The mild buzzing silently twisting the insides of his coat had Adam cutting their meeting short.
"We'll have to discuss this another time."
"Whatever for?" Cinder's voice creeped through the other end of the scroll, impatiently yearning for an answer, and Adam spoke curtly.
"I'm getting word from my scouts on their progress within Mountain Glenn's "reopening" of the subway system, and I suspect it'll eat up both my time, and patience."
A satisfied hum confirmed her acceptance of the lie.
"Very well. Simply ensure it stays on schedule. I'll have our available allies gathering more fuel for our little soiree~"
"Right." Cutting it there, Adam felt that tick of annoyance in the back of his skull again. Working for a human... how revolting. Its similarity to his previous life sickened him to no end, but if there was any saving grace, it was that their work would reignite terror with the hearts of the people who thought the White Fang could be ignored.
Well... that, and the fact that he wasn't sure he could even classify Cinder as a human.
Salem... What a terrifying concept: the queen of grimm. Although, the butchering Cinder wrought against his men before dragging him into her group added one point of believability to the idea, and second was tacked on when the grimm themselves looked to visibly calm down within the viper's presence, downright following her command to back away from the bars of their cages and silence themselves. If the grimm had a conscious ruler, one who could not only communicate but also plan... It was no wonder over 90% of the planet was owned by them.
Still, Cinder referred to him and the other poor sods under her heel as 'allies,' meaning there just may be hope that the wants and needs of the White Fang might possibly be met. Only time would tell.
Speaking of time, Adam reached into the pocket on the inside of his attire to grab the offending object which so carelessly shook without a peep, interrupting his call. But before answering this particular device, whose number was known to only one other person within Remnant - much like the other three custom scrolls he used to communicate with various individuals - he went and locked the door to his office. Currently, they were sorting a new shipment of dust which had arrived around an hour ago, and he couldn't afford anyone bothering him while he was on the line.
"Hello?" He began, hearing the huff on the other end.
"Finally. I thought I'd be waiting for an hour. What happened? Cindy up your ass again?"
And of course, Roman Torchwick went and upped the theatrics.
"She was checking on how well our recruitment process is faring."
"Sticking her nose into everyone's business again; no shocker there." Roman's more jovial mood died down instantly after that, and his tone fell into a hushed whisper. "You know Tukson's old place?"
"Yes." Adam felt a small smirk begin to blossom across his lips. "I take it you're looking to continue our… conversation."
"Look, it's not just your ass on the line here: it's mine too."
"Correction: it's only yours." Adam himself could suck up his pride in the wake of Cinder's ambition; it helped the Fang spread fear, and so long as it kept doing that, he saw no need to turn tail and flee - unlike Roman. "I'm fine with everything as is."
"Yeah yeah, vengeance and whatever. Listen, I got some stuff ready down here for you to collect and do whatever with, but I need to know if this'll be worthwhile."
Ah yes, the dust. For Cinder's idea to work, they'd need enough to rig the various explosives set to go off in the subway; inviting the captured grimm right into the heart of Vale. As it turns out, Cinder was a bit touchy when it came to dust, and despite having more than enough to do the deed, she insisted they keep draining the city of everything it had until the time came to unleash their fury.
A safe approach, but a flawed one.
That dust could be immensely useful in the hands of various other sects of the White Fang scattered all across Remnant, but when he brought up the idea once before, Cinder shot it down immediately, saying the time would come for the other kingdoms. Realistically, a more cowardly man would cut his losses and skip, but Adam was neither a coward, nor a fool. He was willing to keep working for her, yes, but that didn't mean he trusted her.
He trusted that Cinder would continue marching towards her goals, but nothing else. And so, when she reached her goal, naturally their contract would either end, or be rewritten to accommodate other ideas she might come up with.
Cinder, being as hyper-focused as she was, certainly didn't have time to keep perfect track of anything but the core essentials of her scheme - especially now with her intrusion into Beacon Academy. And thus, he knew she wouldn't notice if some of the dust should go missing. But, seeing as he explicitly asked about sending the dust out earlier, he couldn't risk taking that task upon himself, or having his own goons do so under his command. But fortunately, a few weeks ago, Roman came to him seeking info in exchange for any favors or price...
And thus, a beautiful partnership was born.
"Then clarify." Adam stated, strong and direct. "What explicitly do you want to know, and how much are you willing to trade?"
"We've got 35 crates ready to be shipped. Just say the word and I'll have some of my personal guys load them up on the next passenger ship to Menagerie."
"Excellent. That'll get you a solid overview at least. So, where shall we begin?"
"Yeah." Roman swallowed after, and Adam didn't blame him for his apprehension. Just knowing Cinder's relationship with the grimm was bad enough, but things were about to get worse." Let's start with a name."
A whole lot worse.
"Tell me, have you ever heard of one by the name of Salem?"
