Alright guys, so heres the thing. I only got about four months left in the army. And I just got back from JRTC. And well, it was a total shit show, we had cases of covid, cases of mono, a shit ton of heat casualties, a helicopter dropped a howitzer, and of course the fucking hurricane hit us.

Literally was the work of Loki.

But some good news, I'm working on my terminal leave packet, and I've also been talking with the Anchorage Police Department of Alaska to go up there to test to become a police officer up there. Which would get me the fuck out of Illinois.

Anyways, some more good news, my final student loan is at 2500 right now, so I've almost got that whipped. I'm also getting a slight pay raise before I get out, so thats extra money in my pocket. And with any luck by the time I move to Alaska I'll have either a new Jeep or a new Dodge Ram, it all depends on what suits my needs best.

Winter had been quiet, after Jem had made her a serving of eggs, bacon and some pancakes. He put on Alaska State Troopers and sat next to Nala who was happily digging into her breakfast without a care in the world. Winter had never been so confused in her life. Had this girl shown up with them? No, she would have noticed by now. More importantly she wasn't even in the group when they came. So where did she come from? Winter had never been so confused in her life. Especially since she knew the only way they all got here was due to some kind of dust accident, and the odds of someone actually figuring out the mixture this fast would be..

Wait a minute, she remembered how her drone had footage of their campsite. But even then, whoever found the footage couldn't possibly have reversed engineered the dust THAT fast right? That was some deus ex machina bullshit right there! And even so, even if they did reverse engineer it, what would be the point of sending a child through? Again! More questions than answers.

"Would you like some more bacon?" Jem asked Nala.

"YES PLEASE!" She said as Jem threw some more bacon on her plate.

"There you go little one." He said as Nala just giggled as Winter was still processing what was going on.

"Oh yeah...uhm, Winter this is Nala, Nala this is Winter." Jem said as Nala smiled and waved.

"Hi Miss Winter!" She said as Winter had to admit, the little girl was adorable.

Even when she had a piece of bacon hanging out of her mouth.

"Mr. Jem, is this your girlfriend?" At this Winter sputtered and Jem laughed.

"Nope, just another out of place traveler like yourself." He said as Nala got sparkly eyes.

"You're also from Remnant?!" Nala was excited to see she wasn't alone.

Winter just nodded, her brain still shut own by what she was seeing. None of this was making any logical sense in her brain.

Wait a minute, something else wasn't making sense. If Nala was a faunus and was from Remnant, wouldn't she recognize Winter as a schnee? She knew about her familys reputation amongst the faunus and couldn't believe this little girl didn't recognize her, she wasn't glaring, which meant that she must not know who Winter was. So either she was very polite and hiding her malice, or she legit had no idea who she was.

"So uhm, Nala came here in an explosion when dust fell on her, from what I could gather." Jem said as Nala was taking a few bites out of her pancakes.

"Mhmm! I was just trying to run away from the men in black, and next thing I know, I hit that shelf of dust, and Kablooey! Here I am!" She said as she took a bite out of a sausage link.

Well, that helped clear some of Winter's questions up, well except for the men in black part, and the part about Nala somehow having access to a dust facility, and somehow stumbling across what could only be a secret project? Actually the more she thought about it, all it did was create more questions!

"Ooooff, I haven't eaten that good in a long time." Nala said leaning back and yawning like a sleepy kitty.

"..." Winter couldn't explain it, but she felt a sudden need to hug Nala, but she restrained herself.

"None of makes any sense.." Winter couldn't believe it, this was all just too convenient.

"To quote you and the others...Anime logic." Jem smirked as Winter glared.

He was not seriously going to use their own joke against them! And yet he just did!

"WOOF WOOF!" Nala's tail perked up at that.

"Could it be?" She asked as she suddenly saw the door to the motorhome burst open.

Only to see a big fluffy dog with a kitten riding on top of it with their tails wagging.

"DOGGY! KITTY!" Nala suddenly zoomed over and started playing with both Zeus and Kirby.

Jem was looking at the three of them playing around like little balls of fluff and he could think of only one thing.

"So apparently Blake is just the odd feline faunus out when it comes to being afraid of dogs."

"So cute!" Nala said as she was currently using one hand to pet Kirby under the chin and her other hand to give Zeus a belly rub.

"Nooooooooo! I told you you don't ride on top of his he-" Blake came to confront Kirby and saw Nala.

"Huh? What? Whadda?" She was confused as she saw the lion tail coming out of the girl.

Nala meanwhile looked up and saw Blake's cat ears.

