There's an A/N at the end of the chapter than explains a bit about Jacques character. If you're interested in my interpretation of the man, give it a read, otherwise, that's about it.
(Chapter 13)
As the two teens reached the foyer of the Schnee mansion again, the atmosphere had lightened to a point where idle conversation was made. Whitley hadn't expected to convince his father to acquiesce to his desire of staying enrolled at the academy, or at the very least, as easily as he did.
As he looked to his friend, the younger teen was intensely grateful for his presence during the visit he was making to his family. As they stood there in the large empty open room, Whitley walked up the central stairs in the foyer with Jaune following behind him closely.
"Where are we going now?" The white-haired teen turned to the side as Jaune was now walking in step with him before responding.
"I'm heading to my room. I left something here as I believed it would be safer at home than with me at the academy as I wasn't using it." The blonde teen looked curious as he asked another question to the teen.
"What is it?" Whitley pondered the answer to the question as they continued to walk down the long corridor, before he thought of a satisfactory description.
"A gift." With that, he walked slightly faster, and with a small, yet smug smile on his face as Jaune side-eyed him. Minutes later, and the two teens reached Whitley's destination. With a twist of the doorknob, the white-haired teen's room was revealed to the blonde.
It was more spartan than what Jaune expected and wondered to himself if this was how Whitley wanted his room, or how Jacques Schnee wanted the room kept. He watched as the younger teen sat on the bed and let out an uncharacteristically loud and indulging sigh. Jaune watched the younger teen stare at the ceiling in thought before he made his way to the bookshelf and began scanning over the various titles in his friend's collection.
Eventually finding a book that would keep his attention for at least a few minutes, Jaune sat down in the chair next to the desk in his friend's room. After a few minutes of silence with the only sound being the blonde flipping to the next page. Whitley spoke out idly.
"I was really dreading coming back here you know." The older teen flipped to the next page as he answered.
"I got the feeling that may have been the case. I'm glad I was here to help you try and convince him. In the end, everything turned out okay." Quiet footsteps slowly made their way down the hall, unbeknownst to the two teens as they continued their conversation.
"Thank you, by the way." At this, Jaune looked up from the book to address his friend.
"What for?" Whitley looked to the older teen with a bit of incredulity at the question his fellow leader had asked him.
"Jaune, you helped me convince my father to let me stay at the academy. You came here with me, and I didn't even ask you to." The blonde put down the book before he responded to the younger teen.
"You may not have asked me with your words, but I could tell you needed help. So, I chose to help you out however I could."
Whitley just stared at the teen for a moment before bringing a hand to his face.
"Only you would make this seem like less than it is Jaune." The blonde shrugged his shoulders from where he sat before responding.
"I really didn't do anything all that special though Whitley, I would've done this for anyone from our squad if I thought it would help them." The youngest Schnee fixed a thankful smile on his face before another voice spoke out from the doorway.
"I'm glad to see you made a friend Whitley, and a rather good one in my opinion." The two teens' heads snapped to the doorway to see a woman with white hair holding a glass of some liquid.
"Mother…" That answered Jaune's unasked question as to who she was.
"Hello Dear." She walked into his room with the grace expected of a woman of her status. The drink she was nursing made a sound as the ice in the beverage clinked against the glass slightly. Whitley stared at the drink in her hand before schooling his emotions and picking up his end of the conversation.
"It's good to see you Mother, I hope you're well." She was about to sip her drink, but a brief look of negativity from her son caused her to pull the glass away from her lips as she set it down on the dresser she stood next to with a sigh.
Jaune was able to pick up on the significance of her putting the drink down when Whitley had a look of contentment. The older woman looked to the blonde before asking her son a question.
"Who is your friend?" Whitley stood from where he sat and gestured with his hand as he explained.
"This is Jaune, he's a friend of mine that I made at the academy. He's a fellow team leader like I am, and the co-leader of our squad." A look of understanding came upon her face as she turned to the blonde and spoke to him directly.
"It's a pleasure to meet one of Whitley's friends. My name is Willow Schnee." With that she gave him a nod, one that he returned as Willow turned back to her son to speak with him.
"Have you come back…to stay?" A hopeful look came upon her face as she traced the rim of her glass with a finger. Whitley looked pained as he shook his head answering her.
