Chapter 28: Sailor's Delight
DOMINIC
Tuesday
Neptune's awakening was akin to a banshee's wail. Loud. Ear-piercing. Dominic was the first to respond, entering the luxurious cabin where SSS had restrained Neptune on a large poster-bed. Sage had fallen asleep on Neptune-watch, leaving only Dominic and Scarlet awake aboard the yacht. The latter because he knew how to sail the ship competently and the team had decided that if they were going to be pursued by Piter's forces, it would happen sooner rather than later, so Scarlet and Sage were appointed as first watch. Scarlet had argued, but apparently Scarlet and Sage had spent most of the day prior sleeping to recover from a 'mountaineering accident', so his arguments didn't hold much water.
Unlike Neptune's cabin, which was taking on a large, irritating quantity of the liquid as Dominic pushed open the door.
"What's going-" Dominic began yelling at Sage.
Sage was struggling to get his balance against the combination of having just woken up on the floor and the even roll of the ship in the waves. "I don't know! I think I fell asleep! He woke up and he's panicking!"
Of course you fell asleep; I heard you snoring from the adjacent room! In the interest of cooperation and more pressing matters, Dominic ignored the lapse in Sage's discipline.
A crack opened in the hull beside Sage and a blast of water knocked him up into the ceiling. Dominic noted that with interest, as the water was behaving strangely. It was like it was being controlled with dust.
Or a semblance.
He looked at Neptune, on the bed screaming and frothing at the bit like a lunatic. Runs in the family. Dominic scooted over towards the bed, evading another geyser that blasted through the crack in the hull, and deftly gave Neptune a gentle tap on his head to put him back to sleep.
Just his luck, Sun arrived as he did, letting the other faunus bear witness to Dominic's fast-thinking heroics.
"Dominic! What are you doing? Are you destroying the ship and attacking my team?"
Or, bear witness to what could also be interpreted as Dominic's treachery by a half-asleep, uninformed blonde airhead as said airhead's partner's aura broke from the 'gentle tap'.
Really, it was a matter of perspective!
"No! Your human partner woke up and started freaking out. Sage can tell you." He looked at Sage, who lay on the floor under the breach. The good news was that with Neptune unconscious, the flow of water was now normalized; not that any flow of water was comforting, but they could fix that. The bad news was that Sage was also unconscious, having not had any time to recharge his aura. Even Dominic's aura was low, after unexpectedly shattering earlier in the morning. "I didn't realize he controlled water with his semblance."
"Yeah, he doesn't really mention that to people. He's not very good with his semblance. Or comfortable having it." Sun admitted, immediately accepting Dominic's authenticity. He moved to Sage and lifted him out of the water.
Dominic had been mentally preparing for a fight with Sun: looking for objects in the room he could use to his advantage and determining if taking one of the humans hostage would be tactically advantageous. It was disconcerting to just have Sun trust his explanation without any hint of residual doubt. Even though he'd been telling the truth, that had never kept people from believing the worst of him in the past. It had been so long since people had just taken him at his word.
What makes you different, Sun?
Sage's eyes fluttered open and he shook a soaked sleeve, then glanced about at the water seeping in. "So, you're a carpenter, right? Can you patch the hole?"
Right, my made-up backstory. Why didn't I pretend to be something less useful in any situation, like a realtor or a life coach or an SDC executive? Dominic nodded. How hard could it be to fix a hole? "I'll go check the hold for some materials to seal it up with." It would just be like sealing up a leak in a mineshaft. He'd done that plenty of times to not be too worried about this; it wasn't like they were asking him to make a chair or something. "You find a way to get him under control, before we run out of seals."
He walked out of the room and nearly bowled over Cammy, who'd woken up to come see what was happening in her underwear.
"Are we under attack?"
"No. Just Neptune waking up. I'd say it's under control but... I don't know. Go in there and see if you can help? I need to find some stuff to patch the hole."
"Hole?" She squeaked, but he didn't stay to answer any follow-up questions.
By the time he'd found some planks, hammer, nails, and some handy earth dust, everyone in the cabin was awake and yelling. Scarlet involved himself in the conversation via yelling from the deck above until Sage called him on his scroll so that he could focus more on steering the ship than listening through the deck.
"This is what Piter told me to do, what he was going to do to me! Did you even consider how I'd feel about this?" Neptune croaked. "Of course I thought we'd been defeated and captured!" He grumbled something under his breath about not knowing who he could trust anymore.
"Well, as I've told you, we pulled through after you got knocked out. Mission success." Queue award-winning smile and big thumbs-up from the team leader.
Neptune: not impressed.
"What Sun means to say is, we didn't die and we're pretty sure we gave the faunus a fair chance to get out of harm's way." Sage explained. "But we had to make a quick get-away and didn't have many options, which led to us stealing the royal yacht."
As they spoke, Dominic nailed some planks onto the wall, then applied the earth dust with a touch of his aura to create a cement-like seal to patch it. Thankfully it worked well enough to make them confident that they could at least make it to their destination without swimming.
"You stole the royal yacht?" Neptune asked, rolling his eyes. Then he looked intensely at Sun. "Did you remove the tracking devices?"
"Tracking devices?"
"Yes. Tracking devices. Plural. To prevent valuable royal property from being stolen. You did remove those, so that we would not be followed by my cousin, right?"
"Tracking devices?" Sun repeated, his face blank.
"Will those even work with the Cross Continental out?" Scarlet asked, "we have an on-board signal tower, but that's only boosting our scrolls' reach by a few kilometers. All the aircraft went off after the decoy, too…"
Neptune huffed in frustration. "Probably doesn't matter anyways. Not like it was a secret that we were planning to go to Shade. Piter might be paranoid enough to think that it was all a sham, but it isn't like there are many other options for us." Neptune sighed, "unless he thinks I'm heading to Argus to regroup with my family... or if he thinks that us, hanging out with - and I cannot understate how strange this is - Adam Taurus, means we're up to something. Something nefarious. Are we nefarious now?" Neptune looked at the faces of his teammates. "Seriously, can anyone explain to me how and why we're on a stolen ship with a wanted terrorist?"
