAAAAH!"
Bedlam watched through the window as the body of Dee was carried away by some flying nastiness, which dropped the useless human huntsman a hundred meters into a snow-capped pine forest below.
"I feel safer already!" Bedlam deadpanned. Maria gave a resigned sigh.
The fight was not going in the train's favour. Dudley had crawled back into the car with a shattered arm; Blake's team was still all together, now arguing with Dudley to turn off the Atlas-designed defensive turrets. Bedlam had to wonder why the turrets could be deactivated at all: wouldn't it be safer to just have them on all the while, rather than relying on an incompetent boob like Dudley to have the presence of mind during a grimm assault to turn them on? Bedlam and Maria were cramped into one of the seat-filled passenger cars with the rest of the non-combatants, as Maria had felt like the front of the train would be safer during the battle. It seemed the bulk of the passengers had the same idea. He couldn't hear what was happening in the adjacent car, where his target was, for the din of terrified humans pressing in all around him.
Can't they all shut up for one minute and let me overhear what Blake is saying up there? Useless humans! At least in the atmosphere of terror, nobody paid him any suspicion.
"Passengers, this is your conductor speaking. We regret to inform you that we will be detaching the back four passenger cars and the caboose for routine maintenance. For those passengers who currently occupy a seat or cabin in those affected areas, the Argus Ltd will partially refund your ticket and provide you with complimentary seating in car four. If you have personal items or luggage in the aforementioned area, we request that you remove them presently. Thank you for your patronage."
"Well, I'd better go fetch my things." Maria sighed and Bedlam nodded, content to stick to the shadows and watch as Blake's allies, team JNR, came into the car. They began assisting the civilians, trying to calm them down and organize their relocation to the front.
What is their plan?
The efforts of Blake's friends from team JNR were mostly wasted: the desperate cries, arguments, and shoving as people forced their way through one another to get their precious things, to claim space for themselves in the front. Bedlam wondered what was taking Maria so long. Here I am, saving her a bloody seat, and she's taking her sweet time getting her luggage. He chewed on a new jelly tart - the general upset mood had left the food counter completely unguarded, and Bedlam had felt the need to indulge a bit. This one was a delicious yellow lemon-filled number that-
Wait.
He didn't know much about Maria Calavera. For whatever reason, she hadn't snitched on him to anybody - even when the staff had come knocking on their door or the huntsmen came to try to shake her down for extra surcharges for the journey. All he really knew was that she was ridiculously old, acted lucid at times, had as much luggage as he did, and that she ate pretty much anything with the manners and grace of a starving faunus fresh out of a nine-week stint in the mines.
Has as much luggage as I do.
He lurched up out of his seat and began climbing over the mass of humans to get to the back of the train. Every single person seemed intent on blocking his passage, like they were all in on some secret plan to bar his way. More than once he had to snarl threateningly to get the attention of some space-taking idiot with their back turned to him. As his progress continued to be impeded, he began simply shoving people to the side. He heard the mechanical screech as the roof-mounted turrets retracted into their sockets, and wondered why they would de-activate the defences. What's the point of a weapon if you aren't going to use it? A passenger yelled out as Bedlam forcefully pushed him into a nearby seated passenger's lap.
"Sir, there's no need for that! Please just find a seat... we'll protect you!" Blake's friend, the red-cloaked Ruby who had feasted on cookies in the dark, admonished him as she saw his crude approach, but then she opened the side door and disappeared out as a red blur. He shut the door, reeling backwards, momentarily dazzled, as the darkness of the tunnel they had been shielded by suddenly returned to the albedo vista of the snowy forest. He was thankful to have his blindfold and drawn-down hood in place to safeguard his eyes from the brightness.
He heard movement from the next car and began walking towards it. He peered through the window and there, standing alone, was Blake. Her attention seemed to be on someone behind her on the roof of the train. Bedlam removed his weapon from his back by unlatching the buckle that wrapped around his torso, placing his constant companion once more at his hip. She's right there. Reason be damned, she's right in front of me.
Her hair billowing behind her in the rush of air, her perfect complexion and amber eyes...
She drew her weapon. Had she seen him? She wasn't even looking this way. Had she heard him with those soft, sensitive ears of hers, finally exposed to the world again? How he had despised the sight of her hiding her heritage at Beacon, ashamed of who she was. Ashamed to be associated with him, what she had turned him into.
She dropped down from the roof and struck with her cleaver-form weapon, severing the train cars. She... she did it again!
What is it with the pair of us and trains?
He realized that his body had moved through the door and was now standing on the balcony of what was now the end of his side of the Argus Limited. She looked up and her eyes widened in shock as she saw him.
He scowled as he saw the back of young Oscar above her, turned away for the moment to watch the flock of winged grimm closing the distance to the train but ready to shout a warning to the rest of the humans if he should hear Blake in danger.
This is a bad idea. Bedlam realized, regaining motor control and his presence of mind. In a spray of concealing snow as the train plowed through a snowbank, he slipped back through the doors and crouched down to get himself out of the windowframe. He tried to think of what the next best course of action would be.
He had to get to where Blake was, which presently seemed to be an increasingly distant set of unpowered train cars. He sighed. I never even found Maria, he scolded himself. Maybe she had managed her way to get back to the food car without him noticing.
There was no way that Blake was going to get back on this half of the train. It was obvious now to him that their plan was to divide the targets, try to lure the grimm away from the passengers while also letting them fight with no restraints for fear of harming 'innocents'. Without the fear of hurting humans huddled below, the huntresses would probably have a good chance of defeating those grimm. No matter whether they defeated the grimm or not, the back half of the train was unpowered: the gravity dust track would keep it lifted, but without the front engine pulling it, Blake would be stranded.