"No, I only came today because Father required my presence." Willow's face shifted to one of solemn understanding.
"Ah, of course. Though I shouldn't be surprised; why would you or your sisters ever want to visit home with what awaits you here?" The question was rhetorical, but Jaune could sense a problem about to show itself with how the mood was going. Whitley was silent for a moment before he spoke again.
"I try to visit at least once a month, I was preoccupied these last two weeks with my exams." He fixed her with an appraising look, and she flinched at his gaze as he spoke somewhat exhaustedly.
"I take it you've been drinking." A look of shame passed on the face of the older woman, and the white-haired teen sighed as he walked to where a painting of himself was, before taking it off the wall to reveal a safe. Entering the code, a ten-minute timer started to count down as he sat back down on his bed.
A moment of silence hung in the air before Willow answered her son.
"Y-yes."
"And how many will that one make?" The immediate questioning caused her to feel worse as she had to think hard about the number.
"Seven…" Jaune's diagnosis of the woman was that she was a depressed alcoholic, and it seemed as if all her children didn't just leave the nest, but fled from it. As another pregnant pause hung in the air, Whitley eventually spoke.
"…How long?" The teen's eyes were looking not at his mother but at his clenched fists in his lap.
"W-well…I believe I had my first drink at –" She went to continue but was cut off by her son.
"How long are you going to keep drowning yourself in alcohol." She looked downcast and Jaune began to feel slightly uncomfortable being in the presence of what was sure to be an emotional confrontation.
"…" She didn't answer, shame keeping her from answering her son. Seeing her silence, he continued.
"Until your liver fails you? Until it kills you? Until…" Whitley bit his lip as he paused before speaking again.
"Until you forget who I am?" Hearing her fifteen-year-old son say that broke Willow's heart, and she instinctively brought the drink from the dresser to her mouth, before she realized what she was doing in horror.
The drink slipped from her hands and fell to the ground, glass shattering upon impact. And she took a step back, then another, before she lost her footing and fell to the ground on her behind. Whitley and Jaune looked concerned for the woman, but then she did something her son didn't expect. Tears slowly began to run down her face, and she covered her face as she began to sob quietly.
The youngest of her children looked at her sadly, wanting to do something, but not knowing what. Suddenly, a hand had pushed him forwards from his back gently. He looked behind him seeing Jaune having moved to stand near the edge of the bed to urge him forwards. He looked uncertain, but slowly made his way forwards before kneeling and hugging Willow.
She stopped her sobbing in shock as her son held her, before returning the hug and remaining like that for a short while. Eventually, Whitley took a step back from her, before helping her to her feet.
"Mother…this has to stop." Whitley's comment was true, and she knew it, but she looked forlorn as she answered the young man.
"I don't know how…or if I have the strength to do it." Silence returned between the two, when the third occupant of the room spoke up.
"Why not get rehab?" Both heads of white hair snapped to him in surprise. His proposal held merit to the younger teen, who fixed his mother with a look.
"It wouldn't look good for the family if I went to a rehabilitation center…" Her answer made sense to the blonde, but then he spoke again.
"Why not get in home therapy? There are places that provide alcoholic rehab at home." At this, the woman seemed to shift uncomfortably again before she responded.
"That doesn't sound terrible…but I'm still not sure…" Whitley sent the blonde a look, begging him to somehow convince the woman to agree to get help. Jaune adopted a thinking pose as he began to talk again.
"I don't know everything about it, but I know that someone would come here daily to talk to you and help you develop healthier habits. They also set some kind of reward system to help you get rid of your addiction." At this, the younger teen deflated a bit. What reward could you give to a woman with the ability to buy anything? But then his friend spoke again, shocking him.
"Your reward could be Whitley coming to visit you more often." This seemed to break the woman from her stupor as she looked to her son's friend with shock and a bit of hope. Before the youngest Schnee could say anything, his mother looked to him with wide blue eyes.
"Would you really come home more for me Dear?" A moment passed before Whitley let out a breath and nodded to his mother as he answered.
"If you go through with the therapy and bring your alcoholism under control, then I suppose I could find myself visiting home on a more frequent basis." The woman looked to her son silently, before pulling out her scroll and leaving the room.
