Cover Art: Mystery White Flame

Chapter 18

Well, well, well. Look who came crawling back.

Such were the thoughts of one Roman Torchwick, as Cinder Fall let herself into his apartment without her two goons to threaten him. She closed the door behind her with a soft click, biting back momentary displeasure at having to lower herself to come to him, before plastering a relaxed smile over the top of it.

But they both knew her power had waned.

"Cinder!" he declared, standing and smiling flamboyantly. "So good to see you – I hear you're the talk of the city for your courageous actions at the carnival massacre. They're talking about giving you a medal, aren't they?"

Her smile was a tight, brittle thing. "They are. And a commendation from the police."

"Hmhmhm. My own must have gotten lost in the post, I'm sure, but I suppose the adoration and respect of the masses will have to suffice."

His face and the video taken by Lisa had been all over the news, and it was hard for even Ironwood to paint him as a villain in it. Not that Roman would care about that, in fact he might just have to do something illegal soon to make sure people didn't jump to any crazy conclusions. He didn't want to be associated with terrorism, but he also didn't want to be associated with casual heroism either. Yuck. No sir, he had a reputation to uphold and that was as a gentleman thief, not a two-bit huntsman.

Still, the adoration was appreciated and Lisa had caught his best angles as always – that woman really knew how use a camera, even the one on her scroll. He could fall for a woman like that, one who knew how to make him look fabulous. Of course, Red just had to insert herself into the conversation as well, and the fact they'd ended up on the floor together had somehow fed more rumours of one-sided romance, though thankfully people assumed it was one-sided on her part.

Poor Red must have been having a fit, though even he had to wonder how Adam throwing her at him constituted her tackling him to the floor in the minds of some people. Yet another reminder, if he needed any, that for a genius like him to exist, there had to be a lot of people who were too stupid to draw breath without a reminder. That was just the law of averages, and he was so far above average it hurt sometimes.

It was lonely being at the top.

"If you're done preening," Cinder bit out, "Then I have a... I have a job for you."

Ooooh. A job. Not a task, not a demand – both of which she typically used interchangeably to make it clear that she owned him and he had no say in his own actions. A job implied pay, a job implied some degree of partnership that had been sorely lacking in their previous discussions. But it was only to be expected, wasn't it? Through actions that were surely not his fault, Cinder had lost most of her allies.

Truly, such awful coincidences.

"I am at your disposal as always."

Roman offered a bow. He would have swept off his bowler to add to it, but Neo hated when he wore the thing indoors and had snatched it from him earlier. She looked rather good in it, he felt, which was just a sign of how brilliant his taste in fashion was.

"But, and I hate to question you, might I suggest my talents are best suited to theft and not actions of a more terroristic nature."

Cinder regarded him as if he were a conman come off the street to swindle her, which wasn't an unfair comparison, not that she knew it. The woman was too arrogant to believe he'd actually hoodwinked her. Oh, the poor girl was such a narcissist that it didn't cross her mind she could fail. Such a shame. Really, she ought to rein it in and practice humility like he did. Though it was hard to be humble when everyone kept singing his praises. Ah, the challenge of being Roman Torchwick.

"That won't be a problem," she said. "My more terroristic actions, as you put it, have not yielded much success, so I think a more subtle approach is best here. What I need is for you to steal something from Beacon."

"Ah? And now I'm interested. Tell me more."

"It's a large object, more of a machine really – quite sizable and difficult to move. It's really the contents of it I'm after."

"Do you have an image?"

"I'm afraid not. It's an experimental machine from Atlas that was smuggled into Beacon before this year's term."

"Oh? How interesting. Will I know it when I see it?"

"I believe so. It's stored beneath Beacon in a hidden underground area accessible via the main elevator shaft. It should stick out like a sore thumb. I'd intended to go down there myself once Beacon came under attack, but the White Fang have all but killed themselves now. The damn fools."

"Quite incompetent, they were," he agreed, casually ignoring his role in their implosion. "Impatient, too. All they needed to do was wait for your signal and they would have had a far grander showing. Now, they'll be likened to fools for attacking a carnival. Give it a few years and people will have forgotten the tragedy and retold it as Adam giving his life to kill clowns."

