Heart to Heart
Chapter 36: Back in Action
Everyone was a bit nervous because today was the day that they were all going on their first mission in Atlas. They had waited and now all their gear was ready for use, new uniforms for the climate and now they had been called into Ironwood's office for the mission briefing.
Yang checked out her new arm, it was a bit bulkier than her other one but this one held a replica of her weapon on it. Flexing the arm hand she was eager to test it out, it did feel a little odd as the extra weight made her feel slightly lop-sided but it wasn't too bad. She would get used to it in time she was sure of that.
"How's the new arm?" Jaune asked next to her.
"Feels good, now I just need to test it out for real."
Jaune paused for a moment before saying, "So I guess you can say you've been re-armed?"
There was a silence that filled the room as everyone looked at him after saying that. Yang's eyes widened a bit before a huge grinned grew on her face before laughing. "Now that's more like it! Keep it up Lover Boy and you'll make me fall in love with you."
"No Yang!" Ruby cried out. "Stop corrupting Jaune!"
"What do you mean?" Yang glared at her little sister.
"We already have to deal with your puns," Blake face palmed. "We don't have to deal with another one."
"Hell no," Yang grabbed Jaune's arm with her own. "My boyfriend made a good pun and I'm encouraging this. I finally got a great guy and now he's getting my sense of humor. I'm not letting him go any time soon."
"Thanks Yang," Jaune blushed a bit scratching the back of his head with his free arm. He knew how much she liked puns so he just made one on the spot and he hoped she would like what he came up with. While he knew it was a bad pun if it made her laugh then it was worth it.
"He's a lost cause, we need to protect the rest of us," Weiss said flatly.
Yang rolled her eyes at Weiss' comment as she then looked over at Jaune, as she looked over his new look with the new footwear, darker jeans and the weapons and armor he had on. "No more bunny shirt?" She asked looking at the high color black shirt he was now wearing.
Jaune blushed a little as he scratched the back of his head. "I figured it was time to look a bit more grown up. Plus it's taken a bit of a beating this past year, I'm worried anymore and it will get wrecked to the point I can't wear it anymore."
Yang nodded her head her new khaki coveralls and winter jacket fit just right for her. Then she noticed something else on Jaune. "Hey you got another armor piece on your shoulder now, why did you only have one?"
"Well I was trying to get used to swinging my sword without it to give me more movement?"
Yang raised an eyebrow.
Jaune sighed and slumped. "Okay, it was because after the modifications to my sword and the new armor I could only afford the one."
"That's more like it," Yang laughed as she padded him gently on the back. "So they did something to your sword?"
"Actually the shield," Jaune pulled out his family sword and extended the shield as he showed her a few slots in the back. "It can use dust now."
"Nice," Yang grinned as she couldn't wait for her boyfriend to show off what he could do before. "You can still make the large sword with it right?"
"Oh yeah," Jaune nodded. "In fact when it's in that form I can still activate the dust."
Yang thought of Jaune wielding the massive new sword now on fire in his new outfit. She had to admit, it was pretty hot, especially those new dark blue jeans of his. She got a good look at his backside in them on the walk over here and was tempted to cop a feel. Well there was always later, mission first, then fun times.
Ironwood entered the room. "Everyone I'm glad you're all here. Today's mission is important to the project to launch Amity."
"We're ready for anything," Ruby nodded.
Ironwood smiled, as he was glad to see this kind of spirit.
"I want you to meet the team that will be joining you, the Ace Ops." Ironwood told them as five people walked into the room wearing a slight variation of the Specialist uniform only instead of being all white, it was a mix of white and blue with some red thrown in there.
"Clover is the leader of the group." Ironwood introduced as an older man with green eyes stepped forward. He had this commanding presence about him but it wasn't imposing. He thumbed a small four leaf clover pin he had on his shirt front.
"Next we have Harriet," The woman in the group was the shortest one there with dark skin and her hair was shaved close to the sides but had a more wild strip of hair on top. She also had what looked like blonde hair mixed with her brown as two bangs in the front stuck up like rabbit ears. She had this no nonsense vibe to her.