A hissing sound came from the safe, and Whitley remembered why he'd come to his room in the first place. Moving to the safe, he opened it and removed a fancy box from inside. Checking its contents, he nodded before calling Klein to inform him that they were ready to return to the academy.
The ride back to the academy was slower than before due to the traffic, and both teens sat in the back of the limousine across from each other. Neither of them had spoken since leaving, but Jaune could see something different in his friend. He didn't look haunted anymore, he seemed…free.
Suddenly, the box Whitley had retrieved was presented to him. He looked at it confusedly, but upon the younger teen pushing it towards him insistently, he took it. Unclasping the latches, he opened the box to reveal a twin of Whitley's gun. Gently lifting it from the box, he admired the craftmanship of the weapon, before placing it back in the box and held it towards his fellow leader.
"It's a beautiful weapon." The Schnee nodded before pushing the box back towards his friend as he responded.
"And now it's yours." Jaune looked like he was about to decline or argue, but Whitley was having none of it and held up his hand as he spoke.
"Don't bother trying to change my mind. It was sitting in my safe not doing anything for months. I'll feel satisfied knowing it's in good hands with someone that will use it to save lives. Besides," The white-haired teen grew a small smile as he continued.
"even giving you this, I don't think I'll ever be able to repay what you've done for me today." Whitley leaned back in his seat as he looked out the window.
"Jaune, you may not think what you did for me was incredible, but that isn't the case. You've given me the one thing I wasn't sure I'd ever have, and that's a chance to save my family. I've watched my mother despair for years behind a bottle, and then you manage to give her hope. And for that, I can't express my gratitude enough."
Jaune just looked at the teen with a smile as he responded.
"I still disagree with you Whitley," At this, the white-haired teen looked a bit annoyed with his friend, but then the blonde continued.
"I may have proposed therapy, but you were the one who gave her hope." The Schnee's face shifted to one of confusion as he waited for his friend to explain.
"After all, the only reward she needed to look for therapy was a chance to reconnect with you." And suddenly, Whitley's eyes widened at his friend's words. He thought silently to himself before a question stole him from his mind.
"Hey Whitley, if you don't mind me asking, why do you want to be a huntsman?" The pale teen met his friend's eyes before he leaned forward lacing his fingers together as he thought of where he should begin. Finally, he spoke.
"My…my family wasn't always like this Jaune. Years ago, my parents, my sisters, and myself used to all live in the mansion together. And while things weren't perfect, they were…normal, for us I suppose." The blonde nodded his head in understanding as he asked a question.
"So what changed." Whitley seemed to be remembering something when he spoke.
"My father always had high expectations for us, each of us. But for Winter, my oldest sister, these expectations were double for her since she was the heir. She spent hours learning etiquette, politics, and of the other kingdoms. She was taught how to dance, of the responsibility she had, and how to mingle with society's finest." Whitley looked slightly depressed as he continued.
"And she hated it. She hated the people she was forced to interact with, she hated feeling that her future had all but been written for her. But above all else, she despised being given all these burdens because of her last name. When she was seventeenth, she knew father was going to begin looking for suitors, so the day of her seventeenth birthday, she packed her things, renounced her status as the heir, and left. She hasn't come home since." Jaune sat quietly as his friend pressed on.
"Father wasn't always as…cold as he's made out to be. Before Winter left, there were even a few times I swore he smiled. But after she left for the military, he named Weiss his heir and began to change. He became more controlling, his compliments became scarcer, his criticisms harsher and more frequent, and his general attitude worsened by the day." Jaune decided he needed to ask a question for clarification.
"Was that when your mother began drinking?" He asked it gently, but was surprised when Whitley shook his head and began to talk again.
"Mother always drank, as it was expected of her during events and social gatherings, but once Winter left, she began drinking to cope with my eldest sister's departure. But a multitude of things began to pile onto her shoulders, and her coping mechanism became an addiction."
"Why didn't your father do anything about her drinking?" Whitley looked at his friends with a sad expression as he answered.
"My parents didn't come together because they loved each other, they were brought together by their parents to unite their families. The nature of their marriage aside, all I've ever wanted was for my family to be just that, a family. But Winter…she abandoned us. Or rather, she abandoned me." At that Jaune fixed him with a look of empathy, knowing at least part of his pain.
