Chapter 14

"Get back here you little shit!" Priscilla yelled after me as I flew out of her reach.

"Not until you stop trying to strangle me and tell me why you're like this?!" I said back avoiding a stone she threw at me.

"You fucked my friend! You degenerate piece of crap!" Her angry scowl got worse as I let the information sink in.

"What? Why does that even matter!?" I lowered myself down so I was eye level with her as she stood on the balcony of Serqet's apartment.

"Because she's my friend you little shitwick!" My sister attempted to swipe at me again.

"I don't see a problem with that considering we're dating." I felt like this was an overeating and I didn't understand why she was so pissed off at it.

Eventually my sister calmed down and let me come back inside where I was grilled by her more for whatever reason. When she was done I asked how she found out and that lead to me looking at Serqet for five minutes waiting to hear what her reason for telling my sister was or why she gave into my sister pressuring an answer out of her.

It was stupid.

Really fucking dumb.

[Grilled]

While I had been going through my things the next day after informing my mother as she was leaving about the conversation that was held.

I came across the id and whatnot that I stole from the car of that woman I blinded after her underlings robbed me, her id I had was a drivers licence, a debit card and a Mistralian passport. They were all for one Cinder Fall, a 5'8/179cm tall 22 year old woman from Mistral who was in Vale as a representative for Haven Academy for the upcoming festival.

All of which seemed to be bullshit.

From what I saw in person, yeah sure she could have been that tall and that old, but she looked and sounded like some stuck up girl who's not used to not getting what she wants.

Anyway I still hadn't seen anything from that group so far, but I was worried they would come after me or worse yet people around me now. For all I know when that car blew up I actually incinerated and destroyed that entire building by setting off all the Dust inside it.

Honestly the more I think about it the more I hope that it's true, but at the same time if it had I have a feeling the explosion might have caught me in some of it's blast.

I had tried to do some digging around for information on her but nothing came up from what I found and as far as the other two went they ran away from the Dust store robbery before the police arrived to get statements from people. Which brings me around to why the green haired one even stole my stuff to begin with.

Anyhow as for what I was doing now I was at Beacon in my team's dorm sitting on my bed playing the guitar I got at the store Diarmuid was working at, I was playing one of the many war songs I had learned. I wasn't sure what it was, maybe I was just drawn to everything death related but the current songs being about a man who was sending a letter to his sister telling her not to tell their mother that he was in whichever location said war was going on.

The artist was from a time in Solitas' history when they were at war with Sanus or more specifically parts of Vale, though they were from when Solitas had four major countries in it and weren't just Atlas and… wait, were there more than just Atlas anymore?

I think I've read too many books.

As it stands I know very little about the state of our current world and know a lot about the history of Remnant though I think that's just because all that time without television and only radio ment I had lots of time to read whenever I was out on walks through the forests around Valor.

For reference I've been singing in my head this entire time though because I don't think the others would appreciate my poor attempts at it. As far as the girls went Yang wasn't with us at the moment as she had gone to Patch to spend the rest of the holiday with her sister at home leaving Blake, Pyrrha and I here.

I'm pretty sure Blake must've picked up a job because I haven't seen her all day and when I asked Pyrrha about it she said the raven haired girl disappeared at around seven every morning and didn't come back until three that afternoon.

For obvious reasons my partner couldn't really go and work at any place in Vale without being mobbed by fans that she had everywhere. She had just left the room a few minutes ago to go and work out in the gym though so I was free to sing out loud to myself.

Which was why I moved into the main room and sat down on one of the couches with the guitar and started again anew with a song still in the same trend of war songs it was called "Ya Soldat" or I'm a Soldier.

It was a really odd song in that it was reggae sung by a group from the wastes of Solitas' ruined cities that were all left over from its wars. I didn't really think it sounded like a reggae song but it was one.

Though I basically learned the language this song was in just for the music if I was honest, and when I mentioned knowing a few languages there was a reason I chose the ones I did and that was mostly up to whether or not they had music I liked.

Anyway my weird love for foreign war songs from a time since past aside.

Playing the start of the tune I brushed the strings of the guitar slapping it to get a beat going along with it before I started my best attempt at singing the lyrics

In the middle of the song I was forced to cut myself off as my Scroll started ringing bring down my mood some, putting the guitar to the side I picked up my Scroll and answered the call.

"Mr. Solatium."

I sighed. "Yes?"

"I would like you to come to my office so we might continue that conversation if you are free to do so?" The headmaster said his voice sounded like there was more of a choice to the matter than there was.

"I'll be there as soon as I can, Sir." I said ending the call and putting some shoes and my fox mask on before heading to the tower.

My walk there wasn't very interesting and that was probably because there were so few people hanging around the school grounds during the holiday period, though I did pass by Weiss who was heading somewhere in a rush. She gave a small acknowledging nod when she went by me.

As I reached the elevator that went to the headmasters office Anastasia came out of the elevator and said 'Good luck' so I was somewhat concerned as for what this might actually be about, but at the same time she could just be messing with me.