"Oh cool! You're a faunus too!" She said as suddenly Blake had no idea what the fuck to think.

"Uhm...what? When? HOW?" She asked as she had never seen this little girl before, and she was certain she didn't come with them.

Blake would have noticed another faunus running around.

"I'm Nala! Whats your name?" Nala asked as she shook Blakes hand.

"...Blake..." She was still having trouble processing this.

"Nala, why don't you go play with Zeus and Kirby outside for a bit?" Jem asked as she nodded and proceeded to go play with the doggo and kitten.

"EXPLAIN." Blake and Winter said as soon as she left.

Jem sighed as he took a sip of his coffee.

"Well to be honest, I'm still confused, so you both know I went on my little weekend getaway to go camping, I had just found a nice place to set up camp, I was cooking up some steak, and then the next thing I know, I see a big ass flash, and I see her faceplant into the ground in front of me. And the first thing she did after realizing she wasn't home was ask me for a steak...and well, I couldn't say no to her, look at how adorable she is!" Jem said pointing to the little lion faunus who was currently being licked by both Zeus and Kirby and giggling while her tail wagged.

"..." Winter had to admit that was one of the most adorable things she had ever seen.

"But how? How could she possibly have gotten here?" Blake asked.

"Well theres anime lo-"

"That doesn't work for you, you're not an anime character." Blake said as Jem groaned.

"I may as well be because right now it seems like I'm in some bullshit manga like Love Hina where the character gets screwed over." At this Blake shifted her attention.

"Thats a romance manga..."

"Yeah a bad one where the women abuse the fuck out of the main character, seriously I hate that anime trope, if that happened in real life, people would be calling the cops." Jem honestly couldn't stand when the male characters in manga and anime got their asses kicked all the time by mentally unstable teenage girls.

"Fair enough, but your life isn't a romance manga." Blake pointed out.

"Yeah fair enough, but the point is at this point I may as well be an anime protagonist with all the crazy shit going on."

"Again I see your point, but the point is anime logic doesn't work for you."

Jem grumbled as he decided not to argue any futher. Odin knows they were being dicks about it.

"So you see a little girl appear out of nowhere and your first reaction is to feed her? Your grandma would be proud." Winter said as Jem puffed his chest out in pride.

"Honestly shes a good kid, plus, when she started explaining to me her...well her life story, I couldn't help myself, she needed some help and some time to relax." Blake looked confused.

"What do you mean?"

"She...she told me she's an orphan and she's been working on Menagerie at a dust store." At this Blake went silent.

"Child labor laws aren't a thing in Remnant?" He asked as Blake sighed.

"It's not that they're not a thing, its just that with the amount of orphans on Menagerie, sometimes its inevitable, either they work or starve, not everyone can afford to take in another mouth to feed, as much as my family hates it, its really hard to feed everyone when money runs low and disasters keep happening." She said remembering the amount of storms and disasters that happened on her home island.

"Shame..." Jem said as he looked out the window.

"Well, she's here now, so lets just try to help her be a kid." He said as he walked outside to go play with her.

"..." Winter was quiet as she had never seen Jem this serious about something.

"Surprised?" Blake asked drawing Winter out of her stupor.

"Huh what?"

"I mean, I haven't seen this side of him, its almost kind of fatherly." She said as Winter watched how Jem was now playing with Nala and Zeus.

"Its actually refreshing..." Winter admitted there was something appealing about it.

"It is, I mean I know he can be serious, but he also seems to act high on life, this time he seems to be reeling it in a bit.

Winter looked out and noticed how Jem was now swinging Nala by her arms in a circle.

"That doesn't look safe." Winter said feeling a little worried.

"Nah, look at her shes having a blast, my dad used to do that all the time." Blake remembered those times fondly.

"Its peaceful, to think we're in a world with no faunus discrimination, this is the first time I've been able to truly relax without having to worry about anything." Blake said as Winter raised an eyebrow.

"What are you talking about? You still have to hide, the humans here wouldn't understand."

"Actually, most of them just think I'm a cosplayer, or something called a tiktoker...I don't know what it is, but I'm not sure I like it." Blake was just being honest.

"My point is, its kind of refreshing, this world isn't perfect, and its certainly had its problems, but if this world can get through time periods that make ours look like a bad day at school, then we're all going to be just fine."

Blake started to walk outside.

"Where are you going?"

"Well...Jem's grandmother is cooking a tuna casserole and asked me to taste test it." If one looked closely you could see Blake's eyes were lighting up like a kid on Christmas.