"Winter kept in contact with Weiss, often messaging her via scroll or through letters. I tried writing her too, but never got any replies from her. Naturally, I'd assumed something was wrong and asked Mother about it. She told me that my father had been intercepting Winter's letters back to me and confiscating them, to keep me from being influenced by her." Jaune watched as Whitley remembered something that hurt him as he spoke again.
"So that night, I did something unthinkable. I snuck into my father's study and rummaged through his desk trying to find the letters. That was when I found my mother had lied to me to spare my feelings. Because when Father had discovered me in his study that night, I learned that there were no letters. She never responded to anything I'd sent her. Granted, we never had the strongest of sibling bonds…but I still thought she at least cared." He took a breath to calm his nerves before he brought his emotions under control and spoke to the silent blonde across from him.
"The years got harder, and eventually, Weiss and I started to drift apart as well. One day, she asked Father if she could attend Beacon. And after weeks of begging for a chance to become a huntress, my father made her a deal. He gave her what should have been an impossible task, and told her that if she succeeded, she could go to Vale. She earned the scar over her eye from the test, but managed to accomplish her goal, and left." He paused briefly before continuing.
"I'm not sure what other conditions my father set for her, but I could see through her. She had no intention of ever returning home, until it was time for her to lead the SDC. My family in shambles at this point, I decided that I needed to get away from the Schnee mansion, but unlike my sisters, I didn't want to abandon my family. So, I made a deal with Father." At this Jaune's interest was piqued, and he motioned for Whitley to continue.
"My father is a greedy man, that's no secret, and he desires more influence for the Schnee family. I think he believes that he can reign in either Winter or Weiss. Since Winter is touted as a prodigy, if she becomes the next general, she'll have a seat on the council, and he'll try and get her to agree to whatever he wants support from them on. If Weiss was to return, she'd likely be groomed into becoming just like my father so that he'd have a suitable heir to the SDC, and a possible family member to run for the position of governor."
"So, what deal did you make with your dad?" Whitley looked rather proud of himself as he answered.
"I told him that it would more beneficial for me to attend the huntsman academy here in Atlas, but unlike Winter, I wouldn't be going into the military. With my huntsman training, I'd work to become the police commissioner of Atlas, earning the Schnee family another seat on the council. My father debated it for a few days, before he finally agreed. But since he pulled strings to get me admitted into the academy two years earlier, I also have to go home at least once a month to inform him of my progress."
Jaune thought about everything he was told, before Whitley concluded the explanation of his reasoning.
"You asked me why I want to be a huntsman. I suppose my answer is rather selfish. Helping those in need is noble, but that's just an added benefit to me. I just want a chance to bring my family back together, and this was all I could think of." Jaune's respect for the teen grew three times what it was, but before he could say anything, Whitley asked him a question in return.
"What about you? Why do you want to be a huntsman Jaune? And why at Atlas?" Jaune looked to the younger teen and with a sigh, began to recount his own tale.
The walk down the hall to the first-year dorms was quick, and before long, both teens were standing in front of the doors to their respective team dorms across the hall from each other. Whitley and Jaune met eyes, and the younger teen said one last thing before moving to enter the room.
"It's your story to tell, but I think you should tell my team what you told me back in the limo Jaune. I'm sure they'd like to know, and I'm positive none of them are going to hold your past against you." And with that, he opened the door, and walked in, leaving the blonde to think about what his younger friend had said.
Jaune scratched the back of his head, before entering his own dorm room to see that Flynt, Neon, and Penny had returned and were laughing about something when they noticed his arrival. He gave them a wave and informed them that he'd spent the day hanging out with Whitley but didn't delve into any details.
A few hours passed by and Jaune was stretching at the running track behind the fitness center. He put his earbuds in before he began to jog at a comfortable pace. Normally, the blonde would have met up with Marrow to improve on his parkour, but after being away from campus for much of the day, he was content to use the academy's track.
Minutes passed by, and once the teen completed his second go around the track, he stopped before lowering himself into a runner's stance. Jaune kept his eyes ahead of him as he prepared to take off, and a moment later, he was again in motion.