.
.
Neo kicked up pebbles with every step she took, outright disregarding most of the other people sharing the sidewalk, but earning nothing more than mild discontent and silent swears whenever she bumbled through them.
"How long have you known?"
"I couldn't confirm it until that night a week ago, when you killed those three men and brought back Cinder's message."
That bastard had his suspicions since the first few missions she'd played solo, outright accepting it the night she thought she'd finally won. In a way, she had, but Neo wasn't happy about it. The rabble around her grew in volume, and the lights ahead confirmed that Junior's club was bright and lively.
"Why can't we just run?"
"There's no running from this."
She hadn't understood at first, outright feeling betrayed and hurling her fist down hard upon the nearby shelf above where they were storing the crates. She'd been on a ladder propped against it at the time, having begun clearing it away to fit more boxes alongside the two others - they were taking too long for her tastes, and she wanted to scoot away as fast as she could and relax for the rest of the night. The echo spooked the other two guys, and they ended up dropping the container they'd been positioning below on the lower shelf. Luckily, it was right above where they were lodging it, and close enough that it did little more than make a thump as it hit steel.
"Trust me, no matter where we go, we'll never escape Cinder."
"Why?!"
Taking her first few sorry steps inside, Neo scoffed at the people dancing and cheering on the main floor; so carefree and reckless. Why couldn't she share in their ignorance too? Why did she need to contend with a prick like Cinder?
Why did Cinder essentially own over 90% of the fucking planet?
"BULLSHIT!"
"It's true." Roman's face had not only aged upwards of ten years in that moment, but it mimicked a death-row inmate walking to the chair. "I'm sure you've heard it mentioned in passing around our "helpful" moving buddies from the Fang."
Plopping her behind down on a stool, the barkeep gave her an almost knowing stare. Apparently Junior wasn't serving this evening, meaning he was most likely out on other business unrelated to Cinder's meddling. Lucky him.
"Shall I pour you a shot of whiskey for the evening, just to start you off?" Neo gave him a little nod, and the older gentleman went right to work, sliding the shot her way not ten seconds later. That was the good thing about Junior's: they could often read the room flawlessly - kind of a requirement when working for the man, considering his real line of work.
"But it can't be that crazy! We can run off to Vacuo; she'll never find us there!"
"Neo, you've seen the Grimm they have on hand already. Knowing how "great" they are with their aim, you tell me why there were zero casualties when moving them within the city."
She hadn't had a retort for that.
"For all we know, she can sick 'em on us like bloodhounds. For Brothers' sake, we can probably spend the rest of our lives flying and she'll just mail us a flock of nevermore, or worse."
Roman's face, following that, deepened disturbingly, because right then, she'd called him out with as much fury as her face could manage.
"What about the plan? Didn't you say we could run once we had proof Cinder was after me?!"
"That was before I knew about the grimm."
"So what?! The plan's toast then?!"
Roman stayed quiet for a bit, before muttering the only answer he seemed capable of.
"I'm sorry, alright. Don't you think I've been trying to come up with something since then? But right now, I've got nothing; zilch! I just… I need more time, to figure things out and think it through."
I'm sorry... I'm fucking sorry; that was all he had for her. Yeah, okay, she'd suspected Cinder may have been a touch more deadly than she'd usually shown, but to have control over the grimm themselves? Neo called bullshit. But that wasn't the worst of it, oh no. She could tolerate his lying if he had a valid excuse, and technically he did, but that would only come into play if it ended there.
Disregarding her inflamed fury, Neo could tell he was still holding something back; he knew more than what he'd told her.
Roman, the man she'd come to trust, and the one who convinced her that life wasn't so bad after all, continued to keep secrets from her. Everyone was entitled to their secrets, but he and she had a thing going. They were family, and he promised, on the day he found her curled up in a ball outside the rundown playground, that he'd never abandon her: that they'd always be there for each other.
How could she keep her end of that promise when he was pushing her away?
What was so scary he didn't want to tell her? Cinder's apparent control over the grimm? Yeah, that was pretty freaky and nightmarish, but they could just kill her. Everyone, and she meant everyone would die eventually, so it was only a matter of time before fire-bitch kicked the bucket. Roman, instead of considering that, chose to keep her in the dark about something, and that... that frightened her.
Because it said he didn't believe she could handle whatever spooked him.
When the whiskey was placed gently before her on the countertop, she eyed it for a few moments, staring it down with a mighty glare. Fear... she hated fear; the only thing to ever bring her to her knees. Neo was no stranger to feeling frightened, but it had been so long since she'd felt fear for herself, and it was all Roman's fault. He hadn't meant to scare her, of course, but he'd done it anyway. Neo reached over, taking her little shot, but merely sipped at bits of it while pondering just what to do next.
