As people noticed I made a continuity error over my week off in which I previously had Coral stay and Pyrrha go with them, which didn't make sense when Coral was the one to die. I have gone back and edited the older chapters to have Pyrrha stay now. Sorry for the mistake and thanks for those that pointed it out to me.
I basically wrote it one way, had my week break, then forgot which way I'd written it.
Cover Art: Kirire
Chapter 53
The week Blake spent recovering from her "condition" was one of the hardest in her memory. It wasn't that it felt miserable so much as it felt like nothing. She moved around like a zombie, never putting in any effort and never feeling so much as the slightest desire to act. It was, she imagined, not dissimilar to what people who suffered from depression talked about. Not the crippling doubt or the unhappiness, but the welling sense of emptiness and the way you could wake up and feel no drive whatsoever, and waste a whole morning, or even a whole day, alone and in silence.
It had to be alone, too. The few moments she tried to cheer herself up by interacting with others turned into exercises in impatience. Her favourite café became a place where she criticised everything, and where the constant inane chatter of the people around drove her mad. Even a massage hadn't helped. The physical pleasure of it alone had been sapped away, and the light chatter of the girls almost had her snap. They sensed her mood and finished her session in silence.
Even Timothy recognised something was wrong. The spider had come to greet her when she returned with Jaune, only to stop and skitter back like it was afraid of her. Maybe it could smell the other anomaly on her. It hadn't come close to her since.
All of that might normally have distressed her, or at least worried her, but there'd been nothing. Nothing but the dreary interior of her apartment, the low drone of the television and numerous takeout meals, and their empty boxes stacking up on the kitchen side, the table, even the floor. It was too much of a hassle to clean any of it up.
And then, with the opening of her eyes after the seventh day, everything changed.
The first thing she did was gag at the smell – both of her apartment and of herself. A long shower was followed by a rigorous spring cleaning of her apartment, resulting in four bin bags worth of trash – some rotten – and an entire morning on hands and knees scrubbing mould away. Then another shower.
I've put on weight, Blake thought in horror, pinching her stomach. A week of sugary food, takeout, and soda with not much movement had, expectedly, taken its toll on her. I can't believe I lived like that. No. That wasn't living. That was existing. And even then, only barely.
It would have been nice if it was all happy feelings that came rushing back in when she regained the ability to feel at all, but the reality was that the emotions were mostly bad. She felt guilt for how she'd acted during the week, horror at the state of herself, sorrow for Timothy's fear, and a gnawing urge to go around everyone she'd interacted with, apologise, and make excuses that it had been a bad week and they shouldn't take the way she acted or anything she said seriously.
And then the fallout from the SDC hit her and it was all she could do not to scream.
Winter Schnee was dead. Coral Arc was dead. Dust was made from faunus – not just faunus, humans too, but the faunus had been the easy choice for the SDC in those horrible mines. Then she recalled the people in those cages, the horrible experiments, and finally the reality that a whole week had passed since then and she hadn't done anything about it.
A week in which the SDC had been propped up by ARC Corp and the kingdom of Atlas, and a week in which the decision had been made to continue the use of All Becomes Dust. An inevitable decision at the end of the day; they couldn't just take dust away. Couldn't reveal the truth of it either. At least she recalled Jaune saying that ARC Corp would be finding an alternative way of choosing sacrifices. Most likely, this was going to come from prisons. What happened if there weren't enough? What then? There were plenty of small villages no one would notice disappearing. Blake had a feeling she didn't want to know what they'd planned if the dust shortages continued.
All said, there wasn't much at all to be happy about, but she still preferred having her feelings than not – even if they were painful. The agony she felt was preferable to the emptiness. Blake never wanted to go back there again.
Jaune looked up when she let herself into the office. Technically, she was half a day late to work, but he didn't make a meal out of it. He simply smiled and raised a mug of coffee in greeting. A far more exuberant greeting came from Timothy, who hissed and scuttled toward her, bumbling his body clumsily against her legs and hissing like he hadn't seen her for a whole month. Blake scratched his carapace, sat down on the sofa and let the monstrous spider climb up and curl across her legs like a cat. Her fingers played atop its head as the burning blue eyes and swirling human molars ground together happily.