The blonde wasn't the fastest among the first years, but he had stamina in spades. As he ran at an impressive speed for a first year, Jaune could feel the sweat beginning to form on his skin as he exerted himself with a grin. Looking to his side, he was surprised to see a dark-skinned female shorter than himself, keeping pace with him perfectly. Their eyes met, and she fixed him with a smirk, before she began to up her speed slightly.
Not one to shy away from a challenge, Jaune pushed himself a bit before he managed to catch up to the runner, earning a raised eyebrow at his determination. They kept the pace for two laps, before they began to slow down. As they reached the starting points, the girl raised an arm to wipe the sweat from her brow as she looked to the teen that ran besides her.
The leader of team JCKP was panting heavily and sweating hard from where he stood still with his hands on his knees for support. After regaining the ability to speak, he looked to the tan girl, who now had a bottle of water. She had sucked down half its contents by the time the blonde had removed his earbuds to speak with her.
"Not bad kid, you kept up with me pretty well." The blonde nodded to acknowledge her praise as he brought his breathing under control to speak.
"T-thanks. I gotta say though, you're pretty fast. I had a hard time keeping up with you." At this, the tan runner smirked as she responded to him.
"Sorry to burst your bubble kid, but I wasn't going anywhere near my top speed. And if I'd been using my semblance? Forget about keeping up with me, you'd have a hard time keeping sight of me." Jaune imagined the scenario in his head but was unable to think on it long as the girl continued to speak.
"Anyway, name's Harriet. Who're you?" Jaune took a thinking pose as if trying to remember something before it occurred to him.
"Wait, are you Marrow's teammate?" the tan girl looked at him with surprise, before she squinted her eyes at him. She studied him up and down before she snapped her fingers and spoke.
"You're the kid Marrow and Elm won't shut up about; Jaune right?" Jaune rubbed his neck and nodded, embarrassed that the two older hunters spoke of him, and quite often apparently. The girl looked to her watch as it beeped, before she turned to leave the track.
"Well, duty calls. I only came over to mess with you, but you ended up being kind of interesting kid. If you see me at the track, feel free to try and match my pace." And with that, the tan woman activated her semblance, and with a glow of her eyes and sparks of lighting flickering around her, she was moving in speed towards her destination.
Jaune looked to where she'd disappeared towards before returning his focus to the athletic track he'd been jogging on before and continuing his cardio work out.
(Three days later)
After his daily early morning exercises and a refreshing shower in his dorm, Jaune checked the clock to see that it was 0722. He walked over to the box Whitley had given to him as a gift, before taking out the weapon inside and storing it on his right hip inside a holster given to him by the Schnee the next day.
He looked himself over in the mirror and felt proud of his appearance. He'd grown at least an inch since having left Beacon, and his body had changed from before too. He could confidently say he would never be called a noodle again. From the vigilance he observed with his workouts, the muscles on his body had become more prominent and defined.
He looked to his outfit and deflated a bit, however. He really needed to get a stylish outfit for himself, feeling a bit too mundane in comparison to the fashion his friends had.
He peered around the room to see that Flynt and Neon were just sitting on the edge of their bed's groggily, but that Penny wasn't present in the room. He looked to his friends with an obvious question on his face, before Neon answered his look.
"She said that she was going down to the lab to visit Mr. Polendina." Jaune sent a look of thanks to the girl as he went to leave the room, grabbing two of his breakfast snack bars on his way out. Unwrapping one to eat and pocketing the other, Jaune walked at a brisk pace towards the lab to visit his partner and her father.
With a hiss, the doors to the lab slid open, and the blonde walked inside as he deposited the now torn and empty snack wrapper into the waste bin. The sound of Pietro's robotic chair moving faintly grew louder before he turned the corner to see the old man he was looking for with a scroll in his hand, but no Penny present.
"Ah, Jaune! Perfect timing; I was actually just about to contact you to come and get your weapon." Jaune's eyes widened as he followed excitedly to where Pietro had a cloth over a table with the silhouette of something beneath it. As they stood on opposite ends of the table, Pietro noticed the blonde's firearm that was at his hip and smiled approvingly.