Through the scroll, Scarlet mumbled something that ended on "...wanted terrorists being a running joke with Sun."
"Blake's reformed! And there was never any bounty on her, since she was just an activist!" Sun hissed back at the man steering the ship.
"You did say that we'd deal with the issue of his identity later, when we weren't fighting for our lives." Sage said to Sun. "Later is now. So is he Adam Taurus or not? Cammy, you said you believe he isn't?"
Scarlet sighed. "What's it even matter, now? I don't think Vacuo has a standing warrant for Taurus' arrest. Ergo, no bounty, no reward…"
Is that all I am to them? A paycheque?
"I just think it would be nice, for once, for all of us to know who we are working with. Scarlet. Neptune." Sage said pointedly, invoking some sense of unresolved party conflict that Dominic wasn't privy to.
Team SSSN all went quiet, each of them tensing up and glancing at one another uneasily.
"So, I have something to help with that and also answer the question 'what is Cammy's semblance going to be' all at once." Cammy held up her scroll, projecting a holographic image of what she'd seen while dangling out of the airship. Two incoming ships, Dominic standing atop one, Brazen and the girls aboard the other. "Seems like I can turn what I see into video. I was playing around with my scroll because I couldn't get to sleep after everything that happened... I feel really tired because of that. We nearly died multiple times! I'm pretty sure I'm traumatized. Anyways, I noticed I had a new video file on here, so I watched it, and it was my perspective of Dominic right before he boarded the flagship, and it shows Adam on another ship with Rothy, the little girl from Kuchinashi. So yeah, there's two of them, brothers."
"So you make videos? I don't see that as being more impressive than just having a scroll out. Not very good in a fight, but at least it isn't a detrimental one. Lets you have a hand free, maybe?" Dominic assessed, still happy that at least the human's semblance was giving him another ally in continuing his identity confusion hijinks. "What more proof do we need that I'm telling the truth about my brother being Adam?" My brothers are Adam... just because I am, too, doesn't make what I stated into a lie.
"I think I can make videos from memories, too, after the fact, and it also lets me share my point of view with others later." Cammy argued proudly, crossing her arms. "I think it is useful, at least."
"Nobody's saying it isn't useful. Not all semblances have to be combat-oriented to be valuable." Sun said quickly. "It sounds very useful. You said you can make your memories into videos?"
Cammy nodded. "So, I was on a train into the city from Kuchinashi when it was attacked by grimm. The train was saved and I took a picture for my work of the person who saved us; the headline was that it was Raven Branwen - a local bandit boss - that had saved the train, but I'd thought it was Adam Taurus all along. My boss disagreed and ran the headline for Branwen. I didn't care, because a picture that I took made the front page! The front page! Anyways, I have a pretty strong memory of that night, what with the threat of death being something new to me a couple weeks ago. So I managed to turn that memory into a video, too. It is not as good as this one from the flagship... I guess my memory isn't high-definition sometimes... but it is clearly Dominic saving the train."
Everyone looked at Dominic, putting him back on the spot.
"Yeah, I saved a train. My brother was there, too. Didn't know I had you to thank for my being mistaken for an old human woman. Adam had a good laugh at that." He stared hard at Cammy. If she had been on the train that night, there was no telling what else she knew. It hadn't just been him and Brazen aboard the roof that night. Bedlam had been present as well. Does she know? Could she risk my real secret? He fought the urge to grip Wilt. He forced himself to hope that she'd just missed the third man entirely, or perhaps had assumed that he was an unrelated White Fang loyalist. Humans do tend to mistake faunus for one another, racist pricks. "I... wouldn't mind seeing that video later, Cammy. Uh, you know, because Adam said it was a pretty neat kill I pulled off on that Alpha Nevermore."
Cammy nodded uncertainly. Whether that was because she felt nervous about being in close proximity to him, or because her memory let her know too much, Dominic wasn't sure.
"I'm still on the fence about this. Let's not all forget so hastily that we saw Neopolitan tonight." Scarlet said.
"The illusionist who worked with Torchwick and Cinder at Beacon? The girl who nearly killed Yang?" Neptune exclaimed. "What's she doing here?"
Nearly killed Yang? Dominic noted, impressed that he and Neo had a lot more in common than he'd been aware of.
"Working with Dominic, apparently." Scarlet replied. "She used her illusion semblance to warn the city about the impending attack while we delayed it."
"But that doesn't mean she wasn't also making an illusion of another Adam to make us think Dominic was a different guy!" Sage said. "I mean, to make us think Adam was Dominic? Ugh, this is getting complicated."
Welcome to my life… Dominic stifled a smirk at the confusion his multiple bodies were causing SSSN.
"Does anyone know if Neopolitan can make more than one illusion at a time?" Sun asked.
Even Dominic wasn't sure about that. The rest of them seemed just as uncertain.
"Okay, so Neopolitan might have made the illusion of a second ship with a fake-Adam aboard... and a fake Rothy?" Sage summed up.
"Why would he have her make a fake Rothy? How would that even help?"
"Maybe it was for Piter's benefit, not ours, since Piter saw my recording of Rothy admitting to having been with Adam in the city?"
"Recording?" Dominic interrupted. "How would Neo and I have known about you knowing Rothy if she hadn't been with me? Which, for the record, we didn't discuss anyways."
Sage scratched his head. "Yeah, that's true. Prince was the only one with a copy of that."
"Maybe he sent it to the place where Taurus swiped his airship from, and Taurus saw it while stealing his ship?" Scarlet said.