Cinder snorted. "Good. He deserves no better. And you were right," she admitted, sounding aggrieved at having to do so. "I should not have relied on fanatical terrorists in the first place. While they were easy to get on board, their discipline was abysmal."

"That's the way of it. They were unprofessional, practically lunatics. I, on the other hand, am a career thief. I not only have made my life off my craft, but on both being successful at it, and in getting away with it time and time again. That's a proven record, Cinder. The same can't really be said for a terrorist group that's failed to achieve its aims ever since it was founded."

"True. It is a lesson learned." Cinder closed her eyes and sighed, obviously wanting off the conversation about her failure. "Regardless, can you do as I ask? It should be the only machine of any size down in the basement, so you can't miss it. I believe it will contain pods or capsules the likes of which could contain a human body."

The likes of which could contain, or the likes of which did contain?

Cinder had said she wanted the contents, which implied something – or someone – was stuck down there. Had she lost a companion? Was all this ridiculous assault on Beacon some bizarre rescue attempt on her part? That really didn't fit with Roman's mental image of her, though he'd admit that image wasn't a very flattering image in the first place.

And if Ozpin did capture someone, wouldn't that make him more aware of potential rescue attempts? And why keep such a person at a school instead of, say, handing her over to an Atlas super-prison?

Roman kept his face neutral as he shelved the idea. It could be that Cinder was after something else, some coding or information in the machine. He wouldn't know until he got to see it himself and check it out.

"When do you need it stolen by?"

"Before I'm forced to return to Haven to maintain my cover. That gives you ten days."

"More than enough time," he promised, adding a mental note to schedule a celebration for that day – because Cinder would finally be out his hair for good. Of course, he'd also have to keep his guard up for these ten days to make sure she didn't try and kill him to clean up any loose ends. "But I'll need to scout Beacon out first, so I'd expect it in the latter half of the period. That's better for you as well, I expect. You won't want to be sticking around in Vale if Beacon is on the warpath."

"As long as it gets done. If you're unable to, we shall have to make a more reckless play to secure it."

Oh no, the horror. Don't die, Cinder. Nooo.

"And I'll expect you to be involved in that."

Ah. Less good.

"Then I'll make sure the machine and its contents are yours by the end of this week."

Cinder nodded, and looked rather pleased with herself as she swept out his apartment and closed the door behind her. She'd failed to discuss price, but then she had likely fallen back on old habits once she felt he was bowing to her demands. The silly girl was so used to people being afraid of her that she saw fear in his sarcastic silences.

"You hear our latest job?"

Neo poked her head over the back of the sofa she'd been hiding behind. He didn't believe Neo was afraid of Cinder so much as she just hadn't wanted to have to deal with her. The small girl was wearing his hat and munching on a stick of candy instead of her ice-cream for once. For a girl so perilously afraid of the dentist, she sure enjoyed rotting her teeth away. The last time he'd tried to help with her addiction, though, she'd almost gutted him for stealing her ice-cream and throwing it away.

"Looks like Cindy is getting desperate enough to bring us back into the fold. And without her two shadows to make vaguely threatening gestures our way as well." Roman flopped back onto his sofa, then tapped his cap to flip it off Neo's head and into his hand. She batted it away before he could put it on his head, sadly. "Ah, so cruel. Anyway, I'm rather interested in what it is Cinder wants down there."

Neo tilted her head and raised an eyebrow.

"Yes, I think I will go ahead with this little heist of hers. Tempting as it is to refuse, it'd give her ten days to track us down and kill us. I'd rather her timetable be a little too tight to fit that in if I'm being honest."

Nodding, Neo slid around the sofa and sat on the armrest, crossing one leg over the other. Even propped up like that, she was a little shorter than him. Her eyes narrowed at his smirk, accurately guessing what he found so funny. Roman quickly pushed on before she could kick him in the face.

"—anyway, it's best we at least appear loyal to her for a little longer, and things have been going so badly for her that I can't help but feel she'll be expecting us to fail. I think it'll be funny to succeed beyond her wildest expectations."

Neo crossed her arms.