"I see you looked into a backup weapon, and it also deals with the lack of a ranged option that you would've had. But…" The older man couldn't help but feel as if the weapon looked a bit familiar, before he remembered where he believed he'd seen it before.
"Isn't that Whitley's revolver?" Jaune remembered being given the weapon by his friend and patted the firearm on his hip before responding.
"Yea, but this is actually the twin of his weapon." Pietro looked to the boy in surprise, before his perpetual smile returned.
"I see. Well then, would you like to do the honors?" Pietro held a hand out to the table with the cloth. Jaune nodded to the man, before he slowly reached his hand out and grasped the covering, before he tugged it away swiftly to reveal his weapon.
Before him lay a sword inside a sheath, silver being the main color with blue for the accents. If enough time was spent looking at the weapon's shape, once could see the inspiration it bore from Crocea Mors, but the inspiration was where it ended. The weapon bore the telltale signs of mechashift properties as it had a more modern feel to it.
Gently, he picked up the weapon before he slid the sheath onto his arm, and with the click of a button, the sheath turned into a shield. Releasing the sword from its resting place, the weapon made a lovely sound as it exited the shield, the ringing of metal seeming to have muted all other sound for a few moments.
He walked away from the older man to stand in the center of a large open space. He took a few practice swings, before pretending to block enemy attacks and counter swiftly. The weight felt satisfying to the blonde, and he nodded happily.
"Why don't you re-sheath the sword, channel your aura into it, and slide your thumb down a bit where its resting." Jaune took a breath as he did so and what happened next surprised him a bit. He watched as the sheath his sword was contained in, extended outwards a bit and locked the blade in place, having turned the blade and the shield into one weapon; a great sword.
He held it in front of himself and took a practice swing. Having forgot to stop channeling his aura, the force of his swing went well beyond his blade, and the wind generated caused a stack of packets to fall from where they were stationed. The older man gave a chuckle at the embarrassed and apologizing look that the younger man sent him, before signaling him to continue.
Jaune looked down to the flat of the blade and saw a set of vents near the sword's edge. While the great sword was an addition of Pietro's design, he suspected he knew what the vents were for. With a bit of aura and the flick of a switch, the vents opened, and metal formed a dome on both the face sides of the weapon. Finally, the handle extended backwards, and in Jaune's hands was his lance, although, slightly different.
He found that it still was able to raise the canopy of the weapon to be an umbrella for a landing strategy, but there felt like there was something more. From his side, Pietro cleared his throat and spoke to the teen.
"I added one last function to your weapon. This one is aura activated, so you'll need to get used to it. Focus your aura into whatever hand if further up on the weapon and see what happens."
Jaune did so and was startled when the canopy of the weapon rotated rapidly. He looked down to his weapon in awe, admiring the thought that his partner's father must have put into creating it. As he looked over the weapon, Pietro decided to explain a bit about the weapon.
"Now, when we were discussing the design of the weapon, you only brought up the shield sheath/sword combination, and the lance/umbrella. The reason I added the great sword as a mode for you was because I wanted you to still be able to use this weapon with whatever ranged option you investigated. Now, whenever you're in a fight, you'll have an option for every range, and it should feel a little more natural in your hands." The blonde remembered something about his old weapon and asked the older man.
"What about the dust?" The older man adopted a lecturer's pose as he motioned for Jaune to hand him the weapon. Once in his hands, he pointed to the center and edges of the shield and unscrewed the pommel as he explained.
"The dust is contained in both of the weapons now. The shield stores dust in the center of itself as well as in the edges, and the sword stores dust in the hilt."
As the teen looked into the handle, he could see a clear division inside, one side glowing with the familiar shade of purple unique to gravity dust, while the other was empty. He looked to Pietro, who nodded his head and began to explain.
"I know that as you become more comfortable with the weapon, or as you look into widening the scope of abilities at your disposal, that you'll probably think about using a second type of dust. I designed your weapon so that when you've decided what type of dust you'd like to incorporate; it'll be as simple as loading it into your weapon."
The blonde stood silently as he admired the weapon, and once it was handed back to him, he let it hang at his side from his left hip. The two males stood in silence, and just as Jaune was about to beginning thanking the inventor, Pietro raised his hand.