"Sorry I'm late," she said. "How are things?"
"Quiet," said Jaune. "Not a big surprise after the Schnee family were killed by the White Fang. The inheritance has passed down to Whitley and Weiss Schnee, but Atlas has taken stewardship over the SDC as you know. I guess the world is too shocked to want to make a move." He chuckled. "Except for the White Fang. They've been crowing about their victory for days now."
Blake smiled faintly. It didn't surprise her that they'd accept the victory despite not knowing who did it. Adam and Sienna might be suspicious, but they wouldn't question their good fortune. For all they knew, it really had been one of their cells that acted on their own and got lucky.
"That does remind me," he said. "Pyrrha mentioned that you'd decided to take a Slaved Anomaly." He nodded to her hip.
Blake froze.
She hadn't brought it—but it was there. The book, tightly bound, hung on her hip beneath her suit jacket, and she hadn't felt it. Blake shuddered. Her mouth felt dry, her tongue too big for it. Jaune didn't notice.
"That's fine and all but it needs to be registered so we know what we're dealing with. Coral gave it to you. Right? Do you know what it's called?"
Blake's lips moved without her consent. "It's called The Lady of the Lake." Her eyes widened. Those words hadn't been her own. Desperately, she tried to tell Jaune that she wasn't in control. That she needed help. Her mouth opened. "It reads a story of me visiting a lady at a lake, who can grant me boons to defeat certain enemies. It's useful."
"Is that what happened against Winter? It certainly helped there. What about this week you needed off? Is that related to it?"
"The power comes with a small price," the anomaly said, speaking through Blake. "Nothing too strenuous. I was just taken off my feet for a week. Exhaustion," she – it – lied. "I was warned about it in advance and accepted."
"Hmm." Jaune was typing her words into his computer, and so missed her panicked expression. "I guess that makes sense. It must use up your energy over the next few days to feed the power. And you definitely want to have this anomaly registered to you?"
No. No, no, no.
Blake's mouth formed a sultry smile. "I believe it will be invaluable."
"If you say so. It's registered to you now. At least it's not as destructive as Terra's, or as self-harming as mine. It could be worse I guess."
"It-" Blake's words came out as her own. "Jaune, the book-" They didn't continue. Her throat choked, and the words crumbled off. Blake took a breath and tried again. "I don't think-" Again, her throat closed off. "He-" Again.
Jaune looked up. "What's wrong?"
"I…" The words died. Blake grimaced and tried a new tack. "Nothing." There was no interruption. She was allowed to speak normally. "Nothing is wrong. I… I had something caught in my throat. That's all."
Blake wasn't sure if she imagined the book warming up at her side or not, but she knew it was behind this. It wasn't letting her tell him the truth. It was forcing her to lie. Would it do the same if she tried to write a message down? Blake snatched a notepad and pen on his table and started writing a message.
I need help. I've put on weight and need to lose it.
Blake stared at the sentence she had not intended to write. The first bit, maybe, but not the second. Blake crossed it out and tried again.
The book is useful. I want to keep it with me at all times.
That wasn't-
Scowling, she scribbled that out too and put pen to paper.
Thou art being a naughty child, Blake. Do not force mine hand to punish thee.
Her right hand moved outside her control, destroying the message moments after she had read it. Defeated, Blake shoved the pen and paper away and sat back with Timothy. The Guardian Weaver, sensing her fear, curled up tighter over her, hissing protectively. It didn't know what it was protecting her from, but it was determined to try its best.
"Are you okay, Blake?" asked Jaune.
"I'm… I'm fine. Just catching up with things. Losing a week feels strange." The anomaly didn't interfere with her speech if she didn't talk about it. "Has there really been no work? I'm surprised a whole week has gone by without so much as a peep."