"Vine," A pale and thin man stepped forward, he had several small tattoos on his face and wore some beads in a few places. He had a calm and composed look that reminded them all of Ren in a way. Although while many said Ren was their 'ninja' of the group, this man looked more like the 'monk' of the Ace Ops.
"Elm," A huge tan skinned woman stepped forward and not huge as in fat this woman had no fat on her at all. She was over six feet tall and built like a brick house. She was obviously someone that worked out a lot. The one odd thing was that she was bare feet for some reason.
"And finally Marrow."
"I'm last?" The man slumped a bit at being called last as they noticed he had a dog tail behind him making him as the only Faunus in the group. He also seemed to be the youngest of them all, he was either the same age as Ruby and her friends or maybe a year or two older.
"Don't take it too hard," Elm told him slapping him on the shoulder making him move from the force.
"This is Atlas' best team, they report to me personally and no one else." Ironwood explained since the Ace Ops were the only team he felt he could trust these days. He clicked a controller as an image of a facility built into a mountain showed up.
"This is an old defunct SDC mining operation. Given what we are about to do we will need the resources still there, mainly the dust."
"Why is it defunct?" Weiss asked.
"Grimm," Ironwood stated. "That's why you're all going in, the Grimm infested that area five years ago and SDC wrote it off. Given that Jacques has been putting a halt on the selling of dust to the military, we'll have to clear this area to mine it ourselves."
"Even if we do isn't it still SDC property? I mean this is legal right?" Weiss asked just making sure.
"It is a legal grey area at the moment," Ironwood nodded. "Although they legally own the mine the fact that they abandoned it for so long means that the place is technically 'vacant', but with the Grimm there I can use my power and authority to place it under military command to clear it out."
"And if some dust happens to fall into your pockets because of it, then what's the harm?" Qrow stated with a sign. "That's a dangerous game you're playing the other council members can have your hide for this if they weren't on board."
"Thankfully with the election to find a third seat still in the works and that I have two seats myself it's a deadlock." Ironwood held a chair as both leader of the armed forces and being the headmaster for Atlas. But Qrow did have a point, it was why he was pushing this while he could. All indications were that Robyn Hill was the favorite to win and she had a dim view of the Atlas Military at the moment or maybe it was a dim view of himself.
He had to complete this operation before Hill was elected, since after that, the council could be swayed to out vote him three to two.
But these were desperate times and sometimes you had to do what you needed to do in order to survive.
The rest of the briefing was very simple, they would go in and deal with all the Grimm and keep the mine intact. They would have to be careful of what they did since the mine was full of duck that could explode if a stray shot for instance hit a dust deposit. Ruby remembered her first day at Beacon and how her sneeze of all things had set off Weiss' dust that she had been carrying.
A full mine of that did give her a slight worry but she was certain with everyone they could do this. As they were leaving, she quickly went over to Oscar as she unclipped the relic at her waist.
"Oscar I think you should hold onto this," She offered him the golden lamp.
"Wait, really?" Although he had been originally carrying it, well him and Ozpin really, he hadn't really thought about asking for it back.
"Yeah," Ruby smiled at him. "I think it should be protected and you're the best person to look after it."
He gently took it as he saw the look she was giving him, she looked at him with such confidence in his ability to do just that it was hard to argue with her. He felt the weight of the object, it could somehow shrink and expand (which was still not the craziest thing he had come across) and although light physically, it felt heavy in his hands.
The 'weight' of the small object was hard to describe. "I'll, I'll do my best."
"Thanks, I know I can trust you with this." Ruby smiled at him and that smile made him feel a bit better.
"Plus that thing attracts Grimm," Yang stated walking past them. "We don't really need them coming to us when we're going right to them."
"Yang!" Ruby glared at her sister. "That's not the point, I feel like Oscar should keep it safe because I trust him with it."
"Okay okay, but hurry up we don't want to be late for our first mission," Yang finished leaving through the door.
"Good luck," Oscar told her.
"Thanks." She replied before leaving.
-Over Operation Zone-
Jaune took a breath, he was thankful that Atlas had decent air sickness medication. He did feel he wasn't as bad as he used to be, at least as long as the craft stayed straight and he could see outside that is. He also felt a bit nervous, this was their first major mission since coming to Atlas and he felt butterflies in his stomach.