She'd have to walk the rest of the way. Bedlam remembered before, when she'd cut another train they'd been on, stranding him in the middle of Forever Fall forest. It had been an awful trek to get back to camp, where he had to tell the huddle of loyalists he had started with upon arrival in Vale that his trusted second had betrayed them, that he hadn't managed to do more than prevent the train's arrival at station ('we need drive the trucks into the forest to offload the supplies before an SDC recovery team gets there') and that he required medical attention from a scuffle he'd gotten into with several large ursa grimm that had taken umbrage at his intrusion into their section of forest. Knowing Blake would have to walk away from a stranded train seemed poetic, yes; knowing Blake would have to walk to Argus didn't actually help him, though. He had to tail her, not wait for her, lest she somehow get away. What if this had all been a ruse to throw him off her scent? She called him paranoid, but she was notoriously so herself. Paranoid and clever.
It was easy to love her.
I'll have to jump off this I guess. He hoped that the distraction provided by the remaining grimm would prevent them from noticing his movement. He stood up.
Everything went grey.
He slumped down, his head finding itself in someone's lap. He looked up slowly, and saw the human's head drooping to the side, their eyes glazed over and breathing slowing to a regular pace rather than the panicked beat that it had been keeping during the evacuation. His own frantic thoughts found themselves evening out, he felt relaxed. What had he been so worried about before? It didn't seem to be important now.
Need to take care of Blake!
Or I could just sit here for a while.
She's getting away...
She was still likely heading to Argus. So what if he beat her there? He could use a break... he could use a nap...
Could miss only chance to find resolution with her.
Meh. So it goes.
The paradox of choice, freedom and bondage. What direction would you follow? Do you accept the gift?
I have work to do.
Bedlam struggled to his feet, his thoughts sharpening: honed by his existential focus on his singular driving purpose. He noted with some concern that the people around him seemed listless, their very colours faded into dimmer grey hues. His own tones were returning to vibrancy. He forced himself to march to the rear door and swung it open. Far away, in the distance, a burst of pronounced orange beyond the haze of the snowstorm, beyond the tiresome snowy white and dark stone and pine green that dominated the landscape's palette.
Like the railway, his path forward was straight.
With the difficulty of getting out of a warm bed in the morning, he leapt off the subdued train and landed on the gravity dust line. At least, he would have if it did not have the unfortunate effect of distorting his gravity from 'straight down' to 'straight off'. He was sent sprawling over and off the track into the snowbank. He'd not concerned himself about its depth, having planned to just walk back along the track until he could stow himself a ride on the other half of the train, so found himself surprised as he was immediately buried and tumbling down the slope into the woods. He clawed at the ground for purchase, but, finding none, was forced to accept being turned into the catalyst of a faunus-formed avalanche. After a few minutes he managed to dig himself out of the snow, gasping for air and channelling his aura into Wilt for snow-melting heat.
"Fucking trains!"
He worked his way back up to the track over the course of another minute, the snowflakes melting on his forehead and running down in rivulets to his chin. His entire body was getting damp from snow melt and sweat, but he managed to eventually get back onto the humming gravity dust track where the snow was significantly shallower.
"Where is the other train?" He asked nobody. "It wasn't this far behind us and shouldn't have slowed down for a few more klicks." Even buried in snow, I would have felt it passing by. He peered down the line. Hard to see through the snow. "Well, I guess I'd better go see what is going on." He began to trudge along the rail, finding an excess of time that was easily put to use growing increasingly upset about how the day had gone so badly so quickly. He used his blindfold to wipe the perspiration and snow off of his cheeks, then put it back on to shield his eye from the light reflecting off the snowy seasonal setting.
After fifteen minutes or so, he'd shimmied the blindfold down to his neck to function as a makeshift neck-scarf; the encroaching snowclouds and his gradual acclimation were making the brightness less painful, anyways. He shivered a little. He wasn't actually dressed for a hike in these conditions, but he still had aura. Wilt was practically made of dust. It wouldn't take too much of it to keep him warm enough. I hope I don't get frostbite, he thought sarcastically, I could end up losing a fingernail. He kept marching along the track, frustrated at how long the trip was taking. How long had he been greyed out, whatever 'that' had been? Where was the other half of the train?
Where was Blake?
He pulled out Wilt and accessed his scroll. He opened up the journal file and typed. ~Train issues. Backtracking to find the half Blake was on. Will my finger heal if I merge? I saw a Mistral newspaper's headline regarding my previous train ride. I might not be dressed for this hike but at least I'm not dressed as a lady.~ He wasn't sure if it would matter in the long run, but he still wanted some answers and well-earned laughter when this was all over. He finished the entry, then turned off the scroll. He wasn't sure how long he'd be out here, and the scroll was really only useful as a journal, a timepiece, and an aura-meter. He would have to conserve its power reserves for now.
"Hello!"
A voice sounded from the distance. Bedlam squinted and regarded, with some astonishment, the figure of the errant huntsman Dee shuffling along through the snow.
"Hey! Up there! Were you on the other part of the train?" Dee shouted. "I'm Dee! The huntsman for the Argus Limited! I got thrown off and made it to the wreckage, but a lot of the cars were missing. What happened?"
Bedlam looked back and forth down the track. Nothing else in sight.
"Why are you walking through the snow?"
"It's not that deep and I heard that unshielded over-exposure to gravity dust makes you impotent!"
Bedlam looked at the gravity dust line beside him. That's an old wives' tale... isn't it? Dust isn't harmful. Unless it explodes or something. Of course, that is what the SDC had told him and his fellow indentured servants in the mines. It would be just like them to lie, as humans are wont to do. "It's a lot easier to walk through the train's wake up here."
