AN: After some long thought, and personal chastising, I decided to split the previous chapter into two separate chapters. Mainly to reduce bloat and fix the pacing issues after going through it.
Vine watched as the lone bandit casually takes a puff from his cigarette, the small flame illuminating in the moonlit dark. He inches closer and closer, as calm as the swaying trees above him. As he moves closer, he can hear the bandit muttering to himself angrily. Right when he takes another puff, Vine grabs him with his aura vines and binds him to the ground. An Atlesian Marine runs up to him and cuffs him while putting a gag on his mouth to prevent alerting the rest of the camp.
Vine whistles in the air and a squad of marines emerged from the woods, one of them stayed behind to watch over the bandit. For the past few hours, they've been tracking the bandits in the region to retrieve the stolen property from the attacked mines. In the air, the faint noise of a party can be heard, Vine signaled to the marines to follow him.
Soon enough, the telltale signs of a bandit encampment can be seen. Strangely it has two unmotivated bandits guarding the gate, while a loud party can be heard beyond the walls. Vine takes out his scroll.
"Teal One, this is Sirius one. Bandit encampment spotted, relaying coordinates to your command."
"Coordinates received, manta and orca gunships have been dispatched to your location."
Vine whistled to the squad, before pointing to the two guards. They nodded, before disappearing into the bush. Vine slowly crept up toward the guards, before using his vines to grab and slam the guards into each other, knocking them out. He whistled again and the marines moved towards the door, two of them stopping to cuff the knocked-out bandits.
Vine uses his semblance to peek over the wall to get an overview of the situation. Most of the camp was drunk or in the mood of the party. A few guards wander about, clearly disgruntled that they can't enjoy their fun. Large amounts of SDC mining equipment and stolen valuables. This would be relatively easy to subdue. Vine went down onto the ground and faced the marines.
"Support is on their way, minimal security, mostly drunk occupants. Don't forget to examine for any crucial evidence from among the stolen equipment."
Though he can't see their faces through the black and white helmets, he knew they understood the orders. Taking a deep breath, Vine pried open the wooden gates of the bandit encampment, disrupting the party music and startling everyone inside.
The marines began barking orders to stand down and get on the ground. Most were drunk to properly respond, and the few that were assigned guards knew that they were outmatched. One tried to rush a marine, only to get beaten in CQC by their target. Soon enough the engine whirs of the manta and orca can be heard, their lights illuminating the dark sky.
The mantas hovered over the bandit encampment, releasing marines and soldiers before landing outside the camp, while the orcas stayed in the air and maintain air supremacy in the case of any Grimm attacks. The Atlesian troops began arresting and securing the stolen equipment, meanwhile, a single marine walked up to Vine.
"Sir! You've been called up to command, Alpha Priority."
Vine only nodded in response, before boarding one of the Manta transports, which was filled up with drunken bandits and soldiers. Before lifting up and flying back towards the Atlesian airship.
Vine enters the central command room. Unlike the bridge, this section of the airship was used for regional operations, and fleet command. Nominally it would be filled with crew and security maintaining the ground operations, however, due to recent events, Clover had the room empty for a debriefing.
"Alpha Priority?" Vine asked curiously, as he takes a seat next to Elm.
"Yes, classified information will be discussed."
"Alright then," Harriet spoke up. "What exactly requires all of us to be here Clover?"
"Well…" Clover takes a deep breath, and a holographic screen is turned on behind him.
"In terms of our goals that the public is aware of. We succeeded. Atlesian forces have fended off multiple Grimm attacks, our forces are viewed as a stabilizing force within Southern Vale. All in all, we have done our jobs as peacekeepers and VNN is writing praise stories about us."
"In our actual goals, however…"
The holographic display turned into a map of the Moonfall Forests. One screen displayed a bloody White Fang logo.
"We have concluded that the attacks are what Sienna said, a false flag. However, we have made no progress in discerning who exactly is responsible for them. Autopsies from the bodies…well the ones that weren't completely rotted, revealed that the assailant or assailants are heavily trained. Each victim was bounded and then received a quick stab through the heart, from whence they quickly bleed out and died. The ones that didn't were slashed by sharp weaponry, or experienced extreme blunt force trauma. We assumed the blood is then collected to form the logo and pin it on the Fang."
"As for the pattern, it involves disabling the established CCT tower within the mining settlement, the destruction of all recording equipment, then the victims are bounded, collected into a group, and murdered. Mining equipment, buildings, and documents remain untouched by this threat, barring raids from scavaging bandits."
"Why is Jacques so persistent in this area in the first place?" Elm asked curiously.
"Dust…Lots and Lots of dust, Not to mention the weather is amazing, and low amounts of Grimm. Who wouldn't want to settle there in the first place? We have a theory though. Marrow?"