Stepping out of the elevator into the large windowed room I looked up at the gears above my head as they silently moved making me wonder what they actually did, though at the centre of the room was the headmaster sitting at his desk in that awful looking chair and the deputy headmistress standing next to him reading off her Scroll before she looked up adjusting her glasses.

Miss Goodwitch's eyes were an oddity in that they always had a sternness about them, but yet conveyed a level of compassion that didn't make much sense. Maybe it was her professionalism and care for the students she taught.

"Welcome Mr. Solatium, if you'll allow it I'd like to call you by your first name?" The grey haired old man said as he adjusted his own glasses before sipping from a mug on his desk.

"Sure." I shrugged, it wasn't really like I lost anything from letting them say my name.

He motioned for me to sit down on the chairs in front of his desk so I did and waited for them to start.

"Firstly Mr. Solatium we would like to discuss yours and Ms. Nikos' involvement in stopping an armed robbery of a Dust store that resulted in the death of three Faunus." The Blonde woman said looking at what could only assume was her version of the report the police wrote up.

"What is it you want to talk about? I thought things went fine, all things considered." Both adults looked at me with raised brows for a moment, at which point I remembered to take off my mask and let them see my face again.

I immediately noticed the subtle uncomfortableness in Ms. Goodwitch's stance and eyes, like I'd said before if I have that is- my eyes see a lot more than just the lines of death, they pick up quite a lot of smaller details though that could just be my Faunus heritage.

"From the police report and witness testimony you admitted to actively shooting with intent to kill during the incident, directly killing two White Fang members who were involved." The old man just listened to his Deputy watching me as she spoke about the incident.

"I did yes, they had guns and didn't seem to have any qualms about firing at civilians or killing people themselves aside from a boy they had with them who I knocked out before Pyrrha and I coordinated an attack on the White Fang holding up the store." I really needed to thank Manus and Yang for all that extra training we do as a team, because if we hadn't spent so much time training different scenarios and using the Gun Course for them I feel like it would have been far more messy.

Though that's what the Gun Course was for after all and Mrs. Garand loved to remind us whenever our team was in there with Manus or just during class that it was imperative we learned how to deal with every kind of situation even if it wasn't Grimm related because helping your average person out is just as important as slaying hordes of the mindless beasts.

"Indeed, we've spoken with Miss Cosmos about your sessions with her and what sort of development they've produced and she has said you are far better now than you were when you first arrived." Goodwitch didn't look like she believed that entirely.

She talked about a few more things relating to that before finishing up, thanking me for my time and leaving.

There was a long silence between myself and the Headmaster as he waited and I did so as well, it wasn't like I wanted to be here right now I'd rather be back playing my guitar.

Speaking of which, when I sent my mother on her way I gave her my Oud to take back home when she stopped off there before they went on to Vacuo and headed to Shade to see Castus. I hoped my little brother was doing well.

Ugh that whole situation was something I'm not sure how to deal with.

"You appear to be distracted by something Azrael?" Ozpin said, bringing me forth from thought.

"I am, but you wanted to talk to me about whatever it was we talked about before school started?" I wasn't in the mood to discuss my personal life with this old man.

He was looking at me with those eyes again, the same ones that were trying to analys how best to use me and my abilities again, reminding me of what my sister told me when I said I was applying here. I mentioned that before but I never said what she said did I?

I'll be paraphrasing because it's been a while, but it'll be the general gist of what she said.

"Azrael if you're ever approached by Ozpin about your Semblance then make sure you don't get caught up in his words, he might try to sell you on this idea of fighting for him and not just the people or guide you to where his enemies are."

Paraphrasing like I said though.

"You said that these 'Lines of Death' you see are like zigzagging lines that float in the air almost? I believe you said it was like they were cracks in reality?" He probed and pretty sure he quoted me almost.

"Yeah I did." Okay but what did he want?

"Why is it you wish to become a Huntsmen Azrael? Your sister- actually all of her team were quite enamoured with the idea of helping people and making the world a better place in one way or another so much so the two combatants of their team only did so because it was a requirement for teams to have at least two fighters amongst themselves to participate and help the others with mandatory fighting and related classes." He said completely changing the direction of the conversation for whatever reason.

I was sure he had his reasons.

"If I'm honest I just couldn't think of anything better to do and I wanted to learn to fight in a way that didn't rely on my Semblance as well as get my Huntsmen license that is basically an infinite passport that doesn't need renewing and it acts as an ID." that appeared to get a reaction out of him.

Also it was true, I'm not sure if I've talked about why I even came here in the first place before, but yeah that was pretty much my reasoning.

"Actually what was my sister's team like then? If only Priscilla and Scáthach were the fighters I imagine?" He nodded, moving onto the new topic easily.

"I believe Miss Cosmos did most of the psychology based courses we offer and spent a lot of time learning how to deal with people and such which led to her later applying for the schools counselor position as you know." He paused to drink from his cup. "As for Miss Lapis, she did every course we have relating to taking care of people, medical training and a few similar courses to Miss Cosmos, I believe those to women truly believe in their ability to make a change and wish to be on the front line of that by being staff here at Beacon."

