Despite Roman's misgivings, the deal was struck and both parties would be seeing each other again. Excusing himself, Roman suggested the two boys scram while they began transferring the dust.
Not wanting to stay any longer, Caelum accepted the suggestion and pulled a shocked Raiden along. The partners were halfway to an unguarded section of gate to make their escape when Raiden suddenly stopped.
Caelum glanced at his partner and without a word, continued on.
"What- What was that back there?!" demanded Raiden in a shaky voice.
Turning again, Caelum saw the frustration on his face. Taking a deep breath he leaned onto one hip, averting his eyes. "I admit my temper flared for a moment. But you had said more than needed so I took over negotiations. Just be glad it wasn't mentioned that we are purchasing from your family's firm."
With an incredulous look and tears stinging the corners of his eyes, Raiden looked up. Staring into Caelum's brown irises he could see the absence of emotion wasn't a trick of the moonlight. "What?" his voice rasped.
Caelum nodded. "It worked out in the end. We've secured a vital line of supply."
With disbelief in his voice, Raiden shouted. His outburst quickly turned to a hiss. "Caelum. You killed someone! In cold blood! He didn't even have aura! And for what?" Raiden's nerves were strung tight, his mind begging for a semblance of reason within an unreasonable turn of events from his leader.
"Raiden" Caelum firmly stated, shaky eyes falling on him as he continued. "Take a breath. He was just a terrorist."
Raiden's eyes dilated slightly at his statement. "J-just" his voice whispered. "Just a terrorist?"
Shocked by the words, Raiden was frozen in place. A cold sweat began to break out on his back as he stared at his partner through the moonlight surrounding them in the dark corners of the docks. Not ten minutes ago he had seen a man take his last breath to try and beg in vain. A sudden snap from Caelum's fingers pulled his attention back to reality.
Back to the moment, Raiden felt a slight fear of his teammate as he protested. "They didn't do anything!"
Caelum's expression changed from indifference to disapproval. A small frown set upon his features. "Did you miss the White Fang outfit? You don't know what he may have or would have done."
"Neither do you! He could have been a new initiate! Someone desperate!"
Exactly why it's best he's gone. "Those who are desperate are rash and die in one of two ways. In their blood or that of others."
Raiden's voice seemed to beg for his partner to see his perspective. "He could have changed Caelum." His eyes filled with fright, failed to see through Caelum's own narrowed with a silent rage.
"They wouldn't have. Even when I gave him a second chance he didn't so much as think of anything other than doubling down and that was with my barrel aimed at his skull. They are terrorists Raiden. They chose their path and I chose mine."
"What was it? What he said? About your honor?"
Caelum glared silently.
"Would you kill me if I was in the way? If I stepped too far out of line?"
Caelum took a heavy breath, not blinking as he answered calmly. "You have the same option Niel does when we graduate. You can go your own way and stay silent about all of this but for now, you're complicit."
'Complicit' that word struck a heavyweight within Raiden's stomach. He was complicit in that man's death. Something completely avoidable when they came for a simple transaction. He felt he wasn't wrong in his thinking yet he couldn't refute Caelum.
"Welcome to life outside your small town. If it helps stifle your nerves, think back to what the White Fang has done in the past decade since their leadership changed half a dozen times. A bullet is a quick mercy compared to being locked up in Vale or even worse, Atlas's prisons being tortured for info."
It was an absurd notion that the governments of Vale or Atlas would use torture yet the certainty with which he declared such left him further questioning his grasp on the world.
Suddenly the night silence was disrupted by a loud blast. Not a few hundred meters from their meeting place, a large explosion had ignited the dock. Both boys turned to the source where the sounds of combat began.
"Get up high" ordered Caelum. Raiden hesitated, unsure of what to do. "What now you're scared of saving lives?" sneered Caelum
"Are you sure it's not about saving your interests?" retorted Raiden.
"Does it matter if they align? I don't want Roman dying and you don't either." A look of doubt from Raiden pushed Caelum to explain. "He dies then there's a power vacuum. Vale gets more dangerous, especially with the Fang around and people start killing to get to the top. Now are you going to help or not?"
With a reluctant nod, Raiden followed Caelum to a rooftop where they moved along the heights till they got a clear view of the situation. Gunfire continued as the boys sat low atop a warehouse, Caelum looking through a pair of small binoculars and Raiden through the HUD system in his glasses.