Clover sat down, and Marrow walked up to take his place. Collected appeared on the hologram.
"We…or rather I should say I, believe that the target in question is a hyper-intelligent, elder Alpha class Grimm that emigrated from Mistral to Vale long ago. It was then defeated, but not killed, and laid dormant until the first mine uncovered it, and fell to it. This is barely supported by these bone shurikens that Clover retrieved, and these slash marks later analyzed to emerge from a weapon. As for what, well we need to return to Vale and scour the Beacon archives for anything mentioning a Grimm such as this, as such a beast would have undoubtedly been mythicized like the Wyvern."
"Well, anything that can explain the attacks is better than nothing." Harriet responded with disappointment.
Clover got up again and switched the screen to an archeological site.
"As for our other goal…The Odin trap failed. Harriet and Elm can attest to this."
"There were simply too many elders! We couldn't be everywhere at once!" Harriet angrily responded.
"I know, but I'm not saying you failed. More so it was due to outside forces."
"What exactly happened?" Marrow asked.
"The dig site was reinforced with 20 marines, 50 soldiers, Harriet, and Elm. Our goal was to repeal any Grimm Odin would have thrown at us and then, through overwhelming firepower, subdue the threat. The building matched the records Oobleck mentioned in a meeting before. However…"
The screen changed to bone white elder Grimm pouring out of the ancient building. Elm is shown smashing the head of an elder beowolf.
"The archeologists opened a Grimm box, and dozens of elders and ancient Grimm poured out from the ruins and began to overwhelm the defenses, some of which didn't even match our records. Not to mention..."
The screen cut to two archeologists infected with…something, their flesh looks like it's rotting off and they have black tear streams pouring from their eyes. They were running towards a marine firing line.
"An unknown Grimm type within the ruins infected these two men with an unknown pathogen, from there I gave the order to scorch the earth and retreat. In total, we lost 15 marines, 35 soldiers, half of the dig team, and loads of equipment. All in all, a total failure of an operation, and not even a single glimpse of Odin was detected."
As Clover takes a deep sigh, the intercom within the command room buzz.
"Ace Operative Captain Ebi, report to the bridge. I repeat, Ace Operative Captain Ebi, report to the bridge."
"...Consider this meeting adjourned."
Clover was the first to leave the room and immediately head towards the bridge. When he arrived he saw that the sky captain was already waiting for him.
"Omega priority, we must depart for Atlas at once."
"And the bodies? We still have a morgue overflowing with them, and a brig stuffed with bandits."
"Procedure dictates the bodies and bandits will be processed and extradited in accordance to the Vytal Accords."
"Mmmm…"
Pietro looked upon his daughter and felt only anger. Anger towards himself. How, how can he be so stupid? Letting her wander was to help her get used to talking to people and the social environment she'll inevitably face at the Vytal Festival. But when he checked o her location after finishing some work on the AK-200s, he felt his heart drop all the to the crater. Out of all the places she could have gone to in Atlas, it had to be the Celestial Theatre. He pushed his co-worker to essentially ignore the traffic laws and get him to the Theatre as fast as possible.
But he was, of course, too late.
When he arrived, Penny was staring at the ceiling, her beautiful green eyes were cracked, and her clothes were bloodstained, pieces of flesh were on her mouth and hands. She was eating a person, a person that she killed. Whatever happened, it forced his daughter to act inhumanly, as a monster. This play, as James called it. if Pietro had his way he would've shot it straight toward the sun!
"D...AD?"
He remembered those words, those words Penny spoke when he hugged her by instinct, to assure her that everything will be alright. That word gave him hope that he can fix her. Pietro gently rubs the sleeping Penny's hair, before turning towards the computer.
Her core registered a "symbol" as it was called. This symbol self-replicated in her mind and resulted in the corruption of her processor unit, audiovisual cortex, and AFE engine. Thankfully her core was left untouched. Unfortunately, most of Penny's logs detailing her events are also corrupted. The ones that remain safe have one repeating word typed in them.
"Submit..."
Too many questions he wanted to answer, but he blocks them out. As Pietro began to work on fixing Penny, he realized something.
A portion, a small portion, of Penny's memories were...corrupted. First, this thing tried taking his daughter. Now it tried taking her memories?!
He takes deep breaths and clenches his fists, he had to calm down, for Penny. If they were corrupted, as much as it pains him he has to delete them to ensure Penny's recovery. He turns once again to Penny.
"Penny...I know you can't hear me. But don't worry, Papa's here to wake you up now. Whatever happens, you may think of it a mere bad dream..."
He gave a grim chuckle before focusing on saving his daughter.