"I guess I haven't really looked for work," said Jaune. "I've been busy with the fallout from Coral's death." He sighed and thumbed at his face. He'd obviously started to get over it, but she realised this week must have been hard on him. And she'd not been in any mind to help him. "The Secrets Office is being shut down now there's no director to run it. A lot of the anomalies Coral had hold of are being rounded up and destroyed. That includes the human transformation one we rescued from San Valeo. To say this is slowing things down is an understatement. Coral had over a hundred anomalies in her office."
"So many…? That's crazy. And we're the Containments Office."
"Yes, but we contain if it's safe to be contained. Coral researched even if it wasn't safe. Anything and everything she found was brought back in one piece, even if it cost her employees to pull it off. It's a mess. It turns out there's a lot more than she let on, and now father and Saphron are demanding full audits from us." He smiled weakly. "I've been doing that for most of the week, along with trying to continue some of Coral's research on my own. Not that I've had much luck. I don't really know where to start with it all."
That was no surprise. Coral was a researcher at the end of the day. A scientist. Jaune couldn't just pick up her studies and expect to make sense of them. Blake couldn't, either. "What about her staff? What happens to them?"
"They'll be absorbed into other offices and offered jobs. Those that refuse can retire." He smiled at her. "And I do mean retire as in stop work and find a new job. We don't do the whole bullet to the head retirement package thing. They get to sign a whole bunch of NDAs, but most people who have worked for ARC Corp kind of agree keeping anomalies a secret is a good idea by the time they leave us. We don't have to work very hard to convince them of that."
"No kidding. I think I was committed to that after my first run-in with a monstrous house that had eaten a whole bunch of people, including children." Blake sighed. "But what I meant was maybe we could take on some of Coral's staff. They could work on that research you're bashing your head against a wall over."
Jaune hummed. He leaned back, tapping his fingers on the armrest of his chair. It was obvious he hadn't thought of it, but then he'd had a lot on his mind. The death of his sister first of that, and no doubt he was asking himself if it wasn't all his fault. The worst part was that she didn't know. Winter had killed Coral specifically to enrage Jaune, so there was definitely a line of thinking that said he was the cause for her death. Winter was the one at fault, but he'd definitely been a part of her reasoning for it.
"It's not a bad idea," he eventually said. "We'd have to set them up somewhere but it wouldn't hurt to have a few extra staff to do some of the heavy lifting. Our workload has been increasing of late. Now with no office in Atlas, it's bound to get work. I think Lavender or Amber are going to find themselves pushed to set up an office there in a year or two." He nodded at last. "I'll message my father and see if he'll approve it. There's a chance he won't if he thinks we're going to become like Coral, but I'll mention that we want to investigate the human-to-anomaly transformations. If that fails, I'll suggest it be set up close to Saphron instead as an independent research organisation. We just need this looking into. It doesn't have to be in Vale or under our direct control." He laughed suddenly. "Ruby is going to be pissed if she finds out we're taking on new staff but not her."
Blake smiled. "I won't tell her if you don't tell her."
"Deal." Jaune stood. "Well, I'd better go make that call to father. I should probably call Saphron first and see if I can get her on board with it. That'll make things easier."
/-/
It turned out that convincing ARC Corp of his idea – or hers, really – was initially much harder than it sounded, and then paradoxically easier the more people got involved. Jaune had hit the nail on the head when he'd said their office wouldn't be trusted. Saphron stamped her foot down so hard Blake imagined they could hear it all the way from Argus and argued that she would never allow such a thing.
Nicholas Arc had agreed with her.
Then Jaune went and suggested it be set up in Argus instead, to be overseen by the Fist Office, and their tune changed. Once it became clear they weren't trying to get it in Vale or become the next Secrets Office, the tone eased up. Anger faded and the various offices debated as rational human beings instead.