She'd only ever feared for Roman, and he knew a good deal about her semblance - as much as he could reasonably get, anyway. And yet, he'd expressed fear for her.
Cinder's current plan, if it hadn't changed, was to bring the grimm into Vale. Why? Well, to distract Vale and Beacon of course. With so many grimm in the heart of the city, the school and local police - as well as any standby hunters - would be forced to deal with it, allowing Cindy and her buddies to do whatever it was they needed to do. And that was where the real issue lay: nobody knew what the heck Cinder wanted with Beacon.
The invasion they had in the works would fail, Cinder said as much herself, but whenever any idiotic goober questioned why they were going through all that effort just to lose, she'd hush them and tell them not to worry about it, reminding the Fang in particular that this would make the humans fear them, which shifted their doubts away flawlessly. This handwaving only psyched both Roman and her out even further. Robbing the city of every speck of dust? Okay, cool; a bit extreme, but with clear benefits for those involved if they could pull it off. There was so much they could do with dust.
But ignoring all your hard work to sneak into a school? What did Beacon do to piss Cinder off so much?
Neo suspected revenge in some form, because hatred was one of the few emotions strong enough to drive someone that freaking bonkers. You don't just invite a terrorist faction to lay waste within the city merely to steal a few daisies in the school garden. Although, every now and then, Neo - whilst sent off to do whatever job was assigned to her - would hear murmurings of 'Ozpin' under the trio's breaths midway through leaving their presence.
She'd overlooked it before, but with murdering Cinder being her only option in the wake of Roman's sudden spout of cowardice, she couldn't ignore the thought that maybe there was a more personal vendetta involved.
It took all of ten minutes, but eventually Neo got the entirety of the shot down, and seeing as it should have only been seconds, the woman knew she needed something to take her mind off the problem at hand. Clubbing wasn't much fun when you felt nothing but envy towards everyone else, and she wasn't keen to ask the source of her issues for more work anytime soon. Realistically, the only option she had was to head home, cuddle up on the couch, and try to lose herself in the TV.
A mild buzz shook her inner pocket, and a quick glance, strangely, answered all her temporary problems. For some odd reason, Ruby had sent her a text, asking how she was doing. Looking around, Neo slowly pushed off her seat, leaving behind a couple of lien before taking off out of the club. Honestly, a little chat with Little Red couldn't hurt.
"I'm good. Got called out because the fam was in town. Weird timing honestly, but I think they're just here for the Vytal Festival coming up - a touch too early for my taste, but whatever."
"I mean, yeah, it's a bit early, but isn't that a good thing? It means they won't miss anything, and that they care about you, right?"
Neo felt a tiny grin pick at her cheeks upon reading that.
"I guess. BTW, what about yours? Is your family kinda douchey?"
"WHAT?! NO! WHY WOULD YOU THINK THAT?!"
"Because you texted like you were jealous."
"I'm not jealous. It just sounded like you weren't all that happy to see them. I was kinda worried."
Awe~ Now wasn't that precious; Little Red was worried for her. Neo snickered, looking up from time to time and making sure she was on route to the apartment. Still, this didn't stop her from chatting back.
"Trust me, I'm fine with them; I'm just not used to them showing up so early. To make a long story short, they're cheap, real cheap. Normally they'd only show up at the tail end of any event because they don't want to spend money for more than a week at most, despite the fact that they'd booked their room months in advance."
"That's kind of neat." 'That's weird,' was the mental translation Neo got instead. "They're efficient."
"They're annoying is what they are." Having made her way inside and to the door of her apartment, she stepped inside, kicked off her boots, and firmly embedded herself into the couch, but not before grabbing a big puffy blanket from the closet and wrapping herself up, all the while still texting. "We have plenty of money - not really rich, but decently above average - so it gets irritating when they scurry around like rodents."
"I think they're just being a bit careful." Yep, that checked out; Little Red was the type to mainly focus on the good in people. "You never know when times might get a little tight."
"When was the last time your ilk microwaved a packet of instant noodles and tried to pass it off as a feast?" Neo couldn't help but giggle as she sent that; Roman forgot his lunch one day, and not wanting to admit he'd done so, snuck a cup of the stale sort from the warehouse cupboard, insisting his lunch was shit because he was on a diet. She was mostly bullshitting by this point, but Cinder was the one who sent her down to Vale and provided the cover story, so she sort of had to play along.
"Fine, you win. I have nothing on my end to make of that."
"See? Now you're getting it. Good girl~ ;)"
Her flirty jab must have done something, because Ruby took about a minute before her response dinged through.
"It still sounds a little mean though."
"Eh, they can take it. Anyway, why don't we throw that idea in the recycling for now. How's things up there?" Getting a few updates out of the girl could help tide the topic away from her for the moment, although she did have something she wanted a more direct answer on, but she'd wait until Ruby gave her the rundown first.