Dee seemed to accept the truth in that, and began trudging his way up the slope while Bedlam watched the spectacle. It was mildly amusing to watch the human slip and scramble up to the tracks. As he crested the drift and rolled onto the track, Bedlam realized he had been talking the entire time. Muttering would be a better description, since even with his faunus hearing Bedlam hadn't picked up on it over the noise of the growing blizzard.
"-distance back that way, some provisions but not many. The girls took what they could carry away from the wreckage, but for some reason headed into the wilderness instead of doing the smart thing and following the tracks like I did."
Something about Blake!
"What? They went into the woods?" Bedlam asked, annoyed at having been proven right. It would seem like Blake had decided to try to lose him, just as he had suspected her purpose in ditching his half of the train was. "Why would they do that?" He asked even though he strongly suspected Blake was the reason.
"Anyone on the train after our last stop was heading to Argus; I guess they thought that following the coastal route would be too long so they would have an easier time of it by cutting through the hinterlands. It is a shorter trip, distance-wise, but it would be so easy to get lost if unfamiliar with the territory. I decided to not join them and come this way because my partner Dudley would expect me to, he might even have slowed down the rest of the train so that I can catch back up."
"Didn't you get carried away by the grimm?" Bedlam reminded the man. "I don't think anyone thought you had survived, and it isn't like your aura was in range of his scroll out in the wilderness like this." Individual scrolls' range was scarcely more than the length of the Argus Limited, after all.
"My boy wouldn't give up on me so quickly, we've been through too much together. We're going to be the greatest huntsmen this Kingdom has ever seen! This is just a minor setback, soon we'll be laughing about it in a warm inn. Ah, I can already taste the steak and mashed potatoes I'll order..."
Gross, Bedlam involuntarily twitched at the man's appetite. "You said you parted ways with the huntresses? What else did you see them doing? One of them was a black-haired faunus, cat ears?"
Dee frowned. "I never said they were... wait, I know you!"
"Yes, I was travelling with the elderly lady at the rear of the train. Sorry you couldn't get a free jelly tart, but that's life." Bedlam said through gritted teeth. Now wasn't the time to worry about that nonsense, he needed to know more about Blake! "What else did they do? Did you hear them say anything else? Did the black-haired girl say anything about a plan?"
"No."
"You didn't hear anything at all?"
"No, I mean - 'no', that's not how I know you. I know you from a poster. You're Adam-Fucking-Taurus, Mistral's most-wanted! You've got the chin, the red hair, and I'd bet those points up through your hood are your signature faunus trait. Oh man, I'm going to be a fucking legend! When Dud finds out I took you down without him, he's going to be so-ooo jealous. Oh man, when I tell chicks about this, there's not going to be a dry piece of underwear for a city block!" The moron's face contorted into a goofy, ridiculous grin as he fell into his lurid fantasies.
Bedlam pulled back his hood, revealing his horns for the huntsman to see - not that he actually looked, he seemed to be acting out a scene where he was kissing some overweight barmaid he fancied. "You're right. You managed to see through my disguise." I guess getting wet with snow made it a bit easier to see my horns, and my moist hair hanging down certainly makes it that much more visible to the human eye. "However, you forgot one thing."
"Nuh-uh!" Dee brandished his electric mace, which began spinning on its axle. "Yeah, this is going to be sweet." Well, maybe he didn't forget that he hasn't caught me yet...
Wilt flashed out of its sheath and met the mace in between them, sparks of electricity and fire shooting out as they clashed.
...But I think he has forgotten why I'm Mistral's most-wanted.
"You can't beat me, Taurus. You had a good run-"
Their weapons met again, Dee attempting to put his entire body's weight behind his blow.
"-fighting civilians, women, children, Vale folk, and the SDC!"
"I never fought children," Bedlam argued as he parried another swing, "where did you hear that?"
"I heard you killed a lot of minors!"
Bedlam took a couple steps back, disengaging from the skirmish for a moment. "Miners, you idiot. Miners. Like what you would find in a mine. As run by the SDC. Human idiot."
Dee rushed forwards to keep Bedlam in range of his humming mace. "Oh, that makes a lot of sense actually. I mean, who goes around fighting little kids? What a dumb thing to do. But you're just a dumb animal, so I thought it was true."
"Animal?" Bedlam felt the blood rush to his face. "Animal! I'll show you who's an animal! You'll beg me to end your life, in the name of mercy, like a sick cur!"
Bedlam rushed forward, unleashing a flurry of quick, precise strikes on Dee, gouging deep into his aura reserves and sending him reeling backwards. The blistering heat from Wilt turned the flanking snowbanks to mush, the water splashing down onto the track and then floating up where it met the influence of the gravity dust line, filling the air with an array of sprayed water droplets floating in contrast to gravity as the influence of the dust remained on them.
"I don't think anyone will mind if I haul your corpse into town a bit worse for wear; tenderized steak is always easier to chew!" Dee threw his mace around in large, swooping figure-eight strikes, which Bedlam dodged over and under. The spinning-mace sputtered and sparked as it weaved through the mist.
"Your weapon is garbage, you can't even hit me! I guess your ability to afford food was as good as your ability to afford decent equipment." Bedlam laughed, taking a certain amount of joy in taunting his foe, retaliation for the puns Dee was making about his faunus traits. Huntsmen really only cared about a few things, as a general rule: their family, their body, and their beloved weapons. "Tell me what Blake and her friends said, and maybe I'll leave what's left of you on the track for your partner to collect."
"You're just like Dudley: always thinking he's better than me with his fancy gun that he got with his inheritance. You think you're a match for me? Like I was saying, you've had a good run at being Mistral's resident bad boy, but now you're in for some serious comeuppance. I was trained at Haven, you stupid cow, the best school on Remnant. We tear little shits like you apart in first year. You're practically an initiation challenge for guys at Haven!"
