Chapter 21 – A New Deal

Now that Velvet's a member of the team, Jaune and Blake decide to rework their vague arrangement into a sensible one.

Intellectually, Blake knew that Velvet meant no offense by slowly and meticulously reading over every single line of the contract she'd written up. Jaune often complimented Blake for having a good head for business, and that meant recognizing that a binding contract of employment wasn't something to just be glanced at and signed.

Still, it worried her a little bit every time the gears in Velvet's head began to visibly turn. Was the bunny girl upset by the verbiage of their agreement? Was Blake's wording vague and ambiguous? Was she having second thoughts about Team Job altogether? It was impossible to know.

The three of them were once again inside Jaune and Blake's shared apartment, but this time it was Velvet who sat at the desk and looked over the papers Blake had drafted. In order to not make her uncomfortable, Jaune was busying himself with making them all lunch while Blake read from her books, but it was impossible for their eyes to not wander at least a little.

It's only eight pages, and she's been reading for nearly a full hour…is something wrong?

But Velvet had only asked for more time to read when Blake had asked if she needed anything – twice, in fact – so Blake just went back to silently stressing as Velvet intently focused.

"Any, uh…any allergies to shellfish?" Jaune asked out of the blue. "I realized that I forgot to –"

"Blake, could you come over here for a second?" Velvet asked. "I think you might have, uh, a-accidentally left a few lines out of the contract."

Okay. Okay, you can do this, Blake. Swallow your pride and admit your mistakes if you made any; she's a real huntress and knows more about this than you do.

Blake marked the page she'd been on and got up from her chair. "Sure. Let's have a look."

Leaning over Velvet's shoulder, Blake looked down at the words she'd carefully chosen to bring them –

Wait, I should…

"Jaune, how about you come and join us? This pertains to you as well."

The flabbergasted way that Jaune responded to being summoned over to the business table was a testament to how much she needed to invite him and in doing so change her behaviors. He was the student and she his teacher, but that extended to more than just hunting. Anything could be a lesson, but if Blake gave him nothing, he would learn nothing.

"Velvet, what's the sitch?" Blake asked.

"Well, it's just that…a lot of this is mostly on payment and benefits, but you leave out things like arbitration, quality assurance…I mean, you don't even have a line on how to fire me."

She was…worried about the fact that Blake wasn't planning on firing her? What?

Velvet seemed to notice her obvious confusion. "It's not that I want that or something. But if you ever decide to fire me, is it effective immediately? How will I be ensured I get due compensation for services performed that are as of yet unpaid? Could you fire me at will, or does it have to be justified?" Velvet shifted around in the chair to face them both. "It's not just that. A contract is meant to be comprehensive…water-tight, if you will. If you leave any detail out, you leave yourself open to litigation."

Blake hadn't known all that. Menagerie had no such bullshit, and people agreed to pay one another for the work they did there. If your boss fired you, you took what you were owed for today's wages out of the till and went on to find another job.

"I…I…"

The problem was that Blake had no idea how to fix this. The books on business management were meant for entry-level readers, and this sounded like the kind of problem that even a lawyer would need to sit down and think about. She could easily leave it to Velvet, but asking an employee that wasn't even formally hired yet to write her own contract sounded like inviting trouble, especially when Velvet could decide if and how she could be fired.

"We should probably get this run by a lawyer," Jaune said, drying his hands off with a hand-towel. "Vale has to have some, right? Business contract lawyers?"

"Jaune, we can't afford –"

"Sure we can," he said with a laugh. Blake rolled her eyes, but he just shrugged at her. "We have 25,000 lien in the bank. Yeah, we were saving it up, but what for? An emergency? A rainy day? This is the rainy day. It's the kind of business expense we probably ought to splurge on if we don't want to regret it later."

Velvet, her scroll out and open to a web browser, piped in. "It says that a simple drafting of a contract costs on average 2,000 lien from start to finish, and a complex one doesn't usually go for more than 5,000." She looked up. "We…if it really costs too much, we could subtract it from –"

"No way," Jaune said, shaking his head resolutely. "We're not going to make you pay us to work here. Blake and I are the owners of the company, so it's our job to get our employees signed up and signed on properly. You can count on us to do this right, okay?"

As much as Blake wanted to chide Jaune for his bleeding-hearted generosity, he did have a point. If they were to be Velvet's bosses, it was unreasonable to expect them to put this on her.

"Sorry about the confusion," Blake said, taking back the contracts she'd made herself. "I guess this means we won't be signing today, but we fully intend to hire you, Velvet."

"Oh, it's fine. Do you want me to start looking up some good contract lawyers at least? I should help out a little."

Blake shook her head. "You did more than enough to amaze us on the last mission. I think it's only fair that we do something to wow you."

It took them three sessions to iron out the full details of Velvet's contract, each one lasting at least four hours long. At the going rate of 275 lien per hour, Blake honestly wondered if it might have been easier to pay the lump sum that had initially been offered.