"You killed hundreds of people!"
"I-I-I did not! I am a victim as much as everyone else! Do you have any idea the backlash I received for sponsoring this play?!"
"You were the one that was sponsoring the guild! You were essentially responsible for the many deaths that occurred last night!"
"I-I'm innocent! I'm telling you I am innocent! How am I supposed to know that such events would even occur!"
"Enough!"
Ironwood's voice silenced the argument, his tone expressing annoyance. The emergency meeting of the council was to establish what to do with this crisis, all councilors and guests were told to meet physically. Instead of providing a clear path on what to do, it devolved into accusations and arguments when Jacques arrived.
"This emergency meeting was to figure out what exactly should Atlas do to not only prevent such a tragedy but to deal with the insuring panic that would no doubt arise should word get out."
"General Ironwood, I understand your concerns…" Sleet spoke and then pointed to Jacques. "But that man cost the lives of hundreds of people! He should be tried for at least manslaughter!"
There was consensus among the attendees, Jacques looked shocked and looked towards Ironwood, pleading at him with his eyes.
"I agree, and CA shall no longer provide the SDC with armaments and knights until there is a change of leadership and proper compensation to the victims."
Once again, there was consensus among the council, Jacques looks like he is about to suffer a heart attack. Ironwood then takes a deep breath.
"Jacques is innocent."
The council went into a stunned silence before everyone started shouting at Ironwood. He slams his hand on the table to get them to be quiet.
"Our investigation, tragic it may be, revealed that the main culprit of the attack…was a play."
The council went silent.
"General…" Sleet spoke once again. "I understand your position may be a bit taxing on the mind, but…a play?! I fail to see a piece of an ancient paper cause so much bloodshed?! Might as well pin it on some random ancient Grimm then!"
"Simple. It's a play."
"How exactly is that simple?!"
"It did not show its hand until it was "known". Jacques provided a report to me stating that the play was gifted to the guild. With anomalous activity surrounding the play that did not start until the play was translated. If he was actively involved in the deaths, then the same activity would have been noticed around SDC property."
"This play is, by all accounts, a weapon. It uses its simple appearance to land itself within a kingdom, before showing its true potential. As for who, or what created it, my men are working hard to discover that piece of the puzzle. Carefully of course."
"Do you have evidence at least?"
"I have no reason to lie, but I can send you the transcript that Jacques provided to me."
"And the casualties? How are we going to deal with the populace?"
"Gas attack, unknown perpetrators, the intent was to knock out but too strong dosage. Increased security around ports and checkpoints was established for a month. That should be enough to fuel the journalists and give the people a believable lie. Meanwhile, my men would make sure that any cognition-based attacks will not occur again."
The council look at each other before Camilla looked at Ironwood.
"We'll be expecting a proper report later this month. But we'll run the gas attack story this week. SDC will however provide at least compensation to the victims, and CA will continue selling their weapons to SDC. As it is clear that he was an unwilling participant for a devious weapon. Council dismissed, though we'll reconvene by the end of the month."
As everyone began to leave the room, Ironwood spoke up.
"Jacques, I need you to answer a few questions."
The SDC chairman froze, before walking back towards Ironwood.
"Y-yes James?"
"I'm going to keep this simple: You caused a colossal mess by accident, all from your "patronage". I know you're innocent, but that doesn't mean you're free. So answer the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth."
"Where did you acquire Queen in Black and White?"
Jacques stammers at the question, trying to figure out an excuse to absolve him. However, the general's cold gaze shot down any attempt at lying. Eventually, he relents.
"I-it was illegally acquired. I have one of my subordinates acquire rare, valuable artifacts for a party next month."
"Of course, you would." Ironwood mutter under his breath.
"What?"
"Continue."
"Oh! Uh, I have no idea what period they were from, only that among them were of the utmost quality. Pure white with no trace of decay. Among them was a parchment that was later identified as a "play" due to the structure of the wording."
"Is this subordinate still with us?"
"No…He…he was found murdered in his apartment. The same night the White Fang infiltrated my estate, killed and attacked staff, and stole them."
"...Was there a location he obtained them from?"
"Vale. He mentioned Vale, I even promoted him too for finding such high-quality relics!"
"That is all, you may leave."
Ironwood sat on his desk reading the report Winter gave him. Since the bombing, there was a total lockdown and audit of the entire army stationed in Atlas. Out of the total army, several groups were caught having connections to the spider syndicate and were responsible for missing shipments of arms and invisibility cloaks. 200 were caught taking bribes, 300 were discovered to have abused Faunus, and six groups help previously unknown allegiances to several corporations as black ops. A total mess that would have led to a massive scandal and embarrassment for Atlas. He was grateful that Winter was able to prevent that issue from reaching the ever-present ears of the press.
