Chapter 12

We descended upon Vale city from Beacon in one of the airships I had become more than a little familiar with taking them to go out with Serqet in the weekends. Blake had been settled down after being talked to by her partner and the rest of us expressing that we wouldn't out her to the rest of the world if she still wanted to wear her bow just that Yang in particular asked that she take it off in the dorm like with how I didn't wear my mask in the dorm.

Our group was on the roof of the Airship watching as the ship slowly made it's twenty odd minute long flight, I wasn't really sure why we were on the top of it but it was definitely nice out here.

In order of our team name, Blake was in a white, v-neck, zip-up crop shirt with a black hem and three-quarter sleeves. Her emblem was printed in off-white on the left side of the shirt, as well as that she was in black pants that have a vertical gray stripe on the outer side of each leg and a black belt plus black high-heel boots with two straps and buckles and purple under roles, reaching to mid-calf.

Yang was in an outfit that consisted of a deep-collared cream vest worn over a low cut black shirt; both are covered by a dark gray shrug with a raised collar, three-quarter sleeves adorned with a single black stripe down the outside of each sleeve, and gold cuffs. She had on a black mini skirt under the vest, past that pair of crooked black belts with gold accents were on her hip, with a purple piece of fabric attached to the left-rear section of the lower belt. Also she had thigh high stockings attached to her miniskirt by garter-belts on the front and back of each thigh, decorated with four golden studs above her knee and her emblem on the outside of each thigh in gold. Lastly she was wearing black ankle boots with multiple buckles and white ribbons on the back tied in a bow.

Osiris above these girls loved their over the top fashion. I was just wearing a grey dress shirt that had black cuffs and collar, of which I had the sleeves rolled up to my elbows, aside from that I was wearing black pants and boots. Plus I had on my Ankh necklace and was in my fox mask.

My leader said I looked like a dusty old crow she knew and I wasn't really sure how to take that, if she meant literally or if it was some in-joke she had with someone.

Lastly was my partner who had also opted for more is less and a far more sensible outfit in the form of a beige sweater with dark brown cuffs and collar, along with that she was in a dark brown knee length skirt, black stockings and tan mid-calf low heel boots with golden accents.

Seriously I had no idea what was up with the intensity of Blake and Yangs outfits, then again I suppose the way my partner and I dressed said a lot about what we were like as people.

When the Airship finally settled down onto the landing platform and we were on our way off the ship I looked out over the hundreds of people getting off and heading on and amongst them I saw someone. My mouth moved before my brain let any thoughts stick long enough for me to have realised the issue in the first place.

"Well shit I completely forgot about that." Was all I said garnering the attention of my teammates.

"What's wrong Azzy?" My leader asked, looking out into the crowds trying to find whatever direction I had been looking in.

"Nothing I just made a mistake was all- Hey do you mind if someone I know joins us? They're right over there-" I pointed in the person's direction, the blonde said it was fine and the rest of our team had no issue.

And so we approached Serqet who I had completely forgotten that I had a date with tonight, wading through the crowds getting closer she spotted me easily and went to call out to me but stopped herself when she saw who was with me.

When we waded through the crowd and were in the clear of other people I stopped in front of her and before I could introduce my team to her properly she spoke.

"Azrael I didn't realise you were into polygamy, here I thought our date was going to be just us and you've brought a harem of girls." She smiled watching the array of confused looks across my team.

It was something else to say that this wasn't the first time something like this happened, or I should say worse has happened. When I was fourteen or fifteen I brought home a girlfriend when my sister had been back on break from Beacon, she had tried to convince the girl that we had some sort of cult thing going on.

"Please don't say that." Was all I could say putting my face in my hand- to which I realised I had my mask on and became flushed from embarrassment.

"I'm glad to meet you all again, I hope you're doing well and not planning on anything dangerous?" I felt my shoulders slump when she changed her tone.

"Ms Lapis right?" Yang said, casting her eyes between me and Serqet.

"That's the one, though you can call me Serqet since we're outside of school hours." as she spoke I noticed Blake staring off out into the crowds behind us trying not to be involved.

"Anyway, Serqet was the person who I meant earlier." I said earning a raised brow from my partner, the blonde and said woman.

"The same one you said 'Well shit I completely forgot about that.' for?" Pyrrha chimed in, I don't think I had ever seen her do or say something like that before. Why would she throw me under the bus like that?

"Did he? Well that's nice." She was going to break me later, fuck. "Well I wouldn't want to have it on my mind later if anything happened to you kids so how about I chaperone you to wherever you're heading dressed so fancily, we don't want you drinking anything someone's laced or dropped a pill into." Serqet sounded very serious and I believed her, it wasn't something I had ever heard of before, but y'know country bumpkin.