"Okay, yes, part of it is that I feel the need to prove her wrong for doubting my skill, but it's also just a good idea. If she gives up on this, she has ten days to clean up loose ends – us, specifically. If we steal this for her on day seven or eight, that gives her only two days to try and find a way to smuggle this machine out of Vale. By the time she manages that, it'll be time for her to return to Mistral, and you and I can be conveniently far away. How about a trip to Vacuo? We could gamble our ill-gotten gains in the casinos."

Neo bounced and smiled, bobbing her head wildly. For a girl who routinely criticised him (with sharp eyes instead of words) for wasting their money, she sure was a fiend at it when faced with a casino. It was the bright lights and sounds, he believed, that always sucked Neo in until she was destitute.

But the benefit of being master thieves was that they could just rob the casino after losing all their money to it. Honestly, casinos to thieves were more akin to banks than anything. You deposited your money, came back for it later, and reaped the unintentionally generous interest the casino-bank had applied to it. In some cases, those interest rates could be as high as 50,000%. Really, he and Neo were more akin to specialist investors than criminals.

"But first of all," Roman said. "We need to do a little scouting of Beacon. I'd like to have a better idea what we're after, what we're working with, and how easy it will be to get down to it. I can't help but think that if this thing is important, Ozpin will have some serious security down there!"

/-/

"Well... that was anticlimactic..."

Beacon's basement did not, in fact, have any serious security down there. It didn't even have any locked doors, being a rather oddly large chamber with tall pillars and a roof so high up that they might as well have made Beacon a subterranean school. They'd have said billions in construction costs.

Getting into Beacon had been rather trivial. Neo used her Semblance to hide them and they walked in. Truth be told, he didn't like relying on it much – partly because it felt like cheating, but mostly because his whole schtick was that he wanted people to see them stealing things.

Sure, he'd still make headlines stealing things without ever being seen, but then he'd just be some terribly efficient criminal and not Vale's most eligible bachelor and worldwide mysterious gentleman thief. Anyone could be good at what they did.

Not everyone could be Roman Torchwick, however.

Neo poked his side and pointed.

"Yes, we could steal this right now, but then Cinder would find new work for us. Also, it wasn't really a challenge to get down here."

Neo kicked him in the shin.

"Well, it wasn't a challenge, was it? You can't just pretend otherwise. We need to give Beacon a chance to stop us—"

He ignored Neo's dramatic sigh and the way she threw her hands up as if giving up on explaining something simple to an idiot. Ah, Neo just didn't understand. What he did was a wonderfully symbiotic thing. He robbed places, but only theatrically, and that gave the security and denizens a chance to fight back.

In a very real way, Vale's very healthy and in-demand security sector owed its success to him – for if he really wanted, he could have used Neo to rob Vale blind without anyone being able to do a thing to stop them.

"Also," he added, "We can't exactly shift this thing out between the two of us. Not unless you think you'll be able to lift your half. Bend with your knees, Neo, not your back."

Neo took one look at the machine that likely weighed several tonnes and looked away angrily.

Chuckling, he rubbed her head and stepped on by, scaling the machine's steps to look at it properly. As Cinder had said, it couldn't really be missed, just sort of sitting in the middle of the basement surrounded by what looked like a movie set for some fantasy film involving a dwarven mountain home.

The machine itself came with a little platform and computer, and then several large tubes with frosted glass. Roman approached and ran his hand over them one by one until he found what he was looking for. A woman trapped in a single tube, fast asleep – or kept asleep by the machine. Judging by the state of her, she was less of a prisoner and more of a patient. Though if that were the case, he had to wonder why she wasn't in a medical facility. Even if they expected Cinder to come for her – whether that be rescue or murder – there were far more easily defended ways to protect someone.

On an airship, for instance, or in a military hospital with an army around it, or up in Atlas flying above the ground where you'd need an ID to even step foot on the island. Not down in the basement of a school that was bordering a forest literally anyone could travel through. There was no controls over who could get through the Emerald Forest, and it hadn't exactly been a great challenge for him to get down here.

This felt like a rushed job, or perhaps a stopgap measure. Maybe they intended to move the machine and this woman to Atlas but needed the cover of the festival to bring an airship big enough to transport her here. It was about the only excuse Roman could think of for the frankly awful decision to hide something important in a school.

Shoes clicked on stone coming from the direction of the elevator.

Surprisingly, their arrival had not gone unnoticed.