"…Miss Scarlatina agrees that, in the event of termination, a valid reason must be given, with pages 29 through 32 listing all possible 'valid reasons.' In the event that Miss Scarlatina wishes to prematurely terminate the five year contract with Team Job Security, she may do so in accordance with Valean Civil Code Chapter 3, though she forfeits any and all benefits…"

Blake was feeling a little overwhelmed by the sheer volume of information that had been put into the contract. It wasn't that any one part was confusing – it was actually all rather simple when the lawyer explained it to her (though that cost her another 550 lien) – but just that there were so many scenarios they needed to cover. If Velvet were injured, if they wanted to give her a raise or a salary reduction, if Jaune and Blake discriminated against her on account of her being a member of a protected class, if she somehow discriminated against them on the same basis – there was no room for ambiguity.

The lawyer had also offered to write up a document that outlined Jaune and Blake's relationship with one another and their control of the company, but they'd both instantly rushed to say no, preferring their own handshake to be the only thing that bound them.

Blake, like Jaune, trusted her partner. It was the way he had phrased it back when they'd just interviewed Velvet that described it best. They'd both been there at one another's worst, and they both mutually understood how harsh the world could be if they didn't stick together. Jaune had been moments away from being eaten alive by Grimm, and Blake had been cast adrift in a sea of prejudice that would never let her rise in station.

I don't think we need a contract, and even writing one feels like a breach of trust – some sort of implicit suggestion that one of us might try to screw over the other with lawyers or something. Sure, we've had our differences, but I choose to…I want to believe in Jaune. If he betrays me or I him, I'd rather it all crumble down than watch ourselves destroy one another in legal battles. Besides, we've already got Ozpin watching from up high, ready to fill the role of our enemy should the opportunity present itself.

Perhaps she was being a sentimental fool, but Blake wanted to believe in someone again. She had been burned by Adam, and after that the world had seemed a whole lot colder and grayer, but Jaune had done right by her, even in the times when she couldn't say the inverse. He'd trusted her on every mission, he'd handed control of his finances to her without a second though, he'd listened and learned when on the SDC mission…in short, he was a good person.

In the end, once they'd had Velvet sign her contract, Jaune and Blake mutually agreed that the way they were doing things so far – pretending to split their profits in some unequal bargain but never actually moving their communal funds out from the suitcase under the bed – wasn't working. Rather, it was working, but it wasn't the most sensible arrangement, not when they were roommates anyways.

With Velvet, change had become an inevitability, so Jaune and Blake had decided to embrace it and restructure not only their company but their entire lifestyle. A number of changes were made, the kinds of things they'd always planned on doing when they were more 'financially secure.' Neither had really known what that meant, but with Velvet and an SDC review to back them, now felt like the time.

Firstly, they reserved a membership to a huntsman gym with specialized equipment that wouldn't break at the first touch of an aura user. It was expensive, costing 300 lien per person per month, but it would increase the effectiveness of Jaune's training by at least an order of magnitude now that he could actually use his sword. Plus, having a place to train would give them something to do other than work from home or receive a librarian's glare for overstaying their welcome in the library's public spaces.

Secondly, Jaune and Blake moved out of their hotel and into an actual apartment. It, too, was pricey (land in a cramped, walled city always tended to be), but not to the extent that it would truly strain their finances. To avoid being pestered by Velvet with her seemingly incessant questions about their relationship, they'd splurged a little bit and gotten a two-bedroom place, giving them each their own spaces.

On top of that, Team Job's new prices and salaries were finally decided, and a more secure place for their money than the bottom of the bed was secured.

They could now increase their prices to 15,000, as their newest member's presence would no doubt speed up missions and improve customer satisfaction. Her contract stipulated that the cost of the flight and any Dust than the three of them spent on the mission, regardless of circumstance, would be paid first from the fee money. Then, Velvet would receive 30% of the profit, and the remaining 70% would go to Jaune and Blake.

Jaune had tried to argue for an equal split of the money, but Blake had put her foot down there and insisted that there needed to be some difference in their pay scale to differentiate the fact that Jaune and Blake's names were on the business license. That meant that they would be liable for any legal trouble the company got it, and they had greater duties than their underling. All three were security consultants, but the bosses had to be bosses.

Velvet had actually agreed with Blake on that one.

"I was honestly expecting something more like 10%, since I'm just a new member," she explained. "30% is really generous, and it's more than enough to pay for what I need. Besides, if we did an even split, it would only be 30% to 33%. I think I'd rather have a good relationship with my superiors than the extra 3%."

It had taken Blake pointing out the part of the contract that described how they could give Velvet a pay raise to appease Jaune and get him to agree to the uneven division.

As for the two of them, Jaune and Blake decided on something…different.