"I mean, I could have, but what actually happened was this: Neo told me that the military station that she was investigating for information about Cinder was keeping Rothy and some other faunus I know prisoners. My brother - Adam - and I went to free them, then I received word from S..." Sun made a barely noticeable shake of his head as his eyes went wide. "...From someone... that things were even worse. Found out from the humans at the base that they were going to attack Ghira and the faunus district, so my brother and I split up to deal with both problems. Neo and I came to deal with the military leadership to stop the bombing of the faunus district while Adam took the girls to Ghira. I have no idea whether or not he succeeded in that, but if anyone can do it, it's him."
"Why would Adam save Ghira Belladonna?" Neptune asked. "I thought they were enemies now?"
"Yeah, he totally foiled his plan to destroy the school."
"Friends, they ain't."
"Just because we differ in our… outlooks… doesn't mean we don't still respect him as a faunus leader." Dominic declared. "Even if he thinks humans can be won over with words, which, given my inability to convince you of the truth…"
Besides, any excuse to kill humans was a good reason! So what if it kept all of Dominic's rivals alive - at least they were faunus rivals.
"Hey!" Sun interjected, "don't say that! Humans can be reasonable! My team is being reasonable right now, and all it is taking is words. If we can come together like this, then it proves that Ghira's right. That there is hope for our species living in peace and harmony!" Sun poked Dom in the chest. "Admit it! I'm right! Ghira's right! Peace is possible!" Sun spun back around to address his team again. "Guys, why can't we just believe him? There's no reason why Adam Taurus can't have an as-of-yet unknown brother. What about innocent until proven Adam? Dominic helped us out a lot: he saved our lives, in fact. He didn't have to! He is not our enemy. Let's just look forward to getting to Vacuo and becoming the best team of huntsmen! Can I get a hooray?"
"Meh. I only cared about the bounty anyways, and if we can't collect that anymore than he can be whoever he wants to say he is."
"Whatever, man. You're the leader. Just so long as he remembers we're all on the same side, too."
"I'll let my protests about present company subside for now, if for no other reason than continued suspicion while restrained is unconducive to my prospects."
Ugh, Sun, you're making me regret being so charming and rational. Seeing Sun's team working in harmony despite their differences of opinion was jarring. In the White Fang, the High Leader was in charge and to question that was to question the faunus. When his subordinates had questioned him, he had reacted much differently than Sun was now. How did SSSN operate in this state of awful democracy? He probably should have just killed these extra humans and sailed himself and Sun to Vale, instead, rather than contribute to some sort of demonstration of Ghira's hopes and dreams. Too late for that now.
Probably.
I wonder if I could sail this ship by myself, he wondered pensively as Sun returned to poking him in the chest for him to join him for a hooray, mocking his ideology like a boob.
It occurred to him that despite his distaste for Sun's methods, his leadership continued - while Adam Taurus' authority over the White Fang had come to a rather bloody conclusion. He could argue all he wanted that the Relic would have lured the grimm in and killed them all, or that the authorities would have nabbed them, but at the end of the day Adam had failed. Because I'd been so distracted by everything else! I'd lost my focus! Obviously Dominic was fixed, thanks to the Relic's power, but that didn't really assuage his guilt for the faunus blood on his blade.
Cammy stepped in and grabbed Sun's hand and pulled it away from Dominic's chest, giving the team leader a look that asked him why he was poking the bull and an askance glance at Dominic wondering why he looked perturbed that his identity was being endorsed. "In any case, I didn't see that Neopolitan girl on the train. Two brothers there, too, no illusions, backing up Dominic's claims of not being Adam."
That video would certainly add weight to his disguise - nobody, not even he, had been aware of Neo's presence on the train that night. However, Dominic, having not ascertained whether or not that video might give away his other clone's existence, decided he should act fast to change the subject. Explaining one twin brother had been chore enough; explaining a second would be a herculean task against an already wary audience. "See? Like I said before, what more proof do you need that I'm telling the truth? I'm just fortunate enough to have a twin brother with such a good reputation. So this has all been very exciting, but maybe we should get some more rest. Someone should shadow Scarlet, learn how to steer this ship so that he can get some sleep."
"Yes. I agree with Ad... with Dominic. Scarlet needs sleep up here." The current captain's weariness came through the scroll's speakers clearly.
Everyone seemed amiable to that, and Dominic's identity seemed safeguarded. The issue was resolved. He felt a bit of tension ease off; now that they trusted who he was, he could work his way towards his minor goals: squeezing Sun for information about what had transpired in Menagerie, and figuring out how Sun made this team of oddballs function as a team so Dom could use that to rebuild his White Fang and bring humanity to its knees in obedience to the rightful masters of Remnant! The faunus! Led by him!
"Hold up a moment, Cammy." Sun said suddenly. "You said that you made the video of Dominic and Adam while you were hanging out of the flagship, right?"
"Yes. Not going to be my happiest memory, but a strong one."
"How exactly did you record the memory to your scroll?"
"My semblance, innit?" Cammy replied slowly. "It created the video on my scroll."
"Yeah, but how did you tell it to do that?"
"I dunno... it must have been instinct?"
"You can train her semblance later, man." Scarlet complained. "Someone come up here and relieve me of steering duty already. Going to fall asleep at the helm here."
"Cammy, you had two scrolls when this happened, though." Sun told her. "You'd had Jupiter's scroll, too; that's why he was after you when you were hanging out the window."
The human paled. "Oh no! You mean I might have made a copy of what I saw on both?"
"Did your semblance make any other memory-movies, or just that one?" Scarlet asked.
"Just the one, then I made the other one of the train fight half an hour ago..."
"Which means that Jupiter knows that I have a brother." Dominic said glumly. Letting the Mistral human authorities know about the two of them had not been intentional. He'd have to let his errant selves know about this.