He rechecked his shield, it had been modified for dust use and at the moment he was eager to try it out. Jaune knew that they would have to jump from the airship to prevent the Grimm below from attacking it until a safe zone could be made.
"At least this time I have a landing strategy," Jaune said to himself, never thinking he would ever need one in the future. He wasn't sure if Ozpin had experience in the past about falling into combat or what. If he ever came out he would ask, actually there was still a lot of things he wanted to talk to Ozpin about. A lot of it personal stuff.
"What was that?" Elm asked hearing him. She was with Nora, Ren and him with the other member of her team Vine as he stood in the flyer with them.
"Just remembering something from initiation day at Beacon," He told her.
"So," Nora dragged out the word looking up at Elm. "Aren't your foot kind of cold like that?"
Elm smiled as she just tapped her bare foot, she got this question a lot and just learned to roll with it. "I got to keep my feet exposed my semblance kind of relies on it. With my aura and training my feet are the toughest part of me."
"Okay cool," Nora then looked at her weapon. "So I noticed you use a hammer too."
"Yep." Elm simply nodded.
"Cool," Nora was trying so very hard not to gush over the older woman. This person was like her ideal version of how she wanted to be. Big, strong and using a massive hammer to fight with. From the looks of it instead of grenades, she looked to use missiles instead. That was so cool to her, the explosive power have to be so much better than her grenades. Maybe she could get her weapon modified again to shoot missiles?
She couldn't wait to get into some action and actually fight Grimm for once. It had been too long since fighting them and she wanted to test out her equipment. She ran a hand over the new belt buckle she wore at her waist. This was something that apparently, Penny's dad came up with, it held lightning dust in it and she could feel both a slider and a button on the top of the belt.
The slider was supposed to adjust the power level and the button to activate it, which would then shock her with the lightning dust. She should have thought of this sooner! No wonder Penny's dad was a genius in her book, with this she wouldn't have to get shot by lightning rounds like from Ruby or have to find a lightning bolt or electrical outlet to get a charge.
"We're over the area, you're good to go!" The voice from the cockpit shouted at them.
"Yes, finally!" Nora shouted as she quickly jumped out of the air vehicle with a laugh. Ren only jumped after her without a word.
"Good to be eager," Elm stated with a grin a she jumped with a silent Vine following after her.
"Okay then," Jaune took a breath and then jumped. He was freefalling for a bit seeing the ground below them. There was snow everywhere but he could still see what looked like the mining complex. Looking to the side he saw the other teams falling and he thought he could hear the sounds of Ruby's sniper rounds and Yang's shotgun blasts.
He smiled as he opened his shield and activated it blue energy came out of the sides as the family crest glowed with the same blue light. This was Atlas hard light technology which had been put into his shield. Now with the expanded surface he used his shield like a small glider to help slow him down to the ground.
"I really wish I had this back at initiation," Jaune couldn't help but smile he had come a long way since that day. He was more confident now in his combat abilities, leadership and personally. He also was dating a knockout of a girl. Casting a look to the side, he could just make out Yang and he mentally wished her luck.
He might be a bit worried about her but it was a small part of him, he couldn't help it. It wasn't like on the train when he had to leave them all behind. Now they were all together and fighting, now it was different. Besides, if he started worrying all the time about her and tried to treat her like she couldn't handle herself she would kick his ass.
He managed to land himself without any effort and he was kind of proud of it. Sure, it wasn't anything major but looking back to how he had needed Pyrrha to save him by impaling him into a tree. This was a huge leap from where he had been to where he was now.
"Ha!" Elm gave a good-natured laugh. "For rookies you all might not be so bad after all."
Jaune looked around they were at one of the exit points for the facility. There were three areas, the main one which most of them were going towards and the two emergency exits. Since they were taking this one, Qrow and the Ace Ops leader Clover were taking the other.
Suddenly the communications bud in their ears came online as they all heard Clover speaking. "Okay you all know the plan at this point. We each make our way into the center of the facility, take out any and all Grimm on the way you see since we're going to need to pacify this entire area if we're going to make it the launch site."