"It's all good. None of the teachers have really said anything about you being gone, but with our classes officially being put on hold next week for the festival and upcoming dance, we're not doing much in the way of work anyway. I think we're being allowed to go out on missions in a couple of days, but besides that, we're just sort of killing time." A short pause sprung up, as while Neo was midway through reading, she spied the little typing symbol sprout up, and Ruby shuffled back in with a new message. "Well... Everyone else is killing time; Weiss has me on catch-up duty, saying it's my responsibility to try and read up on the material I missed when I got pulled into Beacon early."
Neo rolled her eyes; at least some of the rumors were true, that being how the Schnees all had a tendency to be more than a little demanding. But then again, in her line of experience, there were few wealthy folk who weren't living up to that stigma. And, seeing as commissioning a big fuck-off mansion was a distinct and conscious choice, you were usually able to tell who exactly fell into this particular basket of apples. Seeing her chance, Neo sent a discreet little request.
"You win some, you lose some; she'll show mercy eventually. BTW, how are my current exes doing? I'm assuming at least one of them is whining about my absence."
"It's probably gonna sound a little cruel, but I don't think any of them have even reacted. And I get that they know why you left, but if Yang, Weiss, or even Blake took a bit of time off, I'd still feel a little bummed even if they left for a happy reason."
You know, with Cinder explicitly requesting they blend in, Neo figured the woman would at least try to do the same; apparently not. Either that, or they weren't exactly all that great at pretending - considering what her pops said about her reaction a while ago when out to dinner, Neo couldn't say it shocked her.
"Don't let it bother you. We aren't exactly what you'd call a tightly knit sweater, so I kinda expected them to treat this like a vacation for themselves too. At least tell me Emmi did something stupid."
"No offense, but she's gotten a little creepy since you left. She keeps smiling and trying to talk to me, and I take her up on chats just to be nice, but her grin looks like one of those worn by serial killers in slasher movies."
Try-hard Emerald, making her move while she was away - and poorly too, apparently.
"She's got the self-awareness of a 6 year old; ignore her. People usually think I'm weird because of the whole 'mute' thing, but Emmi's a special kind of unsettling." But seeing as Cinder might one day get a hold of Ruby's or her scrolls, Neo opted to throw the kicked puppy that was her obligatory teammate a bone - covering her own ass by proxy. "She's just trying to be friendly... in her weird, flamethrower-a-house-fly sort of way."
On the bright side, Emerald was the only one Neo had to talk out of suspicion, because according to Ruby, Cinder spent most of her time back in their room, only coming out for the few classes they had and nothing more. If she didn't know better, she'd say Cindy was hiding from something; now if only she knew what. Coming back in sweat; giving Neo personally a few missions; creeping around Beacon only when necessary; shit was obvious in all kinds of ways.
Their conversation devolved into their usual pattern past that point: casual garbage that was totally useless information wise, which led to a calm rest of the night before she chose to sleep on the couch out of pure laziness. At least she now knew the quiet girl, Blake, did indeed read the literary equivalent of hardcore porn; she just gave off that vibe, you know? Ruby, at Weiss's suggestion, sought to bond with her teammates through shared hobbies, and ended up opening one of Blake's books to a random page in an attempt to understand her reading habit.
Who knew the shy one was into interdimensional sci-fi smut... of the non-mortal variety. And ninjas, don't forget the ninjas. Then again, it would be weird if her perviness wasn't varied every which way…
She'd never forgive Roman for that job scoping out the kink club two blocks past juniors - it's clearly left irreparable damage on her psyche.
Author's note
...
Yeah, it's happening, I brought in the bull. The terrorist that should have, but couldn't, become a formidable villain. Regardless of anyone's opinions on the man, he's here, and he's up to no good. The first thing anyone should have noticed was the mention of you-know-who... and the fact he's apparently selling that info. There are also a few changes with how Cinder handled the whole recruitment of the Fang, so that was fun.
Roman, as it turns out - but was probably obvious a few times before - kinda got a little extra info in regards to the flirty ember that is Cinder, all thanks to the woman's particular brand of "persuasion." Neo's hung up on it, of course, but her worries towards Cinder are now exemplified. At the very least, Ruby managed to cheer her up, and the two deepened the bonds of friendship a level more.
We got one review/question this time, and I'm reminded that there are people who think before they speak. This ain't a jab against my reviewers for this story in particular either; you've all been surprisingly sensible. But I'm so used to people ignoring clear intentions and decisions in other stories that I was caught a little off guard when someone came out with some decent rationale behind their words.
I mean... this chapter kind of covers a bunch of what the question was directed towards, but I chalk that up to the sheer speed of which this story is zooming at. The plot inches ever closer, and believe me, it's going to be... something. I won't say what, but it's something alright.
Anyway, I'll see you all next chapter.