It was hard not to see the value Coral's office had granted ARC Corp even if they didn't agree with the way it was run. A lot of the problems had been with its director, though. Coral had done what she wanted, when she wanted, and ignored a lot of the rules. Having an independent company that worked for ARC Corp would solve a lot of that, and the company would answer to every office of ARC Corp equally – though it would answer to Nicholas and Saphron the most due to their positions.
Soon, the idea was cemented, and then it was a case of ironing it out the kinks and deciding on where it would be stationed and how it would be set up. In the end, it was decided that it would stay in Atlas. That would help it keep to the independence it so claimed, and would also mean ARC Corp still had a foothold there. Plus, they could repurpose Coral's offices, which was a much more convenient choice than building something new. They also wouldn't have to demand any staff staying on from Coral's office move to another country.
"So, let me get this straight," said Jaune. "We're going to split the staff among the offices, right? So, there'll be a dedicated research team helping each of us?"
"That's right," said Nicholas. "Each team will be equal in size and funding. And I'm sure I can trust you all to work together if you want to and pool resources. However, any research topic will be publicly known to everyone in the organisation, and everyone in ARC Corp as well. Nothing will be secret and other directors will have the right to demand information and results."
More trust issues. Blake rolled her eyes, sat beside Jaune as she was as the conference call went on. He didn't say it, but she just knew that caveat was put into the contract to keep an eye on what their office was doing. Jaune's family really were a paranoid bunch.
"That's fine," said Jaune. He had nothing to hide. "I want to call in my topics now then. There are two of them – but I'm fine for one to be done before the other. The first is the so-called cure I got from the Schnee Auction. I'm almost certain it's a fake but I want to know what it is, if it's anomalous at all."
"I have no topic to research," said Saphron, "So I'm willing to let my team collaborate on this one. That should see it done quicker."
"Very well," said Nicholas. "I'm pleased to see the two of you working together. You implied a second, Jaune. I trust you're not asking for more resources."
"No. It's more that I want something researched that I gave to Coral, and I don't want you destroying it before they can. It's the San Valeo anomaly. I'm forwarding the details through to you now. It's a human-to-anomaly transformation that Coral said she was keeping out in an old oil rig in the ocean. It exudes an effect on people nearby late at night, so it has to be kept out there. I just want to make sure you all know it's next on the research table, so you don't put it on the chopping block."
"How dangerous is it?" demanded Saphron.
"It's contained. Even when it wasn't, it didn't have a body count. It basically makes people drunk and hallucinate about a party atmosphere. It's relatively harmless – and the first case we have where we've captured a live specimen of an anomalous transformation. It'd be stupid to throw that away."
"Fine. But the moment it's researched – the moment it's done – it will be killed."
Jaune gritted his teeth. "Fine."
"Is there anything else?" asked Nicholas.
"What of Winter's transformation?" asked Blake, speaking up from the side. "We were down in the mine, but your radio message said something about her injecting herself. Do we have any idea what that was, and whether we have it under control?"
"That is classified, Agent Belladonna," said Nicholas. Blake growled. "But if it will calm you down then I will confirm we have the material in question, and that we have secured the means of its production and destroyed it. There will not be any cases of a plague escaping that turns innocent people into anomalies. For that, we can at least be thankful that the Schnee had such tight security measures in place. They wouldn't have taken any risks when their own home was situated above their research labs."
It was good to know it had been dealt with, and she assumed the rest of it being classified was to do with the substance itself and what they'd been able to find about it. Blake wouldn't be surprised if that was researched quietly. This whole "everyone will know" business probably only applied to the lower-ranked offices. The Blades and the Fist Offices probably had access to more clandestine teams. There was no point arguing about how unfair that was.
"That's all, sir," she said. "Thank you for explaining."
"Is that it, then? If we are all agreed, the CRF – the Coral Research Facility – will be set up in Atlas over the remains of the Secrets Office. Associate-Director Saphron Arc will see to that, and Agent Terra Arc will be granted temporary control of the facility until we can select and promote a trusted agent from the internal research team. Agent Terra will have the research teams send out their contact details to the offices when they are formed."