"You should all have the new scrolls so keep an eye on everyone if you see a team in danger call it out. We should all be meeting up in the main mine shaft if all goes well, Alpha out."
"Well you heard the boss, time to get a move on kids," Elm lifted her massive war hammer over one shoulder making their way into the ice caves.
The trek through the ice caves were quiet the whole place looked to have been carved out of some ancient glacier or something. Jaune could feel the cold pressing against him even with his aura helping to keep things warm enough that he wouldn't start to freeze.
"Hard to believe people used to be down here mining," Nora said looking around.
"It has been years," Vine nodded his head. "The place has become a shadow of its former self."
"So we beat kick the Grimm out and it's ours again." Nora nodded.
"Don't forget what are target is," Jaune sighed in the mission they had found that the main Grimm that was in the area was a Geist.
"Hey at least this time you got a weapon to fight against a Geist." Nora offered.
"You fought a Geist without a weapon?" Elm asked over her shoulder.
"Fight is stretching it," Jaune scratched the back of his head. "My weapon was getting upgraded and so I was put into strategy role."
"Your strategy did work and we did kill it because of it." Ren offered him.
"Yep that's our fearless leader for you, Jaune always has a plan. I mean you came up with the plan to steal that Atlas air ship so-" Ren quickly covered her mouth but it was too late as both operatives stopped to look at them.
"You two stole an Atlas airship?" Vine asked them.
"It was kind of a desperate situation and Ironwood said we're all good now so, no harm done?" Jaune said shyly shrugging a bit. He didn't want to get into the damage to the giant mech in Argus or how they ended up crashing said air ship into Mantel doing who knows how much damage to that road they had landed on.
"Damn and I thought I did crazy things in my youth," Elm laughed it off as they continued on.
"Wait that's it?" Nora asked.
"If the General said it's okay then it's okay by us." Elm explained.
"And if he wasn't?" Ren carefully asked.
"Then we would be forced to take you into custody." Vine simply stated.
"Oh, well…good, yeah, that's…totally good." Jaune swallowed, as he was so glad that everything was forgiven for that whole thing. He was pretty sure ending up on the Atlas most wanted list so young wouldn't have been a good thing for his future career as a Huntsman, for him or any of them.
There was a rumbling sound in the cave system as they started looking around. For a moment, Jaune was worried that there might be a cave in before suddenly several Grimm broke out of the ice in several spots. He would alter learn that they were called Centinels, to him they looked like giant black centipedes with the usual skull like 'mask' that all Grimm wore on their heads.
"Okay so how-" Jaune was going to ask the Ace Ops how they wanted to handle it but both of them were already off before they could do anything. Vine suddenly had glowing arms stretch out from his actual ones as they wrapped around one of the Grimm and with a war cry Elm smashed her giant hammer with so much force into the lead Grimm's head, she smashed it into the ground with a shattering impact.
Jaune shook himself, now was not the time to just sit back in awe. "Nora, Ren go!"
Both of his teammates rushed off with him following behind. Ren fired the new tow cables that were in his weapons. The blades of his guns fired off into the top of the cave as he started the reel. The cables pulled Ren into the air as he reached a certain spot and pulled the blades free. As the momentum carried him and spun around like a top using the now retracted blades to make many slashing wounds against one of the Grimm.
Nora fired one grenade at that Grimm to gain its attention and wounding it further as Ren landed and quickly came back and making a sliding move under the creature, he speared his weapons under the jaw and into the head. The monster cried out once before going limp and disintegrating like all Grimm did.
Elm was already going for the last of the Grimm as it charged her a mucus-like substance suddenly grew out of her exposed feet as it rooted her in place. She grabbed the deadly pincers on its face using all her strength to hold it in place.
"Nora up!" Jaune shouted at her as she reached out a hand to him when he gripped it she threw him into the air with a smile.
Jaune put his sword back into the sheath and turned it back into the broadsword mode. He cried out as he used his aura to enhance his strength and when the blade came down it sliced through the Grimm easily, as it faded away he looked around and so far that was it for the Grimm.
"Not bad kids," Elm stated crossed her arms with a grin. "I'm starting to see why the General seems to think highly of you lot."