After that the conversation was lightened when she mentioned her car and heading straight to it, on the drive to the club Yang had picked out which I wasn't really fond of the idea of going to, all four girls were discussing something I decidedly wasn't paying any attention to. The blonde was in the front seat, with Blake in the middle of Pyrrha and I in the back seat.

[Twenty cent in the club]

Much later that night I was leaving Mauzer's feeling a little annoyed that we hadn't gotten there sooner. Pyrrha and I were headed in the direction of a Dust store she wanted to visit before heading back to Beacon having come along with me to the gun store for that reason.

Since I didn't own a car and Pyrrha had neither a license nor a car we had to walk through the streets of Vale, it was nice enough I guess, we got looks from random people either recognizing the redhead or staring at me because of obvious reasons. I didn't care to see what the name of the store was when we walked in and my partner got right to buying while I walked into a back section of the store and went through a few of the books and magazines that were on a stand. I didn't look for anything in particular but it's not like I got very far before I heard voices sound in the front of the shop.

"C'mon you Bastard Human!" a gruff voice said as what I assumed was the person slamming a fist on the countertop at the front of the store.

Patting myself down I swore under my breath as I remembered that not fifteen minutes earlier I hadn't brought my replacement pistol, pretending to ignore the situation at the front I caught sight of my partner in my peripheral where she was holding onto a pack of Dust crystals. Slow stepping towards her I talked loudly as though I hadn't heard the people at the front-

"Look Babe! they've got Playboy here!" I said completely out of my character's general tone of voice as I did this I held up a magazine that had a rabbit Faunus on the cover with Brown ears wearing a strapless corset teddy, black pantyhose, a bow tie, a collar, white cuffs and a fluffy cottontail who was posing sultrily next to two other girls on either side of her wearing fake bunny ears.

Suffice to say Pyrrha's face flushed bright red as she gave a confused look before a glint in her eye told me she understood why I had suddenly changed, once she realized she went to play along with my dopey teen couple act but got stopped when a guy came over dressed in the new outfit the White Fang had started wearing since they became more militarized and terrorist like. He was shorter than Pyrrha or I so it wasn't particularly imposing aside from the Uzi he was wielding.

"Hey! You two! Put your hands up and keep out of our way!" His voice sounded kind of young, like he was a Faunus kid that had been dragged into the new regimen of the WF.

"W-Whoa Dude! We d-don't want a-any trouble, okay! We'll comply!" I said showing a fake fear in my voice and face as I lowered myself to the ground and the redhead followed suit-

"Wait… you're a Faunus too…?" the boy asked, realizing my very obvious wings finally. "Oh man… they didn't say anything about hurting other Faunus?!" he said the last part under his breath.

Despite all that though he failed to realize I was wearing a mask, which I suppose meant I hadn't really needed to match my face to how I sounded, but I suppose that was just on me. While he was distracted I made a motion with my hands that Pyrrha caught and nodded her head at me waiting for my move, I guess all that time Yang and Manus had us forced to train together and really work out team combo attacks and such. I'll probably thank her for it later when we get back to Beacon then, after she prys us for the gorey details of our runin, though I was already thinking of how our Blake might respond to it. She seemed like this might conflict with how she saw the Fang seeing as her Parents started it.

Coughing softly and clearing my throat just loud enough that the boy standing over us having a crisis could hear, it caught his attention before I thrust my wings forward in a flash of movement as I hardened my Aura around them to make sure it hit him hard and knocked him out in a single blow, Pyrrha used her semblance to keep his weapon from making heaps of noise as it hit the floor while I made sure the kid was fine as well keeping his body hitting floor with a loud thump and picked up said Uzi.

Looking at Pyrrha as she moved around the shelves to where the other White Fang were standing around she held up her hand and flashed enough fingers to tell me how many there were. I noticed as I peaked around the corner that one of them was sitting up on the counter top pointing a pistol around in the mans face waving it ignorantly as he spouted some propaganda type of crap about humans to them like he was some sort of philosophical preacher.

I spoke in my normal tone and level of voice so that the redhead could hear me the same as the morons at the counter while they got the Dust.

"3, 2, 1- Lets Jam!" coming out from behind the shelves that were loaded with Dust I pointed the gun at one of the men who had turned upon hearing me and I fired.

The White Fang member dropped as blood spurted from the wound slightly, the body made a soft thump as the one crouched on the counter preaching turned towards me while Pyrrha dropped down from the ceiling, kicking away the vent plate as she had found the time to get in them while I was doing what I was doing. As she did that her fist impacted the gut of a man with bull horns that doubled over, the redhead took the gun from the hand of the man as he crumpled to the ground. That distracted the preacher Bear further allowing me to take him down without firing again, she looked over at me with a almost fairly happy expression like she was glad that we diffused the situation-

A door in the back burst open with another White Fang member coming out in the midst of doing up their fly while the sounds of a toilet flushing sounded behind him, seeing me standing over their boss the Dog Faunus looked around wildly and ran over grabbing a hold of a woman who had stood up after seeing the situation to have returned to normal.