"Funny, the way I've heard it, older guys at Haven are an initiation challenge for guys at Haven." Bedlam bantered. "When you say Dudley is your partner, did that love blossom on your first night together in Haven's remedial class or do you have to pay him to touch you?"
It was Dee's turn to fume. "We're not that kind of partner, you crud licking lump! Oh, you're just begging to get what's coming to you now. I'm going to relish turning you into another count on my tally of victories." Dee's stance became reckless as he threw all his energy into his attacks, his renewed rage putting Bedlam on the defensive, blocking blow after blow with the glowing red blade of Wilt.
"Seriously, tell me what you know about Blake, right now, and this can end relatively peacefully. If the information is to my liking." He darted backwards to get some distance while Dee recovered his strength after his furious assault. Now out of reach of the mace, he pulled Blush off his hip and aimed it at Dee. "You might handle your mace well enough, but unlike your partner you don't have a gun. I do. Start talking."
Dee made an exaggerated face of terror. "Oh no! He's got a gun! What ever will I do? I've never had to deal with someone with a gun before. Oh, woe is me! Alas! Alack! Is this the end for Dee?" He laughed in an exaggerated manner for a moment, then vanished.
Great, a semblance. Did he disappear or teleport? Always hard to tell. It was why one rarely wanted to fight someone with a semblance without knowing what that semblance was. "Fatherfu-" Bedlam began, then took a direct hit to his face as Dee's invisible weapon struck him.
"Yeah, I can hit you now, can't I? Let's see Dudley do that with Blunder Bus!" Dee crowed triumphantly.
Invisibility, probably. Bedlam fell into the slushy snowbank. He grunted in pain, estimating that the hit had cost him a solid chunk of his aura. "I wonder, though, do you still make footprints?" He stepped deeper into the snow, towards the cliff along which the tracks ran.
No answer.
Bedlam was not certain about the man's semblance yet, but hoped his guess was right. He was certain that he didn't really want to take another blow to his head, if for no other reasons than 'it hurts a lot' and 'Braze and Dom might need the aura, too, wherever they are'. "Looks like you're trapped on the tracks, then." Bedlam exhaled a long breath. "So, your semblance lets you turn invisible? That must have been fun in a co-ed dormitory. No wonder you didn't do well in school. Probably too busy abusing it for your own human perversity than spending time learning. For instance, do you even know that your semblance ability runs off your aura reserves?"
Still no answer.
"I wonder how long you can run that for without burning through all your aura?"
Dee reappeared on the other side of the tracks, which Bedlam rewarded by firing at him with Blush. The shot was absorbed by the huntsman's aura, but he still lurched back from the momentum and fell gracelessly down the slope. Bedlam felt himself relax a little. It was good to know that the semblance was just invisibility, instead of something else that would have let him move about undetectable even to honed faunus senses, like intangibility or something. He walked back onto the tracks and peered down the hill, where he saw Dee clambering out of his own little avalanche of snow and slush.
"So you can either be invisible, be shot, or be useful." Bedlam called out while smiling. "What's it gonna be? Tell me what you saw at the other half of the train, the wreck."
Dee seemed to undergo a rapid process of thought, self-evaluation about his chosen weapon's clear ranged inadequacy, intestinal distress, and then realization that his semblance was completely useless in his current circumstances. It wasn't like he could block gunfire just by spinning his weapon around really fast or something stupid like that. "Fine! Don't shoot, don't shoot. We can talk. I can tell you what I saw..."
"See? Not so hard." Humans should serve the faunus. "So, what did you see?"
"When I got there, the girls were all gathering up spilled supplies from the train. The track was busted up and the cars had flown off into the ravine like I did." Dee began his slow, careful ascent back up the slope, stopping periodically to brush snow off of his clothes. Bedlam kept Blush trained on his target, but didn't bother taking a shot while the man was cooperating.
"How did you survive that, yourself, by the way?"
"Idiot." He gestured to himself. "Huntsman. I've got a landing strategy."
"Was that strategy something along the lines of 'landing on the most useless part of my body so as to cushion my arms, legs, and torso?' I feel like it was." Bedlam said with the appropriate amount of snark for the insult to gain some traction in the simpleton's mind.
"I don't have to tell you what I saw, Taurus!" Dee complained vehemently.
Bedlam tapped Blush loudly with the blade of Wilt, the echo of metal on metal ringing down to the human. "Yes, yes you do. It's not like you can get away through the snow, not from me, even if you tried to run."
Dee bit his lip nervously, his eyes searching all over Bedlam before his stubborn pride gave way to cowardly reason. "They were all upset at someone for not telling them something about a relic, saying that it attracts the monsters. They were all yelling at a little boy about him lying to them all, which was understandable, but then the little boy was yelling at himself about lying to them, too, which was odd." He started working his way up the slope again.
Ah, so the girls got a taste of what I got at the throne room.
"Then the boy started talking trash about Headmaster Lionheart, so maybe he deserves those girls ganging up on him."
Bedlam smiled a little at that.
"Apparently the little boy has some really weird trust issues. Also, he talks like he's in charge, even though he's clearly the youngest of them? Then they started arguing about some blue glowing lamp thing that the red-cloaked girl held... the little guy wanted it, but she seemed hesitant to give it to him. Definitely some internal group dynamic issues there. Not like what you'd see with kids trained at a proper academy, like Haven."
Haven's relic. Ruby clearly had it, which made sense: she was the team leader. A human appointed by another human, despite Blake clearly being a more capable candidate for the role.