"They do seem more experienced than one expects from students," Vine nodded his head. The teamwork that he had seen was obvious to them. With barely a word, they were able to fight well together, covering each other and working with each other. Teamwork was something the Ace Ops prided itself on after all.
"Awww shucks," Nora blushed waving it off.
"Well time to get moving, we don't want to get behind the others," Elm stated as they continued their way through the caves.
Jaune felt a bit better about things, that fight had been easy. He remembered back when he had trouble with just a single Beowolf and look at him now?
They made their way into the central chamber, it was a huge area with equipment left all over the place. He saw the other teams walking in as well. He waved over to them.
"Hey guys you seen our main target?" Jaune asked.
"Not on our end," Yang responded.
There was a rumbling sound as everyone looked around to see the source of it.
"Uh, guys?" Ruby looked up as everyone followed suit and on the ceiling as a large rock formation started to move as the Geist made itself known to everyone. Huge chunks of rocks, some pieces of metal were inside of its 'body' that it was animating. That wasn't such a huge deal, the large glowing crystals however were.
"Is that dusk in all that?" Yang asked narrowing her eyes.
"Yes," Weiss stated, as she knew this was a problem. Dusk was unstable if enough force was applied to it, raw unprocessed dust crystals if not handled properly could explode. Looking around the main mine shaft they were in. If those crystals exploded, the exposed dust around them could chain-react.
It was why dusk mining was a very dangerous thing, if you hit an exposed crystal it could literally explode in your face while mining. It was why you had to be careful, you had to use sonar technology to scan the rock and then dig around the dust. You then had to pull it out and slowly remove the dust from the rock. There were various ways of doing that like a chemical bath but they didn't exactly have time for that now.
"Okay so what's the plan then-" Ruby was cut off as the Ace Ops went to work charging in without a word as one.
The team moved with a purpose as they rushed the large Grimm. Vine stretched out his arms wrapping them around an arm of the huge creature pulling on it. Elm didn't waste time as she grabbed the leg holding it in place with her strength as her feet were now glued to the ground from her semblance.
Marrow saw his opening as the Grimm was now being stretched as it struggled. The arm was stretched to the point that the Geist's actual body was shown between the limb joints. A Geist could animate anything non-living but it did so by spreading it's actual body like a virus through said objects. The black strand that looked like giant tendons Marrow transformed his rifle into a boomerang.
He didn't want to risk a shot and accidentally hit any of the dusk in the body. He threw the weapon as it sailed through the air and effortlessly severed the arm.
"Oh, so that's the plan," Ruby said amazed at how quickly they were dealing with this. The last time they had fought one they never thought to cut it into pieces like this.
Harriet saw that some of the dusk got lose and as electricity flowed over her body she speed off like living lighting catching the pieces. Elm caught the large arm that still held some chucks in it as she gently set it down with her massive strength as Vain wrapped up another shard himself.
Qrow was impressed apparently this team wasn't just for show. It took years of training for most huntsmen to perform that well as a team. He was about to join in but stopped, earlier on the way here his stupid bad luck had struck. He and Clover had nearly gotten flattened by the cave falling down in a section.
He was afraid it might act up again here and this was the worst time for his stupid semblance to act up. Clover just jumped off the ledge without a care in the world. How he envied that man, Clover had said that his semblance was good luck, that's how they got down here so quickly because his luck apparently trumped the bad luck of Qrow's. Never in his life did he think there would be someone with the exact opposite semblance as him.
Qrow considered his semblance a curse and that man's a gift. Sometimes the universe was just unfair he didn't hate the man for it. It did make him want to reach for a drink he felt the urge to go grab a bottle stronger than it had been in awhile. He felt tired a lot lately, not only that but he wasn't eating as much and he felt his hands shaking a bit.
He knew it was withdrawal symptoms of not drinking, he honestly didn't think he had been that bad to even get symptoms but he was feeling it. Maybe he shouldn't have been on this mission, maybe he should have just stayed back. He wanted to get out there and help but his feet were just rooted into the ground. He felt pathetic and hated himself even more.
The Ace Ops were not letting up and team RWBY and JNR were not just sitting on their heels.