"As an update to the Schnee matter," he continued, "We have agreement from Atlas to cover up the attack as a White Fang assault, and they have also agreed to fund and take on various fake dust mines so long as the profits from the dust sales are sent through them. ARC Corp doesn't need the money so we have agreed. Atlas will NOT be using the miners as fuel for the anomaly All Becomes Dust, and instead will be using criminals of certain sentences and above. The other kingdoms will also be donating their own lifetime criminals in exchange for discounts on dust. I recognise this is abhorrent to many of you. It is abhorrent to myself that we not only must allow an anomaly to survive, but that we must cater to it."
"Even so, there is little we can do for now. The kingdoms have agreed to begin investment in alternative energy sources now that they realise we can't keep it fed forever. Sooner or later, we'll run out of prisoners to feed to it, and then darker decisions will have to be made. With any luck, Remnant will outgrow dust before that happens – and then we can finally deal with All Becomes Dust and avenge those who have died to it."
Blake couldn't wait for that time. Maybe the anomaly wasn't the one at fault – not when it was them who were using its secretions as a fuel source. Human greed ever had its way of making things worse. Even so, she would rather the world be rid of it.
"Until then, Remnant shall have to continue on the course it has chosen. Let this be a reminder to all of you why we must prevent more anomalies becoming Reality Class. Once the cat is out of the bag, it is impossible to put it back in."
The call ended moments later.
"How much shit would we be in if they actually found out about all those anomalies in Alistair's bar?" asked Blake. "Or the fact we're letting them live peacefully in Vale?"
Jaune laughed. "We'd be hunted down and killed without question. And then they would be."
"Do you think they'd manage it?"
"No. That's the worst part. I thought it would be a few anomalies at best. Two or three, maybe less than ten, but the news spread. I never even realised that sapient anomalies have their own little communities and friendship circles. I guess I should have guessed. How hard is it for people to meet on a forum and form a chat group nowadays? There are probably sites they visit, and when the news spread, well, Vale became a safe haven. There are way too many now – and some of them are ridiculously strong."
"Like Neo?"
"Like Neo," he said, nodding. "I fully believe Neo could eradicate the entire Blades Office if it wanted – and probably much of Vale alongside it. If it came to all-out war, there'd be a lot of casualties. And the ability to keep the anomalous hidden would be the biggest one. The curtain would be torn down and everyone would know they exist."
Blake sighed. "Way to put all that on our shoulders, Jaune."
"I didn't think it would get this bad!" he complained. "I thought it'd be, like, a couple of them. A couple of peaceful anomalies keeping their heads down." He sighed and slumped back in his seat. "It won't be a problem as long as we keep it secret. There's no more SDC to rile them up, and no more stupid auctions to cause problems. We've also made it clear they need to respect the rules."
By killing a whole bunch of them.
Maybe that was for the best. It sounded horrible, but better a whole bunch of anomalies be killed than an all-out war begin in Vale's streets. What would happen after she and Jaune died of old age, she wasn't sure, but it wouldn't be any of their business at that point.
"I guess our best bet now is to wait and see what the CRF can find," said Blake. "There's not much else for us, specifically, to do. Is there? There's no job, no SDC to make things worse, and nothing immediate on the radar."
"You make that sound so unlikely," said Jaune. "You realise this is how things were normally before you joined, right? The SDC used to be content to run around behind the scenes. It's Winter who got too big for her britches." He laughed. "Now that all that is dealt with, things should get a little calmer around here. I'm all for it personally."
She was too, but she couldn't help but wonder if the book that had forced its way along with her would let that happen.
Went to the dentist today. Has to be the first thing this year that hasn't gone wrong in some way lol. Car crash, cat dies, stress crisis, health, and throat sickness, then dentist. I was really expecting something stupid like "yeah, it all has to go" but it was relaxed. No big problems. Thank goodness.
Next Chapter: 22nd May
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