"So will he go after Adam or you?" Sage asked. "Or, is that even a question? I guess he'll just come after the both of you. He doesn't lack the forces to do so. Anyways, I'm gonna go up and learn how to steer this ship. I've had the most sleep of us lately, I think. Not by choice..."
"Yeah, I'm just going to sleep now... Adrenaline and excitement is finally wearing out." Cammy relayed, staggering to follow Sage out.
Dominic looked at Sun. "What do we do about your partner? If his semblance is water control, he will wreck the ship when his aura recharges. We can sedate him or keep him without aura."
"Dude, I don't even know."
"How about you involve me in this conversation?" Neptune demanded. "Like I'm a person in this room possessed of a voice?"
"Okay, what do you think we should do?"
"Head to the nearest shoreline and get off this boat."
"Noted." Sun said, giving his partner a big thumbs-up, then turned back to Dominic. "Okay, so sedate or keep without aura." He pulled at his hair in frustration at the necessity of making such a decision.
"Hey!" Neptune protested.
Dominic looked at Neptune. "He's more useful to us awake than asleep, so if this is up to a… vote… I say we keep tapping him so that he doesn't get his aura back. Otherwise we're going to run out of earth dust to patch holes real quick."
"We can't just keep him prisoner here. That's... nobody would want that. It'd be so boring for so long. It's a long way to Vacuo."
"We could call it 'Faunus-Human Relations Experience Training'; you know, show the rich human noble what it's like for the faunus his empire was built on the backs of."
Sun visibly paled. "Man, how rough do faunus outside of Vacuo have it? I mean, Vale was bad after the attack, but you're talking about institutionalized oppression that I've never even heard of."
"What, you haven't heard of dust?" Dominic smirked. "Who do you think mines it for so cheap and how? Children. Little kids. Because they don't get to grow up more often than not. Little hands to get into the crevices where the dust hides in the rock, darkvision to save on the bottomline lighting costs." Dominic held up his hands, wiggling his fingers to imitate children's arms contorting in the tunnels of Solitas. His smirk turned into a manic grin as he recalled how many times he had nearly died digging dust out of the cold rock beneath the tundra.
Sun stood in stupefied silence for a moment. "Okay. Okay, we aren't just going to tie him up and keep him powerless with nothing to do." Sun gestured around the luxurious cabin. "There's lots of books in here. He likes books. We can read to him."
"You can read to him."
"Aw, come on. The journey will be boring anyways. We can do it in shifts! You can pick the book, Neptune likes 'em all, he's a total nerd!"
"No, I mean, you can read to him. I can't. I'm... not that literate." Dominic admitted. "Not comfortable reading out-loud."
Sun looked shocked, an expression that Dominic kept making appear on the blonde's face.
Dominic didn't like admitting to his weakness, showing vulnerability, so he quickly added, "I know all my letters and stuff, but it just takes me a while to put them together."
"Is it because of the eyepatch?"
Dominic shrugged. His one-eyed vision wasn't terrible, but he wasn't going to show off his brand to these guys if he could avoid it. That and his history with the SDC as a kid would call his disguise into question. "I can read a bit, but not fast or well."
"Okay, then you can practice reading with me. Any entertainment that might distract me from the fact that my teammates put. Me. On. A. Boat." Neptune shrilled. "Honestly, maybe I should trust the terrorist... sorry, terrorist's brother more than you three. At least I can't blame him for doing this with knowledge of how I react to water!"
Dominic saw no need to correct him by relating that he had, in fact, been partial to Neptune's team discussing his phobia as an impediment to their travel arrangements. Unlike his teammates, I just didn't give a shit about it.
Neptune continued. "Go get some sleep. Sun can 'watch over me' for now. When you wake up, we can start your lessons."
"I'm not tired. I don't actually need to sleep much. I guess if this is what we're going to do, we can start it up now." Dominic walked over to the bookcase and looked for something thin.
"Alright. Got a plan! I shall go straight to sleep now... And remember, Neptune, if you do start spraying everything with your semblance again, just try to think of all these precious, precious books that would get ruined if you did. So many, many books. Such a loss of academia..." Sun said cheerfully, gave a large yawn, then fell flat on his face onto the bed with Neptune, where he immediately fell asleep.
Dominic brought his chosen book over to Neptune, who had Dom give it a fast flip-through after showing off the title on the spine. "Fairy tales, eh? Good enough I guess. Lots of pictures." Neptune looked at Sun for a few seconds until the faunus gave a little half-snort, half-snore. "One other thing... I didn't want to ask, but, my cousin? Piter. Is he still...?"
"Alive. Still a thorn in our sides. We destroyed his ship and got him nice and distracted. Even if there are tracking devices aboard, we sent his forces on a wild goose-chase after Neo in my low-fuel airship, so we have a solid lead to get away. At this point we should be far enough out to sea that they won't risk sending aircraft out after us. Wind out here gets too strong for them." Dominic said, then, at the sight of Neptune's horrified face, added, "Sun made sure we avoided casualties."
Neptune let out a relieved breath. "Thanks," he said after a moment of letting the information sink in. "I didn't want to ask the other guys, because it might seem sketchy, but it's not like I care what Adam Taurus or his brother think of my family situation. What else happened after I got knocked out? Are we actual criminals, or just at odds with the authorities? I mean, the Cloud Olympus was not an inexpensive ship. That thing was a flying fortune. I mean, this boat is pretty swanky, too, but the Olympic is just a little rowboat compared to the floating parade palace. When you say that you destroyed his ship, how badly wrecked is it?"