There was one small issue. No mention nor hint of the group that was the bomber's master.
Ironwood sighed. He pours out a cup of Patch rum and downs it in one go. He coughs as the hard liquor burns his throat. Booze helps calm the mind, and drives away the paranoia. Though in this case, he has every right to be paranoid and call martial law. An unknown group compromised one of his men, convinced him to bomb the warning system in Atlas, and then disappeared without a trace.
Soon after, an entire theatre gets massacred, and the survivors are suffering from a mental disorder that can affect even Penny. He should be glad that Pietro was able to reverse the damages, at the cost of some of her memories and a total reboot of her AFE engine. Her uncorrupted logs mentioned corruption, and to submit. This has Salem written all over it, but it doesn't really match what Ozpin told him about her. He ponders about it.
"A queen. A Black and White Queen, that was mentioned in Vacuo of all places, before the play was even announced…Only one way to confirm."
Ironwood turned on his computer and called Ozpin. There was a tense period as the CCT reaches across continents to contact the old wizard.
"James. What seems to be-."
"Omega Priority."
"...What happened?"
Ironwood sighed.
"Where do I begin? A bombing disabled the sensors of Atlas, I had a compromised military, and now an entire theatre was either murdered or traumatized. I haven't exactly been having a very good week, and have been keeping a tight ship on the information."
"...She's making her move then."
"...Oz, you fought her longer than anyone in this world. But I need to know: Can she create a cognition-based weapon using only writing?"
Ozpin looked…confused by James's question. Confusion, the expert, the leader against Salem was confused. His heartbeat starts beating faster.
"No. No, I…I don't know what you mean. I am aware of special Grimm species that can target the mind, like the Apathy or Nightmare. But writing? James, what happened?"
"...A few weeks ago, Jacques donated an ancient play to the Atlesian Arts Guild. Last night, that play was performed. Today, my men are busy clearing out hundreds of bodies and dealing with unknown mental conditions. Some spoke of a Queen, a Queen of Black and White, coincidentally, the same queen has been mentioned weeks ago, way before the play. When the Gaze syndicate was purged by an unknown party. All inflicted that survived mention hearing a certain ticking, like a clock. I honestly don't have a clue on to treat them, there's no reference point I can point to and use as a guide. The books never had a procedure to deal with an event on this scale."
"...I…hmmm. I don't understand. She's intelligent and powerful, but, she'll never act so brazenly unless she is certain of her assured victory. What about the vault and the maiden?"
"The vault remains secured, and the winter maiden hasn't had any unidentifiable visitors or accidents. No one besides authorized personnel met with her, I made sure of it."
"This…does not fit her behavior. I need to know more. What you're mentioning sounds completely fictional, but I know you aren't the type to espouse such words without proof backing them. This issue needs to be quickly addressed before it spirals into something beyond our control. From what I am hearing, it sounds like you have a WMD on Atlas."
"A WMD... Besides that, I was made aware of one crucial detail I found. Vale. It was found in Vale. See if you can have Qrow find anything when he is finished. I'll send you what we learned from the play and the victims. Even if by some miracle it wasn't Salem, there's no doubt she'll exploit the situation to her benefit. We must make sure that Humanity is able to face this unknown threat."
"I agree, I'll see you soon James."
The video call ends, leaving Ironwood alone with his thoughts. First Salem, then Odin, and now this unknown Queen. Then he hears it. The ticking of a clock. By instinct he draws out Due Process, only stopping when he realized it was a clock he bought a few months ago to "liven up the office". Groaning in disappointment of himself, he walks up to the clock and turns it off. Before turning back and looking at the Atlesian skyline. His job just gets harder and harder.
World Note: Atlas uses a grading system to identify the threat level of a Grimm species. The threat level ranges from Zeta, being the weakest and easily taken out by soldiers or trained militia. To Alpha, being the strongest, and requires full huntsmen teams or a dedicated campaign to exterminate. Additionally, if the species of Grimm contain dangerous or unique abilities, a side grade would be assigned to their threat level.
Chi class means that the Grimm type or species is either extinct or mythos. For context, the Wyvern would be classified as Chi-Omega. Omega class is reserved for kingdom-threatening Grimm, but officially it is kept blank to prevent fear, it is not a side grade. Psi class indicates the Grimm is able to manipulate the mind. Kappa class indicates the Grimm is able to manipulate the environment to its benefit. For context: a Geist would be a Kappa-Gamma. Mu class indicates the Grimm is able to use elemental manipulation to its benefit. For context: The Sea Feilong, the Tempest, and Duskborn that specialize in elemental manipulation would be classified as Mu, with varying degrees of threat.