The small figures in the distance were no more than five hundred meters away and engaged in heavy combat. Below in white and at the center of it all was Torchwick engaged in a vicious melee with two faunus.
At first, it seemed a mutiny perhaps even due to Caelum's actions. On closer inspection, however, it couldn't have. Incapacitated White Fang members lay strewn about the area as Roman fought against the blonde faunus with a tail and a black-clad girl. With an even closer look, they could just make out ears atop the girl's head as she worked against their new business partner.
Raiden's glasses held a better zoom than the bino's his leader held and with exasperation, he spoke. "Is that Blake?"
"Belladonna?!" Caelum leered through his small optics and sure enough, the clothing, the weapons, and the fighting style matched. The blonde faunus was unknown but a fellow student being present was too problematic for him to care otherwise.
'Has someone caught on? Have I been tailed?' Caelum's mind raced with worry as he cast a suspicious glance at his partner whose eyes were glued on the fight. The genuine fear on Raiden's face showed it was a paranoic assumption. He too was fearful they'd been caught.
With the small assurance he didn't have a turncoat for a partner, Calm led Caelum to assume it had to do with Belladonna keeping herself being a faunus secret. The boys watched as their fellow investor seemed to get the upper hand, dispatching Blake and having the blonde faunus at gunpoint.
Caelum was intent on letting things play out as Raiden insisted they intervene on behalf of their classmates when Ruby Rose appeared with Penny Poledina of all people.
The red-clad girl turned to speak with Penny when, quick on his feet, Roman fired a shot and struck Ruby in the torso, sending her flying. Instead of taking the moment to flee, Roman gloated with a loud cackle as Penny stepped forward. What followed left the two boys in disbelief.
The socially awkward ginger flew into battle and easily dispatched a squad of Fang members with swords that seemed to levitate around her. Roman's evac then arrived just in time to lay a strafing run against the poor girl. At least that was the thought before she backpedaled fifty meters and somehow unleashed a beam of energy and tore two of the bullheads in half.
Penny wasn't done just yet as she turned her attention to a third bullhead trying to make off with one of the containers full of the dust that the boys had just sold to Roman. Her blades impaled the flying vehicle and with monstrous strength, she ripped it from the air and cast it down like a toy.
Roman, Ruby, Raiden, and Caelum watched in stupefaction at the sight. Realizing it was time to leave, Roman took to one of the surviving bullheads as it was taking off. The bird began to rattle and shake violently as it fought to gain altitude. Clasping his hat to his head and barely staying aboard with his cane, Roman turned to see the glowing eyes of Penny as she focused on bringing him down as well.
Caelum and Raiden watched as Ruby ran to assist with her rifle drawn to presumably take out the engines and Roman shouted at his pilot. However, they hadn't been idle in their watch from afar.
"Where's that Neo girl?!" asked Raiden plugging his glasses into his Rifle.
Caelum himself was busy preparing his MG and setting the bipod atop the edge of the building. "Hell if I know! Maybe on the first bullheads out? Just get that gun up!"
The two boys had finished their preparations as Penny began reeling Romans bullhead in and Caelum issued an order to Raiden. "One shot! No more than that! Fire in between or even through the buildings just be sure to hit the target when you hear my burst stop!"
"G-got it!" answered Raiden moving to ground level.
There was no time left for deliberation as Caelum saw Ruby taking aim at the bird. Without delay, he squeezed the trigger. Three seconds he held it firm and controlled the extreme recoil and vibrations as seventy-five rounds were sent toward the girls.
His aim wasn't to harm only to scare, the rounds impacted around the girl's feet and sent Ruby scurrying away with rose petals in her wake as Penny pulled half her blades back to defend herself. As Caelum began preparing to pull back he saw Penny staring in his direction, instinctually he ducked down even if it was a preposterous thought that she could see him at this distance.
As instructed Raiden fired right at the end of Caelum's burst. The bright blue light from his rail gun would have given him away if he had not fired from an alley that provided concealment and the projectile pierced through another hangar altogether. Other than Caelum who was high up, no one saw the obscured light except for the fraction of a second it struck its target, a dockside fuel tank.
The explosion was instant, sending Penny flying backward and the resulting updraft nearly toppling the bullhead midair. As the VTOL stabilized and took off, the two boys now making their escape, saw the white figure of Roman waving his bowler at them as he flew into the distance with what was left of their cargo.