You don't care what I think of you? Ignoring the stinging verbal barb and managing not to sulk and pout, Dominic tried his best to fill Neptune in on what he'd missed: Sun's insistence on being heroic via non-homicidal tactics, how he'd sort of blown up a blimp with a fire-infused Moonslice - which necessitating a brief tangent into how his semblance let him shoot energy out through his sword, a recounting of how he'd extricated Sage from the rubble, how Piter had used his semblance to carry the burning blimp away to a safe crash distance from the city, and the decision-making process that had led to them parting paths with Neopolitan to get on the yacht.
"Damn. Wish we could have found a way to purloin an airship capable of flying us to Vacuo."
"Vacuo is a long way through hostile Mistral territory or a slightly shorter way over open ocean, unless you want to fly along the Dark Coast..." Dominic stated. He wondered briefly where Hazel and his kids were going. Where is Salem's base? It would be odd - and just Dominic's luck - to discover that it was in Vacuo somewhere. Brazen's ship had taken most of the dust, so if Hazel wanted to he could probably make it by airship to Vacuo. Cinder's faction's alliance with the creatures of grimm would mean he'd probably have no compunction against using the Dark Coast to avoid the ocean gales.
"Yeah, Mistral airships are not great at flying over water for long periods... which is why they can become boats in a pinch. A bullhead would have been better." Neptune explained while trying to innocuously test the strength of the restraints keeping him tied to the large bed. "No offense intended. Or is it offensive? Are you a bull-faunus?"
Dominic looked up and rubbed one of the hard protrusions that made combing his hair a difficulty. "Not sure. Share the trait with Adam, but it's not like either one of us knew who our parents were. Outside of a brother, I've never met any faunus with horns like mine. I sort of adopted his last name when we met, since I didn't have one prior. We didn't grow up together, like most faunus in our situation." Not a lie. Before I met my brothers, I didn't exist, so I couldn't have a last name! As for other faunus in my situation, I don't think any faunus has ever made use of the Relic of Choice before. "As he tells it, the name Taurus was something he adopted on his own based on a nickname the other faunus had for him in Mantle."
"Oh? What was that?"
Dominic took a deep breath. It wasn't like he'd hated the name, and it wasn't embarrassing. Plus, I'm Dominic, not Adam. "Minotaur of Mantle. No idea why, but I - I and Adam, that is - have an easy time figuring out underground caves. Hard to get lost."
"So that was a name he liked?"
"It was a name." Dominic said immediately, without thinking. Not Adam. I'm not Adam. Keeping up this ruse was hard sometimes. "Probably not, I mean, but having any name is better than no name at all. The nickname and reputation made the SDC give him more dangerous work... but... he did survive. Sort of a cursed blessing. Anyways, that's where the name comes from."
"Thanks for sharing. About yourself and what happened after I got knocked out." Neptune smiled wistfully. "Guess we can call our stand against Piter a win, even if it's probably cost us our futures in Mistral. Good thing we're going to Vacuo instead of Argus. My mother will want to slap me sideways, I reckon." He breathed and let a morose expression grace his face. Unlike a faunus, Neptune had had hope of a fruitful future in his nation. He handed the book back to Dominic. "Alright, let's see what you can do."
"Ugh, it's so much easier to just use a text-to-speech program on my scroll..."
Neptune replied that those wouldn't help him with hardcopy print. Dominic sat down in the bed on Neptune's side, opposite of where Sun was snoring quietly.
Dominic squinted at the letters on the page, and over the course of the next minute sounded out the title. "The... Story of the... Seasons."
"Nice." Neptune said. "That's a good one."
Dominic rolled his eye. It wasn't like there was much better to do, but it still pained him to be the one that was the butt of the joke here. "You know, if I'm training to read, maybe you should try training your semblance. It'd be a lot easier for us if we didn't have to babysit you. How'd a human with water powers end up afraid of water? Seems to me it is where you should feel most at-ease."
"Um, it's mostly because of how I unlocked it. It's best if we just keep me at 0% or, better yet, put me on shore as quickly as possible." Neptune said hopefully.
"Dark Coast isn't that far, but it is far from hospitable."
"Okay, not on the Dark Coast!"
"I told you where the name Taurus came from. Least you can do in exchange is tell me why you're afraid of getting wet."
"What are you, the fairness police all of a sudden?" Neptune chewed on his lip a little. He looked at the sleeping form of Sun. "Okay, but you don't tell the others. It's... embarrassing."
Dominic nodded.
Neptune continued in a whisper. "I'm careful around water because it is so tempting to tap into. I know that if I do, I won't be able to control it like I need to. It's dangerous. So as a huntsman, I've focused on my martial abilities, honing my aura, and, of course, furthering my intellectual breadth. When I first unlocked my semblance, I... I nearly drowned my brother. It is hard to control, like holding water. Control slips so easily out of my fingers, and then crazy stuff happens. Water is always all around me, and I can always feel it. When it's in my body it isn't so bad, like holding a water balloon instead of trying to just hold loose water. At least when it is inside me, controlling it won't hurt anyone else." Neptune went quiet for a moment and began to blush beet red. "Well, that is to say, won't adversely affect them on its own. But nevermind what I had to do to outlast those soldiers. It's not like I make a habit of using my semblance for personal performance-boosts, it was just a desperate situation. Had to keep the balloon full and firm, yeah?"
Dominic had no idea what he was talking about, but nodded to reassure the human. "Why not train with it on your own, away from anyone you could hurt?"
"Because there's a solid possibility I'd drown myself or something." Neptune said, then added with a pout, "and also because I just don't wanna! I can be a fine huntsman without relying on my semblance like others do, without going anywhere near water."
"What if... drowning wasn't an issue?"
"Atlas mechs can still get shorted out by water damage." Neptune replied. "Believe me. Parents got me one of those for my fifteenth birthday. Poor Mr. No-Face. The Argus garrison techs couldn't even get him working again afterwards."