"Before you begin trying to thank me, let me say this. Thank you Jaune." The blonde looked to the older man confusedly, who took his glasses off to clean them quickly before putting them back on as he spoke.
"Why are you thanking me Mr. Polendina?" The older man got a faraway look in his eyes as he thought about something before answering him.
"Penny informed me that you're aware of her being an artificial human. Yet, you didn't treat her any differently than the rest of your squad. You're giving her a chance to live as a human, and I'm grateful to you for it. So, I feel that putting my heart and soul into making you the best weapon I could was the only way I could begin to repay you."
The blonde just smiled in response to the older man's words before replying.
"Still, thank you Sir." The older man chuckled before responding.
"Don't thank me my boy, go out and save lives. That's enough for me." The two stood in silence, before Jaune remembered something. He looked to Pietro before asking him a question.
"Do you know where Penny is by any chance? That's actually the reason I came here." The dark-skinned man nodded as he informed the boy of where she went.
"You actually just missed her. She was here maybe less than five minutes before you arrived."
"Do you know where she's going?" The older man sighed as he stroked his beard before speaking.
"The general is heading to Vale today. Penny caught wind of this, and since she'd been begging to visit somewhere outside Atlas or Mantle, I asked James to take her with him so that she could explore a bit." Jaune's eyes widened, and he made for the exit quickly to try and meet her at the bullhead docks. As he was about to open the door, Pietro called out to him one last time.
"If you're hoping to go with her, tell James that it'd be a personal favor to me!" With that, the boy nodded and made for the bullhead docks.
Five minutes of running had put the blonde teen at the unusually busy bullhead docks, and he spotted the girl he was looking for walking next to the general with a cheery expression on her face. He called out to her as he ran over.
"Penny!" The girl turned around and her eyes brightened upon seeing her partner. She skipped over to him as he caught up, Ironwood standing slightly off to the side.
"Good morning Partner, how are you?" The blonde smiled in response to her as he spoke.
"I'm great Penny, what about you?" He was given a glowing smile as she answered him with a grin.
"I'm wonderful! Thanks for asking." The blonde glanced at the general for a moment before he spoke to his partner again.
"Hey, you're heading to Vale with the general today right? Would you like for me to tag along with you? I stayed in Vale for a while before Beacon, so I know the area pretty well." Penny's eyes widened before she turned to face the general.
"Can Jaune accompany me to Vale Mr. Ironwood, please?" If seeing the girl giving him a hopeful set of puppy dog eyes had any effect, he didn't show it. But just as he was about to speak, the blonde took his chance to speak again.
"Mr. Polendina said that it'd be a personal favor to him if you took me along as well."
James massaged his temples after hearing that, before taking a deep breath and walking towards the bullhead.
"I suppose it wouldn't hurt for Ms. Polendina to have a chaperone." Though he muttered it, it was heard perfectly by the two teens, and they followed him up the ramp spirits high, unable to see the exasperated smile on the disciplined man's face.
(A/N)
Sup guys! Looks like another chapter basically wrote itself for me, and I gotta say, It was a nice write.
Next chapter though...heh, I can't wait to write it.
So since I don't have a lot to say in this note, I'm gonna go ahead and elaborate on what seems to be a shared wonder about Jacques character.
In the animation, Jacques is a greedy bad guy. Here, he is still greedy, he isn't someone people like to deal with, but he isn't unreasonable. He is still critical and demanding, but he sees what Whitley proposed as a worthy investment. Whitley gets to do what he wants, and Jacques gets a possible future seat on the council for his family, a mutually beneficial agreement, except with the possibility for him to get much more from the deal, which he would like.
He isn't per say approving of Whitley undergoing huntsman training, and that's because of the dangers that come with that lifestyle. If he dies, he loses a possible heir or seat on the council, if he lives, Whitley could try and leave the family. The reason he had Whitley convince him in the last chapter was because he wanted to make sure his son could still negotiate, and see what he would do when backed into a "corner."
Maybe somewhere deep down, there is still hope for Jacques, maybe not. Who knows?
Also, I can't guarantee that updates will always be as quick as they have been the last week, I ran into an unexpected burst of motivation, but I'm gonna keep trying.
See ya next time,
B.J.H.