"Then the boy seemed to have a seizure and yelled out 'he's trying to stop you' or something, then said something about a girl named Ginny or something. Then they seemed to all get really angry, started yelling about spoiled salami and how their lives were chalk-full of lies. Then the old guy who was with them punched the little boy, something about his life decisions to be a huntsman? Then the old lady convinced everyone that they had to find shelter and said that there looked to be a trail. So, rather than taking shelter in the wreckage and waiting for a rescue-salvage crew, they all headed inland. Into the storm. I figured I'd follow the tracks to find Dudley, after stuffing my pockets with what food I could scrounge from the staff car and the dust the others didn't take."
"Wait, so Qrow hits a minor and it's fine, but I'm an animal because you think I'd do the same?"
"No, the dust crystals were all from the trainwreck, not a mine."
Bedlam had to stop himself from shaking his head in despair at the man's stupidity. "Not miner, minor. A child. Like what you said earlier."
"Oh, right." Dee reflected on that as he made it back up to the gravity-dust track. "The kid seemed like he'd pissed everyone else off, so maybe the old guy was his father, just disciplining him? You know, making sure the boy grows up right and all that."
Bedlam considered his own upbringing, the constant beatings he received from SDC company men. "I didn't know my father..."
"And just look how you turned out! Killing folks, blowing up stuff, jaywalking, robbing and stealing as you like; there's no way your parents would be proud of what's become of you."
"I didn't ask to be this way! What I am, humanity is responsible for turning me into! Do you think I wanted to spend my entire life fighting? Killing? No! But I can't live in a fantasy... and I can't let you live on my tail with an invisibility semblance and a desire to be responsible for killing me. So this is just how things are, rather than how they should be."
"Are you even proud of yourself?" Dee asked, holding his weapon steadily between them in order to deflect any shots from Blush. "It doesn't matter, you've turned yourself into a monster..."
Bedlam took a deep breath, exhaled, and increased his grip on his own weapons. "So the old lady I was with on the train was with them?"
"Yeah. She seemed pretty smart. Unlike you."
"I'm a deal smarter than you," Bedlam said with a smile. "You're still on a fast-track to be a corpse."
Dee shook his head. "Nuh-uh, buddy. See, I actually do happen to know a bit about semblances and aura. It's one of the things they teach at Haven, Remnant's premiere school for aspiring huntsmen and huntresses. Just like you said: my invisibility would drain my aura. But so does your semblance, and while I've been throwing all this useless plot exposition your way, whatever semblance you've got going has been cooking."
Bedlam turned his gaze from his opponent to the ground around himself. A great swath of area around him was completely melted, the snow having sloshed away to reveal the yellowed grass beneath. He had ensnared himself in an area preferential for Dee's advantage. Moonslice! He'd blocked Dee's attacks, and now Wilt was literally melting the snow around him with the charged energy.
Dee vanished, taking advantage of the fact that there was no snow left to reveal his footprints.
"You're stupider than I thought," Bedlam sneered as he slid his blindfold up his neck to cover his eyes, letting what aura he had left focus on amplifying his other phenomenal senses.
He heard the rustle of pine needles in the trees.
He felt the heat of the sun against his face.
He smelled his sweat before it was carried away by the wilderness breeze.
He heard the soggy squish of cloth as Dee flexed his arm. Bedlam raised Wilt and blocked the blow from his invisible - but still audible - assailant. "Don't remember me as well as you should have from the train, I suppose."
He blocked another invisible blow and leapt backwards, landing knee deep in snow.
"I was wearing a blindfold, dimwit," Bedlam raised Blush and pointed it at what, to any visual observer, was empty space. "I don't need my eye to know where your heart is."
Dee didn't have anything to respond with to that, but Blush did.
Blush's retort echoed through the woods, a single gunshot; a moment later an empty human-shaped depression appeared in the snow. Dee's aura - and his semblance - sputtered and broke, revealing the huntsman clutching fruitlessly at the hole blasted through his windpipe. His body gushed blood into the pristine white snowbanks as his limbs twitched, as his eyelids went wide in disbelief.
Bedlam charged forward and drove Wilt into Dee's chest - through the man's wildly thumping heart - and unleashed the full fury of Moonslice, definitively ending his miserable existence as his torso burst asunder. Gore splattered across Bedlam's front; some even hit the gravity dust line and rebounded to splash onto his back.
"Do you know where my heart is, I wonder?" Bedlam whispered into the ear of the mutilated corpse as he rifled through the man's clothes for anything valuable: lien, dust, food. He found a few granola bars and a trio of yellow dust crystals, one of which was in the man's useless armament. "She can't be far. And if she is travelling with Maria, she won't be moving fast. Thank you, Dee. You really did make my experience aboard the Argus Limited a positive one. I'll recommend the line to all my friends. Ten out of ten service."
Bedlam continued down along the tracks until he reached the wreckage, eating one of the granola bars as he went. Deep footprints in the snow leading into the woods towards a faint trail revealed the passage of his quarry; from what he could piece together, one of the girls was pulling Maria on a narrow vehicle or treaded toboggan. They had spent some time at the crash site, evidently gathering what they could, before pressing on.
Every advantage was his, save their meagre headstart: he was alone, he was unburdened by possessions, he was driven to pursue them while they would be stumbling around unknown territory. He put on a thin smile and continued his hunt.
DOMINIC
The harbour bustled with activity as people hurried to and fro. His people. Faunus, their mood one of disgustingly optimistic hope. Porters and passengers mixing together as everyone save those few observers laboured to get every last bit of transportable goods onto the ships.