"I wasn't talking about an Atlas droid." Dominic replied tersely, his memories of Atlas technologies less than pleasant. "I might have been blessed with these handsome horns, but not all faunus are. I know a fair few who spend most of their time in the shore waters of Kuo Kuana because they have gills."
Neptune looked thoughtful. Like most humans, he'd habitually discounted the faunus. "They live in the water? Aquatic faunus?"
BRAZEN
Wednesday
It wasn't like Adam had never been cognizant of the existence of aquatic faunus. It was just that he always assumed that they lived separated from the troubles that plagued the rest of his people. Even faunus with wings still had to sleep on the ground, but aquatic faunus could just live in the ocean - right? He assumed the ones he'd seen as a teenager, frolicking in the waves along the shore of Kuo Kuana, had just been visiting from some magical underwater realm safely detached from the troubles of land life. Their aquatic traits made them ill-suited to his own focus on a land-war against human opponents. If a faunus had claws or ears, they were an asset. If they had gills or flippers, then unless a target was near water, they were less of an asset. Still more valuable than a human. He hadn't felt guilty about ignoring them on the assumption that they were doing better than he was.
As it turned out, they generally weren't.
Shelly snorted derisively after Brazen explained his presumptions about faunus life at sea. "Just because I have fins doesn't mean I can breathe underwater!" She kept laughing as she held up her elbows and the sea-turtle fins that sprouted gracefully out from them. "And even if I had gills, I wouldn't have fins! We only get one animal trait after all."
"I always thought Adam was some sort of evil mastermind." Giggled Shelly's friend, Eileen (or, as Shelly called her, Eeleen). "Turns out he's dumb as a rock."
Brazen wanted to argue against it with a claim that he'd thought there were underwater tunnels full of air pockets for finned faunus to reside in, but he knew when to stop digging himself into a hole. Trapped in a mess hall that had been converted into a makeshift infirmary for the wounded on Ghira's ship, he decided he'd be better off taking a page out of Neo's playbook and tried to keep his mouth shut for a while.
It wasn't that he wasn't grateful to the sea turtle and eel-traited faunus who'd rescued him from drowning; he was quite happy to have survived with their assistance. They hadn't taken any chances with him, even though his body had been badly burned and broken. He'd been stuck in a full-body cast for his burns and broken limbs, then shackled to an infirmary bed. Despite his gratitude, he felt like the restraints were a bit unnecessary. They were just being overly cautious.
Lucky for them that they were a bit paranoid about him. They hadn't yet realized that his triple-charged aura had already fixed up most of his damage. Any regular person would take months to recover underneath the bandages. He could already feel the tingling itch on his furthest extremities - an annoyance he bore with stubborn patience - of his scarred skin flaking off as a fresh layer grew.
"You know what's also like a rock? His body." Eeleen went on. She let her hand trace up and down his stomach, where the bandages and burns didn't cover him. Or his clothes, wherever they had gotten to if they'd survived the blast. "This guy's got muscles in a bad boy way all day. Besides, there's nothing wrong with a boy being a bit stupid."
Shelly nodded her agreement. She slid up next to him and poked at his abs, too. "That outfit you were wearing. I know where ya bought it, because I'm the one who made it. Which tells me where you do your shopping, bad boy."
Brazen could say that things had turned out badly for him, but he was at least mollified in his outrage by the fact that Lichen and the rest of the girls he'd rescued from the city had made it onto Ghira's ship, too. Shelly had said that they were in an audience with the chieftain of Menagerie, explaining what was happening and why. Hopefully arguing in favour of letting Brazen out of this bondage soon.
"I bet you're right at home in those tight bandages, aren't ya?" Shelly continued. "I wrapped you up myself. I wonder what other fun stuff you bought from the store? Ooooh, I wonder how they're doing. Mossy was always such a total pain in my butt. I bet she misses me now that I've left!"
"Shame you didn't pack any of those sexy nurse costumes. I think he's upset that we're not dressed for the part."
"It's not like we had a lot of notice that we could board the ships!" Shelly replied.
Eeleen went out to the hallway for a moment to inquire with some passerby about what was going on elsewhere aboard the ship, since they were isolated playing nurse for Brazen. He had told Eeleen and Shelly a brief overview of what had happened in the city, trying as best as he could to paint his actions as the selfless, heroic endeavours of a champion for faunus rights such as himself, so they weren't being kept totally out of the loop. They had been 'awarded' the duty of watching him because they'd been the ones to pull his limp body aboard after he'd fallen into the sea. "What do you think the Menagerie folk plan to do with him?"
"Seems like it would be a waste to execute him or anything, especially if what he said is true. He might be a dangerous lunatic, but at least he's on our side. Sort of. I mean, his intentions are probably somewhat honest in wanting to help us, right?"
"I don't know. You heard his slogan after he took over the White Fang, didn't you? If humanity is declaring another war on us, he's probably to blame for it. Heck, we shouldn't even believe a word he's said. For all we know the attack was all his fault!"
"That's not true!" Brazen protested, breaking his vow of silence. "I came here to protect faunus' lives! From human cruelty!"
Which he had done; the vessel that the bombers had sunk had managed to get all its passengers into lifeboats in time. No faunus had been killed. Ironically, the only casualties of the attack had been some human crewmembers that had been unfortunate enough to be working on the top deck.
Oh, and probably a lot of humans that had been on the aircraft he'd shot down. Brazen thought of how many humans had died, compared to the number of faunus casualties, assessed the ratio, and smirked. Not a bad day's work.
"Are you sure about that?" Shelly jabbed at him with a stick. "You seemed pretty sure faunus like me lived in underwater cities like in the movies. Maybe you just were misinformed."
"What a big brute he is!"
"We should take selfies with him in the background."
"Oh totally!"
"If his attack on Beacon hadn't taken out international communications, I could send Mossy the pic! Ooooh, she'd be so jealous. She always had a fetish for faunus guys."