Instead of doing some sort of arbitrary division of percentages and lien chips, they put their money into a shared bank account. It was in Jaune's name, as the banks in Vale tended to be more receptive to humans opening accounts, but they agreed that it would be 'their' funds, or Team Job's funds – there wasn't really a big distinction.

Money in the account would go towards any company-related expenses, their shared rent and groceries expenses, and any other costs that affected the both of them. If either wanted to spend their hard-earned cash on something personal, they could do so at their discretion, but the other partner would be given just as much for their own spending pleasures.

Blake might have worried about the account being in Jaune's name if not for the fact that a) he typically obeyed her without question when it came to handling their money, b) he typically seemed to be less interested in the financial reward aspect of their work than his own satisfaction in being a mock huntsman, and c) she was added as the secondary signer. That way, in the event that Jaune were indisposed, she could access their shared money.

No sooner than the account was open than Jaune had almost immediately asked for some money to buy his own comic books. Blake might have judged him a little bit more for his spendthrift behavior if the newest volume in her favorite series hadn't come out just yesterday.

"So, just to be clear…you have a shared account," Velvet asked as they flew to their next mission. "Joint finances?"

Blake nodded, but she kept a weather eye on the rabbit. The way she was asking suggested she was about to say something suspicious.

"And you live together? Are you guys sure you aren't, like, a married couple?" Velvet shrugged. "Because I won't be weird about it if you are or something."

"No," Jaune said firmly. "Didn't you have a partner? I would think you…y…s-sorry."

Velvet's pleasant smile immediately dropped at the mention of their team, as did the mood of the airship's cabin. Blake didn't like to think poorly of her co-boss, but he really should have known better, especially after so recently being reminded of Velvet's situation.

The reason she was asking about their financial union was because Velvet herself hadn't actually gone with them to the bank. Firstly, she wasn't involved in that endeavor, but secondly, she had been busy at the time, doing her 'thing.'

The unspoken thing that she refuses to tell us about which requires a few hours of her week and forced her to leave Beacon…maybe we should have had a mention of that in our contract.

Honestly, Blake had almost forgotten about it until Velvet had informed them she would be leaving. Their contract demanded she perform her duties as a 'security consultant' without personal affairs interfering, and it had then gone on to outline in excruciating detail what those duties were, so there was no chance of this 'thing' interfering with her work, but the singular loose end irked Blake a little. It was especially annoying given how everything else had been sealed up perfectly, three times over and with enough fine print to fill the footnotes of a work of classical literature.

"It's…mmm…it's okay, Jaune," Velvet forced out. "I got this job because of my years of experience at Beacon, so it's not weird that Beacon comes up every now and again."

"Your, uh, your team…d-do you wanna talk about it?"

"Not yet," Velvet said. She bent forwards and rested her elbows on her kneecaps. "I'll tell you soon. I'll have to. But I'd just like for things to be normal for as long as possible."

It was sometimes difficult to reconcile the sweet-seeming girl in front of her with the Grimm-massacring monster slayer and master martial artist who was a more lethal fighter than Blake herself. Velvet was something of an impossible combination that seemed to conflict with herself on every plane – one second she was a gentle bunny girl who ate up all of Jaune's stories about Team Job with wide eyes, the next she was snapping the head off of a Beowolf with her bare hands. Just as quickly as she was saying something weirdly lewd, she would immediately transition to an ominous clue about her presumably dark past. Everything about her seemed to contradict itself at some point.

But aren't we the same? Jaune plays the part of the champion huntsman so well that it feels like he was born to wear the skin…only when in front of the customers. Otherwise, he's about as graceful as a penguin in a volcano. Plus, for all that he's the one man I can trust, he was fully prepared to sneak his way through Beacon without a qualm in his heart.

And I can't deny that I'm also a girl of many masks. Velvet may tease some deep dark secret that tore apart her relationship with her team and her school, but my secret is actually deep and dark. Whatever she did can't be worse than what I witnessed in the White Fang…what I allowed to happen.

How similar three otherwise entirely different souls could be…perhaps it was fate that brought this unlucky trinity of outcasts together with people they could depend on.

In reality, it was probably just necessity and happenstance that forced them to rely on one another. Jaune and Blake had only been united because Ozpin wanted to get two expulsions done in the time of one, and Velvet had heard of them from Ruby and sought them out for the protection and legitimacy they could offer a flunked huntress. The three of them were like rats huddling for warmth, desperately rubbing together in a vain hope to weather out the winter storm without freezing to death.

But Blake preferred to think it was fate. And a small part of her that she'd once thought stamped out was beginning to have faith in that spark of hope.

Coming Soon: The Disconnect

Jaune finds himself against his first non-Grimm opponent and begins to question the disconnect between his level and his teammates'.

Author's Notes

Diehard Ratatouille fans will notice another reference to the OG in this chapter's title.

Happy rats, and don't do crime!