Sort of a pathetic effort, Dominic chided as he watched the effort. What little the faunus of Mistral possessed were worn-down hunks of junk (at best), their only value in whatever sentiment their owners attached to them. In a way, it was a metaphor for the faunus themselves from the human elites' perspective. They treated us like we were worthless, too, our value only in the service of our purpose until we gained... sentimental value after fighting side-by-side with weaker human soldiers in the Great War. The Great War: when the fortunes of faunus had suddenly changed, and humanity had realized just how dangerous their sentient pets were. Had always been. In any case, Dominic found it unremarkable that the humans didn't intercede in the removal of so much physical property from their poorest community. Their ire seemed to be more suitably directed at the escape of their cheap labour pool; behind a line of armed human police, protesters shouted racial slurs and vitriolic hate at the faunus who had elected to leave for Menagerie with Belladonna. Belladonna himself moved between the largest ship and the line of police to - if Dominic were to wager a guess - occasionally thank the armed humans for keeping the peace.
It was rather irritating to watch for Dominic. He knew Ghira could single-handedly tear the protesters apart. Instead, he had decided that peace and politicking was preferable to aggression and action. On the plus side, Ghira wandering about like that made him an easy target for snipers. Maybe Dominic's little schism issue would see itself solved by some enterprising racist with a scope?
Dominic wouldn't have it so easy, of course. Things seemed predisposed lately to not go his way where the Belladonnas were involved.
Case in point: he glanced up at the rooftops and quickly spotted the unmistakable blonde tail of Wukong. The huntsman-in-training had his eyes strictly trained at the perimeter, keeping a keen watch out for anyone thinking about marring with bloodshed what was otherwise a tame occasion.
Dominic suddenly smiled as a thought occurred to him, and he ducked into a dark alley to parkour his way up to the roof underneath Sun. A little payback for the other day...
"Gah!" Sun shouted as Dominic slinked up behind him and patted him on the shoulder. "Wow! You scared me there! Dom! Wasn't expecting to see you here. Like, up here here, not here in general... how did you sneak up on me like that?"
"Seems like a busy day," Dominic said casually, ignoring the question as he moved to stand beside his monkey-traited peer. "I hear the faunus are, for the most part, heading to Menagerie. I can't say I blame them: Mistral is awful."
Sun nodded, "yeah, that's sort of why you're trying to leave, too?"
Dominic shrugged. "I think I've had enough of Mistral for a few decades. It's time for me to find something more my pace." Something like a shred of loyalty and motivation among my trusted followers, for instance. "Where are your teammates? On other rooftops?" Dominic peered around, but failed to spot any of them. Maybe they were just better at hiding?
"I'm on my own here today," Sun admitted. "I mean, obviously I'm not alone-alone: lotta faunus down there I'm pretty friendly with. The boys are off doing other stuff though. Sage and Scarlet got a gig to make some lien because Mistral - much like Vale - doesn't really have a communal sense of food and shelter going on. Make you pay for everything around here. If you take so much as a banana they call you a thief! It's unreasonable. Aren't we all supposed to be on the same side?"
"Humans don't like sharing," Dominic said tersely. "They don't like a lot of things," he added, looking towards the line of protesters who were spiritedly chanting 'get back to work you lazy mutts, Menagerie's for lazy butts'.
Sun grimaced. "They're getting better, though."
"I heard that this is all being kept sort of hush-hush from the public." Dominic said slowly, "that probably explains the smaller-than-expected crowd over there."
"You're not wrong. Quick and quietly. We had to do it this way, though. Afterwards, everyone will be happier and it avoids a tense showdown and chances for violence on both sides."
"Easier to beg forgiveness-" Dominic began.
"-than to ask permission," Sun finished. "See? You see. It's cool, it's all cool."
No wonder he and Blake got along so well, Dominic considered. Neither was one to share plans before enacting them, it seems, much to his constant chagrin.
They watched the crowd for a while in silence.
"Still set on Vale?" Sun asked. "There's still room aboard a few of those ships, I hear."
"I'm not sure Menagerie is my sort of place, not my sort of pace."
"How did you hear about this happening?" Sun asked.
Dominic spent a moment to think about his answer. The news of the exodus was probably relatively nonexistent outside the faunus population, and it wasn't like his cover story had included a means to have heard about it from anything beyond having wandered through the deserted neighbourhood. Sun probably knew that. Was he trying to gauge Dominic, or was it just an innocent question? Dominic felt like Sun had asked the question for a reason, since his true answer would tie in so closely with the vector of the conversation. Sun doesn't have proof that I'm a faunus, yet. It may have been heavily implied, but what fun was there in certainty when Dom could play a little with it?
"A friend in the faunus district mentioned it to me."
Sun grabbed his tail with his hand and held it up to his chest. "I mean, I don't hide what I am."
"Maybe it's just easier to be who you are when you're a huntsman, surrounded by surprisingly accepting humans. Maybe it's just not easy for the rest of them, hence this little venture of Ghira's."
Sun let go of his tail and nodded.
Both of the faunus gave a start as trumpets blared. They turned and saw that the Crown Prince had arrived to bid farewell to the Menagerians. Menagerites? Dominic realized he didn't know the proper term for them. Mites? It was suitably diminutive. He settled on it, until he could figure out the proper term. The Crown Prince, surrounded by his heavily armed and armoured guards, made his way over to the ship ramp.
"You're right, though. Life's probably been easier for me than it has been for others." Sun said, taking a seat on the edge of the roof. Apparently now that the Prince was on the scene with his guards, he figured that the risk of snipers was mitigated. "Ghira has a harder time of it, for instance. Sorry for bringing that up."
Dominic ignored the apology, though. Shit, I shouldn't call Ghira by his first name. The local news always calls him Chieftain Belladonna. Damage control was necessary, a fast change of topic. "So, the others are working a paying gig? How much is that worth for the lot of you?"