"Can't blame her for that." Eeleen said, her hand retaking its perch on Brazen's torso.
Why did I open my mouth?
After enduring exclusion from the interesting activities aboard the ship for what was starting to feel like hours, a familiar figure came into the room to check on him. He'd never had much interaction with Blake's mother, but the similarities between mother and daughter were easy to see. She strode gracefully up to his bed, then bent over as she greeted him. "Hello there, Adam. Are you getting hungry? What would you like to eat?"
Brazen kept the gaze of his good eye fixed firmly on the woman's face, determined not to stray from making eye contact with her. To look upward would be to see the faunus cat ears Blake had inherited from her, a painful reminder of Bedlam. To look lower would be to take advantage of how low she was bent over and how her loose top was letting a generous amount of her cleavage show. "Cucumber sandwich?" He answered.
She nodded, but kept leaning over in the same position. Like she was daring him to ogle her or something. "Alright dear, I'll see what I can do. Say, do you want me to check your scroll for any messages or such? I could bring it over here for you so that you would at least know how your aura is recovering and what time it is." She pointed at the corner of his bed, letting him see in his peripheral vision how the stretch of her arm widened the opening of her top. "I could just stick it over there by your feet so that you could see it." She paused for a moment, then added, "but I'd need to unlock it for you to do that. What's your scroll password?"
Brazen focused on her cat ears as she pointed to the corner of the bed, as even his limited peripheral vision was enough to distract him with how her chest swayed as she made the gesture. He tried to keep his mind focused, but the rest of his body was led to think of Neo and the things they had done with one another over the past few days. The way Kali's chest swung back and forth as she hovered in front of him was innocuously stimulating, insisting that his mind's focus was distracted.
I wonder how good an impression of Blake's mom Neo could pull off with her semblance…
"Adam?" She asked again after a moment with a kind smile.
"What?" He asked, forcing eye contact with her again.
"Your scroll password, dear?"
She was holding his scroll in her hands. She must have had it from the start, while innocently not-quite-flashing him and offering him food. He was getting rather hungry... it had been most of a day since he'd eaten. Not to mention he'd started to develop a taste for another sort of fare, thanks to Neo.
The gentle rocking motion of the ship atop the waves must have been responsible for much of his plight, Brazen thought blankly, as Kali's chest continued to sway. Back and forth. Back and forth.
"What's your password, Adam?"
Back and forth.
"Do you want anything else on your sandwich, Adam?"
Back and forth.
"Maybe some music to help you relax on your scroll, Adam? You kids all have personal playlists on these things these days…"
Back and forth.
"I can unlock it for you, dear."
Brazen shook his head fiercely. "Sorry, no, just the sandwich, please. I don't need anything on my scroll." He looked past Kali. "What have they decided to do with me?"
Kali straightened up and looked back at the door, frowning slightly. "Oh, we haven't started talking about what to do with you, yet. The situation with Mistral's government is more dire, while you're not really much of an issue right now." She waved her hand to gesture at his bandaged, shackled body.
Brazen couldn't tell if she was telling the truth or not. She was hard to read - another trait Blake must have inherited from her. It made sense that they'd focus on the issue of why Mistral would launch a surprise attack, rather than deal with a disarmed and captive freedom fighter. I'm so small a threat to them right now they had a pair of civilians watching my behaviour. He looked around and realized Shelly and Eeleen were gone. When did they leave? "I wouldn't mind being dropped off on the shore here, actually. Places to be and such."
"We'll see." Kali said curtly. Her tone told him that the chances of him being let go were slim-to-none. "My husband and I aren't particularly fond of how we saw you treating Blake. I'm sure there are a few more people with grievances they'd like to air about your tenure as High Leader of the White Fang... so letting you go without some debate isn't an option."
Brazen sighed. Serves me right for getting caught. "Well, is there anything you can tell me?"
"Well I can tell you that saving those four women from captivity, even if you did it in your typical way with your sword rather than your head, is a point in your favour. They even told us about how well you are getting along with certain humans. Maybe not the right sort of humans, but it still shows some level of character development on your part." Kali replied slowly.
Brazen understood her to be saying that his meeting with Hazel, and his association with Neo, wasn't being kept secret from his hosts.
"Why didn't you ever mention you had a brother before?"
Dammit, Lichen! He hadn't planned on trying to keep his lie going against Ghira, who probably knew him best of all the nearby faunus. Ilia was a close second, but since she'd spent her childhood in Atlas rather than in Mantle they had only really met when they'd joined the Fang.
"I didn't know I had one until very recently." Brazen said quickly, hoping that the simplicity of his fiction regarding his twin would keep it and his newfound power safe from exposure. "We get along well."
"It would be nice to meet him someday." Kali said cheerfully.
"So you can arrest him for doing what's necessary, too?" Brazen considered if Dominic would be able to plead double jeopardy - certainly they couldn't try him for the same actions (not crimes!) twice. "What do you think they're going to do with me? Execution? Seems like a poor thanks for saving you all."
Kali frowned. "We have a jail in Menagerie. It already holds enough of your minions, it could hold you, too, if a trial deems it proper. They've been rather cooperative after their defeat, which has led to them all getting reduced sentences. If you cooperated, you could probably get the same. See, some value faunus lives enough to not want to kill one another unnecessarily, but the White Fang will stand for peace and cooperation between all people of Remnant."
Brazen doubted that his followers in Menagerie had been treated kindly for philosophical reasons, or that he would be put in prison for long. It was more likely that Menagerie didn't have enough guards to staff the prison, wanted to appear gracious, and, most importantly, recognized that with a Kingdom declaring war on Menagerie, they'd need all the skilled fighters - no matter how ethically superior to themselves - they could field.
They wanted him to feel indebted to them, releasing him early on condition of him becoming a defender of their lands from danger.