"Weiss, ice!" Ruby shouted out as Weiss used her abilities to form ice around the other arm keeping it in place for the moment.
"Yang, Blake!" Ruby told them.
Blake tossed Yang her weapon as Yang gave a war cry as she rushed forward and when the ribbon that Blake held was tight, that was when Yang twisted and threw her partner through the air. Blake used a clone to jump a little higher and pulled back her weapon as Yang let go. The small gun returned to her hand and transformed into a blade as Blake twisted and cut the strand holding the other arm.
"Guys, the dust!" Jaune called out as he, Ren and Nora quickly went to catch the dust that was falling.
As they had cut the final arm, Harriet speed forward and with a mighty jump using the momentum of her speed to launch herself straight up. The mechanical devices on her back transformed mid jump as they wrapped around her arms. These mechanical armor attachments increased the strength of her blows. In addition, with her speed, she was able to add force with momentum. The result was an uppercut so powerful it staggered back the huge rock creature stunning it.
Clover was up in the air as his weapon unfolded showing that oddly enough, it was what looked like a metal fishing pole. He cast the line out as with expert movements was able to manipulate the line to wrap around the mask of the Grimm pulling it off.
"I got a shot!" Ruby stated looking down her sniper rifle.
"Do it," Clover called out. He had read up on these kids and apparently, the leader of team RWBY was a good shot.
Ruby exhaled as she squeezed the trigger as a single shot ran out as the bullet hit the mask shattering it and killing the Grimm. The rest of its 'body' without the control fell apart. That also meant any leftover dust crystals were now falling. Everyone quickly acted grabbing the few that were falling.
One however was in an area where no one was close to as the glowing crystal chunk was falling.
"Harriet!" Clover yelled out to his team's fastest member.
Harriet used her speed semblance to run towards where it was landing. When she moved this fast it wasn't just her body that got faster, her mind did too in order to keep up with her speed. Although the world seemed to move into slow motion, she noticed that she might not make it.
She pushed herself feeling the burning in her muscles as she could only watch as the dust was falling too fast.
At the last minute a large amount of red rose peddles passed her and engulfed the crystal as it reformed into Ruby as she landed on her butt holding the crystal.
"Got it!" Ruby breathed out.
Harriet was impressed the girl was faster than she thought. "Nice catch kid, what kind of semblance is that?"
"Huh? Well it's like yours," Ruby said confused. "It's a speed semblance."
Harriet tilted her head thinking back on what she saw. "I don't think it is."
"Wait, what?" Ruby asked.
"I've been around a few others with speed based semblances, what you got is fast but none of us turn into something else. What you have is fast but I don't think speed is the core of what your semblance is about." The older woman explained.
Ruby sat there dumbfounded, all her life she thought that her semblance was speed but it was something else?
"She might have a point sis," Yang was coming over to check on her when she heard the conversation. She had been thinking about what Harriet said. "You didn't use to turn your whole body into rose peddles before."
"Yeah, I kind of learned how to do that…" Ruby trailed off thinking about it all. She had learned to turn her whole body into rose peddles, how to take people with her as well without side effects and even how to split herself in that form. She really had to lot to think about now, if speed wasn't what her semblance was about then what else could she learn to do?
It was something she was going to look into later when they get back. They did have access to all those training rooms.
"Well hard job is over," Yang said helping her sister up.
"Yep, I wonder how Oscar is doing?"
Yang waved it off, "Oh I bet he's fine, we left him back in Atlas where it's nice and safe after all."
-Atlas-
Oscar hit the ground hard with a groan. He stared up at the ceiling of the training room as he tried to remember how to move his body. How did he get here again? Oh yes, the General thought that some training might help jog Ozpin loose. Honestly, he wasn't sure if he should just tell him that Ozpin sealed himself away after all. He hated lying about what happened, how he had just 'lost' Ozpin during the train crash.
Maybe he could talk to Ruby when she got back about this it just didn't sit well with him.
"Maybe we should take a break." Ironwood stated.
"I'm okay…just…trying to remember how to move my arms," Oscar sighed.
"I have to say," Ironwood offered a hand as Oscar managed to grab as the adult pulled him up. "For someone who never had any training before now you're doing well."