"I'm afraid, Mr Torchwick, that I shall have to ask why you are here today." Headmaster Ozpin walked with a simple, wooden cane. Beacon's budgets hadn't been kind to him. "I do hope you're not intended to steal anything here, for I would have to stop you most violently."

Well, well, well.

This could work.

"I think you'll find gravity has done a better job than you," Roman said, spinning away from the woman and leaning on the railings to grin at Ozpin. "That and the laws of physics, or do you think my associate and I capable of lifting this thing and carrying it out of here?"

Ozpin considered that, then smiled faintly. It didn't make him any less dangerous, but Roman's tacit promise to not take this today – as subtle as it had been – had apparently bought them some time. Enough for idle conversation.

"I suppose that would be beyond even you. I expect you have questions."

"I have one question that eats at me, Ozpin."

"Oh? Who the woman in the tube is?"

"What? No." Roman snorted. "My big question is how in the hell you managed to get this thing down an elevator shaft."

Ozpin regarded him with no small degree of shock, then closed his eyes and chuckled. "Ah. Yes, I suppose that is a good question. With great difficulty would be the best answer. Obviously, the thing had to be built down here, but that didn't make it any easier to work it down. It was like trying to fit a sofa up a fire escape. There was much struggling, plenty of angry comments between James and me, and lots and lots of broken glass."

"Getting this thing out is going to be a pain in my ass."

Ozpin tilted his head, eyebrow raised. He looked very much like Neo for a moment, which let Roman read him like a book. The man was curiously intrigued and hadn't failed to spot the very specific thing Roman said.

"You are to steal the machine...?"

"I am to steal the machine and its contents. This is little more than scouting. Browsing, you might say. I'll be back in a few nights for the full thing – and what a chore that's going to be, I tell you. Getting in and out of Beacon won't be difficult, but carting this garbage up the elevator shaft? Absolute nightmare."

"I expect it will be. Can I convince you it's too much trouble?"

"I'm afraid not. This is a `do or die` situation if you catch my drift."

Ozpin smiled. "I think that I do."

Neo sighed and plodded over to sit sullenly on the metal steps, realising this was going to be a case of two men monologuing at one another that was going to stretch on. She went ignored by both men, each doing their best to out-mysterious the other.

"I could make it easy for you," said Roman. "Break down the machine yourself and have it flat-packed and ready for me to steal before ten days is up, and I'll be in and gone without causing your school any disruption."

"Ten days? Is that not when the other schools are leaving Vale?"

"I'm sure I wouldn't know," Roman drawled.

"Ah, I see. Well, I would rather like to not have a petty theft interrupt lessons..." Ozpin stroked his chin. "It's been a rather hectic semester. The festival alone has interrupted lessons, but terrorist attacks, the breach, and now this? Miss Rose, especially, is already behind after having skipped two years, and this isn't making her life any easier."

Roman shrugged. "Maybe if she spent more time focusing on her lessons and less time longing for an older man who's too good for her, she wouldn't have that problem. Feel free to tell her I said that."

Ozpin smiled faintly. "I won't."

"Aw. Go on. I'll pay you to tell her."

"I'm afraid I'm not so easily corrupted. Regardless, you have me at a disadvantage and your track record for stealing things you've promised to is one I simply cannot compete with. Give me seven days and you can come and take this from us without being challenged. Is that suitable?"

"Seven days and you release a press release saying I broke into your school and stole a big machine from you."

Ozpin haggled back. "As long as the nature of the machine is kept secret."

"Deal!"

"Excellent." Ozpin stepped away to let them reach the elevator. "I'll see you in a week, then."

/-/

One week later, Roman Torchwick stole an unidentified machine from Beacon in the dark of the night. One week later, Cinder excitedly rushed to a warehouse Roman had commandeered and knocked hurriedly on the metal door, stepping in once Neo unlocked it. The machine stood in the centre of the warehouse, fully operational and with frosting over the glass pods.

"I'm going to assume this is it," Roman said, tapping a hand on the metal. "Since this was literally the only thing down there when we hit Beacon, and you did say it would stick out like a sore thumb."

He'd done it.

Cinder practically trembled with excitement, unsure if the words that would come out her mouth might stutter and stammer. Swallowing, she forced herself to at least appear calm.