I don't have time to do community service in Menagerie, though. I need to get back to tracking down Cinder. I need to be the one to figure out her secrets, Salem's secrets, so that I can position myself to ensure the faunus' survival in the world to come.
"Keeping you from getting bombed isn't considered 'cooperative'?" Brazen huffed, "how much more cooperative have my prior associates been?"
"It's more about the combination of intention, action, and willingness to listen to others rather than just charging forwards." Kali snapped back, before moving away. "I'll fetch you something to eat."
She tucked his scroll into her pocket, clearly disappointed she hadn't been able to get any secrets out of him.
Brazen was left alone to ponder how he would navigate whatever sham of a trial they intended to run him through. He pondered that, and was also appreciative of how thickly wrapped and tight Shelly had made the bandages around his waist.
Cat ears weren't the only similarity between the ladies Belladonna.
ADAM TAURUS
Adam had become so used to the green environment it had startled him when the colour had shifted, mixed now with striking shades of blue and teal.
I think they made the Relic of Choice circular for her benefit. The blue newcomer said with a facial expression that itself spoke of her utter disdain for his erstwhile companion. If Adam had thought Dai to be rather immodest, Blue (for lack of an actual introduction) was even more so - if her attire was any indication. Dai, at least, usually wore her chasuble. She had the chasuble, at least. It was an option! The newcomer wore jewellery, and only jewellery. If being around Dai hadn't desensitized him to feminine nudity, then he might have had trouble knowing where to look when talking to them. This way, even if her bearer was ignorant of the power they held, she could at least get something shoved into her hole.
Bitch! Dai accused, floating angrily in a tight circle in the air.
Skank! Blue mirrored Dai's flight, so that each of them were spiraling around in the air, facing off against one another.
Adam's decision to remain as an impartial observer of Dai's spat with Blue was just as much due to his lack of understanding of why they were quarrelling as it was other concerns. Namely, keeping Bedlam's screen lifted up as it kept trying to sink into the 'ground'. "So do I get to make use of the other relic now that you're here?" He asked through gritted teeth.
No, but as the generous and beautiful Warden of Knowledge, I will freely tell you that Dai has been telling you the truth, but only in ways that suit her fancy. As usual for one of her treacherous, poor-mannered ilk. You have more power here than she lets on. Blue explained quickly, then followed it up with because she is a thirsty, depraved-
Adam didn't keep paying attention, even as Dai started hurling clumps of green mist at Blue. I don't need the incarnation of knowledge to tell me what I already know. He had more interesting things to worry about than tantalizing hints and alien nudity. Bedlam was awake and, as suspected when his screen had begun to sink, surrounded by grimm. Apparently he'd somehow obtained the Relic of Knowledge while Adam had been struggling to keep his morale raised, hence the sudden intrusion of Blue. If the two creatures hadn't immediately began arguing, Adam would have relished the new company. Instead, their bickering was a distraction from his attempt to watch what Bedlam was up to. Thanks to his perspective of all of his split selves, he knew the control over the grimm was because Bedlam was carrying Salem's horrid little messenger around in his pocket.
The powers of the Relic of Choice are a lure to the creatures of grimm, but grant Bedlam no control over them. The voluptuous blue newcomer added her own commentary: I do enjoy his thought processes, however. All three of you can be quite smart when you take the time to stop being so bullheaded. I do so enjoy cleverness.
"I assume you are Dai's counterpart from the Relic of Knowledge?" Adam asked her, "and not just some random visitation."
She nodded.
"You didn't say your name." Adam stated. He didn't feel like referring to her as 'Blue' forever. He looked at Dai. "Do you want to introduce me to your… peer?"
Dai hmphed at his words, floating back over to put herself between Adam and the interested gaze of the blue feminine creature. I would hardly consider her my peer. On that note, by the rules, I cannot tell you her name unless you already know it. Or if Bedlam guesses her name while he is in possession of the ugly trinket she is bound to.
Which seems like it will not be for much longer. Blue said with her detached tone, watching Bedlam laying a trap for Team RWBY with the Relic of Knowledge as bait. It was pleasant to meet you in person, Adam Taurus. Do not-
Whatever she intended to tell him not to do was cut off as she vanished. Everything was green again.
Oh, do not mind her. She always ends her conversations enigmatically. It is my theory that she enjoys teasing people's curiosity.
Adam had doubts, but, with the blue bombshell gone, it wasn't like he could get a second opinion.
As he watched Bedlam fail to capture Blake or the Relic of Knowledge in the tunnels under the farm, he knew it might be a while before he got to see Dai's blue counterpart again.
Not that he needed any more enigmas in his life right now. He already had Dai and Salem to figure out, and at this point he was getting close to counting Neopolitan as another.
"Well, it was nice meeting her, whatever her name was." Adam said wistfully, already missing the additional company. "So if the Seer is letting Bedlam control these Apathy grimm, what let Ruby destroy them? I doubt the Relic of Knowledge is more powerful than the Relic of Choice in that regard."
Certainly not. The Relic of Choice is by far superior - especially insofar as Wardens are concerned. Dai huffed, then pointed at the other screens in an obvious attempt to change the topic. Bedlam looks like he has a long walk through the snow again, but Brazen and Neopolitan are setting up something interesting with that ceiling fan…
The diminished presence of grimm around Bedlam allowed Adam to stop being responsible for holding it up. Now it floated like a balloon; it still kept falling, but Adam had time to make a little rudimentary platform of greenstuff under it to keep it propped up. He had to wonder if it was the actual material, or his own willpower and effort in piling it up that made it function as more solid than the 'ground' here. He made similar props under Brazen and Dominic's screens, just in case.
Blue had said that he had more power in Between Realms than Dai had let on. He had plenty of time to ruminate over Blue's clues while watching what the three of him were doing.