"Yeah I noticed that about them, how about Scáthach then? She's a bit of an anomaly despite how close my sister was to all those girls, I can barely remember what she was like and I imagine you have a better idea." I was kind of just wasting time at this point, but milking information out of him would at least be useful.

"Hm well Miss Ulster was probably one of the strongest students I've ever witnessed come through Beacon, her mental fortitude, physical strength and a personality that was quite strong in the sense that she understood very well from the day she set foot on the grounds who she was and what she wanted long before any other student had even begun to be like that." Ozpin sounded quite fond of remembering how Skadi was.

This went on for another half and hour of me asking questions and him willingly answering everything without issue.

[Questionnaire]

It was Wednesday now, I'd been spending the last few days with Blake and Pyrrha hanging out as much as they wanted me to since I spent almost all of the first week with Serqet. Pyrrha had found my new guitar and pressured me into playing a song for her so I sang one of the few I could think of.

The song's name wasn't important, but she ended up liking it and said I should play more often, but I was fairly uncomfortable about the whole situation. Even when I had played for the girls while we were camping in Forever Fall it wasn't something I was used to doing.

Most of the time I did spend with Pyrrha involved training via sparring or going to the gym occasionally with Yan Qing since he was around fairly often as Manus was out spending time with some family visiting. Though I did spend a lot of time talking about music with my partner and as it turned out she listened to some similar stuff to what I had grown up- and I don't mean the war songs, those were something I picked up in the past four or so years.

Anyway though, Yang had messaged us all in our teams chat that had all of us in it saying that she would be back by the end of today or sometime tomorrow and was looking forward to taking us out to Vale and go to a cafe or something as once last piece of rest before school starts back up again.

None of the girls knew yet and I was planning to keep it that way until I couldn't since I was still thinking about dropping out at the end of the year after the festival in the third term to go and help my girlfriend out.

At the moment though I was with Nereius and Mr. Howitzer and we were finally putting my weapon together. Originally we had designed a scythe mechashift up but scraped it when the irony of it settled in and I didn't really feel like making my image closer to that of a reaper or psychopomp than it already was.

Also we ended up melting my sword down and using its material to help with casting some of the parts for the new weapon.

Essentially though it was a fully automatic shotgun with that extended into a bearded axe with the blade of the axe appearing out of the stock. The idea would be that I would be using it in the bearded axe form most of the time and when I was with my sister at Mauzers I had purchased a Saiga 12 it was a 12 gauge shotgun that I was using as the base for this and what tore pretty deep into my wallet aside from the other stuff I got.

Mr. Howitzer was really impressed with the design I had put together and obviously I keep mentioning that Nereius has been helping me with the whole process, Howitzer said we should have it ready for extensive use by Sunday and that having actually brought the saiga itself sped the building process up as well as melting my sword down.

So as a suggestion from my green haired friend he said I should call this new weapon "Macellazione" as a step up from "Macellaio" which meant 'Butcher' as I've said before where as the new name meant 'Slaughter' because whereas there was something cleaner about the process of the executioner's blade- an axe/shotgun was more likely to leave scenes of slaughter in its wake.

He thought it was funny and I agreed that the sword had the grace of a skilled butcher where as an axe and shotgun had the grace of a murder scene. So "Macellazione" was the name of my new weapon.

My green haired friend, as it turned out, was a very smart and weapon savvy person who built allsorts of mechashift in his spare time and his family owned a business where his mother and father sold pre-made mechashift for people.

Anyhow I was in the middle of sharpening the actual blade of the bearded axe.

"What do you think Pyrrha would say if I asked her out?" Nereius said out of nowhere causing me to jump slightly before I was left baffled at his question.

"Uh well I'm not sure, I guess there's no harm in trying?" This was another revelation on top of the many I've been having in recent.

"Damn I thought since you were her partner you'd know how she was with that sort of thing." he commented while sharpening the tip of his spear 'Diachoristikó ouranoú' pretty sure it meant 'sky splitter' or something.

"Can't you go ask your brother for dating advice?" I asked back hoping to steer away from him talking about the redhead in the light of being a potential girlfriend because honestly if I hadn't met Serqet I gladly would have approached her about it already.

"Eh? Hektor? Well I guess, but she's your partner soI thought you'd know her better than every other person in the school that wasn't your team, plus Hektor's off chasing girls and acting like a seventeen year old with the heart and soul of a forty year old dad, so he's not really the best to ask."

"Why what's his target?" Now I was a little curious. I hadn't talked to Hektor much.

"He's currently trying to woo Miss Goodwitch." he said to dead silence as I looked at him in genuine confusion.

"What?" oh right he couldn't see my face through the mask.

"Yeah that's what I said to him when he told me, apparently according to him older women are better because they're more likely to want to do 'kinkier' shit. I hadn't really heard that word before my brother said that and had to look it up online." The golden eyed boy shook his head remembering the moment.

"Anyway..."

"Yeah anyway."

A silence hung between us while we went about sharpening the edges on our weapons.