"H-hey drop your damn guns!" he said seriously. "I'll kill this woman if you don't!"

I paused somewhat annoyed at what I was seeing. "Pyrrha you said there were only three more!" she seemed baffled by what I said.

Though Pyrrha dropped her gun in plain sight of him and it looked like she might try her semblance on him but I made a subtle notion letting her know not to, it was too dangerous with the barrel of the gun pressed against the green haired and dark skinned woman's head.

Whipping the gun in my hand around so that I was aiming it directly at the man's head I spoke setting my plan into motion. "Listen I don't really care about her, I'm no cop or huntsman I'm not into protecting and serving or whatever- sorry lady you'll have you chalk it up to shit luck." I gave a shrug, he freaked a bit and the girl who seemed a little too calm about it seemed to change mood and scowl at me saying something about me being an asshole.

"What kind of fucking person are you then!" The White Fang lackey turned his gun on me and didn't get to think twice as he tried to fire but my perfectly aimed shot painted his brains across the case behind him before he could properly register what was happening.

The girl actually screamed frightenedly this time unlike when he had grabbed her, she dropped to the ground moving out of the corpse's way before running her hands over her head and such to check if she'd been shot or cut by the glass case that shattered.

A few minutes went by and the other people in the shop got up and seemed to be quite shaken or in shock still, the girl who had been used as a human shield was talking to a guy dressed in dark colours with grey hair. Pyrrha was making sure the Faunus were bound and couldn't make any moves on us while she got to checking on the other people to make sure they were fine and not harmed.

The Vale Police showed up shortly after with two squad cars, five officers came out and began searching for what was wrong after likely getting calls about the gunfire. Each of the officers were carrying a rifle though only two were actually using it the other three were cautiously handling their pistols, pushing the door open one of the officers holding a pistol seemed to take in the situation and understand what was happening going by the bodies leaning up against the counter unconscious though the two dead white fang hadn't moved.

It seemed my partner was disturbed by something when she finally came and stood next to me after giving a statement to the Police as they made the rounds on everyone getting the different accounts, I gave mine and it surprised the woman I spoke to- apparently she hadn't expected a Faunus to react the way I did to the White Fang.

I suppose I was meant to sympathize with them because they were Faunus too? I didn't because these guys were here just trashing a business for no reason and it wasn't like they didn't serve Faunus because I had been allowed in there.

While we were leaving and on our way down the street to a bus stop/ the place Serqet said she'd pick us up from. On our way there I heard footsteps behind us and a bubbly voice when suddenly dark hands covered the eye holes on my mask-

"Guess who?" a femmine voice said make me turn automatically.

As I did the girl let go and I was met with the sight of a girl who looked vaguely similar to the one who had been in the dust store, she apologized saying she had mistaken me for someone and patted me down as a further apology before stepping back and bowing a little and walking off.

Three minutes went by before I realised my wallet and Scroll were gone.

[Space Cowboy]

Once I had realised my wallet and Scroll were gone I took off my mask, told the redhead to head back without me and informed her of what I thought had happened before flying off into the sky toward where I had seen the woman rushing off toward embarrassed after patting me down.

It took me a minute to catch up and spot the woman as she was walking idly down the road without a care next to a grey haired boy about the same age as her, her Scroll rang and she answered it. I listened in from where I was perched atop of the roofs above them, it was a brief conversation that sounded like someone was ordering the thieves to go somewhere. My thought process was if I followed them to wherever they were headed I could take out this entire group assuming there was more of them, thankfully it would be very easy because when she had robbed me she hadn't found the Khurki somehow so I was going to make short work of them.

I had no clue whether they had been terrorizing the city through similar robberies, but getting thieves like them off the streets could only be a good thing.

Plus that Scroll was a gift from my sister so I wanted it back.

The chatter between the two as they walked was pretty boring, mostly it was just them actively trying to set the other off, but the guy with grey hair seemed to be the only one of the two able to do it. They went through parts of the city I had never seen until they reached slums that stretched on for longer than I felt they should.

Coming out of the slums of which I flew high above not wanting to take the chance of the roofs there to collapse beneath me while traveling across them, the area past the Slums was an industrial area with lots of open wide roads with enormous warehouses around them and shipping containers out near the dar end.

It was here that the thieves moved faster than they had been heading straight for one of the lone warehouses that had a car sitting outside of it from what I could see, as they approached a woman in a red dress stepped out of it causing the thieves to cease up stopping in front of her outside the side door of the massive building.

The woman in red led the other two into the building at which point I took the moment to touch down on the ground next to the car, peeking in through its windows. I didn't spot anything particularly obvious for indicating who these people were. So I checked if the door was open- it was.