There was no time to return the sentiment, the boys would take no more risks. It was possible the other idyllic members of team RWBY weren't far behind and with Penny in their wake, both knew this was not a fight they should take.
Thankfully the Vale police department held up the girls allowing the boys to escape the docks and return to Vale's commercial district.
When in the lamplight of the streets with the occasional passerby, the boys fought to control their breaths as they maintained a brisk pace. They had long since lost any tails but were understandably cautious. Eventually, they had crossed half the commercial district before they slunk into a back alley and began panting, catching their breath, and calming their nerves.
They had just fired on fellow huntsman and aided in the escape of Vale's most wanted. Least of all they had also irreparably damaged that section of the dock with the explosion and alerted half the city with it.
Back against a wall and slumped onto the cold concrete ground, Raiden rustled his hair in distress and frayed nerves. His attention was pulled away by Caelum, still standing and barely restraining his laughter.
Raiden didn't even have the energy to ask what was wrong with him. Caelum would answer without it.
"Ha ha, shit's not going to plan" he muttered shaking his head. Turning to his partner he gave perhaps the widest grin he had seen to date. Perhaps that wasn't the wisest description, however, as Caelum seemed to have taken a manic twist to it. "Congrats, You just saved far more lives than were taken today. Consider your karma fixed.'
With wide eyes, Raiden looked up from beneath his arms and groaned. Shaking his head, he dissented. "You're sarcasm will be the death of me if these missions don't do me in."
"Pfft, it will come for you eventually, be glad I'm putting it to the test now. After all, where would you be without me?" asked Caelum offering a hand.
"In a warm bed not thinking about possible life sentences," responded Raiden grasping his hand.
"Or in a cold ditch in forever fall" snickered Caelum as he pulled him up. With adrenaline cooling, the two boys returned to Beacon without any further delay.
Back at the site of the incident, the VPD had taped off the area and kept all witnesses for questioning after securing the safety of the area and detaining the incapacitated White Fang members. This was another case of their efficiency or as locals said, 'Vales best, doing their best, once it's all over.'
Ruby waited with Penny, a strange male faunus, and a slightly injured Blake when Weiss and Yang arrived. To her relief, her team hashed out their issues and mended former bonds without any hiccups. Weiss even delivered the benefit of the doubt to the boy named Sun.
As relief took her, Ruby noticed Penny was gone. Before she could search for her friend however the police pulled her aside for questioning. She gave her full account, covered for Blake and Sun while also detailing everything she knew. She did have trust for the police and respect for their jobs even if sometimes they were impolite.
There was only one thing she kept to herself after the kind detective left. The hail of gunfire that forced her away. It was so fast, far, and yet accurate, she had never heard anything like it yet it sounded familiar. It wasn't as fast as Coco's minigun yet too fast for anything conventional. The buzz of the weapon and snapping of its rounds at her feet replayed in her mind restlessly as she deliberated on just how to describe it to her team if she could at all.
Penny was thinking much the same as she was escorted out of the perimeter by an Atlas official. After being scolded and meekly acknowledging her mistake of acting without permission, Penny's eyes glowed and seemed to flicker. She had recorded the final shot that had blown the fuel tank. Replaying the video, slowing the frames, enlarging the image, all yielded little information.
She could only tell that the shot had indeed flown in front of her and from the right. The baffling part was the speed at which it did. It had flown so fast that her camera's refresh rate had not captured it in totality. The only other footage was the source of the machine gun fire which had yielded no identifiable image of the assailant.
In the end, she could only deduce it was no normal weapon that struck the fuel and someone working outside of Torchwick's influence. Without hard proof and only suspicions, her programming dictated via Atlas command that the video was insufficient as reportable evidence.
Back in Beacon, atop his tower and with strained eyes, the headmaster stared at his scroll with interest. Taking a sip from his mug he hummed to himself as the live feed showed a tired team RWBY in temporary police custody. As per his agreement with the city of Vale, he would have access to all information on the incident tomorrow morning. For now, he had to make a call to the precinct for his student's release.
Once that was done, his scrutinizing mind would likely keep him up into the night rewatching the CCTV footage of the docks from afar. Faint gunfire and lights were all it could offer until he could interview his students.
-Chapter End-