"Thanks," Oscar rubbed his arm thankful the aura had stopped most of the damage of that last attack. "Ozpin said something about muscle memory and at times I feel like my body is reacting before I even think it."
"Yes, people who trained for years can have that happen thanks to muscle memory. All those lives Ozpin has led is slowly ingraining into you." Ironwood smiled at that. "That most likely means that we're closer to drawing him out then."
"Yeah, sure." Oscar could tell him that he already had been feeling muscle memory since he started training back in Haven. He really did want to but he held his tongue.
There was a moment of silence and Oscar hated those so he wanted to ask something. "So, when did Ozpin tell you everything?"
Ironwood stroked his beard thinking back to it. "It was soon after I was given my office of both General of the armed forces and Headmaster of Atlas Academy. I remember I had only been in office for a week before I was given a call to a meeting between all the head masters."
"All the head masters?" Oscar asked.
Ironwood nodded his head. "I thought it was just something that all Headmasters did for the new member, which they did, I just didn't expect what I was told."
"So they gave you the whole talk about everything then."
"Well not at first," James thought back to that day. "Ozpin likes to ease people into the big secret. I guess he's had enough experience to know you don't just throw people into it."
"How did you take it? I mean, it couldn't have been easy."
"Honest?" He looked to Oscar who nodded. "I didn't believe a single word at first. I thought they were either crazy or they were pulling a prank on me…but no one was laughing."
James remembered how serious everyone got during that talk as Ozpin had explained everything to him. The secret war with Salem, magic being real, the story of the Maidens not actually being a story, it had all been a lot to take in.
"So how did he convince you?" Oscar asked him. "You plan on telling everyone and there will be people who won't believe what you said just like you didn't believe him right?"
Ironwood paused thinking about that, he hoped that his words would be enough, but no. No some people would need to be convinced, placing his hands behind his back as he thought back to that moment.
"He showed me the truth." Ironwood told him solemnly. "He took me to the vault and there was a young girl waiting there for us. She was the Fall Maiden."
"Amber," Oscar said the words without even thinking it as a flash of a nice young woman with tan skin, brown hair and eyes came into his mind but as soon as it appeared, it was gone again.
"You remember?" Ironwood said with hope.
Oscar shook his head. "It was just a flash I saw a face and a name, sorry."
"Don't be, it's a good sign." James continued with his story. "They opened the vault with powers that I've never seen before. The large gate opened and inside was like another world and sitting there was the crown. The Crown of Choice, it's a moment I'll never forget."
"After that I listened carefully to the whole story, I came home and was introduced to the Winter Maiden, she was better back then but still needed to be cared for."
"So I guess a little bit of magic is all we need to get people to listen to us," Oscar joked.
"It would be nice." Ironwood smirked.
"So what is the difference between a semblance and magic?" Oscar asked him. It was something that had been on his mind lately and with Ozpin locked away, he had no one he could really ask. He hoped Ironwood might have some answers.
"That's…difficult to explain," Ironwood sighed rubbing his face. "Ozpin was the expert on that, but how it was explained to me is. A semblance is tied to a person's aura, their soul. It's a reflect of their soul some would say. I honestly don't know about that, I leave that up to philosophers. At any rate, the amount of aura you can call upon is limited so you have a limit to your semblance."
"Magic bypasses that limit. The only limit there seems to be is the physical strain it can place on the body and the person's skill with it. While a semblance might be used for more than one purpose, its core is unchanged. Magic users can use different abilities, they can fly, control the weather and other things that are normally impossible for a semblance to do."
At that moment, the General's scroll went off as she pulled it out and checked it. It was a message from the mission giving him a smile. "Good news, they have cleared the area and we can move in now."
Oscar was glad to hear it. "That's good."
"I better get out there to oversee the start of the operation," Ironwood stated looking at the boy. "Would you like to come along?"
"I think I'll want to stay back and get an ice pack," Oscar rubbed a sore area.
Ironwood only smiled and nodded. "Don't worry, we'll toughen you up. That's something this academy is good at."
"Yeah…can't wait." Oscar sighed.
TBC…