Opening the door and leaning in I checked the glovebox and found a box of tissues and some smaller miscellaneous stuff, looking around I did find a wallet with some identification in it, so I took it before reading them and just stuffed them in my pocket. I did find a lighter and some matches as well along with a shirt in the back which gave me some ideas and a nasty grin crossed my face as I put together paying these people back for my things- and it's not like normal good people met at night in abandoned warehouses.

Tearing some cloth off the shirt I found the fuel cap, opened it and stuffed the cloth into it, tossing away the rest of the shirt. I prepared myself for the confrontation with these people. I had no idea what they had in terms of potential weapons and Aura or Semblances, while I had my mask on my hip since the moment I left Pyrrha and my own Semblance would make the situation basically entirely in my favour. They could have like two hundred people in there or something.

Standing in front of the door they went in through, I took a deep breath relaxing myself as I changed my shit eating grin from earlier into a neutral expression.

So I pushed the door open walking into the enormous warehouse where I was met with the sight of massive rows of shelving that were all filled to the brim with Dust crates most of which appeared to be stamped with Weiss' family emblem which meant all of this was probably stolen.

In the center of all the rows was a large aisle about four meters side to side and down at the end of it were the thieves from earlier without the woman in the red dress, hoping she was off somewhere else I just walked straight toward them.

When my footsteps were heard they both looked up in surprise from whatever they had been looking at on a table in front of them, a defensive tenseness took them over as I approached with my blank expression keeping my eyes on their lines finding the right one that would kill them on the spot if need be.

"What the hell are you doing here?" the guy said as the girl pulled out a gun- knife thing? From her back and aimed it in my direction as I closed the distance.

A shot was fired at the concrete before my feet stopping me in my tracks.

"I just want my wallet and Scroll back, that Scroll was a gift from my sister so I'm partial to it and I liked that wallet." I kept my expression uncaring, while I was a little scared that that shot was to alert more people to the situation or again they could mess me over with a Semblance that could counter me.

"You tracked us all the way here for your Scroll and wallet?" the guy asked while his partner did something that I couldn't see necessarily so much as she herself didn't move but all her lines walked off and began trying to circle me.

She stopped however when I felt a presence behind me and a sultry voice spoke out-

"A canary squawks from its cage." Whatever the woman had been planning to say as I turned on a dime and found my hand gripping her throat crushing it as I held her up.

This probably wasn't the best way to go about this but whatever they were doing here I needed a way to make sure they wouldn't come after me again once I had my things back.

"Then you should get out of the mine shouldn't you?" I said watching the fear rising in the woman's eyes, it was the one in the red dress who I now could see her golden eyes quite well.

Turning around I held her out above me in front of the other two.

"I do really just want my things back, you don't realise this but my Semblance has had you in its grasps this entire time so unless you all wish to die right now-"

Before I could continue the woman in my grip choked out orders to her underlings to hurry up as I felt a fiery warmth emanating from her, but I didn't let it distract me from what I was doing.

Once my things were handed back to me I looked at them all dead eyed as I put them in my pocket at the same time I pulled out my Khukri and instead of disemboweling them like I had the urge to- I wasn't really sure why but the tense air around me made me want to retaliate. It was an unnatural urge to kill or slash their lines and the longer it drew on the more focused it became.

Suddenly there were only the lines that would kill, ones that wouldn't leave room for anything else.

"You might want to punish them for this, I suggest removing the thief's hands personally." I said as I tightened my grip briefly then dropped the woman- before she hit her knees my knife worked its edge and I carved out her eyes.

I would have done it to all of them or just killed them if it weren't for the fact that I was sure I could hear more people approaching from the otherside of the warehouse so I fled after doing so through the door I came in from.

As I passed the car, seeing the rag sticking out of the fuel cap I lit it and flew off into the night towards Serqet's apartment as the sounds of an explosion echoed behind me after yelling.

[Drawn to death]

The next morning when I was sitting at the counter eating cereal from a bowl and Serqet was making her own she asked me-

"You came back with blood on your shoes and pants last night, I didn't say anything then because you looked tired and worn out from flying around-"

"However?" I filled in while she stopped for a moment to make sure she didn't pour boiling hot water on herself instead of in her tea cup.

"However, I want to know what happened." She gave me a stern look that said there wasn't any room for bullshit.

"Me and Pyrrha got caught up in a White Fang robbery and stopped it, after that though I got pickpocketed and went after the thief." I explained in less detail than I should have because she continued to look at me expectantly afterward.

"So you got blood on you during the robbery?" As she took her seat she asked.

"Not necessarily, we came out of that fine. It was when I stopped the thieves who had pickpocketed me that I must've gotten blood on them."

Her amber eyes looked at me with her brow raised waiting to hear more.