"Hopefully enough to pay for a good room on our ship, whenever it floats into dock. Team is still flat broke." He peered out at the ocean, as if the vessel would appear. It failed to answer his verbal summon, and the horizon was flat and boat-less. "There was a better gig, but they missed the interview. The job they ended up on doesn't pay as well, and it was a one-man gig, but Sage and Scarlet worked it together anyways for the same payout. Neither one was enough to afford air fare; Scarlet muttered something about the gangs taking the bulk of the juicy jobs? Being a huntsman in Mistral was easier when the school had clout. Anyhow, Scarlet had nothing better to do in town, and I like him having Sage's back. They're a solid duo, like me and Nep."
"Where is your hydrophobic human?" Dominic asked with a chuckle.
"You say that like it would be an easy affair to convince him to come down to the docks with me like this. Nah, I didn't even bother because he said he had to deal with some boring family stuff. I thought his folks lived up north, but I guess he has some more family here in the city. He doesn't talk about his clan much." Sun shrugged it off. "I guess I'd be a hypocrite if that bothered me: I don't talk about my clan much, either."
"You have a clan?" Dominic momentarily imagined a bunch of people who looked eerily like Sun, stealing bananas by the bunch.
"Which I don't talk about much, either!" Sun repeated pointedly, letting Dominic get the hint.
They focused their attention on the activity around the ship. Ilia and Kali came out on deck and called to Ghira. The loading was finished now. Ghira and the Prince posed a few times for a camera crew, then shook hands. Ghira hustled back to the ship and the gangplank was raised.
"Well, I guess that's that." Sun said. "You want to get something to eat?"
"Another time. I've got to deliver something to an associate, figured I'd come watch this show before doing that." He patted the pocket of his trenchcoat, revealing the concealed camera bulge at his side. "When the ship comes, I'm sure we'll have lots of time for that sort of thing..."
"Okay, well, see you around!" He waved goodbye while he tilted his head to try to see - unsuccessfully - what was in the pocket
They parted ways, but Dom was not even down the fire escape ladder when his scroll began to buzz. He looked at the screen. Green Eyes had texted him. Neopolitan's scroll - Brazen. He suspected his clone was worried about what was taking him so long with the food or something trivial. He opened the message to read it, while trying to think of what sort of food to buy.
~Come see what I'm wearing!~
It seemed like Brazen had finally discovered that he had been bequeathed the ill-fitting outfit Dom had purchased for Bedlam. He's probably pissy about it. Dom slipped the scroll back into his pocket. Maybe it would be better to let Brazen blow off that steam alone for a bit longer while I think of a proper apology for not mentioning Bedlam's theft earlier on. He called up the ladder towards the roof, "hey Sun, I think I might have some extra time. What do you like eating?"
Sun's grinning face poked out over the corner of the roof. "Whatever you're buying, buddy!"
Oh right, he's broke.
Fortunately, Dominic wasn't. "Let's go somewhere nice." He felt like celebrating Ghira's long-overdue retreat to his consolation continent.
BEDLAM
Bedlam retracted his arm through his sleeve into his chest. With his other arm he twisted the empty cloth appendage, forcing a stream of water to soak out and slop onto the snow at his feet. He was cold and wet. He forced his arm back into the sleeve and drew Wilt again, sending a trace amount of aura flowing through the blade. He hugged his warm weapon and looked skyward. As much as he had yearned for the surface as a boy, as a man he knew that the quickly setting sun would not do him any favours when it came to keeping warm. His fingertips were numbing. The blizzard was getting worse. He kept his blindfold over his face as much as possible, taking it off every few minutes just to make sure he was still following Blake's tracks. It was hard to tell if he was, the snow was getting deeper.
Would she suddenly leave this trail? He wondered. She might, if she was trying to evade him.
He heard something in the distance. A scream? He stopped still and listened. There was no subsequent sound. Irregardless, he didn't like it. He was glad to have Wilt in his hand as he trudged further forward. He looked at the ground and at the trees. He wasn't even sure if he was still on the right path anymore. Or any path at all. He might just be wandering in circles through these trees now; they all looked the same. It was like he was in a maze of the damned things. He made a cut in one, just in case he was going in circles, then moved quickly - but careful for danger - forward.
He came to a wooden fence and sheathed Wilt. With his free hand he examined the wood: it seemed old and weathered. Parts of it had fallen over and were covered in snow now, but it was better than trees. In the distance, through the storm, he saw the outline of buildings. A better place to be than out here, certainly. He thought. He might have to slaughter the inhabitants if they weren't faunus.
Maybe even if they were faunus... it wasn't like his hands were clean of his own people's blood anymore. He would do whatever he had to do to get at Blake, though.
Blake.
What if she found this place first? It was an irritating thought. If she was already in there, with all of her precious human companions, it would not do for him to barge in. He moved closer to a nearby gap in the fence to get a better look. As he grew closer, his nose recognized the smell of smoke dispersing through the area. Well, someone's alive in here.
He pondered what to do, until he settled on scouting around. He had to know what he was getting himself into. He shivered and began to draw Wilt back out so that he could warm himself up again.
The falling snow cleared for a moment and he briefly saw into the nearest building. The blonde inhabitant seemed to see him, too, her eyes going wide with shock and raising her mechanical arm defensively. Yang. He sprang away, out of sight of the window, his questions about Blake answered. If Yang was there, so were the rest of them. Unless they'd somehow gotten separated in the snow? He couldn't imagine them getting lost from one another that quickly, which meant Yang would certainly soon tell Blake she had seen him out here.
He looked towards the forest. He could flee, set up some traps or snares in the forest and wait for Blake to come for him. She would probably be able to convince Yang to accompany her in such a hunt - chopping off an arm tended to give people a lasting grudge. The humans would be weaker in the blizzard. They would probably argue it was safer for them to bunker down in the buildings.