"This is it, Roman. You have done... You have done marvellously. Consider me impressed – and consider yourself to be well compensated for your effort. This was in the basement, then? The information was correct?"

"Yep. Just a huge, empty chasm of a hall underground and this thing slap bang in the middle. Kind of weird if you ask me, but my job isn't to decide Beacon's IT policy. It's to steal what you ask me to steal. And that's one big machine and its contents."

Cinder couldn't contain herself any longer. Leaping up, she rushed from one pod to the next, wiping the frosted glass clean to peer inside. There were so many pods, which didn't make sense when this was for one person – but then maybe Ozpin had dreamed of collecting the four maidens and locking them away like this. A cruel fate, but it wasn't hard to believe the immortal man could be just as cruel as Salem in his own way.

The first was empty, as was the second, and then the third. Cinder approached the last with excitement bubbling away in her stomach. She bit her lip, ecstasy overflowing, and wiped her hand over the glass at what would be face height.

Empty.

Panic did not set in immediately.

Instead, Cinder leaned back and looked for the fifth tube she must have missed.

There was no fifth tube.

Panic set in.

"Roman, where is she?"

"She...?"

Cinder did not scream. Just. "The woman – a woman. A person kept in the machine. There was a person in the machine, correct?"

Roman looked to Neo, who shook her head, and Roman then looked back to her. "I don't know what to tell you, Cinder. This is what we found when we went down into Beacon last night. This machine, like this, and no one in it."

Cinder's heart shattered.

"I mean, if there'd been a person inside then I'd have assumed you wanted them kidnapping rather than the machine itself. Would have saved us hours having to work it up out the elevator shaft. Kidnapping a person would have been so much easier, but there wasn't anyone. Honestly, the thing wasn't even plugged in when we got down there. It was just stood there, deactivated, without even having dust cells in it to power the thing."

"B—But it's operational," Cinder stammered.

Roman scratched his cheek with a finger. "Yeah, I kinda added those once we got it back here for dramatic effect. It wasn't in use down in Beacon. Though it looked like it might have been in use a month or so ago. Or maybe further back. If there was a person in here, I feel like they took her out and sent her someone else a while back – probably when the White Fang first appeared, or when Grimm breached in Vale."

Cinder's knees hit the metal. They... They had moved her? How? When? But she'd been watching – No, she hadn't been. Cinder had been distracted dealing with the White Fang's nonsense and reeling in shock at Roman stealing Amity, and... and her attention had slipped. Somewhere in the midst of that, Ozpin must have had Ironwood come down and steal Amber away, take her up onto his airship.

Cinder's vision began to spin.

No. No, this wasn't the end. It wasn't. Cinder bit her lip until it bled.

"Roman," she hissed. "I have a job for you – for all of us. A combined effort. We... We need to storm Ironwood's flagship in two days. We must storm it, locate the person that was in this tube, and we must kill them!"

"I'm really more of a thief..."

"Then steal the damned airship!" she screamed. "As long as I can kill her, I don't care! Steal the airship, steal his army, steal his cannons and his robots and his soldiers – I don't care so long as I'm on that ship when it happens!"

Roman's smirk pissed her off. "As long as you're on the ship, eh? Yeah. Yeah, I think I can pull that off. One final heist before you leave Vale for good, eh? I suppose good old Roman can make sure it's one to be remembered."

Good. Good! This was salvageable. This wasn't over. This was... This was just another setback, just another – one of so many setbacks. But that was fine, because she would overcome them, she had Roman, and he at least was proving competent. And Amber had to be on that flagship, it was the only place left where she could have been smuggled. Victory would be hers, it would all be hers, and then she would be free of this blasted kingdom!

And for annoying her one too many times with his smugness, maybe she would make sure Roman took a tumble from that airship and struck the floor at terminal velocity while she was at it. Wipe the smug look from his face even as she wiped him across the landscape.

A good bit of catharsis to put an end to this sorry excursion.

This story is ending soon – which is concerning as I've not had any ideas for a new one to replace it. That's mostly down to life being a little too hectic at the moment to focus on anything like writing than it is me running out of juice.

Just got a lot of other things demanding more attention.

Next Chapter: 30th July

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