Okay. Sorry. Everything at work has imploded. I thought it might.
Staff emailing one another about me behind my back, saying I'm on the owner's side, also emailing the owner telling lies about me to them. Owner went into their emails, found them all and sent them to me.
Immediately the two staff quit but threatened legal action for us going in their WORK EMAILS and finding they'd been going so far as to look up the business' accounts with the government and try to find us doing bad stuff to threaten us.
It's bad, it's messy, and this is all I could manage as a result.
Sorry all. I'll try and be better tomorrow and coming days.
Cover Art: Kirire
Chapter 104
Blake had reached that point of exhaustion where the body decided it must be in a life or death situation and kicked in some adrenaline, waking her back up again, but she could feel the second wave of fatigue creeping in at the edge of her mind. The crash was coming, her body telling her she really ought to sit down.
But if she sat down, she'd slump forward and fall asleep at the table – and that wasn't a good idea when they were in front of the Council of Vale, summoned to an emergency meeting right when she'd thought she might have a chance to crawl into bed and pass out.
The Council sat at a round wooden table, symbolically meant to remind each member that no one was above the other and they were all a part of a closed loop. It didn't feel it when Jaune sat ostracised with her stood behind him, his elbows on the table and gloved fingers meshed as the various members of the council harangued him over his responsibilities, demanding answers they just hadn't had the time to gather.
"Councilmembers, please—" How Jaune managed to sound both awake and calm, Blake didn't know, but she'd have liked some of what he was having. "I understand there is panic, but we must remain calm in the face of this crisis."
"Calm? Calm!? There have been six incidents this day alone! They're calling them sproutings, and the fact they've happened to different people has blown our excuses of semblances use out the window!"
"ARC Corp is aware of the incidents."
They'd come the same day she and Jaune began their investigation. Not in her or Sun, thankfully, but in various people around Vale who, for the moment, didn't seem to have much in common. Blake was sure they'd find some link between them, even if it was just that they shopped at the same supermarket, but things like that were going to take time. It was about thirty-six hours since the first sprouting which, with her day before, meant she'd been awake for around fifty hours.
A little over two days of running from case to case, pushing into homes turned into indoor gardens where trees had sprouted from a person slumped on a couch, or in one case in a bathtub, the roots punching through the tub and tiles below and into the roof of someone else's apartment. They'd naturally been evacuated, but this was getting ridiculous. It had taken time to move the one on the street and have it burned, and now they had to somehow figure out how to excavate a tree from the twenty-first floor of an apartment block.
Nightmare stuff as far as she was concerned.
"There's going to be panic no matter what we do," said the mayor. "What we need is a way to avoid a lockdown."
Jaune grimaced. "A general lockdown would help us isolate—"
"NO!" The mayor slammed his fist on the table. "This is the Vytal Festival! Do you have any idea how much damage will be caused if we close down the economy now?"
"Less than will be caused if a sprouting happens up on Amity with all those people around," Jaune fired back.
"That won't happen because you are on the case," the mayor finished, making Jaune grimace and Blake suck in a sharp breath. "We will issue an advisory for people not to travel and write this off as a new infectious disease. We will rely on good old fashioned common sense to keep people from mingling and passing it on."
Common sense...? Blake felt like screaming.
"That won't accomplish anything," said Jaune.
"It will show the people that we are taking action and that we have faith in them. Sometimes it's more important to bolster their spirit than impose draconian measures."
"Sometimes isn't this time," Blake hissed, but she went ignored. The other politicians were already nodding along, convinced not by logic but by the easier decision of dumping this on ARC Corp's head and blaming them if it all went wrong. They probably knew Jaune was the black sheep of the family, and that he'd take the fall. "All in favour?"
Jaune and Blake remained silent as the politicians approved. In all fairness, Ozpin also remained silent, frowning stoically but not offering much in the way of support. Perhaps he felt there was nothing meaningful he could add, or maybe he was just a prick. Blake was too tired to dig deeper and find out.
If her book wanted to possess her right now, it was free to.
No?
Fuck you, book, and the anomaly inside you.
The tome on her hip seemed to warm and cool in rhythm, almost like it was laughing at her. Even a damned monster didn't want to put up with this crap – or maybe it knew possessing her right now would lead to it using up its allotted time being fast asleep.
Jaune sighed, pushed down on the table and stood. "Thank you for your time, Council. We shall see to the issue and do our best to solve it."
"Will this become a Reality Class anomaly?" asked Ozpin, his first words since the start.
"Not explicitly. While there's no putting this back in the bag and pretending it didn't happen, it'll likely be classified as an infectious disease as the councillors suggested. That will be the case whether or not we put a stop to it."
The consequences would be known, then, but not the anomaly itself. It was almost like dust in the sense that it was the byproduct of an anomaly that remained as of yet unknown to the world. The only anomalies that were truly known and accepted with no obfuscation in place to pretend otherwise were aura and the Grimm. And maybe dreams, she supposed. It still amazed her how people just kind of accepted the concept of passing out, having vivid hallucinations and then sudden amnesia, as a normal thing.
"Is that all?" asked the mayor. He looked about for interruptions, took Jaune and her grimaces as somehow being supportive, and struck his hand down. "The matter is dealt with. We expect swift action from ARC Corp."
"Of course," said Jaune. "We will get on that immediately..."
Next Chapter: 27th May
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