He looked at the building. This storm, for all my misgivings about it, for all its discomfort, is my shield. Besides that, Blake hadn't chased after him with Sun at Haven. He slid up to the side of the building, which seemed to be some sort of barn.
"Do you think Adam's still out there?" Yang's voice seeped through the thin barn wood walls, the poor craftsmanship of the building resulting in several gaping holes. Yang must have related what she had seen outside to the others.
Of course I'm still out here, how would I have gotten inside so quickly? Bedlam thought.
Beloved Blake's voice replied, and Adam's grip on his sheathed sword intensified. "I dunno. If he went back to the White Fang there would have been serious consequences; but he never really liked people telling him what to do."
You only ever told me to restrain myself, to act more like Sienna or, fates forbid, your pacifist father. Adam Taurus was smart and clever, he knew what to do to take care of his people. He knew what was best for their cause. Maybe he hadn't known what to do when it came to Blake's ethics, but could he really be blamed for not liking it when she told him to not touch her? To not hurt humans? Even if he hadn't liked her telling him what not to do, he had still respected her wishes as best as he was able. He had worked all the harder to make their vision of a safe world for faunus happen.
She continued, though. "Adam's strong, but his real power comes from control. He used to get in my head, make me feel small, but now I see he just wanted to pull me down to his size."
Wait, is she insulting my... little Adam? Is she calling me too small for her? Did she not want to go further with our relationship because she thought I couldn't satisfy her? Or is she saying that she thought I only cared about her sexually? He fumed at the insinuation. Then he fumed at how she would even know something like that about his body when she was the one who insisted they keep their affection for one another non-physical as much as possible. It would be just like her to sneakily peep on him when her mercurial mood had decided to. Had she spied on him in the shower or something? It wasn't like White Fang camps had heated water; showers were cold when you were fighting for freedom!
He had only himself to blame. Letting her read all of those torrid romance novels with unrealistic proportions. She was just setting herself up for disappointment, he knew. As if there is some magical hero who can make a woman convulse with delight with a mere touch! What a load of bullshit. Blake had become a cautionary tale: the unavoidable result of a person too invested in fantasy rather than reality.
"If we ever see him again, I'll protect..." her words were muffled as the wind picked up.
Strange, Bedlam thought, his mind moving away from an ardent defence of his physique towards a critique of what he was listening into. The way she spoke about him, about the possibility of seeing him again... did she not understand that Yang had just seen him outside? Was this some sort of ruse they were putting on, knowing that he could overhear them?
He pressed his ear to the wall, desperate to hear more words from Blake. Her sultry, velvety tone, the way she spoke to someone she trusted rather than to an opponent. He had missed that version of her voice. He was disappointed to hear no more from Blake; instead, all he heard was Yang loudly finishing their conversation. "We're fine. We can hook that flatbed up to Bumblebee in the morning. Should carry..." Her voice faded. He felt the wall shake slightly, the sound of the barn door opening on the far side.
Bedlam fell back to the line of trees, following the fence around the perimeter as the sky darkened. The blizzard continued to worsen; he didn't feel like Blake or Yang would be coming out looking for him, for whatever reason. He was in his element, despite the chill running through his entire body. He was a child of icy Solitas, right? He found a drainage gully that had once been fed by a sealed tunnel entrance. Speaking of my element, he thought wryly. There didn't seem like there was much to differentiate a sewer from a tunnel, a tunnel from a mine... Still, better to be dry and covered in a sewer than to be frozen dead out in the open like this, which is what he would be if he stayed out like this much longer. I could just burn through Wilt... but he didn't know if he would have the time to re-infuse his blade with dust at any point during his pursuit. So in the spirit of conserving his limited resources, he instead relied upon his superhuman strength, using his hands to pry open the tunnel entrance. With three bodies charging up his aura reserves, his aura was a dependable resource.
He didn't bother wasting the time to question why someone would have boarded it up in the first place; he was far too tired and shivering in the storm, and what thoughts he had which did stray from his immediate concerns found themselves lingering on the question: why would Yang not alert Blake to my arrival?
The tunnels were cold, and damp, but at least the wind didn't nip at his exposed skin. There were wooden support beams that he could even climb up onto to get dry if he wanted, where he could curl up for a nap.
Overall, it seemed like a good place to get some much-needed sleep. Forcing himself to stay awake on the train for days had taken a toll, but it wasn't like he was going to trust some human he'd just met just because she seemed harmless. He could figure out what his next steps for his chase would be in the morning. It had been a long day and now he just felt tired.
AN: Ahoy, ye scoundrel dogs! Life ashore be skewerin' all me scribblin' time, with hours of ten t' fifteen becomin' as common as the salt in the sea to the likes of this haggard soul. Whilst I plan t' plunder a twentieth chapter fer ye from these perilous depths afore the next moon, I be fearin' that there'll be ice in the ports when it sails in. Still yer roguish qualms awhile yet: when 'Hush n' Blush' finally fires its literary broadside against ye, I'm fond yer ire fer that cliffhangin' scallywag what came afore this here chapter will be properly dealt with.
As fer the chance of a chapter after that'n, well, the tides be a fickle thing and there be plenty of muck on the deck I be needin' to swab up.
Don't talk like a landlubber if ye want ta keep yer limbs off the gangplank!
~Jolly Jackie, the Rummy Writer
[Post-TLAPD Translation of that gibberish]
Real life taking its toll; 10-15 hour workdays becoming routine as conditions get worse. Hoping to post chapter #20 in late October/early November. It should appease those of you who disliked the previous cliffhanger chapter. After that, might spend some time polishing up earlier chapters, fixing minor inconsistencies, before posting chapter #21.
Stay Safe and talk like a pirate,
~J A
